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You know how to read? (Snark) Spend some time doing that. (Not snark)

It is fun, and we could do this. There are just a couple who want to warn me all the time. What? Everything has been good natured from my end. I don't know the special environment of every forum. This is the second thread where I made any comment

You aren’t hurting my feelings. I can dish it and take it. Keep it up. It’s fun. Just don’t be a hypocrite and not expect to be curb stomped for it. But do it in the appropriate forum.

It's just soft, I don't want any of it. Oh, you're hurting my feelings. I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. Whateva... All good. All love. Everybody get some Kleenex. It'll be OK.

Snark is permitted in the “About The Way” forum. Indeed, that forum is a veritable Petri dish blooming with snark. The ”Matters of Faith” forum has narrower guard rails. You can read the rules in the pinned post. Few are at greater risk of violation than I, so I try to be extra careful and generally stay out of it. In your thread, my question about the nature of God was in response to your justification of profit in the name of God. It was a serious question, but devolved into snark through the exchange with Rocky. And that happens all the time in that forum. As to who started it? Oh, it started ages ago! But in that thread, I think your suggestion that I should visit Tel Aviv, the gayest city in Israel, kicked it off. I must admit, for a middle school lunchroom, that was some high-level, well-played snark.

It's almost like that's what you were looking for. But that would be cynical.

Most involved, antagonistic "moderator" I've ever come across.

Seems to me that's the only reason you're here. But maybe I'm wrong.

I already said my old "church" had an entire "service" with four or five of them talking about their out of body experiences. NDEs; visitations; caught up; seeing angels, on and on and on... OK with the utterance manifestations at the Way but I don't talk about everything with every Christian group I come across. Other than that, things are just a bit tender around here for me. I prefer to just lurk awhile. Makes me think of cats but...I'm really not here to offend

Thank you for clarifying the point you were making. If anyone actually has evidence of a double standard in moderating, please let us know. You may contact me directly at this profile or contact ModSerling, Modgellan or Pawtucket to complain. Or you could make a public spectacle like the last one did. Up to you. Just be honest. If you're just here to instigate the moderators, just admit it.

Finally, JoyfulSoul, in the back of my mind, I was thinking about you being around twi again and comparing that with your past experiences with Morningstar and IHOPKC and how different the two are in the area of "manifesting" holy spirit. twi can definitely be more on the boring/less extravagant side of this issue. Lovebombing in twi, however, was BIG with this and therefore may excel in comparison to the other two groups. I don't know. Either way, travel on.

Excuse me for coming back to this issue, but I'm just realizing that my post above had apparently been taken by some as an atheist attacking Christians. When I wrote the post, I was thinking about the criticism other Christians themselves have laid against the prophetic practices (and teachings) of these groups which is what the documentation I said I'd share was based on and which I, as a former Christian, agree with as well. As an atheist, I've just taken it a step further and think there is no evidence for this biblical God or the holy spirit (meaning both the "gift" and the 3rd person of the trinity). I participate in the discussion because I find this specific topic pretty problematic. Thanks Raf for your post.

This was a prior question in response to the statement "In Essentials Unity, In Nonessentials Liberty, and In All Things Love." Was thinking it over ... here's my quick 2 cents. I would say mostly Yes. Because of these things: (1) Unity: Yes. Without unity, or a system of "forced" integration with love, what do you really have? There's either a mandate of likemindedness and conformity, which is one of the major essences of an organized religion; or division and confusion, right? You can go on and on about telling people they should live the way they want to live but regarding essentials that's not biblical Christianity, right? Add on the Corps commitment, and you've got assimilation x 2. or 3. "Deny Yourself and be Sold Out to the Program". (2) Liberty: Yes to nonessentials. You like colgate toothpaste and I like crest. You like blue dresses and I like yellow. Granted, there was less of that sort of thing in the Corps. (3) Love: Yes. Without it any religion is ultimately doomed.

I can understand where you are coming from making such a statement, since believer’s think one can only experience joy by what is written in a book written thousands of years ago. They rationalize the only way of knowing if something is right or wrong is by reading it chapter and verse from this book. They also must read, apparently, what joy is to bevable to experience it. As an atheist I can tell you i have not experienced so much joy since no longer relying on god. I find joy in everyday living doing the things necessary to live. Family and friends play a significant role in my happiness and it doesn’t matter what their religious beliefs might be. Plus I no longer have to be concerned if I am pleasing god or not.

I think the bottom line is, nothing Charity said amounts to a broad attack on Christians in general that warrants a pre-emptive retaliatory attack on atheists.

If I were to go ahead with the documentation, it would be about ministries other than twi, offshoots of twi or cults. Would it be best to do so then in the Open forum or the Doctrinal: Exploring the Bible sub-forum? (Mind you, there is not a lot of scriptural support for the documentation since it's pretty much man made doctrines and practices.) Other than doing so specifically in response to JoyfulSoul's post, the documentation sheds a light on what leaders of these mega churches are saying and doing.

My post was about the prophetic phoniness (with a few extra adjectives added) that certain ministries prosper in. Your reply made it about the ministries themselves. Slight, but important, difference. I was aiming solely with the prophetic practices of these groups - not all the practices. These are the specific practices that I planned to document for you.

Same pattern. Break the clear site rules. Find out no one's going to put up with it. Claim bias and persecution and run off pretending to be taking the high ground. It was a nice try.

The mob can dish it out. Taking it? Not so much. I started reading the thread I started to find out why it felt right to be a 'bit' punchy. Lots of snarky and it didn't start with me. It's a balancing act. I'll withdraw from this thread just as I did the other. It was an interesting conversation. Now, I'm done.

I appreciate your judgmentalism about how uptight people are when it comes to this site's moderation. It really keeps me up, sometimes, wondering what you think of whether and how we enforce site rules. But rest assured, if we ever REALLY need to know we'll ask you.

So here's the exact wording Joyful cited. This was, of course, MANY posts after Joyful's broadside against atheists, so he can't honestly portray his comment as a response. In any event, specific or even general criticisms of ministry practices are not nearly the same thing as bigoted comments about all or most Christians, and don't deserve to be treated as such.

Alright, I just glanced at that thread. Still, some seem kind of uptight- like, 'oooohhhh, don't cross that line' So, we toss it back and forth a little, so what? I can't really tell if the criticism is objective or if it's because I'm scoring points? Tough pill to swallow. All of us were brimming with faith at some point. Some continued on with timeless, scared truths. Others of us got wounded and became entrenched in a protective, adversarial belief system. I don't know who said it but the way to fix a wrong turn is to go back to the place it was made (well, I guess there could be a shortcut). That can be a tough pill. As the O' Jays sang, 'if you miss it, I feel sorry, sorry for you.' We weren't wrong when we believed.