Posts by czarofmischief

rather than hijacking lostreality's "question" topic, and frannie's post---i began to think of movies that were particularly moving to me...... there have been many throughout the years, but right off the top of my head i'd have to say "imitation of life" (lana turner), "love is a many splendored thing" (william holden), "the way we were" (barbra streisand) and "evergreen" (barbra streisand) that really made me lose it in the theater.. what movies struck *you* the hardest?.

annie....who should have invested in the kleenex corp)

czarofmischief

I enjoyed Les Miserables with Liam Neeson and Geoffrey Rush a lot. Also Shine, with Rush.

Fearless with Jeff Bridges is just a gorgeous portrait of a character and life and death.

Bringing out the Dead with Nicolas Cage is deeply moving - when the drug dealer is impaled on the fence and they are cutting him free - he is dangling out over the city with sparks from the torch flying everywhere into the city lights and he smiles, spits blood and says, "It's beautiful. Look. It's beautiful." And it is.

I've always wept at Saving Private Ryan - that damnable coward got his buddy killed... god I hated him.

CZAR

17

Comments You Will Not Hear at the 1-2-05 WT Study

by blondie in

comments you will not hear at the 01-02-05 wt study (november 15, 2004 issue)

review comments

will be in black and parentheses ().

czarofmischief

It's amazing how twenty odd paragraphs can still say absolutely NOTHING. I mean NOTHING. Passive writing, third person, hypotheticals... my god, if I was trying to I couldn't write twenty paragraphs of NOTHING.

No wonder the dubs spend so much time trying to interpret the nuances of words and the meanings of what the pictures in the WT indicate. The actual content is stupefying and is empty of all substance.

How could I not notice it before? Thanks Blondie for that refreshing bath of reality.

CZAR

47

The reason why the deceased are buried facing east.

by Schizm in

jw
friends

if you click on the link below what you'll see is an aerial view of the llano cemetery, located in amarillo, texas -- the place where i'll probably be buried.

the gravestones can actually be seen.

they are the white specks, all layed out in rows.

czarofmischief

I think it might be a folk myth - the idea that they could see the sun rising on Judgement Day. At least, that was the reference I got in a book of historical fiction about Texas settlers.

CZAR

17

Did anyone became abusive/violent at the doors?

by badboy in

jw
friends

did you have experiences like that?

czarofmischief

One guy threated to shoot my mom, seven year old me, and my baby sister in the stroller - shouldn't have denied the Virgin Mary in Dormont, huh?

Another guy apparently chased my dad around with knives; but you'd have to ask him for the whole story.

CZAR

83

To those that believe in a god; Please help me believe

by AlmostAtheist in

jw
friends

hey gang,.

this isn't a debate-for-debate's sake thread.

i enter with an informed but open mind.

czarofmischief

That's right Rochelle.....god is picky. He likes you though...and all others who claim he has answered them. For those of us who have begged, cried, pleaded, searched, and still don't know our ass from a hole in the ground as to lifes questions....will have to assume god just doesn't like us.

Maybe. After all, nobody else does.

I know that when I went looking for the "Jehovah" of the WT - I failed to find him. All I can say is that you shouldn't give up seeking. Don't consider God to have been falsified, keep looking, if you really want to meet him. "Keep on knocking, and it will be opened to you," the Bible says. Maybe God is afraid of you?

CZAR

83

To those that believe in a god; Please help me believe

by AlmostAtheist in

jw
friends

hey gang,.

this isn't a debate-for-debate's sake thread.

i enter with an informed but open mind.

czarofmischief

Keep trying, LR. Loveya...

CZAR

83

To those that believe in a god; Please help me believe

by AlmostAtheist in

jw
friends

hey gang,.

this isn't a debate-for-debate's sake thread.

i enter with an informed but open mind.

czarofmischief

or so I'm told. If I ever meet one, I'll ask him

LOL! Let me know when you find him. I have a business proposition for him...

Let me try to see what we can agree on before we shake hands and part. So we at least both agree that death is inevitable. It is part of the way we are made.

But "painful, agonizing deaths" are simply not a necessary part of it.

Fair enough. You know what Christian theology teaches about the nature of suffering, why it exists, why it is permitted. C.S. Lewis wrote a whole book on "The Problem of Pain." There isn't really a whole lot I can add to it.

I can't buy the "we learn on the earth what we use later in heaven" argument since so many never get to learn anything

Well maybe there is an assumption there about what the immortal soul recalls, remembers, learns to use. It may be more than we suspect.

If heavenly rewards seem a bit too much, well, a lot of souls that live around the sick one learn to love a little bit more, feel a little bit more compassion, strive a little bit harder to find a cure, etc. I'm not being callous, I'm just pointing out that there positive outcomes to even the most horrible situations. And if we learn from our mistakes, we can prevent future suffering among ourselves.

But there are lines that God himself should be able to draw between right and wrong without impinging on free-will.

How would he draw them? How would he enforce them? How would he "stop" anybody? How would people be informed of the rules? Remember, according to Christian doctrine, the suffering of this life is only temporary, and the bad people are not permitted into the next life; ergo they must be a given a chance to prove themselves wicked in this life - because on what grounds could they be denied entry into Heaven except on the bad behavior they had exhibited when they had the chance?

If you knew I was going to bash in somebody's skull with a bat because I want to see how it feels, you'd stop me.

If I thought you were serious. If I had the power. But even the police can't do much about a threat. People have the inherent right to talk, even threateningly - and terroristic threats won't get you much jail time. Not nearly enough to protect your victim, assuming you were serious. Unless you want God to restrict free speech as well?

IF the solution to crime is more power, ala "Minority Report" - well, just think about that. People today cannot be trusted with the power that they do have, if you gave the power to read minds, teleport, or cause earthquakes - you would immediately see wars that would tear the very fabric of the universe apart. From Cain brutally bludgeoning defenseless Abel on down to Uday and Qusay torturing the soccer team that failed them - mankind has utterly failed to control his violent impulses. The answer is not that man is powerless to control his neighbor. He is powerless to control himself.

This reminds me of Jesus and the rich young ruler, who asked him, "How can I be saved." Jesus answered that he had the Law and the Prophets - and the ruler could sense that it wasn't enough. He was aware of his own connection to God - the need to somehow do more to "prove" that God was real. So Jesus then commanded a leap of faith - sell off everything, give it all away, and then be Jesus' follower.

Maybe, just maybe, you might benefit from a leap of faith of some sort? Only God can prove Himself to you, as Littletoe said. I could gibber on this board all day - but never prove a single thing to you. You may very well know what a "leap of faith" in your own life could entail. Where do you think God wants you to go? To do? To be? Try leaping in that direction and see what happens.

If the traditional religon isn't filling your spiritual need, then you must go and get it filled elsewhere.

CZAR