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How Could This Happen Here?

15 April 2014, 08:42

Moderator

101

Recovering Grace will observe Sexual Assault Awareness Month for the remainder of April. In April 2012 and 2013, we published some very difficult stories of sexual abuse in ATI [Advanced Training Institute] families. Some critics objected that these families were extreme outliers within the program, and that ATI and IBLP have never condoned sexual […]

Realization, Fear, and Action without Acquiescence: Joy Wood’s Story

13 March 2014, 06:00

Moderator

Joy and her daughters, c. 1980

Editor’s Note: Joy Wood, an IBYC staff wife from 1974–1980, tells in today’s post of her and her husband’s time with the Institute, and of their resignation when asked to promote “lies of omission” after the 1980 scandal broke. This narrative, combined with Joy’s reflections composed shortly after her family left IBYC, records a journey […]

The GOTHARD Files: Failure to Reconcile 1981–ATI, part two

8 March 2014, 06:00

Moderator

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Today’s post is a continuation of yesterday’s article. Accountability The LA Committee was launching its own massive last-ditch effort to hold Bill accountable. Using their personal funds, the committee drafted a unified letter dated January 19, 1981, with a list of 28 questions they wanted answered, stating that in spite of their removal from seminar […]

Defrauding: What does it mean?

27 February 2014, 06:00

Moderator

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In February 1976, Bill Gothard confessed to the poorly-defined offense of “having ‘defrauded’ staff secretaries.” In a July 1980 meeting of the Institute in Basic Youth Conflicts (IBYC) board, it was confirmed that Bill Gothard was responsible for the “physical and emotional defrauding of several of his personal secretaries.” In February 1981, Bill once again […]

Letter from a Survivor of Spiritual Abuse

25 November 2013, 06:00

Moderator

To all those who are a part of my life in some way: Please don’t tell me that my parents loved me and “only wanted what was best” for me. When I hear you say that, I hear you telling me that all the spiritual abuse, oppression, and deep pain I have felt and experienced […]

When We Criticize The Church

13 May 2013, 06:00

Micah J. Murray

We were sold a package deal. Truth and lies, hope and despair, real and fake — all tied up in a neat package with a bow and sold to us with the label of “Christianity.” The men in the suits with all the words told us that what they taught was true. They said it […]

How “Lessons From Moral Failures in a Family” Blames Victims

11 April 2013, 06:00

Moderator

An Institute publication entitled “Lessons From Moral Failures in a Family” [Click here for the full pdf document] was first mailed to Advanced Training Institute (ATI) families in the late 1990s, and it has been periodically distributed at conferences since. Recovering Grace does not know the identity of the family members who shared their story […]

Why We Care About Sexual Abuse

4 April 2013, 06:00

Beverly

April is national Sexual Assault Awareness Month. Last year Recovering Grace dedicated the month of April to bringing these stories of darkness into the light, and we are doing so again this year. Why do we choose to focus our attention on this emotionally disturbing, heart-wrenching subject? It takes only a glance at today’s news […]

Parents in a Potemkin Village: Six Weeks in the Moscow Training Center

14 January 2013, 06:00

Diana Hall

A panoramic view of the Moscow Training Center assembled from four snapshots taken in Fall 1995

We entered the Advanced Training Institute (ATI) homeschool program when I was fifteen, and not much about my life changed. Our family attended functions here and there and added the Wisdom Booklets to our home school curriculum, but the more unique ATI teachings did not have much effect on us. Before we joined ATI we […]

I Just Want to Be Normal!

25 June 2012, 09:00

JoyS

“What does this song remind you of?” my husband asked, as the song Take My Breath Away played on the radio station. I thought for a second before responding, “I don’t know. — Nothing, I guess. What does it remind you of?” He laughed. “Top Gun!” “Oh.” I said, feeling that familiar embarrassment overtaking me. […]