This card was stuck in our windshield when we came back from shopping today. Up to now, such things have been ads for gutter cleaning, roofing, landscaping, or something mundane like that. But this was different.
Haven't seen anything quite like it - it seems to cover any known human issue (including Mother Katery and Removing of Obiya), a few that aren't even known yet, problems that you don't have and may never have, or CANNOT have ("Help! I'm stuck on the moon!"). I don't wish to be too critical here, as something like this may help someone, or maybe a lot of someones.
If this person has some real ability to help with SOME of these issues, or can at least provide a listening ear. . . but that's NOT what it's usually about.
Like Benny Hinn and Joel Osteen and Creflo Dollar, this person may well be preying on the weak and vulnerable. OR NOT. The fact that this advertisement likely represents a different culture (South Asian, I think) makes me want to tread carefully - for how do I know what it's like to live within that culture?
Still, when a solution to EVERY SINGLE problem is laid out for you like a banquet of exaggeration, you've got to wonder. And I'd have to go all the way out to Delta to partake of this, unless it can be done by text message or Zoom (the way most "therapy" is done these days. You have to have the app.)
I can't begin to go into the times I've been taken in by people who seemed to have a genuine gift. But at some point, the "gift" became more important than they were - and the whole thing got corrupted, if it ever had any value to begin with.
My former friend Paul Biscop, whom I met when he was teaching a university course in anthropology, claimed to be a spiritualist medium, and even founded his own church on Vancouver Island (though that ended rather badly). But the relationship was rocky and uneven, and eventually he dismissed all of my spiritual experiences as "fantasies" or even mental illness - which really hurt, though I can't imagine why. He said he was trying to help me with this insight, and of course I should have been grateful. But he often pulled rank, citing his two Masters degrees and his PhD as proof that all of HIS experiences were obviously valid, and mine were bogus.
Many years later, long after I had broken off the dubious friendship, he suddenly died, and what he left in his wake appalled me. His partner/spouse of 24 years (also named Paul) was left with more than $10,000.00 in debt that he had no idea existed. Far from being left with no insurance money, he was left with a gaping hole that couldn't be filled. Last I heard he was literally homeless, and the spiritualist church Paul Biscop stomped away from was trying to help him by setting up a GoFundMe page.
As nice as the folks at this church were, I could tell there had been bad blood there. It had become Paul's little pocket cult, and the rest of the congregation ultimately protested. When he died, his memorial was held at a local Masonic Hall, and very few from the church attended. A table was set up at the back of the hall to sell off some of his books on anthropology and spiritualisms in order to help his surviving partner. . . survive.
To this day, there's a page-long tribute online all about how wonderful the man was, with none of the problematic things he did even mentioned. It almost seems like, as with Elvis, dying was a good career move for Paul. In any case, it's a cautionary tale, for it's just possible Paul set off on this spiritual journey with good intentions. Like Marshall Applewhite, like David Koresh, like Jim Jones? ALL of these men started off as relatively mainstream Christian preachers who may have thought their intentions were good. And they brought a lot of people along with them, one way or another.
Let's just say it didn't end well.
OK then. . . what does this have to do with this card? Everything and nothing. It may be a whole 'nother circumstance, and I hope it is, but I also hope it isn't another form of Benny Hinn-ism, where people pour all their hopes and most of their savings into something that will only leave them spiritually bankrupt.
FURTHER READING. I went into more detail in this blog post, which deals with some of the same issues. Read it if you like.
