Blindsight

Blindsight is a phenomenon in which people who are perceptually blind in a certain area of their visual field demonstrate some response to visual stimuli, without any qualitative experience.

The definition goes deeper than that, but let’s stick with the simple stuff, and apply it to the experience of the church (bear in mind I am coming at this from the point of view of a child who was successfully indoctrinated, unlike the rest of the lucky rebels I knew and despised at the time). I was conceptually blindsighted, as a child of the church.

Case in point: Up until the mid-90s, I really did believe that all the Jews in the world had largely died out, and that the Judaic religion was only a small remnant of people who bore a passing connection to the tribes of Judah and Levi. Thank you, WCG, and your fucked-up racism.

I remember someone mentioning to me in passing that HWA had a copy of Mein Kampf; I didn’t even know what Mein Kampf was, beyond the fact that it was popular with a couple of the deacons in my area. An explanation of Hitler and WWII was then met by my blank-faced and absolutely serious ”Oh, well, the Germans haven’t come yet, that’s going to happen after the Great Tribulation starts.”

What did I base this unquestioning belief on you ask? Level 7, Lesson 8, of the Youth Educational Service’s Youth Bible Lessons, “Key Prophecies of The Major Prophets”.

The Bible Lessons (colloquially known in the church as “YES Lessons”) started being actively taught to the children at Saturday services around 1980, and were taught right up until 1992. The lessons ranged from pre-school/kindergarten age (Level 1) to junior high (Level 7/8, after which you were expected to start reading church literature on your own, if you hadn’t already begun doing so). But let’s quote some of “Key Prophecies of the Major Prophets”: All emphasis is the original formatting.

A LOOK INTO THE FUTURE

Let’s take a look into the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel to see what God inspired these prophets to write about the years just ahead. Using the Bible as a time machine to project us into the future, let’s take a brief look at just part of what is prophesied to occur.

Our time machine brings us into a prison camp. It is very large. Armed guards patrol the barbed wire fences surrounding it. The guards, clad in unfamiliar uniforms, are stern in appearance.

In a clearing between several large dirty buildings are two women huddled around a fire. One of them is stirring a large cauldron of boiling soup. A long line of thin, sickly prisoners trudge slowly by as the other woman pours soup into a metal cup held by each prisoner.

These tired and weak prisoners have worked all day in the prison workshop, where they were mistreated by cruel guards. For months they have worked in the same clothing, eaten thin and tasteless soup, and rested only a few hours each night.

As we take a closer look, we begin to recognize some of these people. They are Americans, Britons, Canadians, Australians, South Africans, and other English-speaking peoples. Then we learn that there are many other prison camps like this one!

But how could this be? How could people from such powerful countries have ended up in prison camps?

Our time machine now moves us across an ocean to the shores of North America. The United States and Canada look completely different! The major cities of both countries are laid waste! The big cities of other countries such as Britain, Australia, and South Africa are desolate also.

Instead of cities full of homes, humming factories and freeways, there is nothing but rubble! And the city suburbs, formally [sic] filled with friendly neighborhoods, have been charred by fire. The green trees, grass and bushes are all burned up!

What could possibly have happened? Are these scenes from some science fiction movie? Unfortunately not!

THE KEY THAT UNLOCKS PROPHECY TO OUR UNDERSTANDING

The book of Isaiah contains 66 chapters, Jeremiah 52 and Ezekiel 48. In none of these chapters will you find the United States or Britain ever mentioned by name.

How then, can we know that the scenes just depicted from the prophecies of these prophets involve these countries?

The vital key that unlocks prophecy to our understanding is knowledge of the astonishing identity of the American and British peoples in Biblical prophecies. God has revealed this key to Mr. Herbert W. Armstrong, Pastor General of the Worldwide Church of God.

In his book, The United States and Britain in Prophecy, Mr. Armstrong explains that the United States and Britain have actually descended from the tribes of Manasseh and Ephraim, which at one time were part of the ancient nation of Israel. The United States and Britain, along with certain other nations in the world today, are often collectively referred to as the “house of Israel” in Biblical prophecies.

The lesson then goes into a further exegesis of the specious Assyrian Germany hypothesis. Let’s take a look at the cover of this YES lesson shall we?

If you have the stomach for it, you can go through the entire lesson, complete with Basil Wolverton illustrations and proof-texting scripture ciphers, here.

Now do you see why I say the CoG leaders are just as much children of the church as the rest of us? I  really, truly, absolutely, did not know any better than what I was being taught. What I believed to be true was fear-mongering, racist, anti-Semitic drivel.

If presented with material on the Holocaust, or on WWII during these years of my adolescence, I demonstrated an acceptable emotional response to the material — but no one ever thought nor realized to dig deeper and examine just what that emotional response was based on.

I was conceptually blindsighted.