Frequently Asked Questions: Cults & Cult Leaders. By Jesus (AJ Miller) & Mary Magdalene (Mary Luck)

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1 Frequently Asked Questions: Cults & Cult Leaders By Jesus (AJ Miller) & Mary Magdalene (Mary Luck) Session 1 Published by Divine Truth, Australia at Smashwords Copyright 2016 Divine Truth Smashwords Edition, License Notes Thank you for downloading this ebook. You are welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be reproduced, copied and distributed. If you enjoyed this book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.

2 This ebook is a collection of answers given by Jesus (AJ Miller) on the topic of cults and cult leaders. The answers were given in an interview with Mary Magdalene (Mary Luck), who posed frequently asked questions from members of the media and public, on 13th November 2012 in Wilkesdale, Queensland, Australia. In this session Jesus discusses issues such as what is the common definition of a cult, and whether Jesus is the leader of one.

3 Reminder From Jesus & Mary Jesus and Mary would like to remind you that any document produced by Divine Truth containing any information from Jesus, Mary or any other person includes only a portion of God's Truth that they have personally discovered. It does not and cannot contain the entire of God's Truth since God's Truth is infinite and humankind will forever continue to discover more of God's Truth as we progress in receiving more of God's Love. Please remember that due to these limitations information contained within this document may need to be revised in the future.

4 Many other ebooks have been published by Divine Truth, including ebooks translated into a variety of different languages. Please visit or for further information. Additional sessions on the subject in this book can be found on For more information go to: Divine Truth ( Divine Truth Channel on YouTube ( Divine Truth FAQ Channel on YouTube (

5 Table of Contents 1. Do you feel that care is owed to God? 2. Do you feel that God punishes those who neglect worship of God? 3. Do you feel that external religious practice makes a person sacred? 4. Do you feel that neglecting religious practice is impiety or a lack of reverence for God? 5. Do you believe people should be rejected for not having the same beliefs? 6. Are you setting up a new religion? 7. Do you have any beliefs that are strange? 8. Do you suggest any practices that are strange? 9. Why are new groups initially mostly considered as cults? 10. Do you have a group of people that you organize in any way? 11. Do you have any beliefs or practices that are abnormal or bizarre? 12. Do you have a system of ritual practices? 13. How would you define a cult? 14. Are you a cult leader? 15. Do you require that people worship you? 16. Why are people afraid of cults? 17. What do you say to the media comparing you to violent abusive people? 18. What do you say to media claims you are the leader of a "chilling cult"? 19. What do you say to the media comparing you with Jonestown & Waco? 20. Do you have a cult headquarters? 21. Do you call your home the headquarters? 22. Have you been given property from other people, that you live on? 23. Do you hide things from people? 24. Are world religions "cults"? 25. Do you believe you are the Messiah? 26. Do you have direct authority from God

6 27. Do you believe that you are better than other people? 28. Do you allow people to question you? 29. When will you not allow people to question you? 30. Do you believe that you are the only source of Truth on the planet? 31. Do you attempt to cut people off from their family and friends? 32. If families are concerned about their loved ones being involved with you, what would you say to them? 33. Do you try to stop other people being influenced by their friends, families, or the public generally? 34. What do you feel about people examining other beliefs? 35. Do you filter information given to members? 36. Why are people careful about what they say to you? 37. Do you ask members hide their true thoughts & feelings? 38. Are you Divinely inspired (revelations, visions etc)? 39. Do you punish people who don't follow your teachings? 40. Do you give personal advice to people? 41. Do you tell people what to believe?

