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Post by krwordgazer on Oct 1, 2009 23:45:58 GMT -5
Erika, your story here just made me want to cry. My own daughter is turning 15 in just two weeks. The thought of her happy freedom being suddenly stripped from her-- the confusion and pain she'd be feeling-- it just breaks my heart, thinking that this happened to you. That it would be done by her own parents-- her father and I-- horrifies me no end. I can hardly imagine what your parents must feel like, looking back on it all, now they have come to their senses.
15 is an age when a kid is learning who she is, learning to take responsibility for herself, learning the consequences of her own choices. It's the age when she ought to be trusted with more and more independence as she demonstrates that she can handle it. The awfulness of being clamped down on at that age, just when you should have been spreading your wings-- so terrible. It just makes me want to take the teenage you into my house and become your guardian, so I could let you go back to school with your friends. . . Gloriamarilyn too. Stuff like you're describing should never, ever have happened to you.
Hugs to you both.
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Post by krwordgazer on Sept 28, 2009 23:33:22 GMT -5
This is interesting, Tapati. Nowadays, I think, if someone running a shelter heard a girl tell her mother, "I'm afraid of you!" they'd be asking a good many more questions. Or should be, anyway-- though there is still a tendency to assume the "best place" for a kid is with her parents and to not look too closely at the consequences. I feel for both you and Sierra.
I'm a little surprised , Tapati, that you were not blackballed or ostracized when you left the temple-- that's the way anyone who left the cult I was in, was treated. Did they believe you had succumbed to maya? How exactly did they treat you once you had left? Were they trying to get you back?
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Post by krwordgazer on Sept 16, 2009 21:44:22 GMT -5
One question this raised in my mind: Vyckie, do you believe folks like Debbie Pearl are deliberately bilking folks? Or do you think she and others like her really believe in the cause in which they make so much profit? I'm inclined to believe the latter. I don't think it's a vast con-job. Not, at least, for most of its leaders. They truly believe "God is blessing them" for fighting for "the truth." The fact that they are making lots of money just shows that they are in God's will . . .
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Post by krwordgazer on Sept 10, 2009 23:00:27 GMT -5
Those are really good points, Ruby!
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Post by krwordgazer on Sept 8, 2009 19:00:27 GMT -5
Even though the religion is different, so much of what you are talking about, Tapati, sounds like my experiences in Maranatha Campus Ministries. The regimented schedule, the isolation from the rest of the world, the emphasis on spending lots of time in religious exercises. . .
Almost like a monastery or convent. I wonder whether monasteries or convents, historically, have had a tendency to be cult-like? Not being RC, I really don't know. . .
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Post by krwordgazer on Sept 3, 2009 19:59:49 GMT -5
I once heard it expressed as follows, ironically by "Message" people: You can't take away a dog's bone. You have to offer the dog a juicy steak. Then it'll drop the bone and take the steak. In this instance, there needs to be something to replace the QF/P life, something tantalizing: like free thought and the realization that there is something better available, but more importantly the emotional support of free people. I completely agree with this principle, sierra ~ however, to the QF woman's mind, that juicy steak is pure poison ~ and the dog bone is her ticket to untold eternal rewards ~ she's highly unlikely to make the exchange. Sad, but true. This is why I am striving in the telling of my story to work with the QF mindset to lead the martyrs (who'll gladly suffer incredible deprivation and abuse for the benefit of anyone besides themselves) that this philosophy is poison FOR OTHERS ~ the children, the husbands, and even God Himself. My strategy (yes, believe it or not, I do have a plan ) is to undermine the martyr mentality in a manner which won't automatically trip the woman's do-nothing-from-self-interest thought-stopping switch. So, in keeping with the J.O.Y. principle, my message is, QF/P belittles Jesus, irreparably harms children and men, puts the "submissive" woman in a position of power and control and dominance over her husband and God. IOW ~ QF/P in practice turns the J.O.Y. principle on its head. Understanding the truth of this could be enough to cause the woman to realize that the dog bone actually is a dog bone ~ and maybe then, she'll go for the juicy steak. What do you all think of my strategy? I am soliciting honest / realistic feedback here. I think your strategy will be very effective, Vyckie-- but from what I've read from others, I'm not sure all women would be able to identify with this: This is not what women believe is going on, of course. But I agree that the prevailing tendency in patriarchal religion to give lip-service to the responsibility of the man for everything, while simultaneously blaming the woman for anything that goes wrong, is self-contradictory in that it does mean that women are tacitly required to control their husbands through their submission. The trick will be to get the women to see past this double-speak and recognize that this is what is really going on. But probably that's the direction you're already headed with this. Also, what I understand you to be saying is that Q/F women (simply because of the harshness of their lives!)are quite likely to be internally motivated not with a "pure desire to please God", as they would put it-- but with a desire to get a blessed household -- in other words, to make God bless their households through their own submission. I agree. But this is something that would be difficult for them to see, and that if not handled very carefully, will come across (as I'm sure you can see), as blaming the victim. . .
