Mercy Ministries claim exorcisms cure mental illness and drug addiction

LiveNews.com - Australia
July 19, 2008

How to cure anorexia with exorcisms

by Tim Brunero

Exorcisms to cure mental illness and drug addiction, locking vulnerable people away from friends and family, prayer as a solution to all problems – sounds like psych ward from last century. But actually it’s just the ‘Mercy Way’.

The once mighty ‘Mercy Ministries’, a secretive outfit that purports to treat young women with mental illness, is now in serious trouble.

Bankrolled by controversial Pentecostal group the ‘Hillsong Church’ and Hillsong-aligned Gloria Jean’s coffees the group has been the subject of a number of complaints to authorities. They’ve already closed one of their two facilities.

Women who’ve been through its programs say the main ‘treatment’ they were prescribed were exorcisms and prayer study, supervised by bible studies students. That’s whether they were dealing with anorexia, anxiety disorders or substance abuse.

And all the time being kept virtually as prisoners - cut off from the outside world with no TV or newspapers, with severely restricted access to friends and family and made to even ask permission to go to the toilet.

Nowhere was the promised phalanx of mental health professionals, psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers and dieticians. Just bible studies students whose answer to all questions was more prayer.

Three former residents told LIVENEWS.com.au they were left in a worse state after going to stay at Mercy Ministries – which still operates in a house in Sydney’s Glenhaven.

Meg Smith (not her real name) says she went to Mercy because of the group’s promise of free treatment for her anxiety disorder and panic attacks.

But she quickly became disheartened after “free” meant signing over her Centrelink payments to the group and “treatment” didn’t include proper access to doctors, psychologists and social workers.

“The 'counsellor' I had was not qualified to treat mental illness... nobody there was. She was in the middle of a mercy 'in-house program' to teach her how to prayer counsel,” says Smith.

“I spent months there and the only 'therapy' I had was prayer readings and an exorcism.”

She paints a disturbing picture - where a group of vulnerable girls isolated in a suburban home and forbidden to leave or form friendships on pain of being expelled – followed a punishing daily routine.

A seven o’clock wake up call and a stint of cleaning was followed by bible reading.

After that came a “praise” session where the girls would stand in a circle, eyes closed, singing along to Christian music and jumping on the spot with arms outstretched.

After locked food cupboards were opened for a piece of fruit or a few tablespoons of yoghurt it was back to class – usually taking notes from audio tapes by Joyce Meyer, an American evangelist.

After lunch, homework, letter-writing and recreation were followed by more cleaning and bible study.

Smith began to get worse.

“I was having lots of panic attacks… they seemed to be getting worse at ministry,” she said.

“I couldn’t work out why, apart from being away from friends and family and my support network.

“I was self harming – I was cutting my arm with anything I could get my hands on – scratching with anything from my nails to paper clips.

“I never really had a problem with self harm beforehand. When you tell them about self harming they said I was trying to get attention and I was taking their valuable time away from girls with real problems.”

Finally Smith was told she would have to have what she describes as an ‘exorcism’.

“The counsellor gave me a list of different demons – demon of anger, demon of unforgiveness, demon of pride, there were lots of them and I was told to go away and circle the demons I had in me or around me,” said Smith.

“I was really scared… they cast demons out of me, one by one, and they became quite excited and animated during the process, and spoke in tongues.

“It was the counsellors and myself and they put their hands on me and started praying one by one for each of the demons that were on the list to be cast out of me.

“After each demon was cast out I had to say ‘I confirm the demon of X has been cast out of me in the name of Jesus and is unwelcome to return.'

“The whole time I was there, all I heard was that I'm demonic.

“Even after the exorcism, when I had the next anxiety attack, I was told that they had already cast the demons out, so therefore I was obviously either faking it, or I had chosen to let the demons come back, in which case I was not serious about getting better.

“They kept telling us that the world can't help us, professionals with all their 'worldly qualifications' can't help us, only Mercy could because only they have God's power.

“So when I was kicked out for being 'demonic, unable to be helped, not worth a place at Mercy and because I had taken too long to pray to become a Christian... it left me worse than I had ever been before in my life.

“They told me I would never get better now because I had blown my chance. I started cutting my arms and wrists more than ever, with their voices echoing in my mind as I did it.”

Suicidal and self harming after being removed from the program, which she now thought was her only hope, she went to see a “proper psychologist to prepare me to go back to Mercy to help me fit in better.”

