Religion: Cult Wars on Capitol Hill

(2 of 2)

Patrick, of course, is the creator of "deprogramming" for cult converts, and he was on hand also. He works with family members to abduct converts and subject them to nonstop ranting by teams of operatives until they renounce their new faith. Warning that "there is a conspiracy to turn [the U.S.] into a totalitarian state," he stated that he has personally deprogrammed 1,600 people, ranging in age from 13 to 81. In a forthcoming Playboy interview, Patrick includes First Sister Ruth Carter Stapleton, a neoPentecostal "memory healer," on his list of cult leaders who bear watching. Another witness, Author Flo Conway, stated that deprogramming should be "recognized as a new and valuable form of mental health therapy."

In the S.R.O. audience was Paul Pasquarosa, a devotee of "The Way," a zealous anti-Trinitarian group, who says that Patrick slashed at him repeatedly with a straight-edged razor at a December deprogramming in Massachusetts. As a result, Patrick, who has served time elsewhere, has been charged with assault with a dangerous weapon.

Another listener was Cynthia Slaughter, 27, a star witness at a similar hearing on cults held by Dole in 1976, who asked if she could testify again but was turned down. Slaughter, baptized into the Disciples of Christ as a youth, became a Moonie in 1975 and was deprogrammed by Patrick, then joined him and others in deprogramming work and giving dozens of anti-Moon speeches across the nation. She also wrote a first-person 1976 article in TIME. Now Slaughter, who would seem to be a highly suggestible sort, has reconverted.

Slaughter contends that the anticult network in which she was so active is itself a kind of "cult" and that Patrick's technique is psychologically "destructive." She said that it "scarred me," stirred up resentment and violent dreams, and that an anticult psychiatrist told her she came close to a psychotic break during her deprogramming. She freely admits that Moonies use high-pressure indoctrination methods, but she compares them to Zen-like spiritual disciplines. She also denies Patrick's theory that converts are "brainwashed."

It is unclear whether Senator Dole will pursue his cult hearings any further. Nor has Congress given any clue as to whether it will consider legislation to attack either the questionable religious groups, or the strong-arm tactics being used against them. There is always that little problem of squaring any such attacks with the First Amendment.