Cult Test Explained

So I got this 'cult test' on a 'church of reality' website. Although I do not agree with the beliefs of the church of reality, this 'test' is very accurate! These are the points that were present in the cult that I was involved in. I will put a little piece of my experience that can be related to these points.

1. The Guru is always right.
Carol was always right, and if you questioned anything she did or said, she would say that you were "coming against a prophet", and it would be rejected.

2. You are always wrong.
To be related with the first point...she had a scripture to come against everything you said. Inevitably, we were wrong because we were full of sin and needed to reach a certain place with God to be trustworthy.

3. No Exit.
I was not permitted to have friends outside of the group. There were several instances where I was asked to a school dance, and I had to refuse. I couldn't go to the movies or the mall with friends. When I had visitation with my dad, I had to be 'cleansed' when I returned, to get rid of any demons that may have attached themselves to me. Even after phone conversations with dad, I had to go through the cleansing process because "demons traveled through phone lines."

4. No Graduates.
How I interpret this is that you do not 'move up with God'. Carol used to tell me that I sinned because I wasn't at the right place with God, I wasn't mature enough. She told me that I would never be successful in life, and the best I would do is drive a Volkswagon.

5. Cult-speak.
Carol spoke in a way that she said was spiritual. For example, she would pray that people have a "Mack truck experience with God", the Mack truck being a semi truck. 

 6. Group-think.
No one in Carol's group can think individually, everything has to be approved by her. so, any decisions are made together as a group, and everyone knows everyone's personal business. Whether it be how much money is brought in annually, or who cheated on his wife.

7. Irrationality.
One day when I was eating at Carol's breakfast table, all of the sudden my peripheral vision was gone. I told her that something wasn't right, and told her what was going on. She immediately told me that it was God showing me how spiritually blind I was. I, of course, believed her. I went into the bathroom to take my contacts out, and realized that the contact that was in the eye that I couldn't see from was ripped. An edge was completely gone. That's why I couldn't see...not God showing me my spiritual blindness.

8. Suspension of disbelief.
One night when I was living with Carol, I was getting ready for bed and saw a cockroach in my room. I screamed hysterically and Carol came in. She convinced me that the cockroach was not there, but it was God allowing the demon of lust that was inside of me to manifest itself. 

9. Denigration of competing sects, cults, religions, etc.
I had never been in any other church, except for when my dad took me once. I was told that several well known denominations were cults, and that none of the commercial churches had the truth. If we went to another church, we would be sacrificing the truth of God's Word.

10. Personal attacks on critics.
Carol sued my dad for a million dollars for defamation of character for sharing his story about being in the cult online. She, of course lost because she had no grounds. Another family counter-sued Carol because she had been in contact with their underage daughter, after the parents told her not to. She never showed up to the court hearing. 

11. Insistence that the cult is THE ONLY WAY.
Carol would tell us that The storehouse of God's Inheritance was one of the few churches spoken about in the Bible.

12. The cult and its members are special.
Carol would always use scriptures to defend her teaching and beliefs. She trained us to do the same. We (The Storehouse) were in the last days, and we had the truth, unlike a large majority of the world.

13. Induction of guilt, and the use of guilt to manipulate cult members.
Carol would tell people that the reason bad things happen to them was because of their sin.  

14. Dogma, Unquestionable Dogma, and Sacred Science.
Carol convinced me and her other followers that she, and very few others in the world, had the truth of God's Word.

15. Indoctrination of members.
Carol would hold church in her home. She always had lengthy sermons prepared, which usually took all week to do. She would speak very loudly and was convincing in everything that she said. The sermons would take hours to complete.

16. Appeals to "holy" or "wise" authorities.
Carol would say things to me like "God wants you to know (fill in the blank)." She told us that she had an angel visitation several years before. She was in direct communication with God, and no one else was mature enough to be.

17. Instant Community.
Whenever someone 'new' visited (which was very rare!!), we always were very nice and inviting; making people think that we were the right church to go to. We never pushed anyone away who came to us. What would usually happen in a case like this is that Carol would invite the newcomer to live with her, to refresh themselves and be surrounded by holiness. Of course, no one else was mature enough to do this.

18. Instant Intimacy.
All of the sudden, Carol and everyone else knows EVERYTHING about you. Carol is the type of person who instantly makes you feel comfortable, like you can tell her anything in confidence. It never stays in confidence, even when she tells you it will. 

