Religion can really mess you up. Pious conviction, I suppose, with marginal information, can really send you down the wrong path. Recovery is optional. It is a world where every world event has some significance and can be found in the Bible. It is a world where we were all waiting, with baited breath, for the final conflict at the end of the age where we, the elect, would be protected and then rewarded for our being a part of the chosen ones. It was a world where the book of Revelation was to read like a newspaper and all news somehow pointed to the Book of Revelation. It was nuts.
Perhaps we can call it "Thielocracy" which is where every world event seems to point to something Revelatory. Jesus is almost here. He is just around the corner or over the hill. Everything is about to wrap up and just around the corner. We are almost there. It is nuts or did I say that?
In my humble opinion, the Book of Revelation is a 2000 year old failed prophecy. Written to encourage the Jewish Christians in the months before the fall of Jerusalem where Vespasian was the Beast and the Apostle Paul the false prophet to the Jewish faithful. Of course, it failed in its scope and the Romans crushed the Jews, the Church and Jerusalem in one fell swoop in the fall of 70 AD.Today, the Churches of God rely on the ever imminent fulfillment of Revelation for their income and credibility. We have the Two Witnesses of Revelation 11 in the guise of Mr and Mrs Ron Weinland. How lame is that? How screwed up does on have to be to come to the conclusion that they are the Two Witnesses. Very shortly, I promise, Ron will have to change his tune and adjust or sink into ministerial oblivion. What kind of people put up with this stuff and show up every week to act like they believe it?
So how screwed up are you? How tainted is your view of scripture because of the almost return of Jesus now going on over 2000 years. 2000 Years!!!!! Did you get that? It has been 2000 years since Revelation announced that the book was a record of those things which "must SHORTLY come to pass." How screwed up are you?
I don't know what it is about humans who relinquish their brains and minds to others to whom they give their allegiance and money. Hope I guess. We all could use some for sure. But hope in error and misinterpretation is not hope. It is a lie.
I'm curious. How screwed up are you? How much have you had to adjust your thinking and what have you learned from this whole WCG experience concerning prophecy and "3-5 years, perhaps 10, 20 at the most"? Have you learned anything? Bob Thiel sees the Second Coming in every news event. Do you? Is it possible really bad stuff can happen but minus the Second Coming? If Jesus didn't return for the holocaust, what makes you think he will come back because you lost your retirement or savings in bad investments?
There is much money to be made in "Jesus is almost here." There is none in he is not returning as we thought or he's baaaaaack.
How has "prophecy" been tempered by your WCG experience and the antics of the Ron Weinlands, Dave Packs and William Dankenbrings of the world?
44 comments:
These days I won't touch anything prophecy related with a 10 foot pole. Heck, maybe not even a 50 foot pole:)
I have a lot of mainstream fundamentalist relatives (southern Baptist) who occasionally want to talk about how evil everything is and certaily Christ will be returning soon. I usually tell them that prophecy isn't my thing and that I concentrate on the here and now. Back it up with Christ talking about today's evil being sufficient to worry about without dragging in the future and usually it quiets them down:)
How screwed up am I? Well, since leaving WCG I have progressed from "Unbelievably Screwed Up Seemingly Beyond Repair" to "Just Your Normally Screwed Up Average Human Being" AND it has taken me only 30 short years!
"In my humble opinion, the Book of Revelation is a 2000 year old failed prophecy." Indeed. There were dozens, maybe hundreds, of "books of revelation" written in similar style around that era. Only one garnered enough votes to make it into the "canon" of the bible. Barely. It was controversial at the time, but it achieved a narrow majority of the votes and squeaked in. On this WCG based much of its theology.
The other books of revelation? They're called "apocryphal". They weren't inspired by god, I suppose, and this one was. But they sure read almost exactly the same.
Duh.
The Skeptic
How screwed up am I? Not very. Certainly no more screwed up than I was BEFORE my WCG experience, LOL. In fact, in some ways it did me good. I'd say, in my case, the "goods" and the "bads" about cancelled each other out: it's a "push".
I was looking for answers. We all were. We thought WCG had the answers. it turns out it didn't. And it damaged a lot of people in the process. Fortunately, I was less damaged than most. I finished my education, got a good job, married a good wife and raised a family. I had good health along the way. So, other than giving a lot of money to a rotten cause, I didn't lose much.
