Cults have never been a big problem at Syracuse University, but they are present, said Thomas Wolfe, dean of Hendricks Chapel...
..."We have (in the past) become aware of groups where it's clear they don't have the student's best interests in mind," Wolfe said...
...At first, cults offer unconditional love and acceptance, Wolfe said. They then slowly cause members to lose perspective. Members often feel safe telling secrets they would otherwise never reveal, and groups can use this to exert control over their members, he said.
Some try to make members drop out of college, Giambalvo said...
October 17, 2007Conquering coercion, Amanda Wilcosky, Staff Writer, The Post,
Ohio University
...Wellspring is the only residential facility in the world that treats people who have been in cults or abusive relationships, said Donna Adams, Wellspring's clinical director...
...The Wellspring model describes to individuals how they were recruited and how group dynamics kept them from thinking independently, Martin said...
...Martin, Adams and Orchowski agreed that those who become involved with cults or abusive groups do not have a predisposed weakness and should not be stigmatized...
...As part of Parents Weekend, the USC Department of Sociology presented "Sects in the City: Protecting Your Children from Cults" ...with the aim of educating parents about how to help their children avoid cult recruitment techniques.
"Cults are known to recruit on college campuses," said the presenter, Doni Whitsett, a professor in the School of Social Work and an independent clinician...
...groups on and around USC's campus - including the LaRouche movement and the Los Angeles Church of Christ - have been accused of cult activity in the past...
...Los Angeles Church of Christ ... a branch of the International Church of Christ...
Revd. Elizabeth Davenport
Senior Associate Dean of Religious Life
...If it comes to the notice of the Office of Religious Life that a group
has violated the terms of the Ethical Framework, prompt action is taken to rectify the situation, and if any students feel that a religious group is making unreasonable demands on them, the deans of Religious Life strongly encourage them to come and talk about it.
June 28, 2007
Fellowship Or Foe?, Kelly Wilson, The Diamondback, University of Maryland, Maryland
The Washington University Bible Fellowship, a small, university-focused evangelical church on Metzerott Road, has become the home to a number of students, and is described by many of them as a "close-knit community."...
...recently accusations of member abuse and cult-like behavior have been raised by students at the university...
...Another student, who also asked not to be named because he is a current member of the local UBF, said the amount of control in the church makes it impossible for a trusting relationship to form...
...Denny Gulick, a mathematics professor at this university who runs a training session on cults for resident assistants, said the accusation is a complicated one.
The word "cult" has to do only with a pattern of behavior, Gulick said, and nothing to do with religious beliefs. He said such a group replaces the rules of typical society with its own, operating through the domination, manipulation, coercion and control of its members, which can have serious and detrimental effects on the people involved...
July 5, 2007Letters to the Editor, The Diamondback, University of Maryland, Maryland
You have to watch this video. It shows Tom Cruise, with all the wide-eyed fervor that he brings to the promotion of a movie, making the argument for Scientology...Let me put it this way: if Tom Cruise jumping on Oprah's couch was an 8 on the scale of scary, this is a 10...Gawker is now hosting a copy of the video; it's newsworthy; and we will not be removing it.
ST. GEORGE, Utah - The split-screen video shows Warren Jeffs in the upper right hand square wearing the jail-issued green and white "pajamas". On the left is his brother Nephi. The conversation was recorded January 25, 2007 in the Purgatory Correctional Facility in Washington County...
Victim in Jeffs Case Encourages Women in Polygamist Communities to 'Stand Up and Fight'
Elissa Wall talks to the media outside a Utah courthouse after polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs was convicted of being an accomplice to rape for arranging her marriage when she was 14 to her 19-year-old cousin...
By JENNIFER DOBNER Associated Press Writer
ST. GEORGE, Utah (AP)
Polygamist Leader in Utah Convicted of Sex Charges in Arranged Marriage
The leader of a polygamous Mormon splinter group was convicted Tuesday of being an accomplice to rape for performing a marriage between a 19-year-old man and a 14-year-old girl.
Warren Jeffs, 51, could get life in prison after a trial that threw a spotlight on a renegade community along the Arizona-Utah line where as many as 10,000 of Jeffs' followers practice plural marriage and revere him as a mighty prophet...
Video August 17, 2007Stephan Jones on The Hour with George Stroumboulopoulos on CBC, Canada
The Jonestown massacre is one of the most notorious mass suicides in history. More than 900 people died there. The quasi-socialist spiritual utopia turned hell on earth was founded by the Reverend Jim Jones.
Stephan Jones, son to Reverend Jim Jones, talks about...wanting to murder his father.
Stephan Jones did not take part in the suicide as he was away, playing basketball with the People's Temple Basketball team...
On TV June 14, 2007Planet Aid Investigation, I-Team, CBS 3, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Video included)
...Planet Aid...
You've seen them around the Delaware Valley, clothing donation bins to help the poor...
...And the secret ways that group is using the money, to fund unorthodox schools, have led some to call them a cult...
These yellow bins are owned by an organization called Planet Aid...
...So called Training Colleges that are not in Africa, but rather California and in Massachusetts...
...British journalist Michael Durham - after years of research - says the fundraising and profits from the clothing donations are really going to a group called Tvind which has 860 million dollars in assets.
Critics call Tvind a cult because they say it requires members to cut off from family and friends and restricts information from the outside world.
Kai Nelson with Philadelphia's Planet Aid wouldn't address critics directly but defended his organization... saying again the oft-repeated claims that any proceeds go to help the poor in Africa...
On TV May 17, 2007Highway Through 'Hallowed' Ground, By Dan Morris and Terry Moran, Nightline, ABC News (Video Included. Time 10:45)
...Mount Carmel is the infamous land outside Waco, Texas, where David Koresh and his Branch Davidian followers went down in flames in 1993 after a 51-day standoff with the federal government. Charles Pace brought his family there in the hopes of revitalizing the Branch Davidian faith and preserving the memories of those who died there...
...In 1993, the 51-day siege at the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas, ended as fire destroyed the structure after federal agents began smashing their way in; dozens of people, including David Koresh, were killed...
- Temple Members' Stories - What was the appeal of Jim Jones' Peoples Temple? By the time of its deadly end in the Guyanese jungle, membership exceeded one thousand people.
-Cult Conflict - Uganda, Jonestown, and other cults in history - Infoplease.com
-Cult Activity in the '90s - The Waco Incident, Japan's Aum Shinrikyo, and Heaven's Gate - Infoplease.com
- Note:
In a bizarre twist of fortune, the organization that was once the most vocal critic of Scientology is now owned by a member of the controversial church...)
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