“The psychologist had never heard of them but told me to stay away from them… that person helped me more in the 40 minute session – really listening to me and understanding me.”

Smith, who is on the mend after a long process, is not alone.

Other women who spoke to LIVENEWS.com.au described being “literally bible bashed” and supervised during limited visits to GPs and psychiatrists.

One Patricia (not her real name) says when she approached staff with problems she was asked if she had prayed about it.

“In the end I stopped going to staff members because they just didn’t seem to help me and that’s one of the things they commented on… but how can you when they’re not actually helping you?” she said.

“I went to the psychiatrist three times in eight months I was there to get medication – and I was always accompanied in the session by a staff member.

“Once I told the psychiatrist what I was feeling and when we got back to the house I was yelled at because I hadn’t told the staff there… Now I go to the psychiatrist every two weeks – that’s the kind of care you need when you’re acutely unwell.

“Four to six weeks after I got kicked out I tried to kill myself and I almost succeeded and it was because I didn’t think I could live or get better without Mercy because it was just so ingrained into me.”

Since the former clients of Mercy Ministires began telling their stories, high profile “sponsors” listed on their website have disappeared. No longer do Rebel Sport, Bunnings Warehouse or LG electronics have anything to do with with the group.

Gloria Jean’s coffees, which once had collection boxes for the groups in all their stores, and whose former managing director, Peter Irvine, was a director at Mercy, still maintains conspicuous support.

The group have closed their Queensland centre but the Sydney facility remains open for business – still without scrutiny from government authorities.

Ready to continue to dispense their peculiar kind of care to the most vulnerable.

This article was found at:

http://www.livenews.com.au/Articles/2008/07/18/How_to_cure_anorexia_
with_exorcisms_101

Mormon Church criticised by District Court judge for dealing with sexual offenders "in-house"

The Southland Times - New Zealand
July 18, 2008

Church's sex offender secrecy deplored

Judge Robert Wolff was sentencing Raphael Giuseppe Caccioppoli, 37, who had been a member and Sunday school teacher with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, to five years jail.

Caccioppoli, a former judicial officer, appeared for sentence in the Invercargill District Court yesterday on indecency, sexual and violence offences.

He earlier pleaded guilty to 13 charges, including seven of performing an indecent act on two boys aged 10 and 12 years old, one each of sexual violation, indecent assault on an 18-year-old man, and committing an act of indecency on a dog, and two of assault between October 1990 and July 2007.

The court was told the church knew Caccioppoli had sexually offended against boys but did not tell police.

Defence counsel Bill Dawkins said his client had disclosed details of his offending to his church as early as one month after he committed an indecent act on a 12-year-old boy in 1998.

The church had held many meetings with Caccioppoli. In August 2005 he was told the matter was resolved and he was excommunicated in 2006, Dawkins said.

Excommunication is the most severe discipline that can be handed out by the Mormon church. Excommunicated members can no longer wear sacramental garments, attend church meetings or actively participate in church services, although they can still attend church in a limited role.

But police did not become aware of any of Caccioppoli's offending until he assaulted a man and a woman in Invercargill on July 30 last year, which brought the "house of cards" down, he said.

Judge Wolff criticised the church's handling of the issue.

"I would like to encourage churches in these circumstances to not endeavour to deal with these things in-house. They are ill- equipped to do so and there are better and wiser courses to follow," he said.

If Caccioppoli's offending had been "acknowledged in the appropriate place" some of his later offending may not have occurred, Judge Wolff said.

Mormon church spokeswoman Melanie Riwai-Couch last night declined to comment on the case and criticism of the church, saying she had not been given sufficient time.

This article was found at:

http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/4621993a12855.html

Roman Catholic Diocese of Davenport has released the names of 24 of its priests who can be "credibly accused" of sexual abuse.

Chicago Tribune - July 12, 2008
Associated Press

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa - The Roman Catholic Diocese of Davenport has released the names of 24 of its priests who can be "credibly accused" of sexual abuse. More names could be released later.

Release of the names was one of the non-monetary provisions the diocese had to fulfill as part of its $37 million settlement to emerge from the bankruptcy protection it sought because of its clergy sex abuse scandal.

Most of the names have been published before, but the list includes several new ones.

Names of some priests accused of abuse are not on the list, including retired Sioux City Bishop Lawrence Soens.

