After a good night's sleep I'm raring to go; I hope you are too! There's a fair amount still to go on this topic, but I'd like to finish it before going on to something else.
***
These next quotes are from this book:
Sargant, W. (1957). Battle of the Mind. Doubleday: Garden City, NY.
***
Chapter 5: Techniques of Religious Conversion
"By increasing or prolonging stresses in various ways, or inducing physical debilitation, a more thorough alteration of the person's thinking processes may be achieved. The immediate effect of such treatment is usually to impair judgment and increase suggestibility." (p. 92)
Socialization was taken pretty seriously at the mission in Vienna and I suspect that in the relatively short history of that organization I was one of the more difficult they had to work with. Of course, they did have the added advantage of having available to it the resources and experience of the 15 member missions, and there may have been one or more of those that had experience with cases like me. However, it still is not clear their intentions regarding how they treated me, whether it was to induct me into their fold or to get rid of me because of my father.
At any rate, the difficulties I faced in working with them increased over time, and they had 2 years to work their magic with me, which seems to me a relatively long period of time.
***
"But successful 'brain-washing' also demands the rousing of strong emotions, and these need not have particular relevance to the new faith, provided that they are sufficiently disruptive." (p. 102, same chapter)
Although I haven't used section of the previous sources dealing with this, it seems to be a common theme that emotions are key to religious conversions, and cults use this well. In my case, it is not "conversion" in the sense of conversion to a different faith that was sought, but conversion to the group's norms, values and ways of doing things.
In a real sense there was a surprise factor in this, because at least part of how I ended out with that group is because I agree with their theology, so who'd have guessed that their values and norms were so apparently divergent from those of the churches back home? It's not like walking into a cult meeting where you expect to find differences from your historical background.
Emotion was also used in the way social ties were formed, creating a sense of mutual (Christian/brotherly/sisterly) love for one another and a sense of share mission and the importance of the work. Also, admissions of "failings" and "erroneous" ways of thinking (according to their standards) were welcomed (generally in private discussions) and efforts to assist in overcoming such "sins" (by their standards) were handled lovingly and with the ostensible aim of helping the initiate become a "better" (by their standards) person.
In other words, there was a lot by way of emotional things going on there, and these things served, in diverse ways, to bond the novice ever closer to the group.
Some of these emotional gymnastics bound the person in a positive way to the group, some did so in a negative way, and some things had the potential to bind either positively or negatively. For example, admissions of "failings", for example, could bind the person to the group by making the person see how the group (or particular representative individuals in the group) can be trusted with private information and how that person helps overcome these personal problem areas, resulting in a sense of gratitude and, perhaps, debt owed to the person/group. But this could also be a negative bond if the initiate felt threatened with divulsion of these secrets or that these admissions would be used in ways not otherwise beneficial to the confessor. [These kinds of relations involving confessions were common with the secretaries, but they were probably also used with others.] Things that would just have been positive include sharing of collective and individual victories at group meetings, the creation of group memories, and the like.
Since we're talking about Christian groups here that claim to hold the Bible as their highest standard, I think it's fair to hold them accountable to that standard, and no matter what you call this, I don't think there's any room for this kind of (intentional) social and personal engineering. As we have seen, however, there may be other standards that likewise condemn this kind of treatment.
***
"The best way to avoid possession, conversion, and all similar conditions is to avoid getting emotionally involved in the proceedings. Too fierce an anger or contempt for the voodoo priest, or for the religious snake handler, may be as dangerous as to quake with fear when one or the other inaugurates a meeting." (p. 109, same chapter).
Of course, we're not dealing with snake handlers or other such groups in Vienna, but I think the premise of staying detached (that's my interpretation of "avoid getting emotionally involved...") also holds water in the Vienna situation. It's not that I wasn't at all affected by what has happening to me and around me at the mission, but I think I did for a long time take everything pretty much in stride and go along with the flow. It's almost like I was calling their bluff, seeing how far they'd go. But I was shocked when I really saw how far they'd go and it really shook me up to my very core and I guess somewhere about that time when I really became convinced that they were using the "enemy's" tactics (similar tactics to how believers were treated in the USSR) was when I realized what a behemoth I was facing. And if I was shocked, it's really scary to think that no one else will believe me either. But I just went along with the changing game rules, offices, responsibilities, etc. With each change I tried my best to do a good job, be a good employee, even take initiative at improvements in the position. I took them at face value, rather than responding to the insinuations and innuendos which I think really belied the truth about what was going on.
