When asked why she thinks so many former members have launched impassioned campaigns against the church, Church Spokesperson Mary Ann Ahmad says, "There's only one reason and one reason only - they have lots of words they don't understand, " which hampers their grasp of "what the religion is about."

Word Clearing

A misunderstood word will remain misunderstood until one clears the meaning of the word. Once the word is fully understood by the person, it is said to be cleared.

The procedures used to locate and clear up words the student has misunderstood in his studies are called Word Clearing. The first thing to learn is the exact procedure to clear any word or symbol one comes across in reading or studying that he does not understand. All Word Clearing technology uses this procedure.

Steps to Clear a Word

1. Have a dictionary to hand while reading so that you can clear any misunderstood word or symbol you come across. A simple but good dictionary can be found that does not itself contain large words within the definitions of the words which themselves have to be cleared.

2. When you come across a word or symbol that you do not understand, look it up in a dictionary and look rapidly over the definitions to find the one which applies to the context in which the word was misunderstood. Read that definition and make up sentences using the word with that meaning until you have a clear concept of that meaning of the word. This could require ten or more sentences.

3. Then clear each of the other definitions of that word, using each one in sentences until you clearly understand each definition.

When a word has several different definitions, you cannot limit your understanding of the word to one definition only and call the word "understood." You must be able to understand the word when, at a later date, it is used in a different way.

Don't, however, clear the technical or specialized definitions (math, biology, etc.) or obsolete (no longer used) or archaic (ancient and no longer in general use) definitions unless the word is being used that way in the context where it was misunderstood. Doing so may lead off into many other words contained in those definitions and greatly slow one's study progress.