Soens has been accused of many acts of abuse while he was principal of Iowa City Regina in the 1950s and 1960s. The bankruptcy settlement requires the Davenport diocese to submit a report to the pope's diplomatic representative in the United States about Soens. Victim advocates have said they hope that leads to Soens being defrocked.

Deacon David Montgomery, spokesman for the diocese said the claims against Soens still are being reviewed, although the report to the Vatican already has been sent. A few other priests also still are being investigated, he said.

Craig Levien, a Davenport attorney who represents about half of the 162 avowed victims who filed claims in the bankruptcy case, wants the diocese to release complete files on the priests. He wants to know where they served and where those still alive are now.

"This isn't the full and complete story," Levien said.

Montgomery said he hoped to have that additional information on the 24 named clergy available next week.

The bankruptcy settlement says the diocese must publicly release the names of all "perpetrators" and post them on its Web site for nine years.

The names released so far are: James Janssen, Francis Bass, William Wiebler, Theodore Geerts, Frank Martinez, James Leu, Thomas Feeney, Carl Meinberg, Herman Bongers, Richard Welsh, Thomas Hackett, Louis Telegdy, Donald Redmond, Fidelis Forrester, Placidus Kieffer, Raymond Kalter, Paul Deyo, Alphonse Wagner, John Kennedy, Bernard Brugman, Orville DeCoursey and Sylvester Conrad. Also included are Brothers Francis Skube and Mark Quillen, who are members of a lay religious group.

This article was found at:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-ap-ia-priestabuse-
names,0,191096.story

Free Omar Khadr

National Post - Canada
July 15, 2008

Opinion | Jonathan Kay

This is a bad day for Canada. As I write this at 1pm Tuesday, piteous video images from Omar Khadr's interrogation at Guantanamo Bay are not only the #1 news item on the National Post web site, but also the lead item on BBC News and USA Today. Millions of Web surfers are now wondering why Canada's government has acquiesced — and as the video shows, even participated — in the unconscionable treatment of a blubbering boy-soldier.

As someone who otherwise considers himself one of the War on Terror's noisiest Canadian cheerleaders, I submit that the bleeding hearts are right on this one: Omar Khadr needs to come home.

Here's why:

Omar Khadr was a child soldier. During the carnage that gripped Sierra Leone in the 1990s, the most terrifying crimes were often committed by gangs of children who'd been abducted by the Revolutionary United Front. Isolated from their family, and stripped of any sort of moral compass, these child brigades were renowned for such monstrous acts as hacking off the legs and arms of defenseless villagers. When the RUF's war with the government ended, many of these children were assimilated back into civilized society. No one — in the West, at least — blamed them for what they had done. As in Sri Lanka, Congo, and other parts of the world where children are abducted and forced into combat, it is universally recognized that child soldiers are not morally culpable for their actions in the same way as adults. That's why the Sierra Leone war crimes tribunal didn't prosecute child soldiers — it prosecuted the monsters who exploited them. Can someone please tell me why this principle has not been applied to Omar Khadr, who was all of 15 when he allegedly threw the grenade that killed Sgt Christopher Speer of Delta Force in 2002?

What makes the case for Khadr especially strong is that he was essentially recruited into combat from birth — by his own flesh-and-blood no less. The true monster in the Khadr narrative is not Omar, but his father, Ahmed Said Khadr, an al-Qaeda lieutenant who moved his whole family from Canada to central Asia so they could share in the glory of jihad.

As a nine-year-old, Omar drank in his father's Islamist propaganda — spending months by his father's bed as the jihadi patriarch lay hunger-striking against Pakistani authorities, who'd arrested him on terrorism charges in 1995. Following 9/11, Ahmed (who, thankfully, was dispatched to his celestial virgins in 2003) enlisted his son as a sort of sidekick and maidservant to a jihadi cell hiding out in the Afghan outback. It was in this capacity that Omar tagged along with the pack of terrorists who would eventually be killed in the June 27, 2002 firefight that claimed the life of Sgt Speer.

I have spent today reading a lot of tough talk on the blogs about how Khadr should be "waterboarded until he stops crying" and such. I wonder if those same hawks could tell me how they would have turned out if they'd been told — literally, since the day they were born — about the necessity of jihad and the beauty of martyrdom; if, since early days, they'd been propagandized into believing that the West was waging a genocidal war against Muslims; and that military resistance was the only path of survival. Are we to expect some sort of inborn moral sense to activate — to tell us that everything being told to us by our own parents is wrong — even before one is old enough to shave?