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Post by krwordgazer on Aug 23, 2009 22:51:44 GMT -5
It's interesting that just before Vyckie posted this, I posted a comment on another blog about how the authority-submission paradigm really just results in control and enabling. That some men are mature enough to eschew being treated as a demigod by their wives and children, but that in any event it is a huge temptation when everyone surrounding you treats you as if you are inherently more special than everyone else, not to believe it.
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Post by krwordgazer on Aug 23, 2009 14:30:10 GMT -5
Vyckie-- I've made some more comments on the Equality Central for you review. I also wanted you to know that I'm gathering some resources for addressing the hermeneutics issue.
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Post by krwordgazer on Aug 20, 2009 18:14:49 GMT -5
I have been following your story with great interest, Tapati. Some of it is similar to my own experiences with the Christian cult I was in, in college. I remember my parents' suspicion, and the way I longed so much to be with my new friends in Maranatha, rather than home with my parents. Some of that was part of growing up and going to college, I think-- wanting to forge my own life, separate from that of my parents. But some of it had to do with problems at home and wanting to escape, and some of it had to do with the genuine closeness the members of the religious group had with one another. As for some of the ideas about God that are being expressed here-- it seems to me that if God is the Source and Ground of Being, people could connect with the Divine from any and all of these perspectives. I think what Vyckie was describing-- the idea of God as being in the universe but more than the universe-- is called "panentheism," distinguishable from pantheism in that panentheism tends to see God as having Consciousness, and of containing the universe rather than merely being the sum total of the universe. I don't believe this view need be incompatible with that of Christianity. I'm a bit uncomfortable with Lewis' analogy of monarchy vs. democracy, since I think existence and government are sort of apples-and-oranges when it comes to these comparisons. I see God as upholding and undergirding the Creation, not lording it over the Creation. "I am gentle and humble of heart," Jesus said, and also "He who has seen me has seen the Father."
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Post by krwordgazer on Aug 16, 2009 23:02:03 GMT -5
Vyckie, it would help me a lot to respond to the female-subordination views you posted for rebuttal, if I had some understanding of why the Q/F believer believes that only the King James version of the Bible can be used. Why do they object to going back to the meaning of words in the original Hebrew? And since they do so object, why does the author of the passage feel it's ok to change the word "help" to "helper"-- which is not the word that appears in the King James! The word is the same word, both in the KJV and in the Hebrew, as is used in "God is our refuge and strength, our very present help in trouble."
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Post by krwordgazer on Aug 13, 2009 21:23:33 GMT -5
Thanks, JLP. I really appreciate your taking the reins on this FAQ-- I will help out as I can.
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Post by krwordgazer on Aug 11, 2009 22:25:40 GMT -5
Vyckie, I am almost completely unfamiliar with emergent church thought-- though my understanding is that it's pretty much all over the map. . . As for starting the new FAQ, I don't know when I'll actually be able to do that-- so if anyone else beats me to it, I won't be offended.
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Post by krwordgazer on Aug 11, 2009 21:53:12 GMT -5
Yes, Vyckie-- I think the hermeneutics/interpretation issue should be addressed in its own FAQ -- and in terms of a "read this first" message to any QF'er who plans to read the other Biblical FAQs.