7 1. Do you feel that care is owed to God? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult (religious practice) it states in the first few lines In traditional usage, the cult of a religion, quite apart from its sacred writings ("scriptures"), its theology or myths, or the personal faith of its believers, is the totality of external religious practice and its observance, the neglect of which is the definition of impiety. Cult in this primary sense is literally the "care" (Latin cultus) owed to the god and the shrine. Mary: Do you feel that care is owed to God? Well firstly, if I can point out that the word 'cult' comes from the Latin cultus, which actually literally means care, so the suggestion is that all religions need take care for the way in which they worship God. If they don t care for it, they don t have enough piety and therefore you know they are probably not observing that particular religion. It is interesting that the underlying word, the word that 'cult' comes from is implying that God needs to be cared for. The reality is that God does not need to be cared for. God is self-caring, self-responsible, God does not need to be cared for and God is not seeking our worship. There is this common viewpoint on the planet, I feel, that God is seeking worship and God does not seek worship. God knows Herself very well and knows Her value and She does not need us to support Her value or to make Her feel better about Herself than She already feels. In fact the underlying word of cult is implying that. Now if you look at how the word is used today, it is often applied to a cult leader and I am often associated with being one. If you look at the underlying thing again, it is like, does a person, does one single person need to be cared for and honoured above all others? The answer to that is also: no. Any person who has any degree of self-responsibility and love for themselves does not need to be cared for by any other person, and therefore does not need to be worshipped or even listened too. God does not have an investment in us listening to God and any person who is an appropriate spiritual leader would also not have any investment in another person listening to them. By 'an appropriate spiritual leader' I mean a spiritual leader who is not invested in other people s opinion of them and who is just interested in telling the truth.

8 2. Do you feel that God punishes those who neglect worship of God? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult (religious practice) it states in the first few lines In traditional usage, the cult of a religion, quite apart from its sacred writings ("scriptures"), its theology or myths, or the personal faith of its believers, is the totality of external religious practice and observance, the neglect of which is the definition of impiety. Cult in this primary sense is literally the "care" (Latin cultus) owed to the god and the shrine. Mary: Do you feel that God punishes those who neglect worship of God? Definitely not. In fact, God does not even desire our worship. God desires our love, which is a very different thing to desiring to be worshipped. Somebody who feels a lack within themselves generally, wanting somebody else to support that lack by providing them with feelings that they wouldn t otherwise have is desiring to be worshipped. God doesn t do that with us. All God desires is a relationship with us and God desires that we have this relationship in a sincere, frank, open, truthful manner. God certainly does not desire our worship in the sense of desiring all of these reverential emotions given to God. However many people who come to know God do finish up giving those particular emotions to God, because of the honour they feel towards God and that is a different matter, whether God desires it or whether the person desires to give it. God desires a close relationship with each one of Her children, very similar to the type of relationship that a parent desires with its children on earth. It is very important for us to understand that God does not demand that we worship God but rather God desires a relationship with us based on love. I don t believe God demands worship and therefore God does not want to punish the people who do not worship God. This whole concept that the people who do not worship God will be punished comes from a very human trait of punishing people who do not give honour. God is okay with the concept of giving us free will and this means that God is also accepting of the fact that we might not honour God or we might not worship God. God still makes the sun shine and makes it rain upon the righteous and the wicked because God is not selective in the way in which God gives Her gifts to all of Her children. However God recognises that there are some children who will receive God's gifts differently and who will desire to have the closer personal relationship with God and under those circumstances more Love flows to that particular person because of their desire for it.

9 3. Do you feel that external religious practice makes a person sacred? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult (religious practice) it states in the first few lines In traditional usage, the cult of a religion, quite apart from its sacred writings ("scriptures"), its theology or myths, or the personal faith of its believers, is the totality of external religious practice and observance, the neglect of which is the definition of impiety. Cult in this primary sense is literally the "care" (Latin cultus) owed to the god and the shrine. Mary: Do you feel that external religious practice makes a person sacred? Definitely not. In fact what I have found in my personal experience is that many people who have an attitude of piety or an attitude of being holy are often some of the least holy or impious persons on the planet because they use their piety as a justification for violence. What is true is that there is only really one religious practice that is God's definition of a religious practice and that is, whenever we love. Whenever we act in a loving manner towards another person or thing we are automatically in a state of piety, if you like. We are not creating an alternate state based on belief systems but rather we have a feeling and a desire to love and this feeling and desire to love - that is true religion.

