And all ring hallow, as excuses and not reasonable answers.... I'll add more thoughts later.
King Solomon
JoinedPosts by King Solomon
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7
If God Doesn't Interfere with Free Will, Why Pray for Others?
by leavingwt injohn w. loftus asks the question in this post at his blog.. .
when terrible things happen, god is hidden in a way that make him seem non-existent.. .
so, why pray for someone to be saved, or to travel safe, etc, etc?.
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If God Doesn't Interfere with Free Will, Why Pray for Others?
by leavingwt injohn w. loftus asks the question in this post at his blog.. .
when terrible things happen, god is hidden in a way that make him seem non-existent.. .
so, why pray for someone to be saved, or to travel safe, etc, etc?.
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King Solomon
And all ring hallow, as excuses and not reasonable answers.... I'll add more thoughts later.
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7
If God Doesn't Interfere with Free Will, Why Pray for Others?
by leavingwt injohn w. loftus asks the question in this post at his blog.. .
when terrible things happen, god is hidden in a way that make him seem non-existent.. .
so, why pray for someone to be saved, or to travel safe, etc, etc?.
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King Solomon
A philosopher tends to focus on free will vs pre-destiny element, which arises via God's omniscience (including knowing future events; a prerequisite of prophecying); the other aspect of free will is who has the authority, ie God's Divine Will vs mans free will (using a Bible-trained conscience for all matters not dictated by Divine Will).
This case is pertaining to the former usage, and raises the theodicy question ("why does God allow evil to continue?") that theologians have debated for centuries, yet the question remains (and some whacky explanations have been floated by Xian apologists).
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think i'm becoming an atheist
by rather be in hades ini was just thinking about how often i prayed when i was going downhill.. now i subscribed wholeheartedly to the 'don't pray for bullshit requests' concept, so at first i rarely prayed.. starting around middle school, 9/10 i prayed for friends.
didn't really pray to stop the teasing, my fists did some of that and besides...racism isn't/wasn't jehovah's fault anyway and i can't pray for that to end when he allowed the witnesses to suffer in ww2.. through high school, same issue and then when i started pioneering and hanging out with some of the other witnesses, those prayers prayers for friends intensified cuz they were asses.. but they were dominated by the prayers to love god starting around 15. i didn't want to read the magazines, despite how much i love reading.
didn't want to stdy the lessons, didn't want to plan my presentations, though i did enjoy giving the talks and crafting them.
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King Solomon
"I find it ironic that Atheists have a habit of touting the believe in only what you can prove, but are the loudest about stating there is no god .. so my response.. prove it."
While I cannot prove the non-existence of a deistic God who wishes to hide (no one can, although God himself could solve the whole silly question yesterday, if He wanted to!), I sure can disprove beyond a reasonable doubt that YHWH, the God depicted in Abrahamic religions, is a creation of mortals. They wrote fatal continuity errors in the Bible, not to mention just flat-out untruths and scientific inaccuracies which, while maybe they were the best information in 400BC, are now just known to be flat-out wrong, incorrect.
(it's OT in this thread, but ask and I'll start a new one.)
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WT Society Feels they are Above the Laws of the Land - Even in their own....
by flipper in...... words.
knowing that the candace conti child abuse case was probably coming down the turnpike as was the 5 out of court child abuse settlements the wt society settled in san diego, california - this past april as most of you know the wt society sent a secret letter instructing all elders to essentially keep their " pie-holes " shut ( mouths for those not hip to modern lingo ) and essentially instructed them to not divulge anything to any authorities investigating crimes or other information concerning wt organization operations.. someone posted a thread on this in april, however - with all the news coming out about wt child abuse coverups, the anonymous organization investigating the wt society , i felt it important to reveal some snippets of what the wt society instructed their elders regarding legal issues.
in one section it states, " when someone seeks confidential information : you should never reveal confidential information to anyone unless theocratic procedure requires it or the branch office has instructed you to do so.
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King Solomon
Bnm said:
"KS, Undercover Officers would be really helpful. In the meantime, some of us have to do what we can to get justice. That's the reason why I am still attending the meetings. I have gathered some very useful evidences."
Good: more power to you (and don't get caught, or they'll set their Shun Guns to "super-ignore"!)
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WT Society Feels they are Above the Laws of the Land - Even in their own....
by flipper in...... words.
knowing that the candace conti child abuse case was probably coming down the turnpike as was the 5 out of court child abuse settlements the wt society settled in san diego, california - this past april as most of you know the wt society sent a secret letter instructing all elders to essentially keep their " pie-holes " shut ( mouths for those not hip to modern lingo ) and essentially instructed them to not divulge anything to any authorities investigating crimes or other information concerning wt organization operations.. someone posted a thread on this in april, however - with all the news coming out about wt child abuse coverups, the anonymous organization investigating the wt society , i felt it important to reveal some snippets of what the wt society instructed their elders regarding legal issues.
in one section it states, " when someone seeks confidential information : you should never reveal confidential information to anyone unless theocratic procedure requires it or the branch office has instructed you to do so.
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King Solomon
Cheriko said:
"Because the Governing Body and the Society (and by extension the elders) represent Jehovah, I was told, it is ultimately they who are to be obeyed. In essence, that confirms the proposition in the title of the thread. They are indeed, in their own minds, above the law of the land."
