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Unprecedented Look Inside Scientology's Culture of Violence

This account comes from executives who for decades were key figures in Scientology's powerful inner circle. Marty Rathbun and Mike Rinder, the highest-ranking executives to leave the church, are speaking out for the first time.

Two other former executives who defected also agreed to interviews with the St. Petersburg Times: De Vocht, who for years oversaw the church's spiritual headquarters in Clearwater, and Amy Scobee, who helped create Scientology's celebrity network, which caters to the likes of John Travolta and Tom Cruise.

One by one, the four defectors walked away from the only life they knew. That Rathbun and Rinder are speaking out is a stunning reversal because they were among Miscavige's closest associates, Haldeman and Ehrlichman to his Nixon.

Now they provide an unprecedented look inside the upper reaches of the tightly controlled organization. They reveal:

• Physical violence permeated Scientology's international management team. Miscavige set the tone, routinely attacking his lieutenants. Rinder says the leader attacked him some 50 times.

Rathbun, Rinder and De Vocht admit that they, too, attacked their colleagues, to demonstrate loyalty to Miscavige and prove their mettle.

• Staffers are disciplined and controlled by a multi­layered system of "ecclesiastical justice.'' It includes publicly confessing sins and crimes to a group of peers, being ordered to jump into a pool fully clothed, facing embarrassing "security checks'' or, worse, being isolated as a "suppressive person.''

At the pinnacle of the hierarchy, Miscavige commands such power that managers follow his orders, however bizarre, with lemming-like obedience.

• Church staffers covered up how they botched the care of Lisa McPherson, a Scientologist who died after they held her 17 days in isolation at Clearwater's Fort Harrison Hotel.

Rathbun, who Miscavige put in charge of dealing with the fallout from the case, admits that he ordered the destruction of incriminating evidence. He and others also reveal that Miscavige made an embarrassing miscalculation on McPherson's Scientology counseling.

• With Miscavige calling the shots and Rathbun among those at his side, the church muscled the IRS into granting Scientology tax-exempt status. Offering fresh perspective on one of the church's crowning moments, Rathbun details an extraordinary campaign of public pressure backed by thousands of lawsuits.

• To prop up revenues, Miscavige has turned to long-time parishioners, urging them to buy material that the church markets as must-have, improved sacred scripture.

Church officials deny the accusations. Miscavige never hit a single church staffer, not once, they said.

...

"But I believe these abuses need to end … This rot being instigated from inside Scientology actually is more destructive to the Scientology movement than anything external to it.''

BEATINGS: Random, whimsical

At 49, Miscavige is fit and tanned, his chiseled good looks accented by intense blue eyes. His frame is on the short side at 5 feet 5, but solid, with a matching, vise-like handshake.

The voice, resonant and strong, can transfix a crowd of thousands. Many call him "COB," because he is chairman of the board of the entity responsible for safeguarding Scientology, founded by L. Ron Hubbard in 1954.

"He is one of the most capable, intelligent individuals I've ever met," Rathbun said. "But L. Ron Hubbard says the intelligence scale doesn't necessarily line up with the sanity scale. Adolf Hitler was brilliant. Stalin was brilliant. They were geniuses. But they were also on a certain level stark, staring mad."

Rathbun, Rinder, Scobee and De Vocht say they participated in and witnessed madness, from musical chairs to repeated physical abuse.

What triggered Miscavige's outbursts? The victims usually had no clue.

"If it wasn't the answer he wanted to hear, he'd lose it," De Vocht said. "If it was contrary to how he thought, he'd lose it. If he found it to be smart aleck, or it was a better answer than he had, he would lose it."

Rathbun and Rinder list the executives they saw Miscavige attack:

Marc Yager: At least 20 times.

Guillaume Lesevre: At least 10 times.

Ray Mithoff: Rathbun said Miscavige "would regularly hit this guy open-handed upside the head real hard and jar him. Or grab him by the neck and throw him on the floor."

Norman Starkey: "Right in the parking lot, (Miscavige) just beat the living f--- out of him, got him on the ground and then started kicking him when he was down,'' Rathbun said.

He said he saw Rinder "get beat up at least a dozen times just in those last four years … some of them were pretty gruesome."

Said Rinder: "Yager was like a punching bag. So was I."