On the flip side, I learned a great deal. Much of it was learned during the difficult transition OUT of cult thinking, of course. Still, I learned it because of WCG. Today, I think I have a fairly balanced understanding of reality. And I live a happy life.
The Skeptic
I used to be in that category until I realized that not one word from Genesis to Revelation can be verified or authenticated with an original document. From that point, it became clear that that single fact proved that the claimed authority of the church was based on air.
This was the way I unscrewed myself.
"If Jesus didn't return for the holocaust, what makes you think he will come back because you lost your retirement or savings in bad investments?"
I don't agree with most of what you said, but this made me laugh out loud. So true.
My view of the Book of Revelation would be termed preterist by some. I believe most of what is there has happened already. There is a section in the later part of the Book that is yet future. So the bulk of the text refers to things that did "shortly come to pass." Believing that the Book of Revelation is your daily newspaper, right down to locusts really being helicopters, is a ridiculous notion. But so is believing that the Book of Revelation should be disregarded as false.
Prophecy in the COGs is a sociological rather than theological phenomenon. Currently, we are seeing a great ground swell of anger in the United States over health care reform. People are shouting down Congressmen and engaging in all manner of angry antics on camera.
Psycholgists and sociologists have rightly identified this behavior as a product of "loss of control." It is not about health care. It is about a small group of neo-conservative caucasians sensing that they are losing power. They must personally stand in the way of anything that Obama does in order to defeat him and the malevalent (read minority) forces trying to destroy American. Think for a moment. How could health insurance companies recruit caucasians with low levels of education to champion their cause as large corporations. Only by convincing these people that the country is being taken over by malevolent forces (read minority). so these people don't really care what the health bills say. They only care about what they want to believe that the health bills say.
But the COGs are similarly dispositioned. It is not about prophecy. It is about control and feeling important. Prophecy is the means by which marginalized people feel they have special knowledge and experience a sense of importance. That is why they don't care about the content of the Bible just as those who oppose health care do not care about the content of the health care bills. So you cannot appeal to content to show them anything even though appealing to content would be the reasonable approach. The unfortunate consequence of this is that there are shrewd religionists perched and ready to take advantage of this human flaw in order to make money.
How screwed up am I? Well I did lose interest in my college studies and turned in a poor performance because I was so absored with the WCG and prophecy. The "here and now" became unimportant. I am sure this is not an unusual story among refugees from Armstrongism.
The Bear
It is clear from just a brief perusal of the scriptures that the apocalyptic prophecies were NOT meant for the first century AD.
Consider these two:
Matthew 24:22
And, unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved (alive); but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened.
Daniel 12:4
“But you, Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book until the time of the end; many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.
The conditions described in these passages simply did not exist until the late 20th century. They could not have been truly comprehended by the early Christian Church, but they were written for us.
To be more precise... Revelation was a Jewish Christian rant against Rome, Caesar and the false prophet, who hijacked their history and sold it to the Gentiles, the Apostle Paul.
Revelation promises to wrap everything up in 42 months. It took the Romans only eight months to lay seige to Jerusalem and scrape it off the face of the earth. Thus it failed 34 months early to their horror.
Paul always claimed a close relationship with the Ephesian Church. But in Revelation, the Ephesians are praised by Jesus for routing out "those who say they are Apostles and are not."
Jesus: Congratulations on sending Paul packing.
Ephesian Church: No problem
Paul: ALL those in Asia have forsaken me (that's where Ephesus is)....
The 144,000 are all "Jews" (kindred Israelites) from the Twelve Tribes. (Each Tribe represents one of the Twelve Signs of the Zodiac, but that's another story.) They are all male and Virgins. (That right there ought to tell you the book is fiction:) Actually they are celibate males.
The innumerable multitude are also Jews and Israelites. They were called "out of" all nations but not members of all nations. These are the secondary Jews of dispora who were not celibate or in the original 144,000 fellow celibate Jews. But all Jews none the less. Revelation gives Gentiles nothing but grief.
Revelation, being a Jewish Christain rant against Rome and Paul, who they hated, was for loyal Jewish Christians only. One became a Jewish Christian by first becoming Jewish if you were not.