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Post by krwordgazer on Aug 11, 2009 14:55:59 GMT -5
I hope it's ok for me to briefly go back to one of the points Vyckie was making before the agreement to focus on one question at a time. I think the whole issue of how to read the Bible is foundational, and that it may do very little good to simply try to refute the QF position while accepting, hook, line and sinker, their hyper-literalistic, non-historical methods of Biblical interpretation. Even starting from the viewpoint that the Scriptures are God-breathed (which I believe), the idea that the cultures into which the Scriptures were breathed were "biblical" in the sense of "God-approved" is an assumption that I believe QF members should be asked to question. Even the fact that there are major cultural changes that take place between the Old and New Testaments should be used to raise the question in the QF mind: If God giving the Law to the Hebrews shows that the culture of the Hebrews was God's will for all mankind, including us today-- then why doesn't Jesus try to bring the Jews of the New Testament back to the Hebrew culture? Why doesn't Jesus do what they were expecting him to do, and become a military leader like Joshua, toss out the Romans and return the Jews to a Davidic earthly kingdom?
In short, is there not substantial evidence within the Sciptures themselves that God was accommodating Himself to the cultures in order to uplift them? That the change in cultural norms and values between the Old and New Testaments show that God does not approve any one culture, but works within cultures to change them? And by inference, that the counter-cultural callings placed on women like Deborah, Ruth, Huldah, etc., show God's intention to try to change male-female relations to where women could once again be "face-to-face strong helpers"?
I fear that Vyckie is right-- as long as we concede to the QF'ers their foundational stance of Biblical interpretation, we are going to be unable to convince them. They must at least listen to the idea that the Bible was first of all spoken to certain groups of people in certain times and places in history, and that if we don't try to understand how they would have understood the message, we are bound to misunderstand what it should mean to us. QF'ers can certainly keep their belief in the Bible as inspired and God-breathed-- but it is necessary to get them to question their understanding of it as intending to impose the cultural norms within which it was spoken, as God's intended cultural norms for us today.
That said, I must also address this:
JLP said: There is no verse in the Bible that tells women that submitting to abuse will glorify God. Some people think Peter was telling wives to do that in 1 Peter 3:1-6 (see scripture above). This is a misunderstanding of what Peter was trying to say. In his time, wives had no rights. For a woman in that time to not obey her husband was socially unacceptable. Husbands considered themselves their wife’s masters, and expected obedience. Peter was telling women to practice behavior that their husbands expected, so as to win them to Christ.
Vyckie replied:
WARNING: Rant to follow! And I want to be clear that my intention here is not to start a heated comp. vs. egal. debate on this thread ~ I'm just expressing my frustration in the hopes that this endeavor is not actually so impossible as it seems.
Husbands considered themselves their wives' masters ~ because that's what their scriptures taught them!! Ugh ~ I don't know if this FAQ is even possible. I just don't see how you can get around the patriarchal nature of the bible ~ it's even in the godhead ~ God the FATHER ~ chief authority. This is why I tossed it all out.
We are talking about the Book of 1 Peter. This book was NOT written to Jewish Christians who "considered themselves their wives' masters, because that's what their Scriptures taught them." Leaving aside for now the question of whether the Jewish Scriptures teach that men are "masters" over their wives, the Book of 1 Peter was specifically addressed (verse 1 of 1 Peter) to "God's elect. . . scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, . . Asia and Bithynia. . ." What JLP is saying is that Peter was writing to those who lived in non-Hebrew, non-biblical cultures, where the Roman and Greek gods were worshipped. The passage in question is to women and slaves in THAT culture (and specifically, by context, to wives and slaves of unconverted, non-Christian men), which even a QF'er could not define as God-approved! It is true that in THAT culture men were considered lords and masters of their wives, children and slaves, in ways that went far beyond anything the Jewish Scriptures ever say or even could be construed to imply. Misunderstanding the audience will cause a misunderstanding of Peter's intention, and thus of what God was breathing to Peter.
This historical disengagement simply has to be addressed, or we will get nowhere.