I know about 20,000 former child soldiers in Sierra Leone who could tell you the answer to that question. And unlike Khadr, not one of them stands accused of "Violation of the Law of War."

Omar Khadr probably didn't kill anyone. The U.S. government's line on the events of June 27, 2002 — reported uncritically, for the most part, by the Canadian media — is that a cowardly Khadr popped up from the rubble in the aftermath of a firefight in the Afghan hinterland, killing a U.S. medic who was looking to treat wounded survivors. In fact, the grenade that killed Speer (who was fighting as a solider, whatever his training as a medic) was thrown when the four-hour long battle was still hot — and it is far from clear who threw it: Contrary to initial accounts, there was a second jihadi still alive when the fatal grenade was thrown — and since Khadr was badly wounded at the time, the second militant (who later died) seems the more likely candidate.

(We might also dispense with the idea that Speer was on a mission of mercy: Post-battle testimony from his battlefield companions suggests they were — quite understandably — more interested in shooting the wounded than healing them.)

My own view is that Speer may well have been killed by a grenade thrown by one of his comrades. (Reports from the battle suggest that grenades were flying thick and fast from both sides.) As the Pat Tillman scandal shows, the U.S. military sometimes goes to extraordinary lengths to cover up friendly-fire deaths. And in the Khadr case, his U.S. Department of Defense attorney claims, there is at least one instance in which a U.S. lieutenant-colonel retroactively amended and backdated a battlefield report to buttress the case against Khadr.

Even if Khadr did kill Sgt. Speer, he did so as a soldier, not a terrorist. There's little doubt that Ahmed Khadr was training his sons to be terrorists — the sort of people who blow up buses and restaurants, or who wear civilian clothing as they lie in wait to detonate explosives under vehicle convoys. But what Omar Khadr did on June 27, 2002 wasn't terrorism. It was participation in a military engagement — a fact that can't be changed merely by slapping a label like "unlawful combatant" on him.

Moreover, it was a military engagement fought on American terms: After U.S. soldiers sealed off the village encampment housing Khadr's cell, they prosecuted the siege with about 100 troops, some of them Special Forces, as well as Apache helicopters, F-18 Hornets and A-10 Warthogs. You can say that Khadr was fighting in an evil cause when he was captured, but you can't say that he was preying on the defenseless.

Even if you don't buy anything I've written above, Khadr's treatment still ranks as abominable. Let us assume that Omar Khadr actually threw the grenade that killed Sgt Christopher Speer; that he did so as a cold-blooded killer, not as a soldier; and that his status as a child combatant is irrelevant — in short, that Omar Khadr is a murderer. Well then, how do we treat murderers in Western countries? Answer: We put them in jail. We don't beat them; or move them from cell to cell every three hours; or terrify them with threats of pedophilic rape; or deny them appropriate medical care — all punishments that Khadr has endured — a litany of abuse so traumatic that, according to one piteous detail among many, he took to falling asleep at Guantanamo desperately hugging a Mickey Mouse book brought to him as a gift. In the space of six years incarceration, Khadr has endured more brutality than any ordinary jailbird would endure in 60.

That's punishment enough. Please bring Omar Khadr home.

This article was found at:

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/07/15/jonathan-kay-free-omar-khadr.aspx

Shurtleff to testify before Congress on polygamous sect

Legal News Line - July 15, 2008

by Chris Rizo

SALT LAKE CITY (Legal Newsline)-Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff will testify before a U.S. Senate panel investigating a polygamous sect in Texas, Utah and Colorado, his spokesman said Tuesday.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is probing allegations of fraud, bribery, extortion and crimes against children in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Shurtleff, a Republican, has been pursuing an investigation into the FLDS Church.

His spokesman Paul Murphy told Legal Newsline that Shurtleff is happy that the U.S. government is taking a bigger interest in potential federal crimes by the reclusive sect.

"These people have been ignored for the last 50 years," Murphy said. "We think the states of Utah and Arizona have done everything possible to pursue allegations of state crimes."

Among other allegations, Murphy said FLDS members have been suspected of flouting federal child labor laws and avoiding paying federal taxes.

"There are allegations that a lot of money is being funneled about without being accounted for," Murphy said.

The Senate hearing, called by Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., comes on the heels of a meeting in Las Vegas between several state attorneys general and officials to discuss legal issues relating to polygamy.

At the closed-door meeting were Shurtleff, Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto and Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard along with federal and local authorities.