This was the whole argument between James and the Jewish Church and Paul. The book of James is a rant on works vs faith and a response to Paul's view in Romans. Do not think for a minute all the NT characters were hand in hand teaching the same one truth thing.
It is the Apostle Paul and his gentile Church and Vespasian that are hoped to be thrown into the Lake of Fire. Of course they weren't and went on to conquer both Jerusalem and bring us our modern gentile version of the Gospel.
Bottom line. WCG of old was a more accuate kind of Church if one goes along with Jewish Christian origins and applications.
Paul and the gentiles won over James, Peter and John, for whom he had little good say (Gal 1- 2) The Church, i.e. Catholic, spent much time editing the NT to reflect the victory. It's why the book of James almost didn't make the cut. It contradicts Romans.
Acts was added to give the NT the appearance of harmony between Paul and the Jewish Church. It is mostly fiction. However, the book makes Paul the hero and fades everyone else out.
The Book of Revelation is a past failed event and prophecy. It did not come to pass shortly or ever. Unfortunately, being a spectacular and vague book, it can still be used in ways it was never originally intended for. It is why we laugh at "time is short" in our experience and why it has gone on so long.
The astro-theological nature of Revelation is stunning when you realize where the Sea of Glass, (the Milky Way) throne (Cassopia)and the Seven Spirits of God (The Big Dipper) really are and how they are laid out in the "heavens."
The four beasts around that throne lion, ox, man, eagle..reflect the four seasons each three months apart in the zodiac. (Leo-Taurus-Aquarius-Aquila) Nuther story...but deeply imbedded in the Book of Revlation and literalized in our day.
No doubt, the early Jewish Christians thought that Jesus would return and conquer the Roman Empire and it's all based on the book of Daniel. At least as far as their prophecy about the antichrists, the false prophet and the end time coming their generation.
They were wrong and they were wrong because the book of Daniel wasn't a prophecy for their time. It was history and the only prophecy at the end of the book should have been fulfilled by the Maccabean revolt but it wasn't.
It did inspire the Jews to revolt against Antiochus Epiphanes and that was probably the purpose of the book.
The early Christians yanked passages out of context from the Jewish scriptures and put an allegorical interpretation on them that was not meant and was never there except in their mistaken imagination.
The sad part is, they are still doing it.
They look for Jesus' return but seem to forget that the god-man, once he leaves the earth, never returns but ever after watches over the faithful from above.
It's that way in all the god-man myths of that time. I don't know why Christians think their god-man will be any different.
You posed a lot of questions, so I am going to answer every one of them.
"It is nuts or did I say that?"
You just said it.
"How lame is that?"
Very lame.
"What kind of people put up with this stuff and show up every week to act like they believe it?"
They don't "act" like they believe it. They BELIEVE it.
"So how screwed up are you?"
Very.
"How tainted is your view of scripture because of the almost return of Jesus now going on over 2000 years."
This is technically a question although it doesn't have a question mark. My answer- not really tainted.
"Did you get that?"
Yes.
"How screwed up are you?"
Again, very.
"How screwed up are you?"
Very...very?
"How much have you had to adjust your thinking and what have you learned from this whole WCG experience concerning prophecy and "3-5 years, perhaps 10, 20 at the most"?"
Not much.
"Have you learned anything?"
Yes, that we're all screwed up.
"Bob Thiel sees the Second Coming in every news event. Do you?"
No
"Is it possible really bad stuff can happen but minus the Second Coming?"
Sure, anything's possible.
"If Jesus didn't return for the holocaust, what makes you think he will come back because you lost your retirement or savings in bad investments?"
I don't.
"How has "prophecy" been tempered by your WCG experience and the antics of the Ron Weinlands, Dave Packs and William Dankenbrings of the world?"
I don't read it. The Bible says don't worry about it, so I don't.
We could be in the end times.....or not. I've been through quite a number of adjustments and thought processes over the past 30+ years since I realized that HWA was faking the "gift" of prophecy.
As of right now, I sincerely hope that Jesus Christ does return. But, my emphasis is on daily learning, the adventure of being a Christian, and the blessings we are intended to enjoy from the various freedoms which result from our new life in Jesus Christ.
