A couple of kids in my neighborhood got my brother and me to go to one of those Christian revival things.  We thought it was a concert.  Anyhow, I was not only freaked and embarrassed, I was afraid I might accidently stand up and have to go up to the front and "accept Jesus into my heart."  That would have been bad enough, but I was about 10 and a good Catholic kid going to Catholic School and we were taught from the Baltimore chatechism that it was a sin, or close to it, to attend religious services of another religion.  [The nuns even told us it was wrong to belong to the YMCA!!]

I also was freaked by my first Rawat event, too.  But the thing was, it was really the people, the premies I loved, not Rawat.  There were a lot of really cool, sincere premies and I felt accepted by them.  So, when I got freaked by the way the premies were worshipping Rawat as God and getting all hyped about it, they supported me afterwards and I got through it.  Yes, I should have trusted by own, initial gut feelings.  So much for trusting your own "experience," right?

But by the last couple of years in the cult, I always felt that way at Festivals.  I just no longer "got it."  I couldn't relate. 

Years later, when I saw Rawat at a program in SF that I just went to to see how I would react, (and this was supposed to be an intro event) and I was completely creeped out at the way the premies still looked at him gaga, as the Lord, just like I remembered.  It was when Rawat started on his gratuitious rant about how confused and out of it the "people of the world" were that I got offended and walked out.   That's when I really saw the faces of the premies and got permanently grossed out, with full confirmation that I had done the right thing in getting out of that cult when I did.

We would love to come to Berlin, and it is still on the schedule for late Spring, but, as you know, the US dollar, thanks to the brilliant economic policies of Junior, is dropping through the toilet as we speak.  So, we kind of have to re-evaluate our plans, so, we'll see.  Would love to see you.