How The WMSCOG Indoctrinates And Changes A Person’s Life – Part 3 of 5
9. Confusion and Transference
By alternating self-interested and random demands, the cult brings its followers into a state of great confusion – they aren’t sure how to please the cult. Sometime leaders will reward members who fail to carry out commands, and punish those who complete them successfully. The CIA suggests using rewards and punishments in a random, illogical manner so that the subjects regress into a childlike dependence. Similarly, the confused cult member will eventually regress to a childlike state and transfers parental authority to the cult leaders – which is why so many cult leaders insist on being called “Mother” or “Father.”
Child-like dependence seemed prevalent at the World Mission Society Church Of God. Members refer to their gods as “father and mother”. They frequently make statements like “I want to follow father and mother” or “I only study father’s teachings”. Childlike dependence in this case promotes blind followers of the group’s rules.
10. Prescriptive Behavior
Like any victim of induced regression and transference, once their ability to make decisions have been suspended, the cult members look to their leaders for guidance on how to behave. They long for direction on what to think, do and believe.
Why does the WMSCOG have a long list of prescribed studies, feast dates, 5am services, 6 hour long studies, 9 hour long testing sessions where members will teach the same subject over and over to one another in order to get signatures from group elders, etc…if not for re-indoctrination of the group’s instructions on how members should think, do and believe? This is also done throughout the 3 services on Saturdays and 1 service every Tuesday. The main message is about obedience.
11. Goal Of Inclusion
Once transference has been achieved, the elusive stated goal of the pyramid cult is replaced with the much more tangible one of establishing a relationship with the cult leaders and acceptance in the cult. The cult members become, in effect, siblings competing for their parent’s approval. The result is a prolonged psychodrama that capitalizes on unresolved issues from the members’ own family backgrounds. The cult leaders orchestrate emotional battles, pitting members against one another as they seek to develop a “special relationship” with the leaders.
One way that WMSCOG members gain acceptance into the group is by unquestioned loyalty and obedience. In an effort to become more perfect, members put on an elaborate façade of seeming happiness and perfection. WMSCOG members will criticize and put down those that have not come to or cannot see “the truth”. This keeps the members off balance and the leadership in control.
12. Never Expose Uncertainty To Those Lower In The Pyramid
By the time a member is this far into a cult, he/she is required to preserve the illusion of its cohesion and perfection.
WMSCOG members are under constant pressure to recruit. “Mother said to bear ten talents” (meaning, recruit ten tithing members) is a statement that is frequently repeated during sermons and group prayer. Becoming a “mature disciple” is directly related to how many people you have recruited into the organization. Members who “care for younger brothers or sisters” must maintain the appearance of steadfast devotion to the group and cannot reveal any doubts about the doctrine or leader. A group member’s position in the “pyramid-like” structure is defined by his ability to dissolve the doubts of those beneath him, without submitting to doubt himself. See “Is Doubt A Sign Of Little Faith?” Leaders never express any doubts about the group’s claims of absolute truth and authority. Leaders instead substantiate their authority by saying that members are not obeying God’s laws, not following God’s teachings, arrogant, using their own mind to interpret Scripture, etc.