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A correspondent asks “Why have you chosen [Victor] to go against [or] expose, seeing he has a but a minimum of followers?” “Why?” indeed. In this post I share the backstory and personal motivation that has driven my unquestionably hugely successful ministry, opining on and exposing Victor Hafichuk’s Ministry, Path of Truth. It has included assistance to many ex-PoT adherents ‘messed up’ by their engagement with him.
On Truth
I am first and foremost a truthseeker/truth-speaker. I have found that the pinnacle of Truth exists in the person of Christ and this requires a conscious application of brain and human willpower to accept. It is self-evident to the humble; conversely it eludes the arrogant. Truth also has no need for violence and is never in a hurry. It exists. It simply is.
Someone who seeks the truth asks questions. Because those who ask questions in time know more than those who answer them, and because the world is in the midst of a huge conspiracy established in the Garden of Eden, it is inevitable that truthseekers become a lot more familiar with the global conspiracy at practical levels, than the unthinking or the trusting. That I do and I believe am.
As it is a logical fallacy to accept or reject a proposition based on the messenger, so too must a genuine truthseeker explore all options before coming to a definitive conclusion. Further, a genuine truthseeker need not know much in order to make an assessment once we have a good grasp of the big picture. We use many different tools to establish how logic fits onto fact. That is the role of investigation.
The Victor Hafichuk Back-Story
Victor has run an online ministry for a few decades running back to even before the Internet started. It grew and punched above its weight for more than a decade with Victor’s [then] trusty off-sider Paul Cohen, a high energy, ultra-capable, passionate writer and communicator who amplified Victor’s message massively.
I engaged with Victor and Paul a few years ago in their hey-day and went through a fairly robust exchange essentially asking for any validation of the Six Million figure being claimed deaths in the Holocaust story. In the process I exposed their hypocrisy and failure in logic, and called them to account. They exposed my arrogance, claiming that I loved the sound of my own voice. I confessed. They didn’t and doubled down. They cursed me and cast me asunder. I wrote and wrote and wrote, building a huge resource of commentary and contacts, many who had been through the same process in some ways, many who read my articles and appreciated my warnings.
My Current Take
With Paul Cohen’s demotion by, chastisement by and distancing from Victor the Path of Truth has lost the bulk of its energy, and dare I say its credibility. Finding that the head poncho was being undermined by the 2IC would have been devastating for someone like Victor who demands, expects and believes that he has total loyalty – indeed that’s exactly what he said at the time, then bringing Paul to account and watching the inevitable distancing would have been soul destroying. Irreversable.
It is now an opportunity for Paul to grow in his faith of Christ without the influence of his previous Master, Victor, but good things should come as he spreads his ‘clipped’ wings, hopefully a little less arrogantly now. Research into the validation of the Holocaust claims will be the sign that Paul has humbled himself. He’s Jewish and buys the Six Million story. Researchign it with an open mind will be one of the hardest things he could do, but it will show the world that he’s a changed man if he does. I don’t care what his conclusion is, but if he doesn’t even know the issues that detractors speak of, he’ll always be a deluded fella in my books!
Once the soul-tie was broken between the two this will have given freedom to Paul (and Victor) to do and achieve better things.
Putting it crudely, PoT is now down now to one single ‘crazy’ old man and a few hangers on, thus the question Lynda asks, “Why bother?” has legs.
Personal, Principle
I care and live by principle.
When someone is out to steal from me, or lies to me, I see red. In Victor’s case, his personal attacks including curse and casting off was IMHO in error and way over the top, but it was certainly a public attempt to discredit me. That’s theft of something I have worked hard for – credibility. So all and anything I write proves to the world much of who I am – simply a guy with a brain who uses it, and who is fearless to speak the truth, certainly as I find it, learn it and see it. Credible and real.
In that sense every time I write about PoT, it is a personal thing. It is my right to do so and I exercise that right.
So I care about truth and myself, but I also care about others. I want Victor (and in days gone past Paul Cohen) to be confronted with a detractor who can talk specifics respectfully without calling them a cult. I don’ think it’s fair to label Victor a cult leader. That I care about [mainly] Christians labeling PoT and him as a cult is simply being honest to myself. And when (as Victor rightly points out) naysayers condemn the same way as he does then this is child-like conduct.
Sure, he’s overly judgmental in the extreme. Sure his [if I am right] personal uniquenesses can be psychiatrically based but things like hypocrisy and so on need to be seen in context if we care. I do. A case in point – Victor has NEVER to my knowledge talked about anything I’ve said outside of this blog. This is the hypocrisy that every departing adherent talks about within PoT. He will hide things that are perceived to be disadvantageous to his cause. He talks of openness and transparency yet doesn’t practice it.
People who call him out and then write him off for not being a Christian or having faulty theology simply don’t understand. That’s not truth. That’s dogmatism.
Then to the assistance my words give to others, sometimes those seeking to understand PoT more before they engage (most don’t after reading my PoT materials) and those who have left – usually pretty messed up! I have helped many people to get over the negatives. Living or engaging with Victor or his Ministry is generally a massive blow to ones self-esteem. It’s not that Victor deliberately sets out to destroy our belief in ourselves, to the contrary, he actually wants to build his people in faith. It’s that because of his personal issues he does undermine others despite his best intentions. The reason is because he seeks perfection; he demands perfection; and despite what he says about it, claims perfection – not all the time but in many critical situations.
This messes with peoples’ minds because after a while they get disillusioned and Victor falls from grace. Everybody does including his wife and son, eventually. EVERYBODY. Those leaving have to work through their grief as they realise that they’ve been conned. They need to see how it was their pride that got them caught and Victor’s pride that kept them there. They all share GOOD things as well, and it’s important to balance that, but the grieving can take years to work through. Remember that this generally starts in the context of a vicious abandonment and curses from the PoT leader(s). It can be extremely hard to deal with.
Listen to the words of an ex-Path of Truth adherent, a young man years out of PoT but still frustrated by their hypocrisy:
What has disappointed me is when a group always claims to have a monopoly on truth, they are usually wrong, and for me it seems the theorists can be very off, not your analysis but it seems the typical “minority majority” of the fringe group.
Put in proper context, these words scream “PAIN” and a man seeking perfection. Because he still seeks it, he will have to learn for the rest of his life that perfection can only be found in one person, Christ.
And Jesus stopped for the one.
Our heart too should be the same – to care for those that need help. I do what I do because I care – about those that have gone through the PoT experience; those who are yet to and the people at PoT, primarily Victor, who create the whole thing. It’s not pretty and I don’t know all, but I share what I do know and think. Exposure is good, in the end. Hate and arrogance isn’t. Truth though can be quite brutal. I hope to speak the truth as directly as I can but with understanding.
Thank you for asking Lynda