Fellowship Of Friends/Pathway To Presence Discussion – Part 102 April 26, 2011
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http://www.livingpresence.com/
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Fellowship of Friends - Living Presence Discussion 
182. brucelevy – April 26, 2011
http://rltblog.com/about/
“learning to discern between the fraudulent and the authentic.”
Unfuckingbelievable.
I agree.
What a hypocrat.
Well, they all known for that.
1. black marker – May 20, 2009
Da..d Spring…ld, Attorney at Law November 19, 2007
To All Board Members of the Fellowship of Friends, Inc. and Giova.ni Bu.co
Re: No Further Legal Representation
Dear Board Members and Giova.ni
I am not sending this letter because I like writing of these matters or because I want to repeat what has already been stated repeatedly by both Abraham and me. This letter is written because of my professional obligations and my personal obligations to the School. My professional responsibilities require me to send this letter to confirm again that I will provide no further legal services to the Fellowship of Friends, and have stopped working on all ongoing legal matters that I was involved with. This letter also advises you to immediately work with Abraham Goldman and/or other legal counsel to handle the legal work I was involved in and to address other ongoing and/or upcoming legal matters that I will outline in this letter. The recent board activities have been covered in a number of letters and emails by Abraham and me. None of the communications were ever acknowledged or responded to by any board member. As you know, Abraham and I were instructed to stop all legal work.
First, a directive was issued on November 3, 2007, via email, on behalf of Et..n Har..s, Chairman of the Board, through R.se Ke.n.dy S.afer Vice Chairman of the Board, without explanation, question, or discussion. My emails and letter of November 6, 2007, about this heavy-handed and improper directive were ignored by all board members.
Next, I wrote to Li.da T.li.so who ignored my question about what to do about the ongoing legal work but was ignored. After learning about the secret board meeting and illegal vote that took place on or about November 10, 2007, I talked with Li.da T.li.so the President in person at her
office on November 13, 2007. Linda confirmed the secret vote of the Board (although both W.yne Mo.t and Al.n Sc.wa.tzbe.g lied that no other “crisis team” members voted at the secret Board meeting) and Linda instructed me to suspend all my legal work. I confirmed this in a letter dated November 13, 2007 that has also been copied to all of you. There was no response to this letter from anyone.
On November 18, 2007, I was voted off the Board of Directors. Now, no longer working as attorney, nor being able to act as a member of the Board, I will be unable to assist the Fellowship with any legal work or offer any oversight. All of this occurred after one week of false and contradictory statements by W.yne Mo.t, Al.n Sc.wa.tzbe.g, Et.an Ha.ris and others about the secret board meeting where this was already decided in advance. Only G.eg Hol.an acknowledged yesterday that the secret Board meeting was improper and that he wished that matters would have been done openly and correctly.
The failure by almost all of the Board members to even have the decency or honesty to acknowledge a secret Board meeting was held and a secret vote taken (to vote the lawyers off the Board), without any opportunity to address the issues by the persons involved is below the level of school work for any student, let alone a board member with responsibility for our church.
Al.n Sc.warzbe.g’s refusal to show the minutes of the secret Board meeting, and subsequent refusal to return my many calls and emails, is conduct that is highly irregular for the Secretary of the Corporation and the Board of Directors. To date, I still have not obtained a copy of the “RESOLUTION OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS” that I personally saw when both Alan and Wayne in heavy-handed fashion informed Abe and myself, on November 12, 2007, we were voted off the Board.
It is my feeling that what occurred over the last three weeks is a combination of crime, gross carelessness and ignorance of almost all Board members. In my opinion, serious crimes have likely been committed and are possibly continuing to be committed by current members on the Board. This should be addressed immediately. As I wrote about in my letter of November 6, 2007, the requirement of legal compliance and checks and balances within our organization needs urgent attention. The Board has been for some time but a passive “rubber-stamp” board without active or meaningful oversight. This almost complete inaction may create the impression of the Fellowship as a criminal organization that is functioning as the later ego of Robert Burton, involved in a conspiracy to engage in financial, tax and immigration fraud, and perhaps other illegal activities and/or tortuous conduct.
Responding to a call from Mr.Margalli? this morning, I gave him my impressions of yesterday’s Board meeting. Mr. Margalli? suggested I write a confirming letter and cover the ongoing legal work that you must all appreciate should be addressed immediately.
This list does not purport to cover all of the areas that need immediate and significant work, and you should immediately consult with Abraham and all other lawyers for the Fellowship.
The legal work I have been involved in covers the following areas:
1. Immigration. Ongoing assessment and evaluations of the needs and requirements of our religious programs/individual’s status and possible need to go back to their country of origin. I will notify Mr. Shusterman of the fact I will be no longer working with him on behalf of the Fellowship. I was also working with a number of individual students who would call with questions in the last months.
2. Financial Compliance. This is critical and should be a top priority. You have knowingly allowed having a system in place where the CFO is made responsible but essentially helpless and without authority. The CFO is not being consulted in important decisions. The Fellowship’s financial activities, in my opinion, could be seen as criminal conspiracy to commit tax fraud and private inurement benefiting Robert and a number of other individuals (including possibly some Board members) and could be considered a fraud on the government. The status as a non profit corporation could well be in serious danger.
3. Investigation/Monitoring of Blog?GF/PR, etc. Several times this year I have written to Youtube or other websites to have offending material taken off line. This has been largely successful. I also have conducted an investigation into aspects of the Blog and some individuals with the aim to allow us to file suit for defamation and/or invasion of privacy if and when appropriate. I have worked on obtaining PR consultations for which then no funding was purportedly available. (Nic.ol.s Spa.ldi.g who was helping in this area, was threatened by Et.an Har.is to stop working with Abraham and myself) This area should be a major concern for the Board which has been almost totally unresponsive.
4. It was our diligent monitoring of the blog that put us on notice that A.af Brave.man’s arranged (by Fellowship officers and/or agents) fraudulent marriage to Elisa.et.a da Ros was being exposed to the world. This finally stimulated action in this area but more is needed. I will no longer monitor the Blogs or any other sites, in any language, and will no longer assist with analysis and efforts to bring these matters into compliance. A lot more needs to be done in this area for many involved.
5. Insurance. We were working on a review of all materials from the Internet and other sources that could constitute a claim (including foreign websites). I wrote about this before as well. Insurance could possibly pay for some of the costs incurred, including legal costs. I will stop all my work on this claim process, including any work on the research into the bad faith claim aspect of the insurance which I wrote about before. TIme may be of the utmost essence. See my letter of November 6, 2007.
6. Other matters: There are outstanding million dollar judgments from the Ming litigation era that will need to be renewed in the next years, if the Fellowship wants to collect on them. I had this calendared for a review in January 2008, 10 years after the first settlements and judgments were obtained. Given the success we have had collecting from various parties, I would consider this an important item to follow up on. I will no longer take any action in this area either.
In short, the overall picture is in my opinion that the Fellowship itself, Robert, and a number of our friends, including several board members and officers, continue to be in potential legal jeopardy and liability.
With the information, according to what I gathered from my investigation, shared by certain former members to various agencies, I cannot envision that there will not be a government investigation and/or lawsuit in the planning/preparation stages with possibly serious consequences for the Fellowship, the Board of Directors, Robert and possibly a number of individual students, including possibly individual Board members.
A fully professional and active compliance team to put matters straight must be created. This team would need to be working daily, hands on, with the supervision and input from professionals. The existing irregularities cannot be hidden from the people that need to help bring us into compliance.
Again, I am no longer acting as the Fellowship’s attorney. Immediate attention is required to the numerous outstanding legal issues facing the Fellowship. You are advised to consult with legal counsel immediately.
Thank you for your time and consideration to these important matters. Do not hesitate to call if you have any questions.
Very truly yours, Dav.d Spri.gfield
cc. Robert E. Burton ??? Abraham Gold.an, Esq.
• It’s a doomsday cult.
• The predicted doomsdays never came.
• Burton predicted major catastrophes for 1984 and 1998, and then nuclear war for 2006. For decades, he predicted the Fellowship of Friends would become the beginning of a new civilization in 2006. Burton said, “Our task is to establish a new civilization.”
• When his predictions didn’t come true, Burton on a few occasions revised them to dates in the near future, or hinted vaguely that the “events” would occur in the near future — similar to many other cult leaders who predict doomsdays.
• Regarding the doomsday scenarios now imagined by some for the year 2012, the message of fear continues: “Theoretically, we will survive it unharmed,” Burton said in recent months.
• Through cognitive dissonance, followers try to forget the above predictions, or downplay them.
• Like other cults, followers object to the word “cult”, but there’s no better one-word description for this organization in the English language.
• Burton has coerced and seduced several hundred young followers — and perhaps thousands — into having sex with him, using promises of spiritual salvation, expensive gifts, vacations abroad, and entry into the United States for those from other countries. Burton plays on their fears of being outcast from their circle of friends, or being sent back to their home countries.
• Many former and current followers have suffered lasting psychological scars and emotional trauma, and a few have committed suicide. (Read the numerous personal accounts within this blog.)
• In doing the above, Burton has violated the trust of thousands of his followers who were unaware of the extent of his sexual activities within the cult, and unaware of the extent of his deception.
• Burton is a sociopath and malignant narcissist who shows no concern for the welfare of his followers unless they are useful to him in some way. When they cease to be useful to him, he discards them.
• Burton’s “public” persona is often one of a gentle guru who speaks with a soft voice. This personality helps him deceive his followers into believing they have found the one truth path to enlightenment, salvation, and heaven.
• Burton tells his followers that 44 angels, or gods, guide the Fellowship of Friends — and that they guide only the Fellowship of Friends. Angels, he says, do not guide anyone else on earth.
• Burton advances a world view that Hell exists, and that there’s only one way to avoid going to Hell when one dies: Join the Fellowship of Friends, and stay in the Fellowship of Friends until your death. All people on earth who do not join the Fellowship of Friends will go to Hell when they die, Burton says. Likewise, followers are warned that they will go to Hell if they leave the cult, and — to promote his message of fear even more deeply — he frequently implies that leaving the cult may lead to a fate even worse than those who never joined it.
• Followers are discouraged or forbidden from communicating with former members. Those who leave the cult will lose contact with their closest friends within the cult.
• Followers are forbidden to discuss any of the above. If they do discuss these facts with their friends, or question anyone about these facts, they will be expelled. This in turn fosters secrecy and lack of transparency within the cult.
• Burton charges exorbitant membership fees – anywhere from 20% to 40% of income, depending on a person’s salary. The full amount of these fees is never discussed when representatives recruit people. When they join, followers are rarely fully aware of how much they will need to pay in the long term.
• The fees have helped pay for Burton’s extravagant lifestyle, which includes expensive clothing, frequent expensive vacations, and a lavish home at the cult’s compound in Oregon House, California (between Grass Valley and Yuba City).
• Burton and the Fellowship of Friends have been sued by former members on multiple occasions. Most of these suits have been settled out of court, with insurance companies paying the settlement on behalf of the Fellowship of Friends.
• Burton founded the cult in 1970. For more than three decades, he characterized the cult as a so-called “Fourth Way school.” In recent years, the cult has virtually abandoned any discussions about the Fourth Way.
• Because the Fellowship of Friends (also referred to as Pathway to Presence, and Living Presence) has been granted religious status, American taxpayers help pay for this cult.
• In the last four years, several hundred followers have left the Fellowship of Friends, and many followers continue to leave. It’s believed that slightly over 1,000 members remain worldwide, but reliable statistics are not publicly available.
The televangelist Pat Robertson demonstrates an ongoing example of the dangers of using drugs recreationaly. His audience supports his habits. RB is also an example. His students support his habits. Some of his students are also his commercial time and merchandisers(rltblog.com).
I have a lot to say but not enough “free time” to say it today, except; after reading Asaf’s RTL blog I realized that the people that remain in FOF are the ones that if approached by Burton for sexual favors would think to themselves: “well, it would take me out of patterns…”
#5 in new
2011, post 5.
For some, what you describe may be true. But you are coming closer to describing the line that Burton delivers, “Well, it would take you out of patterns…”
I guarantee you that such a casual decision making process is far from true for most. The vast majority of men who have had sex with Burton feel trapped and confused. With the exception of his team of enablers, Fof followers in general (whether they have sex with Burton or not) stay in the fof because they feel trapped. Many people eventually convince themselves that they are not trapped at all, but that they are choosing to stay. Some have trouble convincing themselves of such a lie, so there’s a constant level of angst and confusion and frustration, not knowing who to turn to, and not knowing what to do next. When people are in that state, they can be vulnerable to Burton’s usual nonsense: “You need this for your evolution…”
More than a bit slimy.
http://rltblog.com/about/
‘Start Here’
In a nutshell, we explore the profound destinations of the world. We uncover their roots and offer interpretations of their messages.’
Oh..and how about your interpretations of the shitting bull depicted on the cave wall?
Why don’t you present that one on your blog?
8 X-ray
The whole thing about the FOF is pose and pretence…..a bunch of wankers looking like they know about art and culture and fine living, while at the core they are canniving bastards, wanting Burton’s approval…..
“Dear, you have a strawberry-pink essence with purple polka-dots – please put your cock in my mouth”
con·scious·ness (knshs-ns)
n.
1. The state or condition of being conscious.
2. A sense of one’s personal or collective identity, including the attitudes, beliefs, and sensitivities held by or considered characteristic of an individual or group: Love of freedom runs deep in the national consciousness.
3.
a. Special awareness or sensitivity: class consciousness; race consciousness.
b. Alertness to or concern for a particular issue or situation: a movement aimed at raising the general public’s consciousness of social injustice.
4. In psychoanalysis, the conscious.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
ThesaurusLegend: Synonyms Related Words Antonyms
Noun 1. consciousness – an alert cognitive state in which you are aware of yourself and your situation; “he lost consciousness”
cognitive state, state of mind – the state of a person’s cognitive processes
stream of consciousness – the continuous flow of ideas and feelings that constitute an individual’s conscious experience
self, ego – your consciousness of your own identity
sentience, awareness – state of elementary or undifferentiated consciousness; “the crash intruded on his awareness”
aesthesia, esthesia, sensibility – mental responsiveness and awareness
waking – the state of remaining awake; “days of danger and nights of waking”
unconsciousness – a state lacking normal awareness of the self or environment
2. consciousness – having knowledge of; “he had no awareness of his mistakes”; “his sudden consciousness of the problem he faced”; “their intelligence and general knowingness was impressive”
awareness, cognisance, cognizance, knowingness
self-awareness – awareness of your own individuality
feel – an intuitive awareness; “he has a feel for animals” or “it’s easy when you get the feel of it”;
sense – a general conscious awareness; “a sense of security”; “a sense of happiness”; “a sense of danger”; “a sense of self”
knowing – a clear and certain mental apprehension
Based on WordNet 3.0, Farlex clipart collection. © 2003-2008 Princeton University, Farlex Inc.
consciousness
noun
1. awareness, understanding, knowledge, recognition, enlightenment, sensibility, realization, apprehension. His political consciousness sprang from his upbringing.
