Ahh! Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 It seems like there are a lot of cults that live near me (as I live in the desert, I count people pretty far away as "near me though.") Out about 50 miles, there is this colony of about 300 people who hold the Urantia Book as holy. Their leader recruits members out of women shelters and brings them and their children to the compound to "recover" (he takes all their money when they sign up.) There's a Catholic monastery outside of town that the Church has been thinking of closing because of a long history of bizarre happenings, even after several changes of power. A few months ago, the monks wouldn't let someone leave when that person (according to our local paper) tried to leave because he feared for his life. They have also been accused of "unorthodox ritual", which has no meaning to me being that I'm not Catholic, though I am quite curious how the rituals were "unorthodox." We have a very small black population but the Black Muslims are really active here too. There is this group called the United Nation of Islam, which tells its members to give 100% of their income to some nut called Royall Muhammad (who by the way, is the reincarnation of Elijah Muhammad and can talk to aliens) who gives them free housing. The Five Percenters, another offshoot of the Nation of Islam, are active here too. I had some in my classes in high school. Unlike Nation of Islam members they can drink liquor and smoke pot. They also hold that it is important to "save the babies," or in normal terms, recruit children. There's a bunch of kids who are only 8 or even younger, talking about "the white devil" and all of that crap. The Five Percent hang around street corners in town, drinking liquor and handing out pamphlets. They insist in these pamphlet "We are not a gang, cult, religion, or hate group but a Nation of Righteous Teachers." A lot of freaky Christian groups are here too. Something called "The Way" harasses people at the mall a lot. I was reading the Tao Te Ching in a bookstore once and a man walked up to me and said, "You are interested in the Way. That is good. But did you know Jesus taught The Way too?" Now, I was searching spiritually at the time but as open-minded as I was, my first thought was, "get away from me!" Instead I said, "Oh, that's nice." But he wouldn't go away. He started rambling on about how Christianity was an Eastern religion and if I joined his cult, I could learn more than anything I could gain from books. Then, he told me all believers had the potential to have the same powers of Jesus. He finished up by asking if he could have my phone number. I said it would probably be better if I took his as "I just moved in and couldn't remember it" (wink, wink.) On my way out, I threw it away. My friends have told me similar stories. This seems like A LOT of cult activity. What cults do you guys have in your area? Is it this bad? One of my concerns is that as Christianity shrinks, these even more dogmatic and outright creepy groups will grow exponentially, preying off of the newly deconverted. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thurisaz Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 This seems like A LOT of cult activity. What cults do you guys have in your area? Is it this bad? Don't know about the rest of the world, but over here, in the small German town of Gifhorn, it's baaaad indeed. An amazing number of "Freikirchen" (non-denominational cultist packs), quite a few of which are at least borderline morontheist. The two baptist covens I examined are at least close to the borderline (on which side is debatable of course), but the "Gemeinde Gottes" (German spawn of the Arse of Gawd? Hard to tell without knowing the original cult) is so full of it that my first thoughts when leaving their temple (on a Wodan's day evening after their "prayer meeting") was pretty literally "Wipe out. No matter how. Wait until they're all in here, then wipe them out. With a tacnuke if need be. Better lose a few innocents than risk that this madness can spread further!"... And then we have jehoover's witlesses in the west end of town, and a mor(m)on temple in nearby Braunschweig. One of my concerns is that as Christianity shrinks, these even more dogmatic and outright creepy groups will grow exponentially, preying off of the newly deconverted. Certainly looks like that. The interesting question is: How many (in percent) of former mainstream christians turn non-morontheist (whether atheist or something else) and how many dive headlong into the cult madness? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brother Jeff Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 Unfortunately, the Jehovah's Witnesses are very active here, or at least they are in our neighborhood. I have grown tired of wasting my valuable time being civil to them. The next time they come by wishing to invade my privacy and talk about their religious bullshit, I'm going to let them have it with both barrels and tell them not so politely not to ever darken our doorstep again! Glory! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ahh! Posted June 29, 2007 Author Share Posted June 29, 2007 And then we have jehoover's witlesses in the west end of town, and a mor(m)on temple in nearby Braunschweig. I completely forgot to mention the witnesses (witlesses lol) and the Mormons. The Mormons are really bad where I live; I'd say probably 1 out of every 10 kids at my old school was one. It was hard to even make friends because they could only have Mormon friends. They prostelytyzed all the time too- I think I have 4 Books of Mormon that people gave me in my closet. I have no idea what to do with them. One time a friend of mine took one from someone who offered it, sat on it and farted. The Mormons went nuts and to this day hate him with a passion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ahh! Posted June 29, 2007 Author Share Posted June 29, 2007 This is for all the people who have been harassed by Witnesses and Mormons... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjPKIcR3occ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lycorth Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 I think I have 4 Books of Mormon that people gave me in my closet. I have no idea what to do with them. Burn 'em. Cult propaganda makes for nice fires Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brother Jeff Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 I commented on my latest encounter with the Jehovah's Witnesses (which was today!) here on my glorious site and here on this site. Glory! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toxic Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 In my town we have Mormons, Christian Science, JWs, Christadelphians plus we also get scientologists appearing in groups in the high street from time to time. We've also got fundie born agains of course - recently they protested about an adult entertainment shop being set up in my town. In the UK we have the Nation of Islam as well, although they are scarcely seen outside of London. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amethyst Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 Well, from my perspective, they're all cults. Some are just more dangerous than others. The harmless ones, I don't give a crap about. However, there are a lot of fundy Christians in my state. Minnesota has a lot of rural areas and they tend to cluster there, but they're in the Twin Cities area as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
leftofpunk Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 We have several protestant and catholic churches as well as mormons and jehova's witnesses They're all cults. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robbobrob Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 Wiki "stub" here. Some of you may have heard of the cult from Attleboro, MA that two children had died because of malnutrition (the leader, Jacques Robideaux had heard God tell him to starve his kids) and had been buried up in Maine. Jacques and I were in Boy Scouts together. Great kid. Outgoing, freindly, great athlete. It hurt me terribly when I saw what became of him. (He is in prison now for the kid's deaths). The signs that he was in some strange stuff was there even in scouts, but I didn't know. They lived by very strict dietary guidelines (think old testement restrictions). But he would always say he was Roman Catholic (most prominent denomination in my area). I look back at the photos I have of him, and it really pains me to know that such a good guy ended up in so much trouble. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toxic Posted June 29, 2007 Share Posted June 29, 2007 I didn't include mainstream churches like Anglican, Catholic, Methodist, Pentecostal etc, although they are of course cults as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R. S. Martin Posted June 30, 2007 Share Posted June 30, 2007 Given the international culture of this town (actually it's twin cities with a combined population of about 300,000) with its two universities with international students, I would guess we have pretty much everything that exists out there. If I take a radius of fifty miles, that includes a large variety of horse and buggy people in the rural areas along with varieties of Chinese, African, and Pagan religions here in town. Christianity dominates by far but we have all the colours of the rainbow when it comes to skin colours, and probably all the philosophies of life when it comes to religion. The area was settled about two hundred years ago by Mennonites, Lutherans, and Roman Catholics, and possibly Anglicans. This is reflected by the churches that mark our street corners. Within a fifteen minute walk from where I live there are: United Church of Canada, and some brand or other of Lutheran, Baptist, Jewish, and Mennonite (maybe a bit further than fifteen minutes). That's all I can think of right now. I don't know where the Muslims' place of worship is. The Siekhs have a temple on the other edge of town that I visited with a group of others from school. It occurs to me that learning all the places of worship that exist in this town would be a course in religious studies in and of itself. Let's see, Presbyterian, Catholic, and Anglican would be other Christian denominations in the area. No wonder it's hard to find atheists. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garnet Posted June 30, 2007 Share Posted June 30, 2007 You can't throw a rock around here without hitting a church. I haven't paid any attention to what denominations, but there are at least five churches, including one mega church, within a mile of where I live. However, I have not had one encounter with a fundy since I moved back to Michigan in last year. Christians, for the most part, just are not in my face here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R. S. Martin Posted June 30, 2007 Share Posted June 30, 2007 Christians, for the most part, just are not in my face here. That's mostly the way it is here. I had one bad experience (outside family) and it was very seriously bad. Everyone I talked to (outside family) thought it was terrible so I guess most people around here are not out to convert everyone they meet. I had a spooky experience one day rather late in the afternoon when I was walking alone in a school hallway. There was one other person in the hallway and he seemed not to really know where he wanted to go. When we were side by side I heard him saying something about Jesus and love. After it was over I realized he was evangelizing. Not because he knew me but because it was what he did. Chances are he wasn't quite "right in the head." That is how he seemed to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Euthyphro's Thorn Posted July 1, 2007 Share Posted July 1, 2007 We have churches all over the place with the typical denominations. Some people bow their heads in silent prayer in restaurants and I