He added: "The issue wasn't the physical pain of it. The issue was the humiliation and the domination. ... It's the fact that the domination you're getting — hit in the face, kicked — and you can't do anything about it. If you did try, you'd be attacking the COB.

"It was random and whimsical. It could be the look on your face. Or not answering a question quickly. But it always was a punishment.''

Scobee said Miscavige never laid a hand on her or any other woman, but she witnessed many attacks, including the time the leader choked Rinder until his face turned purple. Rinder confirmed that account.

De Vocht estimated that from 2003 to 2005, he saw Miscavige strike staffers as many as 100 times.

Rathbun, Rinder and De Vocht admit that they, in turn, hit others. In January 2004, Rathbun pummeled Rinder and had to be pried off by several church staffers.

"Yes, that incident happened," Rinder said. "It wasn't the only time that Marty or I was involved in some form of physical violence with people."

He recalled holding a church staffer against a wall by the collar and pressing into his throat.

Rathbun said he attacked many people, many times, including throwing Lesevre across a table, boxing Starkey's ears, and tackling Yager down a flight of stairs — all, he said, on Miscavige's orders. He said he threw another staffer against the hood of a cab at Los Angeles International Airport. As a crowd gathered to watch, he cocked his fist and told him to improve his attitude.

De Vocht said he "punched a couple of guys" during one of many sessions where managers confessed their wrongdoings to their peers, a gathering that got raucous and physical. Embarrassed about it now, he says he easily rationalized it then: "If I don't attack I'm going to be attacked. It's a survival instinct in a weird situation that no one should be in."

The four defectors each said the leader established a culture that encouraged physical violence.

"It had become the accepted way of doing things," Rinder said. "If COB did it, it was okay for everybody else to do it, too."

Rinder said Rathbun was Miscavige's enforcer. "If Dave didn't want to go do any dirty work himself, he sent Marty to do it for him."

Rathbun doesn't deny it. It's difficult to get the truth, he said, "unless you talk to somebody who's got some dirt on their hands. And I freely admit I got dirt on my hands, and I feel terrible about it. That's why I'm doing what I'm doing."

Rathbun wasn't exempt from Miscavige's attacks. "He once grabbed me by the neck and banged my head against the wall.''

Nobody fought back.

(excerpts) 

Full Article:

http://www.tampabay.com/news/article1012148.ece

Corporate America, Mind Control and New Age Cult Groups (NY Times 1986)

Jack Rafferty (L) and Werner Erhart (aka "Jack" Rosenberg) - Erhart Seminars Training (est)

Representatives of some of the nation's largest corporations, including I.B.M., A.T.&T., and General Motors, met in New Mexico in July to discuss how meta-physics, the occult, and Hindu mysticism might help executives compete in the world marketplace.

Here in San Francisco, a politically conservative research center foresees an eventual alliance of conservatives, leftists of the 1960's, and Americans with interests ranging from eastern mysticism and the occult to holistic medicine.

And this November, ABC-TV plans a five-hour miniseries, based on an auto-biography by the actress Shirley McLaine that delves deeply and seriously into reincarnation and the supernatural.  These are strands in a

thread of alternative thought that scholars say is working its way increasingly into the nation's cultural, religious, social, economic, and political life.

On one level, they say, it is evidenced by a surge in interest in new meta- physical religions, mediums, the occult, reincarnation, psychic healing, satanism, "spirit guides," and other aspects of supernatural belief.

At another level, the scholars site the spreading influence of psychological self-help and "human potential groups" that operate under names such as The Forum, Insight, Actualizations, Silva Mind Control, and Lifespring. These groups' programs for corporate employees attract millions of dollars a year.

Borrowing some spiritual concepts from asian religions, the programs try to transform clients' thought processes and make them better, more creative people.

On both levels, leaders contend they are ushering in what they call a New Age of understanding and intellectual ferment, as significant as the Renaissance. But critics of these groups that many are nothing more than cults, and that others subject unwitting participants to mind control.

Professor Rashky, a critic of the trend, describes it as a "most powerful social force in the country today.  I think its as much a political movement as a religious movement," he says, "and its spreading into Business Management Theory and alot of other areas.  If you look at it carefully you see it represents a complete rejection of judeo-christian and bedrock American values."

