Posted by Detractor on July 23, 2009 at 23:38:23
In Reply to: Re: COG never fully developed suicide doctrine posted by Peace on July 17, 2009 at 03:38:54:
I remember there being some letter where Berg commented on the Jonestown suicides and said that the people there were forced into it and he was basically laying the blame on the US gov't and Leo J. Ryan who was anti-cult. Original Cult Awareness Network sprang up as a result of the death of Leo J Ryan.
I seem to remember Berg indicating he had more to say about Jonestown, and maybe some supposed words from the lord about it, but I can't remember ever seeing the letter he referred to. It could be that it would have been too big of a security risk to send to the masses. Could be it was one of those "Leader Only" letters.
From my recollection, one thing that was very confusing about the COG/FOL was how there were often messages that were very contradicting of each other, like the earliest teachings of pursuing life in the face of even the worst torture (lots of readings from Richard Wurmbrand who was Jewish and was in solitary confinement allegedly tortured by communists), while at the same time we called it a "Revolution" for Jesus and said that our lifestyle was like Karl Marx, quoting that verse about living together and having all things common, parting goods as every man had need.
In early days, Berg would say he was Jewish but then after his trip to Israel where he wanted to start a kibbutz, he realized the Jews didn't want Christians there proselytizing, he began to see the Jews as devils.
Very confusing indeed.
TF can say, we didn't teach this, we taught THAT. But then upon examination you can realize they taught BOTH. This was true of many doctrines. He did feel the Jews were persecuting him and viewed the media as Jewish controlled. The first 60 Minutes was a favorable show. I remember when that was filmed. The person that interviewed us brought along a film of Jewish fighter pilots and we cheered their performance. I remember watching that.
I remember seeing the 2nd 60 Minutes show, after Berg felt betrayed by Jews, and it was not favorable. Rather than realizing that the show was about people who had left that were exposing the family for earliest sexual liberties that were kept secret from the family at large (I remember seeing "Timnah" describing her experience, probably at Burlington) and then Faithy denying it saying it was "absolute filthy lies". I believed at the time that it was lies. It wasn't. This show came out sometime near the summer of 1972.
So while top leaders were exploiting female members, many rank and file COG were still living a virtually Victorian lifestyle. A person could be severely "dealt with" in a purging session for having thoughts of lust. This was another big contradiction.