hear the occasional "God has a plan for us" bullshit. I've only had evangelists knock on my door once, and my mom's door once when I lived with her. All in all, I wouldn't say my town is inundated with fundies, although it is somewhat conservative. Aside from the typical Methodist, Baptist, Catholic, JW, 7th Day, etc, we have... The House of David Wikipedia Official site (Notice his Jesus hair and beard, lol) Michigan History Magazine - I think they meant to say "immorality" not "immortality" but I think it's a hilarious slipup because of HoD members' belief that old, long-deceased Ben will rise again. Local legend has it (or it might be true) that they kept him in a locked, windowed casket that can be opened from the inside, on the top floor of a house they called "Diamond House." That building was destroyed by fire at some point and was unsalvagable, so the casket was allegedly moved to another location. In its day, the House of David was a major enterprise. They had a national baseball team and a world-famous amusement park. "Seventh Messenger" (yeah, right!) founder, Benjamin Purnell, died in 1927, but the cult still has a few dozen members, undoubtedly still waiting for him to rise from the dead. Those remaining seem to keep to themselves, but I know one of them because of my job. He's a nice guy, and I would've never guessed he was a HoD member if I only met him on the street. The only indication, really, is that he runs the HoD print shop that is on the cult's huge property. I have to say, the architecture of the old buildings is pretty cool (see Diamond House and Shiloh). Neither of us has brought up the topic of religion, which is probably a good thing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Euthyphro's Thorn Posted July 1, 2007 Share Posted July 1, 2007 Double post, due to "Connection was reset" error message making me think the post didn't go through the first time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ahh! Posted July 1, 2007 Author Share Posted July 1, 2007 We have churches all over the place with the typical denominations. Some people bow their heads in silent prayer in restaurants and I hear the occasional "God has a plan for us" bullshit. I've only had evangelists knock on my door once, and my mom's door once when I lived with her. All in all, I wouldn't say my town is inundated with fundies, although it is somewhat conservative. Aside from the typical Methodist, Baptist, Catholic, JW, 7th Day, etc, we have... The House of David Wikipedia Official site (Notice his Jesus hair and beard, lol) Michigan History Magazine - I think they meant to say "immorality" not "immortality" but I think it's a hilarious slipup because of HoD members' belief that old, long-deceased Ben will rise again. Local legend has it (or it might be true) that they kept him in a locked, windowed casket that can be opened from the inside, on the top floor of a house they called "Diamond House." That building was destroyed by fire at some point and was unsalvagable, so the casket was allegedly moved to another location. In its day, the House of David was a major enterprise. They had a national baseball team and a world-famous amusement park. "Seventh Messenger" (yeah, right!) founder, Benjamin Purnell, died in 1927, but the cult still has a few dozen members, undoubtedly still waiting for him to rise from the dead. Those remaining seem to keep to themselves, but I know one of them because of my job. He's a nice guy, and I would've never guessed he was a HoD member if I only met him on the street. The only indication, really, is that he runs the HoD print shop that is on the cult's huge property. I have to say, the architecture of the old buildings is pretty cool (see Diamond House and Shiloh). Neither of us has brought up the topic of religion, which is probably a good thing. Now THAT is a cult! Is it just me or was there a huge trend to have a cult with a "new messenger from God" in 1800s/ early 1900s America? That's how the 7th Day Adventists, Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons all started. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garrisonjj Posted July 1, 2007 Share Posted July 1, 2007 It seems like there are a lot of cults that live near me (as I live in the desert, I count people pretty far away as "near me though.") Not really a cult, but many protestant "bible banger" churches are springing up. Many members are disgruntled catholics that are fed up with the church but still find jesus through the bible. Alleluia Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kirangel Posted July 1, 2007 Share Posted July 1, 2007 Mormons and Catholics...then again technically neither would be considered a cult anymore. I can't hate on them though. The Mormans have a good parking lot by their churching for playing hockey in. The Catholic church is further away but it's good for rollerblading, it was redone a few years ago and still very smoothe. I'll admit that I did almost feel bad for swerving around the mormons parking lot right after service. They were all dressed up so nicely and I was in shorts and a tank top, jumping onto and off of their sidewalk. I don't try to offend people...and I didn't think they minded. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
texmex2003 Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 Lets see, Oral Roberts University 4 miles away, Rhema Bible College, Victory Bible Center, etc. I am surrounded by Paulists nuts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pitchu Posted July 2, 2007 Share Posted July 2, 2007 About a mile away is a group that calls itself "Wisdom's Goldenrod." Make of that name what you will. This "spiritually searching" group evidently spent many years in the thrall of a martinet leader. Then we're also fortunate enough to be a mere hop, skip and jump over the border from the Pennsylvania-based U. S. Headquarters of Aryan Nation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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