Quote:
Originally Posted by ACuriousFellow
I also started looking into the church history, including the "We Were Wrong" article. Jo Casteel. John Ingalls. Phillip Lee, Steve Isitt, Daystar, Harvest House, SCP, Andrea McArdle, Titus Chu, John Myer, and more.
The more I read, the more my heart was grieved. It was torn into a million pieces. I did not want it to be true, but I knew it was. [My friend] asked if I've read Witness Lee's works. I want to ask "have you?" I found out that he started doing research into it all just like I did, but he decided to stop because it was too unpleasant.
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Any group that reaches a certain critical mass of mutually reinforcing social interactions can keep it going by feeding members circular reasoning, and cutting them off from outside information. A few will get objective information and leave the group, or will heed the red flags, but most will remain.**
A: "Witness Lee is the minister of the age. Look at all the revelations that he saw. Nobody else gave us the lofty vision of God's economy except WL."
Q: "But how do you know his vision of God's economy is according the NT? Have you actually examined it?"
A: "It's from the wise master builder himself! How dare you question God's deputy authority! That would be rebellion against God!"
So, the teaching carries it's own 'poison pill' that provides a buffer against critical examination and exposure. As long as a sufficient number of people speak this to each other, it can go on indefinitely. Then with Living Stream, there are various campus recruitment teams and post-Uni training centres round the globe, stuffing their brains with this supposed vision, and continually warning them of outsiders.
Look at the Mormons - there's no independent evidence that I know of, showing us that the current Native Americans were descended from the 10 Lost Tribes of Israel. Yet the Latter Day Saints church, founded solely on this supposed revelation from God, continues apace, as if that glaring lack of corroboration isn't relevant. They didn't have DNA testing in 1823, but they do in 2023, yet a religious body which should be most interested in finding out remains deliberately unawares, and resolutely obtuse, as if centuries hadn't passed. It's as if the effort had now become intrinsically valid, just because they have large stone buildings and libraries, as if Joseph Smith's revelations were from heaven. Look at the golden angel statue with the trumpet! How could this not be from God?
Or the Luz Del Mundo church from Mexico, with several hundred thousand members spread through North America. Their current leader is in Federal penitentiary for sexually assaulting minors. Yet the group continues, telling one another that he's being persecuted for his faith. He's God's apostle - how could he have done what they say? It must be all lies, an attack from Satan.
So, the web of mental concepts and social relations are enduring. Additionally, Living Stream operatives can drop hundreds of millions of dollars in donations and real estate investments at Harvard and its environs to aid campus recruiting. They own an apartment building - they must be legit, right? They can buy off former critics like Christian Research Institute. Their leaders host international trade meetings with the likes of Russia's Putin. Surely WN and WL would be pleased with the work of such devoted followers. The entire narrative is that this organizational mass equates to "God's building". Everything useful for today's narrative is shoehorned in, and anything unhelpful is excluded pro forma.
**There are a few high-profile cases where the "ministry" is exposed as an invalid sham and the whole thing collapses into utter ruin, but that's rare. See, e.g., Ravi Zacharias and RZIM.