Mark Israel, his in the hospital.
Rosie Israel
A. Israel,
is now in critical condition in the Scripps Memorial Hospital in la
Jolla, California. He ran a red light on his bike, and got hit by an
incoming car.
This happened on Monday april 19, 2004 on his way to work. For more
information or to send him a message you can write to my e-mail
directly (he is not able to use a computer now, so I print and take
e-mail to him.)
Thanks
Rosaura Israel (Mark's wife)
Garry J. Vass
news:a54338b4.04042...@posting.google.com...
Rosie,
Thanks for advising us!
My prayers go out to Mark. I'll try to call in the morning.
Kind regards,
GJV
Skitt
> Israel:
>> For any of the alt.usage.english members that may be interested Mark
>> A. Israel,
>> is now in critical condition in the Scripps Memorial Hospital in la
>> Jolla, California. He ran a red light on his bike, and got hit by an
>> incoming car.
>
>
>> This happened on Monday april 19, 2004 on his way to work. For more
>> information or to send him a message you can write to my e-mail
>> directly (he is not able to use a computer now, so I print and take
>> e-mail to him.)
>
> often for my liking.
See this for a tiny bit more detail:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20040419-0946-bicycle.html
--
Skitt (in Hayward, California)
www.geocities.com/opus731/
Evan Kirshenbaum
> Israel:
>
>>For any of the alt.usage.english members that may be interested Mark
>>A. Israel, is now in critical condition in the Scripps Memorial
>>Hospital in la Jolla, California. He ran a red light on his bike,
>>and got hit by an incoming car.
>
> OMG!! That's fucking horrible!
Agreed. (I've already sent my regards by email. This is one of those
situations in which I envy religious people their belief that they can
actually do something to help by praying.)
> How can you be so calm about this?
Consider the alternative. Life occasionally hands you situations to
which you just have to say "I'll fall to pieces later. I can't afford
to right now".
>>This happened on Monday april 19, 2004 on his way to work. For more
>>information or to send him a message you can write to my e-mail
>>directly (he is not able to use a computer now, so I print and take
>>e-mail to him.)
>
> Is he gon' be OK?
Unfortunately, this has been an AUE topic in the past. According to
http://www.uchsc.edu/news/conditions.htm
"critical condition" is officially
Vital signs are unstable or not within normal limits. There are
major complications. Patient may be unconscious. Outlook is
unfavorable.
Here's hoping that this changes for the better soon.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |On a scale of one to ten...
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |it sucked.
Palo Alto, CA 94304
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com
(650)857-7572
Christopher Johnson
I hope Mark makes it, but "massive head injuries"
doesn't sound very promising. I wish him good luck,
though, in what we can only hope will turn out to
be a great recovery.
--
Christopher
My e-mail address <chris_jo...@yahoo.com> is
not 'munged' in any way and is fully replyable!
Charles Riggs
<kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote:
> (I've already sent my regards by email...)
How good of you. Me too, since you mentioned it.
--
Charles Riggs
My email address: chriggs/at/eircom/dot/net
Ross Howard
wrought:
>See this for a tiny bit more detail:
>http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20040419-0946-bicycle.html
"Bicyclist" as used in the headline -- is that standard AmE? I would
have expected just "cyclist" (with "biker" for the Harleyed-up
variety).
--
Ross Howard
Michael West
YEs, it's standard. A cyclist is "One who rides or races a bicycle,
motorcycle, or similar vehicle." [AHD3]
"Cyclist" is fine once you've established which kind of
cycle you're talking about.
"Biker" connotes a subculture, not just a mode of transport.
--
Michael West
Richard R. Hershberger
> de...@aol.com (DE781) writes:
> (I've already sent my regards by email. This is one of those
> situations in which I envy religious people their belief that they can
> actually do something to help by praying.)
Oh, prayer certainly helps. You might contemplate whom it helps, though.
Richard R. Hershberger
Evan Kirshenbaum
> On Thu, 22 Apr 2004 17:31:18 -0700, Evan Kirshenbaum
> <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote:
>
>> (I've already sent my regards by email...)
>
> How good of you. Me too, since you mentioned it.
I know how you feel about such statements, Charles. Since I was
commenting on a usage point, though, it seemed a bit callous not to
mention it, as though all I could see in such a personal tragedy was
an opportunity to discuss the meaning of a word.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |The whole idea of our government is
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |this: if enough people get together
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |and act in concert, they can take
|something and not pay for it.
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com | P.J. O'Rourke
(650)857-7572
david56
> When I was born, I was in "critical condition" for weeks, if not
> months. Outlook was very unfavorable for me.
I was tempted to make a smart anti-Microsoft comment here, but it's
the wrong thread.
> But, what helped me survive it? Prayer.
Understand that for many people, this statement is literally
unbelievable.
> You may not believe it,
I don't.
> but scientific evidence suggests that prayer does, for whatever reason, increase the liklihood
> that someone in the hospital will have a quick and complete recovery.
