Ham

Now Exie, lets be fair. Only if he is picking his nose with his big toe, going 80 miles and hour, and in a snowstorm.

In fifty years of life, I have never, ever ever seen a butterfly beat a pillow.. I think it is a myth, that change has to be uncomfortable. "some change implies lack of comfort" is not equivalent to "I suffered discomfort, therefore I experienced change".

Hmm. Maybe they started seeing debils under shoelaces. Saw them everywhere else..

Welcome, another spot! Yes, I think that was the thought, couldn't learn anything new on your own. I remember the advanced class teaching took it further- only way you could learn anything "new" would have to be by revelation. That's kinda narrow minded, in my opinion. People asked Einstein what made him so "special".. his answer was something like most of it was hard work..

That is a good point. Einstein and a few others stepped beyond a few assumptions that their predecessors held to. Before Einstein and a few others, they thought they knew everything there was to be known about physics, that they only needed to polish it up a little bit.

I'm not arguing the validity of the concept.. it's just, I think it was used to replace one set of limitations with another. One set of assumptions for another.

Very slippery. Seems every (?) religion shares this core belief of sorts.. speak "THE WORDS" with the right kind of mind set or motivation, and the heavens and the foundation of the earth is supposed to shake.. Those who dabble in practical kabbalism make the same claim.

Yeah, but with Kesey, if you were "off the bus" that generally meant you ended up in a psychiatric ward somewhere.. well, the similarity is striking..

Yeah.. we could claim it is all for the public good. Just trying to save the sports world from bad manners, ankle wounds, AND rabies, all at the same time. sorry Socks.. heheh. carry on..

I'm somewhere in the middle. While I think I can be anything I want to be, I tend to try to be something that doesn't cause too much harm in life in the process.

Maybe they should issue a "booing license", affirming with reasonable certaintly, that said person won't go mad, run out on the gym floor, and bite the ref by the ankle.. Get a paper signed off by a psychologist, a therapist, and half a dozen personal references. That oughta make some money, for somebody..

Another murky thought on a Thursday morning.. "You can't go beyond what you are taught". The "teacher" boldly declared this little bit of supposedly self apparent wisdom, and then came: how you are supposed to think, how you are supposed to read, what you are supposed to say. I won't argue the validity of any specific concept here, but: 1. We were taught to approach the bible, as originally given, as being God-breathed, and as such "perfect". 2. We were taught to change OUR THINKING such that it agrees with the bible. No room for thought, no room for opinion. Doesn't that simply replace one intellectual straight jacket for another, one more frame of mind that a person can't "go beyond"?

Very interesting. And it makes more sense than what I learned in der vey. Just a thought.. Corinthians is supposed to be a reproof epistle.. I wonder why they had to be told that "prophecy" was to edify, exhort, comfort.. I wonder if they even then were mutating prophecy into some kind of intrusive "conditional" "personal prophecy" kind of concept.

At the risk of being booed by country western lovers.. Doesn't it sound like some old CW, "my wife left with my huntin dog, but not before the dog bit me, my truck broke down, life's just awwwwwfull" Maybe some of those guys have a future, if they can put some song to those lyrics..

That's just wonderful. But are the tents air conditioned too? I did see one tent at the ROA with an air conditioner once..

Yeah.. but one can dream, can't one? Just makes me wonder though.. so many words, so many "prophecies"- how many of them would be spoken, if the speaker's life depended on whether it was genuine or not. No "practice sessions" till I get it right.. No excuses. "Now, if you'd just put down those rocks, and read my book first.."

So few that can handle the "power".. and I can count them easily on one hand. They had "safeguards" in old testament times, but I think we'd get in *slightly* a little trouble implementing them here..

"Prophet" 1. A spokesman for Gawd A nice guy A hard man to live with.

Yeah. I think when answers to honest questions are anticipated with the response "if you disagree with me, read my book".. it's PRACTICALLY a lost cause. "I'm right, you're wrong, because discounting prophecy as false IN ITSELF is unbiblical.." More posturing.. "I'm da man, listen to me.." I didn't close the door. To say that the "critics" who disagree with him are discounting prophecy as false in itself is an unwarranted assumption. I don't discount prophecy in itself, but 99.9 % of the ones I've heard, I would say were made up in the imagination of the one giving them. Say the right catch-phrases, maybe quote a few verses of scripture, and everything is OK. Or is it? MY bible has a few things to say about "da man" that opens his mouth, and says "The Lord Sayeth", when the Lord has NOT spoken.

Makes me wonder how she could live with herself. Loyal wayfer to the end, probably didn't have a tinge of guilt. I know of an incident, a fairly well educated person, higher up in social services office, and higher up in the "ministry" in this area.. caused some REAL problems for an ex-wayer, who really needed some help. Since it's not my personal story, all I'll say is the person did some real unethical and harmful crap. I think "these kind" of people live for those kind of moments.. to mete what they consider God's vengeance on humanity, or something like that.. They seem to enjoy their "job" too well.

I have things stuck in my brain too. I have thought of capitalizing on it, and using the material as a stand up comic. Unfortunately, the only people who would understand it would be ex-cultist.

Hmmmm. If I had a son, I was going to name him Bill. Figured people would chase down to pay at least one of the members in the family here..

"That da ministry be not blamed" 1. An obscure, partial quote invoked to plow under a multitude of blatant indescretions, often illegal, of the mog. 2. Lying, maneurvering, doing whatever is necessary to keep people from fleeing for their lives from "da ministry that taught them da word".

Amazing how such a "spiritual" organization can bring out the most hateful, harmful carnality in people.

I dunno. It seems like a scene out of Hotel California. The beast is properly dispatched, but it's only playing dead.. Or like a perpeptual Groundhog Day, you get up every morning, and there it is again.. been beaten, stabbed, run over by a truck.. and every morning it comes back.. Careful there Socks, I think I saw it blink..