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Okay, so now that we have discussed the doctrine of the 4th Watch church, let's now begin to actually discuss their practices. We have already discussed their beliefs and what they actually teach, but here we will see how they practice their religion and the methods they use to teach those beliefs.
Arsenio Ferriol cannot make any money unless he has others who are foolish enough to give it to him. So in order to find victims, he had to promote his religion and sell others on the idea of his true apostleship. He succeeded, and as of today, he has victimized thousands of persons who have bought into his scam. Today, the church continues to prey on the weak-minded by promoting their church and luring unsuspecting persons into a cultic organization.
The main purpose of non-cultic churches in promoting a religion is to teach others about God and to save their souls from damnation. This is mainly done by sending out representatives of such churches to spread God's word and to teach the Gospel. This is called evangelizing, and the representatives are called evangelists. However, cultic churches are a little different. Most cults when promoting their religion do teach about God and salvation, but the intent is not to save their souls, but to acquire new members for their church. This is not evangelizing, but recruitment; And with cults, recruitment is often a requirement of membership, and more pressure is placed on members to recruit than just about any other practice other than tithing. In many cults, just like tithing, recruitment is more important than salvation.
The 4th Watch also promotes their church. They also say they do this to teach others about God and to save souls. They also send out representatives called evangelists, and they too call this evangelizing. However, the 4th Watch is a cult, and such evangelical efforts are of a deceitful nature. The main purpose of promotion for the 4th Watch church is not about saving souls, it's about enslaving them. All the church really cares about is gaining new members. This is not evangelizing, it's recruiting. In the PMCC 4th Watch cult, members are tirelessly pushed to recruit new members, almost as much as giving their tithes, but more so than just about any other duty; And just like tithing, 4th Watch members are threatened if they do not try to recruit others.
Jonathon Ferriol, sub-cult leader of the 4th Watch expands on this idea:
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God won't judge us for not having a convert, but for not having an "effort" to have a convert! (Mark 8:38). Sooner or later, the believer who seeks to bring others to Christ would find one, but the believer who does not seek the lost at all, himself will be at a loss - lecture on "Evangelism & Barriers"
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So as you can see, in order to achieve salvation in the 4th Watch cult, you not only have to pay them money; you have to recruit others to do the same. In truth, tithing and recruitment in the 4th Watch are focused more on than the actual issue of salvation itself.
Remember that the cult leaders provide nothing for their followers. Everything that is needed is already paid for by them through their "donations" and tithes. All the food is paid for by the followers. All plane tickets purchased to fly new members to training camps must be bought by the followers themselves; And as the cult grows and new members are assigned specific jobs within the cult, the leaders never pay them. So as you can see, it is absolutely no burden to the leaders or to the cult. The more persons that they get, the more slaves they own, and the more Arsenio and his family grow in money and power. In fact, the only time it is not good for the cult to acquire a new member, is when that new member is someone like us, who can see what's really going on and who will educate others about how the 4th Watch is a dangerous cult.
Now, with the members doing all of the work and getting nothing in return, and with all of their ridiculous claims and their dangerous lifestyle, what would cause someone to join such an organization? You have to remember that few persons know when they are entering and joining a cult. An organization will often certainly look good in the beginning, and if you were to know all the truth before hand, then many would not want to join. But they first suck you in through many techniques, such as love bombing, while lying to you about their true intentions. As time goes by, they slowly introduce you to new teachings, all while at the same time, programming you to be a true 4th Watch cult member. After a while, you accept everything they are and will find yourself being proud to be a member of the 4th Watch. While this does not always work for everyone, that is the general plan, and it has worked for a lot of foolish members. So how exactly is this promotion executed?
First off, there are specific persons that the 4th Watch likes to target when promoting their cult. Just like when the military recruits new soldiers, it wants persons who meet certain requirements, such as being strong enough, having an affirmative attitude, and being physically fit. In actuality, the 4th Watch will accept just about anyone, because everyone's money is worth the same, and even if you have no money, you might know others that do. But even with this being the case, the 4th Watch does have certain properties that they look for in persons first, because they are the easiest to target and to manipulate. Firstly the 4th Watch knows it can be more successful recruiting those who are very young and those with weak minds. They often target persons who are going through traumatic times, and they bring with them all of their promises of love and forgiveness, and false hope. They know that these types of persons are the most easily programmable. Of course, other characteristics help with this, such as being uneducated, naive, and passive. In addition to this, the 4th Watch aggressively goes after family members, as they too are easier to capture due to their trusting and loving nature towards family members who are already in the cult. And of course, the 4th Watch always targets the rich, as they have the most money to give. About the only persons they won't accept into their cult are persons like us who won't be fooled by their nonsense and who would learn about their true ways and expose them to the public.
