World Wide Cultology

"Our church is different in that light! We uphold the Passover! I'm offering you a chance to accept life. You do want to live, don't you? You do trust Jesus, don't you? Accept this gift of baptism now, Matthew. Now. Matthew."

Oh for heaven's sake, I couldn't trust that Nigerian accent and creepy fucking smile with slightly visible rounded teeth if I watched the fucker descend from God's throne myself.

Back story.
My fiancé and I were invited to a church gathering.  I googled the address and returned was some Methodist church. Judging by the genuinely pure-hearted young woman that invited us, I assumed it was some new age Protestant song singer youth group for young adults funsies time. I was ok with this, as was my better half, so we said "fuck it" and took off to 8613 Bunkerhill Dr. in Southaven, MS. We figured a little Lord in our life couldn't hurt us, right?

We arrive early and Asami's girlfriend, the woman that invited us, hadn't arrived yet. I noticed the sign at the entrance did not read "Methodist" anything. Instead, written was "World Mission Society Church of God" - whatever that means. I was thrown off by the location. It was in the middle of a neighborhood. An older neighborhood at that. There were lots of additions with cheap pre-fab materials that many new churches often times use. Odd, but not frightening.  Since no one was there, not even a car, I joked with Asami that maybe we were to all three, when her friend arrived,  take turns dribbling basketballs in the building I assumed was a tiny gym.

Asami received a text from her friend informing us her ETA was approximately five minutes.

Then minivan pulled in and parked in front of the door where obviously only the minister parks. I assumed she must be close with him. To my surprise three people exited the van. An older Korean couple, smiling, waiving, and bowing obsessively, followed by the young Korean woman my fiancé(Japanese) considers her best friend in the States.

I gave Asami a not so well hidden "WTF?!?!" grin/fake laugh/thing and greeted the older couple, followed by my usual, over the top, excessively loud, and frighteningly aggressive, hello I routinely save for the young Korean woman.  It felt strange to me, but since this is my lady's best friend, I wanted her to believe this is totally normal to me and I don't feel a single milliliter of insane fucking weirdness.  Little did I know, Asami was as weirded out as I was.

We make our way into the church, and it smells like moth balls mixed with geriatric ward. Oh, fuck me, joy!  We are taken to a small room with a big table and a few chairs. The older Korean woman speaks insanely fast, but her accent is insanely thick, which requires an insanely acute amount of focus. She's bringing Asami and I hot cocoa though, so I like the woman. She didn't offer Asami's friend any. While gone, old woman's husband is asking basic questions about japan, the food, wedding dates, and the usual banter we catch from strangers.  The older woman returns and distributes hardly warm Swiss Miss, but, topped with real deal marshmallows, so I'm half stoked. This old woman is so animated and zealous about the conversation, I sense Asami shying up. The woman speaks such broken English so quickly, I know Asami isn't digging it, so I entertain the question-bombing solo. Keep this in mind. There are five people in this room. Three young adults in their twenties who had the intention of hanging out and bullshitting, and a couple over fifty scrupulously dominating any attempt in having what anyone in their twenties would consider a normal conversation. I'm uncomfortable, as is my fiancé, as is her best friend.

At this time I'm the only native English speaker and westerner.  Just as I realize it, boom, here comes captain charming Jesus loving/preaching white boy. He's that kid in high school that was overly into God, so much so that he even undertook a new tone of voice: one unbelievably softer and more peace promoting than given by God.  I forgot his fuckin' name.  I reckon I'll call him Fluff.  Fluff is 24 years old.  Fluff enters with a look on his face like he's got a huge bag of dope in his rectum and he's satisfied in his level of sneakiness but maybe just a little unsure whether or not we can smell the lube he over applied which may trigger our thoughts to believe he's got a giant bag of dope in his asshole, and greets Asami and I.  We entertain him with the same level of bullshit that we butterknifed onto the old couple.  His facial expression didn't change 'til he shook my hand. I think he thought I smelled lube, and his TOV(tone of voice) quickly turned to slightly masculine from angelic as he shook my hand. I wiped my hand on my jeans and could swear I smelled Vaseline. Anyways, I give a smile as to say "I'm not hear to make you relive your HS experience or bust you out for the ounce of Ketamine in your ass" in my own if Johnny Cash was an angel hello, and he quickly reverts back to sissy boy. Fluff then goes from sissy to startled, "I know you from the university!" he tells Asami. Braggingly he continues, "I attend classes their myself." I swear fluff looks like a 17 yo Peewee Herman with the muscularity of gumby. Pale as snow skin, checks red like a chapped ass, and the build of two day boiled Somen. I would punch this guy if I didn't think my hand would pass straight through his body. Asami replied, "Oh I have not seen you!" with a giant smile. I love her.