2. sentience, awareness, sensibility. She banged her head and lost consciousness.
Quotations
“Consciousness… is the phenomenon whereby the universe’s very existence is made known” [Roger Penrose The Emperor’s New Mind]
con·science (knshns)
n.
1.
a. The awareness of a moral or ethical aspect to one’s conduct together with the urge to prefer right over wrong: Let your conscience be your guide.
b. A source of moral or ethical judgment or pronouncement: a document that serves as the nation’s conscience.
c. Conformity to one’s own sense of right conduct: a person of unflagging conscience.
2. The part of the superego in psychoanalysis that judges the ethical nature of one’s actions and thoughts and then transmits such determinations to the ego for consideration.
self (slf)
n. pl. selves (slvz)
1. The total, essential, or particular being of a person; the individual: “An actor’s instrument is the self” (Joan Juliet Buck).
2. The essential qualities distinguishing one person from another; individuality: “He would walk a little first along the southern walls, shed his European self, fully enter this world” (Howard Kaplan).
3. One’s consciousness of one’s own being or identity; the ego: “For some of us, the self’s natural doubts are given in mesmerizing amplification by way of critics’ negative assessments of our writing” (Joyce Carol Oates).
4. One’s own interests, welfare, or advantage: thinking of self alone.
5. Immunology That which the immune system identifies as belonging to the body: tissues no longer recognized as self.
pron.
Myself, yourself, himself, or herself: a living wage for self and family.
adj.
1. Of the same character throughout.
2. Of the same material as the article with which it is used: a dress with a self belt.
3. Obsolete – Same or identical.
[Middle English, selfsame, from Old English; see s(w)e- in Indo-European roots.]
http://www.elephantjournal.com/2011/04/10-things-we-can-learn-from-the-bizarre-case-of-sai-baba-a-manifesto-on-reality-based-spiritual-empowerment/
With thanks to Bruce for his link…..
Contemporary integrated grown-up spirituality can learn from this and move forward.
We really can create a new paradigm. We really can learn from the past and move this spiritual developmental line to a new level /stage. We really can learn from the mistakes and madness of old world religion that still has so much of the planet in its grips, from the failed experiment of the “enlightened guru” trip, from the pseudoscience extreme relativism of the new age zeitgeist that creates a multicultural smorgasbord of the most superficial and superstitious aspects of every tradition and turns it into a narcissistic, materialistic I-am-the-center-of-the-universe mind game.
We can learn from Sai Baba and all the other corrupt gurus, we can learn from the Catholic Church and it’s legacy of pedophile priests and broken, victimized altar boys. We can learn from the crusades and the inquisition, from sexually repressive, body-hating, dualistic beliefs in every tradition.
We can learn from the understandable pre-scientific confusion of mental illness for prophecy or having a direct line to some supernatural realm. We can learn from the unreasonable projection of the sacred into impossible feats, invisible beings and non-existent realms, and reclaim it instead as being here and now in the world, in ourselves, evidenced by reality, not fantasy.
We can learn about ourselves and our complex layered psyches and the ways in which we even use spirituality to lie to ourselves about what, who and where we are.
And maybe, just maybe, we can stop the madness, sit still, use our powerful capacities for critical thinking and genuine compassion, curiosity and courage, to forge a healthy, grounded, embodied, psychologically aware, practice-based spirituality that is truly healing, nurtures growth and integrates well with what we know about inner and outer reality at this juncture in our marvelous dance across the stage of time and space.
As for Sai Baba – with all the spiritual honesty and compassion in the world I have only one thing to say: good riddance!
Robert Burton vs.Muammar Gaddafi
Both in love with Viagra. With only difference. The Fellowship dictator using it to rape himself and one another, while Libyan dictator using it rape every body else.
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/u-says-gaddafi-troops-raping-issued-viagra-envoys-213303457.html
There are two sides to every story, and even according to their own words on this blog, one of the biggest complaints from those who were willing to prostitute themselves was that they did not get enough in return.
The Master of Bullshit, aptly named.
Well, there were also those who WERE NOT willing to prostitute themselves for anything and these are the people who are speaking here and now.
It’s true that “there are two sides to this story”, it’s also true that in return, while in the circles of the FoF, we/they got money, attention, envy, respect, free food, free fancy hotels, free Armani, free Rolex, free car rental, free Opera, free instant enlightenment; and in addition to that they/we also got bankruptcy, herpes, poor health, chronic manic depression, endless hours of therapy, poverty, divorce, schizophrenia, unremitting grief, a multitude of neurosis, phobias and disorders, low self-esteem, chemotherapy, loss of hair, loss of teeth, loss of friends, loss of family, loss of limbs, even loss of life! … You call that “not enough in return”?
Good point, J.D. And many of those who’ve been thru the loses were actually good people who did their best trying to become even better, not every one was a whore in the fof.
But you right, there are two sides to the FOF: either you fuck or you get fucked.
19. J. D. – April 30, 2011:
‘It’s true that “there are two sides to this story”, it’s also true that in return, while in the circles of the FoF, we/they got money. . .’
You forgot to mention: free sex, free K-Y Jelly and/or olive oil, free wine, free living quarters, free attendance at many events that others in FoF had to pay $$$ to go to, free green cards, free residence in USA, free marriages of convenience, free status as religious ministers and/or religious workers, free health care, free legal services, free international travel, free real estate, free hand-me-down clothing, free prostitutes, etc. – aaah! the perks of the inner circle.
Almost forgot: free Viagra and other sex enhancing medications, either prescription (controlled substances) or otherwise.
Yes, you forgot about an opioid Darvon, which has been prescribed to Burton for decades by one of his inner circle psychiatrists whose license must be revoked immediately and farther actions taken according to the law.
From Wikipedia…..
“Dextropropoxyphene, like codeine, is a weak opioid, known to cause dependency among recreational users. Codeine is more commonly used; however, as codeine is, in essence, a prodrug that requires in vivo metabolism to the more active opioid morphine for maximum efficacy, it is ineffective for some individuals with the “poor metabolizer” genotype of the liver cytochrome P450 enzyme CYP2D6. It is in people with this low-function isoform of the CYP2D6 gene that dextropropoxyphene is particularly useful, as its metabolism does not require CYP2D6. It is also used for patients with digestive complaints as it is less liable to worsen their symptoms.”
Excerpt from:
10 Things we can Learn from the Bizarre Case of. . .
http://www.elephantjournal.com/2011/04/10-things-we-can-learn-from-the-bizarre-case-of-sai-baba-a-manifesto-on-reality-based-spiritual-empowerment/
‘Even if he did it, it was probably a way of helping them to become more enlightened, we cannot judge him from our unenlightened consciousness.
How could that be possible, he is a holy man – they must be making it up.
Perhaps he did it, perhaps he was a pedophile, but we must separate the man from the divine spirit he embodied, or we must separate the teacher from the teachings.
All of this, I offer, stems from an unwillingness to face the truth, out of a desire to protect magical fantasies, and ironically perpetuates the dark and seedy underbelly of criminal corruption and soul-destroying trauma.
Something has gone wrong when we do not hold holy men accountable to the same basic standards of behavior we expect from ordinary citizens.’
26. Ill Never Tell – May 1, 2011
‘Even if he did it, it was probably a way of helping them to become more enlightened, we cannot judge him from our unenlightened consciousness.’
OH yeah.. the lower can’t see the higher.. I remember this crap..
All cults the same, no difference whatsoever.
What could happen (copied and pasted)…..
“Cults and Cult Leaders
A cult is generally described as a close group of people that associate their beliefs and practices with ideas outside of the mainstream beliefs that are held by society. The word ‘cult’ is sometimes used in a disparaging way to describe a group of misled people who are willing to do whatever a cult leader instructs them to do.
A cult differs from religion by this simple fact: a religion is a tradition that is passed down through generations of family and society, while a cult is created for a specific purpose, usually led by a single leader who takes control of the cult member’s lives.
Cults are made of a group of people that follow the dictates of a leader. A cult leader will condition the followers with emotional manipulation, making the cult members trust and believe in the cult leader with unquestioning faith.
Many people, from all walks of life are attracted to cults, either because of a need to belong to a group that they feel they identify with or because they are manipulated in many ways to give up their freedom for the sake of the group and it’s leader. Cults can be dangerous to society, as cult leaders can be controlling and manipulative, destroying peoples lives in their quest to lead and to be followed. Doomsday Cults hold the dangerous belief that the end of the world is approaching, so the members may take their own life in preparation, or take the lives of others in their quest to transcend life on earth.
Jim Jones, and the “People’s Church”
Some people who lead cults begin with a life of religion and take it to the extreme. One such example, is the Jonestown cult, which started out as a Christian social reform group, and turned into one of largest mass-suicide cults of the 20th century.
Jim Jones, Cult Leader
The cult leader Jim Jones was a charismatic man who was very passionate about religion and idealism. He became an ordained minister in 1950. He founded a church group in Indiana, called the Peoples Temple Full Gospel Church. He created a social belief system, called Apolistic Socialism.
In 1978, Jim Jones, organized a group of followers and called it The Peoples Temple Church. The Peoples Temple Church was eventually moved to San Fransisco. By then it had over a thousand followers. These people believed in Jim and accepted him as a father figure and called him “Dad”. When the church was investigated by the IRS, it moved to Guyana, South America, where Jones created a settlement with his cult members that he named Jonestown.
His claims that he was the incarnation of Jesus, Buddha, Lenin and, ‘Father Divine’, brought him many people who believed in his supposed powers of healing. He catered to and accepted members of the African-American community, and the group became more cult-like and less Christian over time.
This settlement was to be a racist-free society based on agriculture, and the principles of communism. He was even praised for helping out the local poor black community as a benefit. After the move from San Fransisco, the organization began to fall apart, as Jone’s schemes and his drug addiction to Phenobarbital was uncovered by members of the group. Eventually, some people had been outcast or they had left the group because they were in fear for their lives, and in fear for the lives of others in the group. Unfortunately when people who had left the cult went to the authorities revealing information about beatings, brutality, and the plan of taking their own life through suicide, they were not believed.
The Fall of Jonestown
Finally, in 1978 the US congress lead a delegation team led by Congressman Leo Ryan to investigate the claims of violation of human rights within the Jones cult. For three days, members of Jonestown were interviewed, and on the third day the team left after an assassination attempt on Jone’s life was made. The team was able to talk twenty members of the cult into leaving with them, but as the group members were boarding the plane, bullets were flying as they were being shot at by some of the Jonestown compound guards.
Five people died as they were trying to board the plane. Later on, all 914 people in the Jonestown cult ended their lives by drinking “Grape Flavor-Aid laced with cyanide”. Jones ended his life when he shot himself in the head while sitting in his chair.
History reminds us that the human will is easily led astray by hopes and desires to have something to believe in. A cult leader will operate a group based on mind control to serve a personal agenda, because of power, money, glory, or just to feed a maniacal ego. When the cult leader has gained control, the group becomes like a unit – an extension of the cult leader’s will.”
The most dangerous man in the world: the one who says, “I have answers.”
The danger spans a scale that indicates, on its lowest side, a silly man who is a danger only to himself, with his special form of confident delusion; it continues up to the genuine predators, exploiting humans’ need for answers to satisfy his own demented and conscience-free cravings.
Robert Burton must have been beside himself when he realized that he could form a “school” based on the fourth way, a system that purports to answer just about everything. On the one hand, you have a group of people who sincerely and desperately are seeking answers. On the other, you have a predator with a fabricated system of knowledge that provides him the information he needs to play the role of answerer in chief. And so the exploitation began…
The dangerous men are easy to spot once you’ve been burned. They can never help themselves, in their desire to be viewed as “one who knows,” and at every opportunity they spout ideas with certainty, which they have absolutely no way of knowing.
Perhaps the fourth way was Gurdjieff’s biggest joke, and a public service offering. He wove in bits of plausible spirituality with utter nonsense, like the stuff about the role of the moon. That way when the would-be guru starts spouting that foolishness, they give themselves away as buffoons to just about everybody with a functioning critical mind. It’s like a big sign hanging around their neck, or a scarlet letter, saying, “avoid me, I am a dangerous man.” Just how dangerous remains to be seen.
This e-mail has appeared on the FoF media channel:
“Ola friends!
I am Carey, a young man who came to Apollo & joined the Fellowship of Friends in Mid-March. I have been working in the Garden & riding my bike around the property.
Thank you to everyone who has been so welcoming!
Over several years I have created a project called (WORD POWER!)along with a User Guide to help people make the best of it.
I share them with you now because I believe they will be helpful for you & anyone you influence, in the process of realizing all we are.
They are normally for $ale on my website
http://www.words-of-power.info
but I am providing them to you as ‘presents of Presence’…
So here is the link to the download page:
http://www.WORDS-OF-POWER.info/download-WORD-POWER.html
I have listened to certain ‘miracle music’ while doing a lot of this,
& I am seeing amazing synchronicity between that music & the values of the Fellowship, so I will name some of it here in case you are interested:
Artist / Album / Song
Capitanata / Amore e Buona Energia (Love & Good Energy) / Divinity
Divino with Aeoliah / The Magic Presence / Venus Rising
Divino / Visions of Love / Celestial Awakening
IASOS / Javanese Dream Bells
Ivo Sedlacek & Gandharva Choir / OM / Harmony
I hope you find this valuable;
ENJOY!
Sincerely with Love,
Carey ”
(I kid you not! These are the people who join the FoF; the new litter: don’t sweat it, there’s nothing new or different.)
And then I came across this other gem:
http://nondualityliving.com/
As you enter the site the author welcomes you with these words:
“Exploring what it’s like to serve truth in everyday living.”
“In my writing, I show little interest in cooking up a “story” and add only so much sweetening in words as it takes to wash down a nourishing content. This content is more than ideas and ideals; it’s our wordless Resonate Knowing or Divine Awareness…Reality, Truth, God.”
(Let’s serve the truth, let’s not cook up a ‘story’, … let’s talk about God!! And let’s use some irrefutable adjectives to make it even truer! I’ve seen it work before…)
In “My story” the author writes:
“Let’s fast forward to when it all came down! Now here, at the point of a personal 9/11, words also collapse, are reduced like “me” to skin and bones. Let’s just say that my ego carcass and its world, which I thought was “me” and “mine,” painfully plummeted to the ground and was precisely picked apart by the crows of reality with sharp beaks strong as truth!
Honestly, it wasn’t that much of a drama.”
