Charlene Lamy Edge Speaks about The Way International

Greetings, readers. Do you know a "high-control" group or a cult when you see one? From my 17-year experience in The Way International™, founded by Victor Paul Wierwille (1961-1985), I know first-hand what it's like to be in one of those groups. Their leaders, like Wierwille, and their recruiters, engage in usurping your life, not respecting personal boundaries, and making you feel powerless. They reinterpret this behavior to mean it's what God wants. This post gives helpful hints to avoid that trap. First, below is a valuable summary of such a group's tactics. It's published in the newsletter "Cult NEWS 101." One of the editors of the newsletter is Patrick Ryan. Years ago, Patrick provided a promotional "blurb" for my cult memoir, Undertow . At the end of this post, you can read the blurb.  Below that you'll find a great description of "reality bending" and the link to the Substack article where I found it. CultNEWS101 Articl...

Greetings, readers, especially fellow former followers of The Way International—in its heyday one of the largest cults in America. Today I'm celebrating Cult Recovery Day, and I honor your strength to have left Victor Paul Wierwille's cult and its offshoot groups in the rearview mirror to create a new life. It's not an easy path. Cult Recovery Day The following is from the team at Cult News 101. Ten years ago, Patrick Ryan, one of its editors, provided a supportive blurb for Undertow when it was published. You can read that blurb in Undertow and also at the end of this post. Honoring Strength on Cult Recovery Day Today, we observe **Cult Recovery Day**—a time to recognize the immense courage it takes to reclaim one's life, identity, and autonomy. Healing is not a linear path, but it is one paved with resilience. We honor the survivors, the families who never stopped searching for answers, and the dedicated professionals working to provide a safe harbor for t...

Greetings, readers! I hope you're all doing well. It's November already and one thing I celebrate in November is a birthday. Not my birthday but my first book's. Undertow is nine years old this month. I think many of you have read it, so thank you very much. If you haven't, I invite you to do that! It reads like a mystery and has a happy ending. Today I'm sending a little insider info to you on the book's progress in the world. This is relevant because I created this blog 10 years ago specifically to let subscribers (to my personal blog) like you know I was working on what became Undertow. Over the years, I also wrote a lot of blog posts about cults and fundamentalism which many folks tell me are helpful. In November 2016, we launched the book and sold it from my website for one month before it was available online at Amazon , Barnes & Noble , etc. It was a VERY exciting time. Actually, it still is an exciting time for the book. Read on... Undertow fun fact...

The following is the Preface to  Undertow: My Escape from the Fundamentalism and Cult Control of The Way International. By Charlene L. Edge In its heyday in the 1980s, The Way International was one of the largest fundamentalist cults in America, with about forty thousand followers worldwide. 1 Founded in 1942 by a self-proclaimed prophet, Victor Paul Wierwille (1916–1985), who marketed the group as a biblical research, teaching, and fellowship ministry, The Way still operates in the shadow of its dark history.  I knew Wierwille personally. As one of his biblical research assistants and ministry leaders, I am a witness to his charisma, as well as his abuse of power and manipulation of Scriptures to serve his own agenda. I discovered his sexual abuse of women and chronic plagiarism. Today, those underbelly facts are hidden, denied, or otherwise squelched. The years of Wierwille’s authoritarian reign and the chaos after his death provide the context of my story. In 1987, after...

 by Charlene L. Edge Sometimes people who have not yet read my memoir, Undertow , get the impression from articles I write about The Way, that I think everyone ever involved with The Way was "bad." Not true. What I think is that an array of people with a myriad of interests, needs, and talents, were caught in the high-control group of The Way just as I was. Some of the kindest people you'd ever meet showed me love and understanding, and offered me support in many ways. Often. The "people problem" I had with Way believers came about when it was discovered I no longer held Way beliefs as true, no longer clung to the belief that Wierwille was a great man of God. Then I was shunned by loyalists who could not accept my change of heart and mind. Sadly, when a person rejects the beliefs and practices of a group they were enmeshed in for years and years, they usually lose the friends who remain in the group. So, they must start over. They must make a new path in life an...

What Makes The Way International™ a Fundamentalist Cult? by Charlene L. Edge First, what makes The Way International a  cult ? The Way International organization, at least while I was involved 1970-1987, exhibited two major features of a cult: 1) A "guru's" claim of  special knowledge  not found anywhere else.  The Way was founded in 1942 by Victor Paul Wierwille, its "guru," who claimed: "God told me He would teach me The Word like it had not been known since the first century if I would teach it to others." Right away, that claim set him apart from every other minister and let us know we couldn't get this special Bible knowledge from anyone but Wierwille. I believed that claim with my whole heart until about fourteen years into it, I began to doubt it. This claim of Wierwille's was published in Way materials, for instance, the book by Elena Whiteside, The Way: Living in Love . How did we get this special Bible knowledge: we ...