The June 11 meeting followed public comments by Reid that criticized authorities in Arizona and Utah for not doing more to crackdown on crimes in polygamous communities, such as the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

For his part, U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey recently appointed a senior Justice Department prosecutor to work with Utah, Arizona and Nevada to review how federal authorities can help investigate and prosecute polygamy-related crimes.

From Legal Newsline: Reach reporter Chris Rizo at chrisrizo@legalnewsline.com.

This article was found at:

http://www.legalnewsline.com/news/214150-shurtleff-to-testify-before-congress-on-polygamous-sect

Commune head sentenced for child torture

Sydney Morning Herald - July 12, 2008

Paul Schaefer, the founder of the notorious former German religious commune Colonia Dignidad in Chile, has been sentenced to three years and a day in prison for torturing children.

The sentencing is the latest in a series of cases that have condemned Schaefer to at least 30 years in Jail in 25 cases of sexual abuse of minors and violations of legislation over the possession of firearms.

The victims in the current case were eight children who were given psychotropic medication and electroshock therapy from 1970 to 1980 in the settlement hospital, the court said in Santiago.

Moreover, the children were separated from their parents and prevented from developing a normal sexuality through the use of physical violence, the court added.

A former corporal in Adolf Hitler's army, Schaefer started the commune in southeastern Chile with other German emigrants. While preaching rigid morality, he sexually abused children and teenagers at the sealed-off complex, authorities have said.

Schaefer, 86, also faces charges of human rights abuses.

Prosecutors allege that the dreaded secret police of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, who ruled from 1973 to 1990, killed and tortured political opponents at Colonia Dignidad and that Schaefer took part.

In the 1950s, Schaefer was under investigation by German authorities over an alleged sexual abuse of German minors. In the early 1960s he convinced hundreds of Germans to emigrate to Chile, founding his commune near Parral in southern Chile.

Hundreds of people lived there, in complete isolation from the outside world and unallowed to leave the commune.

In Colonia Dignidad, children were taken from their parents.

Marriages and relationships between the settlers were forbidden, and many former residents have only recently dared to speak of their experience.

In addition to electric fencing and camera surveillance, the commune procured weapons to protect their compound. Schaefer disappeared in 1997 as investigations began, but was arrested in Argentina in 2005 and extradited to Chile.

The settlement lost its legal status and tax-free privileges after Pinochet fell, and renamed itself "Villa Baviera."

This article was found at:

http://news.smh.com.au/world/commune-head-sentenced-for-child-torture-20080712-3dx1.html

The Church Of Scientology’s Child Labor Abuse Exposed

GlossLip.com July 7, 2008

Australia’s Channel 7 reporter Brian Seymour did a brilliant expose on the Church of Scientology’s long-standing child labor abuse, and their wide-spread deprivation of education to children of staff members. The expose, done in conjunction with an ex-child Sea Org member, exposes children being forced to work over 40 hour weeks and not providing these children with basic education.

Of course Scientology’s response to the report was typical. They accused the reporter of being an agent who is working with Anonymous, because of course, no one in their right mind would question a sinister cult which seeks to undermine families, rob people of their money AND their dignity, and violate both moral and legal codes of conduct. Right?

WRONG. Thank you to Brian Seymour for having the courage and to Channel 7 for backing him up. Also, many thanks to WS for forwarding this story.

Also, Anonymous will be staging their SIXTH protest this weekend, Saturday, July 12th. Clearly, their efforts are hammering away at the crumbling facade of deception Scientology has precariously built on its web of lies.

Glosslip will have more on the next protest later this week.

To view the video accompanying this article please go to:

http://glosslip.com/2008/07/07/the-church-of-scientologys-child-labor-abuse-exposed/

A Writer in Bridgewater Found Way Out of The Way International Cult

Litchfield County Times - July 10, 2008

by Jack Coraggio

BRIDGEWATER-In the May 14, 1971 issue of Life magazine, spread across almost two full pages is a closely-cropped and candid headshot of a young Kristen Skedgell, gazing innocently into the distance with a kind of mesmerized captivation. At 15 years old, her doe eyes and gentle smile are delicately framed by long, wavy chestnut hair, rendering her the portrait of the unabashedly idealistic flower child so often found in the Simon & Garfunkel generation.

Indeed, she was a lovely girl and very photogenic, but there is something disconcerting about her captivated stare. It's almost as if the spellbound look on her face is more of a trance than it is childlike wonderment.