(What? You call “The carcass of the ego plummeted painfully to the ground and picked apart by the crows with sharp beaks strong as…” not much of a drama?)
He continues: “It happened quite simply. I had quit a long Spiritual search,”
(Maybe the author refers to the twenty-ish years spent in the FoF: quite a spiritual search, I’ll say. Note the analogy FoF-9/11, a literal vicious attack to one’s own common sense.)
“I was sitting silently at a sangha, tired, limp and empty, listening but not “listening”… In hindsight, let me put it this way: there was a looking away, a mindless allowing which had not occurred before, accompanied with a sudden cognition and simple recognition –knowing, that this that is, is reality.”
(It was “mindless” all right. The mind would be really offended if it was considered responsible of this doing. I also beg to differ that the same “mindless allowing” “had not occurred before”, in fact it occurred when he and everybody else joined the FoF.)
I wonder why the author omitted this unimportant insignificant detail.
Was it forgetfulness? Was it embarrassment or even shame? Was it another one of those ‘looking away’ moments? Was it humiliation? Was it pride or dignity? Was it denial or delusion? Or was it just inconsequential?
Why, when it comes to admit that we fucked-up, we listened and we followed,it is so difficult to own it?
What is the difference between the happy-go-lucky new student Carey, with his FoF and his ‘Word Power’ and the latter with his memory blocks and Divine Awareness? Twenty years in the FoF.
Besides parting ways with a cock-ivore dictatorial spiritual guide, looking at the results there is not much difference. People are what they are and they want to believe no matter what. Getting in or going out of a cult, from Word Power to Wordless Breaths, from ‘C’ Influence to the Universe, from Divine Presence to Divine Awareness… it is quite an improvement!
The important thing is to pose as an enlightened winner.
29. surelyujest – May 2, 2011
‘The most dangerous man in the world: the one who says, “I have answers.” ‘
Well, not all the people are stupid in this world and there are those who do have the answers but what answers can have a drug and sex addict Burton is the question.
You know, if you think about it, if you have some sincere questions about life on planet earth, the chances are far greater that a delusional madman will profess to have the answers than that someone who actually knows will come forward to help.
Q. How to tell the difference?
A. Sex, drugs, money & power have nothing to do with it.
32 Agent 45
I have said before – misogyny is the killer of mankind – no respect for the female/creative nature. Where do you think REB stands with regard to this statement?…..Nigel.
For those of you who have recently left the Fellowship, try to relax into the “self-loathing”. If you had a speck of it when you joined, Robert wouldn’t rest until he sniffed it out and presented it to you as a “present”. Surprise!No need to be depressed. Just get into it, understand something about yourself and grow deeper from your understanding.
Disappointment with oneself is really just the other side of self -love. Both are a preoccupation with ‘self’.
34 silentpurr
God!…..You can say that again. Certainly do not feel you could have done more for the cult…..Nigel.
Nigel Dude –
The above list is pretty much a complete listing of automatically disqualifing factors.
I see nothing wrong with showing a little deference to the ladies. After all they are the fairer sex and if Momma ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.
32/36 Agent 45
Your list is pretty much a description of what happens in a cult, as a microcosm of all that is wrong with humanity in general. I am not sure I would have been so fucked up in my head if I had not joined the FOF and had needed psychotherapy (not including the drugs I need to take for bipolar disorder) for the many years I have had it. It is no use saying that, of course, because it was part of my fate and I opened myself up to ‘a million demons’ by joining. Where we stand now is important and what we can give to the blog to help others who feel ‘strangled’ by the cult matters…..Nigel.
Bullshit Master:
“…according to their own words on this blog, one of the biggest complaints from those who were willing to prostitute themselves was that they did not get enough in return.”
Wow, that is pure, gold alchemy bullshit.
I’ve been on the blog for quite some time and don’t recall any such complaints from my peers. Would you care to cite any?
Oh, I got quite enough in return. In fact, that’s why I left. I’d had enough bullshit (never mind the rhino shit of the latter days).
Burton is very generous with his emotional abuse; he spares nobody, not even his mother.
Is Burton’s paradise a place where entrance is dependant upon the tweaking and compromising of one’s morals and values to serve his mania as either his prostitute or his pimp?
If there is a paradise available in the afterlife, doesn’t spirituality teach us the opposite, that entrance into paradise is dependent upon living at the highest possible moral standard and not at the lowest?
Or rather is Burton’s self-serving version of paradise simply part of a sociopathic delusional system that he shares with his followers?
Funny how you describe me as a person “willing to prostitute myself”…ostensibly because I was under the delusion like you that by compromising my dignity I’d grow a soul in return…do you use that term loosely because no one will believe a prostitute when they claim that they were raped?
Don’t know about you guys, but this new moon was an absolute shit period for me. My business took a nose-dive and I went into depressed mode. Luckily, I have my music…..hopefully, someone can translate the Italian for us in this Andrea Bocelli song…..’Because We Believe’…..
“Guarda fuori è già mattina
Questo è un giorno che ricorderai
Alzati in fretta e vai
C’è chi crede in te
Non ti arrendere
Once in every life
There comes a time
We walk out all alone
And into the light
The moment won’t last but then,
We remember it again
When we close our eyes.
Like stars across the sky
E per avvincere
Tu dovrai vincere
We were born to shine
All of us here because we believe
Guarda avanti e non voltarti mai
Accarezza con i sogni tuoi
Le tue speranze e poi
Verso il giorno che verrà
C’è un traguardo là
Like stars across the sky
E per avvincere
Tu dovrai vincere
We were born to shine
All of us here because we believe
Non arrenderti
Qualcuno è con te
Like stars across the sky
We were born to shine
E per avvincere
Dovrai vincere
E allora vincerai.”
I think Bruce have said it best in post 17.
Whalerider, you have to go back years and years but they are there.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42928874/ns/world_news-death_of_bin_laden/?GT1=43001
Check under “humble bin Laden”, some common traits of cult leaders.
who is that minister?
43. veramente – May 6, 2011
Oh give me a break! A known womanizer ministering a marriage?
Now let me tell you few things here:
Burton forced Edit to marry Dorian so Dorian will get a green card, now Dorian is marrying Carmina to make her green card so later Burton can have Carmina marryinb anyone of Burton choice to expand his harem.
These people have to be charged with immigration fraud starting from Asaf!
44 X-ray
Has anyone told the authorities, not just us on the blog, about this immigration fraud situation? It seems it may not be a case of a recently exploited Burton-male-prostitute (sorry, cannot think of a ‘nicer’ description) bringing a lawsuit within limited statutes (i.e. promptly). This is something that can be done NOW by anyone who has CHANNELS TO THE EVIDENCE!!!!!
(And by the way, at my friend Alastair’s funeral today, the closing music was – ‘Hotel California’, which seemed to me that we cannot stop thinking about what OBJECTS OF DEAD-MEAT AND DEAD-SOULS LIKE ROBERT EARL BURTON ARE DOING as we go about our own lives, eh X-ray?????…..Nigel)
The Master of Bullshit:
“…you have to go back years and years but they are there.”
Sounds like the process of verifabrication if you ask me; sign of an imbalanced and lazy intellect.
When the unconscious mind incorporates a belief, even an erroneous one (like Saddam had something to do with 9-11 or Robert Burton is a conscious being on a different level than the rest of us) it will deny all evidence to the contrary.
As you can probably guess, VERIFABRICATION is not a dictionary word. However, I found an interesting post from a year ago…..
“What You Should Know About Robert Burton and the Fellowship of Friends – January 18, 2010
• It’s a doomsday cult.
• The predicted doomsday never came.
• Burton predicted major catastrophes for 1984 and 1998, and then nuclear war for 2006. For decades, he predicted the Fellowship of Friends would become the beginning of a new civilization in 2006. Burton said, “Our task is to establish a new civilization.”
• Through cognitive dissonance, followers try to forget the above predictions, or downplay them.
• Like other cults, followers object to the word “cult.” But there’s no better one-word description for this organization in the English language.
• Burton has coerced and seduced several hundred young followers — and perhaps thousands — into having sex with him, using promises of spiritual salvation, expensive gifts, vacations abroad, as well as playing on their fears of being outcast from their circle of friends. As a result, many former and current followers have suffered lasting psychological scars and emotional trauma, and a few have committed suicide. (Read the numerous personal accounts within this blog.)
• In doing the above, Burton has violated the trust of thousands of his followers who were unaware of the extent of his sexual activities within the cult, and unaware of the extent of his deception.
• Burton is a sociopath and malignant narcissist who shows no concern for the welfare of his followers unless they are useful to him in some way. When they cease to be useful to him, he discards them.
• Burton’s “public” persona is one of a gentle guru who speaks with a soft voice. This personality helps him deceive his followers into believing they have found the one truth path to enlightenment, salvation, and heaven.
• Burton tells his followers that 44 angels, or gods, guide the Fellowship of Friends — and that they guide only the Fellowship of Friends. Angels, he says, do not guide anyone else on earth.
• Burton advances a world view that Hell exists, and that there’s only one way to avoid going to Hell when one dies: Join the Fellowship of Friends, and stay in the Fellowship of Friends until your death. All people on earth who do not join the Fellowship of Friends will go to Hell when they die. Likewise, followers are warned that they will go to Hell if they leave the cult.
• Followers are discouraged or forbidden from communicating with former members. Those who leave the cult will lose contact with their closest friends within the cult.
• Followers are forbidden to discuss any of the above. If they do discuss these facts with their friends, or question anyone about these facts, they will be expelled. This in turn fosters secrecy and lack of transparency within the cult.
• People outside the cult who try to provide the above information to followers within it are intimidated or threatened with legal retaliation, much like the Scientology cult.
• Burton charges exorbitant membership fees – anywhere from 20% to 40% of income, depending on a person’s salary. The full amount of these fees is never discussed when representatives try to sell people on joining the cult.
• The fees have helped pay for Burton’s extravagant lifestyle, which includes expensive clothing, frequent expensive vacations, and a lavish home at the cult’s compound in Oregon House, California (between Grass Valley and Yuba City).
• Burton and the Fellowship of Friends have been sued by former members on multiple occasions. Most of these suits have been settled out of court, with insurance companies paying the settlement on behalf of the Fellowship of Friends.
• Burton founded the cult in 1970. For more than three decades, he characterized the cult as a so-called “Fourth Way school.” In recent years, the cult has virtually abandoned any discussions about the Fourth Way.
• Because the Fellowship of Friends (also referred to as Pathway to Presence) has been granted religious status, American taxpayers help pay for this cult.
• In the last four years, several hundred followers have left the Fellowship of Friends, and many followers continue to leave. It’s believed that slightly over 1,000 members remain worldwide, but reliable statistics are not publicly available.”
Use your own knowledge of your current/former membership to provide yourself with answers to questions you may have about the above…..Nigel.
Nigel:
“…insight into dopamine/serotonin floods, which I experience in hypo-mania.”
An example of this flooding of the nervous system is the process of ‘love-bombing’ practiced in cults.
“As soon as any interest is shown by the recruits, they may be love bombed by the recruiter or other cult members. This process of feigning friendship and interest in the recruit was originally associated with one of the early youth cults, but soon it was taken up by a number of groups as part of their program for luring people in.
Love bombing…involves long-term members’ flooding recruits and newer members with flattery, verbal seduction, affectionate but usually nonsexual touching, and lots of attention to their every remark. Love bombing – or the offer of instant companionship – is a deceptive ploy accounting for many successful recruitment drives.”
“Cults in Our Midst”, 1996, Dr. Margaret Singer, PhD.
FYI, the difference between hypomania and full blown mania is the absence of psychosis and grandiosity in the hypomanic state.
As you well know, the psychosis in a full blown manic episode can be dangerous and often requires medication to manage.
Hypomania can occur in most people without detrimental effects and can be the source of increased energy, creativity and productivity.
In fact, an argument can be made that a high intensity-high control cult like the Fellowship of Friends, AKA Pathway to Presence, thrives upon fostering and maintaining a hypomanic state among its members, employing techniques such as love bombing, large gatherings of people, and apocalyptic predictions of the imminent cataclysmic destruction or partial destruction of the world.
One of the side effects of antidepressants is hypomania.
(This is why mood stabilizers like depakote are usually prescribed to go along with antidepressants when there is underlying Bipolar Disorder present in a patient…hypomania in BiPD can trigger mania.)
So it would follow that antidepressant use would be prevalent in the Fellowship.
…which begs the question: is the “intensity” of hypomania associated with “self-remembering”, whether produced through circumstances, drugs, or as a consequence of mental illness truely a sign of enlightenment?
A person is just as likely to receive insight and spiritual guidance from within during a restful meditative state, than during a hypomanic state produced environmentally in a high intensity/high control cult.
The difference is: a person can practice meditation independently of a group, and thus retains more self-control and self-empowerment than a person whose so called, “higher state” is dependant upon cult membership and participation.
Burton often characterized practices such as “TM” as “transcendental imagination”.
Burton’s cult teaches its members to mistrust themselves through psychological compartmentalization…the lower self against the higher self.
Does one really benefit from chasing the hypomanic, “higher” state?
Seems like an imbalance to me, which could easily flip into its opposite, depression, hence the need for antidepressants in the FOF to fill the void.
Nige,
There are enough evidence of a tax fraud, immigration fraud, insurance fraud (bistro), power abuse and sex assaults, to lock Burton in jail forever and he knows that and his lawyers knows that, that’s why they sitting quite in their hole, hoping that we will ‘move on’ leaving them to themselves and their dirty business.
Hey, has anyone sent a copy of that long expose/letter from what’s his name (FOF lawyer…is it Braverman?) to the FBI? Because…read this. A lawyer for these guys also wrote a letter that the FBI got hold of that basically said the same thing, and now they’re under active investigation.
http://gawker.com/#!5799472/kabbalah-centre-and-madonna-charity-under-criminal-investigation-for-tax-evasion
I did my best but obviously not good enough.
Why don’t we do it together today and tomorrow?
All of us copy/paste the David L. letter to the FBI once again.
If they got busy digging that Kabbalah thing, they would be over their heads with criminal findings when they get to the fellowship Burton.
brucelevy and x-ray…excellent idea!
I’ll help
Then write them providing all links.
For those who missed it:
A letter from D…d L.bb..s/Spr..gf..ld to the Fellowship Board
1. black marker – May 20, 2009
Da..d Spring…ld, Attorney at Law November 19, 2007
To All Board Members of the Fellowship of Friends, Inc. and Giova.ni Bu.co
Re: No Further Legal Representation
Dear Board Members and Giova.ni
I am not sending this letter because I like writing of these matters or because I want to repeat what has already been stated repeatedly by both Abraham and me. This letter is written because of my professional obligations and my personal obligations to the School. My professional responsibilities require me to send this letter to confirm again that I will provide no further legal services to the Fellowship of Friends, and have stopped working on all ongoing legal matters that I was involved with. This letter also advises you to immediately work with Abraham Goldman and/or other legal counsel to handle the legal work I was involved in and to address other ongoing and/or upcoming legal matters that I will outline in this letter. The recent board activities have been covered in a number of letters and emails by Abraham and me. None of the communications were ever acknowledged or responded to by any board member. As you know, Abraham and I were instructed to stop all legal work.
