Big flood of new users

[JoeCapricorn]

I'm merely a wanderer, I browse the news, and stumbled upon this site somewhat because of it.

I'm not familiar with Gothard, but a quick glance at his Wikipedia page reveals that he is one of those guys...

I was a part of a more mainstream Christian group back in elementary school, but when I brought up how my dog died one day, I was told that dogs don't go to heaven, and since I knew deep inside that they were wrong, I no longer considered myself a Christian.

I align myself closer to Wicca, but religion is not a major part of my life.

As for these posts by Matt, they will somehow surface in one form or the other. The internet is huge, as soon as the story broke, these posts are already on several hard drives bound to be reposted.

While it is obvious from these posts that Matt had some mental problems, it seems the media is already overblowing it. I was wondering though what MSNBC was referring to when it mentioned "Swedish metal bands"... I guess they were referring to Matt's posting of the lyrics to the song "The Arrival of Satan's Empire" by Dark Funeral.

I can tell that Matt was not a metalhead. He probably only cherry picked the bands he could find that were the most satanic. Cradle of Filth is definitely of notability for being a mainstream yawnfest of "extreme gothic metal" with a really annoying vocalist. Dark Funeral always has a pentagram of some sort on the cover, along with inverted crosses. Same with Dimmu Borgir. It seems Matt was just using metal as a source of music that was anti-Christian, then posting about it to look br00tl, and Xtr33m, and kvlt, and gr1m, and tr00...

I am a metalhead, and I listen to a lot of stuff that is far darker than anything Dark Funeral put out. Some of it is probably dark enough that it might've caused Matt to enter into a state of total psychosis... but when I listen to it, it's to enjoy it as art. Some of it is really dark, but musically, it is boring and not that well executed. Of course, I listen to lighter stuff too, I even enjoy Killswitch Engage, despite their unpopularity with "tr00" metalheads...

*ends post, since rambling has started*

[maze00]

I'm new too!

I came across this site reading something about the shootings in CO.  I was interested because I homeschool my child.  We are Christians and attend an Evangelical church (some weeks or months we don't make it there though).  I made the choice to homeschool due to problems in public school.  My child wanted to do it.  We use sonlight for curriculum.

I'm not familiar with Bill Gothard either, but from the way it sounds, it seems really strict.  It is people or situations like these that turn people away from God.  I don't understand what those of you who have used Gothard have gone through...but I can get a sense.  On a much smaller scale--When I was growing up, my parents would worry about what people would think if we did this or that.  It was always about looking like a good, nice, happy, Christian all the time.  It irritated me.  That's not how life is, happy all the time.  Now, if I'm in a bad mood before church, I don't care what people think.  No matter what, we all sin and not even the pope is sin free.  So no one should look down on anyone.  What I will do with my children is give them the choice.  That's what being a Christian is about...making a choice.  We all have free will to choose.  

Like Coursler, My kids watch nickelodian and disney and go to Awana and homeschool groups, and also have play dates with friends.  
I worry that this horrible thing that happened will make all the homeschoolers look bad now.  

Do those of you who have used gothard think that you might have liked homeschool better if it wasn't strict and you were able to do things other kids do?  

[Norbert the Mage]

maze00, it's not the strictness that I find problematic so much as it is the mindset that Gothard's standards are the only way to live holy lives acceptable to God. In short, he's a false teacher preaching a false gospel. That's why I have a problem with him and his so-called ministry.

[spitfire1979]

Wow... We have been out of power here in OK this week, so while I knew about the CO shooting, I hadn't read anything about the connection here.  This is heartbreaking... I'm crying inside and raging outwardly, and then just cry.  I thought perhaps that because of all the abused children I deal with, my tears were long gone.  

I remember so many times feeling completely at a loss in replying to Chrstngtmr, even dreading his posts because he expressed more hurt and anger than I had words to "make better"... we're all going through our little metamorphoses, I figured.  But that wasn't his journey, was it?  Were there any words for someone who wasn't necessarily changing into a new skin, but really dying inside?  

My prayers are for the families of his victims, and even for his own family.  I don't think there should be any finger pointing, not for this action.  That should have happened years ago, when there was time, when there was hope.  I don't know why Matthew did not move away from that environment... I guess we all tend to stick around trying to find love wherever it was promised to us, at least for a while.  