If you stop and think about it, prophecy was used by the ACOGs to leverage us all into doing things which we would normally not have thought to do. Much of that was most unpleasant and could hardly be considered to be fruit, let alone good fruit! I do not believe that prophecy was ever intended to be the "whip" that the ACOGs have supposed it to be. While not wishing to second guess God, I can see where He would have had very good reason for applying a Tower of Babel solution to the whole nasty mess!
BB
Dennis wrote:
"How much have you had to adjust your thinking and what have you learned from this whole WCG experience concerning prophecy and "3-5 years, perhaps 10, 20 at the most"? Have you learned anything?"
I've learned how incredibly gullible the human mind is when it comes to religious hucksters offering any kind of hope, even false hopes, and especially false hopes that fail repeatedly (as in failed prophecies, for instance), and yet to which the faithful still keep coming back for more.
This mental bottomless pit in believers ultimately leads to an endless financial profit stream for those unscrupulously willing to exploit it. In my view, this is the primary need religion vainly attempts to fill, and what will keep religion in business for centuries to come.
Since my days of passionate wholeheartedness - wherein I sincerely believed in virtually everything the Church taught - I've become very interested in the general subject of epistemology, the study of the nature and limits of knowledge, perhaps best expressed by the following: "HOW do you know that assertion (or belief) is true? What actual evidence can you present to support it?"
This is where it all begins.
There is a massive chasm between objective KNOWLEDGE and subjective BELIEF. If I would have been educated enough as a young person to have asked such foundational questions at the very beginning of my journey through Armstrongism I could have avoided a lot of pain, disappointment and philosophical dead-ends.
But I consider myself extremely fortunate in that I eventually DID come to the point in my life, as painful and as embarrassing as it was, where I asked such questions seriously.
On the contrary, many ardent religious believers will NEVER admit they’ve been sucked in, deceived and deluded by their faith in supernatural religion. Many of those folks are the more strident and fundamentalist of those who contribute comments to this blogsite. You all know who they are. Notice the essence of their comments: they just refuse to admit error, they simply cannot face up to the fact that they have been hoodwinked. They will continue on “fighting the good fight” in spite of the accumulating amount of evidence that their religious ideology is, and always was, a bunch of delusional bunk.
I observe many dear friends from my Church days who see virtually every world event in terms of evidence that “the end is near” – folks who can accidentally stumble over a street curb, and who then see even this mundane event as evidence to support their earnest belief that things are getting bad, real bad, and that Christ will return soon.
Yes, it is tragic to get sucked into the vacuous way of life and non-thinking that is religious fundamentalism in the first place – but what is an infinitely greater tragedy is when people refuse to admit they've made an error in doing so.
It is getting closer to the "end time", definitely. It won't, unfortunately, involve the return of the Christian god-man to fix everything.
No, the NT makes it plain, over and over, that those were the last days. It just happened to turn out that they weren't.
But, considering man's weapons capable of destroying all life on this planet, we are probably closer to being in the last days for real - and with no help coming from anywhere.
Weapons aren't the only danger we face either. There are several ways we can be carried back to starve in a stone age environment, oil not being the least of them.
A combination of all of the possibilities or the happenstance of a large wayward asteroid will take care of all of us, sooner or later. That will be the time when people discover that prayer doesn't do anything to solve our problems.
One can only hope that the real apocalypse doesn't happen in their own lifetime.
I am waiting for ". . . there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." (2 Peter 3:3-4.)
Of course, this was because people were waking up even back then to the fact that nothing Paul or others said about "soon" or "short time" was true. It was wearing on and on as yet it does.
Paul went from "we who are alive and remain shall....." to "I fought a good fight...bye" himself.
Like WCG at times, Paul had counseled people to adjust their lives to time is short and so who knows what regret and misery he caused doing that. Relationships were not important to Paul. Neither his nor theirs.
The imminent return of Jesus has been fouling the waters of life for a very long time. It fuels the fear of not being ready or not being in the right church and keeps money flowing to do "the work" in what little time we have left.
I look at where and how Ron Weinland and Dave Pack live, where they go, how often and at whose expense and it is all just amazing.
Paul may have tried to indicate he took no funds and was a humble tentmaker (also a non paid Super Pharisee of the Pharisees, evidently, and much above all others)but in time he also gave in to "they that preach the Gospel should live of the Gospel" Added no doubt by the later church leadership that was evolving into what we see today.
Anyone wanna buy a tent? I didn't think so.