But in any case, the 4th Watch uses typical cultic methods to promote their cult, but they are fierce in carrying them out. These usually include walking the streets and knocking on persons' doors, and approaching strangers in public places. They'll go to super markets, colleges, parks, and any place where persons carry wallets. They do not care where they bring their hatred. They carry with them flyers and brochures known as "tracts" that talk about their religion. They will leave these tracts in grocery stores and what not, and will lovingly hand them out to the persons that they talk to. They will even sometimes set up a little concert right there on the street where they can annoy anyone who walks by, singing about their god, and of course having a donation bag nearby; And while it is easier to recruit some over others, they will go after anybody. They will try to recruit your kids and they will try to get your kids to recruit you. They can be very aggressive in their ways, and even if you tell them that you are not interested, they still might not leave you alone, or they might send someone else to pester you.
4th Watchers never tell you the whole truth about their church when promoting it to potentially new members. They certainly don't reveal that it is a cult that they are trying to get you to join. In stead, they try to glorify it as much as they can, by telling as many lies as they believe they can get away with. The tracts themselves often portraya glorified version of the church. They will tell you many great things about it, but they don't reveal how they have a cult leader, or how they are required to give him money, or that they are required to recruit others like what they're doing now in order to make even more money for their leaders.
When a 4th Watcher does talk to you about their religion, they will always invite you to their local church. They of course give every impression that it's a real church. And of course, if and when you go, you'll most likely have no idea at first that you're entering a church of a cult. It is only after you've been there a few times, do most persons start to understand, even though it only takes one visit to become suspicious.
One of their favorite things to do in addition to inviting someone to their church, is inviting them to meet up with the pastor and another church member at a popular place of conversation, such as Starbucks or McDonald's. The pastor might buy the new member a cup of coffee and for the next hour or so, talks about their religion and gives the potential member a Bible lesson. This technique is good because it is more personal than just meeting in the church, and gives a way for the cult members to "break" into the new guy, and make them more comfortable. After the pastor himself, who's so important, takes time out of their busy schedule to talk to you, and then buys you coffee, it's difficult to not say no. You'll at least want to go to their church then.
If they know you, and you seem not to be going to their church, they prove to be very relentless and they will even come uninvited to persons' homes. You could be at home minding your own business, when cult members pull up on your driveway, ring the door bell, and march into your house after you open the door. Then they start praying for you and conduct a bible study in the middle of whatever you're doing. We've seen it happen. You try not to match their rudeness, so you often let them do it.
Something else that they do to recruit new members is engaging in special events that they disguise as charities but are really sad ways to promote their church. In fact, 4th Watchers will use any such activities to gain recruits and promote their religion. As an example, they might initiate an event to give persons free medicine for those need it. It sounds noble, but while doing this, they are actively promoting their religion and leader to those who they are trying to help, ultimately deceiving them through what appeared to be a legitimate event to help those in need, but was merely an attempt to recruit new members for their church.
The Philippines is also known for having a very corrupt government. There is no doubt that the 4th Watch takes advantage of this in order to spread their cultic messages. The 4th Watch even has a member, named Abigail Ferriol, in the Philippine Congress, who is no doubt used to promote her cultic church.
And of course, the best way for 4th Watchers to obtain new recruits is to simply skip all of those painstaking techniques and just breed new members. Of course, this is really the easiest way to add to their cultic family, and it is much more guaranteed to be successful. Despite being the "one true church", it's only been around for a couple generations now, but with the rapid expansion of family, this could definitely be one of the main reasons for growth that they have.
When the cult is successful with their promotion, and they acquire a fool who wishes to join, the initiation step is next.
You have just learned how ambitious they are at promoting their church in order recruit new members. They are out there everyday selling their beliefs to the public, and certain fools will literally buy it...with both their money and their lives. Most of the persons that they are able to recruit are unintelligent to begin with, but this is often because they are very young, but they are often uneducated past highschool, they are naive, superstitious, and overall weak-minded.
Regardless of who they get, the fact is, the 4th Watch is very active and successful in their recruitment and they are gaining new members every day. Fortunately, we happen to know that they also lose members quite often, no doubt because there are persons in the church who are able to figure out that they joined a cult. However, the 4th Watch is unfortunately gaining more members than it is losing. In any case, the 4th Watch knows that they lose members a lot, but the idea is to snatch them at the right time when they are most susceptible to the programming that they will receive as a member. And even if they do leave before they are able to be programmed, at least it is possible to have gotten some money from them before they left.
