when i believed in god i tried not to pray for anything selfish.. after a while i began to think that a lot of things i was asking my imaginary friend in the sky for were selfish for some reason.. i do not ever remember a single thing i prayed for ever being answered.
if there was the appearance of an answer it was because i did mental gymnastics to make it fit the delusion that god had actually answered me.
there was never an obvious message/answer from god.
The problem of God answering prayers is, as already pointed out, that it then boils down to whose, which, and how often. And therein lies the problem.
Don'tCallMeShirley's illustration of the plane crash bears this out. If God answered the one, then it immediately becomes troubling and problematic that he did not answer the other 249, or at least some of them.
and the final score is 78 to 22!.
oh wait!
we need clarity for this to mean anything.. .
Isn't this based on whether the findings of the Jesus Seminar are accurate?
Their conclusions are heavily criticized by biblical scholars as the Wiki article cited by Giordano points out.
do you remember anything from your baptism talk or the brother who gave it?.
I remember the speaker, a brother in my home congregation, giving the talk at the Circuit Assembly. Afterward, in the cafeteria, he shook my hand and said "welcome to Jehovah's organization". I recall the emotion I felt when he said those words - I was taken back by hearing that term (that was prior to the change in wording), and I thought to myself that maybe getting baptized wasn't such a great idea.
my wife went to visit her best friend who had moved back to a tropical island .
years ago to be near family.
i won't search for the threads, but i have posted.
Crazy indeed.
Isn't it great how one has to jump through hoops to "prove" adultery on the part of a spouse?
the former king of queens star has left the church of scientology, the hollywood reporter confirms.. on thursday, the new york post initially reported that remini had decided to quit the controversial religion, citing a source's claim that the 43-year-old actress had been subjected to years of "interrogations" and "thought modification.".
the new york post's source added that remini decided to cease being a parishioner, in part, because of policies preventing members to question the leadership of david miscavige.. when asked for a comment, a rep for the church of scientology told e!
news: "the church respects the privacy of parishioners and has no comment about any individual church member.".
Interesting, good for her!
And yes, familiar indeed...
i mentioned i was cleaning the forum archive when i bumped this thread by oompa:.
damm i miss jwd...this place will always be jwd to me.... rather than turn that into a discussion of the archive, i'll answer slimboyfat's concern here.. the things i'm clearing up are either:.
time specific and non jw related (e.g.
Good point, Splash.
I agree with Data Dog's analogy too - it's like cleaning house. You could end up throwing away something that could have later proved important or even valuable. But that doesn't stop all of us from doing a periodic 'spring cleaning' at home.
Unless you're vying for an appearance on "Hoarders", you're going to have to dispose of things from time to time.
...totally freak out and drop something if your child fails to say "please.".
http://www.jw.org/en/bible-teachings/family/children/become-jehovahs-friend/videos/please-thank-you/.
the woman is clearly a nervous wreck, and very easily offended.. if this is her reaction to caleb forgetting his manners, i shudder to think how she will cope if she ever finds him doing drugs.. .
I'm surprised they didn't decide to name him Andre.
when i was in it, especially as a young person, it was rules oriented but not like it is now.
to me, the religion is a lot more fanatical than ever before....what do you think?
is it the same religion even as it was 20 years ago?.
Changes for the better: Fewer meetings, shorter in length.
Changes for the worse: Emphasis on obedience, lack of "deep" study material. Increasingly strict stand on df'd/da'd persons, that, as Terry mentioned, started in the early 80s.
this is the letter i wrote back in '96 about the parousia.
following the '95 watchtower that disconnected the "generation" from 1914 i began to look carefully at end-time prophecy and soon discovered what i knew were basic errors in what i had been taught.. i was a loyal jw at the time and was still serving as an elder.
i used only watchtower publications in my research.
Great letter. It reminds me of an essay written by Alan Fuerbacher. Alan F was the first to get me thinking that the prophecies about the sign and the parousia, etc, would unfold differently than what I had been taught as a JW.
As it happens, the WTS seems to be gradually shifting everything to a later fulfillment anyway. For instance, now the FDS will not be appointed over all the belongings of Christ until later, rather than since 1918.
It would not surprise me at all that one day their teaching will match your letter almost exactly.
"in a similar way, at the beginning of the 20th century, there were a number of wrong expectations among true christians regarding the last days.
(2 tim.
3:1) for instance, in the year 1914, some thought that their being taken to heaven was imminent.
This was the main stumbling point for me when the understanding of the term "Generation" was altered in 1995. I resented the implication greatly, and even though I was an elder at the time, it was a turning point and the impetus for my eventual exit.
The notorious quote:
"Eager to see the end of this evil system, Jehovah's people have at times speculated about the time when the "great tribulation" would break out, even tying this to calculations of what is the lifetime of a generation since 1914"