[PatrickH]

Thanks for the Marlene Winell quote, spitfire! I had not heard of her, but the second chapter of Leaving the Fold (available on her website) really confronts a lot of the issues I am facing now. I'm coming at it from the other direction, though. I started out in secular therapy and then began hanging out with progressively more fundamentalist Christians, and I have started to question what I'm learning from them. I really do see how it is a form of indoctrination and am grateful that I started so late in life and after developing so many resources to be able to see it for what it is. I think I will remain a Christian, even though my particular beliefs might make me not a "real Christian" in the eyes of many fundamentalists. Luckily I am now able to separate my identity and self-worth from their acceptance, which initially I had a hard time doing.

[spitfire1979]

Welcome, Patrick.  Whatever path you end up taking through (or in) Christianity, it sounds like you've at least got the mind God gave a goat and won't stick around where there's danger.  Talk about wolves in sheep's clothing... fundamentalists are masters at equating their own opinions with God's... so, yes, separating their acceptance of you from God's is a huge step in freeing yourself from control.  

Winell's book was a major jolt in helping me make sense of the knots in my head after a lifetime of Gothardism and independent Baptist authoritarian hell.  My big breakthrough began in high school when I actually had to read the Bible through to go on a mission trip.  I finished it with a growing dis-ease with the so-called "love" of a God who fathered children (without a mother), then ordered ritual bloodletting for the benefit of a few.  And that was just the Old Testament.

Needless to say, it was not (as I had always heard of "backsliders" and non-Christians) my desire to do great sin that led me away from the church, but an enormity of conscience and sense of personal responsibility as a human being.  My personal choices may not be the right ones for everyone... but if you can get to a place, like I had to, where there was NO church, NO dogma--only me and a God I had never really known, maybe you'll find the things you need... and things you just cannot.

Here's a link to Winnell's site.  She's posted a couple of things about Matthew.

 

Code:

http://marlenewinell.net

[planemechanic]

Hey, I would be considered part of the flood of new users.  I found out about this site from the Denver news article.  I have really been enjoying this site, and its been a big encouragement to me.  I have spent all my life in IBLP, and am currently at ALERT finishing up my training.  I may still be in the program, but I certainly do not agree with a lot of what Mr. Gothard teaches

[ConcernedSister71]

I have spent all my life in IBLP, and am currently at ALERT finishing up my training.  I may still be in the program, but I certainly do not agree with a lot of what Mr. Gothard teaches

I have to ask you, if you do not agree with what Gothard teaches then why are you still involved with IBLP and going through the ALERT program?  I have a family member who has told me that they do not agree with Gothard's teachings, yet they live at one of his "Training Centers" . . . to me that just does not make sense . . . if I did not agree with the teachings of a person/group I would not go through their programs, so I have always felt that this family member DOES believe in/follow Gothard's rules and just does not want to talk about it.

Thanks.

[Been There]

I have spent all my life in IBLP, and am currently at ALERT finishing up my training.  I may still be in the program, but I certainly do not agree with a lot of what Mr. Gothard teaches

I have to ask you, if you do not agree with what Gothard teaches then why are you still involved with IBLP and going through the ALERT program?  I have a family member who has told me that they do not agree with Gothard's teachings, yet they live at one of his "Training Centers" . . . to me that just does not make sense . . . if I did not agree with the teachings of a person/group I would not go through their programs, so I have always felt that this family member DOES believe in/follow Gothard's rules and just does not want to talk about it.

Thanks.

Hee, hee.  Exactly!  Thanks for asking a question that I've wanted to ask for a long time... !lol

[That Chick]

I have spent all my life in IBLP, and am currently at ALERT finishing up my training.  I may still be in the program, but I certainly do not agree with a lot of what Mr. Gothard teaches

I have to ask you, if you do not agree with what Gothard teaches then why are you still involved with IBLP and going through the ALERT program?  I have a family member who has told me that they do not agree with Gothard's teachings, yet they live at one of his "Training Centers" . . . to me that just does not make sense . . . if I did not agree with the teachings of a person/group I would not go through their programs, so I have always felt that this family member DOES believe in/follow Gothard's rules and just does not want to talk about it.

Thanks.

I gotta say, I agree with you on this one.  I have two family members who still believe there's some good to be desperately wrung out from ATI/IBLP.  One in particular seems almost like she wants to cling for dear life to that little bit of good.  It's so weird.  I can hardly talk about what happened to me.  They seem to think what happened to me was an isolated incident, which is so far from the truth...