God did not bless me with the chemistry for narcissism. They do seem to rise to high positions at the expense of everyone who gets in their way.
I wonder how much of religion has come to us from unbalanced, weird and nutcase personalities who were mistaken for spiritual leaders
"I wonder how much of religion has come to us from unbalanced, weird and nutcase personalities who were mistaken for spiritual leaders.
ALL OF IT.
Contrast this:
Paul: ALL those in Asia have forsaken me (that's where Ephesus is)....
With this audio clip
A gentle reminder to "Barry" and others that CAPS LOCK comments are likely to hit the trash can first, even faster than cut 'n paste proof texts.
I'm not screwed up at all.
A long time ago in a land far away, while I was walking towards the WCG bait, one of GTA's traps snapped shut on my foot. I simply reached down and opened the flimsy trap, turned around and walked away.
The trap looked like it was made of the finest gun steel in the world, but it turned out to be cheap plastic.
Well if the end times are real I can say this with confidence:
"We crucified Jesus once, and we can do it again."
Come back sweet Jesus, come back!
Hint: Click on my name for an evil offense!
Corky said, "One can only hope that the real apocalypse doesn't happen in their own lifetime."
I'm not sure it makes much difference, actually. Even if we escape the final general cataclysm, each of us will experience our own little private apocalypse. We may regret it just as bitterly, albeit in a different way.
My father looked forward with eagerness to the glorious sight of blood running deep as the horses' bridles as he valiantly swung his sword, fighting at the right hand of Jesus. In reality he faded out bit by bit as mini-strokes chipped away at his brain, and he spent the last months of his life inert in his bed in a nursing home. I doubt it ever dawned on him while he was still lucid how mundane his final battle would be.
As mundane as the last days of the Armstrongs who enticed him into his delusion.
Dennis, I suggest you read "In the Shadow of the Temple" by Oskar Skarsaune to correct your claim that there was friction between Jewish believers and Paul. Ample historical evidence proves otherwise. Also, 135CE was arguably more significant for Jewish believers than 70CE. Later still, as gentile christianity became more and more politicized, there was movement away from the early unity between Jewish and non-Jewish believers.
You may not believe the claims made about Christ in the NT, but the NT is not wrong at the historical level.
As for Revelation, well, it's apocalyptic and symbolic in style. The 144,000 for instance are the redeemed portrayed as the army of Israel, i.e. they are imputed to be pure - as OC Israel was through purity laws so NC Israel is through redemption.
They don't have to be a bunch of monks or all male or all Israelites. Again, you may not believe its spiritual message, but there is value in trying to understand the literary devices used to portray the spiritual message in an ancient document produced by a culture very distant from us. If only the CoGs would do so as well!!!!
The words "cultural sensitivity" spring to mind here.....
In my previous post I did not answer how screwed up I am.
Not much.
I owe my mother, the parent I lived with after the divorce. When my sisters and I were kids, she observed our birthdays. She reminded us that Mr. Armstrong said, "Don't believe me, believe your Bible!" She took him at his word and couldn't find any biblical reason to avoid birthday celebrations. COG ministers urged her to marry again. They told her that her first marriage didn't count, since my father still had a living ex-wife. She resisted. She had no interest in marrying again, and nowhere in the Bible did she find any requirement to do so. When I grew skeptical about what I was being taught at Ambassador College and applied to transfer to a different school, she assured me that the decision was mine alone to make and she would support me in it. She said I should not continue to attend church for her sake--only if it satisfied my needs. It didn't, so I quit. Forty years later, a year or so before she died, she was recounting some of the doctrinal and administrative turmoil WCG (and then UCG) had gone through. She summed up her attitude with, "I just followed my own conscience."
Even though she died a UCG member and apparently I will die a skeptic, a lot of her rubbed off on me. I'm thankful.
Dennis said:
"..the book of James..contradicts Romans."
Absolutely.
"Acts..is mostly fiction."
Absolutely.
Not intending to upset you Kiwi, but I've read "In the Shadow of the Temple" by Skarsaune, and definitely wasn't impressed. The guy has a huge apologetic agenda... which is why IVP probably ended up publishing it. He also wrote "Incarnation: Myth or Fact?" which was so awful I gave up halfway through.
