.
alright it has only taken me 25 years but i have worked out how they get you to believe.. in all the publications they always present both sides of the story in a logical and often scientific way.
this makes you feel that you don't have to research further because you already know the other side.. the truth is they don't have the truth.
LOL - HA, I love that.
Haven't heard that argument, but, yeah, logic fails them there.
A criticism the JWs *regularly* levelled at false religion was how it 'locked in' the worshippers to their religion, and didn't allow them to learn about other religions.
What they MEANT was 'didn't allow them to learn about HOW TO GIVE US THEIR MONEY'
i have often wondered if many people would be better off if they stayed witnesses.
some people i have known have really gone off the deep end after they left the watchtower.
most all of my family have left now (not due to me as i was cut off from them for years) and many others i know who have left are now bitter atheists or have become pagans and worship stones or new ageers playing with crystals.
But, just to be clear, you DO accept microevolution?
Since the evidence is quite clear on THAT....
And you then hold that no amount of small changes could change a species in any *significant* way?
...which is all the macroevolution requires?
i have been studying to become a witness for about 1yr now and am doing what i can to become clean to be baptised.
unfortunately almost all of my friends were bad associations and i don't deal with them anymore.
i am looking for people to chat with who have the same goals in mind that i do.
I am looking into other religions and have been wondering if maybe just studying the bible and praying and keeping a clean lifestyle on my own is enough
Oh, fine, I'll offer one more thought....
YES, if you must believe the bible as a crutch, JUST STUDYING IT ON YOUR OWN IS FINE. Maybe find a more open, non-apocalyptic church, like the Universal Unitarians.
The JWs will tell you it is NOT okay to just study the bible. Indeed, you will find many meetings of theirs you can sit through using just their own literature alone and not opening the bible once. It is also NOT okay to miss meetings once you join. And NOT okay to miss field service - any one of those will doom you to death at Armageddon , according to them. And, if you don't SHUN friends and family members (IE, don't talk with them, don't associate with them) if they've turned their back on the religion, you are just as doomed...
Does that seem right to you? For a christian group?
Edited by - Xander on 18 December 2002 10:47:22
i have been studying to become a witness for about 1yr now and am doing what i can to become clean to be baptised.
unfortunately almost all of my friends were bad associations and i don't deal with them anymore.
i am looking for people to chat with who have the same goals in mind that i do.
drugs and the bisexuality almost destroyed my marriage.
REALLY??!?
I can see LESBIAL urges 'almost destroying your marriage' - but BISEXUAL??? As in, you, husband, another chick? Destroying your marriage?!??!?
n/m - girl you got OTHER issues....
admitted into a hospital for trying to commit suicide
AHHHH!!! You've ALREADY tried to commit suicide and you're STUDYING WITH WITNESSES!?!?!?!
{oh, I want no more part of this.....}
Edited by - Xander on 18 December 2002 10:41:56
this is part of someone else's post;.
"we had a controversy recently related to this.
our last pastor (a great guy, a harvard grad and a ph.d.) said he would not marry persons with one address (they could live together and fornicate all they wished, they just could not flaunt it) and some condemned him for intolerance!
Religious rules for sexual relations are irritating to begin with.
The whole point is obviously to excercise control over people. Very irritating. And, of course, society is completely ruled over by the religious minority - hence the 'morals' that don't make any logical sense. (IE., 'murder is wrong' - THAT is a moral that makes sense. 'sex before marriage is wrong' ??? where'd that one come from? OH!, That's right - your invisible friend n/m)
Edited by - Xander on 18 December 2002 10:29:22
i have often wondered if many people would be better off if they stayed witnesses.
some people i have known have really gone off the deep end after they left the watchtower.
most all of my family have left now (not due to me as i was cut off from them for years) and many others i know who have left are now bitter atheists or have become pagans and worship stones or new ageers playing with crystals.
Jerry, I read somewhere that Dolphins have sex for pleasure too.
That data was a LITTLE misleading. Dolphins have 'recreational sex', which isn't REALLY the same thing. ('Recreational', as in, the female of the species does indicate when she can conceive, as most species do, and dolphins are one of relatively few species - humans included - that will have sex anyway when it is not possible for conception, hence - 'recreational').
my response is we must have been created to find it pleasurable because if we didn't find it pleasurable we wouldn't ever have done it (and thus we would not have reproduced in the first place).
Well, see, that's not true, and you thus betray your lack of understanding of evolution. We almost certainly did it instinctively, as all other animals do, for most of our prehistory. As sentience started entering our species, the process surely continued. However, as cause->effect relationships started being understood, and the sex->childbirth relationship surely was. Thus, if the only thing to come of sex was a painful delivery, it would be unlikely to happen. If it was enjoyed, it would be more likely to occur. Those who actually enjoyed it would thus have more reproductive success than those who hated it (IE., have more kids because they have sex more often). Thousands of generations of that gets you to where we are today.
Edited by - Xander on 18 December 2002 10:24:45
Hmmmmm....well, I dunno....
Voyager was, by far, the worst of the series. A few of the episodes, MAYBE, had tolerable plots, but most sucked. Kate Mulgrew does have a cameo in the new movie, but her acting (if you can call it that), has NOT improved.
