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Post by Vyckie D. Garrison on Aug 13, 2010 0:33:33 GMT -5
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Post by cherylannhannah on Aug 13, 2010 1:41:30 GMT -5
Oh my poor, dear girl! I truly grieve for what you suffered.
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Post by nikita on Aug 13, 2010 2:42:08 GMT -5
That's so awful, Sierra. I'm glad you're out of there. The thing that strikes me most about your particular tale of Branham's group is how completely over the top the doctrines are, to the point that they almost seem made up for tragic effect.* So your inclusion of actual quotations is all the more jarring for it. 'You think I'm making this shit up? Let's listen to sermon tape #84506 part B from January 12 1956, wherein he said...' It's really horrifying. I can't even imagine growing up with the idea that you could grievously sin and not even be aware of it because some guy you don't even know decides to perv on you. The fact that all these men have sex on the brain and spend way too much time thinking about womens' bodies and dress codes doesn't even seem to occur to them, does it? It's all very perverted and strange. Consider yourself hugged. * I am not saying I have ever thought you made anything up, I am just saying it's so extraordinary that the quotations are almost needed to ground it in reality. It's just all so surreal and unnatural.
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Post by tapati on Aug 13, 2010 3:05:01 GMT -5
{{{hugs}}}
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Post by km on Aug 13, 2010 7:38:54 GMT -5
Wow, Sierrra... You know, despite not growing up in the Message, I really resonate with your way of interpreting so many of these teachings. I never stopped eating, but I took so many of my parents' fundamentalist ideals very very seriously. I have known people who could co-exist with fundamentalism somewhat healthfully, without taking it to the extremes of self-sacrifice or harm. But I was a very literal child, and I took fundamentalist teachings in a very literal way. My mother never did, but she was also an adult when she became entrenched in fundamentalism. For children, I think it's extremely difficult to take such harsh teachings in stride--and just co-exist with them without being seriously harmed. Not that adult women aren't harmed by it as well, but they would certainly have more defenses ready than anyone could have developed in childhood.
I fortunately escaped that kind of extremist woman-hating theology and subsequent fear of my female-ness, but I developed OCD-like symptoms in response to my parents' focus on the Wrath of God. When I learned about the story of Isaac and Abraham, I worried that God would tell my parents (who were deeply influenced by Pentecostal thinking--and believed that God spoke directly to them) to kill me. And what if He forgot to stop them, and they had to kill me to prove their faithfulness to God? My family was fairly volatile and violent, and I don't doubt that some of this fear also came from the family dynamic. And we also focused on stories about people being punished by God for worshipping idols. Since my parents (in their Pentecostal phase) felt that humans could idolize just about anything, I went around thinking I could be struck down at any moment.
I didn't sleep for most of my childhood. Somewhat ironically (I guess), I now have a Lupus diagnosis and often feel that I could go on sleeping forever, I'm so tired. But I was always afraid. I can relate to that. And I took extreme measures to stave off the fear too.
ETA: Throughout those years of not sleeping, I remember frantically needing to "rebuke Satan" over and over for fear of being attacked in my sleep. It wasn't the average childhood nightmares, I don't think. Pentecostalism and I did not do well together.
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Post by Ex-Adriel on Aug 13, 2010 10:39:12 GMT -5
I think Pentacostalism and any literal or imaginative child would not do well together. Children tend to be more literal and accepting than adults anyway, and add a vivid imagination to that - recipe for emotional trauma.
I did the opposite - my spiritual link with my mother was how 'receptive' I was to the Holy Spirit. She practically whored me out to give interpretations and have dreams and to carry the "voice" of the Holy Spirit to her church companions.
So I slept allllll the time. I taught myself what I later learned is an actual trick people can teach - lucid dreaming. I learned to surf that edge of awakeness where you're just barely dreaming right before you fall asleep at night, and before you wake in the morning. I can be in that state for hours, just hovering and dipping barely into sleep. For me now, this means it takes hours for me to fall asleep at night, and it's incredibly hard to wake in the mornings. Ahh, programming.
I memorized all of the dreams I experienced in those times. When I learned that you have sleep cycles (I was maybe 12-13?) I started setting my alarm clock under my pillow at 3 hour increments so I could record those dreams as well. Nothing God spoke to me was going to go to waste.
It's scary now to look back, but at the time, it was perfectly plain that this was my 'gift' and I needed to respect it. When I didn't record my dreams, or when I was too busy to interpret them before I gave them to my mother, I would have terrible, vivid nightmares - I still do when I'm stressed out.