If the 4th Watch is successful in their promotion of their cult, and if they manage to get you into their church, you are seen as a potential new member, and unbeknownst to such persons, the cult has already place their grip around you. Potential new members will go through a pre-initiation process to help tighten that grip. They will show you an unusual amount of kindness, and you will think that you've just meant the nicest persons in the world. This is a mild form what's known in the cultic world as "love bombing". They will try to make you feel as comfortable as possible and will do all they can to make you want to stay and become an official member.
If such a person falls victim to this pre-initiation, and the potential member decides to join the church, then they must go through an actual initiation process. As you might be able to imagine, the addition of a new member is always a big deal, because it means more potential money for the cult, and another potential person who will be good at recruiting more members that will bring in even more money. Because of this, 4th Watchers do all that they can to keep you.
The very first thing that you will experience as someone who just decided to join is an unusual sudden and abundant bursting of love being shown by all of the members towards you; often crushing you with hugs, and even smothering you with kisses. This is a more expanded form of love bombing. The cult will try to make a new recruit feel like they are part of the family; referring to you as "brother" or "sister". With this new love bombing attempt, it is easy, especially with the types of persons that the cult usually recruits, to fall into this trap and develop a sense of belonging and ultimately an emotional dependency. All of this helps to ensure that you've "made the right decision".
New members must go through a strange yet commonly practiced ritual in Christianity known as "baptism" in order to be official "children of God". During a 4th Watch baptism, you are placed within some body of water, such as a lake or a bathtub. A 4th Watch pastor says some meaningless prayer, and then tells you to hold your nose, and then pushes you back so that your whole body is under the water. After a few seconds, you are let back out and the baptism is over. According to the cult, you are now an official child of God who is eligible now to go to Heaven when they die. During all of this, some 4th Watchers in the background might be singing a song.
After baptism, the main part of a new member's training begins. Training must begin immediately to help ensure that you never break free from the tight grip that the church now has on you. However, training is a somewhat slow process because you have to break them in properly. The cult knows that new members will often not be accepting of the cult's whacky beliefs and practices, so members are introduced to these concepts gradually. Part of the training process is teaching members about the 4th Watch doctrine, while using lies and logical fallacies to teach. But the most important part of training comes from their programming. In fact, programming for new members already began the minute they walked in the church, that being the love bombing. After all, the sooner they are programmed, the quicker they make money.
But while new recruits are beginning their training, there is sometimes a more sad and potentially heart-breaking technique employed by the 4th Watch during this initiative process. It is a cultic practice that involves the leader or head pastor secretly "assigning" a friend to the new member. This person who has been assigned to be this new member's friend might actually be quite nice and might even want to legitimately be their friend, but being your friend is not their priority.
The main job of this secret friend is to act like they're your friend, to act as a personal "love bomb" in addition to all of the group love bombing already taking place. Their other main job is to help conform you to the cult and to make you more dependent on the cult by being dependent on your new friend. And very unfortunately, the other main job of this great new friend of yours is to basically spy on you. They have befriended you so that they can get to know you, to know your weaknesses, how to better program you, or they might try to figure out how much money you have and how much they might get out of you. All of this information is secretly reported back to the leader or head pastor. You might even confide in this friend and tell them secrets, but nothing you tell this person is safe.
This entire concept of having a secret friend is so sad and heart-breaking because you really believe that you have a close friend, and then later on, if you're lucky, realize that they were never a friend at all, only a spy and operative working for the leader to learn about you and to break you. It is one of the more shameful acts of the 4th Watch. One day, if you stay with the cult long enough, you might become one of these secret friends. And another sad thing about this, is that by this time you have become so well programmed that you wouldn't even see anything wrong with doing it. In fact, the leader or pastor might actually make you feel like it is an "honor"; Very shameful indeed.
After the 4th Watch promotes their cult, and once new members go through the initiation process, it is time to start their training. In most Christian churches, pastors teach and members learn. But in cults like the 4th Watch, members are not simply taught, they are trained. To the 4th Watch, being a member is more than just going to church and learning about God. They are molded to be servants of their leader and warriors of his god. All members are expected to come to church several times a week, are required to give money, and they are pushed to recruit new members. Here, persons are not taught to be Christians, they are trained to be 4th Watch cult members.
