Cultic Studies Journal, Vol. 15, No. 2, 1998, page 21
seminary, writing papers, and getting down in black and white the story of my experience,
my healing really started. I was looking at the group. I was writing about it. I took a first-
semester course called Theology and Self-Understanding. In that course, we wrote out our
three earliest memories and compared them with a parable of Jesus. I always thought of
myself then as the Prodigal Son—I had been out there in the world and come back.
But I started reading this parable differently, and I looked at the older son who felt like he
was on the outside, looking in. I had said that same thing to my family all the time when I
was growing up. I was adopted (it wasn‘t any big secret), and every once in a while I said,
―I feel like I‘m out here, looking in. I‘m not really a part of the family.‖ My family always
said, ―You‘re being ridiculous you‘re part of the family.‖ That‘s not the way I felt, but they
wouldn‘t acknowledge that. In the cult, I was on the inside.
So I was looking at those kinds of issues. I took another class called The Family as the
Cradle of Theology, where we looked at our families from a family-systems perspective.
Writing the paper for this class was the first time that I had to look at my alcoholic father,
my alcoholism, and the kind of family I grew up in. This exercise forced me to start dealing
with issues I had parked—not really when I started in the cult, but when I started drinking
years before. It was as if I had just taken one addiction and transferred it onto another one.
I think the clincher for me was doing a couple of units of Clinical Pastoral Education. I
worked as a chaplain in an alcohol and drug abuse center. Suddenly, I was counseling other
alcoholics. I remember one evening I was listening to someone‘s story, and I started
shaking. I didn‘t know what was going on. The story really started kicking up all the issues
for me. It was Thanksgiving, and my wife and I were going to South Carolina to visit family.
On the way back, we were driving along at night, and she said, ―You know, Tucker‘s little
blanket is in the trunk, and he needs it so he can sleep in the car.‖ I pulled the car over, got
out, and went to the trunk. I took his little bike and I threw it off to the side of the road,
and I was tearing things apart, looking for his blanket so he could have it to sleep. I stuffed
the things back in the trunk. I got back in the car, and my wife asked, ―What are you so
angry about?‖ I didn‘t know. I didn‘t know I was acting angry. We were driving along, and I
started telling her a story about something that happened to me growing up. I looked at
her, and she was crying. I asked, ―Why are you crying?‖ She said, ―Why aren‘t you? That‘s
your story.‖ And I didn‘t feel a thing. I really didn‘t feel a thing. That‘s when I decided I
needed to get some counseling.
I just called a counselor in Raleigh and started seeing him, going back and working through
the issues (I didn‘t know it at the time, but he had graduated from the seminary). So my
recovery from the cult was a recovery from my alcohol and the cult. But my recovery also
was looking at my story and where I had come from, and accepting that. And the recovery
was a long, slow process. It was getting away from the group, writing the paper in
seminary, and talking to people about my experience. I really feel that things changed for
me after the Gods of the New Age seminar when I realized I had been duped. And having
those people pray for me really set me free. But even at that point I wasn‘t able to work on
the underlying issues. Seminary was a really good experience for me, because it gave me
the opportunity and a format to look at those things and struggle through them.
Carson Miles, M.A. was a practitioner of Transcendental Meditation, Self-Realization
Fellowship, and Siddha Yoga, and a member of a group called The Work. A 1995 graduate
of Denver Seminary, Mr. Miles is a counselor in private practice in the Denver area. He and
his wife have two sons.
This article is an electronic version of an article originally published in Cultic Studies Journal, 1998, Volume 15,
Number 2, pages 139-138. Please keep in mind that the pagination of this electronic reprint differs from that of the
bound volume. This fact could affect how you enter bibliographic information in papers that you may write.
seminary, writing papers, and getting down in black and white the story of my experience,
my healing really started. I was looking at the group. I was writing about it. I took a first-
semester course called Theology and Self-Understanding. In that course, we wrote out our
three earliest memories and compared them with a parable of Jesus. I always thought of
myself then as the Prodigal Son—I had been out there in the world and come back.
But I started reading this parable differently, and I looked at the older son who felt like he
was on the outside, looking in. I had said that same thing to my family all the time when I
was growing up. I was adopted (it wasn‘t any big secret), and every once in a while I said,
―I feel like I‘m out here, looking in. I‘m not really a part of the family.‖ My family always
said, ―You‘re being ridiculous you‘re part of the family.‖ That‘s not the way I felt, but they
wouldn‘t acknowledge that. In the cult, I was on the inside.
So I was looking at those kinds of issues. I took another class called The Family as the
Cradle of Theology, where we looked at our families from a family-systems perspective.
Writing the paper for this class was the first time that I had to look at my alcoholic father,
my alcoholism, and the kind of family I grew up in. This exercise forced me to start dealing
with issues I had parked—not really when I started in the cult, but when I started drinking
years before. It was as if I had just taken one addiction and transferred it onto another one.
I think the clincher for me was doing a couple of units of Clinical Pastoral Education. I
worked as a chaplain in an alcohol and drug abuse center. Suddenly, I was counseling other
alcoholics. I remember one evening I was listening to someone‘s story, and I started
shaking. I didn‘t know what was going on. The story really started kicking up all the issues
for me. It was Thanksgiving, and my wife and I were going to South Carolina to visit family.
On the way back, we were driving along at night, and she said, ―You know, Tucker‘s little
blanket is in the trunk, and he needs it so he can sleep in the car.‖ I pulled the car over, got
out, and went to the trunk. I took his little bike and I threw it off to the side of the road,
and I was tearing things apart, looking for his blanket so he could have it to sleep. I stuffed
the things back in the trunk. I got back in the car, and my wife asked, ―What are you so
angry about?‖ I didn‘t know. I didn‘t know I was acting angry. We were driving along, and I
started telling her a story about something that happened to me growing up. I looked at
her, and she was crying. I asked, ―Why are you crying?‖ She said, ―Why aren‘t you? That‘s
your story.‖ And I didn‘t feel a thing. I really didn‘t feel a thing. That‘s when I decided I
needed to get some counseling.
I just called a counselor in Raleigh and started seeing him, going back and working through
the issues (I didn‘t know it at the time, but he had graduated from the seminary). So my
recovery from the cult was a recovery from my alcohol and the cult. But my recovery also
was looking at my story and where I had come from, and accepting that. And the recovery
was a long, slow process. It was getting away from the group, writing the paper in
seminary, and talking to people about my experience. I really feel that things changed for
me after the Gods of the New Age seminar when I realized I had been duped. And having
those people pray for me really set me free. But even at that point I wasn‘t able to work on
the underlying issues. Seminary was a really good experience for me, because it gave me
the opportunity and a format to look at those things and struggle through them.
Carson Miles, M.A. was a practitioner of Transcendental Meditation, Self-Realization
Fellowship, and Siddha Yoga, and a member of a group called The Work. A 1995 graduate
of Denver Seminary, Mr. Miles is a counselor in private practice in the Denver area. He and
his wife have two sons.
This article is an electronic version of an article originally published in Cultic Studies Journal, 1998, Volume 15,
Number 2, pages 139-138. Please keep in mind that the pagination of this electronic reprint differs from that of the
bound volume. This fact could affect how you enter bibliographic information in papers that you may write.