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 22, 2009 1:03:37 GMT -5
Krwordgazer what does it mean that intensity is a sign of codependency? I had not heard that before but it rings a lot of bells. I think of friends of mine who went from one super intense christian experience to the next and would never find any contentment in a mundane church life, and whose romantic relationships ran a parallel course. Arietty, here's a link to an explanation of how codependent relationships work: www.marriage-relationships.com/codependency_in_relationships.htmlThe main idea is that codependent people are desperate. Desperate for affirmation, affection and love, their relationships are marked by an obsessive intensity. It's difficult for them to simply relax and be casual, because their sense of self-worth is tied up in how much affirmation and positive feedback they are receiving from the other person. They never feel secure in a relationship and so can never just let things flow. That's the way I was, and the way I can slip back into being when something happens that triggers those old patterns. Maranatha fed my need for intensity-- they encouraged obsession with their group and the group's goals. Obsessive people tended to be the ones that joined-- and then we fed one another's intensity. Rosa, I appreciate the link to Wikipedia-- it's a pretty accurate summary of what Maranatha was. Tapati, I hope your migraine goes away soon!
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 20, 2009 14:15:48 GMT -5
What you said, Tapati and Pandapaws, about the way it felt so welcoming and homey when you first started visiting, was also true about the coercive religious group I got involved in, in college.
Most churches are friendly, but in a casual way. The Maranatha Campus Ministries group was intensely friendly. They were intense about everything-- which I learned later is a trait of codependency. I was codependent myself and loved the intensity of the welcome, the way they made me feel I belonged right from the start. . . It was only later, after I was well into it, that the coercion began. And by that time I was emotionally attached to the relationships I had formed, and didn't want to leave.
The relationships themselves, once we all got out (Maranatha eventually dissolved), were high quality friendships, and many of them remain to this day. I would say that in our culture, which tends to high degrees of independence and isolation (everyone home in front of their TVs and not interacting with the community so much anymore), many people are longing for deeper, more intimate relationships. And cults offer this.
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 13, 2009 13:31:48 GMT -5
*hugs Grandmalou*
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 12, 2009 19:48:50 GMT -5
Tapati, your blog post was fascinating. I was especially interested in this statement:
Anywhere you find a rigidly controlled social and religious system, you see women in modest dress behaving in a subservient manner and spending the bulk of their time rearing children with limited access to money of their own. You also fail to see women in roles of authority within the church or temple structure. It’s difficult to escape the conclusion that the real goal of any such organization is in fact the control of women in order to elevate the men to unparalleled authority and power.
I think you're right-- but I'd take it a step further. The main purpose of a rigidly controlled social and religious system is to elevate the leaders to the top of the heap and keep everyone below them in a strict hierarchy. The top leaders, then the lower leaders, then the committed men (in your case, the celibate ones), then the less committed men, then the women, then the children. The middle orders in the hierarchy can feel better about having the leaders over them, by having those under them that they, too, can control. In this way the subjugation of women helps keep the men from getting fed up with being controlled themselves-- which ultimately helps keep the leaders in power. Ultimately, the rank-and-file men are dupes too. It's really all about the power-hungry founders and their successors.
The group I was in was just like this, too. Everyone had their own place in the hierarchy-- and within the ranks, there was constant jockeying for a higher position-- the more "godly" men over the more "worldly" ones; the more submitted women over those who dared to assert themselves; the more outwardly obedient children over those who couldn't play the game.
Dreadful.