Ticks me off.   !mistrust

[ConcernedSister71]

Thanks for your support.   I am glad to see that their are others who also don't get how someone can say that they do not follow/agree with Gothards teachings, but then do things like live at a Training Center, work for them, or attend their programs.  And the thing that really gets me is that THEY get upset when I won't "let it go" . . . how can I let it go when what you say does not match what you are doing?!?!  Now, if they said we don't follow the rules and we are looking for a new place to live and will not be attending any more of the programs, then okay, I would let it go, but that is not what I see happening.

I also get told that the abuse and terrible stories that I hear are "isolated incidents".  I have even been told that "if you look long enough and hard enough you can find something bad about anyone on the internet" . . . well, the problem I see with that answer is that I did not look LONG or HARD . . . I just googled IBLP and except for the first couple of links (that were IBLP sponsored) the rest of the info was about abuse, horror stories and comparisons to cults or cult like control.

I wish that someone who said that they don't follow the rules but does attend seminars or programs could just explain to me why, but it always seems like once I ask they say they don't want to talk about it.

[spitfire1979]

concerned:

i have to say that most people who become that involved with gothard do it for reasons that have nothing to do with logic.  he appeals to fear, an instinct that for most fundamentalists is rooted primarily in guilt and not wanting to be on the other side of "righteousness"... he equates his opinions so closely with "correct" biblical interpretation (and therefore having the favor of god) that no matter what these people's logical sense tells them, they will fall back on that primative instinct of not wanting god to be angry with them.  

this comes between their own survival instincts, their abilities to show compassion and real love to others (who don't accept gothard's teachings.)  the hardest thing for a former gothard junkie to do is to separate his teachings from their own conscience... and to develop one based on individual values.  

does this help?  my guess is that someone who remains in the system while criticizing it just doesn't know much else to hold onto.  when you're told all your life to "think of the thing you would do naturally, and then imagine the opposite, and this is what god wants", you do NOT know how to trust yourself, nor will you permit yourself to do so.  it is the saddest, most dehumanizing feeling in the world, but it must be got over to move on.

the other factor is that all the people you've been pleasing are within the system, and you depend on them for your "gauge" of what's ok and what isn't.  doing without that approval feels like death... or freedom, however you look at things.

my advice for someone in this situation?

"think of the thing that gothard would tell you do to, and then imagine the opposite.  at least you're thinking."

[ConcernedSister71]

i have to say that most people who become that involved with gothard do it for reasons that have nothing to do with logic.  he appeals to fear,

I guess this is the question that I really wish I could ask my SIL . . . WHY an HOW did she get involved with them in the first place.

She has not always been involved with them . . . only for the past couple of years or so . . . her husband (who she just married last spring) is the one that has been in it for most of his life.

my guess is that someone who remains in the system while criticizing it just doesn't know much else to hold onto.

I understand what you are saying, but I am not sure that it fits the situation with my SIL and her hubby.  They do not criticize Gothard, but when the topic of his odd teachings and the stories of abuse were brought up to them they said that they just take the good parts of the teachings and leave the bad.  My SIL even said to me that Gothard's teachings do not influence their daily life, but I still find that hard to believe if they are living at one of the training centers and the hubby works for the training center.

Also, I was told that the stories of abuse at the training centers were lies, and they said that if you look long enough and hard enough you can find something bad about anyone . . . I then said that I did not have to look long or hard . . . I just googled the letters IBLP and the things I found on the first page of that search scared me.  They keep trying to tell me that those stories are the "one in a million" type cases, and not the "norm" of how people are within IBLP.

I really wish that they would leave, but I know that will be hard since she is now married into it, living at the training center, does not work outside of the home anymore now that she is married, and his whole family supports this way of life.  If everyone around you is doing it, it seems "normal".

[VeganHunter]

I spent one week at HQ when I was 15, and there's something about the atmosphere that's like quicksand.  Although I couldn't stand the people, I started visualizing working there.  Met with the BG himself on my last day there.  As he fast-talked me into apprenticeship etc, I felt like my cage was slamming shut.  

Thank the universe for the flight home, and being seated next to a medical intern who listened to me, seemed very open-minded (i.e. not judgemental about the gothard thing) and encouraged me to do what I wanted to do.  She also gave me her lunch ... I was so hungry and weak that airplane food was manna.

My poor parents ... they'd rejoiced and given thanks over BG's success with me and were full of hope.  The daughter they picked up at the airport was a rejuvenated, new and improved version of the one whose spirit they'd hoped to have broken.  Drats!

If it hadn't been for that intern and her generosity, I might be working at a training center today.