—Tips & Warnings For Recent Returnees!DO 249912/88

1. Some of our folks who have recently returned to their home fields may feel sad about having to leave their former fields.—Although I wouldn't doubt that some of them are glad because it was pretty tough in some places. But things are going to get tough at home too. Jobs are going to be difficult & conditions are going to be difficult & even getting welfare is going to be difficult. Facing relatives in the System again is going to be difficult for some. They're going to be asking a lot of questions.

2. I'd like to hear some actual comments from some of you homegoers as to the conditions there, the kind of questions you're being asked: "Why were you away so long? Where have you been? What have you been doing? How have you managed to support yourselves? …

3. "You want a new Social Security card[?]—Where is your old one? What happened to that one? Why didn't you keep it up? …

4. You might be asked some embarrassing questions, & I would like to know what kind of answers you've been able to give that seem to satisfy. The authorities can't just throw you out, but it looks to me like in some cases they might be apt to throw you in!

5. So I'd like to know how you're faring.—What questions you're being asked & how they are being answered. If you could tell us what your problems are, maybe we could help you. I've tried to advise you what to do in setting up works, Homes there just like you had in the foreign field. There's no difference except there may be more opposition.

6. But in some ways it might even be easier because you might be able to get support easier, … or there may be more freedom than you had back on your former field. There are a few things that are going to be easier, but there are a few things that are going to be harder. So I'd like to see a report from you home fields. (See the "Home Field Survey," No.2493.)

7. What are the problems you're facing? What are the difficulties? What are the successes? What are the things to do & not to do in coming home?—What to say & what not to say. …

HOME-SCHOOLING TIPS, TESTIMONIES & CAUTIONS!

8. (Maria: And be careful how you treat your kids!) Yes, that's an important point. What about the schooling, etc.? How are different countries on home schooling & where are they the toughest against it? What do you want to bet the U.S. is going to be the toughest.—It's the most anti-Christ except for Russia & the Communists! Of course, some of the countries in Europe might be tough as well.

9. At least we are already advising them that they should proceed more or less the same as they've been proceeding on their foreign fields. Set up a home for yourself & your family. Have your children in home schooling, or cooperate with other Homes in establishing schools for your children.

10. When I was teaching school in California, I was surprised at how lenient the laws were about forming your own school. The only requirements for a private school in California at that time were that you had to have sufficient space & equipment & teachers & textbooks. There didn't have to be fancy laboratory equipment, you just had to have whatever was sufficient for your needs for the few students you had in your private school.

11. You had to have enough space for classrooms‚ & you had to have enough desks & seats‚ etc.‚ for those classrooms, & you had to have enough teachers & you had to have textbooks which paralleled the subjects taught in the public schools. You had to teach basically the same kind of curriculum, at least the same basic studies that the public schools were studying. And you had to keep the same quantity of hours‚ preferably the same hours as the public schools.—And that was all.

12. The teachers were not even required to have credentials. They preferred, of course, that they have college educations & credentials in teaching, if possible, but it wasn't required. I had only graduated from high school, I'd never graduated from any college or university. I went to a lot of them & got fed up with each one of them so I had a very varied education at the college level, ha! I sometimes didn't even finish the courses. I got sick of it & went back into the Lord's Work.

13. So‚ they're very lenient about private schools in some places. Of course, one reason for that was because the parents weren't given any tax breaks for starting a private school. They were given absolutely no help from the government. You still had to pay taxes to support the public schools, even if you took your kids out of them!

14. Well, I think they have now come to some kind of compromise since then, I don't know exactly what. Of course, the Catholic Church is the one that fought for support then, it had the power & the numbers & the schools‚ & so they fought right with us.

15. In fact, they led the fight for tax money.—If not to get money for the private schools from the government, "At least relieve us of paying double taxation!"—Taxation for the public school & then having to support our own private school. I think they may have now given into them on that. They wouldn't give'm any money, but the one way they said they could do it is to perhaps give them some tax breaks.

16. Of course, the public schools themselves & their staffs & teachers & officials & administrators, they were the greatest ones to fight the private schools. Do you know why?—Because they lost money for every private school that was formed. For every student that was withdrawn from the public school, they lost the daily allowance allotted for that pupil.

