Joseph Genito: Unrepentant Stooge for the ‘Messengers’

Joseph Genito is a man I’ve known from the time I was a child. He has been a member of the CUT community for most of his life, and for many years held service-type jobs such as groundskeeper or kitchen worker. I had not seen nor heard from him for more than 15 years. Then my sister’s book Prophet’s Daughter was published, and he and his wife Virginia orchestrated a chain email slandering my sister and her book (previous article).

Now comes Genito with a BSJ comment admitting he doesn’t care whether the book is "accurate or inaccurate" he is concerned for my "soul." Bring on the violins.

I admit it’s hard to deal with this kind of comment without sounding condescending. But stupid is as stupid does. The fabricated CUT cosmology can’t endure in the face of analysis. It’s a house of cards that buckles under the slightest insult, and forces people to make the kinds of unconditional and blanket assertions with which Genito begins. My responses are directed at him, so remain in the second person.

In sum, let me say that I bear Joseph no ill will personally. He was always kind to me when I was in the church. But he has now come down on the side of defending obfuscation. He is, by his own admission, trying to maintain the melting facade of the divine messengership of my parents regardless of whether or not it was authentic. It is a fools errand. Worse, it reinforces the widely held but bankrupt perception that unearned authority, hierarchy, and idolatry are a good thing, and something worthy of protection.

Here’s the reality: My parents not only failed to have any verifiable divine contact, their human lives were no example to anyone. After running from creditors for years, even changing his name twice, my father left his first family of five children to start his church, and refused to provide them anything but paltry support. He sent them $100 per month for a while, a pittance even in the 1960’s, while our family lived in relative luxury. He drove brand-new Cadillacs, had a series of expensive motor homes, and we lived in a huge mansion in Colorado Springs. We wanted for nothing, had servants and tutors galore, and traveled the world. My oldest sister Becky told me that after awhile, even the $100 per month he had been sending them stopped.

My mother realized ten years ago the persona which Genito now defends was indefensible. She was trained by dad at the beginning of her career to assume absolute authority over the staff. She reinforced that delusion of grandeur by using her "divine authority" to make pronouncements, in one particular case by "Padma Sambhava," that she had balanced 100% of her "karma." Her whole point to me in our final conversation was that she realized this kind of manipulation and hierarchical structure had been a grand mistake. She clearly knew she hadn’t "balanced 100% of her karma," because she took the time to write letters of apology to some of the people she had wronged.

Since her "Community of the Holy Spirit," the "Sangha" of the Buddha were run under supposed divine auspices, and were meant to be the epitome of "heaven on earth," we can see that the teachings were therefore bad fruits from a bad tree. When evaluating CUT’s theology, we can’t avoid looking at such a gross example of corruption at its very core. Plus, if we analyze the teaching itself, there are many passages which support the corruption and unearned authority of the messengers. They were, after all, the "two witnesses" of Revelation 11:3, and were thus directly representative of God. They were not to be questioned under any circumstances. Indeed, the metaphor of the murder of the two witnesses and the dragging of their bodies through the streets was seen as symbolic of how the "world" and the "carnal mind" would destroy God’s representatives. It was in the wise that "human questioning" and "critical thinking" were banished from the repertoire of the "true chela." The privileging of the "I AM Presence" over the "human ego" is the absolute essence of CUT’s teachings. It is why at their core, they are closer to fascism, (defined by mysticism and an emphasis on unity, strength, authority, and ideological or spiritual purity)–rather than emphasizing human freedom.

Apologists will cherry-pick quotes that say otherwise, but if the "masters" were in charge, and worked through their "embodied messengers" that’s not how they chose to run their "mystery school." For the permanent staff in fact, they ran it like a concentration camp. Genito knows this, which is what makes his defense of the "messengers" so disingenuous. Members at lower levels never saw the way the inner circle of staff received merciless summary judgment–much of it to preserve my mom and dad’s air of infallibility. If they had allowed any challenges to their authority to stand, the whole thing would have come unglued.

If there is a lesson to be learned from the abuses of power at CUT, it is that we must cast down idols, set aside superstitions, and that no one is an exception to the rules of human conduct. Genito attempts to stand in the way of that forward evolution, and for that he will receive only my rebuttal and ridicule. He’s trying to protect his own worldview from having to feel the profound impact of new information. And he is helping no one except those who wish to remain buttressed in denial.

