I think, like you, that for me, I am stronger for having once been a partaker of the Cog's extreme dysfunction and, like you, I also feel that it has been worth the work to continue growing, sins and all. What amazes me is His AMAZING GRACE!I surely don't deserve it.

How did I deal with the spiritual side of all this? I guess I got re-brainswashed with post-cog life experiences for starts - one of them being the realization that I hadn't been abandoned, nor forsaken, nor thrown upon a scrap heap. In fact, although I know now that He was there for me all the time, it felt, at times, that He was there for me more outside the group. I also studied a lot. However, in my case, I didn't grasp the pshycology of all that I was going through until after I got through it. Once I got through it, though, I came to an amazing sense of self - the, "I am who I am" thing and that felt REALLY GOOD! I've been building on that - inspite of my faults.

Good post Woodie!

> I recently had a birthday and I’ve been
> thinking a lot lately of the whole of my
> life; I won’t bore you with the story. But I
> have been musing over the failures, and
> successes and mostly the dreams; some come
> true and others elusive or smashed entirely.
> At the center of all, I have almost always
> found a relationship with God – the good bad
> and ugly. The damage done in the COG to my
> faith was, and sometimes still is
> challenging. In spite of all the other
> perverted stuff Berg indulged himself in, I
> think the spiritual damage can be the worst,
> as it cuts the definitive help line.
> I think though, in spite of it all, I am for
> the most part a stronger, more decisive and
> steady Christian today, thought I may never
> know what might have been. (I make no
> excuses for Berg – just, I made it in spite
> of him. He will have to face the music for
> himself.)

> I think what I have been brooding over is
> Just what did it take to clear up my
> image of God and even want to re-develop a
> relationship with the godhead in Christ?
> I was fortunate to know Christ as
> savior before the COG and so I had some
> memory to reflect on that wasn’t soiled.
> This journey, as I’d imagine it has for many
> of us, has taken so many twist and turns,
> lessons learned, layer after layer , but
> each, for me has come with an Ah Ha?
> and finally a realizing that I will not
> get it all in this lifetime. A few
> times I stormed off and told God he could,
> for all I care, drop me dead or leave me
> alone. (He did neither – but I think he gets
> a good laugh at times- and by the way I use
> “HE” as simplification and habit. I’m
> probably one of the first to emphasize that
> God uses feminine images to relate to us as
> well as masculine for the sake of our
> limitations, not his/hers, some might say.
> NT and OT demonstrate that God is neither
> male nor female. That's sort of our problem.
> )

> Anyway, that aside, I think getting past my
> childhood simplistic images, my adopted
> child abandonment issues, my hippy gooey
> pacifist image and my Berg judgmental
> pervert image of God has, if nothing else
> helped me to understand the barrage of
> different theologies as outcroppings of a
> plethora of inadequate understanding. With
> that has come a realization that we humans
> will never have all our theological ducks in
> a preverbal row. But the journey has been
> worth the work to continue growing, seeking
> and learning, laughing and musing. I’ve been
> the prodigal returning from the unclean
> filth of the pigs; and I’ve been the blind
> older brother observing only his own
> rights being violated. Every time I
> have found that it is because Jesus never
> gave up on me, and never will that I
> inevitably lay it all down, climb into my
> fathers arm and reply once more, “be it unto
> me according as you have said”. Somehow that
> seems so dreadfully unsophisticated and once
> again simplistic. It’s been a long journey
> but I’m finding my way back home.

> How have some of the rest of you dealt with
> the spiritual side of all this? I know for
> some it's been a difficult task at best, and
> some have not chosen to attempt it at all.
> Kids born in the COG I'd imagin have the
> most damaged perception of God. What a sick
> legacy the COG still has.