Some who have evaluated the trend attribute it partly to a loss of confidence in traditional western ideas and conventional ways of doing things, and to a willingness to try out anything new in search of a replacement.

"Why is business rushing in to look at everything from EST to firewalking?" asks Robert S. Callodson, a business consultant who is a retired Vice President of the Champion International Corporation.  "The old ways of doing business aren't working anymore, and even the most intelligent of people feel that something's broke."

Although precepts vary from group to group, many argue that western man, partly because of scientific discoveries of recent centuries, has become disillusioned with the spiritual concepts he inherited.  Many groups are
also critical of the world's current economic and social systems, saying they have ravaged the planet.

Most argue that mankind is at the threshold of "a great evolutionary leap of consciousness to new beliefs about many things" and that there is an energy or force in the universe that will lead to a happy, peaceful, perhaps united, new world (the sort of "force" at work in George Lucas' Star Wars films.)

The purpose of many of the groups is to transform the society to prepare for this "New Age."  To get there, it is argued, men and women must first alter conventional ways of thinking and begin using areas of their minds they do
not normally use.  They must enter "an altered state of consciousness" through the use of such types of psychological techniques as meditation, hypnosis, chanting, biofeedback, prolonged isolation, and the intervention of "spirit
guides," or ghosts.

Psychologists who have studied the process say that while participants are in this "altered state," leaders of the groups are able to implant new ideas and alter their thinking processes.

Participants in various new age groups say they often experience euphoria in the altered states and cited this as one reason for their popularity. "The drug of the 60's was LSD and marijuana," said Carrie Klinger, a 29-year
old resident of Washington State, who belonged to several New Age groups before becoming disillusioned.  "I think the drug of the 80's is cosmic consciousness."

Reginald Alev, Executive Director of the Cult Awareness Network, a Chicago- based clearinghouse of information about cults, said "it's very sad what's going on.  Most of the people who get involved in these New Age groups which
are growing all over the place are intelligent, altruistic, idealistic. They want to know the meaning of life, and someone comes along and tells them they have the answer.  Then they're told they are the master of their own destiny, sort of an eastern version of Norman Vincent Peale, but they don't know they are being subjected to mind control."

Richard Wattring, Personnel Director of the Budget Rent-A-Car Corporation in Chicago, is seeking to arouse concern among his peers over how quickly Corporate America is embracing "pseudo-therapy programs."  "I really think you're going down the wrong path in business when you deal with a person's spiritual being and attempt to manipulate his mind," he said.

Graduates of such programs and former cult members are often psychically scarred says Dr. Edwin Morse, a former member of the University of Wisconson's psychology faculty who now counsels such people in Madison.  "These groups are using hypnotic procedures and people are not being told about it."  Not only do leaders of some groups convince clients that they should sign up for expensive new seminars or workshops, it is asserted, many also use the hypnotic state to plant beliefs in their mind they are unaware of.

One concept commonly transmitted in these sessions by "human potential groups" is that because man is a deity equal to God he can do wrong, thus there is no sin, no reason for guilt in life.

The Ford Motor Company, Westinghouse, and the Calvin Klein Fashion House are among scores of major companies that have sent employees for training, according to "human potential organizations" such as Transformation Technologies, Lifespring, and Actualizations, all of which include techniques modelled to a greater or lesser extent after the techniques started by Werner Erhart, the founder of EST.  "We teach new patterns of thinking," said Stuart Emory, chairman of Actualizations.

Kevin Garby, an author and researcher on New Age topics in Carlyle, Pennsylvania, cites an army recruiting slogan "Be All That You Can Be" as evidence of what he contends has been the significant influence of EST, Lifespring, and other New Age programs in certain quarters of the military. In the early 1980's, he said, officers at the Army War College in Carlyle, some of whom were graduates of EST, and were former members of The Radical Students For A Democratic Society, conducted a study aimed at creating a "New Age Army."  The slogan, a derivative of the "You Create Your Own Reality" orthodoxy of New Age groups, grew out of this work.

The study, according to participants, also envisaged training soldiers in meditation, developing skills in extrasensory perception, magic, and in "neurolinguistic training," a hypnosis technique.  Army officials say the program has been cancelled and its principle leaders have left the army. Mr. Garvy, however, contends that EST and Lifespring graduates continue to have influence in the army and other government agencies.

