Thoughts on Toast
by volunteer Adrian Bean
When new residents came to the Panacea Community, they had to agree to comply with the rules that Mabel 'Octavia' Barltrop set out as being essential for membership and by implication, for Salvation. Just as the Ten Commandments in the Bible are (mostly) an appropriate basis for any ordered society, and are mirrored in the writings of religions other than Christianity, so too are some of the Panacea rules a perfectly sensible basis for living in a community. However, some rules, such as about eating toast, have encouraged people to think of them as a bit unusual or even silly. This is to miss the whole point of the rules, and by thinking they are just “silly,” you may fail to see the darker side of what sometimes lay behind their implementation.
Essentially, one rule declared that members should not eat noisily, so if they chose to eat toast for example, they should not make any noise. Which is difficult. Now, Mabel’s dining table is quite small, and I can well imagine that if the people sitting next to her ate noisily, it would be very irritating. And if so, then a polite way of telling them of her irritation might be to diplomatically ask ALL members, via a published rule, to eat quietly, so as not to pinpoint and embarrass the main offender. But not so. There was little diplomacy in her instructions. Whereas you or I might quietly make allowances for a noisy eater, not mention it to them and get on with the day, Mabel took things to extremes. The onus for resolving any noise problem was on the offender; it was not for those affected to be tolerant towards the offender, but the full force of authority was to be put on him or her. In effect this was a reversal of Jesus’ message in the New Testament. He preached Forgiveness, whereas the Panacea stance was more of an Old Testament message.
Messages to the Community from Mabel, but significantly via Emily Goodwin, made things very clear:
“Persons are not expected by Octavia to overcome THEIR annoyance at these things. (eg noisy eating). The persons who do them are to cease doing them. Octavia would not accept a thousand years to live with these people, nor to live with anyone who does not eat nicely.” When hearing about such faults, Mabel despaired: “So many complaints reach her that she has felt the whole edifice falling down about her ears and she is deeply grieved and ashamed.”
She made up a “Ten Commandments of the Spiritual Court” which included: “There is NO FORGIVENESS in the New Kingdom. All must be altered, not forgiven. We do not accept any statement from any member that they have no faults to report to the Divine Mother” (Emily Goodwin). Obeying instructions was essential, and in fact one part of the process of becoming a fully sealed member was “The Destruction of the Mortal Mind” (ie willingly giving up your own free-will).
This might seem an extreme reaction to a noisy breakfast table, but she saw good etiquette and manners as essential parts of overcoming faults and therefore becoming more worthy of Heaven on Earth. The processes of “Overcoming” and Confessions were part and parcel of Community life, and enabled Goodwin in particular to potentially control members’ lives and attitudes in a way normally associated with cults. By and large, the Society members did very little damage, apart from to themselves and each other psychologically, although a few of them may well have felt at home exercising such control had they been in a more extreme group, such as the Exclusive Brethren. Yet they willingly stayed and accepted such rules.
Members weren’t prisoners. They could leave, and some chose to do so if they had the resources. But most stayed, and in the last decades the community might almost have resembled a home for Old People, with elderly members living fairly comfortably in a cloistered environment, tenuously clinging on to beliefs from a bygone age and of long-gone leaders. They were vulnerable people not equipped for normal life in the real world, and as such inclined to accept rules that others might reject. Perhaps they lived a version of “Stockholm Syndrome,” although they had never been captives in that sense.
Over a long period of time, members were encouraged/indoctrinated into certain ways of acting and unquestioningly following instructions so that following the rules was normal life for them. After all, their “mortal mind” had been destroyed. They felt that this was right, or more likely, were made to feel that this was right. Habits became so firmly entrenched that to believe otherwise was impossible, and as the Society became leaderless, they simply carried on unthinkingly to the end.
And I bet they still liked to eat toast.
