Saturday, October 8, 2022

So, You Want to Join a Cult - Part XXXV - Fred Brown

After the so-called Fog Years, Craig Martindale was determined that the rebellion by his senior leaders would not happen again. In his secondary role as Director of The Way Corps he made sure that anyone who made it through the four year program was not only doctrinally toeing the line, but was also personally loyal to him. Previous Nebraska state leaders had graduated from the program before the shit had hit the fan. Gary had been appointed state leader simply because he was the only Way Corps person in the state to remain when the rest of them had left to join splinter groups or start their own. Fred Brown was different. His full time in The Way Corps was under Martindale's bullying paranoia and refusal to accept any disloyalty, which he defined rather broadly. Fred was a True Believer and was fully on board with Martindale's mission to purge The Way of any dissent. 

Of course dissent was framed as devil spirit possession and loyalty reflected being "on the Word". 

Convenient. 

At the time each home fellowship met twice weekly. Once mid-week and again on Sunday morning. At this period in Way history, at least in Nebraska, most of the active participants were married couples with children, so oftentimes family commitments such as sports, or sick kids too precedence over Way fellowship meetings. It was now mandatory - and attendance was taken. "Witnessing", or organized attempts to recruit, were, pre-Fred, casual affairs and consisted of "believers" talking to people in social situations. I personally recruited a guy named Donnie at O'Rourke's tavern one night. In the new administration witnessing nights took place at regular times, also mandatory. We were to keep track of how many contacts we made each week and how many of those ending up attending a Way fellowship meeting. Little by little, all aspects of our lives were tracked by Way leadership. But it still hadn't gotten as bad as it was going to get. 

The real purges hadn't started yet. 

Start at the beginning:

Part XXXVI

No comments:

Post a Comment