Politically, many in the New Age movement have said they tend to gravitate toward democrats like Edmund G. Brown, Jr., the former governer of California, and Senator Gary Hart of Colorado, but A. Lawrence Chickering, editorial director of the Institute For Contemporary Studies here, a conservative research organization, whose alumni include Attorney General Edwin Meese, and Defense Secretary Casper W. Weinberger, forsees the evolution of a New Age Right.

Mr. Chickering attributes the "rediscovery of conservatism" during the 1970's in part to the Esalen Institute, "because what they are trying to do is rediscover principles of order within a context of freedom."  In time, he said, he expected the New Age Right to form an alliance with "some of the components of the New Left of the 1960's and others in the New Age movement."

http://www.skepticfiles.org/mys4/newageci.htm

Related Archives:

Abstracts of Articles in Psychological Journals Concerning est and The Forum

New Age COINTELPRO and the Optimism Gestapo

Cult Groups

Abstracts of Articles in Psychological Journals Concerning est and The Forum

* Psychiatric disturbances associated with Erhard Seminars Training:
      I. A report of cases.
      L. L. Glass, M. A. Kirsch and F. N. Parris.
      American Journal of Psychiatry 1977;134(3):245-7.
      Erhard Seminars Training (est) is a large-group experience that is becoming widely available in this country. This is the first case report in the professional literature of psychiatric disturbance following est training. Five patients, only one of whom had a history of psychiatric disturbance, developed psychotic symptoms including grandiosity, paranoia, uncontrollable mood swings, and delusions. Further work is necessary to ascertain the factors that determine outcome in est.

* Psychiatric disturbances associated with Erhard Seminars Training:
      II. additional cases and theoretical considerations.
      M. A. Kirsch and L. L. Glass.
      American Journal of Psychiatry 1977;134(11):1254-8.
      In a previous article, the authors reported on 5 individuals who developed psychoses after participation in Erhard Seminars Training (est). Two additional cases are reported, and the combined case material is discussed in terms of group and psychodynamic theories. The authoritarian est leadership style may mobilize in trainees an overdetermined and pathological reliance on identification with the aggressor. Such a mechanism may be central to the production of psychiatric casualties, particularly in individuals with defective ego boundaries. Future controlled research is necessary to ascertain the rate of occurrence of psychiatric disturbances associated with est and to test the authors' hypotheses.

* Observations on 67 patients who took Erhard Seminars Training.

      J. Simon.
      American Journal of Psychiatry 1978;135(6):686-91.
      The author describes the effects of Erhard Seminars Training (est) on 67 patients--49 who took est during the course of psychotherapy with him and 18 who were seen for evaluation, consultation, or treatment after having taken est. Responsiveness to est was assessed in terms of individually predefined psychodynamics and treatment goals. Of the 49 patients who took est during therapy, 30 were judged to show some positive response and 19 were rated unchanged. The author believes that est often has a strong influence toward psychotherapeutic movement in patients with good ego strength who are motivated to change.

* A psychotic episode following Erhard Seminars Training.
      A. C. Higgitt and R. M. Murray.
      Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica 1983;67(6):436-9.
      A case of a psychotic episode following Erhard Seminars Training is reported. This is the first reported case of adverse psychological effects from this type of training in Great Britain but it closely resembles previous reports from the United States of America. The possibility of a distinct syndrome is tentatively raised. The apparent rarity of such episodes is noted.

* Characteristics of participants in a large group awareness training.
      Y. Klar, R. Mendola, J. D. Fischer, R. C. Silver, J. M. Chinsky and B. Goff.
      Journal of Consulting & Clinical Psychology 990;58(1):99-108.
      A study was conducted to assess the psychosocial characteristics of individuals who become involved in large group awareness training (LGAT) programs. Prospective participants in The Forum, which has been classified as an LGAT, were compared with nonparticipating peers and with available normative samples on measures of well-being, negative life events, social support, and philosophical orientation. Results revealed that prospective participants were significantly more distressed than peer and normative samples of community residents and had a higher level of impact of recent negative life events compared with peer (but not normative) samples. Prospective participants also held preparticipation values more similar to those espoused by the LGAT than peer or normative samples, and the three groups failed to be distinguished by their levels of social support. The implications of the findings are considered for understanding participation in LGATs and other self-change promoting activities.

http://www.rickross.com/reference/landmark/landmark22.html

http://www.rickross.com/groups/landmark.html

MK-ULTRA SubProject 130: Personality Theory (ACIM, Unity Church, MK-OPRAH)

26 May 2007

National Security Archive
Gelman Library
2130 H St NW Ste 701
Washington DC, District of Columbia 20037
1-202-994-7000 (T)
1-202-994-7005 (F)

Dear

I wish to thank you again for your excellent assistance and detailed answers to my queries the other day on the telephone. Thanks again, you were very kind, tolerant, and thoughtful.