10 4. Do you feel that neglecting religious practice is impiety or a lack of reverence for God? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult (religious practice) it states in the first few lines In traditional usage, the cult of a religion, quite apart from its sacred writings ("scriptures"), its theology or myths, or the personal faith of its believers, is the totality of external religious practice and observance, the neglect of which is the definition of impiety. Cult in this primary sense is literally the "care" (Latin cultus) owed to the god and the shrine. Mary: Do you feel that neglecting religious practice is impiety or a lack of reverence for God? No, I don t believe God ever established any religious practice. The fact is that almost all religious practices that I have observed on this planet have been the result of a person or a group of people deciding upon a religious practice that was acceptable to God without asking God whether that particular practice was acceptable. The concept that God has a desire for a certain type of practice is, I feel, fraught with a lot of impossibilities and dangers. Whenever we establish a concept about God that is our own, we are automatically establishing a concept that is out of harmony with God's concept of Himself. The reality is that God does not demand that we worship God, God does not even demand reverence from us; however God desires love, and love automatically does certain things when we are truly loving. We automatically desire to know the person, desire to understand the person, desire to understand their will and their long term intentions; all of these other things are a part of desire with regard to love. I feel quite strongly that religious practices are fraught with dangers and in fact I don t want to establish any religious practice. However there is possibly one practice and I would not actually call it a practice, but rather a desire that God is looking for, from us, and that is this desire for God s Love, the desire to have a relationship with God. If there is any practice at all, the singular practice that we need to be involved in is desire for a relationship with God. In that desire we will generate a desire for Truth, a desire to be humble, but these will be desires and not forced upon us by our relationship with God. And they certainly won t be forced upon us by God Herself. God has no interest in forcing us to do anything and if we do not desire love and if we do not desire humility then of course God will allow us to make that choice.

11 5. Do you believe people should be rejected for not having the same beliefs? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult (religious practice) it states in the first few lines In traditional usage, the cult of a religion, quite apart from its sacred writings ("scriptures"), its theology or myths, or the personal faith of its believers, is the totality of external religious practice and observance, the neglect of which is the definition of impiety. Cult in this primary sense is literally the "care" (Latin cultus) owed to the god and the shrine. Mary: Do you believe people should be rejected for not having the same beliefs? Definitely not! No single person should ever be rejected under any circumstances with the exception of perhaps one, and that is when they have harmed other people's will; they need to be shown that that particular desire to harm another person s will was out of harmony with love. Rather than rejecting them it needs to be demonstrated to them how that was out of harmony with love and they need to be restricted from those particular practices. Many people in the human race now already do that, in terms of most governments doing this. For example, when it comes to murder, most governments on the planet accept that murder is not the correct action to take towards another person. Whenever a person does take that action they are generally restricted in some way, usually by being placed in a prison and so forth and restricted from taking that action again, hopefully until the time they ve recovered from the reason why they wanted to take the action. Of course unfortunately on the planet there is not much focus on the person's recovery but rather on punishing the person. God's focus though is on the person's recovery. With regards to there ever being an excommunication, if you like, of an individual from a religion, every time we excommunicate someone from something we no longer give them the opportunity to grow. That is going to mean not excommunication but rather addressing the issue that s out of harmony with love in the individual and addressing that issue, sometimes firmly if need be, but certainly not with any desire for punishment or violence. So every time a person is excommunicated from a religion I believe the religion itself is just demonstrating its own "cult -like behaviour. There are many mainstream religions on this planet that do this, and this would indicate that many mainstream religions are cultish in their particular desires because they wish to control the actions of the individual even if the actions of the individual have still been loving, but not what they believe is pious. I feel quite strongly that the important factor should be whether the individual is practicing love or not. If the individual is not practising love then there certainly needs to be some kind of restriction of their behaviour, but we would never take those restrictive actions from a place of rejection or a place of rage or anger towards them or a desire to punish them. What we would do is desire to correct them by demonstrating love to them and also demonstrating to them when they are out of harmony with love themselves.

12 6. Are you setting up a new religion? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult (religious practice) it states in the first few lines In traditional usage, the cult of a religion, quite apart from its sacred writings ("scriptures"), its theology or myths, or the personal faith of its believers, is the totality of external religious practice and observance, the neglect of which is the definition of impiety. Cult in this primary sense is literally the "care" (Latin cultus) owed to the god and the shrine. Mary: Are you setting up a new religion? Definitely not! I have no desire to set up a new religion. The main reason I have no desire to set up a new religion is that I believe that almost every religion that s ever been set up on this planet has been the ideas of men and how those men believe God wants to be worshipped. As I ve already stated in other questions, I don t believe God needs our worship. God desires our love and a relationship with us and for that reason God does not need our worship. God does not need a religious practice in order to be validated. I feel quite strongly that there is no need to set up another religion. We need to have every single organisation on this planet come into more harmony with love and that includes every single religious organisation, because there are many religious organisations on this planet that are completely out of harmony with love and completely out of harmony with ethical behaviour towards other people. We need to bring each religion into harmony with love and ethical behaviour. The golden rule, if you like, that I taught in the 1st century: unless we are willing to treat other people how we would like to be treated, it s really impossible for a religion to have any benefit at all. Now a person can go on practising their religious practice if they want to, but they must come to understand at some point that these practices have all been defined by other people, usually other men, sometimes other women and these particular practices have no bearing on a person s relationship with God. I feel quite strongly that we need to change this and start seeing that love is the thing God is concerned about, not religious practice based around some kind of definition of humanity.

