John_Mann,
It was not Christianity the cause of your deception.
Christianity is a deception - it is based on an ancient, Jewish etiological myth (the story of Adam & Eve).
sometimes theists challenge atheists about what evidence would be required before they would believe.
various unlikely scenarios are offered in reply.
i have taken the bait myself in the past.. i think the correct answer is much more ordinary.
John_Mann,
It was not Christianity the cause of your deception.
Christianity is a deception - it is based on an ancient, Jewish etiological myth (the story of Adam & Eve).
sometimes theists challenge atheists about what evidence would be required before they would believe.
various unlikely scenarios are offered in reply.
i have taken the bait myself in the past.. i think the correct answer is much more ordinary.
John_Mann,
BTW,
How does it happen that all Christians don't believe the same things? What causes this?
It is certainly puzzling why sincere and devout people equally seek God's will and pray to him yet they all come up with different answers so that there are approximately 40,000 different Christian denominations (Center for the Study of Global Christianity (CSGC) at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary).
If God has a relationship with every Christian and every Christian is praying to him then wouldn't he tell every Christian the same thing so that Christians would agree on matters of doctrine and practice?
Shouldn't anyone who has a relationship with Jesus, reads the Bible, and listens to the Holy Spirit come to the same conclusions as others who are doing the same thing?
Aren't Jesus and the Holy Spirit capable of communicating the same ideas, beliefs, and practices to all of his followers so that sincere and devout Christians would all agree on what Jesus is telling them?
sometimes theists challenge atheists about what evidence would be required before they would believe.
various unlikely scenarios are offered in reply.
i have taken the bait myself in the past.. i think the correct answer is much more ordinary.
John_Mann,
It was not Christianity the cause of your deception.
Why don't the traditional Protestants believe what the Catholics believe?
Maybe because the Protestants were deceived by the Catholics?
alone, without my safety net of "god" being there to remember me when i die.
after much consideration, examining science, history and using logic, i have come to the conclusion that there is no "god" at least certainly no loving, personal "god.
" shortly before my final conclusion was reached, i read an excerpt from an expression attributed to marcus aurelius, .
Perry,
According to you, your mother's soul lives on after she died, so, have you heard from your mother since she died?
Please let us know if you do.
Please be sure to ask your Mom about her conversations with God and what he told her.
alone, without my safety net of "god" being there to remember me when i die.
after much consideration, examining science, history and using logic, i have come to the conclusion that there is no "god" at least certainly no loving, personal "god.
" shortly before my final conclusion was reached, i read an excerpt from an expression attributed to marcus aurelius, .
Perry,
According to the WT February 2017 par.12, p.26 - "The Governing Body is neither inspired nor infallible."
So the GB has admitted that God/the Holy Spirit does not speak to /communicate with them. Yet you claim that the Holy Spirit spoke to you/communicated with you belatedly regarding your mother's death.
So the Holy Spirit contacts you but not the GB?
Why would the Holy Spirit contact/speak to/communicate with you but not the GB?
Isn't the GB equally seeking God's will and praying to him, so why isn't God answering them, communicating with them, speaking with them, contacting them?
Also, didn't Jesus promise that he would send the Holy Spirit, the helper, to teach, remind, guide etc persons into all the truth?
John 14:16 - 17, 26:
"And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— the Spirit of truth............But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you."
John 15:26:
“When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father—the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father—he will testify about me."
John 16:7,13 - 15:
"But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.
But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the spirit will receive from me what he will make known to you."
Apparently the GB is way, way down on Jesus' and the Holy Spirit's list?
alone, without my safety net of "god" being there to remember me when i die.
after much consideration, examining science, history and using logic, i have come to the conclusion that there is no "god" at least certainly no loving, personal "god.
" shortly before my final conclusion was reached, i read an excerpt from an expression attributed to marcus aurelius, .
alone, without my safety net of "god" being there to remember me when i die.
after much consideration, examining science, history and using logic, i have come to the conclusion that there is no "god" at least certainly no loving, personal "god.
" shortly before my final conclusion was reached, i read an excerpt from an expression attributed to marcus aurelius, .
Hello Perry,
Condolences on the passing of your mother. I do not wish to sound insensitive to your loss but must ask:
What function(s) was your mother's soul responsible for during her lifetime versus during her end of life experience?
Where was your mother's soul hiding? Area after area of the brain has yielded up its secrets to the probing of neuroscience, and not a trace of the soul has been found.
Can you definitively prove that:
- your mother's brain, though eaten up with cancer, Alzheimer's etc was not the source of her behaviour during her final hours?
- whatever behaviour your mother experienced during her final hours was taking place separately from her brain?
What if your mother was not dying from Alzheimer's, brain tumor etc but was dying from something else that did not impact her brain and yet her end of life behaviour was nevertheless the same, and she screamed the same words: "I don't want to die" and yelled out other fears shortly before her death?
Would you also conclude that this behaviour was taking place separately from her brain?
jws are known to have an obsession and preoccupation with demons.. this obsession and preoccupation is not without merit given that jesus, his disciples/apostles, and the general public of 1st century ce judea and galilee are reported as believing in the existence of demonic spirits and in the possibility of demon possession of an individual.. exorcism formed a large part of jesus' ministry on earth.
the gospels and the book of acts describe many exorcisms where jesus and his disciples release people from demonic possession.. ___ .
but how do demons get inside a person's brain or body?
So Jesus warned:
Matthew 12:43 - 45:
" “When an impure spirit comes out of a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’ When it arrives, it finds the house unoccupied, swept clean and put in order. Then it goes and takes with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that person is worse than the first. That is how it will be with this wicked generation.” "
But then God subsequently cleansed the heavens to protect his spiritual family by sending the demons down to the earth (Revelation 12:7-12). Now his physical family has to fight them.
It was important for God to get rid of these pesky demons from heaven but then he gave them to mankind to deal with and we now have to fight them. WT#!
Maybe Jesus needs to have a word with God about this............didn't God know that the demons will infiltrate our minds when they are blank, before he did this?
jws are known to have an obsession and preoccupation with demons.. this obsession and preoccupation is not without merit given that jesus, his disciples/apostles, and the general public of 1st century ce judea and galilee are reported as believing in the existence of demonic spirits and in the possibility of demon possession of an individual.. exorcism formed a large part of jesus' ministry on earth.
the gospels and the book of acts describe many exorcisms where jesus and his disciples release people from demonic possession.. ___ .
but how do demons get inside a person's brain or body?
Fair enough, point taken.
jws are known to have an obsession and preoccupation with demons.. this obsession and preoccupation is not without merit given that jesus, his disciples/apostles, and the general public of 1st century ce judea and galilee are reported as believing in the existence of demonic spirits and in the possibility of demon possession of an individual.. exorcism formed a large part of jesus' ministry on earth.
the gospels and the book of acts describe many exorcisms where jesus and his disciples release people from demonic possession.. ___ .
but how do demons get inside a person's brain or body?
David_Jay,
I just thought that I would include the info regarding the neurological and psychological processes involved in a séance given that although your comment acknowledged these non-supernatural explanations, you also hinted that it could be otherwise:
Again this may not have been the cause of the alleged possession, but the family was not religious at the time of the so-called events........