As per our conversation of Friday, May 25, 2007, please mail all available government documents (redacted or otherwise – I believe you said there were thirty-five pages in total) regarding MK-ULTRA  SubProject 130: Personality Theory, to the above listed mailing address.

You quoted me a price of $7.92 for attaining these documents. Please find attached a money order in that amount for the aforementioned documents.

The information that follows is primarily for my own personal records, but also might be of interest to you, The National Security Archive or other persons and organizations. What follows is by no means new or original research and has been documented by a wide variety of other researchers and authors in the past.  (The exception being the ACIM milleu’s connection to SRI-Scientology).

The following information essentially serves as a rough bullet point outline and should not by any means be construed as a cohesive narrative of events, past or present, regarding Dr. William Thetford or the A Course In Miracles book.

Beware, the “critique” I engage in here (especially in the latter half) is not “structuralist”. There are also the usual concerns regarding “conspiracy theories”. I have extensively studied, deconstructed and analyzed this term over the years. Please refer to the following compendium of information regarding this subject.

Most of the following biographical information regarding Dr. William Thetford and A Course in Miracles is primarily available from online Wikipedia documents. As of this revision 3/2010, Wikipedia has deleted the criticism and controversy section from their ACIM page.

http://ce399.typepad.com/weblog/2009/12/wikipedia-removes-a-course-in-miracles-controversy-and-criticism-section-.html

Dr. William Thetford, along with David Saunders, headed CIA MK-ULTRA SubProject 130: Personality Theory, while at Columbia University between 1971-1978.

Dr. Thetford’s Professional Vita (also available on the A Course in Miracles web site) makes reference to his involvement in a Personality Theory Research Project while Professor of Medical Psychology at Columbia University, though the information does not specifically cite this as a CIA MK- ULTRA SubProject. (The information might have recently been altered to reflect involvement in MK-ULTRA.)

Dr. William Thetford also directly assisted Dr. Helen Schucman as a so-called ‘scribe’ in the initial transcription (or ‘channeling’) of the A Course in Miracles book originally published in 1975 by an organization called The Foundation for the Investigation of Para Sensory Phenomena.

Dr. Thetford was working for the CIA conducting Personality Theory experiments under MK-ULTRA at the same time the A Course in Miracles book was published in 1975.

A Course in Miracles is commonly known as “the Bible of the New Age.”

The Foundation for the Investigation of Para Sensory Phenomena may have been funded by members involved with or employed by the Stanford Research Institute (SRI), Menlo Park, California, as Remote Viewers at the time. One of the individuals with connections to SRI was Judith Skutch, the president and founder of The Foundation for the Investigation of Para Sensory Phenomena, which, once again, originally published A Course in Miracles in 1975.

Other researchers in this area have speculated that Judith Skutch’s Foundation for the Investigation of Para Sensory Phenomena may have even been an outright front organization for the CIA. The publishing of A Course in Miracles may have been a CIA operation from the beginning.

It has also been claimed Skutch funded many of the early experiments by Israeli telepath Uri Geller. Geller worked for SRI during this same time period.

A Course in Miracles legal documents have revealed that Skutch met with David Hurt (an engineer associated with SRI), Russell Targ, Thetford and Schucman at a luncheon in 1974. Russell Targ was co-founder of the Stanford Research Institute´s CIA funded Remote Viewing program at SRI during this same time period. Targ´s collegue at SRI was chief researcher Dr. Harold Puthoff.  Puthoff was a high ranking ‘Operating Thetan’ for the Church of Scientology and was also working under the auspices of the CIA’s MK-ULTRA program along with Targ when this meeting took place. As previously stated, William Thetford, the so-called co-’scribe‘ of ACIM, was also under the payroll of the CIA during the same period, conducting research under MK-ULTRA SubProject 130: Personality Theory at Columbia University.