13 7. Do you have any beliefs that are strange? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult (disambiguation) it states in the first line A cult references a group whose beliefs or practices are considered strange. Mary: Do you have any beliefs that are strange? No, I don t believe I have any beliefs that are strange; however perhaps many other people who have listened to some of my beliefs think they are strange. Mind you I could probably say the same about their beliefs on many occasions. In fact I believe that many of the beliefs that I observe in most religions are quite strange. If that is the definition of a cult, then that would pretty much define every single religion and other organisations that are strange as a cult. I don t believe that somebody that is strange or different should be defined as someone who s a cult or part of a cult. Cults to me a very very different organisations and we'll talk I think more fully about that through answering other questions. But I can t see how a person who is different or a group of people who are different should be labelled. My feelings are that every single person on this planet, no matter what their background, cultural, sexual, political or otherwise, should be honoured and loved. I feel that once we have that attitude towards all people we won t be going around labelling different people as members of cults or not members of cults or members of religions or not members of religions; rather we'll be labelling every person perhaps as a child of God who deserves my love.

14 8. Do you suggest any practices that are strange? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult, Disambiguation it states in the first line A cult references a group whose beliefs or practices are considered strange. Mary: Do you suggest any practices that are strange? As I have said many times in my discussions with people and on the YouTube presentations, I do not believe that there is any practice at all that we need to engage in our worship of God because I do not believe that God desires our worship but rather God desires our love and a relationship. I do feel that there are certain things that will help us with regard to that relationship. One of those things is a desire for God s Love which I view as prayer; another one of those things is a desire for God s Truth which I also view as a prayer for truth, and the third thing that I view as quite important is a desire for personal humility, something that we need to do to see ourselves more accurately. We need to be honest about ourselves. These are things that I believe are important in our relationship with God. I do not believe that they can be practiced. They can either be desired and felt or not; we can t go through some kind of intellectual practice by rote that earns us a place with God. God is more intelligent than that and also understands more about us then we do. If we believe that we can just go through a heap of intellectual practices while at the same time having unloving emotions, then we have a very poor opinion of God, in my opinion. If we believe that we can get away with having all these terrible emotions coming out of us, all these unloving things that we do to other people, and then still believe that God is going to accept us, we have to relook at the whole situation. We have got to see that God is far more intelligent and far more loving than a God who would accept that kind of worship. So I feel that no religious practice is necessary to connect to God. I do feel that a desire and longing for God is necessary to connect to God. That is going to involve three things - a desire to long for God s Love, a desire to long for God s Truth, and personal humility, the ability to see myself as God sees me, warts and all, and to be the person that I truly am, and to work on recovering this person if the person I truly (currently) am is out of harmony with love. These are the only things necessary for us to have any relationship with God. Anything else, any other religious observance is a manmade creation that is completely unnecessary in our relationship with God.

