Ryker 16: The Lying

Yes, there was definitely, 100%, completely and totally a policy of lying to people outside the group. There was a general concept, put down from Angelo himself, that there is always darkness trying to destroy the light. And there is always somebody coming after the “Christ”, the energy of whatever… and that there is some kind of government agency or something always looking and watching. So we had to be really discreet. You never tell anyone you’re in a spiritual group. You don’t tell your parents what you’re doing, or any relatives. Just endless, endless paranoid instructions. We’d have whole meetings on how to walk out of a house that we met in -- so we wouldn’t look suspicious. What to say if questioned. It was a whole culture of paranoia which turned into having to lie about what you’re doing. Especially to the general public. And then it got so rotten that everyone was lying to each other inside the group. It was absolutely rotten at the core, this thing. And it still is. It got worse and worse the more Angelo wanted to control things and make it about himself. His major plan was to keep everyone here, in the group, no matter what. Because he equated that with doing his spiritual work. And he’d cite all kinds of examples of people doing guru-shopping as to why “going for God” or trying to “become enlightened” or doing your “spiritual work” always equals staying with him. Forever. And nothing else will do. And that was just wrong. Simply put. I know it’s wrong in my heart. I’m simply beginning to uncover my heart -- that I had to ignore for so long.

One major lie… I was under the impression that he had one boyfriend at a time. Literally. I had no idea that he was having sex with multiple people. That he pretty much had every male do some kind of sexual something with him. I had no idea. I had no idea of all of his sexual proclivities. I had no idea he was watching porn during the therapy sessions. I had no idea of those things. Again, I feel really bad for the people because they go there with a sincere heart and that’s what they get? Angelo has recently propagated the message that everyone that left had a problem with his sexuality and I’m here to say, “No, we did not. Oh. No. We. Did. Not. You can f.ck whoever you want to. But you’re lying about it and you’re using it to manipulate people. You’re manipulating people into it through spirituality. That’s f.cked up. It’s not about sexuality, it’s about manipulation and lies and misinformation. That’s disgusting. Shame on you.”

I participated in some of the lies inadvertently. When somebody was “harming the group” (according to Angelo) I probably would go and talk to the person. I didn’t literally know it was a lie that I was participating in at the time… because he’d tell me this person was doing this thing, and tell me “Go and tell them this.” And I would. Because I thought it was serving the greater good. And after a while, when I realized what was happening. I wouldn’t do it. And he wouldn’t ask me either because he knew I wouldn’t do it. He cut me out of that whole process. I didn’t get pulled into a lot of the manipulation stuff. I’m not a manipulative person. It’s too much work for me. And especially in the spiritual reality of my life, it feels too awful to do. So nothing comes to mind that I did because I could never go that far.