Oh, I fully understand the reference, which any ex-JW knows. But it's another matter of proving it in these types of situations, because non-specific talk about principles is cheap, and doesn't present much in the way of evidence (it's also likely protected under freedom of religion protections)....
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think i'm becoming an atheist
by rather be in hades ini was just thinking about how often i prayed when i was going downhill.. now i subscribed wholeheartedly to the 'don't pray for bullshit requests' concept, so at first i rarely prayed.. starting around middle school, 9/10 i prayed for friends.
didn't really pray to stop the teasing, my fists did some of that and besides...racism isn't/wasn't jehovah's fault anyway and i can't pray for that to end when he allowed the witnesses to suffer in ww2.. through high school, same issue and then when i started pioneering and hanging out with some of the other witnesses, those prayers prayers for friends intensified cuz they were asses.. but they were dominated by the prayers to love god starting around 15. i didn't want to read the magazines, despite how much i love reading.
didn't want to stdy the lessons, didn't want to plan my presentations, though i did enjoy giving the talks and crafting them.
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King Solomon
NC brings up a good point about not needing to go to agnostic first: to be honest, I was kinda young when I asked the big questions that couldn't be answered (mine was, if God made everything, including Satan, where did evil come from?" After the usual nonsense that I knew was BS, there was nothing but crickets chirping...).
So I went through the motions of attending meetings, FS, (well, i HAD to: you cant exactly call the shots when youre living under Moms roof!), but i only wanted to play music (in a family of musicians) and as time went on, I did too. God wasn't even a thought, before too long....
(and college sealed it: you cannot study biological sciences and make any sense of all life, unless as seen thru the lenses evolution provides: it's THAT critical of a unifying theory.)
It's trite to say, but the less time spent looking back is time you can spend looking forward: that's all you CAN control, anyway: tomorrow...
(pssstt, how was that, NC? Am I off probation now?)
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43
think i'm becoming an atheist
by rather be in hades ini was just thinking about how often i prayed when i was going downhill.. now i subscribed wholeheartedly to the 'don't pray for bullshit requests' concept, so at first i rarely prayed.. starting around middle school, 9/10 i prayed for friends.
didn't really pray to stop the teasing, my fists did some of that and besides...racism isn't/wasn't jehovah's fault anyway and i can't pray for that to end when he allowed the witnesses to suffer in ww2.. through high school, same issue and then when i started pioneering and hanging out with some of the other witnesses, those prayers prayers for friends intensified cuz they were asses.. but they were dominated by the prayers to love god starting around 15. i didn't want to read the magazines, despite how much i love reading.
didn't want to stdy the lessons, didn't want to plan my presentations, though i did enjoy giving the talks and crafting them.
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King Solomon
"Congratulations... Though you may want to read up on the subject. There is a lot to read about the question of whether there is a God or not."
I dunno: if you don't have doubts by Gen 3, and you're not really questioning by Gen 9, there's a problem...
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43
WT Society Feels they are Above the Laws of the Land - Even in their own....
by flipper in...... words.
knowing that the candace conti child abuse case was probably coming down the turnpike as was the 5 out of court child abuse settlements the wt society settled in san diego, california - this past april as most of you know the wt society sent a secret letter instructing all elders to essentially keep their " pie-holes " shut ( mouths for those not hip to modern lingo ) and essentially instructed them to not divulge anything to any authorities investigating crimes or other information concerning wt organization operations.. someone posted a thread on this in april, however - with all the news coming out about wt child abuse coverups, the anonymous organization investigating the wt society , i felt it important to reveal some snippets of what the wt society instructed their elders regarding legal issues.
in one section it states, " when someone seeks confidential information : you should never reveal confidential information to anyone unless theocratic procedure requires it or the branch office has instructed you to do so.
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King Solomon
Blindnomore, well that's a whole 'nuther ball of wax: destruction of evidence, interference with an active Police investigation, etc.
Problem is, you'd need someone inside the organization to turn informant, as it's extremely difficult for LEOs to penetrate a cultish closed society (like trying to send undercover officers into Amish: they'd stick out like a sore thumb).
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43
think i'm becoming an atheist
by rather be in hades ini was just thinking about how often i prayed when i was going downhill.. now i subscribed wholeheartedly to the 'don't pray for bullshit requests' concept, so at first i rarely prayed.. starting around middle school, 9/10 i prayed for friends.
didn't really pray to stop the teasing, my fists did some of that and besides...racism isn't/wasn't jehovah's fault anyway and i can't pray for that to end when he allowed the witnesses to suffer in ww2.. through high school, same issue and then when i started pioneering and hanging out with some of the other witnesses, those prayers prayers for friends intensified cuz they were asses.. but they were dominated by the prayers to love god starting around 15. i didn't want to read the magazines, despite how much i love reading.
didn't want to stdy the lessons, didn't want to plan my presentations, though i did enjoy giving the talks and crafting them.
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King Solomon
PS when you're ready, though, we do have a baptism ceremony. Well, not really: it's just a hot-tub, and a few beers... Turns out that's all you really need....