Really? Evidence? I mean serious, peer reviewed, published
evidence. You brought up the "science" word; can you back it up?
If not, it's merely anecdote.
> I agree with Skitt and the others. Let's pray or, if you're not a
> religious type, at least keep hope alive.
I don't understand what that means.
--
David
=====
Skitt
> When I was born, I was in "critical condition" for weeks, if not
> months. Outlook was very unfavorable for me. But, what helped me
> survive it? Prayer. You may not believe it, but scientific evidence
> suggests that prayer does, for whatever reason, increase the liklihood
> that someone in the hospital will have a quick and complete recovery.
> I agree with Skitt and the others. Let's pray or, if you're not a
> religious type, at least keep hope alive.
You may have misunderstood me or mixed me up with someone else somewhere
along the way. I do not believe in prayer, nor do I believe in any
religion. I'm funny that way.
There was a time for me too when I was not expected to "pull through". I
did. The unexpected does happen. No prayer was involved (my parents were
non-religious also).
--
Skitt (in SF Bay Area)
Some mornings it just doesn't seem worth it to gnaw through
the leather straps. -- Emo Phillips
Areff
>> "Biker" connotes a subculture, not just a mode of transport.
>
> I am going to be "biking" in the tour of NYC next Sunday. That makes
> me a "biker". I don't know what you old hippies used to think of when
> you heard the word, but I can guarantee you, FEW of those people exist
> anymore.
Don't be too sure, Young Joey. I don't know from the Worcester region of
Massachusetts, but go down to neighboring Connecticut on any Sunday
afternoon and you'll see thousands of bikers (motorcyclists) slowing down
traffic on the highways and byways, as they all head for the Red Dog
Saloon or wherever it is that these people meet up. Most of them do seem
to be approximately over 55 years of age, yes.
> And the ones who do are lost in a timewarp worse than The
> Brady Bunch.
I actually saw some *young* bikers in Chicago the other day.
They were your typical farm-boy types, if you follow me.
They weren't wearing helmets, of course, and one of them actually fell
off his bike (motorcycle) in the middle of downtown Chicago in rush hour,
while it was in motion.
Did I hear you right, Joey? Are you part of the latter-day bicyclist
subculture? One of those people who wear Spandex and use a *helmet* when
they ride a bike? Because I think that's really, if anything, worse than
the various motorcycle subcultures out there. To paraphrase Dr. Zaius,
bicycling was once a paradise; your kind turned it into a desert.
--
Ross Howard
>I actually saw some *young* bikers in Chicago the other day.
>They were your typical farm-boy types, if you follow me.
>They weren't wearing helmets, of course, and one of them actually fell
>off his bike (motorcycle) in the middle of downtown Chicago in rush hour,
>while it was in motion.
Downtown Chicago moves?
--
Ross Howard
Patrick O'Donnell
> DE781 typed thus:
> > but scientific evidence suggests that prayer does, for whatever
> > reason, increase the liklihood that someone in the hospital will
> > have a quick and complete recovery.
>
> Really? Evidence? I mean serious, peer reviewed, published
> evidence. You brought up the "science" word; can you back it up?
> If not, it's merely anecdote.
http://www.jreprodmed.com/abs/jrm1137.htm
See also
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/GMA/DrJohnson/GMA011004Prayer_Dr_Tim.html
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/Downtown/2020/Downtown_010813_remotehealing_feature.html
david56
Nowhere near good enough; extraordinary claims require extraordinary
proof. Ridiculous claims require cast iron proof backed by world
experts, reproduced many times over. If it worked, results would be
reproducible. What we have above is a small number of disputed
studies. Targ's was invalidated by changing the measure during the
trial: she unblinded the subjects to look for a new measure as new
drug therapy meant that patients were no longer dying from AIDS, so
mortality rates (the original measure) became too low to be
significant.
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.12/prayer.html?pg=5
Furthermore, if prayer does work, this is presumably by action of a
Supernatural Being, who may take it into his head to confound the
experiment, since allowing it to produce concrete, reproducible
results would prove his existence which he has previously resisted.
My real gripe above is with the loose bandying about of "scientific
evidence suggests" (no matter what the topic), usually brought up by
somebody in order to "prove" their point of view without having to
actually know anything about it.
--
David
=====
Patrick O'Donnell
> Patrick O'Donnell typed thus:
> > david56 <bass.c...@ntlworld.com> writes:
> > > DE781 typed thus:
> > > > but scientific evidence suggests that prayer does, for whatever
> > > > reason, increase the liklihood that someone in the hospital will
> > > > have a quick and complete recovery.
> > >
> > > Really? Evidence? I mean serious, peer reviewed, published
> > > evidence. You brought up the "science" word; can you back it up?
> > > If not, it's merely anecdote.