First, a directive was issued on November 3, 2007, via email, on behalf of Et..n Har..s, Chairman of the Board, through R.se Ke.n.dy S.afer Vice Chairman of the Board, without explanation, question, or discussion. My emails and letter of November 6, 2007, about this heavy-handed and improper directive were ignored by all board members.
Next, I wrote to Li.da T.li.so who ignored my question about what to do about the ongoing legal work but was ignored. After learning about the secret board meeting and illegal vote that took place on or about November 10, 2007, I talked with Li.da T.li.so the President in person at her
office on November 13, 2007. Linda confirmed the secret vote of the Board (although both W.yne Mo.t and Al.n Sc.wa.tzbe.g lied that no other “crisis team” members voted at the secret Board meeting) and Linda instructed me to suspend all my legal work. I confirmed this in a letter dated November 13, 2007 that has also been copied to all of you. There was no response to this letter from anyone.
On November 18, 2007, I was voted off the Board of Directors. Now, no longer working as attorney, nor being able to act as a member of the Board, I will be unable to assist the Fellowship with any legal work or offer any oversight. All of this occurred after one week of false and contradictory statements by W.yne Mo.t, Al.n Sc.wa.tzbe.g, Et.an Ha.ris and others about the secret board meeting where this was already decided in advance. Only G.eg Hol.an acknowledged yesterday that the secret Board meeting was improper and that he wished that matters would have been done openly and correctly.
The failure by almost all of the Board members to even have the decency or honesty to acknowledge a secret Board meeting was held and a secret vote taken (to vote the lawyers off the Board), without any opportunity to address the issues by the persons involved is below the level of school work for any student, let alone a board member with responsibility for our church.
Al.n Sc.warzbe.g’s refusal to show the minutes of the secret Board meeting, and subsequent refusal to return my many calls and emails, is conduct that is highly irregular for the Secretary of the Corporation and the Board of Directors. To date, I still have not obtained a copy of the “RESOLUTION OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS” that I personally saw when both Alan and Wayne in heavy-handed fashion informed Abe and myself, on November 12, 2007, we were voted off the Board.
It is my feeling that what occurred over the last three weeks is a combination of crime, gross carelessness and ignorance of almost all Board members. In my opinion, serious crimes have likely been committed and are possibly continuing to be committed by current members on the Board. This should be addressed immediately. As I wrote about in my letter of November 6, 2007, the requirement of legal compliance and checks and balances within our organization needs urgent attention. The Board has been for some time but a passive “rubber-stamp” board without active or meaningful oversight. This almost complete inaction may create the impression of the Fellowship as a criminal organization that is functioning as the later ego of Robert Burton, involved in a conspiracy to engage in financial, tax and immigration fraud, and perhaps other illegal activities and/or tortuous conduct.
Responding to a call from Mr.Margalli? this morning, I gave him my impressions of yesterday’s Board meeting. Mr. Margalli? suggested I write a confirming letter and cover the ongoing legal work that you must all appreciate should be addressed immediately.
This list does not purport to cover all of the areas that need immediate and significant work, and you should immediately consult with Abraham and all other lawyers for the Fellowship.
The legal work I have been involved in covers the following areas:
1. Immigration. Ongoing assessment and evaluations of the needs and requirements of our religious programs/individual’s status and possible need to go back to their country of origin. I will notify Mr. Shusterman of the fact I will be no longer working with him on behalf of the Fellowship. I was also working with a number of individual students who would call with questions in the last months.
2. Financial Compliance. This is critical and should be a top priority. You have knowingly allowed having a system in place where the CFO is made responsible but essentially helpless and without authority. The CFO is not being consulted in important decisions. The Fellowship’s financial activities, in my opinion, could be seen as criminal conspiracy to commit tax fraud and private inurement benefiting Robert and a number of other individuals (including possibly some Board members) and could be considered a fraud on the government. The status as a non profit corporation could well be in serious danger.
3. Investigation/Monitoring of Blog?GF/PR, etc. Several times this year I have written to Youtube or other websites to have offending material taken off line. This has been largely successful. I also have conducted an investigation into aspects of the Blog and some individuals with the aim to allow us to file suit for defamation and/or invasion of privacy if and when appropriate. I have worked on obtaining PR consultations for which then no funding was purportedly available. (Nic.ol.s Spa.ldi.g who was helping in this area, was threatened by Et.an Har.is to stop working with Abraham and myself) This area should be a major concern for the Board which has been almost totally unresponsive.
4. It was our diligent monitoring of the blog that put us on notice that A.af Brave.man’s arranged (by Fellowship officers and/or agents) fraudulent marriage to Elisa.et.a da Ros was being exposed to the world. This finally stimulated action in this area but more is needed. I will no longer monitor the Blogs or any other sites, in any language, and will no longer assist with analysis and efforts to bring these matters into compliance. A lot more needs to be done in this area for many involved.
5. Insurance. We were working on a review of all materials from the Internet and other sources that could constitute a claim (including foreign websites). I wrote about this before as well. Insurance could possibly pay for some of the costs incurred, including legal costs. I will stop all my work on this claim process, including any work on the research into the bad faith claim aspect of the insurance which I wrote about before. TIme may be of the utmost essence. See my letter of November 6, 2007.
6. Other matters: There are outstanding million dollar judgments from the Ming litigation era that will need to be renewed in the next years, if the Fellowship wants to collect on them. I had this calendared for a review in January 2008, 10 years after the first settlements and judgments were obtained. Given the success we have had collecting from various parties, I would consider this an important item to follow up on. I will no longer take any action in this area either.
In short, the overall picture is in my opinion that the Fellowship itself, Robert, and a number of our friends, including several board members and officers, continue to be in potential legal jeopardy and liability.
With the information, according to what I gathered from my investigation, shared by certain former members to various agencies, I cannot envision that there will not be a government investigation and/or lawsuit in the planning/preparation stages with possibly serious consequences for the Fellowship, the Board of Directors, Robert and possibly a number of individual students, including possibly individual Board members.
A fully professional and active compliance team to put matters straight must be created. This team would need to be working daily, hands on, with the supervision and input from professionals. The existing irregularities cannot be hidden from the people that need to help bring us into compliance.
Again, I am no longer acting as the Fellowship’s attorney. Immediate attention is required to the numerous outstanding legal issues facing the Fellowship. You are advised to consult with legal counsel immediately.
Thank you for your time and consideration to these important matters. Do not hesitate to call if you have any questions.
Very truly yours, Dav.d Spri.gfield
cc. Robert E. Burton ??? Abraham Gold.an, Esq.
Thank you Bruce.
”The Times has one detail that doesn’t bode well for the Bergs: Investigators have uncovered an August 2010 email from the Kabbalah Centre’s former chief financial officer that basically lays out the case for fraud and tax evasion.”
http://gawker.com/#!5799472/kabbalah-centre-and-madonna-charity-under-criminal-investigation-for-tax-evasion
Compare this little simple letter by Kabbalah Centre’s former chief financial officer to a much more revealing letter by the former fellowship attorney D.L/S.
I mean if I would be investigator, this fellowship letter would keep my up at nights working on the case.
REPORTING A CRIME IS NOT A CRIME!
Nige, did you contact FBI and IRS?
Bruce, Whale and others, did you guys contact FBI and IRS?
Because I have and I would like to know if you guys had the balls to do the same.
57 X-ray
Had the balls but ran out of printer ink and money to buy new. My letter (modified), Springfield letter (saved to memory stick) and completely readable version of petition (saved to memory stick) will be sent to all four recipients – Custom and Border Patrol, Department of Homeland Security, US Immigration and FBI when I can afford to send them. Sorry about the poverty – artistic Solar still prevails…..Nigel.
Dear Nigel,
I understand that you are attaching both letters to the petition. I have seen the Springfield letter. Could you please print your letter (final version) here before sending it?
Just for starters, if you are considering…..
How Do You Report Suspected Tax Fraud Activity?
If you suspect or know of an individual or company that is not complying with the tax laws, you may report this activity by completing Form 3949-A. You may fill out Form 3949-A online, print it and mail it to:
Internal Revenue Service
Fresno, CA 93888
If you do not wish to use Form 3949-A, you may send a letter to the address above. Please include the following information, if available:
*Name and address of the person you are reporting
*The taxpayer identification number (social security number for an individual or employer identification number for a business)
*A brief description of the alleged violation, including how you became aware of or obtained the information
*The years involved
*The estimated dollar amount of any unreported income
*Your name, address and daytime telephone number
*Although you are not required to identify yourself, it is helpful to do so. Your identity can be kept confidential.
To continue…..
Customs and Border Patrol Headquarters
(07/14/2010)1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20229
Commissioner
Alan Bersin
More…..
Secretary Janet Napolitano
Department of Homeland Security
U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Washington, D.C. 20528
For other department staff
U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Washington, D.C. 20528
And yet more…..
Director John Morton
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
500 12th St., SW
Washington, D.C. 20536
And finally…..
Herbert M Brown
Special Agent in Charge
FBI Sacramento
4500 Orange Grove
Sacramento, CA 95841
Phone: (916) 481-9110
Fax: (916) 977-2300
Nige,
While you waiting for your printer, you can send emails or submit ‘tips’ to FBI and IRS as well. But I am glad that some people are doing here something. And while people like silentpurr waiting for the quotation mark removel on the Petition, Burton traveling around with his male prostitutes buying them Armanies and paying for their blow jobs with the money coming from ‘donations’ of his students.
Burton and his monkeys are criminals who must be brought to justice and all of you who are aware of his crimes and prefer to shut up – are his partners in crimes, both legally and morally.
#60 was held up in moderation
66 X-ray
I will look into the email thing although I do not have personal information to give (most of the people on the blog who were close enough to REB’s sex-club, money-squandering, immigration-illegalities and so on have told their stories and should email the appropriate department). However, I do feel that hard-copy sent by courier will have some ‘clout’. I have experience in writing in a business-like manner and hope that will influence the recipient. We can only do what we can, in the best way possible and, as my barrister-friend, Gavin, says…..
“If the authorities have the least inkling of illegalities in the FOF, they will take their time investigating then descend on the cult like a ton of bricks. The clock is slowly ticking down…..”
60 Golden Veil
I appreciate your wishing to see my personal-attached letter to the Springfield letter and Petition. I am guessing it was you who wished me to change it the first time around but, apart from a few amendments, I am pleased with what I have written and feel it will be well-received. Here is the slightly revised version…..
………. 2011
Herbert M Brown
Special Agent in Charge
Federal Bureau of Investigation
4500 Orange Grove
SACRAMENTO
California 95841
United States of America
Dear Mr Brown
I am writing as a former member of the Fellowship of Friends ‘church’, which many, like myself, now uphold to be a ‘cult’, since many cases of impropriety, illegal activity and pure evil have been ‘unearthed’ by former members of the group on the Fellowship of Friends Discussion/Pathway to Presence Blogsite.
We are trying as much as possible to put pressure on authorities (the FBI included) to look into all these ‘wrongdoings’, since we wish no more people to be hurt by the leader, Robert Earl Burton, the enablers including Girard Haven and many power-hungry individuals in the group.
I was a member from January 1978 to June 1989 and left the group as a result of a suicide attempt, because of all the financial pressures that the Fellowship put upon me, causing me to plunge into debt to the tune of over $30,000.
Illegalities we would like to see investigated are:-
Illegal Immigration
Inurnment of funds by the leader and enablers
Tax fraud
Sexual Assault by Robert Earl Burton
Employment Laws
Other Unlawful Activities
I have included a copy of a letter from a former lawyer for the group and a petition that was set up to try to propel activity to have the Fellowship investigated.
Please feel free to contact me.
Nigel Harris Price BA Hons, Cert Ed
nhprice@gmail.com
011 (44) 1392 462103
I have completely rid the petition and accompanying letters of inconsistent quotation marks and enclose the recommendation of investigation here. If anyone wants to do that for themselves (I will not do others work and take up blog-space and I do believe I posted it in full before – no time for lazy buggers) you can copy to word and painstakingly alter the marks before you use it in the way that suites you best…..Nigel.
The Fellowship of Friends Investigation.
To: all appropriate regulating agencies and elected officials of the State of California and the United States of America. World news media, and all world citizens concerned with abuses of religious power.
Petition:
“We are past members of the Fellowship of Friends, an organization operating as a ‘church’ in the rural Sierra Nevada foothills of California. It is dominated and controlled by a man named Robert Earl Burton. Our petition asks for an official investigation into the practices and character of his organization. The charges are documented by personal accounts declared pursuant to California law and under penalty of perjury.
We estimate there are about 15,000 former members worldwide, with current membership estimated at 1600. The long-term influence of this organization can result in the exploitation of its members, the consequences of which are often poor physical and/or mental health, financial ruin and moral devastation. These damaging results are documented.
Robert Burton calls himself a spiritual teacher and compares himself to Jesus, Buddha and Moses. He uses charisma, persuasion, psychological manipulation and coercion to drive large ‘donations’ of labor, money and assets to support the ‘church’. It is documented that these donations are used largely to fund his extravagant lifestyle, outlandish projects and for sexual predation of his ‘students’.
Most all ‘donations’ are mandatory and Mr. Burton enjoys the protection of the organization’s tax-exempt status under the laws of California.
Over the last 37 years, the property belonging to the Fellowship of Friends, including the vineyard and commercial winery producing Renaissance wines, has in large part been developed and maintained by the unpaid labor of foreign nationals in this country working on the basis of religious visas. This fact has been intentionally hidden from authorities. Workers are required to donate back to the church the largest portion of their salary, leaving an average monthly living wage of about $460.00. These facts are documented.
Fellowship centers around the world also fund the church through mandatory donations. It is documented that these monies have been routinely smuggled into this country under the direction of Robert Burton and his minions.
Mr. Burton has abused his role as a spiritual teacher to prey upon young men for sex. His methods are documented. There have been several lawsuits on record against Robert Burton and the Fellowship of Friends. A 1996 lawsuit alleging the rape of a minor child by the group’s leader was settled out of court for an undisclosed but significant amount of money in order to avoid future scrutiny and litigation. (See Yuba County Superior Court Case No. 060209, 04/29/96). Most of the lawsuits on record have been settled financially, out of court.
These offenses have been largely concealed from current followers and the methods of concealment are documented.