Onto the serious prying. Fluff begins asking me a series of psychologically loaded questions. He's obviously prying into my current state of mind, my past, my future goals, ethics, morals, religious upbringing, and manipulability. It was an attempt to see if he personally could psychologically exploit my current beliefs. Several times he would stop me from answering certain questions and would direct them to Asami only. Not to my surprise she reiterated exactly as I had stated, which she does when someone is making her feel uncomfortable. Sensing her uncertainty, I keep reverting the attention back to me. It is now I repeatedly make specific references to being raised Roman Catholic, attending Roman Catholic schools, and consider myself a fair practicing Roman Catholic. Fluff's excitement levels reach their pinnacle as if he were 'bout to judo slam Lucifer and follow it up with Lex Luger's "Rack" - fuck this guy. I make a few passive aggressive allusions to being more educated theologically than he'd ever be, and much to my surprise, Fluff's obviously intimidated. At this, the conversation is purposefully stalled by Fluff, and OMK(old man Korea) is shaking with a wicked nervous energy I can see out of the corner of my eye. Weirded the fuck out, I shoot him a glance.  At the same time, I realize Ive finished my hot cocoa.  Damnit.  Luckily, OMK only asks if we would watch their church promotion video.  We oblige.

The video starts out in a moderately well funded type fashion that one would see from a large sized protestant Christian denomination.  It starts, "Have you longed for something more in your life? The comfort only the warm grasp from a mother could provide?" I felt the subliminal indoctrination already beginning.  It was obviously targeting the unknowing would like to be Christians, especially of foreign decent. Images of peaceful rivers and beautiful mountains a plenty intending to fill the viewer with an unrealistic level of serenity.  Next, we are shown how the church has amassed a huge following world wide, with churches established Nepal, India, Congo, Nigeria, Libya, Mexico, insert anywhere in the world and there is a church their by their admission.  Even cities throughout America presently have these churches.

WHAMMY.  Do you know why the disasters of the world are happening?  The inhabitants of the regions are not celebrating the Passover.  If you are unfamiliar with the Passover it was when God sent the Angel of Death to Egypt to collect the first born of the Egyptians to free the enslaved Jews.  The Jews were to slaughter a ram and paint their door frame with the ram's blood and the Angel of Death would say, "Jew here.  Next!" If only the Haitians, or Cajuns, or Chileans had celebrated the Passover according to the Old Testament, they'd have been spared their death from whatever natural disaster.  I feel so ignorant having not known!  But have no fear, the members of the World Mission Society Church of God are the greatest contributers to the relief efforts, and thus make up for all our fucking ignorance.  Thank Buddha.  The video now returns to interviewing its members recanting pilgrimages to the New Jerusalem, as prophesied by the bible, known as Korea. The Americans are weeping about having met "Mother god" - the interviewees are Americans who speak insane dialects of English I've never heard in Mississippi, Louisiana, or New York.  These folks have definitely had little to zero schooling in America.  One by one they all are carrying on and on about the wonderful Mother god and all her glory and how SHE was really the LORD.  And living! And they met her! "Fucking SWEET!" I think to myself cynically.  I look down at my empty hot cocoa cup and think "Oh shi..." BOOM, Mother god's face is shown on the projector screen.  A Korean woman in ridiculous garb with a giant smile a giant smile and no obvious signs of omni-anything.

 I glance over at Asami and she's holding in a fit of laughter that I would quickly contract if we made eye contact, so I look away again.  The video finally ends, and I'm thinking of who to ask for my sixty minutes back that I've currently invested into this shit hole cult.  In walks a black couple.  Both dressed moderately, the man wearing cheap business attire, and the woman wearing layer after layer of hand me down Sister Anthony post monastery garb.  I entertain the thought of these people being god also and chuckle.  They too have creepy smiles and are a little too nervous for comfort.  They ask us about the video, but there is an obvious hidden agenda.  Before we get the words out of our mouths, they're planning their rebuttals, and can almost not control themselves from interrupting us.  They invite us to bible study.  I said "Sure!" and Asami gives me that "you dirty dog" look.