19. Surrender To The Cult.
Whenever you were 'delivered' from something, you had to cut ties with everything and everyone that was associated with it. For example, when my parents divorced, I had to get rid of every picture that I owned that had my dad in it. Another thing was relationships. Everything had to be forfeited for Christ.

20. Giggly wonderfulness and starry-eyed faith.
Carol told me that out of my family, I was the only one promised into heaven, as long as I did what I was supposed to. She convinced me that I would get into heaven, and the rest of my family wouldn't.

21. Personal testimonies of earlier converts.
Carol would always talk about when she was a Catholic. Everyone would give their testimonies.

22. The cult is self-absorbed.
Nobody is better than Carol. She was at the highest level with God, and no one else could attain that.

23. Dual Purposes.
Carol preaches humility, and being a 'no one on Earth to be a someone in the Kingdom'. Yet she lives in a 5 bedroom home with new cars. Everyone else lives in apartments. 

24. Aggressive Recruiting.
Carol will do anything to make her teaching sound good, even if it means lying about it.

25. Deceptive Recruiting.
When you start attending Carol's group, it's all about cleansing your life from your past. She tends to prey on people who have f@!*ed up childhoods, or bad experiences with people. After a while, though, she requires more and more from you. It's subtle, so you don't notice anything different until hindsight. Also, she masks her demands with scripture.

26. No Humor
When I was 9, I made a list of sins that I needed to be forgiven for. One of those sins was joke telling. Carol took the scripture Ephesians 4:29 literally, which says "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen."

27. You can't tell the truth.
Carol is right, no matter what. You will be attacked by her and her followers if you come against who she says she is, what she believes, or what she teaches.

28. Cloning -- You must redefine yourself and your life in cult terms.
Our old life no longer existed...we were new in Christ. That is true, but Carol took it to the extreme, saying that you couldn't do or participate in anything that you did in the past.

29. You must change your beliefs to conform to the group's beliefs.
If you didn't believe what Carol taught, you were an apostate. She used the scripture Mark 9:40, which says "for whoever is not against us is for us."

30. The End Justifies The Means.
Carol would say "it doesn't matter how you get there, as long as you get there." She would encourage her followers to go to extreme lengths to reach the level of God that they were called.

31. Dishonesty, Deceit, Denial, Falsification, and Rewriting History.
Carol had written a $65,000.00 check to a Cadillac dealership without having any money in her account. She believed that God would put the money into her account. He didn't. Carol encouraged her followers to lie for her, saying that if you lied for God it wasn't a sin.

32. Different Levels of Truth.
As I just mentioned, truth was conditioned based on the circumstance.

33. Newcomers can't think right.
Anyone who wanted to continue attending the cult had to conform to Carol's ideas and ideals. If you hadn't gone through the necessary steps, your mind was adulterated by the devil.

34. The Cult Implants Phobias.
I was scared to death to visit with my dad, because I was told that the devil resided in his house. 

35. The Cult is Money-Grubbing.
Carol would always talk bad about the preachers who only wanted money from the congregation, yet she would accept thousands of dollars a month from only a few working people. 

36. Confession Sessions.
There were many times that Carol told me that in order to move on with God, I had to open up. Opening up was confessing everything to God in front of Carol. She would later use that information against me.

37. A System of Punishments and Rewards.
If you did something that was wrong, God punished you. Your punishment could come in any form...someone talking bad to you or about you at work, your kids not listening to you, being turned down for apartments or jobs. Usually Carol would openly humiliate you if you did something wrong. Rewards hardly ever happened, except to Carol. she always received gifts from God, like her new cars and nice house. Anything that we did good was not to be praised.

38. An Impossible Superhuman Model of Perfection.
Carol would always point out the flaws in everyone. No matter what I did, it was never good enough. If I was good at something, it was in the flesh. If I wasn't good at something, it was because I had sin in my heart. No one could reach the level of maturity that Carol had spoken about. She even said that no one (except her) was producing any fruit.

39. Mentoring.
 Carol wanted the mentoring role in everyone's life. We would sit in her room for hours at a time just talking. It was always me opening up about how I felt and problems that I was having. She apparently never experienced real problems, just her temptation to eat Resee's cups. She enjoyed having the trust of everyone, so that she could control them.

40. Intrusiveness.
Carol would make unannounced house calls, just to check in. She would squirm her way into every aspect of everyone's life. No one could make decision without first consulting Carol. My mom had to make sure that it was okay with Carol before she made our dentist appointments.