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 12, 2009 15:41:02 GMT -5
I understand your reaction, but when I say you need to chill out, I don't mean that you shouldn't be offended by whatever it is that offends you, but that IMO you should moderate your tone when addressing something with people who have previously been peaceable and reasonable. After months of being on this forum together with no trouble, even if we don't know one another well, I can think of many much more appropriate ways to have addressed a problem. Conflating "crack whore" with "nigger" isn't helping your case with me either. I maintain that crack whore is an appropriate title for someone who prostitutes themselves for drugs, but I will no longer use that term here since it offends you. And, again, I was speaking about the life direction of some specific people, so read it as "these specific people weren't becoming prostitutes or drug addicts, and I would not have faulted my parents for not allowing my pre-teen self to spend unsupervised time with peers who were". FWIW, I interpreted AtheistintheBB's words more in the sense of reflecting her parents' perspective, not that she personally was being derogatory towards people who are prostitutes or addicted to drugs. That her parents were treating these girlfriends of hers as if they were the kind of people her parents would have labeled "crack whores." In short, I believe the whole conflict is based on a simple misunderstanding. Sargassosea, the story of the 15-year-old you told wrung my heart. As a society we need to find ways to help kids in his position, not condemn them. Xara, I hear you about the word "child." "Kid" is a much more (if you will) "kid-friendly" term in our language. One of the things that irritates me about fundamentalists is the way they will do anything, make any stretch, to go against the culture-- even in an area where there is no need and no issue. "Kid" does not mean "baby goat" in American English except on farms. Most of us don't speak farm vocabulary in our daily lives. Vyckie-- I loved what you had to say in your blog post. Children are individuals in their own right, and should be allowed to develop according to their own natures, not to be extensions of their parents. The story of Andrew scurrying around trying to avoid being noticed broke my heart. His sensitivity and desire to please remind me very much of own 10-year-old son.
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 12, 2009 1:10:38 GMT -5
Jo, my sister was in a situation like that with an abusive "best friend" who controlled her life for a decade. When my sister left this friend at last, she had no clear idea what she was leaving-- she simply knew she couldn't take it any longer and had to leave. The truth about Narcissistic personalities, codependency, and all that-- those were things she began to learn after she left. My sister first began to wake up when I began to say things very casually like, "That isn't my experience of the way friends treat one another," or simply "Why did she say that to you? That wasn't true!" But she couldn't handle the full truth all at once, and I suspect your dad may be the same way. Give him a little time away from your abusive mom, and he will begin to see what normal looks like. You don't have to convince him of everything right now. You might give him a book like "Codependent No More" by Melody Beatty, if he expresses an interest when you mention it. But I agree with Tapati. Let him take this at his own pace, is my advice. But Grandmalou has a good point, too. If he's open to a suggestion that he needs to guard himself right now, because he's vulnerable-- and not to get into anything on the "rebound"-- that would be a good idea.
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 10, 2009 14:56:58 GMT -5
Stampinmama, I finally had time to read your story all the way though-- I found it appalling and uplifting.
It's appalling that people treat one another that way. It's even more appalling that they drag God into it and abuse one another in God's name.
But I'm filled with admiration for you that you stood up for yourself, found a way to escape, and even (eventually) helped your parents find their way out, too.
I think the love of your family for one another, and the freedom you were accustomed to in your early years, contributed a lot to the strength of mind and heart that dismayed your parents at the time, but eventually influenced them to claim their freedom, too. Spiritual abuse is an ugly thing. When I was in a spiritually abusive church, I also was encouraged to be controlling over those I was put in charge of, in the vast heierarchy that was Maranatha Campus Ministries. I'm glad I'm free now and able to ask forgiveness, and receive it.
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 9, 2009 1:09:33 GMT -5
Yay, Vyckie! ;D
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 5, 2009 16:53:03 GMT -5
KRW - Sorry if you got the impression I was encouraging you to leap in the direction of atheism especially since I am as ignorant of that philosophy as I am of religious philosophy. I guess the word "intellect" denotes atheism? And, really, I would never presume to discount any feeling you have nor would I discount where you believe it came from. I just find it odd (and always have frankly) that a person can claim to be a believer in god yet dismiss any or all of the bible as they see fit. I mean is it of god, or not? (Told you I'm ignorant!) Sargassosea, I apologize for misinterpreting you. When you said, Is it too much of a leap for you to believe that your "heart-feelings" are just your own good common sense?
Why (and I ask ask this with true respect) does your intellect and reason have anything to do with "God"?
