Dear Peter, Greetings from the end of the Earth! I joined COTO in 1986. I took all my initiations at *** Lodge in *** which is a city 880 km approx. from my city of abode; ***. Never received any instruction from this Lodge. Was given a study guide in point form entitled "Liber MCLIII". There was supposed to be some guidance from the Initiator, this was not the case. The Lodge was then fairly anti intellectual & continues to be so. In 1989 took IV` & P.I. again at *** Lodge this time with Grand Lodge assistance. Here I met Caliphornians willing to educate & share insights. Having lots of questions, soon developed correspondence with two of the three GL reps, who I found out later were the Grand Secretary General U.S. & international Secretary General. The subject of Freemasonry came up & we were up & away discussing its influence on the OTO. I was very happy to discuss with people that would be able & inclined towards dialogue & was soon having lengthy phone conversations with them. This was done at my instigation. They would ask me about various Masonic customs of degrees cognate to OTO. I would answer with what I had come across. I received all the source 0`-III` [photocopies] consulted to produce the 1991?
COTO "harmonisation" of 0`-III`. I was even told where the original of the VI` being used was. In 1991 I received charters; to organise a COTO camp & to initiate 0`- III`. I eventually became a priest & took V` again at *** Lodge. It is curious that the very same people are still eager & willing to correspond with me on the very same subject now that I am no longer involved... In this above mentioned example, think that I have an example of the reality of COTO, its alleged powers to initiate & it being "a body of initiates in whose hand are concentrated the wisdom & the knowledge of the following bodies:" vid. Liber LII "manifesto of the O.T.O. While Liber LII says "in whose hand are concentrated the wisdom & the knowledge of the following bodies:"; it seems odd that COTO GL would be interested in the forms of this "concentrated the wisdom & the knowledge of the following bodies:" I suspect that the Admin. of COTO have inherited an incomplete cognition of their initiatory corpus as well as a incomplete initiatory corpus & that this is why COTO is so legalistic.
The mandate they so often claim of "develop the OTO as Aleister Crowley would have wanted" is a ruse to obscure their own lack of resources & recourse on the nature of the subject. I could cite many more examples & details & will do so if you find this line of inquiry fertile. When wandering about the net I came to the Federation of Independent Catholic & Orthodox Bishops homepage. Here in the links I noticed an Apostolic Gnostic church of Switzerland. I am a student of Christian Gnosticisms so delighted to see I followed the link. It went to your OTO Phenomenon page? Are you involved in the aforementioned church, would be interested to learn more about it?