In the end, though, this tactic didn't work. It's as if I was at a 2-year snake handler meeting going through the motion of standing or sitting, singing or praying according to what was called for in the program at any particular time, but not getting emotionally wrapped up in it. But at some point maybe it's just best to leave. But I felt like that was my only chance for missions in that part of the world because, well, there were 15 of some of the most influential missions there, and it was not at all clear at that point that there were any missions that operated differently in that part of the world, and my experience in Vienna might have black-listed me anyway. And never being exactly sure what was going on, made things even more fuzzy. So the fulfillment of my life dream demanded that I stay there, even if I couldn't go along with what they were doing. This might sound irrational on a certain level, but I really had poured my life into preparing for this work and there I was in this horrible situation.
It is scary, which is why I'm dancing all around it and going through so much in the lead up to what happened in Vienna. You won't have so much trouble believing my experiences in the USSR/Russia because, well that the USSR/Russia, and those kinds of things happen there, right? But not in the good ole' pristine US of A! Whoa, no way, not on your life. Yes, on your life. I'm here to tell you that they do happen.
I don't know how many other people were able or motivated to play along with the socialization shenanigans (assuming that's what it was in my case), but I think you'd have to have a bit of knowledge background to be able to do it in the first place. There was one secretary who'd sort of seen a lot of life, but I don't think she particularly knew anything out of the run of the mill popular knowledge about the East Bloc. She might not have had the same convictions I did either about right and wrong.
***
I finished my morning stimulator and got breakfast. And while I was doing that I got to thinking that I shouldn't have gotten so sarcastic about people's blinders about the USA vs. the USSR/Russia. I honestly don't have much patience for such thinking, but perhaps the sarcasm was not especially appropriate there.
***
Chapter 6: Applications of Religious Techniques
"The personality can react only along limited lines to all environmental changes and to a life full of stresses. If stress be severe enough, the most secure and stable personality can show symptoms of anxiety, hypochondria, depression, hysteria, suspiciousness, excitement, anger or aggressiveness, and the list is then almost complete." (pp. 123-124)
If you doubt this statement I suggest you ignore any instructions you might come across for stress management. Also, if this is not true, that the life stress test is probably also invalid (cp. http://www.cliving.org/lifestresstestscore.htm).
Also, while we're on this topic, maybe I'll share this here so that it doesn't get overlooked. When I was out doing deputation (about 15 months 1986-1987) my primary care doctor, a long-time family doctor told me that I really can handle a lot of stress. I believe my Mom was at that appointment (although I don't know why, because I was by then in my mid-20s). The past few years I have consistently rated well over 300 on this life stress test, but have not had a nervous breakdown. I have proof of that, but I'm not ready to go there yet.
But let's have on the record that at least one social scientist (the author of this book) thinks that even otherwise bulwarks of stability can break down given enough stressors. And the discussion here (in the book and also regarding Vienna) is regarding intentionally induced stress, not the kind of life stressors provided in the life stress test that just happen by virtue of living and breathing in this imperfect world.
***
"We see then that religious excitement may exist without religious knowledge." (p. 132).
In the Vienna context we're not talking about "religious" excitement and knowledge, but excitement and knowledge vis a vis the work of the mission. As I understand this, it's a kind of blind, almost unthinking acceptance of the mission / religion. I think that's exactly what the mission in Vienna would have liked. After all, for the sake of the secretive ministry it was in (to "closed" countries) no one person could know everything about the mission anyway, so there had to be a faith that even without requisite knowledge there was complete faith in the mission, and therefore also the leaders and a believe in its work, including its modus operandi. Emotional bonding, irregardless of knowledge and facts, and identity with the mission was required so that the mission cold function with such a fractured, departmentalized information base. This left the leadership a lot of leeway, and only as you proved yourself trustworthy with at first inconsequential bits of information and then increasingly more meaningful and central knowledge would you work your way up and into the heart of the organization, although how high up and inward had its limits too depending on your role in the mission at any given time.
Therefore, under such circumstances, emotional bonding and trust had to practically come before knowledge. So this citation fits how the Vienna mission operated, if you consider it regarding the initiate already in the organization instead of how to gain new converts. Since I never was, evidently, trusted, I never had any (or much) reliable knowledge of any import, so had to go pretty much on emotion and emotional bonding, and inuendos and insinuations, which was like walking on quick sand: very unstable.