41. Disturbed Guru, Mentally Ill Leader.
I recently found out that Carol had been admitted into the mental ward of a prison earlier in her life. I don't know if she was diagnosed with anything while she was there, but I hope to somehow find out. I believe very strongly that she is both disturbed and mentally ill.

42. Disturbed Members, Mentally Ill Followers.
All of the members have had some sort of traumatic experience in their life. Whether it be rape or alcohol/drug abuse, every member who joined as an adult had a traumatic event happen as a child. I believe that everyone there is disturbed and requires professional help.

43. Create a sense of powerlessness, covert fear, guilt, and dependency.
Once Carol has her grip on you, she will make you feel like the most worthless thing on the planet. She will make you feel so ashamed if you make a mistake, and convince you that if you stick with her, you will live a life for Christ that you couldn't do if you were by yourself. There is such fear that if you leave you will go to hell.

44. Dispensed existence
Carol made herself out to be the mediator between you and God. She would, of course, say differently; but she would 'give you messages from God' that you couldn't get yourself. You had to prove yourself worthy before you could do God's work. One way to do that is completely strip your life of anything and everything worldly. 

45. Ideology Over Experience, Observation, and Logic
No matter what your faith was prior to becoming a member of Carol's group, it was wrong. Unless Carol approved it, it was not the truth. One thing that she would say is that "you can't listen to emotions, because emotions lie."

46. Keep them unaware that there is an agenda to change them
Carol would NEVER tell people in the beginning things that might turn them away. The information that she gave would gradually get deeper and more personal, based on the intimate conversations that she would have with people. She says that she would never take anything out of the room after it's been spoken, yet she will share the conversation with other people. She did that with my mom and I. She uses information against you. 

47. Thought-Stopping Language. Thought-terminating clichés and slogans.
There are several things that I remember her saying. I think the one that I remember most is "I know that I know that I know that I know..." and so on. She said that a lot. Mack truck experience, God breaking someone's neck.

48. Mystical Manipulation
One thing that she was always manipulating was the offering. She would say "you don't have to give, but if you don't God's judgment will come upon you". You're damned if you do and damned if you don't. Using God as her tool for punishment.

49. The guru or the group demands ultra-loyalty and total commitment.
Carol would use the scripture Luke 14:33, which says "In the same way, those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples."

50. Demands for Total Faith and Total Trust
In order to have faith in God, you had to trust Carol.

51. Members Get No Respect. They Get Abused.
Everyone there, myself included, would get publicly humiliated in front of everyone else. I was always told by Carol that I had a demon of lust inside of my heart, and my Uncle Mike told me I might as well stand on a street corner because I looked like a prostitute. I got an email from my Aunt Tania, telling me that I am a whore in God's eyes. 

52. Inconsistency. Contradictory Messages
She would call herself a prophet and an angel. She is obviously not a prophet, but she would accept the beliefs of others in addition to self-proclamation. She cannot be an angel, because angels don't get married, don't have children, are not born and never die. She's been married twice, has six children, was born in October 1947 and will die one day. She is human, and one who needs a lot of help.

53. Hierarchical, Authoritarian Power Structure, and Social Castes
She is the ultimate authority, under God. No one is above her, and no one could ever reach her place/level/authority with God.

55. Belief equals truth
No one second-guesses what Carol says or believes. They just think that because Carol is such a powerful person in the kingdom, she must be speaking the truth. She completely encourages this belief.

56. Use of double-binds
If I didn't pray, it was because I had sin in my heart. If I did pray, it was in the flesh and wasn't being heard anyway.

57. The cult leader is not held accountable for his actions.
I once asked Carol about speaking in tongues. She gave me a bunch of different answers, starting with I never did that to I don't remember doing that to I stopped when I realized it was wrong. When asked why she didn't study out her beliefs before teaching them instead of finding out along the way, she said that God only reveals an inch at a time, and that was a few steps ahead. She can do no wrong.

58. Everybody else needs the guru to boss him around, but nobody bosses the guru around.
Every decision needs to be approved by Carol, but nobody needs to approve Carol getting her hair done at one of the most expensive salons in Chandler with their money. She just can because God allows her to.

59. The guru criticizes everybody else, but nobody criticizes the guru.
Carol pointed out every 'demon' that I had in my heart: intellectualism, rebellion, lust, etc. etc. But she didn't have anything wrong with her. She was a prophet sent by God.

60. Dispensed truth and social definition of reality
Carol made the rules, and everyone else followed them. The only responsibility she had was to relay the message and set a good example.