There is a website being developed by former members to provide an organized overview of the organization: http://fellowshipoffriends.wikispaces.com. For on-going discussion among mostly former members, see https://fofdiscussion.wordpress.com.
We ask all who share concern for these conditions to sign this petition and ask for an official investigation into these affairs.”
Nige,
Rise above the doubts and don’t try to do investigator’s work. To dig deeper is their job, not yours or mine. Our job is simply to provide all known information to the authorities and be available for contacts. Nothing more. It’s not about perfecting the Petition, it’s about providing the facts and if people are to stupid to understand that, is their problem. Do what you can and improve as you go.
Nige,
Your availability and willingness to talk to the authorities is what matters. Even the best investigator in the world can’t talk to the ghosts. They need real people to talk to. You answer thier questions to the best of your knowledge and let them do their job. This is what they paid for.
John West and John Graham both passed away.
The other day, someone showed a film of Bin Laden shortly after 9/11 talking about the planes crashing into the World Trade Center. According to translators, he was “explaining” to a small group of people in the room, using hand gestures, speaking in a soft tone, and looking down as he did his explaining, that they expected only the top few floors to collapse, not the entire buildings, etc.
Reminded me of RB. There was something about Bin Laden’s hand gestures and the way he was looking down, explaining something calmly as he tried to convey his calmness and calm guru-like control. The “calm act.” The “humble act.”
Burton also reminds me of Louis XIV — a sociopath who cared nothing about what type of mess he would leave behind, and how it would have potential consequences for his key enablers, and his family. You know who you are. If eventually someone doesn’t stop at Burton’s doors with the handcuffs, beware that they may come after you. And if they do come after Burton one day — believe me, he will not hesitate to use his “calm act” once again — this time, to explain things about you.
John West? He was in a good shape just a few years back. Was his ill? What happened there?
#70 is new (it was hung up in moderation)
75 x ray.
Not quite clear to me. He got sick fast/suddenly? in Mexico. His family transported him to South California and was on a ventilator unconscious. He went within a week on Hospice and died last Monday as far as I now.
I remember so well the day I first met Mr Graham while in Burton’s company after having lunch one sunny afternoon in Nevada City.
Somehow John appeared as we were walking from the restaurant to the parking lot in town. For some unexplained reason, he hadn’t been invited to lunch, but showed up anyway, as Burton’s glassy eyed followers often did just to catch a glimpse of the elusive leader and feast on his so, so special “energy” (energy which the average openly gay male on the prowl displays any day of the week.)
While the others went ahead to fetch the car it was just the three of us silently standing there, with me listening intently as I could, chasing elusive moments of hyper-vigilance…(thus adding to the heightened field of tension that Burton creates around himself)…hopeful that at any moment Burton would cast a pearl of wisdom in our direction, which so rarely happened it’s not even funny.
I will never forget that at one point Burton, with a wry smile and a glint in his eyes, finally introduced me to John, referring to me not as a good “student” as he always called all his other followers, but made a point of calling me a good “boy”!
John giggled and knowingly nodded his head.
The experience left me with the distinct impression that Burton was showing me off, playing a little gay one-upmanship with John!
I felt a jab in the pit of my stomach as the two of them looked me over, sharing their special moment together at my expense. It still makes me sick to think about it.
That was one of many defining moments on my path of liberation from Burton’s Rape Factory.
The FOF, like most cults, provides a ready–made, permanent, adhesive label for everyone, in or out.
In order to liberate myself, I had to choose to make the effort to define myself differently than Burton and his cronies did.
RIP, John Graham.
Hyper-vigilance almost all the time. Some say you’re weird and paranoid.
On a ventlator and unconscious know about that to for five days.
Recently asked a nurse for a “spiritual councilor” as if I believe and they sent a presbytarian clergy.
I’m tired of suffering I say, so pray to God that it ends. He backed out wouldnt do.
Next a Catholic Priest came in same results.
That evening they sent over two psycho-specialists to do what they do, same results.
A blood infection, failing kidneys and pneumonia makes a person wish for an out.
If you know I mean.
79 arthur
Trying to know what help you need…..
My hypo-manic state wants to champion a cause again…..
Hope WhaleRider is tuning in…..Nigel.
[…] 79. arthur – May 11, 2011 […]
Arthur, you are in my heart any prayers
79 arthur
Dear Arthur
I was visiting one of my former APMA students (a Jovial lady) who is connected with an organization that helps people with learning and mental health difficulties. The Community Hall she has taken over with funding she has named SELF UNLIMITED. I like that – that the real core of our being – the Self that can be truly what it is meant to be, is instrumental both in our Well Being and in what we can give to others (true happiness).
Burton makes an absolute rubbish distinction between the ‘lower self’ (everything that questions or has a negative attitude to the FOF) and the ‘higher self’ (all the so-called ‘noble aims’ of the FOF).
I do not know if you have found something to give you even a little joy in your being but, if you work at that and make it grow, you will find it will help you through all your difficulties and let you lead your life to its natural conclusion.
“Only the kernel nourishes” (Walt Whitman)….Nigel
“This is what you shall do: love the earth and sun, and animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence towards the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown, or to any man or number of men; go freely with the powerful uneducated persons, and with the young, and mothers, of families: read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life: re-examine all you have been told at school or church, or in any books, and dismiss whatever insults your soul.”
Walt Whitman – Prologue to ‘Leaves of Grass’
Dear Arthur –
Your note was a surprise for me. You might take some comfort to know that whether you are rich or poor, happy or miserable, it is all here today and gone tomorrow. (To paraphrase a poet).
The link with your body may be snapped, but personally I don’t think that is the end for you.
Try not to be depressed. To paraphrase again, you become that which you think of deeply.
Dear Arthur:
By sharing your experience, for a few moments, we all face the mysterious unknown with you, hand in hand.
Thank you for the lesson in humility, my friend. I invite you to live in my heart.
Be patient, the end will come soon enough.
If I were you, I’d work on remembering the most relaxing, sunniest day you can recall…
…maybe with you on the porch listening to the laughter of the neighborhood kids playing in the yard…
…and make it a swan dive towards the sun.
I’ll meet you there later.
Let’s sustain Arthur…..this is how much I, who now and again experience the God-State want you to move from a Happy Centre…..Nigel…..
“Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is not searching of his understanding.
He giveth power to the to the faint; and TO THEM THAT HAVE NO MIGHT he increaseth strength.
Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the YOUNG MEN SHALL UTTERLY FAIL.
But they that wait upon the Lord SHALL RENEW THEIR STRENGTH; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.”
God is a State, Christ is Pure Intelligence of Light and Satan Redeemed (fuck the Fundamentalist Christians) is the Generative Force of All Us Fallen Angels…..Nigel.
DESIDERATA by Max Ehrmann – for KING ARTHUR…..
“Go placidly amid the noise and haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons,
they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain or bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs;
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment
it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.”
(19)89 was the year of my parting from the Fellowship of Freuds…..again, for Arthur, by a great poet-songwriter, Don Maclean…..
CROSSROADS
“I’ve got nothing on my mind: nothing to remember,
Nothing to forget. and I’ve got nothing to regret,
But I’m all tied up on the inside,
No one knows quite what I’ve got;
And I know that on the outside
What I used to be, I’m not anymore.
You know I’ve heard about people like me,
But I never made the connection.
They walk one road to set them free
And find they’ve gone the wrong direction.
But there’s no need for turning back
`cause all roads lead to where I stand.
And I believe I’ll walk them all
No matter what I may have planned.
Can you remember who I was? can you still feel it?
Can you find my pain? can you heal it?
Then lay your hands upon me now
And cast this darkness from my soul.
You alone can light my way.
You alone can make me whole once again.
We’ve walked both sides of every street
Through all kinds of windy weather.
But that was never our defeat
As long as we could walk together.
So there’s no need for turning back
`cause all roads lead to where we stand.
And I believe we’ll walk them all
No matter what we may have planned.”
From my CELTIC HEART album and because I have a Celtic Heart (Price – highland Welsh/Wallace – lowland Scots)…..to make Arthur Glorious…..
Christy Moore “The Voyage” (Lyrics)
I am a sailor, you’re my first mate
We signed on together, we coupled our fate
Hauled up our anchor, determined not to fail
For the hearts treasure, together we set sail
With no maps to guide us we steered our own course
Rode out the storms when the winds were gale force
Sat out the doldrums in patience and hope
Working together we learned how to cope
(Chorus:)
Life is an ocean and love is a boat
In troubled water that keeps us afloat
When we started the voyage, there was just me and you
Now gathered round us, we have our own crew
Together we’re in this relationship
We built it with care to last the whole trip
Our true destination’s not marked on any charts
We’re navigating to the shores of the heart
(Chorus 2x)
Dear Arthur,
Hold on to life,it’s precious even when it’s difficult.
Dear Arthur
And sometimes we are sooo tired, and our body is soo tired and more and more we will/can let things go?
Your of the vent now, and your infection has stopped.
Virginia Jenkins: everybody gives permission to die.
Take well care, all of us.
http://www.finalexit.org/
For all of us who know that there will be a day ilife is over.
It would take a shit-load of money to use these people but it would make the FOF have a fit if they got involved with an investigation…..Nigel.
Investigative Group International, Inc.
1730 Rhode Island Avenue N.W.
Suite 617
Washington, DC 20036
Tel. 202-789-7700
Fax 202-789-7740
Email: info@igint.com
I would stick with FBI,IRS and immigration agency, they are paid already to do their job.
In Memory of:
Adriana D.
Agnes K.
Alice W. L.
Anna G.
Anna V.
Barbara H.
Bernadette F.
Brian S.
Caroline A.
Cassandra S.
Christopher B.
Christopher F.
Clare B.
Clark A.
Constance M.
Cynthia K.
Darryl B.
Daniella V.
Dennis K.
Donald M.
Don B.
Doris B.
Doris E.
Dorothy B.
Edward L.
Eric E.
Eric N.
Frances B.
Frances T.
Francis K.
Gerry R.
Giovanni P.
Gloria C.
Gregory B.
Harriet A.
Henry V.
Howard H.
James C.
James B.
Janet M.
Jessica L.
Joanne K.
John G.
John W. (S.)
Joseph Mont.
Joseph Mor.
Julian L.
Karl W.
Katherine K.
Kevin K.
Kimo B.
Klair M.
Kristina N.
Leslie L.
Mariam K.
Mary B.
Matthias M.
Maxine T.
Michael P.
Mildred Genevieve S.
Mitchell P.
Moshe M.
Neal O.
Nette O.
Paul T.
Peter B.
Phillip K.
Raffaell L.
Raymond K.
Renato C.
Richard A.
Richard F.
Richard H.
Robert C.
Roberta H.
Roger C.
Ronald P.
Rosemary M.
Rourke M.
Sharole M.
Stanley R.
Stella W.
Stephen D.
Susan K.
Susan W.
Thomas N.
Virginia J.
William B.
All whom I knew and loved at one time.
I’ll fly away, oh glory,
I’ll fly away
When I die,
hallelujah by and by,
I’ll fly away
Some bright morning
when this life is over,
I’ll fly away
To a land on God’s
celestial shore,
I’ll fly away
When the shadows
of this life have grown,
I’ll fly away
Like a bird from
these prison walls,
I’ll fly away
I’ll fly away, oh glory,
I’ll fly away
When I die,
hallelujah by and by,
I’ll fly away
Oh how glad and
happy when we meet,
I’ll fly away
No more cold iron
shackles on my feet,
I’ll fly away
I’ll fly away, oh glory,
I’ll fly away
When I die,
hallelujah by and by,
I’ll fly away
Just a few more
weary days and then,
I’ll fly away
To a land where
joy will never end,
I’ll fly away
I’ll fly away, oh glory,
I’ll fly away
When I die,
hallellujah by and by,
I’ll fly away
Dear 100,000 –
Though I don’t have the same degree of affection for all you mentioned, I thought the entire post, especially the video, was most excellent and apropos.
L-sli- L-ckm-n died yesterday, morning.
This sort of sums up what I felt about those I came to know (and forget) from the Fellowship of Friends. It is from the musical – ‘Chess’, lyrics by Time Rice (family)…..Nigel.
Who needs a dream?
Who needs ambition?
Who’d be the fool
In my position?
Once I had dreams
Now they’re obsessions
Hopes became needs
Lovers possessions
Then they move in
Oh so discreetly
Slowly at first
Smiling too sweetly
I opened doors
They walked right through them
Called me their friend
I hardly knew them
Now I’m where I want to be and who I want to be and doing what I always said I would and yet I feel I haven’t won at all
Running for my life and never looking back in case there’s someone right behind to shoot me down and say he always knew I’d fall.
When the crazy wheel slows down
Where will I be? Back where I started.
100.000 angels
OK: de gustibus non est disputandum
BUT:
I’d rather be in the fire of life instead of your room full of boring angels!
Arthur,
I do not know what is going on with you physically speaking, but from the way you write it seems you are at a difficult place with your health. However I hope that you can hold to a thread of recovering.
It is also true when the body hurts so much we wish to check out, and that is a good thing, in the sense that we can also let go willingly.
In any case, I am thinking of you, wishing you all the best physically and spiritually, to feel at ease and more peaceful.
Anyone who thinks that 44 angels (or more) still work with the FOF is deluded…..Nigel
“The Patience of Angels”
“From the top of the bus
She thought she saw him wave
She saw Tuesdays and forgetfulness
And a little money saved
Does she know, I don’t know
But from here I can tell
That it would try the patience of angels
It would try the patience of angels, angels
And you know something’s wrong
When the morning hurts your eyes
And the baby won’t stop crying
You’ll be waiting till you die
Would I be any good
And if I was would I find
That it would try the patience of angels
It would try the patience of angels
There’s a door in a wall in a house in a street
In a town where no-one knows her name
She’s the patience of angels
Does she know, I don’t know
But from here I can tell
There’s a door in a wall in a house in a street
In a town where no-one knows her name
(There’s a door) there’s a door (in a wall) in a wall
(in a house) in a house (in a street) in a street
(in a town) where no-one knows her name
She’s the patience of angels
The patience of angels
It would try the patience of angels
It would try the patience of angels
It would try the patience of angels
It would try the patience of angels, oh angels
Ooh angels, oh angels, angels.
Robert Burton, Teacher of The Fellowship of Friends, is guided by 44 Angels “The beautiful Italian countryside you see is designed by Leonardo Da Vinci, one of the 44.”
http://i1092.photobucket.com/albums/i411/KikiDuvet/RobertBurton.jpg[/IMG]
96/100000 angels
A dead asshole to me is still an asshole.
96/100,000 angels
To all who feel that consciousness is only achieved by belonging to some dumb-fuck cult where imitative behaviour is the ‘way to heaven’, I would say that consciousness, which comes and goes in waves, can be achieved in LIFE ITSELF, and the only reason for becoming conscious, is that one may have a choice at the Portal of Death…..Nigel.