17. The public schools were paid on the basis of so many child-days per month. That's why they're so particular about you having an excused absence. If you were even absent one day from school, you had to have a bona fide written excuse from your parents, & it had to be a good excuse or they wouldn't even give you credit for it because they lost money for every student on every day he was absent.

18. So to pull all of these kids out‚ they lose money. So they fight it. And they are always on the lookout for truants.—"How come you're not in school? What school do you go to?" And blah blah blah.

19. But a great deal of leniency was given for private schools & churches in past years. They were not subject to taxation. Whoever was in full-time employment in religious work was not subject to income tax. This is why my Mother finally went back & rejoined the Alliance: Otherwise she didn't belong to a recognised religious organisation. She claimed to be an independent missionary, but the IRS (Internal Revenue Service) said that doesn't count. You've got to belong to some kind of a recognised religious organisation, recognised by the IRS as such!

20. Only then can you claim tax exemption as a full-time worker with such an organisation. And she had to get a certification from the Alliance, it was a little form they had made out that the IRS insisted on. She had to fill it out each year & send it in with her declaration that she was still an ordained minister & in full-time service as a missionary for the Christian Missionary Alliance. The Alliance itself had to sign & seal it before she could get two things: Before she could be free from having to pay income tax‚ & so her givers could get tax exemption for their donations.

21. A lot of people just won't give to people that they can't get tax exemption for. So she was finally just forced to go back to the Alliance & rejoin in order to get those benefits, & so her givers could get those benefits. And when they did give, they had to write in the name of who they were giving to & the number of their exemption certificate.—You talk about the Antichrist System, he's got it tied up already!

22. So now, when they make home-schooled kids register with public schools, it's kind of like registering for the Draft.—Nothing may happen right away, but they want to know who's there & how many & how old & whatnot, & therefore, you suspect that eventually you're probably going to be called up, especially in time of war!

23. They don't insist that kids get registered for nothing. They have some kind of plan, & you know the Antichrist will have a plan whereby he gets control of the education of all, & no doubt eventually they won't be so lenient as they were in the days when we had private schools, church schools, etc.

HOW TO SURVIVE & CARRY ON IN YOUR HOME FIELD!

24. Our people who are going back home don't have to stop working for the Lord. They don't have to give up the Lord's Work. We ministered in the United States for years before we ever went anywhere else! We thrived & grew & boomed right there at home, right where they are now.—Same places, same message, same ministry‚ same tactics, only they may not be able to be quite as wild & woolly & annoying with demonstrations & protests & sit-downs & sit-ins & pickets & all of that other stuff we used to do that the kids loved in those days!

25. Everybody else was picketing or demonstrating against the war in some way or another‚ so they wanted to do something, & in me & my message they found a cause! "Look‚ we can do the same for the Lord! We can picket. We can sit-in or sit–down. We can protest for Jesus!"

26. They'd find some complaint they didn't like about their school & they'd go on strike & picket the school, ha! Well, we may not get away with that kind of stuff anymore. And they got thrown in jail a lot too, of course. But I think we ought to go back in a little more quietly & unobtrusively & inoffensively. …

27. … (Maria: … We're some of the few people that have such big families, especially with two or three families living together in one place. …

28. (We can sort of change or tone down our message & change some of our methods.) But we cannot change our communal living, that's what helps keep us alive!—Both economically & for schooling & fellowship & all of the rest.

USE WISDOM WITH YOUR NEIGHBOURS!

29. Now‚ that doesn't mean that the neighbourhood you're going to get into with your little one–house commune of two or three families is going to necessarily be very thankful that you're there & help you & accept you without any prejudice or problems!

30. So, if I were you, I'd try to keep it down as much as possible & out of sight so you'd be out of sight & out of mind. Especially don't be an annoyance to your neighbours in any way by noise or meetings or singing or any kind of activities that are apt to annoy them & make you a nuisance & a pest, disturbing the peace! There are all kinds of laws they can spring on you.—"You're violating the zoning. You're not supposed to have more than so many people in this house." Or, "You're not supposed to have meetings here." And all kinds of things that they can try to spring on you. All you can do is try.