"How Screwed Up Are You?"
prophecy isn't my thing....micky said
Normally Screwed Up Average Human Being".......paco said
enough votes to make it into the "canon" of the bible..anon said
I was less damaged than most...anon said
This was the way I unscrewed myself....anon said
I was so absorbed with the WCG and prophecy.....bear track said
They could not have been truly comprehended...larry said
Revelation gives Gentiles nothing but grief. ...dennis said
The early Christians yanked passages out of context from the Jewish scriptures...corky said
The Bible says don't worry about it, so I don't....mark said
We could be in the end times.....or not....byker bob said
it is tragic to get sucked into the vacuous way of life and non-thinking that is religious fundamentalism.....leonardo said
A combination of all of the possibilities or the happenstance...corky said
Anyone wanna buy a tent? I didn't think so.....dennis said
comments are likely to hit the trash can first, even faster than cut 'n paste proof texts....gavin said
I simply reached down and opened the flimsy trap....jack635 said
the end times are real I can say this with confidence.....mr scribe said
each of us will experience our own little private apocalypse...retired prof said
there is value in trying to understand the literary devices used to portray the spiritual message...kiwi said
respect to......retired prof
Absolutely....Tkach's $wiss Banker said
I gave up halfway through...gavin said
me, well I'm perfect
It's time dispense with dispensationalism:
If a person really thinks that Obama is the antichrist, that our economy will never recover, and some foreign superpower will soon take the U.S. captive.... (ugh!)... don't you think that person should be HAPPY that Christ will soon return (and that they will be saved from it all).
No, their constant fear mongering is ironically the biggest evidence of their own doubt.
BTW: if you come across someone who actually IS happy that the world is going to crap (as they see it)... don't drink the kool aid.
It would appear that the whole issue brought up here is one of trying to reconcile the past by placing it all in a neat little package where there really is no God. It was all just wishful thinking on everyone's part and it's understandable and forgivable to have fallen for all these deceptions rolling around out there for the last several thousand years.
We are the enlightened generation, having risen above our fellow man who are perceived as still gathered around a fire, hooting and howling at each other over that strange phenomenon.
But there are still some hard pressing issues out there that cannot be so easily swept under a global rug.
Matter came into being. Scientists call it the big bang. They claim it all came from nothing. Scripture claims it came from God. Which sounds more plausible? No causality, or causality?
Then there is the issue of Scripture itself, some written down long before the events it foretold, in detail, that came to pass. Oh, I know... easy enough to dismiss out of hand.
What of other historical evidence? If Jesus did not exist, then, using the same reasoning, Plato did not exist, Alexander the Great did not exist. All of it is just myths created and repeated down through history that cannot be truly verified or trusted.
The light of life was self-lit.
Given our understanding now of science, chemistry, and a few other disciplines, the experts conclude that this is impossible.
I guess then we just have to go forward on faith that we are here, despite the impossibility of it all, through natural causes.
How screwed up are you? Screwed up enough to understand why questions like this are important:
Back in the day, the minister tells you to jump out of the window. Do you jump out of the window?
Yes
No
Not sure
I wish this was a joke, but unfortunately it isn't.
Hopefully this does not get missed by most readers of this blog. I was reading recently that Sir Isaac Newton believed that Jesus was returning in his day. He even espoused the day for a year theory of prophetical events. He believed the 1260 days taken from a time, times and half a time, from the book of Revelation, referred to his day.
It was interesting to also find out that William Wiston, the translator of Josephus and Seventh Day Baptist believed Jesus was returning in 1836. I wonder how much that would have influenced William Miller who soon had his dates of the return.
I would like to add that, while I may be partially screwed up now, I expect to become perfect sometime very soon, probably in the next 3-to-5 years, and almost certainly within the next 10-to-15 years.
Bill said...
Matter came into being..
From what? Who said?
Scientists call it the big bang..
Oh, I see now, you're not talking about matter coming into being, you are talking about how the universe came into being.
They claim it all came from nothing..
"They" who? Science doesn't say that. Science simply doesn't know what was before the "big bang"
Scripture claims it came from God..
Yes, here is where the universe came from nothing - it was poofed into existence.
Which sounds more plausible? No causality, or causality?.
Causality. Just as science says. There was a cause, they just don't know for sure what the cause was.
The light of life was self-lit.
Given our understanding now of science, chemistry, and a few other disciplines, the experts conclude that this is impossible..