“Ordinary Angel”, by Hue and Cry…..
I got the card, delivers the goods
Fills me with happiness
It’s joy for a while ’till the first of the month
Then I’m chasing my tail again
I want a life that’s bigger than me
‘Cause I’m crushing myself to death
Tell you what I don’t need
No heaven sent deity
‘Cause I’m an ordinary angel
Winning tiny victories
And though the ordinary angels fly
Their wings weigh heavily
I try to be a daily genius
There’s no idea beyond my reach
With all the angels and the geniuses
My company I’m gonna keep
I’m watching the news and I feel my face
Hanging like plasticene
Now I see the plot, I’ve got the plan
Every move is transparent to me
Profit and power’s turning the world
And I’m leaning against the spin
Give me a vision please
And I don’t mean heavenly
I’m an ordinary angel
Winning tiny victories
And though the ordinary angels fly
Their wings weigh heavily
I try to be a daily genius
There’s no idea beyond my reach
With all the angels and the geniuses
My company I’m gonna keep
I want a life that’s bigger than me
‘Cause I’m crushing myself to death
Give me a vision please
And I don’t mean heavenly
I am an ordinary angel
I am an ordinary angel child
Walking with the daily geniuses
I am an ordinary angel
Flying as high as I can…
One of the visuals in post 96 has a slogan that says…..
“While we’re sleeping, angels have conversations with our souls”
Interesting concept…..
Do we need some mind-blowing (dare I say it? – quasi-hallucinogenic) event to tell us we are in the moment (or some idiotic narcissistic sociopath deluding us up the garden path)?????
Could it be that, just by being human (or, even just a sentient being) we drift in and out of altered/altering states and that is all we need to exist…..let the rest take care of itself…..
AND…..JUST BE YOURSELF!!!!!…..Nigel.
The general group of pharmacological agents can be divided into three broad categories: psychedelics, dissociatives, and deliriants. These classes of psychoactive drugs have in common that they can cause subjective changes in perception, thought, emotion and consciousness. Unlike other psychoactive drugs, such as stimulants and opioids, these drugs do not merely amplify familiar states of mind, but rather induce experiences that are qualitatively different from those of ordinary consciousness. These experiences are often compared to non-ordinary forms of consciousness such as TRANCE, MEDITATION, and DREAMS.
Hollister’s criteria for establishing that a drug is hallucinogenic are:[1]
1.in proportion to other effects, changes in thought, perception, and mood should predominate;
2.intellectual or memory impairment should be minimal;
3.stupor, narcosis, or excessive stimulation should not be an integral effect;
4.autonomic nervous system side effects should be minimal; and
5.addictive craving should be absent.
Not all drugs produce the same effect and even the same drug can produce different effects in the same individual on different occasions.
And, this is all from me for today…..Nigel…..
Robert Dobbs
guardian.co.uk, Friday 25 March 2011 12.16 GMT
Article history
The question: Did the drugs work at all?
At 14, I was much taken by phenomenology. The idea that certainty was an illusion, our experiences and logical conclusions forever trapped behind imperfect senses, gelled with my distrust of religious dogma and fondness for science’s inbuilt doubts. These things are important, at 14.
Ten years later, flat on my back beneath an orange east-London night sky, with Elgar on the headphones and illegal indole groups rewiring my brain, phenomenology went from a nice idea to case proven.
As photography’s true pleasure is in the taking of the picture rather than the printing of it afterwards, the point of the psychedelic experience isn’t in its recollection – let alone in that direst of hippy pastimes, the recounting of how fried we were, man. (Although to the startled Japanese tourist seeking directions whose shoes were vomited over in Kew Gardens one eternal afternoon: sincere apologies. Man, we got that dose wrong.)
The value is in the view suddenly revealed, the mundane perception revealed as an interplay of elements each with their own unique existence, combined for an instant into something with its own being. We think, necessarily, in cliche, in tested metaphors, but cliche get stale and metaphors only work by hiding detail. It was profoundly arresting to find myself in a place where none of that applied and to be forced to deal for a few hours with rude novelty at every level.
You can’t, in general, do much while you’re there apart from go along for the ride. Yet acid’s restless insistence on recategorising, recontextualising and generally mucking around with anything that catches your attention leaves the world you return to forever a little looser at the joints. The realisation that Out There, beyond the parish boundaries of our normal senses and thoughts, is enormously different and strange, is not something you can properly lose thereafter. It is a richer, stranger place I live in now than then.
It can go oh so badly wrong. The overwhelming insight that the interface between consciousness and reality is fractal, vouchsafed at Glastonbury as the sun went down, the Cure came on and the LSD went in, isn’t something I’ve ever found much of a use for. As with the mescaline-drenched Aldous Huxley transfixed by the cosmic mysteries of his grey flannel trousers, you had to be there.
Despair, wretchedness and timeless, unspeakable alienation aren’t much cop either.
But when it’s right: ah, when it’s right. There is a concept among psychedelic connoisseurs of the museum dose, a sub-critical amount of a drug that heightens perception without completely ripping down the wallpaper. It works. You can look at a Constable landscape and focus one moment on the technique, the myriad painterly tricks, then switch to being swept away by the sense of place and time practically forced down your throat by the whole thing. That’s yours to keep.
There’s also a lot to be said, if it were possible, for the largely incommunicable psychedelic experiences at higher dosage. The deeply unsettling return of childhood emotions and perceptions. The ersatz spiritual states – spirituality with waterwings, as Alan Watts called them – which nonetheless seem to match as closely as can be told those recorded by religious esoterics. Ego death, that moment when the self simply vanishes to leave a pure world where Out There and In Here no longer have meaning, is transcendental in any possible reading of the word.
Psychedelics don’t change the kit of parts you’re made of but they do reveal them, albeit by use of a bejewelled sledgehammer. If you’re lucky – or perhaps just that way inclined – they go back in the box with a few new ways of working; at the very least, with a broader sense of beauty and acceptance of how enormously strange the whole business of self is. That can lead, if you wish, to more understanding of how different the world can seem to others, thence to more compassion for them. And yourself.
I’m not a skilled art critic, an enlightened cosmic being or a devastatingly insightful cognitive scientist by virtue of having taken LSD, any more than a trip to Stockholm on Ryanair has left me able to fly or speak Swedish. But I have been places where the world was no longer constrained by normal thoughts, normal senses, and brought back souvenirs that I treasure greatly.
And to look on the bright side, I no longer throw up on the footwear of passers-by.
An “accidental overdose” of cubensis mushrooms showed me that death as I imagined it doesn’t exist. I saw all of life to be connected energetically, emerging and reemerging throughout time…
So, according to a post in one of the GF forums, Burton has taken the final step into hubris, and is now a Man Number Eight (equivalent in pseudo–4th Way numerology to Christ). He is also now 72 years old, the age when he predicted (back in the 70’s) he would die. Maybe he will get just one of his many predictions right? If not, then there is always the fear of something in 2012 to hold over his followers.
But darn it, right now, someone else is hogging the limelight. Alexander Cockburn, (“Counterpunch” Weekend Edition May 13–15, 2011) writes:
Members of the Fellowship of Friends, why take a risk? Oakland is so close, you could zip over right now and make a deal with Harold Camping, and be back at Apollo by dinner–time. That way you’re covered, whichever way it turns out.
And when nothing out of the ordinary happens in 2012, maybe the humiliation of yet another failure will push Burton into claiming to be a Man Number 9?
A new film about a woman who leaves a cult ~
Martha Marcy May Marlene
http://weirdnews.aol.com/2011/05/16/alan-john-miller-mary-suzanne-luck-jesus-mary-magdalene_n_862384.html
110. Ames Gilbert – May 15, 2011
This wild card was always his reserve in case of emergency, which as it looks to me, is happening. The flock is waking up.
111 brucelevy
This is sickening. But what even more sickening is to know that there a lot of people out there who do believe those psychopaths and liars.
Psychopaths and liars … an apt description of cult followers and zealous believers in cult dogma who populated the FOF. But don’t forget the gullible. The “I want to believe” dupe who thinks he has unlocked the secrets of the universe. Add to that the irresistible lure to play the role of the wise guru, striking an arrogant and vain stance of “one who knows,” and you have the makings of a lifetime mark. Silly strutters and posturers, desperate to be the Gurdjieff of In Search of the Miraculous — mysterious, holder of keys, admired, powerful. Pathetic.
Thought the definition of ‘hubris’, the word that Ames brought up, might help…..
In ancient Greece, hubris (ancient Greek ὕβρις) referred to actions that shamed and humiliated the victim for the pleasure or gratification of the abuser. The term had a strong sexual connotation, and the shame reflected on the perpetrator as well. It was most evident in the public and private actions of the powerful and rich. The word was also used to describe actions of those who challenged the gods or their laws, especially in Greek tragedy, resulting in the protagonist’s fall.
Hubris, though not specifically defined, was a legal term and was considered a crime in classical Athens. It was also considered the greatest crime of ancient Greek society. The category of acts constituting hubris for the ancient Greeks apparently broadened from the original specific reference to mutilation of a corpse, or a humiliation of a defeated foe, or irreverent “outrageous treatment” in general. It often resulted in fatal retribution or Nemesis. Atë, ancient Greek for “ruin, folly, delusion,” is the action performed by the hero or heroine, usually because of his or her hubris, or great pride, that leads to his or her death or down-fall.
Violations of the law against hubris included what might today be termed assault and battery; sexual crimes ranging from rape of women or children to consensual but improper activity, in particular anal sex with a free man or with an unconsenting and/or under-aged boy; or the theft of public or sacred property. Two well-known cases are found in the speeches of Demosthenes, a prominent statesman and orator in ancient Greece. These two examples occurred when first, Midias punched Demosthenes in the face in the theatre (Against Midias), and second when (in Against Conon) a defendant allegedly assaulted a man and crowed over the victim. Yet an other example of hubris appears in Aeschines “Against Timarchus,” where the defendant, Timarchus, is accused of breaking the law of hubris by submitting himself to prostitution and anal intercourse. Aeschines brought this suit against Timarchus to bar him from the rights of political office and his case succeeded.
One example of hubris occurs in Sophocles’s Antigone when Creon refuses to bury Polynices.[citation needed] An other example is in the tragedy Agamemnon, by Aeschylus.[citation needed] Agamemnon initially rejects the hubris of walking on the fine purple tapestry, an act suggested by Clytemnestra, in hopes of bringing his ruin. This act may be seen as a desecration of a divinely woven tapestry, as a general flouting of the strictures imposed by the gods, or simply as an act of extreme pride and lack of humility before the gods, tempting them to retribution. One other example is that of Oedipus. In Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, while on the road to Thebes, Oedipus meets King Laius of Thebes who is unknown to him as his biological father. Oedipus kills King Laius in a dispute over which of them has the right of way, thereby fulfilling the prophecy that Oedipus is destined to murder his own father. Icarus, flying too close to the sun despite warning, has been interpreted by ancient authors as hubris, leading to swift retribution. In Odyssey, the behaviour of Penelope’s suitors is called hubris by Homer, possibly still in a broader meaning than was later applied. The blinding and mocking of Polyphemos called down the nemesis of Poseidon upon Odysseus; Poseidon already bore Odysseus a grudge for not giving him a sacrifice when Poseidon prevented the Greeks from being discovered inside the Trojan Horse. Specifically, Odysseus’ telling Polyphemos his true name after having already escaped was an act of hubris.
Hubris against the gods is often attributed as a character flaw of the heroes in Greek tragedy, and the cause of the “nemesis”, or destruction, which befalls these characters. How ever, this represents only a small proportion of occurrences of hubris in Greek literature, and for the most part hubris refers to infractions by mortals against other mortals. Therefore, it is now generally agreed that the Greeks did not generally think of hubris as a religious matter, still less that it was normally punished by the gods. Herodotus made it clear in a passage,
“ Seest thou how God with his lightning smites always the bigger animals, and will not suffer them to wax insolent, while those of a lesser bulk chafe him not? How likewise his bolts fall ever on the highest houses and the tallest trees? So plainly does He love to bring down everything that exalts itself. Thus ofttimes a mighty host is discomfited by a few men, when God in his jealousy sends fear or storm from heaven, and they perish in a way unworthy of them. For God allows no one to have high thoughts but Himself. “
110. Ames Gilbert
Yes, similar to Burton, this prophet also predicated the end of the world years ago. And now he’s predicting it again. Sadly, many people who listen to the man on the radio are now in a state of confusion and fear. “The Bible Guarantees it,” is the slogan. It will interesting to see what the guy says on Sunday. “It’s just an approximate date. God works in mysterious ways.” I recall with Burton that his immediate response was to focus on his teachings about being present, etc., while downplaying the predictions as being much less important (even thought it his predictions were the literally daily topic of discussion for several years).
The Man No. 8 thing is interesting. It’s marketing, plain and simple. You have to keep people interested in the product. Think of it as a new software release with a new number attached to it, that’s all. “New!” People generally balk at buying the same product over and over again, so he changes things here and there to make sure they believe they actually are buying something new and different.
111 is new
Martha Marcy May Marlene
‘A thriller that shifts nearly imperceptibly between dream, memory and reality.’
LA Weekly
Yep, sounds like FoF alright.
Amazing that Burton has gone from just a mere ‘conscious man number 5′ all the way up to a number 8. I mean, that is like “master of the universe” or something, right?
The sheep of course all just go around and around in the same strange mental circles of psychological suffering that Burton keeps turning his followers in, convincing them that his crazy and painful brand of pseudo-spiritualism is good for them. You know, with all that wonderful “friction” doing its work of creating their little souls.
As far as the number 8, I guess Burton figured it would look a bit better if he pretended that at least he was getting somewhere. His followers can now say they don’t have just any ol’ ordinary conscious being for a teacher, but they now have a ‘master of the whole fucking universe’.
I would think that Bobby occasionally tells a select few something like, “You are getting closer, goodness. You just need to work a bit harder.”
And if Burton lives long enough, who knows, maybe another 10 years of sequences and large donations and other sorts of abuse will create some sort of strange altered state in a few followers and they can then imagine that they are just about to “break through”. If it was not so sad, it would be funny.
102/118. Wouldnt You Like To Know – May 19, 2011:
‘Martha Marcy May Marlene
‘A thriller that shifts nearly imperceptibly between dream, memory and reality.’
LA Weekly’
Forgot to mention MAYHEM; as in:
‘Martha Marcy May Marlene Mayhem’
may·hem
–noun
Law: the crime of willfully inflicting a bodily injury on another so as to make the victim less capable of self-defense or, under modern statutes, so as to cripple or mutilate the victim.
Louis Brunel’s “The Exterminating Angel”…..
