Well, it's been four months and I still haven't figured this one out.
Is it possible to create an application so complex that VFP simply runs over itself? I just received an error from an application that makes copious use of CAs.

==> a cursoradapter called Country - Country.CursorInit()

This.Tables = ...
This.KeyFieldList = ...
This.UpdatableFieldList = ...
This.UpdateNameList = ...
This.SelectCmd = "select * from Country order by code"
This.CursorFill()

==> a combo box to select country init method.

This.rs = Newobject("Country","CursorLib")
This.RowSource = This.rs.Alias + ".description,code"

==> error: membersearch.cbocountry1.init Line 2

Expression is not valid outside of WITH/ENDWITH

Obviously the CA has returned an empty dataset
This is the kind of thing happening with alarming regularity.
No trappable error appear to be occurring.

Any ideas?