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Monday, August 31, 2009

Categories of Destructive Cults

by James Randall Noblitt and Pamela Sue Perskin.
extracts (page 215) :-
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1 -- Destructive Religious Cults are associated with a particular religious practice, belief or system of rituals and may be further subdivided as follows :-

1A -- Destructive Apocalyptic Cults promote fear and paranoia along with unfounded predictions that the world is about to end. They may be distinguished from apocalyptic religions in that the former utilizes abuse, exploitation and mind control methods. Examples would include the Branch Davidians, Order of the Solar Temple, and Aum Supreme Truth. [A more recent example would be: 'Church of God - Preparing for the Kingdom of God'.]

1B -- Destructive Pre-Industrial Cults meet the criteria for destructive cults and also embody the traditions of pre-industrial cultures (eg. African and New World Vodoun and Santeria sects) ...

1C -- Destructive Demonic Cults meet the criteria for religious cults and also promote the worship or reverence toward a malevolent deity, spirit or principle (eg. Satanism, Luciferianism) or those cults that use others' fears of demons to manipulate or control them.

2 -- Fraternal Organizations. These groups are often secret and may also espouse particular philosophic, religious, or sociopolitical ideals (eg. the Bizango of Haiti, the Egbo, or Leopard Society of West Africa, and various subgroups within Masonry, and other quasi-Masonic groups...)

3 -- Destructive Sociopolitical Cults would include the Ku Klux Klan, the Aryan Brotherhood, and Neo-Nazi groups. We would include the Christian Identity movement here even though it is technically a religion...

4 -- Organized crime groups that function as destructive cults exist for the primary purpose of supporting criminal activities where there is a [perceived] need for using mind control methods because of the nature of the crime (eg. child prostitution and pornography ... ).

5 -- Government and intelligence related destructive cults refer to the alleged organized use of mind control methods conducted by individuals within government agencies (eg. CIA) for intelligence gathering and other secret operations.
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from a book called: 'Cult and Ritual Abuse: Its History, Anthropology, and Recent Discovery in Contemporary America' by James Randall Noblitt and Pamela Sue Perskin.
(Edition 1 - 1995, Edition 2 - 2000.)
The Google Books article is _here_
The Amazon.com page is _here_
.

Saturday, August 22, 2009

The Two Witnesses of Revelation - by Dennis Diehl

[extracts]
"In my 26-year experience as a Pastor, I had managed to meet 23 of the Two Witnesses of Revelation. I am tempted to say 11 pairs and one who thought he was both, but that’s not how it really was. Every one of these was a lone male, sometimes a pastor, sometimes a member, often times a lone religious renegade that no church would claim. For those of you unfamiliar with the concept of the Two Witnesses, these are the two final humans ..... who will tell all of us on the earth why the end has come. ..... The description is found here in Revelation 11 ....."

"While I personally feel that the chance of any two human beings being taken seriously in this role is about nil, it is none-the-less a very big part of the prophetic hopes of many literalists, especially those in what have become the remaining splinters of the now defunct Worldwide Church of God. ..... The Two Witnesses would never come from the Worldwide Church of God ....."
[extracts end]
_lots more here_
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Que's comments :-
So this is justification for thinking that Ronald Weinland - pastor of the Church of God - Preparing for the Kingdom of God - is very unlikely to be who he says he is. If there have already been over 20 people in the various Churches of God claiming to be one of the Two Witnesses the chances of another claimant being authentic are very slim indeed!

Further, if none of the prophecies come true, and the claimant doesn't have any of the Witnesses' powers, he or she is most likely suffering from delusions of grandeur, and is guilty of religious fraud and extortion. There should be a law against it.

Note. Fraud is described as being deliberate deception, trickery or cheating by a person who acts in a false or deceitful way. One meaning of extortion is to secure money or favors etc. by the misuse of authority. -- The pastor of a church that displays the characteristics of a destructive cult is most definitely "misusing authority".
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Saturday, August 1, 2009

Believe it or not! - Lose Weight Permanently Without Dieting

by 'pgrundy' (a writer from http://hubpages.com)

extracts :-

"Diets don't work !!

"More to the point, any diet will work for awhile. The problem is, at some point, after losing a few pounds (or a lot of pounds) the feeling of deprivation that a diet induces in the dieter causes that person to compensate by overeating. This phenomenon is partly psychological and partly physiological, but it is absolutely real."

"Nine out of ten people who lose weight on any given diet will gain it all back, and then some, within the first year after the diet ends. That's why every single diet commercial you've ever seen has the words 'results not typical' as a disclaimer at the bottom of each and every testimonial."

"In other words, for every single dieting success there are nine failures. And yet, each and every day, thousands of hopeful chubby people start a new diet convinced that this time they will be one of the lucky 10% to be transformed forever...."

..............

[summary of points made in the article]
-- The American way of life is deadly.
-- Just develop one new habit a week...
-- Eat a high fiber, high calcium breakfast.
-- Cut out processed foods six days a week.
-- Five servings of fresh fruit and vegetables each day.
-- Divide up your plate.
-- Take a daily walk.
-- Go to bed earlier.
-- Meditate.
-- Take emotional eating seriously.
-- Learn to appreciate whole foods.
-- Buy locally.
-- Love the body you have.

Please go here for explanations and more information :-
http://hubpages.com/hub/Lose-Weight-Permanently-Without-Dieting
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