Dear Sean,

I stand forever in defense of the Divine Mother, of your father, Mark Lyle Prophet, and your mother, Elizabeth Clare Prophet, as messengers of the Great White Brotherhood, Church Universal and Triumphant, the Summit Lighthouse and the Teachings of Ascended Masters.

Why would you give unconditional support to anyone? Why is your loyalty so cheap that it does not have to be earned by actions and good conduct? Why would a person of intelligence not modify their stance if their loyalty was betrayed? I consider your profession of unconditional loyalty to be naive and a bit pathetic. It makes a mockery of all those people who suffered the abuses at the hands of my parents and their authoritarian cadre of imaginary friends.

My concern is not whether Erin’s book is accurate or inaccurate; I am concerned for your soul. To take a stand against the Ascended Masters of the Great White Brotherhood, their Messengers and your parents, Mark Lyle Prophet and Elizabeth Clare Prophet, is no small thing.

First of all, I don’t have a soul, and neither do you. But if I did, I would be fully responsible for taking care of it, and would not need or want your concern. You think my stance is a big deal because it threatens your investment of time and energy. But what if you found out that the whole idea of the GWB was cooked up? I know that’d be pretty hard to swallow, but it looks like that’s the case. So deal with it.

As for your not caring whether she’s accurate or inaccurate, I knew that was the case from the moment your wife started circulating the email. You’re partisans, and you use post-hoc reasoning to justify your position. "Erin’s book would ruin my faith, and faith is what I live for, so it must not be true."

Why does the Divine Mother cry? She cries because those who are supposed to bring the Light of their inner beings and precipitate it on earth as peace, love and enlightenment have abdicated their reason for being. If there is not Light and goodness put into the earth, it will become darker.

You have provided no other evidence than your empty claim that there is such a thing as a "Divine Mother" and that "she" is crying. It’s a manipulative fiction. You should listen to yourself. In your world it might give you the perception of a moral high ground to say things like that, but to everyone else it sounds utterly ridiculous.

My understanding of the purpose of the Black Sun Journal is to change the earth for the better through anger–especially by renouncing religion. I agree that most religions today are corrupt, but you don’t have to throw out the baby with the bath water. You may want to throw the bath water and keep the baby.

Did you read what my purpose is? It a little more than what you say here: From the about page:

I started Black Sun Journal in 2001, ironically, weeks before the September 11 attacks. I had intended the journal to be a forum where I could discuss my views and experiences against the backdrop of my earlier life as a minister and VP of Church Universal and Triumphant. I wrote two original pieces called, “What is Black Sun Journal?” and “Why is Black Sun Journal?” Things have developed quite a bit since since I wrote these early posts, but they still capture the original spirit of what I intended to accomplish.

After September 11, 2001 much of my discussion centered around the national crisis.

But I also kept true to my central purpose, which was to explore the depths and Jungian “shadow side” of human nature and human psychology as they related to political and social events. A central theme was also the almost entirely negative effect of organized religion on the human experience. This topic for me is both intensely personal and political.

As far as anger goes? It’s a tool and a messenger, and it’s useful. It’s a part of our makeup as human beings. Sometimes we need anger, and sometimes we need love. But they are both part of a continuum, and one is not better than the other. They serve different purposes. Sometimes we can be angry because we love so much.

As far as the "baby and bathwater" thing. You guys need to get a new metaphor. I hear this from practically every CUT member who writes in. Look, the problem is that organized religion is an authority and hierarchy-based construct, and it always leads to corruption. Without checks and balances and empirical verification, people go off the deep end and start to espouse all sorts of self-defeating nonsense. They privilege their subjective experiences, and they abdicate their responsibility for their own lives, and it’s really a mess. You are pretty far gone down that road, my friend. If you want to understand what’s been going on with you, read Daniel Dennett’s Breaking the Spell. It’s an eye opener.

I submit to you that there is no baby. The teachings are self-contradictory and unsupportable, and you are extremely gullible if you refuse to even look at the possible contradictions. Especially when Erin did such a good job of pointing them out to you. If you go all the way back to Madame Blavatsky, you will find that she invented the personage of El Morya, Kuthumi, and others, and she engaged in the exact same types of abuse of power my parents did in their name.