(It's not just Voyager she can't act in - have you seen her in ANYTHING? OMG - who gave that woman a job!!)
Uh, I don't know, the TNG-Borg and TNG-Klingons I've always disliked. They are too transparent villians.
What was best about TOS Trek was that there weren't any 'good guys' and 'bad guys'. It was just different empires in space, each with their own, sometimes conflicting, agendas. There weren't barbaric, warrior races (Klingons) that logic would tell us were quite incapable of stopping fighting and studying science enough to become spacefaring.
There also weren't transparent 'super-villians' like the Borg Queen (to be fair, the Borg, as originally conceived and executed up to about Season 3 TNG WERE pretty decent villians, but it was downhill from there...completely bottoming out as bad guys in Voyager).
So, in short, I liked this movie, but I appear to disagree with you on every point in your post. So you'll probably hate it.
i was just thinking.
since christmas is about the birth of christ, i know dec 25 was not his birthday, probly born around late sept or early oct. i guess he wanted to be born right before the baseball playoffs and world series, just kidding.
it was the early christian church that appointed dec 25th.
No, what he is saying is:
1) There is no such thing as god
2) Christmas is not a solely religious holiday
3) Thus, celebrating christmas is NOT acknowledging 'gods' existence
4) Even if it WAS 'acknowledging gods existence' (it isn't) he could STILL choose to celebrate it because an atheist DOES NOT OPPOSE GOD YOU DIMWIT. He just doesn't believe he exists. What's so hard to understand about this?
If I told you Dec 31st/Jan 1st was my invisible friends birthday, and by celebrating ANYTHING on January 1st, you'd be celebrating my invisible friend's birth and thus acknowledging you are a liar as a christian and wholely worship my invisible friend, what would your reaction be?
It would be: WTF are you talking about? Your invisible friend has no meaning to me, I'll do whatever I want on Jan 1st!!
That's EXACTLY what Funky is saying about Dec 25th. You can claim it has whatever meaning you want TO YOU - it does NOT mean it has that meaning to ANYONE else, and, thus, they can do WHATEVER they want to or not want to, on that day.
Edited by - Xander on 18 December 2002 8:17:38
the man who admitted he attempted to murder the priest whom he accused of molesting him 10 years earlier was acquited.
mind you, the priest was never convicted on any charges.
because one law is violated, it's ok to break another law?.
The judge can always throw the verdict out.
That everyone on the jury came to the conclusion there wasn't enough evidence...
Then the judge didn't throw the verdict out...
And the state's not appealing?
I'd say there just wasn't enough evidence. I mean, yeah, "Man was molested as boy" "Man bought gun" "Man arrested, charged with attempting to kill priest who molested him" would SEEM to indicate a specific chain of events.
I don't think juries make verdicts based on 3 lines of text, though. There was obviously more to the case than what YOU are using to base your judgement (RE: this is a miscarriage of justice) on.
IE, you are making assumtions of guilt based on the incomplete information you have.
Edited by - Xander on 17 December 2002 13:43:55
i was just thinking.
since christmas is about the birth of christ, i know dec 25 was not his birthday, probly born around late sept or early oct. i guess he wanted to be born right before the baseball playoffs and world series, just kidding.
it was the early christian church that appointed dec 25th.
AH-HAH!!!
I see the problem!!!
Clash has confused ATHEIST with SATANIST!
Yes, THERE is the issue.....
A SATANIST believes there IS god, and every action is done to oppose him.
An ATHEIST does not believe in god, and thus, does not measure his actions as to whether or not they have anything to do with your invisible friend.
A SATANIST should not celebrate christmas, since he DOES believe god/christ exists, and opposes them, celebrating the birth of christ would be hypocritical.
An ATHEIST can celebrate christmas or not, it's up to him. Nothing of importance happened on that day in history to the atheist, nor is associated with that day, so whether he celebrates or not is strictly based on whether he wants to participate in the secular holiday or not.
See, the difference is, a SATANIST cares and opposes what a christian thinks, and ATHEIST does not. That Easter is a celebrated as a religious holiday is significant to you and the SATANIST, but matters not at all to the ATHEIST.
AND, HERE IS THE KEY:
If an ATHEIST is deciding whether or not to celebrate a holiday, ALL HE IS CONSIDERING is whether or not he wants to enjoy the festivities and social gatherings or events associated with it or not. NOTHING MORE OR LESS. That the holiday may (or may not) have any religious significance to christians, hindus, buddhists, pagans, jews, or muslims doesn't even factor into his decision in ANY WAY.
IOW, an ATHEIST 'lives his belief' (using your term) merely by NOT INCLUDING 'GOD' IN HIS DECISION AT ALL.
A SATANIST, on the other hand, in deciding whether or not to celebrate a holiday, HAS TO CONSIDER whether or not god is involved, and how. Then, he decides whether he should celebrate the holiday as it is, or have a special version of the holiday to oppose god.
IOW, A SATANIST 'lives his belief' by ACCEPTING GOD AS REAL AND FACTORING THAT IN HIS DECISION.
