Subj: Live "sweatlodge" on Belgian rock radio
Date: 12/6/00 3:23:45 PM Eastern Standard Time
From: kolahq@skynet.be (KOLA)

<+>=<+>KOLA Newslist<+>=<+>

Today on Studio Brussels (Belgium's national rock radio); in the program called "Republica"...live coverage of a so-called sweatlodge ceremony by the group Timotheus!

They explained that "the sweatlodge is a new-age ceremony which has been borrowed from the Indians" [sic].

Their 'sweatlodge' started with a "Chakra Ceremony" on the tunes of synthesizer music. All participants started shaking, jumping and some went into a trance, they said.

They continuously called the initipi an "igloo"...

When the stones were brought in, the participants (all men) greeted the stones with the word "Hoi!" [sic] Studio Brussel presentator, Lieven Vandenhoutte asked their spokesperson what it meant. "Hoi", it seems is the most important word used in a sweatlodge ceremony. It releases energy.

Next, the listeners could hear these men hum "Ohmmmmmmmmmm" on and on and on.

Their spokesperson explained that during the ceremony no-one is allowed out of the igloo, or hut. Even if one is feeling ill. If one leaves, the entire group should leave. Now, Mr. spokesperson had to go to the bathroom....So everybody left while he went for a pee in the woods. He fell, bare-assed, in a bunch of nettles (something like poison ivy)!

After he took his weewee-stop, everybody went back inside and the "ceremony" continued.

Next, the listeners could hear people shouting, mumbling and talking "in tongues."

Here's a part of the conversation just before their circus ended:

Male 1: "I want the fire to glow in me! I want the fire!"
[louder now] "I want passion and sex! I want spirituality!"

Male 2: "Who else wants this?"
All together [very loud]: "Yessssssssssssssssssssssss!!!"

Studio Brussels' Lieven Vdh commented: "Excuse me for saying so, but I think this is all a bit silly."

Timotheus spokesperson: "No, no, we're not alternativoes, or weirdoes. We're all people who followed university education. We're intellectuals. Please call us spiritual adventurers."

Lieven Vdh next asked some other participants how they felt now that it was over. Each and every one of them admitted that they felt sick. One said he was deadbeat, hungry like a horse but had vomitted all his food. And literally said: "I"m sick as hell but as horny as a bear!"

The others enthousiastically echoed him.

To end the show, Lieven Vdh called Timotheus a "new-age gang" but passed on their phone number anyway.

I immediately called Studio Brussels and spoke briefly to Lieven. Without a problem, he agreed to give me their email address:

<info@timotheus.org>

Or if you want to call them: 011-32-3-644-5301
From Europe that's 00-32-3-644-5301
From Belgium: 03-6445301

Sincerely irritated,
Els Herten