In 1998 Russell Targ wrote a book entitled Miracles of Space. Targ and Scientology claim Targ was never a member of L. Ron Hubbard´s so-called ´church.´

According to the Washington Post of August 7, 1977, high-level ‘Operating Thetans‘ (Harold Puthoff, Pat Price, Ingo Swann) from the Church of Scientology were in charge of all Remote Viewing and other related CIA mind control operations at Stanford Research Institute under the auspices of CIA MK-ULTRA during this time period, which began sometime in 1973. (See the Washington Post article of August 7, 1977, Psychic Spying? by John L. Wilhelm regarding the connection between the Stanford Research Institute, CIA mind control operations via MK-ULTRA and the Church of Scientology.)

MK-ULTRA was ‘investigated’ by the US Congress’ Church Committee and the group appointed by President Ford known as the Rockefeller Commission in 1975. MK-ULTRA is now obviously a matter of public record.  As you stated, all of the scanned CIA MK-ULTRA documents are available to the public from the CIA itself on CD-ROM format.

Fast forwarding to the present: Unity Church, a ‘Christian New Age’ tax exempt organization, with locations in numerous communities across the United States, hosts many A Course In Miracles seminars on a weekly basis, and includes the information contained in the book as part of their regular ‘church services.’

I spoke with a woman named ‘Mxxxx’ at the Unity Church in Eugene, Oregon, via telephone on Friday, May 25, 2007, and she stated Unity Church holds seminars in A Course In Miracles twice a week. I requested documentation from her to this effect via regular mail. She claimed that she would comply with this request. And, I might add, she seemed quite ‘happy’ and ‘joyful’ to mail any and all material made available from the church.

Unity Church also sponsors or hosts UFO seminars with titles like: ´UFOs: Earth’s Cosmic Watergate´ and ´Flying Saucers ARE Real.’ These seminars espouse a ‘spirituality’ similar to those found in UFO cults such as the former Heaven’s Gate in San Diego, California and the Church of Scientology. Usually, the ‘information’ disseminated at these UFO seminars claims that a giant, invisible UFO mother ship – containing the spirits of deceased humans, famous leaders from history and supernatural beings such as angels or even Jesus Christ himself – is hovering just above the earth’s atmosphere.

The Scientology UFO ‘religious’ belief system is very similar, though much more detailed, complicated and multifaceted. Part of Scientology’s ‘creation mythos’ advocates passive acceptance of what basically constitutes ‘galactic genocide’ as part of its cult programming. Indeed, from the limited contact I have had with people who have been programmed by these and other similar types of off shoot UFO cult groups such as those found at Unity Church, advocacy of euthanasia or suicide are causally incorporated into their belief systems; even in their interpersonal relationships with others and are completely devoid of any critical analysis as to the larger implications of upholding such philosophies. Briefly, in this respect, similarities to Aldous Huxley’s novel, Brave New World (1932) have come to mind.

Scientology is considered to be a destructive, totalitarian cult by the German government and other European countries and is highly regulated there.

Unity Church and A Course In Miracles are ultimately all about forgiveness and prayer; yet this forgiveness exists in a spiritual construct devoid of basic human social justice.

This construct basically constitutes the same old, repacked and regurgitated snake oil peddled by ‘confidence men’ since the days of PT Barnum. The mantra goes something like this: ‘God will take care of everything and God will forgive everything;’ and therefore, accountability, responsibility, and oversight are not necessary. Thus, the organized crooks, mass murderers, torturers, destroyers of culture, various two bit thugs and other assorted sub humans are  allowed to continue perpetuating their endless cycle of banal criminality at the expense of the innocent and the powerless. As a result,  human justice and even human memory itself has now, for all intents and purposes, been  eviscerated. This is the literal apotheosis of what the authors Gore Vidal and Studs Terkel have each separately called: ‘The United States of Amnesia‘ and ‘The United States of Alzheimer’s.‘

For example, in 2004, the A Course in Miracles website had an very interesting article regarding the Abu Graib Prisoner Abuse Scandal, in which it stated the following:

Let us, then, take a closer look at the Iraq prison scandal from the perspective A Course in Miracles gives us. We will be looking at the monstrous acts of other people, but the point is not to pass judgment on these people, but to use their example to illuminate ego dynamics common to all of us. I’m reminded of what Jesus once said to Helen [Dr. Helen Schucman] before giving an account of the ego lapses she and Bill [Dr. William Thetford] had fallen into on a particular day: “There is nothing of special interest about the events described below, except their typical nature” (Absence from Felicity, by Ken Wapnick, p. 260). The “monster” revealed by the Iraq prison scandal is all too typical, but if we are willing to look at it calmly, we will put ourselves in a position to let it go through forgiveness.