In 1962, Bunuel directed probably his most analyzed and controversial movie, “The Exterminating Angel”. The plot revolves around a dinner party that takes place in a mansion. At the beginning of the party the servants escape for no apparent reason leaving only the head servant to serve the guests. Later on the guests arrive and even though they have finished eating knowing it is time to leave, they cannot get themselves to leave the salon. Bunuel does not use a score for the movie; for he doesn’t need it in this particular movie because it would not serve any purpose. As for mise-en-scene, the only aspect that seems consistant throughout the movie is the surreal environment. There isn’t just one true explanation or meaning to the movie, for each and everyone will most probably interpret it differently. The following argument is not fact or truth behind the movie; for it is simply a series of interpretations, that one viewer (me) went through during and after watching the movie a few times.
Statue of The Exterminating Angel in Comillas, Spain
The first reaction was that the entire movie was part of a dream; however, this could not possibly be true because even though the surreal aspects in the movie convey the feeling of experiencing a dream, it could not possibly be one since it isn’t told through the perspective of one character. It’s more like a presentation of surrealistic events taking place within a salon. The second affect it may have on a viewer is from a religious point of view. The title of the movie, refers to the exterminating angel who killed the first born child of Egypt, and so in order to make some sense of the movie, one could consider the fact that same angel may be punishing those high class guests. The exterminating angel does so by trapping them in an environment that forces them to deal with reality. Therefore, they snap out of their trapped world of mannerism. The angel punishes two lovers for having sexual intercourse in a small room with angel pictures displayed on the wallpapers by forcing them to commit suicide. At the same time, he forces the guests outside of the room to go through barbaric like behavior to show them the harsh reality of our human nature. After they escape, the guests end up trapped once again in a church, which implies that the angel now wants them to break free of their religious habits now that he succeded at breaking them free of their high class manners. In both, the salon and church traps, the angel sends them sheep so they could eat and survive. Both location are perfect for the angel’s tasks. Luis Bunuel was probably attacking both the high class of society and religion. The first viewing of, “The Exterminating Angel” is a very challenging one, and it is almost impossible for the viewer to understand the full meaning, still by concentrating on the details within the movie, one can at least interpret a meaning to the movie, even though it might not necessarily make sense.
From an article about a man convinced that the Rapture is happening tomorrow:
“Living with this idea, it’s not easy,” Fitzpatrick says. Even an ad buy of biblical proportions doesn’t calm his thoughts. He stands in the subway handing out Gospel tracts and each day sees dozens—no, hundreds—of the unsaved. He knows these poor souls will die in the earthquake, or else cling to life before the whole universe is vaporized on October 21. “That’s one of those things that could really get to you if you let it,” he says. Fitzpatrick’s mother has dementia, and he’s not sure if God will make a special dispensation for her.
Knowing the date of the judgment is only half the Rapture equation. The other half is knowing whether you’ll be among those who will “meet the Lord in the air,” as it says in 1 Thessalonians. When I ask Fitzpatrick if he’s sure he’ll be raptured, I notice that his confidence takes a small but perceptible hit. He can’t say for certain. He uses the words “strong suspicion,” lawyerly language he would never use about the date of the Rapture.
You might think of Robert Fitzpatrick’s dilemma like this. He knows that on May 21 the very last train is leaving the station. But he has only a strong suspicion that he has a ticket. It’s the kind of existential fear that might make you spend your life savings on subway ads, or pass out leaflets until the final seconds before the great earthquake. Fitzpatrick tells me, “I’m still praying, let’s put it that way.”
Substitute “self-remembering” for praying, and that your soul will go to the moon for the earthquake, and you have basically the same thing. The whole article is worth reading:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-05-19/may-21-2011-announcing-the-rapture/2/
110 Ames Gilbert
Correct me if I am wrong, but I thought a ‘man number 8’ was actually born that way and did not have to progress ‘through the ranks’…..Nigel.
Nigel:
A man #8 is the eighth person on some kind of a list, in the doctor’s waiting room or amongst those in line to renew their driver’s license.
The rest is pure fantasy.
124 Opus 111
Funny thing, dude. I had to do both today – no shit!!!!!…..Nigel.
124.Opus111
“The rest is pure fantasy.”
Yes.
Man number ate; as in: ate by the moon; or is that: ate by REB?
Real men don’t eat quiche, they are eaten by quiche – blue moon cheese quiche – be sure it is made with crème fraîche (fresh creme from young aspiring hetero men number four – solars preferred).
Or, his ass has evolved to that number.
Now he can take even more.
This is what brought many of into the Fellowship of Friends…..
al·lure (-lr)
v. al·lured, al·lur·ing, al·lures
v.tr.
To attract with something desirable; entice: Promises of quick profits allure the unwary investor.
v.intr.
To be highly, often subtly attractive: charms that still allure.
n.
The power to attract; enticement.
[Middle English aluren, from Old French alurer : a-, to (from Latin ad-; see ad-) + loirre, bait (of Germanic origin).]
…..but, as we see from posts above, Burton’s orifices have literally ‘cocked up’ any inkling of reality which make most of still believe the FOF is a ‘conscious school’…..Nigel.
Robert Burton has never been more “conscious”, more advanced, or more aware than anybody else. In fact, if he has actually “transformed” into anything, it might be into a bigger prick than he already was.
After all, he has spent decades reinforcing and being rewarded for bad behavior.
‘Robert Burton has never been more advanced than anybody else.’
Not in his perversion, on that he is ahead than anybody else.
So, the idea of “self-observation” was something big in the fellowship of friends. People pretended they took an honest look at themselves, and also at their fellow members by giving “photographs.” But why is that some candor never directed at the organization of which they’re a member? And more importantly, why is it never directed at the leader in any sort of honest way.
Robert and Followers: Have you ever noticed a strong resemblance to….. ?
“Judgment Day was supposed to have started at 6 p.m. and last five long months. Dead bodies were going to be strewn about as earthquakes ravaged the Earth, they said. And come October 21, they said, the entire world would be kaput.
It wasn’t immediately clear what the believers thought about Saturday’s nonhappenings. But people around the world sure were making jokes like there was no tomorrow.”
Still no word from the perpetrator/predictor. One thing we apparently can predict: People will keep making predictions about the end of the world, and followers will continue to spend money while following the predictors. We talked so much about “mechanicality” and predictable mechanical behavior in the fellowship of friends. But people don’t direct that “photograph” at our beloved teacher, and at ourselves for believing him. The ramifications of that are just too large — that Burton is just another cult leader, and that we are just another set of cult followers.
Here is an interesting view point regarding “prophets”.
When Doomsday Isn’t, Believers Struggle to Cope
Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior Writer
Sat May 21, 10:31 pm ET
If you’re reading this, Harold Camping’s predictions that the end of the world would start Saturday (May 21) failed to pan out.
That’s good news for most of us, but Camping and his followers were looking forward to the end. After all, they believed that they were likely to be among the 200 million souls sent to live in paradise forever. So how do believers cope when their doomsday predictions fail?
It depends, said Lorenzo DiTommaso, a professor of religion at Concordia University in Montreal who studies the history of doomsday predictions.
“If you have a strong leader, the group survives,” DiTommaso told LiveScience. “Sometimes the group falls apart. Most often, the answer given by the group is that the prophecy is true, but the interpretation was wrong.” [Read: Why People Look Forward to the End]
http://www.livescience.com/14179-doomsday-psychology-21-judgment-day-apocalypse.html
In 1994, Camping predicted a September doomsday, but hedged his bets with a question mark. On his FamilyRadio website, Camping wrote that he had misunderstood a key biblical passage, but since that time, biblical evidence for a 2011 end had “greatly solidified.”
Doomsdays without doom
The classic study of “doomsdays gone bad” took place in 1954. A Chicago woman named Dorothy Martin predicted a cataclysmic flood from which a few true believers would be saved by aliens. Martin and her cult, The Seekers, gathered the night before the expected flood to await the flying saucer. Unbeknown to them, however, their group had been infiltrated by psychologist Leon Festinger, who hoped to find out what happens when the rug of people’s beliefs is pulled out from under them.
Festinger’s study, which became the basis of the book “When Prophecy Fails” (Harper-Torchbooks 1956), revealed that as the appointed time passed with no alien visitors, the group sat stunned. But a few hours before dawn, Martin suddenly received a new prophecy, stating that The Seekers had been so devout that God had called off the apocalypse. At that, the group rejoiced — and started calling newspapers to boast of what they’d done.
Eventually, the group fell apart. Martin later changed her name to “Sister Thedra” and continued her prophecies.
Other failed doomsday prophets have struggled to keep their followers in line. One self-proclaimed prophet, Mariana Andrada (later known as Mariana La Loca), preached to a gang of followers in the 1880s in the San Joaquin Valley of California, predicting doomsday by 1886. But Andrada was not consistent with her predictions, and believers began to defect. Trying to keep one family from leaving, Andrada told them one of them would die on the journey. Sure enough, the family’s young son soon fell violently ill and passed away. The family accused Andrada of poisoning him. She was arrested and found not guilty, but never returned to preach to her followers.
Searching for explanations
How Camping’s followers will cope with a failed doomsday prediction depends on the structure of the group, said Steve Hassan, a counseling psychologist and cult expert who runs the online Freedom of Mind Resource Center.
“The more people have connections outside of the group, the more likely it is that they’re going to stop looking to [Camping] as the mouth of God on Earth,” Hassan told LiveScience. “Information control is one of the most important features of mind control.”
In his experience, Hassan said, about a third of believers become disillusioned after a failed prediction, while another third find reason to believe more strongly. The remaining group members fall somewhere in between, he said.
Doomsday groups in history have run a gamut of responses after failed predictions, said Stephen Kent, a sociologist at the University of Alberta who studies new and alternative religions. On occasion, a leader will admit he or she was wrong (Note from qwertyuiop: Burton occasionally would quietly admit that he was a failure as a predictor of doom. But did he really have any other choice? It was a huge elephant in the room for several years.)
Other groups will come up with a face-saving explanation. Some groups may blame themselves, rationalizing that their lack of faith caused the failure, Kent told LiveScience. Other groups blame outside forces and redouble their efforts.
“One of the options is for the group to say, ‘Society wasn’t ready, Jesus felt there weren’t enough people worthy of rapturing. Hence, we’ve got to go out and convert more people,'” Kent said.
After the apocalypse
Often, a failed prediction leads to splinter groups and re-entrenchment. After Baptist preacher William Miller predicted the end of the world on Oct. 22, 1844 — a date thereafter known as “The Great Disappointment” when nothing happened — his followers struggled to explain their mistake. One subset decided that on that date, Jesus had shifted his location in heaven in preparation to return to Earth. This group later became the Seventh-Day Adventist church.
Sociologists and doomsday experts agree that Camping is likely convinced of doomsday rather than perpetuating a hoax or running a scam. A con artist, Hassan said, would never set himself up for failure by giving a firm date.
(Note from qwertyuiop: In Camping’s case, that may be true, but I have my doubts that Burton really believed in his numerous predictions.)
A belief in doomsday gives followers a clear sense of the world and their place in it, Kent said. Those comforting beliefs are difficult to maintain after the world fails to end.
“This could be a fairly sad day for these people,” Kent said. “There will be some greatly disheartened people who may be terribly confused about what didn’t happen.”
– – – –
Despite failed prophecies for 1984, 1998, and 2006, Fellowship of Friends cult leader Robert Burton continues to hint that the Fellowship of Friends is an “ark” for a new civilization, and he has hinted that some undefined catastrophe may occur in 2012.
“Theoretically, we will survive it unharmed,” Burton said in recent months.
– – – –
The Lord’s Prayer, King James Bible Version…..
After this manner therefore pray ye:
Our Father which art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done
in earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
as we forgive our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil:
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever, WORLD WITHOUT END. Amen.
(Something to stir up more contraversy on the blog…..Nigel.)
When Robert says “we” he means “I”.
qwertyuiop 134
“A belief in doomsday gives followers a clear sense of the world and their place in it, Kent said. Those comforting beliefs are difficult to maintain after the world fails to end.”
It seems Gurdjieff deserves props for his fourth way scam…the real hard evidence, such as the prediction that people go to the moon, does not materialize until after you’re dead. Then it’s too late! He didn’t lock himself into a hard date. The sign of a true con man.
BTW, the followers of Camping who expected the apocalypse — they also are certain that their beliefs “really are different” from the others. Be it self-remembering or a certainty in the date of the apocalypse, that dead-certain belief that their religion or “way” really is true, is one of the giveaways that it’s just another cult belief. It is a sign of an immature psychology to believe that you really are different from all those others.
The Camping church should seek the services of FOF regarding ways of coping with failed predictions. FOF has vast expertise in the “variations on denial” following non-events.
How many people have made a contacts with authorities?
One have made for sure.
Anyone else?
139. X-ray
Have done a 4-way sending off of both Springfield letter and petition pre-amble. I am pretty certain that the authorities are already working on investigations into the FOF, but I think any other ‘push’ will help. Here again, for others interested in adding their voice, are the contact details for authorities who may be interested to know about the FOF goings-on…..Nigel.
Herbert M Brown
Special Agent in Charge
Federal Bureau of Investigation
4500 Orange Grove
SACRAMENTO
California 95841
Director John Morton
US Immigration and Customs Enforcement
500 12th Street SW
WASHINGTON
DC 20536
Secretary Jane Napolitano
Department of Homeland Security
WASHINGTON
DC 20528
Commissioner Alan Bersin
Customs and Border Patrol
1300 Pennsylvania Ave NW
WASHINGTON
DC 20229
Happy targeting!!!!!…..Nigel.
On belief, from http://www.overcomingbias.com/2011/05/dont-believe.html:
“In my experience “I believe X” suggests that the speaker has chosen to affiliate with X, feeling loyal to it and making it part of his or her identity. The speaker is unlikely to offer much evidence for X, or to respond to criticism of X, and such criticism will likely be seen as a personal attack.”
True believers of the fourth way are no different than other religious believers. The most negative comments I’ve ever witnessed on the internet was from a 4th way zealot who was attacking someone who questioned his
“system” ideology. The negativity was far below the level of any “life person” I’ve encountered on the web, and I’ve come across some real nuts. Truly unhinged. That only happens when a person’s core identity has been threatened. And it is evidence that the core identity is built on belief, not experience or understanding. Experience and understanding are never so easily threatened as the precarious ego, especially when it is propped up by an ideology that sells superiority over average people as a key point of dogma.
This also, from http://modeledbehavior.com/2011/05/23/strategies-for-overcoming-bias/:
“…people often convince themselves that they truly reconsider their strongly held beliefs, but what they do is false reconsideration with the real purpose of reassuring themselves and strengthening the belief. Before it was just a strong belief, but after false reconsideration it’s a strong belief that they’ve really, definitely, seriously reconsidered. But if you can’t imagine yourself going through the day holding another set of competing beliefs than you never actually reconsidered it.”