I really think I would be a lot less nervous and keyed-up as a person if I wasn't exposed to all of that 'spiritual warfare' and 'life of the spirit' stuff when I was so impressionable.
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Post by Ex-Adriel on Aug 13, 2010 10:49:08 GMT -5
I was glad for the direct quotations also. I know no-one sounds as smart when what they're saying is recorded directly - spoken English doesn't quite follow the same rules as written English, and most people don't sound quite as educated and intelligent when what they're speaking is simply transcribed (this is for people who don't speak with teleprompters or scripts).
HOWEVER - Between your quotes, and other people elsewhere quoting this man, I have to think that Branham was the most charismatic person on the planet.
He simply has to have been, because reading those quotes, and trying to imagine someone speaking them, all I'm getting is an uneducated, hateful, angry man spewing vindictive bile all over the place. I can't imagine voluntarily listening to this crap, even when I was in the middle of churches who essentially believed the same things.
The same sentiments were there, but nothing was ever so bluntly stated. There were lots of parables and reading particular verses or bible stories "AT" a certain family or individual, but nothing ever this harsh.
How on earth do so many people think this particular man holds the keys to heaven?
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Post by hopewell on Aug 13, 2010 11:18:50 GMT -5
You poor kid! What a mess!
Just when I think I've mastered the list of Christian wack-a-doodles, a new name surfaces. I somehow have missed Branham. I'm off to pray for you and to find out more about the nutjob-dejour!
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Post by Sierra on Aug 13, 2010 12:08:36 GMT -5
Since my parents (in their Pentecostal phase) felt that humans could idolize just about anything, I went around thinking I could be struck down at any moment. I didn't sleep for most of my childhood. Somewhat ironically (I guess), I now have a Lupus diagnosis and often feel that I could go on sleeping forever, I'm so tired. But I was always afraid. I can relate to that. And I took extreme measures to stave off the fear too. ETA: Throughout those years of not sleeping, I remember frantically needing to "rebuke Satan" over and over for fear of being attacked in my sleep. It wasn't the average childhood nightmares, I don't think. Pentecostalism and I did not do well together. Wow, km, what you wrote mirrors my experience, too. Since Branham was a faith healer/prophet, he allegedly saw demons in the form of black shrouds covering sick people. As a child, I used to lie awake in terror, rebuking the shadows in my room lest a demon enter my body and kill me. I became terrified of death around age 8, and kept repeating to myself every night, "I'm never gonna die," hoping to make the Rapture. I only fell asleep when I was totally exhausted with fear.
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Post by Ex-Adriel on Aug 13, 2010 12:15:24 GMT -5
That's awful. That sort of fear is something children anyone! should not have to deal with. It makes me so angry sometimes!
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Post by Sierra on Aug 13, 2010 12:29:34 GMT -5
I was glad for the direct quotations also. I know no-one sounds as smart when what they're saying is recorded directly - spoken English doesn't quite follow the same rules as written English, and most people don't sound quite as educated and intelligent when what they're speaking is simply transcribed (this is for people who don't speak with teleprompters or scripts). HOWEVER - Between your quotes, and other people elsewhere quoting this man, I have to think that Branham was the most charismatic person on the planet. He simply has to have been, because reading those quotes, and trying to imagine someone speaking them, all I'm getting is an uneducated, hateful, angry man spewing vindictive bile all over the place. I can't imagine voluntarily listening to this crap, even when I was in the middle of churches who essentially believed the same things. You got it right with Branham's charisma. The sermons were delivered in the classic Pentecostal style: lots of trembling emotion, following by bursts of screaming. The section I quoted about leering men was probably (though I haven't listened to the audio in a while) delivered in a solemn, sorrowful voice. Listeners got the sense that Branham mourned for the sins of the worldly and the fate that awaited them. But aside from his sermon delivery, Branham was renowned for having the spirit of Christ in his private dealings with people. He was allegedly the sweetest, humblest, gentlest person many had ever met - he made you feel more important than he was when you sat in a room with him, one of his followers said. (I think it may have been Pearry Green, but I can't be sure anymore.) The disconnect between his behavior in private and his screaming delivery of the Message was taken as evidence of the fact that he was under the control of the spirit of God/Elijah when he was at the pulpit. Thus, it wasn't Branham who was screaming about your sins - it was the anointing. Add to this the fact that Branham used to swoon and faint during prayer lines, and, well, he seemed like just a pawn of the spirit of God.