(What the Iraq Prison Abuse Scandal Reveals: Looking Calmly at the Monster and Letting It Go by Greg Mackie. Circle of Atonement, P.O. Box 4238, W. Sedona, AZ 86340. http://www.circlofa.org. info@circleofa.org, 1-928-282-0790.)

This is an excellent example of what many other commentators, researchers, and authors have coined New Age Fascism (also see: From UFO’s to Yoga) and this particular type of mind control programming perfectly compliments the fascism promoted by the Christian and Religious Right or Right Wing Christian Evangelical movements in the United States. I fail to see the fundamental difference between the views espoused by Mr. Mackie above and the opinions communicated by Rush Limbaugh on his talk show. They are both essentially being apologists for the Bush Administration’s use of torture in conducting the so-called ‘War on Terror.‘

‘Students’ in A Course in Miracles programs (which evidently includes devotion to Oprah Winfrey – who has avidly and enthusiastically promoted the book on her television show) might also be involved in an experimental trauma healing treatment program called See Morg Matrix, which includes hypnosis and the evisceration (or ‘clearing’) of memories. Other research in this area has referred to these techniques as ‘pseudo-therapies’.

Involvement in the Unity Church mind control and UFO cult usually comes about through association with some form of unlicensed ‘therapist,’ healer or guru type figure. Possibly even ‘ordained ministers’ in Unity Church serve dual functions as ‘counselors’ or ‘therapists.’ In other words, possible involvement with Unity religion manifests itself as a result of someone seeking some form of psychotherapy, usually to heal childhood or adult trauma and abuse.

An unfortunate possible result and side effect of an individual being involved in this network of healing programs and therapies (and there are many more which I have not mentioned in this brief overview) can be the apparent disability of higher brain functions, including a basic inability to think clearly and engage in basic relationship psychodynamics. The book utilizes hypnotic, mantra-like repetition of concepts which are, more often than not, logically incoherent and are meant to brainwash and control the thoughts of the ‘student.’ I personally know of one person who has been reading A Course In Miracles almost exclusively, (in other words, without reading anything else – like a New York Times best seller, for example) for over twenty years. Indeed, these and other similar types of side effects are relayed in the criticism section from the A Course In Miracles web page documented by Wikipedia:

Some Doctrinal Christian apologists have considered it heretical or counterfeit. Author and Yogi, Joel Kramer, states that the Course could be considered a classic authoritarian example of programming thought to change beliefs. Anton van Harskamp, a German scholar of religion, says that the Course contains, “…endless variation on some universally meant insights in life…” that, “…brings readers of the book, [or] in any case this reader, [to] a mood in which bewilderment and boredom take turns”. Long time teacher of the Course, Hugh Prather, notes that ACIM students often become, “far more separate and egocentric,” with many ultimately, “[losing] the ability to carry on a simple conversation”. He admits that he and his wife Gayle, “…had ended up less flexible, less forgiving, and less generous than we were when we first started our path!

I believe that at the turn of the previous to the last century, similar procedures were carried out through damage to, or the surgical severing of, the nerve fibers connecting the pre frontal cortex to the thalamus of the brain. These were known as lobotomies to the functionaries at ‘Houses of Bedlam’ or asylums for the ‘insane.’ The end result of the procedures described in the above previous paragraphs is, in my opinion, basically the same as a lobotomy.

As mentioned previously, this letter is meant to be a brief overview of the connections between Unity Church, A Course In Miracles, CIA MK-ULTRA Artichoke Subproject 130 and the Stanford Research Institute.

There are many other high level individuals of dubious sanity who espouse equally unsound philosophies surrounding the ACIM millieu. Some of  these individuals include: Lee Carroll (Kryon), who apparently channels nonsense with the blessing and  sanction of the United Nations and Barbara Marx Hubbard, who openly advocates genocide. Further information about these and other caustic so-called New Age leaders is currently beyond the scope of this letter.