***
Chapter 7: Brain-Washing in Religion and Politics
"The evidence marshaled in Chapters 5 and 6 shows how various types of belief can be implanted in people, after brain function has been sufficiently disturbed by accidentally or deliberately induced fear, anger, or excitement. Of the results caused by such disturbances, the most common one is temporarily impaired judgment and heightened suggestibility. Its various group manifestations are sometimes classed under the heading of 'herd instinct,' and appear most spectacularly in wartime, during severe epidemics, and in all similar periods of common danger, which increase anxiety and so individual and mass suggestibility." (p. 145)
In the context of Vienna, the "common danger" was the enemy to the East, the harbinger of all ill intent to Christians (and other believers) of all stripes. But the enemy does not just hide himself behind the iron curtain, but also sends emissaries of destruction out into the West, especially Vienna, to wreak havoc among and topple the life-bringing work of missions such as ours.
Okay, that was a little dramatic, but you get the picture and that does bring in a bit of the attitude of the time towards The Red Scare.
So we were rallied together against this common enemy and were willing to put aside our usual critical thinking abilities to rally together for The Cause. Well, most of us were willing to do that. I'm not sure if I was the only one unwilling to completely trust the mission's benign intent towards me, as an individual, but I couldn't get myself to do that.
I think part of the problem was that I already had a history not just of some knowledge of the East and some experience there as well (but certainly not as much experience as the veterans in the mission), but also a history of questioning missions. I won't go into that now, but it was a bit of a process to finally (and, evidently, mistakenly) decide on the mission I did. That process involved questioning certain things about missions in that part of the world.
I might not have been a ready candidate for indoctrination into the world according to the mission, but I did feel the effects of (mission-induced) stress.
***
Today is laundry day and I had to take a little break to start on that. I want to at least finish this book though.
***
"The most kindly, generous, and humane of men have in fact been conditioned, throughout history, to commit acts which appear horrifying in retrospect to those who ahve been differently conditioned. Many otherwise sensible people cling to strange and cruel views merely because these have been firmly implanted in their brains at an early age, and they can no more be disabused of them by argument than could the generation that still insisted on the flatness of the earth, though it had been circumnavigated on several occasions." (p. 146-147).
How did the mission wind up the way it did? And since organizations are comprised of individuals, it then begs the question as to how these individuals, especially the leadership, wound up like they did? What sort of mental gymnastics did they have to go through to justify what seemed to me to be very wrong in their actions and approaches to organizational functioning? What kind of logic allowed them to operate as they did? What was the process that led to what I witnessed and experienced in Vienna? I wish I knew the answers to these questions and could tell you, but I don't. Like you, I can only surmise possible answers and scenarios, but I don't really know either.
What was going on there at that Vienna mission may not have been the worst thing ever as far as church malfeasance is concerned, but it was still hard for me to believe and I never expected anyone else to really believe me either. How it got that way was even further beyond my comprehension.
***
Here's something really scary...
"With their variety of temperaments, it was found that breakdown or dramatic change in patterns of behavior in animals could be caused, not only by increasing the strength of stimulus applied, but in three other important ways.
1. One could prolong the time between the giving of a preliminary signal and the giving or withholding of food or an unexpected electric shock; the prolongation of a state of tension and expectancy was found to be very disturbing. The result was protective inhibition, which might rapidly become 'transmarginal,' with chaotic effects on brain function.
2. One could alter behavior patterns by confusing the brain if positive and negative food-conditioning signals follow one another rapidly and are not followed by the expected food or shock. Most animals seemed to be able to adjust, within limits, to what they expected; but experienced great difficulty in coping with the unforeseen.
3. If all these means fail to produce alteration or breakdown one can resort to physical debilitation, fevers, etc., which are effective when the same stimuli are later repeated." (p. 147)
Regarding the first method, I was repeatedly given reason to believe, even by direct admission, that the mission had this or that great plan for me, and they would commend me on one thing or another to seemingly back this up. But nothing much ever materialized. There might have been token follow-through, such as move to a better office (unaccompanied by more meaningful work), and these little token moves were enough to leave me hanging. But as things went on, there got to be more and more negative signals, direct or otherwise.
As to the second approach, I remember this as being especially confusing and detrimental to my coping in the situation. But I see this not so much as isolated, although it might be somewhat helpful to point it out on its own right, as part of the huge ambiguity that I faced there. It was really the only time in my life that I've felt such tremendous ambiguity and uncertainty as to what was really going on and what was what. Towards the end I was sidelined enough that it was hard for me to figure out who was in what position even as things seemed to, at least on the surface, be shuffled around so much. That ambiguity was very horrible, and I'll deal with that when eventually I discuss articles in a different file.