Quite the contrary, abiogenesis has already proved that it was indeed possible for life to come from non-life by producing amino acids (the building blocks of life) in a laboratory way back in the 60s.
They have done a lot more since then, you should read about it sometime.
Bear said:
"Psycholgists and sociologists have rightly identified this behavior as a product of "loss of control." It is not about health care. It is about a small group of neo-conservative caucasians sensing that they are losing power. They must personally stand in the way of anything that Obama does in order to defeat him and the malevalent (read minority) forces trying to destroy American. Think for a moment. How could health insurance companies recruit caucasians with low levels of education to champion their cause as large corporations. Only by convincing these people that the country is being taken over by malevolent forces (read minority). so these people don't really care what the health bills say. They only care about what they want to believe that the health bills say."
How you managed to swerve into this discussion about medical care from the initial topic is beyond me. But since no one here has challenged you on your faulty remarks, I will.
"Psycholgists and sociologists have rightly identified this behavior as a product of "loss of control."
Yes, people tend to get frustrated when they are losing control of their situation. Nothing new there. We don't need psychologists pointing this out to us.
"It is not about health care."
That is correct. This is about medical care, and who shall pay for those who don't have any, such as myself. You don't have a right to medical care anymore than you have a right to auto insurance.
"It is about a small group of neo-conservative caucasians sensing that they are losing power."
Why are you playing the race card here? What about the liberal "Caucasians" who sense they are losing power? Just take a walk thru south St. Pete at night and see what kind of power you have. Try playing the race card there and see how far it gets you with the "brothers."
"They must personally stand in the way of anything that Obama does in order to defeat him and the malevalent (read minority) forces trying to destroy American."
Personally, I will stand in the way of our Marxist President until I can no longer stand. He is not fit to be president, given his sleazy background and his Marxist mentors.
"They only care about what they want to believe that the health bills say."
No, actually more people are reading this bill than members of Congress are. This is why more & more people are getting upset with its tacky and budget busting provisions.
VOTE THEM ALL OUT - EVERYTIME.
Let the 2nd American Revolution begin.
- Stingerski
Nice to see you back, Dennis !! Missed reading your posts.
Dennis,
Thanks for giving us some more understanding into how it worked on us.
Your presence from time to time is truly missed.
Corky said:
Oh, I see now, you're not talking about matter coming into being, you are talking about how the universe came into being.
Um, Corky... the universe is matter.
""They" who? Science doesn't say that. Science simply doesn't know what was before the "big bang" "
Yes they do know what was before the big bang. There was nothing. There was no matter. They do indeed claim matter came into existence at an instant; at this big bang. They theorize it was the result of super string theory, but fail to explain where the super strings came from, and neither to they explain why these super strings are have not been producing matter on any regular basis.
"Quite the contrary, abiogenesis has already proved that it was indeed possible for life to come from non-life by producing amino acids (the building blocks of life) in a laboratory way back in the 60s."
Right. They produced amino acids then, and claimed the rest was not unlike the movie, Frankenstein. Just add lightning.
The latest research shows that the jump from non-life to life just could not have happened by any natural causation.
"They have done a lot more since then, you should read about it sometime."
Ditto.
Bill, I suggest ScienceDaily.com but you believe as you will.
Corky; I suggest a trip to DisneyWorld. Don't forget to visit Fantasyland.
The one benefit I received from
the WCG after 20 years membership and employment was to become freed from all religion for all time.
Painful to look back upon but
oh so liberating to become immune to
all the god peddlers. That's at least one mistake I will never make
again. Thank you Herbert!
ConnedNoMore
"Yes they do know what was before the big bang. There was nothing. There was no matter. They do indeed claim matter came into existence at an instant; at this big bang. They theorize it was the result of super string theory, but fail to explain where the super strings came from, and neither to they explain why these super strings are have not been producing matter on any regular basis."
One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
Two can be as bad as one
It's the loneliest number since the number one
"No" is the saddest experience you'll ever know
Yes, it's the saddest experience you'll ever know
'Cause one is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
One is the loneliest number, whoa, worse than two
It's just no good anymore since you went away
Now I spend my time just making rhymes of yesterday
One is the loneliest number
One is the loneliest number
One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
One is the loneliest, one is the loneliest
One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
It's just no good anymore since You went away
Bill said...