Though the MK-ULTRA program has been official declassified and considered terminated, the effects of the damage wrought by this program of psychological warfare (PSYOP) or ‘Mind War’ are still being felt in the year 2007.

Indeed, as I have stated in letters to Senator xx and Peter Dale Scott, among many others, I suspect a new and more high-tech COINTELPRO / MK-ULTRA hybrid domestic surveillance and harassment program may be currently operational today in the United States and is currently being used against US citizens.

One only need look at the stellar work of Nick Begich, MD, Mr. Kucinich in the House of Representatives (see HR 2977) and especially John J. McMurtrey, M.S., and his 2003 paper, Inner Voice, Target Tracking, and Behavioral Influence Technologies (see previous link), to really understand the extent of the potentially bottomless pit of a Pandora’s Box that has been opened by those Aldous Huxley called the ‘power elite.’

As a side note, John J. McMurtrey’s aforementioned paper contains eleven excellent and eye-opening pages of footnotes, with a great many US Patent Office numbers issued for related inventions, dating back to the early 1960’s. The complete document should still be available via Wikipedia, keyword search: Microwave Auditory Effect or Microwave Hearing.

All of the patents referenced in that document are readily available and easily accessible via the US Patent Office website complete with abstracts, claims and detailed descriptions.

Of special interest is Apparatus and Method for Remotely Monitoring and Altering Brain Waves, (United States Patent 3951134), which was issued in 1974, coincidentally, approximately the same year A Course In Miracles was published (1975). To the best of my knowledge, the United States Patent Office does not give patent numbers to inventions that do not work.

Similarly, Nick Begich, MD has done extensive research into the area of what the US military calls the Microwave Auditory Effect, a so-called non-lethal weapon capable of producing intra-cranial sound inside the head of a human target :

This area of research is one of the most important because it points to the ultimate weapon of political control: the ability to place information directly into the human brain, bypassing all normal filtering mechanisms.

In 1995, the US Department of Defense put forward the contract, “Communicating via the Microwave Auditory Effect; Awarding Agency: Department of Defense; SBIR Contract Number: F41624-95-C-9007″. The description of this technology, which would be used for direct communications with military personnel, is written as follows:

“Title: Communicating via the Microwave Auditory Effect. “Description: An innovative and revolutionary technology is described that offers a means of low-probability-of-intercept Radio Frequency (RF) communications. The feasibility of the concept has been established using both a low intensity laboratory system and a high power RF transmitter. Numerous military applications exist in areas of search and rescue, security and special operations.”

(Mind Control: The Ultimate Brave New World, Extracted from Nexus Magazine, Volume 13, Number 2, February – March 2006)

In the August 28, 2005 edition of the Washington Post, an article entitled Xtreme Defense by Sharon Weinberger, stated that similar ’non-lethal’ weapons, as previously described above, are currently being utilized by private contractors and the US military in Iraq:

His latest is to use ultrasonic waves in the dazzler not just to blind enemies, but also to convey messages in their heads, similar to Gibbs’ Medusa project. Hearing voices from God is a ‘big thing’ in Arab culture according to Bitar. “We flash-blind them. And, while their eyes are shut, you could send a recorded message or deep guttural voice that echoes in the inside of their head…“

There is absolutely no doubt that these and other similar types of technologies and programs have been privatized and are being used extensively in theatre today in the Middle East to combat the so-called ‘War on Terror.’ These technologies may also be exasperating the ‘civil wars’ currently raging in Iraq and the Occupied Territories in Palestine.

Ultimately, the point that really needs to be emphasized, above any other is that which has been categorized as an ‘exotic or non-lethal weapon’ is a form of information weapon (the book A Course In Miracles serves a similar purpose – as an information weapon or a weapon of propaganda). Thus, the warfare engaged in is an information type of warfare (or PSYOP) which, by default, constitutes propaganda. Propaganda or PSYOP, by its very definition under US code is lying, speaking an untruth or distorting the truth; as such, propagandizing the citizens of the US or using PSYOP against the citizens of the US is a criminal act under the current laws of the United States of America.  [This law might have been overturned by Patriot Act Two]

Most Sincerely,

Revised 7/2010