15 9. Why are new groups initially mostly considered as cults? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult it states in the first lines The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a new religious movement or other group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. Mary: Under this definition, almost any new group would be considered a cult ; what would you say about that? Well that s correct. I feel for a start what myself and Mary are setting up is not a new religious movement. It s certainly not new because it s something we set up 2,000 years ago anyway, and it s not a religious movement in the sense that we are not interested in having worship or priests or any of those other things, we are interested only in a direct connection with God that every single member of humanity can engage. We're not interested in setting up a new religious movement. However people who know us do group together at times; in other words myself and Mary arrange a seminar and a whole heap of people come along and sometimes it s the same people who came along last time although not always. And so my feelings are with regard to that every time we have a seminar, we're not setting up a new religious group, we're just presenting a series of information about what we have personally learnt about God and relationship with God, the human soul and many other important aspects. I feel though, that under some of the definitions of 'cult' that you could find in Wikipedia and dictionaries and elsewhere, almost any religion could be viewed as a cult. My personal opinion is that the word nowadays has a connotation of evil to it and at some point we need to discuss why it has a connotation of evil to it. The reality I feel is that there is no need for us to keep labelling different things on the planet as having evil or not evil, we just need to see when something is out of harmony with love and bring it into harmony with love and if every religion and every political organisation and every medical organisation on the planet and every other type of organisation, company or otherwise, on the planet brought all their practices into harmony with love, we would have a lovely environment in which to live and enjoy our life. In particular if the family brought their particular practices into complete harmony with love, we would just have a wonderful existence on this planet. The reality is though, we don t have a wonderful existence and the reason, the only problem we face, is defining what love is. Whenever we set up different religious observances we are not defining what love is, we are defining something different. And God is only interested in love, not in all these other things that we're trying or attempting to define. God is certainly interested in truth as well, but not at the expense of love. So we must always focus on the fact that we need to be loving and that is going to be the only, if there is a so-called religious practice, that would be the only religious practice we would be involved in. I believe that a lot of the definitions we find about cults, you know in the world today, are all about people s fears being applied to certain groups of people. They generally have nothing to do with reality but rather the application of people s fears. Years and years ago, for example, the Catholic Church in the 2nd century of this millennium was viewed as a cult. The government was so afraid of it that it was attacked and bitterly persecuted for a long period of time until the government decided to make the church its state religion. Then all of a sudden it became not a cult anymore, all the other religions that weren t the state religion became cults. This is an illustration of how we manipulate the word in order to punish people who have a different belief from ourselves, because we're afraid. If we are truly loving, which is what God desires us to be, we would never imply these particular things and certainly never act violently towards another group of people, no matter what their belief.

16 10. Do you have a group of people that you organize in any way? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult it states in the first lines The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a new religious movement or other group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. [1] The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. Mary: Do you have a group of people that you organize in any way? No. The only people that I actually organise are the people who help us set up a venue for a seminar and help us dismantle the venue after the seminar, and the people who actually help us with the distribution of divine truth on the planet. Now there are many, many more people than that who come along to our seminars, or come along to presentations or workshops that Mary runs, or different interviews that we do, but we don t generally organise them. Generally some other people may organise them. But what we do primarily is just rock up at any request from any person, depending on whether we want to or not, deliver the information we wish to deliver if it s desired to be heard, and then we leave. And we have a group of people who then get that information and produce it onto the internet, so that other people can share in the information that was presented. That s the only things that we actually organise. We don t organise a religion. We don t have a hierarchy of any kind. We don t try to organise people to do things every week. We don t have a religious church service; we don t have a church at all in fact. And we don t have any other things most people believe we have from the media reports.

17 11. Do you have any beliefs or practices that are abnormal or bizarre? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult it states in the first lines The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a new religious movement or other group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. [1] The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. Mary: Do you have any beliefs or practices that are abnormal or bizarre? I would say that we don t have any beliefs or practices that are abnormal or bizarre, but again it depends upon a person s definition of abnormal or bizarre. A lot of people on the planet believe that feeling an emotion is abnormal and so if feeling an emotion is abnormal for you, then you will certainly believe that when we feel our emotion we are being abnormal. My feeling is that, no, every single little child who enters this planet is able to feel its emotions perfectly, so that s normal, and then we turn it into being something abnormal. I feel what is defined as normal or abnormal, bizarre or acceptable almost completely depends upon what somebody has been brought up with over their life. Most people would suggest getting a baby at a certain age and then cutting off the flesh around its penis, which is what happens at circumcision, is a pretty abnormal thing to do, but then there are other people who believe it's a part of their life and has been a part of their life for thousands of years and so they believe it s the normal thing to do. There are other practices such as getting a child who s only a few days old and sprinkling it with water and saying that it s now baptised and therefore saved is pretty abnormal, whereas other people, in fact over a billion and a half people on this planet generally practice that with every one of the children that they have. So I believe that there are many practices happening in religious practice that any other person observing could say, "That's pretty abnormal," but which the people involved feel is pretty normal because they have been brought up with that particular practice. We do not engage in any of those practices. However we do feel our emotions, as a child would. We do have a desire for God because that s a part of having a relationship with God, and we do examine ourselves a lot because we're quite humble and we want to examine ourselves a lot. If a person believes that all of those practices are abnormal then so be it. I don t believe they're abnormal; I think that s part of being what I would classify as a good or righteous person.