The photograph's accompany­ing article, "The Groovy Christians of Rye, N.Y.," was a feature piece about the now controversial Christian fundamentalist group known as The Way International, and its then growing band of exceedingly loyal followers. As detailed in the article, Ms. Skedgell was one of those burgeoning die-hards and, as she now laments, she maintained that fervor for the following decade and a half.

Ms. Skedgell, who has lived in Bridgewater with her second husband since the mid-1990s, details those 15 troubled years in a book she recently had published, "Losing the Way; A Memoir of Spiritual Longing, Manipulation, Abuse and Escape."

As her firsthand account develops over the course of the 200-page memoir, Ms. Skedgell argues that The Way was not so much a Christian fundamentalist group as it was a predatory cult. And as she looks back, her hypnotized Life magazine stare reflects the early stages of what was essentially a brainwashing scheme, one designed to prey on the lonely and spiritually thirsty.

"I had an adolescent need to belong; the desire to belong was strong in me," said Ms. Skedgell, explaining how she became so deeply controlled by The Way. "That and I think I was looking for a father figure. All these events created the perfect storm for [manipulation.]"

It wasn't that her father wasn't around, but he spent far more time with the bottle than with Ms. Skedgell or her two brothers. Her mother, who was instrumental in Ms. Skedgell eventual exit from The Way, was a good-hearted person and an intellectual, but perhaps a little too disconnected from her daughter, never even aware of the sexual molestation the adolescent Ms. Skedgell suffered at the hands of neighborhood ne'er-do-wells.

At the age of 14, Ms. Skedgell tagged along with some friends to a Bible meeting in the apartment of a prominent New York City disc jockey. There, she first learned of the love, compassion and acceptance-three qualities that were in short supply at her home-one could find through "the Word," which was code for the teachings of The Way's founder, "The Doctor" Victor Paul Wierwille.

Dr. Wierwille-who received a doctorate in theology from Pikes Peak Bible College and Seminary, a non-accredited institution-was ordained by The United Church of Christ in 1941, but separated from that institution in 1957. His reasons for leaving are unclear, but it was after his departure that his own unorthodox ministry, The Way International, really took off.

In The Way, Dr. Wierwille taught a very preliminary elucidation of Christianity, one that rejects the traditional Holy Trinity notion that Jesus Christ is God. However, The Way does accept Jesus as both a savior and the Son of God.

Such distinctions aside, Dr. Wierwille apparently saw a lot of potential recruits in the 1960s counterculture movement, and through heavy street promotion, he eventually built membership up to about 100,000.

"Oh, he had campuses, a private jet, a training center, one of those big tour buses you see rock bands ride around in," Ms. Skedgell noted of the many amenities Dr. Wierwille acquired with the money of his followers.

Believers worked part-time and gave their earnings to The Way. Classes were conducted at a cost. And for a fee, many recruits, including Ms. Skedgell, were sent to The Way Corps in Kansas, which was a paramilitary training ground to prepare followers for Armageddon, or perhaps the takeover of the "illuminati," which apparently was an esoteric clan of mortal enemies intimately connected with the devil.

When not resisting illuminati propaganda or working their part-time jobs, followers were expected to be "witnessing," a k a recruiting, the unenlightened.

"There was a lot of deception involved in witnessing. We would befriend somebody, be nice and friendly, build a relationship and invite them to a meeting, but it all had a hidden agenda," said Ms. Skedgell, who at one point likened the ritual to the infamous get-rich-quick "pyramid schemes." "But we really felt that we were here to help humanity and bring peace to the world. The leaders would make money from the followers, but from our point of view, we were bringing the truth."

Despite Dr. Wierwille's having such a vast constituency of believers, which ranged all over the U.S. and into other countries, Ms. Skedgell said she developed a personal relationship with him very early on. From her perspective, she was a naïve child who saw him as a strong patriarch, a figure she was desperate for in her life. She put her faith in him and the Word, and never questioned his absolute authority, even if at times it seemed contradictory-or worse.

Ms. Skedgell, who can't help but observe how Dr. Wierwille's name sounds like werewolf, remembered when the sexual advances started, to which she reluctantly complied. His rationale, according to her book was that woman is made for man and man is made for God. Her rationale was: Even though it kind of feels like incest, the Doctor says it's OK.