61. The Guru Is Extra-Special.
Carol was a prophet, angel and sent here from God himself. She always received gifts from God, most of them lavish, self doting and expensive. Some of them were her large house, pool service, nail services, hair services and cars.

62. Flexible, shifting morality
 Lying is the biggest thing that is twisted to work in Carol's favor. She lies to save her own ass, and everyone will jump on the bandwagon if beckoned.

63. Separatism
Carol taught based on the Bible. She would then twist the scriptures to say what she wanted them to say. She would restrict the Old Testament from our reading, and teach based on the same scriptures over and over again. 

64. Inability to tolerate criticism
Carol would defend herself and her teaching with scripture. The one that she would use most is Matthew 5:11-12 which says, "Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you."

65. A Charismatic Leader
Carol was very opinionated with what she believed and taught. If Carol didn't say it was okay, then it wasn't.

66. Calls to Obliterate Self
Carol would always say to 'get rid of self'. Everything that happened that was wrong was because self got in the way.

67. Don't Trust Your Own Mind.
The mind is full of sin and self, so it cannot be trusted. Your mind must be cleansed by God before you can independently think. Until then, Carol will be the crutch.

68. Don't Feel Your Feelings.
Emotions lie because, same as thinking, it is adulterated with the flesh.

69. The cult takes over the individual's decision-making process.
Since everything has to go through Carol, eventually the individual's thinking is completely severed. After leaving the cult, I went straight into a controlling relationship with Alex. It was comfortable and easy to be controlled, even though I wasn't happy. It's very hard to make decisions when you have been taught for so long that you are inadequate.

70. You Owe The Group.
Essentially, you pay for Carol's 'sacrifice'. Everyone had a job to do at Carol's house, so that she did nothing. When getting gifts, Carol would buy people a shirt or some jewelry. Not super cheap but never expensive. One year for Mother's Day or her birthday, everyone who worked HAD to pitch in and buy a mother's ring for Carol. The total cost was about $1,500.00. 

71. We Have The Panacea.
Carol would use this most when speaking about her husband, John. But she would make you feel that without her, you could not make it into heaven.

72. Progressive Indoctrination and Progressive Commitments
In the beginning, it was just an offering that I had to give. Then I was paying for Eric and Chris' plane tickets home. Then it was random amounts of money for so and so, but don't tell them that you gave me any money.

73. Magical, Mystical, Unexplainable Workings
Anything that happened, whether it could be explained rationally or not, Carol would give a spiritual meaning to. Like the roach in my room, or my ripped contact. 

74. Trance-Inducing Practices
Carol told me that my calling in life was to be an intercessor, someone who prays. That was my job. I had to spend hours in prayer in the morning, pray at work, hours when I got home, and then group prayer in the evening some nights.

75. New Identity -- Redefinition of Self -- Revision of Personal History
Classic Christian belief...the old is gone, new has come.

76. Membership Rivalry
Carol talked about a girl who was a part of the group (long distance) like she could do nothing wrong. When I asked why she never spoke about me like that, she said it was because I wasn't at the place with God that I should have been. Instantly I became jealous.

77. True Believers
You had to be "on fire" for God. We were the church that would make it.

78. Scapegoating and Excommunication
My mom had been kicked out several times while I was there. When someone is kicked out, everyone immediately cuts any and all communication with that person, whether they're family or not.

79. Promised Powers or Knowledge
Carol told me that I was promised into heaven if I did what she told me to do.

80. It's a con. You don't get the promised goodies.
Whenever I thought I was doing good and moving up with God, Carol would always give me a message pretty much saying that I had failed, and that sin was still blocking me from God. She would say that she didn't know what sin, but that God would reveal it to her in time. I was never good enough.

81. Hypocrisy
Carol had always said that drinking alcohol was wrong...it was a sin. But, one night she went out to dinner with one of her sons, and she drank a glass of wine. So, if she wanted to do something, the rules were switched around to cater to her. 

82. Denial of the truth. Reversal of reality. Rationalization and Denial.
Carol and her followers sincerely believe that they have the truth, and they will turn down anything that might prove that they are wrong.

83. Seeing Through Tinted Lenses
Carol and her followers constantly judge the outside world based on what Carol says is right/wrong. For example, Carol believes that, unless you are saved, you cannot truly love anybody.  

84. You can't make it without the cult.
Carol will control every aspect of your life until you have literally lost all individuality. You don't fit in anywhere but the cult. But her teachings make you afraid to deal with the outside world, in fear that you will fall away from Christ. She has the truth, and you will not make it to heaven without her truth.