You can get an idea of this approach from their website:
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Holiness and Service unto the Lord" is PMCC (4th Watch)'s motto. Every member is taught and trained to live their lives free from both spiritual and moral evils plaguing the lives of many today. Members are also constantly encouraged to live with the attitude that they are servants of God and thus, must use every opportunity and means to advance the will God in this world.
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Of course, the main practice of any cult is to teach its members the doctrine of their religion, so that the leaders can make money. As most religious cults do, the 4th Watch ignores scientific facts and downplays the entire concept of science altogether. As discussed in the doctrine piece in this paper, they teach their members many incorrect and outrageous things. Such examples would be that the Earth is only a few thousand years old, that evolution is false, that children who are sick are often possessed by demons, and that natural disasters such as earthquakes are caused by sinning, perhaps by homosexuals. They teach many ridiculous things indeed, and they can do this because this is what their leader says is true. They have absolutely no evidence to support their beliefs and thus nothing to backup their claims.
Many of the falsehoods taught by the 4th Watch are merely concepts which the cult members honestly believe. They have no rational basis for those beliefs, but they do believe them based on irrational thinking, through their leader's teachings. An example is creation verses evolution. As we know, evolution is a fact of nature and there is no evidence of a divine creation. But even though 4th Watchers are incorrect about this, they are not lying, they actually believe this. They are just incorrectly educated. But some of what they teach are just pure lies. Lying mainly comes from the leadership in the cult. Arsenio Ferriol of course is the biggest liar in the entire church. We doubt he believes in much of what he teaches at all. Our belief is that he knows that what he teaches is a lie, but that's the point. If he taught the truth, that he was just a nobody, then he'd have to work for a living, and he can't have that. Therefore, he lies to his people, and tells them that he's God's holy messenger and that he needs money to get them to Heaven. With that lie, come many others, and his family leaders exploit and spread these lies to make them more effective. But whether they're actual incorrect facts or pure lies, members of the cult believe in whatever they are told. Smart.
Once new members have gone through the initiation process, the cult begins by teaching basic concepts that are quite common in general Christianity. This is done deliberately to first disguise the cult as an ordinary church. At first, the 4th Watch religion does seem like a legitimate church. This helps make potentially new members feel like they're in a real Christian church and to feel safe. At this time, members are basically introduced to Jesus, how he died for our sins, and how God loves you. Feeling like you're in a regular church, you might start to see yourself as a real member and you might start to give money in the form of donations.
Later on, as you become more comfortable in the church and have already dedicated money to them, they then start to bring in the more difficult to swallow concepts. This might include the idea that you are robbing God if you do not tithe, that homosexuals deserve to die and to be put in Hell, and that all persons are worthless and evil. At this point, you might already be committed to the church and not see what's actually happening, that it is not a normal church after all.
Quite interesting, is the fact that they often keep their most outrageous beliefs secret until more appropriate times. For instance, they often don't even teach you about their apostle until much later when you have become a more dedicated member. They don't yet teach you that everyone's going to Hell unless they are part of the church. Heck, they don't even tell you that the idea of a "4th Watch" is not even in the Bible. Only once a member's programming has been showing promise, do they then start to tell you these things, because they know that most persons won't buy into it. And they don't want to lose members, because losing members means losing income.
The 4th Watch has a variety of methods and techniques to teach their doctrines. As for methods, of course they have their churches where the majority of members and non-members come to learn about their religion. They also have websites and even a magazine called "The Word", and a short television program seen in the Philippines called "The Surer Word", that helps to spread their garbage. But where they excel the most is in their technique in teaching this nonsense. In addition to the regular sermons given by the pastors, the 4th Watch relies on two ultimate techniques that greatly help to ensure that not only do members and non-members learn the doctrine of the 4th Watch, but that once you are a member, you always stay a member. This is done through the art of irrationality and illogic, and psychological programming, which you will learn about next.
You have learned about cult leaders, superstition, and eccentricity, but now we are going to discuss another feature that is very definitive of cultic environments. As you know, the 4th Watch is led by a man whose ultimate goal is money and glory. In order to achieve these desired goals, he must do something or be something that is worthy of everyone's money and recognition of his worth. Doing something constructive with his life is too much work for Arsenio Ferriol.