Corky; I suggest a trip to DisneyWorld. Don't forget to visit Fantasyland.
----------------------------
You know I would old friend but I can't afford it and I'm too old to enjoy it.
I would have loved to have gone there 30 years and more ago but Nam was the only trip I ever made that was far from home. Kinda sad, ain't it?
The above exchange between Bill and Corky once again illustrates the arrogance of fundamentalists: they spout their "creation science" mantras, which are tissue-thin arguments that have been soundly refuted time and again by the scientific community. If folks like Bill would ever actually do some serious reading from cutting edge scientists, perhaps they might see that their views are woefully obsolete and inadequate as explanations.
Just because science can't currently explain everything with absolute certainty about origins (the way some religions PRETEND to do) doesn't necessarily mean that the supernatural theistic view automatically wins by default. This is something that fundamentalists just don’t seem able or willing to understand. Such an assumption also seems to be the foundation of the so-called Intelligent Design movement.
But then again, it appears they really don't seem that interested in factual reality, only those factoids that can be used to prop up their religious ideology.
Bill, may I humbly suggest reading a very good book called "The Creationists" by Ronald L. Numbers? It's a well-documented history of the creationist movement.
And ConnedNoMore, I liked your phrase "The God Peddlers" - which I think would be a good title for a book on the subject, as there are so many of them in today's modern world, in spite of all that science has learned the past 400 years.
And for the record, I do NOT believe in "scientism" - the belief that scientifically proven and verified knowledge is the ONLY kind of legitimate knowledge - but neither do I fall hook, line and sinker for the supernatural alternatives, which to me seem more like subjective fantasies and wishes than genuine alternative views.
The hard fact is that there are many aspects of reality that we just don't presently understand very well at all. And we might as well make peace with that fact. I’d rather honestly admit “I don’t know” than make the leap to pretending to a form of knowledge (often called "revealed knowledge") that I really don’t possess, nor does anybody else.
HWA seemed unable to do this, perhaps because such a perspective requires a truly humble mind. He often wrote with scorn of the agnostic position. But look at the actual record: many of the dogmatic assertions he put forth with absolute certainty and “authority” have proven false time and again. The same thing can be said of Gerald Waterhouse, and many others both within and outside of the COG context.
Making dogmatic claims about reality with the absolute confidence that they are true doesn’t actually make them objectively true. Reality IS what it IS, in spite of what we may WANT it to be. Our job is to discover what that reality is and humbly face such facts as best we can, rather than desperately cling to ancient fantasies because they make us feel better. The latter provides only a false sense of security that is bound to disappoint us in the end.
Bill says: "Yes they do know what was before the big bang. There was nothing. There was no matter. They do indeed claim matter came into existence at an instant; at this big bang. They theorize it was the result of super string theory, but fail to explain where the super strings came from, and neither to they explain why these super strings are have not been producing matter on any regular basis."
Bill, not all scientists maintain there was nothing before the big bang.
Some theorize that the matter we can sense is tied to one we cannot along a dimension into which we cannot see. These two universes oscillate along that dimension, periodically colliding and rearranging the matter in them--perhaps even their physical laws. Every collision looks like a big bang to the inhabitants. This is not the same thing as the theory that our universe falls back on itself in a big crunch and rebounds. That one just about everyone has rejected, given the evidence that the expansion of the universe is accelerating, instead of slowing down in preparation for falling back.
Other scientists theorize that our universe is just one bubble in an infinite froth of universes continuously coming into being, perhaps spawned by perturbations in ones that already exist.
There is no more evidence for these ideas than for a conscious creator. On the other hand, they are just as credible and just as much fun to speculate about, unless you get off on the idea of a creator who orders soldiers to kill everybody that pisseth against the wall.
For a skeptic the major advantage of physical over supernatural theories is that scientists give up physical theories when enough evidence against them accumulates (as they did with the "big crunch" idea), whereas creationists cling to supernatural theory no matter what.
"20 years membership and employment"
Do we have another ex-minister amongst us, ConnedNoMore?
Just curious, and no, not asking in order to dogpile on you. I personally think it's an excellent sign of how far we have come collectively, if there are at least three ex-ministers, now free from religion, posting on the largest and most well-trafficked ex-Church of God blog on the Internet.
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