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em
Full Member
Posts: 176
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Post by em on Aug 13, 2010 12:48:40 GMT -5
Holy crap, Sierra. Those nightmares about your dad cutting off your curves? Wow. I'm given to vivid nightmares myself, and geez I can't imagine how scarring those would be.
I feel snobby saying it, but I really doubt I'd ever be able to take any Branham seriously. He just sounds like such a totally uneducated, ignorant, stupid hick. I wonder how on earth people could listen to him, let alone listen to him spew such stupid, crazy ideas.
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Post by usotsuki on Aug 13, 2010 13:03:37 GMT -5
He just sounds like such a totally uneducated, ignorant, stupid hick. Isn't that exactly what he was? *hides*
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Tor
New Member
Posts: 9
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Post by Tor on Aug 13, 2010 13:27:58 GMT -5
I think Pentacostalism and any literal or imaginative child would not do well together. Children tend to be more literal and accepting than adults anyway, and add a vivid imagination to that - recipe for emotional trauma. I still am a person with the right amount of stress and sleep-deprivation, can believe that there are demons around and duck under my blanket at night hoping to not see them. The power of demons over me and my family was huge - and mostly because we gave into that power. Yes, there were "demons" but only because we gave into the fear of their existence. The messages in my church were far more subtle, but there just the same. Dress modestly, for the sake of not causing men to stumble - with the implied "it's your fault that if they do." Interestingly, it made me develop a fear of conservative Christians males more than any other. I feel safer on my secular college campus than I do at church, because I have a fear that churched men are the ones more likely to take advantage of a someone with the excuse "well, she was asking for it by the way she dressed."
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phatchick
Junior Member
Medicated for Your Protection
Posts: 80
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Post by phatchick on Aug 13, 2010 13:32:06 GMT -5
Oh, hon, I just don't have the words. {{{{{Sierra}}}}}
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Post by sargassosea on Aug 13, 2010 15:11:48 GMT -5
It’s horrifying how a girl’s world can to devolve into a place where the only control she can have is over her basic need for biological fuel. The strength of will required to deny oneself such a requirement is something which boggles the mind, yet is sadly wasted on the attempt to bend ourselves into something that we are not in the attempt please someone (or something) else. Would that we could redirect all of that strength-of-will women and girls possess! We could surely do away with a whole host of things which oppress us. Surely we could. Glad you’re in the land of the living and being, Sierra. **** And a last second addition dovetailing nicely with what Deborah wrote about modesty and *stumbles* a piece at Sociological Images entitled: Guys on Immodesty, Lust, and the Violence of Women’s Bodies ( thesocietypages.org/socimages/2010/07/27/guys-on-immodesty-lust-and-the-violence-of-womens-bodies/) Apologies if this has already been posted somewhere here already…
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Post by km on Aug 13, 2010 15:28:20 GMT -5
Would that we could redirect all of that strength-of-will women and girls possess! We could surely do away with a whole host of things which oppress us. Surely we could. Seems to me that this is something that this blog is working precisely to do.
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Post by coleslaw on Aug 13, 2010 16:14:56 GMT -5
Ah, the so-called Modesty Survey. I have my own warped take on that here.
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Post by livingforeternity on Aug 13, 2010 16:32:23 GMT -5
I am dealing with a situation with my daughter's choice of clothing. A mom came to me and said they were playing a game and my daughter bent over and cleavage was revealed. She was fine standing up it was just when she bent over. This mom said she wanted to protect her man. My problem is why is it always a women's fault? What about the man who was looking with lust. Shouldn't he be rebuked for looking and lusting?
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Post by nikita on Aug 13, 2010 16:43:43 GMT -5
I am dealing with a situation with my daughter's choice of clothing. A mom came to me and said they were playing a game and my daughter bent over and cleavage was revealed. She was fine standing up it was just when she bent over. This mom said she wanted to protect her man. My problem is why is it always a women's fault? What about the man who was looking with lust. Shouldn't he be rebuked for looking and lusting? In the 'regular' world men are either openly piggish or very embarrassed at being caught looking when a girl bends over and accidentally exposes her cleavage in that way. Why is it in the 'church' world men aren't embarrassed at all but look upon it as a free pass to ogle and then throw up their hands and eschew all blame for their actions? It's so ass-backwards. To me the proper response to a woman who complains that her husband is looking down the blouse of my daughter is to rebuke the husband for ogling my offspring. He should be ashamed of himself.