The fourth way was supposed to be about verification, first and foremost. Anyone who regularly speaks confidently about unverifiable things, including life after death, anything related to the soul, or cosmology that they have only read about in a fourth way book, is a believer, pure and simple.
Gullible. Because Michael told me so.
Googled “ man number eight“ and here is what I first found:
The number 8 technique in oral sex with a man
——————————————————————————–
Try this out to pleasure your man. Use your tongue to make a number 8 sign on his dick. Start from the bottom of his shaft up to the head of his dick. Make the number 8 with your tongue over and over again making sure that you touch the head of his dick. Try it!
Now I understand the gobbligook.
“A man with a conviction is a hard man to change. Tell him you disagree and he turns away. Show him facts or figures and he questions your sources. Appeal to logic and he fails to see your point.”
[In the 1950’s] Stanford University psychologist Leon Festinger and several of his colleagues infiltrated the Seekers, a small Chicago-area cult whose members thought they were communicating with aliens – including one “Sananda,” who they believed was the astral incarnation of Jesus Christ. The group was led by Dorothy Martin, a Dianetics devotee who transcribed the interstellar messages through automatic writing.
Through her, the aliens had given the precise date of an Earth-rendering cataclysm: December 21, 1954. Some of Martin’s followers quit their jobs and sold their property, expecting to be rescued by a flying saucer when the continent split asunder and a new sea swallowed much of the United States. The disciples even went so far as to remove brassieres and rip zippers out of their trousers – the metal, they believed, would pose a danger on the spacecraft.
Festinger and his team were with the cult when the prophecy failed. First, the “boys upstairs” (as the aliens were sometimes called) did not show up and rescue the Seekers. Then December 21 arrived without incident. It was the moment Festinger had been waiting for: How would people so emotionally invested in a belief system react, now that it had been soundly refuted?
At first, the group struggled for an explanation. But then rationalization set in. A new message arrived, announcing that they’d all been spared at the last minute. Festinger summarized the extraterrrestrials’ new pronouncement: “The little group, sitting all night long, had spread so much light that God had saved the world from destruction.” Their willingness to believe in the prophecy had saved Earth from the prophecy!
From that day forward, the Seekers, previously shy of the press and indifferent toward evangelizing, began to proselytize. “Their sense of urgency was enormous,” wrote Festinger. The devastation of all they had believed had made them even more certain of their beliefs.”
– by Chris Mooney in an article We Can’t Handle the Truth
From an article on NPR:
“The 89-year-old retired civil engineer who built a multi-million-dollar Christian media empire to publicize his apocalyptic predictions was wrong. The spectacular failure of his predictions highlights what is right with science and what is wrong with using religion as a gateway to understanding the natural world.”
Perhaps any FOF members reading this could take note. Or any others who boldly state as fact charts depicting the so-called laws of the universe (the Absolute, etc), or human “types” that are somehow defined by the infinitesimal influence of distant, relatively tiny planets.
Rest of the article here:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/13.7/2011/05/24/136553989/time-duration-and-prediction-some-thoughts-after-armageddon?ft=1&f=114424647
Thank you Nige.
I wish there would be more people who would add their voices.
141. Renald – May 24, 2011
Right on. A true face behind the mask.
Don’t forget the
Heaven’s Gate Cult!
144. X-ray
I think that anything from former members of the FOF, who know of misdemeanours or, especially, illegalities, would be of use to the authorities in their efforts to ‘clamp down’ on cults…..Nigel.
Cowards, as far as I can see.
#141 was hung up in moderation
Re 143 Agent 45 “ The devastation of all they had believed had made them even more certain of their beliefs.“
Ever wonder why this is so typical? Here it is once again: The repitition of thoughts form into a habit, a neurological habit and you can give that whatever spin you prefer as it does not matter in the end. The habit strengthens into what I call an addiction with time and energy (effort). One becomes dependent on the trigger and just as a chemical can be a trigger, so can the hormones and other neurological chemicals produced by any physical reaction to any event. From that point of view we are all addicts, no exception, not even for men number nine. Any person who does not have any inkling of it`s robotness, it`s addictions, it`s mechanicalities, does not have a hope in hell (well you know what I mean) of recognizing it and the non-acceptance of this fact is just another of these habits of thoughts (beliefs). Is that not where most of us were at when we decided to follow this group of rebels? Something rang true to us and we were right. On that score so was G. and O. and so many people all over the planet. It was the hook, so to speak. The problem was that the group did not have a clue as to what to do about it. Naturally the first step would have to be some sort of self-observation. That goes for any problem including watching the behavior of the ants in my garden in order to best determine how to erradicate my problem with them.
Funny thing is that once I began to really see the process I began to feel compassion for others. Sometime I remember this fact (belief-habit), sometimes I forget.
148 X-ray. The above applies. Another of these sets of beliefs is one which has to do with self-preservation. Many, myself included, have over the years also been involved in what could be termed accomplice behavior during our time in the fof. Some of the stuff might even be considered askew of the law. Hence comes the wish to let sleeping dogs lie. Friends, and yes I still consider them friends whether in or out, could suffer one way or another by opening up the various cans of worms. If that is cowardice, then fine I am a coward and will stay that way till I die and you can take that to the bank. That brings to mind an old lyric you probably remember, “addicted to love“. Have a great day, Nige too.
Cheers!
Check out the symptoms:
ddicted To Love lyrics
Songwriters: Palmer, Robert Allan;
Your lights are on, but you’re not home
Your mind is not your own
Your heart sweats, your body shakes
Another kiss is what it takes
You can’t sleep, you can’t eat
There’s no doubt, you’re in deep
Your throat is tight, you can’t breathe
Another kiss is all you need
Whoa, you like to think that you’re immune to the stuff, oh yeah
It’s closer to the truth to say you can’t get enough
You know you’re gonna have to face it, you’re addicted to love
You see the signs, but you can’t read
You’re runnin’ at, a different speed
You heart beats, in double time
Another kiss, and you’ll be mine a one track mind
You can’t be saved
Oblivion is all you crave
If there’s some left for you
You don’t mind if you do
Whoa, you like to think that you’re immune to the stuff, oh yeah
It’s closer to the truth to say you can’t get enough
You know you’re gonna have to face it, you’re addicted to love
Might as well face it, you’re addicted to love
Repeats and repeats.
So what is the answer? Take the time and energy to become addicted to whatever else you prefer in this moment in time. Whatever else, if there is anything else that `strikes your fancy` as Gerda used to say.
Cheers again!
Same old shit
http://www.mail.com/news/us/447040-lawyer-sex-lawsuit-involving-us-pastor-resolved.html#.7518-stage-subhero1-1
Same old shit, except that “the boys upstairs” are aliens not angels. How lame!
Cult-like beliefs and sexual improprieties towards minors by so-called spititual leaders…..
That seems to be the content of most recent blogs.
Not much has been said about X-ray’s request to inform the authorities over FOF misconduct. I feel it is important that as many people as possible write to the bodies in my post #140. Obviously, they have more on their workload than just the wrong-doings of the FOF but the more people who put on pressure within the area of what we know of the cult we were in, the more likely the authorities will be to ‘hammer home’ their investigations. I think it is a personal matter as to what people would want to add as a covering letter to the Petition and the Springfield Letter. All of us have had individual ‘trouble’ with the FOF and a personal letter outlining one’s experiences and where one would like the authorities to put on the pressure would work well. Let us do more work than just treat this blog-site as a chat-room…..Nigel.
For all you ex-foffers on the blog who reside in the UK…..Nigel.
“CIC is an educational charity providing advice and information for victims of cults, their families and friends, researchers and the media. CIC was founded in 1987 and became a registered Charity (No.1012914) in 1992. It was the first educational organisation focusing critical concern on the harmful methods of the cults to be granted charitable status in the United Kingdom.
CIC is concerned about the use of deceptive and manipulative methods used by cults to recruit and indoctrinate unsuspecting members of society. CIC believes that these cult methods present a threat to the well-being of the individual and the family. Consequently CIC sees the need for gathering and disseminating accurate information on cultism and aims to meet that need.
CIC’s Activities:
Public Education CIC gives preventative educational talks to Schools, Colleges, Universities, Churches, Clubs and Corporations.
Media Interviews CIC helps the media with interviews to further disseminate information on cultism.
Family Assistance CIC offers information and support for families who have lost a loved one to a cult.
Ex-Cult Members Support CIC offers information and support to ex-cult members who are often experiencing symptoms of cult withdrawal.
Research Assistance CIC assists students and other researchers with bibliographies and other information for projects, academic papers and books.
Information Service CIC provides information to the general public when questions are asked about a particular group’s possible connection with a cult.”
Cult Information Centre
BCM Cults
London WC1N 3XX
United Kingdom
Tel. 081-651-3322
Definition of ‘cult’, from Wkipedia….
The word cult pejoratively refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. The narrower, derogatory sense of the word is a product of the 20th century, especially since the 1980s, and is considered subjective. It is also a result of the anti-cult movement which uses the word in reference to groups seen as authoritarian, exploitative and that are believed to use dangerous rituals or mind control. The word implies a group which is a minority in a given society. The word was first used in the early 17th century denoting homage paid to a divinity and derived from French culte or Latin cultus ‘worship,’ from cult- ‘inhabited, cultivated, worshiped,’ from the verb colere ‘care, cultivation’.
The popular, derogatory sense of the word has no currency in academic studies of religions, where “cults” are subsumed under the neutral label of the “new religious movement”, while academic sociology has partly adopted the popular meaning of the word.
Not a surprise that Burton never used the term “cult” in reference to other groups, although he did have no shortage of opinions about other cults and mainstream religions. I recall conversations with some fellow fof’ers who did use the word, however, in reference to other organizations. Inevitably, we would ask each other what made us different from those organizations — why we were not a cult, while they were. The conversation didn’t last very long.
157. qwertyuiop
The Fellowship of Friends appreciates CULTure!!!!!
Thought you might appreciate this poem by one of my students, who is a holistic healer and aromatherapist…..Nigel
When the unity grid of consciousness bursts
The first light of energy over the earth
Remember remember the stories of old
The ancient teachings now soon to be told
When those first rays of light flow over your heart
They mix and they meld soon to empart
The wisdom and knowledge held deep inside
Each d.n.a. strand sung into life
Now is the time to release and let go
Of the chains and the bonds held from so long ago
Move forward now into glorious light
In the love of our mother our given birth right
Personally, I find this site to be much more interesting as a chat than as a call to arms.
Ragging on poor old Bob gets old after a while.
Besides, writing a letter or signing a petition to try to get someone else do the dirty work doesn’t seem to do anything either.
Confucius say: “Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one.”
Is this “gossip” true?
Th-m-s N–sch–z can not write prescriptions for narcotics due to over- prescribing in the OH clinic?
160. Agent 45
Just thought you might like the quote from ‘Animam Recro’ at the very start of this blogsite…..
“For those of you who got here through coincidence or pure chance, this discussion is about a group called the Fellowship of Friends. I would recommend starting reading from page 1, as what is being said now is quite far removed from what the discussion was about at the beginning. Find out for yourself whether the Fellowship of Friends is a genuine spiritual school, or a dangerous cult, as believed by many who have left. Or simply enjoy interacting with so many interesting and exciting people.”
Yes – you can treat the blog here as a chat room, but that would seem to dilute from the aim that so many of us have – to see the criminal psychopath, Burton, brought to justice. One might ask the question, Agent 45, whether you were are someone who was hurt in one way or another by membership in the FOF or whether you are just a casual onlooker and visitor to the blog who gets a cheap thrill from posting. Personally, I was not close to Burton, but suffered ‘financial agony’ from the demands of ‘teaching payments’ and ended up leaving under ‘messy circumstances’…..Nigel
Nigel ~ Perhaps you should think twice about judging what others write here.
Other than this recent letter project to the Feds, you seem to mainly treat the Fellowship of Friends / Pathway to Presence Discussion as though it were your own personal poetry blog…
Higher Self
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
“Higher self is a new age term associated with multiple belief systems, but its basic premise describes an eternal, omnipotent, conscious, and intelligent being, who is one’s real self. Blavatsky formally defined the higher self as “Atma the inseparable ray of the Universal and ONE SELF. It is the God above, more than within, us”.
The higher self is explained by Dr. Deepak Chopra, M. D. in his book of the same title, which was also made into an audio lecture series. Dr. Chopra elucidates the concept of higher self through they eyes of someone who was brought up in the Hindu traditions and who has studies world religions and medical science.”
I don’t think you are going to come to anything ‘higher’, other than higher monthly bills, within the FOF…..Nigel.
164. Golden Veil
Not forgetting song lyrics…..Nigel.
Nigel’s comment: “…the aim that so many of us have – to see the criminal psychopath, Burton, brought to justice.”
No, that’s not exactly my goal, although I would see it as good news if Burton were held accountable.
The way I see it as that any open discussion and sharing of information about Burton weakens his hold on the hearts and minds of people. Contributing here has the same effect on the writer and the reader alike: It helps you to think (hopefully), helps you process what is occurring and what occurred, helps a person see how they were deceived, and how they deceive or deceived themselves. That is not a good thing for Burton’s agenda.
Yes, I want Burton to be held accountable, but mainly I just want more people to learn more about him. Just a rhetorical question, but when has MORE information and more knowledge about Burton helped to solidify his standing with his followers? The only way he’s able to keep people in the group is to withhold information, hide it, conceal it, distort it.
Ever notice there’s not a pages on Burton’s Cult websites that read something like the following?
“Learn more about Robert Burton and the Fellowships of Friends!”
“Read what former members are saying!”
“How Burton Uses Sexual Encounters to Enlighten his Followers!”
“Why Huge Teaching Payments are Necessary for Awakening!”
“Why Angels Only Communicate with Us and not with You!”
You don’t see such pages because “learning less” is the goal.
I recently heard that RB is very ill. Can any of you confirm this? I left about five years ago and lost interest in the FoF after a couple of years, but I was a member for a long time before seeing the absurdity of it all, and now I’m very interested to follow what happens in the FoF endgame, ie when RB kicks the bucket. Does anyone know if he’s appointed a successor? If poss, I’d appreciate hard facts rather than speculation. Thanks!
167. qwertyuiop
You know, I wholeheartedly agree…..Nigel
I do believe, by the way, that the FBI and other agencies are watching very closely, and have been watching for a long time. I disagree with some of the comments that the FBI won’t take the cult seriously unless enough former members raise their voices. Let’s see — a doomsday cult with hundreds of members, many of whom are from outside the country, and entering under dubious circumstances. They’re taking it seriously. What would need to occur for them to take action? Who knows, but it’s not outside the realm of possibility with this cult.
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