We're taken into a third room, considerably smaller than the first two, and with Asami and I, tag along Asami's bestie and the black couple.  I'm so excited I could piss myself.  More indoctrination, "Do you believe in the bible, Matthew? Do you believe in Jesus, Matthew?" I realize the man is Nigerian. I realize the woman is from an intense Chicago project.  Well, she volunteered the Chicago aspect.  Her excitement let loose her undeniable accent.  In response, I verbally paint a picture for them of Jesus being a ripped, sweaty, good looking, ax wielding badass, chopping down trees and whittling them with a dull blade into an extravagantly intricate tooth pick.  I talk about Jesus hanging out with the rich folk, and being the straight edged party boy that everyone loves.  I mention that he spoke what the rich folk thought was crazy, but they were so intrigued by it, they kept inviting him along.  It was like Jesus was so fucking cool, the wine at the parties was like water. And he just didn't want to see no one hurtin'.  Asami's friend was infatuated and tickled pink at the thought of such a personal Jesus. At this time, she was insanely attentive.  The cult couple listened to not a single fucking word of what I said, and almost didn't let me finish before on to the next set of indoctrinating questions about what I knew of the Passover.  I answered them all in detail.  The man was so uneducated as to whether or not I was accurate, that he had me open the bible and read a set of passages.  It was nearly verbatim what I had said.  It did not register with this man.  He acted as if he slammed me with the good book and like I ought to listen and learn from him.  Suck my fucking balls, bro, I thought, and smiled, and continued to play along.  He took me through verse after verse about the Passover, the Last Supper, and the New Jerusalem.  None of these were new to me.  I even quoted the Last Supper, as any educated, practicing or not, Catholic is more than certainly capable of doing.  Then, with a giant grin, he invites me to join him in passover.  I was confused, and I said, "what? now?" and he laughed and said, "no, not now" - instead, he invited me to be baptized.  Again I said, "now?" This time he was very serious, and said, "yes, now."  I look at Asami, again she's stifling a laugh, so I look at her friend, and she looks almost suicidal, and won't take her eyes off the bible in front of her.  I looked at the black lady, and she is grinning like that cup of cocoa I drank should be kicking in any second.  Fuck.  I turn back to the Nigerian, and say, "Nope. I need to think about this."  It didn't even phase him.  He reiterates, "this is your only option if you want to live, Matthew you, and you do believe in the bible, don't you? The bible states you must do this to live."  I begin aggressively excusing Asami and I from the initiation gang bang that would probably ensue and Captain Nigeria is only fueled by it.  He's been waiting for this deal closer since we began conversing.

Let me take you back.  In the midst of this bible class, he wrote some gibber jabber on the board about "Eygpt" - yes thats how he spelled it - and "Cannan" - again how he spelled it.  This fucker doesnt know a fucking thing regarding the bible, history, theology, or fucking God.

It dawns on me, he's strictly business.  The black woman starts trying the divide and conquer approach, and asks Asami, "This is for both of you, and since he wants to think about it, what about you? Would you like to live Asami?"  One thing that annoys me more than anything is when people make up names for Asami.  If it's one of our drinking buddies, and they call her Tsunami, or Osami, or Sashimi, it's ok - they're our friends, and they do it with a kind heart, a giant smile, and out of general positive regard and love for the woman.  When Miss BornintheghettosavedbyKorea keeps calling my fiancé Osamay, after repeatedly asking both her and I her name, I get pissed.  I get really fucking pissed, so I start the theo-slamming process of running these two clowns through the bible quick like just to make them feel a little inferior in coming at me with such a direct sales pitch to sign up for a fucking cult.  They will not break away from their script.  They site the same verses as before, never wavering from what they have been taught to say.  Finally, after their 5th attempt to close me down on this deal, and this time I'm even told, "we're not selling you a car, we're teaching you the path to Heaven," I tell them they are actually selling me a potentially eternal car and I WILL think about this before acting on it.  The black woman boldly corrects me, "the bible says to act first, research later."  So I blatantly ask, "Am I going to Hell if I wont accept this baptism?"  They do not want to answer, but give me the typical "Thats up to Jesus" answer.  Asami interjects this whole madness, raises her voice, and says "We will not do anything, OK? We're getting married and starting a family soon, and we don't know anything about this, ok?"  They shut the FUCK up, but for only a second.  They tell Asami to come check out the bible study when I'm not around.  And the same for me.  But mostly her.  As we're saying our goodbyes, the Nigerian man is still persistently trying to get me to agree to baptism, right then, so I can live.  We are immediately ushered to the door.  Everyone from before meets us there.  They follow us outside, to our car, and run behind us waiving screaming "god bless you" as we drove away.

Asami's best friend sent her a text, alluding to an apology and that what she wanted was only for us to eat dinner with her, and she didn't understand why we couldn't stay.  This young Korean woman is very innocent, very naive, and does not have a sinful bone in her body.  We said we had previous arrangements for dinner, and that alleviated a bit of her friends worries.

On the way home I call my dad and ask him to do some research.  He's the best web researcher I've ever known. And boy oh boy is this group fucking strange.

This is my experience.  I knew nothing about these people before venturing into their territory.  They manipulate the bible and prey on foreigner's lack of theological study, especially open minded university students studying english as a second language.  If you watch any of these videos and think to yourself, "Shit! They're right!" then I invite you to be a hero and Jim Jones yourself.  These people are fucking psychotic.  Families are shredded, wealth is given away, and peoples lives are consumed over their quest for happiness.  If you know someone subjected to this shit, give them a copy of the Tao of Pooh.  If you're an atheist, cackle at the whole scenario.  If you find this shit life altering, and are considering joining along, eat fucking cyanide.  If you know how to pull people out of this particular cult with very little family collateral damage, email me.

bytethismatt@gmail.com