So many thoughts and reflections during this day, I really don’t know where to start. During many days I have come across short scenes or incidents that remind of my past days and the many lost relationships. For instance, there are some songs that I just can’t listen to on the radio. That does not mean the songs are evil, it just means they remind me of treasures lost; previous times in a foggy memory somewhere back there. When hearing the song, the memories come forward from the cloudy past and shout at me. Does that make sense?

   Tonight, while driving home, I happened upon a radio station where a well known preacher was explaining his point from a Scripture. At this moment, it does not matter the Scripture or the point he was trying to make. Just realizing that I was listening to a preacher on the radio expounding on some Scripture reminded me first of what a forbidden sin that was at Word of Faith Fellowship (WOFF). Listening to the radio in your car was evil- period. Even worse was listening to another religious speaker from outside WOFF!  RL was castigated and threatened with church discipline or worse for this suspected sin, plus, the fact that his wife found a newspaper under the front seat of his truck! He tried to explain he was “just reading the sports scores”. That sent Jane Whaley into another orbit as her volume elevated to paint -peeling heights! Several jumped as she screamed some of her trademarked announcements meant to bring fear upon us all. And here I was partaking of just such a “sin”.

   It was there that I began to ponder the emotional destruction and traumatizing dangers of being in a religious cult. For those that read this blog regularly, you know my experience has been with Word of Faith Fellowship. Though I have read of others and have documented the obvious similarities between WOFF and other cults, my “expertise” stems from my hands-on, up-close, inside day to day observations of Jane Whaley, her leadership, and the other regular members. I was never considered “inside the leadership circle” but, no matter, my perspective is still valid and reflective of life as a “regular member”. For those that attempt to still excuse the WOFF environment as “safe”, I only ask you to read other posts found here; other informative websites on religious cults and the many accounts of other previous members. Can every former member of WOFF be “of the devil”, God-haters, traitors, a “Judas” or lying?

   For me, the whole bank of memories from that time serves as a reminder that “No one joins a cult…” That which seemed good, turned out to be not good. Those who were set-up to represent God  and God’s ways in my life- turned out to be repeating what they had been taught as “God’s ways” and in my efforts to “believe the best about every person”; I give many of them a pass as cogs in the machine of Jane’s controlling, legalistic, self-serving, matriarchal, pyramidal religious structure. I have seen and heard other former members of WOFF speak and share their own individual memories, traumas and losses. Over time, it grows less sensational, but, none the less heartbreaking and sad.

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