So instead, he came up with a scheme in which he would pretend to be sent by God to establish the one true church, and would lie to everyone in the world that in order to go to Heaven, you would need to pay him. Of course, he has created additional lies to hide this truth, and has convinced others that God needs money for their salvation, which of course is given to the apostle, himself. Convincing everybody of all these things is no easy task. In fact, to use logical means would prove to be almost impossible in achieving this. Fortunately for him, he is a very smart and clever man. He knows that he cannot logically convince others that he is an apostle, or that God needs money, so he uses a very, and we do mean very, effective technique called psychological programming, and it is a very common tool used in cults.
Here is the idea behind psychological programming. Suppose you have a computer, keyboard, and monitor. Suppose you want the computer to every morning, tell you what time it is, what the day's current and high temperature is, provide you a daily joke, alert you at the beginning of every hour, and play classical music at exactly 10 am. Now, how would you achieve this? Well, you can talk to your computer and tell it what you want, or you can start pushing a bunch of buttons, but nothing's going to happen unless you have what's called a program that makes the computer do all of these things. This is because a computer doesn't understand interaction the way persons do. In reality, someone has to program the computer to do this. When a program is written, the computer will follow the program. A computer does not think or have the ability to do anything outside its programming. Once it's programmed, it follows the program.
The previous example with the computer is a pretty good analogy for cultic programming. Suppose you sit down with a fellow person with decent intelligence, and you start telling this person that you are a special man sent by God to rule the Earth with your church, and in order for the human race to get into Heaven, they have to obey your every command and pay you as much money as they can. In addition to this, homosexuals and non-believers are extremely bad persons and are automatically going to Hell.
Saying this to an average person would only make you look like a complete idiot, as normal persons know that none of this would be true. Since you cannot convince such a person rationally, just as you cannot just tell the computer to do what you want, you instead have to program them. When you program a person, like the computer, you inscribe instructions into that person's mind that must be followed, just as a computer must follow its program. This is exactly how Arsenio and his 4th Watch cult teaches its members to not only believe in his teachings, but to always remain a part of the cult. Programming will make them completely loyal to the leader of the cult. And just as a computer can't stray from its programming, so too when a person is programmed, it can be extremely difficult to stray from the cult.
Here is a statement from the 4th Watch website that serves as a foreshadow of the programming that members will endure:
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Holiness and Service unto the Lord" is PMCC (4th Watch)'s motto. Every member is taught and trained to live their lives free from both spiritual and moral evils plaguing the lives of many today. Members are also constantly encouraged to live with the attitude that they are servants of God and thus, must use every opportunity and means to advance the will God in this world.
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Programming is dangerous to the individual and once programmed, it is nearly impossible to ever go back to being normal again. The amount of psychological warfare used in programming cult members can be quite dramatic, and deprogramming victims has proven extremely difficult to do. Imagine that you like eating apples. But imagine that the only reason why you like eating apples is because you were programmed to, and in fact you hated apples before. Imagine trying to rewire your brain to not like apples anymore. It is not an easy thing to do. Fortunately, if someone can be programmed in the first place, it is possible to deprogram them. It just takes more work because you have to first convince the person that they were programmed in the first place and get them away from the cult, which can be just as difficult to do. This is why there are special programs set up to help prevent cultic programming, and to deprogram such victims.
Cults have been using psychological programming techniques for centuries. It is perhaps the most important and effective weapon that cultic organizations have. The 4th Watch utilizes programming very well, as the cult leader is extremely trained in this area. When you think about how all of these persons have managed to believe that this man is a prophet sent from God, and that he is the only way to their salvation, in which he needs your money, this is how he does it. He programs his followers. And he teaches his sub leaders to program as well. And they are so good at their programming techniques, that they are able to do so in a very stealth-like fashion. Nobody realizes that they're being programmed, and the pastors that help program their members don't even know they're doing it.
So how is programming achieved? Cult members are bombarded with an arsenal of psychological attacks that alter their ability to process information in the brain. In a sense, their brain is "rewired" to believe and behave according to the cult. Programming is often called brainwashing, but brainwashing is actually just one of the major forms used to program an individual. There are actually four major forms of programming, which are brainwashing, mind control, dependency, and conformity. These are the four areas of programming that must be mastered in order for a member to completely surrender and belong to the cult. In order to achieve the full effects of programming, members must believe what the cult wants them to, they must do what the cult wants them to, they must rely on only the cult for their needs, and they must become one with the cult. Some of these forms are carried out in steps, but thy are often done at the same time. Some steps are actually part of other methods and they often help each other. For instance, brainwashing is achieved through a number of techniques, including dependency, and dependency uses brainwashing as a technique for its achievement as well.
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