18 12. Do you have a system of ritual practices? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult it states in the first lines The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a new religious movement or other group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. [1] The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. Mary: Do you have a system of ritual practices? Definitely not. There is no system of ritual or religious practice that we suggest to anyone. We do make some suggestions about them feeling their feelings and emotions because we feel this is a very important part of having a relationship with God. We also make suggestions about praying, in other words having a desire for God, having a longing for God. We also make suggestions that people analyse themselves, that they look at themselves honestly and examine their own concept of themselves to see whether or not it's actually loving, whether the things they are doing are actually loving or not. We ask people to examine their treatment of other people, you know, whether they are treating other people in a loving manner. We ask people to examine how they are treating their environment, but we don t have any practice to do it. We just present a whole series of information to people in just the same way as any other person on this planet presents a seminar. So even someone like Wayne Dyer or Deepak Chopra would go further than we do about presenting what I would classify to be rituals. Many of them believe in practicing meditation for example; we don t even suggest that. We don t suggest any practice, but we do suggest the need to develop desire to have a relationship with God, a relationship with your partner, a relationship based on love with God and your partner and others, and a relationship with your children, a relationship with your friends, a relationship with the environment. We suggest that we need to always examine these particular relationships and do whatever we can on a daily basis to improve them. But I don t feel that that is like a religious practice or a regular practice that needs to be done, it is just something that is a daily occurrence. Any person on this planet, if they are sincere in becoming more loving, would have that kind of selfexamination. They can also be a member of any religion and have that kind of self-examination. They can be a member of any political party and have that kind of self-examination. I believe that all of the things that Mary and myself are teaching can be incorporated into any organisation on the planet, religious or otherwise, and that organisation will improve in its ability to love other organisations and people. So that s what we suggest to people. Now of course many people go, "Well, that s pretty abnormal," because they believe that the only time you should love somebody is when they re your friend or the only time you should love something is when you know you re getting something from it or whatever. But we feel that you should always love something even if the thing is attacking you; you need to love it and we need to learn how to love all people in all interactions. That s what we teach. Now many people I suppose may think that s abnormal, but I can t see why they d be frightened of that kind of concept.

19 13. How would you define a cult? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult it states in the first lines The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a new religious movement or other group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. [1] The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. Mary: How would you define a cult? If it was me defining a cult I would be looking at quite a number of areas. The first area would be its level of control over other people. I believe quite strongly that no one should have control over another person. In fact God gave us free will and the ability to choose. I feel a cult is any organisation or individual who attempts to have control over another group of people or individual. Many times, under that definition, families would turn into cults, and religions would turn into cults. Secondly, I feel that any person who is desiring worship is automatically going to be part of a cult. As I've stated earlier or in other questions, God does not demand our worship; therefore any person who demands our worship or demands our honour is out of harmony with God, and therefore out of harmony with love. I feel that that would be the second thing I would look at: whether people are demanding to be worshiped or demanding to be honoured. Aside from that I would look at practices that demean or demonstrate a lack of love towards the individual. I believe that any practice that would attack an individual, demean them in some way, is not honest but is a desire to manipulate and control - that would also be something that a cult would do. Fourth, I believe that if there is such a thing as a cult, it would be a group of people who are willing to deceive other people. Now in that condition many organisations and individuals on this planet would come under that definition. I feel that any time we purposefully attempt to deceive another we are automatically placing ourselves in a position where we are taking away the power of the other. I believe that what needs to happen is that we need to help people have the power to make their own choices and decisions, which is the opposite of taking away their power. We need to tell them the truth and then let them decide for themselves how they wish to act. If we withhold truth from people we are not telling them the truth and then we are deciding for them how they should act. Many people are not told the truth by governments, religions and other organisations and I feel that this is a way in which many organisations control individuals. This is completely out of harmony with love and I feel cultish behaviour. I feel that those four things that I have mentioned are probably the main things that I would be looking at, if I was looking at a person and asking myself the question as to whether they were a cult or not. Obviously too there is a fifth element and that is this element of violence, if there is any element of violence or the potential for violence in the particular organisation that we're looking at. I feel that that is also an element of cultish behaviour. If we look at that, even some governments have that in them and again some governments would come under that definition. If we truly love we won t desire violence to be perpetrated towards another in any circumstance or situation. If we truly care about other people we won t perpetrate violence ourselves. I believe that any organisation that perpetrates violence towards any other individual or organisation on the planet is automatically out of harmony with love. In doing so they are automatically placing themselves in a position of power or control over the other people. And I believe that that is what a cult would do. Those five particular things that I ve mentioned I believe are the primary things that I would use to determine whether something is cultish or not in under today s definition of it. As I ve previously stated, I do not believe that the original meaning of the word, coming from the Latin, meant any of those particular things. However the original meaning of the word did portray that God needs care and I do not believe God needs care. God does not need us at all; God desires us which is very different to needing us. And so I feel that whenever we use the word cult today it s usually used in negative connotation and if we were more intelligent about our assessment we'd look at those five particular things that I ve just listed and ask ourselves the questions. Any organisation or individual that does not display those particular qualities would naturally not be a cult leader or even if he is being accused of being one.