85. Enemy-making and Devaluing the Outsider
Anyone who opposes Carol is considered an apostate.

86. The cult wants to own you.
Carol finds pleasure in controlling people's minds, lives, relationships, money...everything. If she gets a chance, she will control you. 

87. Channeling or other occult, unchallengeable, sources of information.
Carol would speak in tongues, or as she calls it, her prayer language. It was a way to break through the walls of communication between God and me, and speak to him personally. She told me that I was meant to have this gift, but there were roadblocks in my heart stopping me from attaining it. I had to 'practice' with her whenever I started acting out this ritual. She would always tell me that it wasn't real, and that I was doing it in the flesh. Of course I was.

88. They Make You Dependent On The Group.
Carol encouraged her followers to cut off their family members who were not in the group. Because of this, although no one even dared to think about it, if they did leave, they would be too ashamed to ask for help. And, because Carol has stripped them down and essentially trained them to be her puppets, they wouldn't know how to survive in the outside world without Carol, unless they found support elsewhere. These people become solely dependent on Carol and her twisted teachings.

89. Demands For Compliance With The Group
I know I've said this a lot, but Carol controls everything about her followers. she teaches based on the Bible, but most of her teachings are fear-based. She once said in one of her teachings that "God would physically kill me if I don't separate myself from the world, because I had become a waste of his time."

90. Newcomers Need Fixing.
When you come to Christ through Carol, all of the old teachings and beliefs that you have need to be stripped away from you. You are a filthy person, and only her truth can cleanse you.

91. Use of the Cognitive Dissonance Technique.
People change after they have been with Carol. She once said that "personality will not get you into heaven." Any individuality was discouraged. 

 92. Grandiose existence. Bombastic, Grandiose Claims.
It's almost as if Carol's followers are robots walking around defending Carol. Their mission in life is to knock down opposers. If someone comes against Carol, the 'flock' will immediately come to her rescue and shoot out scriptures or hateful spiritual curses to people. Carol can do no wrong. 

93. Black And White Thinking
Carol teaches that there is no gray area. If you go to a church and there's one thing that's wrong out of 75 good things, you need to leave. She believes that everyone in the world should believe one thing, no personal opinion to any matter. It is her way or the highway.

94. The use of heavy-duty mind control and rapid conversion techniques.
We would have fasts that lasted for days, sometimes even a week. The only thing we could have was broth and water. One day, when I was having a week long fast, I was on a lunch break at work. It had been a few days since I had eaten, and I had been working all day. I went over to Wendy's and got a kids size french fry. I ate one fry, then called Carol and started balling my eyes out, begging her to forgive me. We would have 24-hour prayer sessions. When I was in high school, I remember going to her house on Sunday morning and we stayed at her house until 5 am on Monday morning. I had to go to school without sleeping.

95. Threats of bodily harm or death to someone who leaves the cult.
Once again, the spiritual curses she would place on people, like my Aunt Lori and my dad.

96. Threats of bodily harm or death to someone who criticizes the cult.
Same as above.

97. Appropriation of all of the members' worldly wealth.
Carol would use guilt to convince her followers to give money every month. I'm not sure exactly how much money she accepted, but I know that it was well within the thousands. My mom made enough money to support herself, my brother and me with enough leftover to live comfortably. Yet, we were always late on the rent payments and had no money...ever! A majority of that money was going to Carol.

98. Making cult members work long hours for free.
I think that there were three people who were most affected by this. Margot did almost all of the housework for Carol, and never got paid. Scott did almost all of the garden work for Carol, and never got paid. And my mom did Carol's hair and bought her product for her hair and never got paid for anything but the product, which was still only sometimes.

99. Total immersion and total isolation.
I dropped out of high school the end of my sophomore year, because school was worldly and a bad influence. I couldn't hang out with friends, because they were worldly. I couldn't be happy to visit my dad, because he had demons in his house. I had no contact with any of my family, and had no lasting relationships with anyone outside of the cult.

Total number of questions? 100.
Total number of questions that fit into the 'Storehouse'? 98.
The questions that don't apply?

54. Front groups, masquerading recruiters, hidden promoters, and disguised propagandists, and

100. Mass suicide.
Although no one in the cult has ever committed suicide, I'm almost positive that if Carol told someone that God wanted them to do it, they would in a heart beat without even thinking twice.

Sad, isn't it?