Presentism

One of the precepts of TFI was the concept of "The Eternal Now." We were to strive to live in the present and cautioned that it was sinful to dwell on the past or worry about the future. Doing so revealed a "lack of faith" in God to "take care of everything."

What a coincidence that our frontal lobes, the last to develop and the first to decline, are what enable us as humans to plan for the future and envision consequences - forbidden behavior to the loyal TFI member. Reminiscent of the patients who endured Walter Freeman's ice-pick "surgery" during the heyday of lobotomies in the 20th century, we were to do our best to not use that portion of our brain for which it was designed. It was as if we willingly underwent spiritual lobotomies.

This concept of "living in the present" may have entered the COG by way of the counterculture of the late 1960s. At that time, a Harvard professor who had worked with Timothy Leary and experimented with LSD, was ousted from his job, went to India, met a guru, and returned to the US with the mission of sharing his new-found knowledge with the unenlightened. This came in book form, Be Here Now, which became the #3 best seller in the US at the time. 

The book espoused the virtue of not thinking about the future and had a big influence on the young people of the day. The atmosphere at that time was one of rebelling against the "system," protesting the Vietnam War, and seeking a life of "peace and love." Berg was at the right place at the right time.

I can't help but wonder that the effortful turning-off of rational thought required by cult members caused those areas of their brains to weaken, as expressed by the old adage "use it or lose it." I suspect it did for me.