20 14. Are you a cult leader? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult it states in the first lines The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a new religious movement or other group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. [1] The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. Mary: Are you a cult leader? I am definitely not a cult leader. If a person looks at my answer to the question about my own definition of what a cult is, I certainly do not come under the definition of any those particular things I have mentioned. A cult leader is a person who promotes control of other people, a person who s willing to manipulate other people into doing what he wants, who desires worship and who desires control and power over others. I do not want any of those things. Just because I am saying that I am Jesus, it doesn t automatically make me a cult leader. What would make me a cult leader is my desiring those particular things. As the bible record shows and as my own record in this century shows, I ve never desired those particular things and so therefore I cannot be defined as a cult leader in my opinion, but of course that s just my opinion.

21 15. Do you require that people worship you? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult it states in the first lines The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a new religious movement or other group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. [1] The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. Mary: Do you require that people worship you? Definitely not. I require that people do not worship me and that people worship God instead. That is what I require; in fact if anyone attempts to worship me, I reject their desire to worship me and correct this desire by stating to them that I do not want their worship. I do not want their worship and I do not need anything from them. All I desire to do is teach any person who will listen about how to develop their relationship with God. I do not even believe that God needs our worship, but if we desire to worship someone, then my suggestion is to worship God, who is far greater than I, and far greater than any person. My suggestion is to never worship another person, because if you worship another person you are always, at some point in the future, going to be disappointed.

22 16. Why are people afraid of cults? Mary: On Wikipedia, under Cult it states in the first lines The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a new religious movement or other group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. [1] The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices. Mary: The public seem very fearful about cults. Why do you feel that is? Well, I feel that most of the public have been brought up in a cult, in the sense that most of the public have been brought up in the cult of family. If you examine almost every family, the behaviour generally is this: if any member of the family does not agree with the family, then generally they are expelled from the family or punished. Now that is the action that I believe a cult would take. Because most people are brought up in the kind of environment where they're not really loved but they are either punished or bartered with, I believe that by the time they get to be adults, because those emotions have not yet been released from them, they are very sensitive to any organisation that tries to do the same thing as their parents did. Interestingly enough, they still accept their parents doing what they have generally done all of their lives, but they are very sensitive to other people doing that particular thing to them. Understandably, so I believe, we should not ever have to put up with that kind of behaviour, where we are punished when we have a different point of view or opinion. And we should not ever have to put up with the behaviour where we barter with people for their love. However, that is what most people are brought up with and so that is what most people expect in a relationship, but they also become very sensitive to that kind of behaviour. As a result of their sensitivity to that kind of behaviour, they then become very focused on attacking individuals or groups of people who they believe - and they only have to believe it, it doesn t have to be true - but any person or group that they believe has that behaviour, they then become very attacking of. Because in reality they have not released the emotions they have with their own parents, they have not worked their way through the issues of why their parents did what they did; they just take these emotions out on other people who are basically doing the same kind of thing as what they grew up with in their own family. That is why I believe that the majority of people are afraid of cults. My opinion is that there s very little to be afraid of, because you can leave anything if you have free will, you are allowed to leave anything at any time. You don t have to get involved, you can use your mind and you can use your clear emotional state to determine whether you want to be there or not. And you should never be anywhere you do not want to be. So if a person truly had any respect of themselves, they would not need to fear the potential of any cult. They would not need to attack it. I also believe that another reason why people become afraid of cults is that many cults get established having different beliefs to the original person who s afraid of them. The reason why that the person is afraid is that they are often questioning of their own belief structure and yet they are unable to do so in an open forum. For example, I could be of a certain type of religion, let s say I m a catholic, and another religious group gets started up that directly contradicts my own belief system. There will be a great temptation within me to call that other religious group a cult. That way I can label the group and not have to examine their teachings to see how those teachings contradict my own and how my own teachings may be flawed. I feel a lot of people label other groups negatively because they are afraid of examining their own beliefs and afraid of examining their own emotions.