According to Ms. Skedgell, Dr. Wierwille, who was old enough to be her father, taught a Christian Family and Sex course, which would use street lingo to describe sexual acts in uncomfortably graphic detail. He often informed students that God's position on intercourse is more lenient now in the "Age of Grace," she said.

Dr. Wierwille wasn't the only minister in the group to take advantage of the susceptible Ms. Skedgell, she recalled. Though it was clandestine, the sex was, in her words, "rampant." Even after she married fellow devotee Alec-whose name, just like that of everyone in the book except for Dr. Wierwille's, was changed-Dr. Wierwille still expected her to continue with their affair, explaining away the sin of adultery with his own distorted interpretation of the Bible.

Apparently, as far as Dr. Wierwille was concerned, The Word was not an interpretation, but the only manner the Bible could be perceived. Ms. Skedgell remembers thinking she understood that, even when she didn't.

"Inside, I am frantic, pedaling to keep up with what the Doctor is saying, to keep up with him...It is either embrace what he says or quit the ministry entirely. If I do that I might as well die," Ms. Skedgell writes in the book, right after Dr. Wierwille instructed her, for the good of The Way, to lie about their first sexual tryst.

"Suddenly, something shifts deep inside of me. Now I get it: 'all things are pure to the pure.' A great door has opened and the Doctor has ushered me into the deeper mysteries of the Word, where grace reigns supreme. I promise the Doctor I will keep his secret."

The speed with which she jumped from confusion to understanding is The Way's brainwashing in action. According to Ms. Skedgell, "We were taught to see everything in terms of black-and-white, because there is no in between."

Ms. Skedgell recalled once speaking with her biological father, who broke free of his alcohol addiction a couple of years before his death, about the Bible. At one point in the conversation, she was taken aback by his use of the qualifier "in my opinion" to describe what he believed was the best biblical verse. The Doctor never gave opinions-he only stated facts.

As for her now ex-husband Alec, with whom she has two children, their marriage turned sour early in the honeymoon stage. She claims he was abusive and had an explosive temper. But he was also corrupted by the control of The Way. After she finally admitted to him the affair she was having with the Doctor, he was surprisingly compassionate and apologetic, but after a "man-to-man" conversation with Dr. Wierwille, Alec suddenly shifted the blame to her, Ms. Skedgell said.

For the sake of their children, both of whom are now adults, she has kept a cordial relationship with Alec, Ms. Skedgell said, and it's easier now that he has left The Way and remarried.

"He told our daughter that it is too bad he was married to a writer, because now I'm going to write about the worst time in his life as well," she noted.

Since word of her book got out, Ms. Skedgell has received seven e-mails from women who also alleged sexual manipulation by the Doctor, who died in 1985. His departure came not long before a very confused, downtrodden and suicidal Ms. Skedgell escaped Alec and The Way with the help of her mother, who was living in Roxbury at the time.

Though she is free of the ministry's influence, more than 20 years after the Doctor's death, Ms. Skedgell did obey one more of his requests. He once asked her, during post-coital "afterglow," as he referred to it, to write a posthumous book about him, because "people need to see the heart of a man of God."

"I cried at the thought of losing him," she states in the book, "but I promised him I would do whatever he asked."

After his death, The Way International went into decline, and now has a mere fraction of the followers it had in the 1970s.

As for Ms. Skedgell, she went on to study at Johns Hopkins University, Yale Divinity School and Columbia University, where she learned to become a clinical social worker. It took her "years before she could even step foot in a church," but she has since made her peace with God.

She said writing the book was "cathartic and therapeutic" but she still urges people with family members under the influence of cult-like groups to maintain consistent contact with them, consult an "exit counselor" and set up an intervention. However, she warns against deprogramming measures, which often employ harsh, counter-brainwashing tactics.

"You know, being in a cult, it's kind of like when people talk about killing a frog by putting it in slowly boiling water," said Ms. Skedgell. "It's the same kind of phenomena. You just don't even realize you are getting sucked in until it is too late."

Ms. Skedgell will be signing copies of "Losing the Way" at the Hickory Stick Bookshop at 2 p.m. on Sunday.

This article was found at:

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=19842943&BRD=2303&PAG=461&dept_id=
478976&rfi=6

Mother sues Mormon church in abuse case

Boston Globe - July 10, 2008

by Connie Paige | Globe Correspondent

A Lawrence-area woman is alleging that the Mormon church failed to conduct a background check on a convicted sex offender, who went on to molest her 9-year-old son in 2004 while baby-sitting the boy at the church's Methuen branch.