***
This next citation is in the context of a discussion of Jonathan Edwards, the famous early American preacher, and his practice of inducing guilt to convert people, which sometimes drove someone "already suffering from religious melancholia" (p. 150) to suicide.
"So occasional cases of suicide and insanity had to be put to the debit side of his conversion ledger..." (p. 151)
I felt like this when I left Vienna, that I was just a 'casualty of war', but the war must go on... these kinds of things are among the types of risks one takes in this kind of ministry. I'm putting words in the mouths of the workers (and especially the leaders) in Vienna. Whether there actions towards me were just a part of their standard modus operandi (or with the realm of possibility given cases like myself), or whether it was because I was the daughter of my dad and they had to find an indirect way to get me out of there, or a combination or the two, they could have taken the perspectives I hypothesize here.
***
"In brain-washing and the eliciting of confessions, the psychological importance of inducing a sense of guilt and conflict can hardly be overemphasized. The prisoner may be bombarded with accusations and continually cross-examined until anxiety confuses him and he contradicts himself on some small point. This is then used as a stick to beat him with; presently his brain ceases to function normally, and he collapses. In a subsequent highly suggestible state, with old thought patterns inhibited, he may readily sign and deliver the desired confession." (p. 154)
This describes, as it seems to me, applies most directly to prisoner of war camps and corrupt police interrogations, but I think there's also a parallel in the context I was working in in Vienna. I'm not sure if this is true for the male induction process, but at least for the female secretaries (all the secretaries were female, but not all the working women were secretaries) and at least some of the female spouses (there weren't any married working women at the mission, so there were no male spouses of workers - homosexuals would not have been part of the work because of the theological beliefs of the organization) and possibly some of the wives the use confessor-confessee relationship was used pretty effectively, as the benevolent mentor assisted the novice out of the quagmire of sin and ignorance into the light and spiritual growth and maturity befitting an effective and trustworthy member of the group.
The negative part of accusations and the like was much more subtle, nothing like what is suggested in this quote. In my experience it was handled in private and was a matter of the strictest confidence. Generally the aim seemed to be to engender complete, unguarded trust in the inductee rather than to break her down interrogation-style. However, there are also different styles of interrogation, and this could fit one of them. I think I come to this also in another text in a different folder.
If a "confession" could be garnered, then the relationship could evolve to complete mutual trust, but without this confession such a relationship was stymied. That's how it appeared to me... as it related to the secretaries there.
***
This next citation follows a fairly lengthy discussion about how the religious conversion tactics discussed in the book have also been applied in political contexts:
"The Chinese Communists spread their gospel by similar methods. They had had the sense to avoid a purely intellectual approach, and to arouse political anger by continually reporting and emphasizing the United States' hostile attitudes towards the new China." (p. 160)
At first glance this text seems hardly to apply to the situation in Vienna, but it does sort of in a round about way. What I want to say about this text is that this is the kind of thinking vis a vis the East Bloc Communist governments that kept us (and the supporters back home, too) aroused in a special sense of us vs. them guardedness and urgency and importance of mission. Without this common view of the enemy I think a lot of what happened in Vienna would not have happened because, 1) the people back home would have demanded more transparency; and 2) it bonded us more closely together against a common enemy, and not just a religious "enemy", but also a very real political one.
***
Continuing in the same vein in his discussion:
"Fear of continued civil war, or foreign intervention, or both, convinced the Chinese Communist leaders that they must use shock tactics to convert the masses. A more intellectual approach migh have resulted in a more stable type of conversion, but it would have taken dangerously long, and been consummated only with the gradual dying off of those brought up in the old ways of thought, and the growing up of the children educated in the new. To make a new China overnight, emotional disruption was essential; and so effective were the methods used that thousands killed themselves in despair, a sense of guilt artificially implanted in them being so strong that they felt unworthy to accept the proffered Communist salvation; leaving the more resilient millions to dance, dance, dance for joy at their liberation from millenniary bondage - until they learned to termble at the periodic visits of the Household Police who now keep a dossier on the history and activities of every household." (p. 163; Remember, this was written in 1957).
You could say that the process of socialization into the work in Vienna was also under some time constraints, although not exactly like those facing the entire country of China.
In a sense all places of employment want their new employees to become fully functional members of their crew as quickly as possible. But few employers have the "luxury" of being able to require virtually the whole of the person (24/7, all aspects of their life, etc.) be under their tutelage and care. To garner such a comprehensive relationship in a short time with the new member, who wasn't even hired directly by the mission, but by a separate member mission who had handled the initial induction process until the person's arrival in Vienna, it was advantageous to use emotional sensibilities at least as a starting point. The usual 2 year commitment, as mine was also, goes by quickly and the bulk of that time needed to be spent productively; hence the time constraints.