23 17. What do you say to the media comparing you to violent abusive people? Mary: Wikipedia says; In the mass media, and among average citizens, "cult" gained an increasingly negative connotation, becoming associated with things like kidnapping, brainwashing, psychological abuse, sexual abuse and other criminal activity, and mass suicide. While most of these negative qualities usually have real documented precedents in the activities of a very small minority of new religious groups, mass culture often extends them to any religious group viewed as culturally deviant, however peaceful or law-abiding it may be. - cite_note-9 Mary: You have often been compared by the media to people who have encouraged violence, suicide, abuse, and criminal activity, such as David Koresh of the Branch Davidian movement. Mary: What do you say about these claims? Well firstly, as I have stated many times before, Mary and I are not setting up a new religious movement. We do not desire to set up a religion; we don t even desire to set up a group. All we desire to do is visit people who want to know more about their relationship with God and want more truth from God s perspective. We are willing to share that truth with anybody who asks. It doesn t matter what religion, what background, what political background, what cultural background, what country; we are completely open to discussing these particular matters with any individual. We are not setting up a new religious group. All we are doing is sharing information that we believe is truth, to other people who are willing to listen to it; that is all we are doing. In that regard we are no different to any other person who does a similar thing, like some of the popular world-renowned people who are seminar presenters. Myself and Mary are not world-renowned but we are seminar presenters. We just present information to groups of people who desire to come along. We are different in that we don t charge for what we do, so people are allowed to come along for free and sit in the seminar for as long as they like, and leave whenever they want. They don t have to feel obliged to stay or obliged to leave or anything in-between. We have a very strong viewpoint that all we are doing is sharing information. However a lot of the time, because I am saying that I am Jesus, most people then think that I am now setting myself up above other people and that I want to be worshipped and all these other things, which are not true. They assume these things about me because that s what other people who have said that they are Jesus have done in the past, or what they are currently doing on the planet. I am very different to those people but unfortunately because I am saying that I am Jesus I am lumped in the same barrow as these other people, as the Wikipedia article suggested. There is only a small minority of groups of people on this planet that are truly dangerous when it comes to any new movement, and yet they tar the brush for any other person. Just because I am claiming that I am Jesus it does not mean that I want to set up a religious movement; it does not mean that I want worship, and it doesn t mean that I want to be the leader of any particular movement. All I want to do and all I have ever wanted to do is share what I believe is the Divine Truth to people on the planet, which they can discover for themselves actually, through their own processes; they don t need me in order to discover them. All I am doing is sharing what I have discovered; that is all. I am not doing anything more than that. I don t have control over people, I don t manipulate people, I don t tell them what to do, I don t tell them how they should live their life. However, if they are not loving in their interaction with me I will walk away. That is the only limitation I place on any relationship with me: if you are going to be unloving towards me then I am probably not going to enjoy a relationship with you. Now I cannot see how that is comparable to these people that I am often compared to. This is only a media beat-up attempting to make the association in people s mind between myself and these other people in order to have the media s viewpoint projected at the mass market. That s all it is. It s the media selling their own viewpoint using the fears of people they are selling it to, joining myself to these people who have been damaging and definitely harmful to other people on the planet. I can t agree with the behaviour of these groups because they are unloving, just as I can t agree with the behaviour of

24 the media because it is manipulative, controlling, power-hungry and therefore unloving. All I can do is continue to say what I am actually doing and that is that I am presenting information in seminars for free if anybody wants to come along and listen; that s all I am doing.

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