ABSTAIN FROM ALL APPEARANCE OF EVIL!—1Thes.5:22—Especially regarding your children!

31. (Maria: They might even try to charge you with child abuse for having too many kids living in one house.) Yes, just because they think you've got too many kids living in the house.—Or if they think the conditions are too poor in your Home. Don't let'm catch you with such poor conditions that everybody's sleeping on the floor. They're apt to go & look in your pantry & see how much food you've got or look in your fridge‚ things like that. So watch out about that.

32. (Maria: And watch out if the boys & girls are living in the same room.) Children? (Maria: Yes.) Imagine!—Good night! When I was a kid, in every big family, which was usually on the farms, there were three or four kids sleeping together in a bed, boys & girls. I can remember I frequently had to sleep with my brother & sister when we stayed over as guests at different places. They often didn't have an awful lot of beds, & we had to sleep on the same big double bed. Nobody thought anything of it in those days at all.—But not now!—They scream, "Child abuse, sexual abuse, blah blah blah! We don't know, we can't prove it, but it looks like it!"

33. Of course, with us they would love to use that as an excuse to try & take our children away. I'm sure that's why the Devil has raised this big issue today, this trying to get children away from Christian parents by one excuse or another.—Poor living conditions, possible child abuse situation, the children protest it's not but "There's the potential. There's the possibility, the situation where it could happen."—God help us!

34. But anyway, we'll just have to do the best we can, that's all. … [F]ind some city that's liberal enough where the situation is not that bad.

GO TO THE LIBERAL AREAS!

35. Apparently there are parts of Europe & North America that are much more liberal than other parts, where the laws about schools & home teaching & all that sort of thing are much more relaxed than in neighbouring countries or states. So you're just going to have to find out which place is best for you & your particular situation. There are certain countries of Europe that are much more liberal than others. The funny thing about it is that most of them seem to be the Northernmost parts of Europe‚ like the Scandinavian countries & even England & the rest of the UK.

36. But the further South you get, the more Catholic they are & the more conservative they are. They have fought us the most in the Southern countries of Europe, but the Northern tier of European countries seem to have been the most liberal & the most lenient in some ways.

37. So you may have to go North now instead of South, ha! That's a big change for the Family to have to go from lovely nice tropical countries where you can virtually run around [nearly] naked at home. But you're going to have to put on the duds now as you go North.—And the further North you go, it seems the more liberal & lenient many of them are.

38. (Maria: The funny thing about it is that some places that are the most liberal in one thing, like education, for example, are the toughest on another thing, like child discipline, for example. In some of the Scandinavian countries, any kind of corporal punishment is completely out.) You can't spank your child at all. (Maria: So our folks need to do some research.) Right. You've got to be cautious about these things. (See the "School Compulsory Ages & Home School Permission" chart in a coming FSM [133].)

39. But generally speaking, those Northern countries like Britain & Scandinavia, etc., are at least more lenient on some things. The same holds true of many of the Northern States in North America, the Northern U.S. & Canada, they're more liberal in many ways than some of the States in the conservative South. Of course, they're all getting stirred up about this child abuse issue, which I think is the Devil's own trap to try to falsely accuse & trap us! He doesn't care how many he gets of the others, it's mostly the poor Christians & their children that he's after!

40. I remember a welfare worker who came around to our trailer camp once & came in & took names & statistics about our little family of six living in our 18-foot trailer, 7 feet wide. It wasn't even as big as most of the other trailers. She was shocked & horrified that a family of six was managing to survive in a habitat that was only 7 feet wide & 18 feet long.—And with a yard only about the same size, the trailer space outside the trailer. I don't know whether she ever reported it or not, but at least, thank God, they never came around & convicted us or anything. Maybe they were getting ready to.

41. They were probably trying to find out what kind of conditions we had at our camp. You know, the social workers are supposed to be there for your welfare, to ensure your living conditions are up to their approved standards, etc. Actually, they usually wind up causing you more trouble than good!

42. So "walk in wisdom towards them that are without!—And be wise as serpents & harmless as doves!"—Col.4:5; Mat.10:16. Amen? GBY! WLY & PFY!

HOMEGOERS BEWARE!

Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family