All I can think is that you can't trust yourself. -- what I understood you to be saying was that you thought the "leap" to believing there was nothing involved but my own intellect and reason, was a small "leap" that I should make, and that there was something lacking in me ("can't trust yourself") that I did not make that leap. In other words, that a person who trusted herself would not trust or believe in God-- the atheist view. It had nothing to do with "intellect" denoting atheism-- it was about whether or not it was ok for me to believe in something more than human intellect, as worthy of trust. As for how I view the Bible-- no, I don't just dismiss any or all of it as I see fit. That isn't what I meant. There are actually a number of different views Christians hold as to how the Bible is inspired (not that it is inspired). Was it dictated word-for-word by God to the human authors? Is every word inspired, or only the general message? Are only the spiritual teachings inspired, or can we also expect it to contain infallible, inerrant facts about matters we now study scientifically? Is everything in the narratives to be taken as factual history? Can we take into account different literary forms, or is it all to be read like a 3000-year-old newspaper? My own view is something I am still a bit fluid on, because I'm still thinking about the role of the human agents involved. I don't believe they were just passive conduits, but recorders in their own voices of encounters with the Divine. What is clear to me is that whatever their role, God's word must be viewed as having been given to them, in their culture and their time in history, first. Our reading of what was said, viewed through the glasses of 21st-century Western culture, may be very different from what the original author intended as the meaning, or what the original audience thought the meaning was. A key understanding here is that the ancient mind did not delineate in the same way we do between empirical fact and literary embellishment. There was no such thing as newspaper-style reporting back then. The writers of the Bible would have been completely puzzled by such a concept. What I believe is that the Bible is inspired by God and is authoritative for the Christian in terms of faith and practice-- but it is not a science text, a historical treatise, or a simple set of rules. It can be understood on different levels-- the child in Sunday school is going to relate to it differently than the theologian, and both levels are good-- but its primary purpose is to record encounters with God in order to lead us to our own encounter with God, not to be turned into a god itself. Jesus said, "You search the scriptures, thinking that in them you have eternal life, and it is they that point to me-- but you do not come to me." When Christians worship the Bible rather than God, it can lead to terrible heartbreak as they turn it into something it was never intended to be. This is especially true when they read it as a strict rule book dictated by the Boss and left on their desks yesterday. Tapati-- I hear what you're saying, and I appreciate your balancing words very much. I think a discussion of the causes of suffering is a natural course for this thread to take, as we all contemplate this poor family's tragedy-- but you're absolutely right that we should treat that tragedy with sensitivity, and to the extent that I have not, I apologize.
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 3, 2009 22:45:03 GMT -5
Thanks, Castor. ;D Sargassosea, I am in no way discounting intellect, reason, or plain old common sense. Or our own instincts-- as I think I made clear above. But just because you've never had a heart-feeling that seemed to you to come from God, doesn't mean I haven't. Sometimes I have felt things that turned out to be fact, that I couldn't possibly have known on my own. It's not that I don't trust myself-- it's that I also trust God. If you're going to insist that there couldn't possibly be anything more to it than my own intellect-- how can you be so sure? Last I checked, you and I were each inside our own heads, having our own experiences, not one another's. ;D And if you don't mind my asking, in all friendliness-- why are you asking me to make a "leap" in the direction of atheism? I haven't asked you to make a "leap of faith," have I?
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Post by krwordgazer on Jul 3, 2009 14:35:56 GMT -5
Jemand, that is so true. Poor kids; I hope that somehow they will get some counseling, if not now, then later. Lunargentee, what you're saying about control ties in with what I've been thinking about-- that fundamentalism is, in essence, religious codependence, and it the codependent who find it appealing. SpiritualAbuse.com has articles about codependent views of God-- I think God weeps, but will still meet people at their point of need, even if they are completely misunderstanding who God is. It doesn't surprise me that Carri and her family are feeling comfort from God's Spirit. God loves them even if they think He's a big abusive dad in the sky. What I think is that God tends to allow us to make our own decisions, even if we make dumb ones. I think our own instincts, and the heart-feelings we get in prayer, can be warnings not to do something dumb-- but we are always capable of ignoring or overriding those instincts. But in the end, in spite of every mistake we make, every box we put God in, and the normal operation of cause-and-effect in this world-- in the end God will bring us Home. Kisekeliea-- you're welcome! I think it's important in reading the Bible to understand that we are always seeing God through the eyes of the human writers (within their own cultural understandings) who were having divine encounters, and that human understanding of God is always, by nature, imperfect and limited. Even our own is.
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