Have you not seen the power of love make great changes in the world? I reference Mother Teresa of Calcutta and Padre Pio of Italy.

You really stepped into it with that one. I don’t know about Padre Pio, but Mother Teresa was a despicable monster. You should read Christopher Hitchens book about her. She accepted funds from Charles Keating (former S&L director) and dictator Duvalier. And she put this money into building up her name rather than relieving the suffering of the impoverished. Here’s an excerpt from an article by Hitchens, which doesn’t even get into the worst of her abuses:

MT was not a friend of the poor. She was a friend of poverty. She said that suffering was a gift from God. She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction. And she was a friend to the worst of the rich, taking misappropriated money from the atrocious Duvalier family in Haiti (whose rule she praised in return) and from Charles Keating of the Lincoln Savings and Loan. Where did that money, and all the other donations, go? The primitive hospice in Calcutta was as run down when she died as it always had been—she preferred California clinics when she got sick herself—and her order always refused to publish any audit. But we have her own claim that she opened 500 convents in more than a hundred countries, all bearing the name of her own order. Excuse me, but this is modesty and humility?

Mother Teresa herself doubted the existence of God as shown by her own letters in these excerpts from Time Magazine:

"[But] as for me, the silence and the emptiness is so great, that I look and do not see, — Listen and do not hear — the tongue moves [in prayer] but does not speak … I want you to pray for me — that I let Him have [a] free hand." 

Although perpetually cheery in public, the Teresa of the letters lived in a state of deep and abiding spiritual pain. In more than 40 communications, many of which have never before been published, she bemoans the "dryness," "darkness," "loneliness" and "torture" she is undergoing. She compares the experience to hell and at one point says it has driven her to doubt the existence of heaven and even of God. She is acutely aware of the discrepancy between her inner state and her public demeanor. "The smile," she writes, is "a mask" or "a cloak that covers everything." Similarly, she wonders whether she is engaged in verbal deception. "I spoke as if my very heart was in love with God — tender, personal love," she remarks to an adviser. "If you were [there], you would have said, ‘What hypocrisy.’"

So if MT is such an example to you, shouldn’t that have some affect? Shouldn’t you question the existence of God also? That is, if you aren’t completely brainwashed and afraid to face the darkness–the desert of the real. Of course you’ll spin it as some sort of saintly crisis of faith or "dark night of the soul" that she ultimately resolved. The facts of her letters and her pitiless conduct toward the poor dispute that interpretation.

I challenge you, Sean Christopher Prophet, to set an example that will make millions act to better their lives

Joseph, I suggest you take a look in the mirror and challenge yourself. You are all worried about things like abortion when the earth itself is at tremendous physical risk from the unsustainable living being done by 7 billion people. Some of the worst abusers of the planet live right here in the USA, since we as 5% of the world’s population consume 25-30% of its resources. That’s something to get worked up about. Not this imaginary bullshit you’ve spent your life supporting.

I do what I can in the time I have available. My writing and advocacy are my example for now. Ending superstition and false belief is a must if we are ever to figure out how to share this planet effectively, and make it last as a decent place to live beyond the next few generations.

Your "Great White Brotherhood" is an Alice-in-Wonderland fantasy. Obviously, Joseph, I’ve made my choice, and I will follow truth, reason, and critical thought to the end. I have absolutely no fear about it. The only thing I fear is ignorance, and especially ignorance professed loudly. If the infinitesimally small probability of CUT’s threatened "final judgment" ever were to come true, I would stand unashamed with my middle finger pointed directly at the eye of God until the last nanosecond. (Because that kind of God, if he existed, would be a sadistic psychopathic tyrant.) I refuse to accept that the universe is run capriciously and irrationally, and if it were, I would want no part in it.

I hope I’ve made myself clear to you. Frankly I think it’s an utter tragedy you’ve become such a sheep and swallowed the lie hook, line, and sinker. Worse than swallowing it, now you’ve become a full-time apologist for the "liar and the lie." The "useful idiot" of the CUT meme replicators. How does it feel to be such a dupe? To delude others you must first delude yourself, of course. I hope you come to your senses and realize the ultimate value of your humanity and the preciousness of your human life (the only one you will EVER have) while you’re still breathing.