I don't know that there was a mission equivalent to the Chinese Household Police... the similarities only go so far. I think (though I can't say I'm 100% sure) that once you're past the trust test and you're "in" and don't do anything really stupid, there's not exactly a police/spy system set up to monitor you, but I do think there is a (formal, informal or both) system of accountability within the mission. Since I never got that far, I can't really speak with any certainty about this, but I do think there was some type of mutual accountability even once you passed the initial trust test. I suspect that this mostly felt pretty benign though, unless you somehow did something out of line.
***
In this next section Sargant discusses how China trains those who lead indoctrination groups.
"This special training course usually lasts from nine to twelve months, and the same general program is everywhere used, though with variations that allow for intellectual level of the trainee. [Richard L. Walker, in China Under Communism] describes the six factors present throughout the period of training. First, the training takes place in a special area or camp, which almost completely severs all ties with the trainees' families and former friends; and facilitates the breakup of old behavior patterns.
'A second constant factor is fatigue. Students are subjected to a schedule which maintains physical and mental fatigue throughout the training. There is no opportunity for relaxation or reflection; they are occupied with memorizing great amounts of theoretical material and are expected to employ the new terminology with facility. Coupled with the fatigue is a third constant: tension.... Uncertainty is a fourth factor throughout the process... Trainees who conspicuously fail to comprehend the camp pattern in the first few weeks disappear overnight, and there is usually a well-sown rumour concerning their fate.... A fifth constant factor is the use of vicious language.... The final factor is the seriousness attached to the whole process. Humour is forbidden.' p. 58 (p. 165-166)
Not all of these things apply to the Vienna context, but some do. I'll take them in order:
1. I've already touched a bit on isolation from friends and families, and I don't know that there's much more to say about that, except that contact that is continued is expected to support the mission's desired image and to further the mission's work, such as by promoting a good p.r. base for the mission.
2. I don't think I really experienced fatigue, but it may well be that someone coming to the work in Vienna with much less experience abroad than me might find it very fatiguing to just orient herself to living there and setting up life there. For me I pretty much started out running, although there were a few technical things, like how and where to register as a resident once you arrived there, that I needed help with. So I wouldn't be surprised if the initial regimen I experienced there might have been fatiguing to someone else. It wasn't to me though. I wasn't given much settle-in time before I was expected to begin work though.
3. I actually didn't feel the tension until after I met the full fury of the mission, which was several months into my being there. That was probably a function of my not allowing myself to be totally under their tutelage. I'm sure that other new-comers probably experienced initial tension, though, if the mission was the only thing they knew in this strange new world.
4. Now the 4th one really hits home. I've sometimes wondered what was said about me. Was I held up as a negative example? Did my experience serve as a threat to anyone else like me who might come along? Some things I wrote in my journal the year after returning home from Vienna made me wonder even more about how the mission (and all 15 of the member missions?) responded to me afterward and what lessons, if any, were learned by the mission's relationship with me.
At any rate, initially I appeared to "fail to comprehend the camp pattern" at first, but later on I really and truly did not understand as things there became more and more ambiguous and it became harder and harder for me to make heads or tails of what was really going on there.
5. I don't think there was any "vicious language" in Vienna. I would be surprised to learn there was, but then again, after what I experienced maybe I wouldn't be surprised. At any rate, I didn't know of any use of vicious language or the threat of it.
6. On the surface of things, there was certainly humour and good-naturedness that permeated the work in Vienna, and anything negative was explained as being intended to be helpful, as a loving parent or tough love or something along those lines.
However, I also think that the humour belied how serious they were of certain things. I tended to take them at face value, though, and respond to that rather than any apparent insinuation. By doing so I was, in effect, indicating a a noncomprehension of "the camp pattern". That's how I see it anyway.
***
Continuing on in this vein, Sargant describes the trainees in these Chinese groups had to write detailed autobiographies and diaries. In speaking of these he says:
"Such detailed confessions then became public property, and they could be used by directors in finding a 'sore spot' to work upon." (p. 166)
I don't know if this was widespread or not in Vienna, but I sometimes felt like they knew a lot about me, mainly things they could have known from my work with the Slavic Gospel Association, who was one of the founding 5 missions that started our mission. These things were always nebulous, though, and it was never clear if this was really so or not, although it's possible I'll find something in my journals or correspondence that says otherwise; I'm just starting to do that as I write this blog.