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Post by km on Aug 13, 2010 17:09:42 GMT -5
I am dealing with a situation with my daughter's choice of clothing. A mom came to me and said they were playing a game and my daughter bent over and cleavage was revealed. She was fine standing up it was just when she bent over. This mom said she wanted to protect her man. My problem is why is it always a women's fault? What about the man who was looking with lust. Shouldn't he be rebuked for looking and lusting? In the 'regular' world men are either openly piggish or very embarrassed at being caught looking when a girl bends over and accidentally exposes her cleavage in that way. Why is it in the 'church' world men aren't embarrassed at all but look upon it as a free pass to ogle and then throw up their hands and eschew all blame for their actions? It's so ass-backwards. To me the proper response to a woman who complains that her husband is looking down the blouse of my daughter is to rebuke the husband for ogling my offspring. He should be ashamed of himself. Absolutely. It never ceases to amaze me when this is interpreted instead as the young girl not living up to her role as her "brother's keeper." Ugh... I prefer the real world.
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Post by fabucat on Aug 13, 2010 17:30:25 GMT -5
WOW! This is some of the best writing ever on the internet, because it's so heartfelt.
You know, the neo-cons who got us into our two current wars say that we are fighting the jihadists who treat women like second class citizens. I really didn't think that any Christian sect treated women as badly as radical Islam sects. All of this talk about "modesty" is why women in Afghanistan wear burquas in 100 degree weather. Christian sects like Burnham or Gotham's appear to have a lot in common with radical Islam. What really got me was when I read on this website that some women subjected to spiritual abuse in Christian cults had to wear headcoverings.
I understand that many Muslim women wear the hijab and I'm quite used to it. But when was it a requirement for Christian women. Maybe someone can correct me, but I don't recall anything in Christian history or dogma which required females to wear headcoverings.
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Post by km on Aug 13, 2010 17:40:14 GMT -5
WOW! This is some of the best writing ever on the internet, because it's so heartfelt. You know, the neo-cons who got us into our two current wars say that we are fighting the jihadists who treat women like second class citizens. I really didn't think that any Christian sect treated women as badly as radical Islam sects. All of this talk about "modesty" is why women in Afghanistan wear burquas in 100 degree weather. Christian sects like Burnham or Gotham's appear to have a lot in common with radical Islam. What really got me was when I read on this website that some women subjected to spiritual abuse in Christian cults had to wear headcoverings. I understand that many Muslim women wear the hijab and I'm quite used to it. But when was it a requirement for Christian women. Maybe someone can correct me, but I don't recall anything in Christian history or dogma which required females to wear headcoverings. I think fundamentalism in general has quite a lot in common with itself. And I don't really think it's about the hijab either...
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Post by coleslaw on Aug 13, 2010 17:51:31 GMT -5
I am dealing with a situation with my daughter's choice of clothing. A mom came to me and said they were playing a game and my daughter bent over and cleavage was revealed. She was fine standing up it was just when she bent over. This mom said she wanted to protect her man. My problem is why is it always a women's fault? What about the man who was looking with lust. Shouldn't he be rebuked for looking and lusting? That sounds so pathetic. I can imagine being totally at a loss for words in the face of someone who cannot trust her husband not to lust after young girls. I mean, what do you say? "I'm sorry your husband is such a disappointment to you"? "You deserve better than a man who checks out every woman's clothing to see what he can get a glimpse of"? "You're joking, right?"
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Post by arietty on Aug 13, 2010 18:17:11 GMT -5
Ah, the so-called Modesty Survey. I have my own warped take on that here. "So, ladies, do you want to get young Ezekiel's attention at the next youth barbecue? Here's what you do. "HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA ~~~ I feel like saying this to the boys who filled out this survey about the badness of girls having backs and breasts and shapes. Boys, you're young. You will see stuff that arouses you and you will get aroused just from things floating through your head for 1 second. This is not sin, it's biology. If it causes you discomfort or embarrassment take yourself to a bathroom and let biology take its course, you will be able to focus fine on other things after that. Repeat until age catches up with you. I am quite sure all this endless thinking about how to not be aroused and how to never ever masturbate as promoted by these teachings results in a sex obsessed culture, only everything is flipped on it's head. Instead of talking about girls being hot you talk about how girls being hot is BAD. But, duh, you are still talking about girls being hot, only now it's a very bad thing that is the girl's fault.
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