Former Religious Right Leader Endorses Undertow by Charlene L. Edge Greetings, readers. I'm honored that my cult memoir is endorsed by Frank Schaeffer. If you have a copy of my memoir, Undertow , you'll see his blurb on the front cover and a longer version of it inside. In brief, Frank Schaeffer is a New York Times bestselling author, an artist, and, among other things, the son of Francis and Edith Schaeffer, Christian evangelicals, who in the 1960s, helped found what's known as the Religious Right. Keep reading to learn more. But first, the endorsement. Frank Schaeffer Endorses Undertow “In  Undertow,  Charlene Edge has written a brilliant and engrossing warning to the future by dissecting the past. There are really two books here: one is on a cult called The Way (one of the largest fundamentalist cults in America with about 40,000 followers [in its heyday]).  The second book is an examination of the dynamics of all personality, religious, and political cu...

Greetings, readers. The following is a version of a post I once published on my website https://charleneedge.com. The same is true of most posts I've included here on my Blogspot account.  Protestant Fundamentalism and scholars who say useful things about it By Charlene L. Edge I'm thinking again about Protestant Fundamentalism and how it hooks believers. How does it do that? With the hook I call "certainty."  Over the years, I've looked into how fundamentalists get hooked on certainty and found scholars who have something helpful to say about it. By the way, there are many kinds of fundamentalism. Most religions have a fundamentalist branch within their system that demands a literal interpretation of and obedience to its doctrines, and engages in black and white thinking. I mainly address Christian fundamentalism because I spent so long in that land of lost perspectives. When I left The Way International, a Christian fundamentalist group, I tore down the curtain ...

  What do you know about Christian Nationalism and why care?  Christian Fundamentalism’s adherents, whether we like it or not, are gaining more and more power every day in the United States thanks to the Religious Right’s promotion of Christian Nationalism, which is based on fundamentalist views of the Bible. Christian Fundamentalism involves the notion that Christianity is the only religion that is “right” with God.  Its rules for interpreting the Scriptures are anchored in inerrancy. Inerrancy means without error. So for fundamentalists, that means the Bible must be perfect. Why? Because they believe God is the author of the Bible and God is perfect. Therefore, whatever He authored would be perfect, too. Usually, to make the Bible appear perfect or without contradiction results in chopping up the Bible into different time periods called "dispensations" or "administrations" to show it has no contradictions. For instance, the God of the Old Testament told His people...

One of my favorite humorists, Oscar Wilde, quoted a popular adage that I absolutely love:  "If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything."  At one of my presentations about cults I used that adage to convey this: Anyone who does not stand for good values, such as respectful discussion, empathy, and transparent leadership, just might find themselves falling for a cult. Feel free to share the following info with anyone who is worried about a loved one (or themselves!) in danger of falling for a controlling organization making promises that sound too good to be true. A word of caution Be wary about spending boatloads of time and energy trying to talk someone out of their involvement in a group that you see as manipulative and deceptive--but remain open to talk about it if they want to.  Remember this wise saying from Mark Twain: "It's easier to fool a man than to convince him he has been fooled. Note: The following is from a presentation I gave to...

What are reliable sources on the subject of cults? This post offers a list of sources I respect on this topic. I encourage you to share this post. Links on the book titles take you to Goodreads.com where you can find descriptions of each book.  In the case of the International Cultic Studies Association (ICSA), the link takes you to their website. This list of sources was compiled by Charlene L. Edge, author of Undertow: My Escape from the Fundamentalism and Cult Control of The Way International. Robert Jay Lifton, PhD Losing Reality: On Cults, Cultism, and The Mindset of Political and Religious Zealotry by Robert Jay Lifton. The New Press. 2019. Pg. 4, 5. [Chapter 7: Trump, is very timely]. "I have insisted upon retaining the word “cult” for groups that meet three criteria: First, a shift in worship from broad spiritual ideas to the person of a charismatic guru; second, the active pursuit of a thought reform-like process that frequently stresses some kind of merger with the guru...

Greetings, readers. This post contains information to help you identify traits of a group which would make it a "cult," otherwise known as a high-control group or coercive organization. High-control groups may be large (thousands of people) or small, in-home fellowships or meetings (just a few people). I prepared this info from screens in a PowerPoint presentation I created when I gave talks to students and other interested groups.  Screen 1. What is a Cult?  First , a shift in worship from broad spiritual ideas to the person of a charismatic guru; second , the active pursuit of a thought reform-like process that frequently stresses some kind of merger with the guru; and third , extensive exploitation from above (by the guru and leading disciples)—whether economic, sexual, or psychological—of the idealism of ordinary followers from below. ♦ Source: Losing Reality: On Cults, Cultism, and The Mindset of Political and Religious Zealotry by Robert Jay Lifton. The New Press. 201...