***
"An important part of the process is the stimulation of fear and doubt. Shall he tell all to his group? If so, will it then be used against him? The trainee has to wrestle silently and alone with all these anxieties and conflicts, until he finally breaks down and decides to confess all; and this is the beginning of his end as an individual." (p. 167).
I don't know how many people at the mission there went through this kind of struggle, and some may well have gone through something like it in work with their sending mission prior to being sent to joint mission. I think, though, that most relations in life don't require this kind of complete trust and for inductees unfamiliar with it and not expecting this kind of thing, it may have been very difficult.
I think I wasn't phased by this kind of thing because I didn't feel like I was lost in a new world without the mission, even though my career was dependent on them, in a very real sense. After a while I thought that my relationship with the mission was tenuous enough that I wasn't sure that they wouldn't really use information about me for my detriment. I'm not sure that was very common though. They did have information about me that could easily serve as a hammer against me, which is at least partially why I haven't written about this before and why it still feels so risky.
[As an aside here, you may wonder why I then find it so necessary to write about my life. That's really a good question and there are several reasons. One is I think people should know about what went on in those missions and even though the world has changed and the specific people in specific positions have changed, I would be surprised if this kind of thing weren't still happening in missions working in "closed" countries. Also, it's hard to life a life where you feel like no one understand you, and I've been through so many things that that's how it feels. By writing about my life that's not a guarantee that I will all of a sudden be understood, and even if I were understood the emotional reaction might not be kindly. But since I don't believe in the use of force, I have to give you the right to come to your own conclusions.]
***
This book is taking longer to work through than I thought!
"The first phase of the conversion process is called 'the phase of physical control' and lasts about two months. Novices are allotted all sorts of routine physical tasks, often of a demeaning nature." (p. 167)
Whoa Nellie!! According to how the Chinese training went, I got stuck on phase 1 for 2 years? Am I incorrigible or what? You'll see when I get into the details of my Vienna experience that my work (when I had any to do) was exactly menial and demeaning. It never was otherwise... for two years... Try explaining that to your supporters back home... telling them by means of a censored prayer letter. I'm not talking insinuations and opinions here, I'm talking physically and concretely how things were. I can't do be that dogmatic about everything in Vienna, but on this score I can. [4/6/2011 correction: There were a few isolated instances where I was given something more meaningful to do, but the context of it was still demeaning to me. For example, the fact that I took a few English teaching trips to Bratislava just engrained further my identity as a secretary. The whole time I was with the mission that was my all and end-all identity to them and as far as they were concerned I was nothing more, nothing less. And I was also denied the right to use the other gifts and knowledge I did have.]
***
The second phase of "intense indoctrination" in the Chinese setting is characterized by tempers being short and social competition among the cohort of trainees. Since there's not exactly a cohort of new inductees, just new recruits straggling in one-by-one as positions open up, so I don't think this fits Vienna. This is another phase where some are dismissed though as being less promising among the group.
The next stage of crisis and breakdown happens about the 6th month of training. About this time I also had a crisis, but I didn't quite breakdown, despite the horrendousness of it. This is when...
"ties [are cut] with the old society, such as family, friends, old values, and so forth. With this total disruption of old behavior patterns, the new ones become much more firmly implanted, as in the cases of sudden religious conversion." (p. 168]
This doesn't exactly happen in the mission, but I suppose it is when one comes to internalize the ways of doing things and perhaps becomes good enough at doing things the mission's way that even prayer letters hardly need censoring. I think that once you reach this stage you have a lot of positive reinforcements that really feels good and confirming, especially coming from such highly regarded leaders in the church.
***
The next stage in the Chinese process is to build on and reinforce the new convert's young faith. After that his zeal for the new faith is effectively channeled toward the training work he has been preparing for this whole time. (Summarizing much of p. 168)
This is similar to what I said earlier about an early test of loyalty after certain barriers have been overcome is to be involved in the induction of newer arrivees.
***
Half my day is gone and I haven't even checked on my plants outside!
I can't imagine who on earth would read this, as I cover such a range of topics and require so much of the reader. And when you consider that the average American reads on something like the 3rd grade level, well it quickly becomes clear that I am either talking to a very, very limited audience base, or I am virtually talking to myself. Be that as it may, I feel like I need to document these things in the hopes that it will be helpful to someone somewhere.
I hear my plants calling...
~ Meg