> >
> > http://www.jreprodmed.com/abs/jrm1137.htm
> >
> > See also
> >
> > http://abcnews.go.com/sections/GMA/DrJohnson/GMA011004Prayer_Dr_Tim.html
> > http://abcnews.go.com/sections/Downtown/2020/Downtown_010813_remotehealing_feature.html
>
> Nowhere near good enough; extraordinary claims require extraordinary
> proof. Ridiculous claims require cast iron proof backed by world
> experts, reproduced many times over.
You're changing the bar. You first asked for evidence. Now you
require cast-iron proof. I didn't offer the citation as proof, and no
number of citations would be cast-iron proof. I am not interested in
"proving" the claim. Your statement suggested that there was no such
evidence. I merely wished to refute that implicit suggestion. The
evidence will be more or less compelling to you or others, just as any
scientific result is. Big deal.
> Furthermore, if prayer does work, this is presumably by action of a
> Supernatural Being, ...
This is your presumption. It is rather unscientific of you to reject
a proposition because your "presumed" mechanism is untestable. _If_
there is a causal relationship between prayer and beneficial outcome,
the underlying mechanism is not necessarily any kind of being.
> My real gripe above is with the loose bandying about of "scientific
> evidence suggests" (no matter what the topic), usually brought up by
> somebody in order to "prove" their point of view without having to
> actually know anything about it.
My real gripe is with the loose shifting around of an argument when a
disputant's original objection is refuted. It's perfectly reasonable
for somebody to offer information in support of their point of view,
whether or not they actually know anything about it. That is true
even if you consider their point of view hogwash.
david56
Then I misunderstood your intent. I accept that there is evidence.
> > Furthermore, if prayer does work, this is presumably by action of a
> > Supernatural Being, ...
>
> This is your presumption. It is rather unscientific of you to reject
> a proposition because your "presumed" mechanism is untestable. _If_
> there is a causal relationship between prayer and beneficial outcome,
> the underlying mechanism is not necessarily any kind of being.
Probably, but the notion is so silly that I find I start to lose all
sense of reason.
--
David
=====
Michael West
> "Michael West" <mbw...@remove.bigpond.com> wrote in message
>> "Biker" connotes a subculture, not just a mode of transport.
>
> I wouldn't have ever considered that. To me a "biker" is a "biker".
> I am going to be "biking" in the tour of NYC next Sunday. That makes
> me a "biker". I don't know what you old hippies used to think of when
> you heard the word, but I can guarantee you, FEW of those people exist
> anymore. And the ones who do are lost in a timewarp worse than The
> Brady Bunch.
I have know idea whether you're talking about
riding a motorbike or a bicycle, so your saying
"to me a 'biker' is a 'biker' " is about as moronic
as I would have expected from you. I communicates
nothing except your own narcissism and solipsism.
--
Michael West
John Dean
> I am going to be "biking" in the tour of NYC next Sunday. That makes
> me a "biker". I don't know what you old hippies used to think of when
> you heard the word, but I can guarantee you, FEW of those people exist
> anymore. And the ones who do are lost in a timewarp worse than The
> Brady Bunch.
http://www.hells-angels.com/
http://www.bandidosmc.com/
http://www.outlawsmc.com/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/correspondent/3311057.stm
<< "When I started in 1991, there were 83 chapters of Hells Angels
worldwide. Today there are 231. They used to be in 14 countries, now they
are in 28.
"They seem to want to have a presence almost everywhere in the world," says
Jean-Pierre Levesque of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
Mr Levesque is the world's leading police expert on biker gangs and he
believes the Hells Angels - and rival gangs - are one of the fastest growing
organised crime threats in the world. >>
--
John Dean
Oxford
Tony Cooper
<bass.c...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
>DE781 typed thus:
>
>> When I was born, I was in "critical condition" for weeks, if not
>> months. Outlook was very unfavorable for me.
>
>I was tempted to make a smart anti-Microsoft comment here, but it's
>the wrong thread.
>
>> But, what helped me survive it? Prayer.
>
>Understand that for many people, this statement is literally
>unbelievable.
>
>> You may not believe it,
>
>I don't.
>
I don't believe that prayer helps the person being prayed for, but I
do firmly believe that praying *can* help the family pull through a
difficult situation. When a loved one is ill, the family feels so
completely helpless. If praying gives them solace and a sense of
doing something positive, it is helpful to them.
It's the act of praying, and not the prayer, that is beneficial. That
is, for people that do believe in prayer.
sage
"John Dean" <john...@frag.lineone.net> wrote in message
news:c6cbd6$oru$1...@news7.svr.pol.co.uk...
'ere hin Kebec, dey har call de 'ells (but we spell it Hells).
Cheers, Sage
Tony Cooper
wrote:
>DE781 wrote:
>
>> When I was born, I was in "critical condition" for weeks, if not
>> months. Outlook was very unfavorable for me. But, what helped me
>> survive it? Prayer. You may not believe it, but scientific evidence
>> suggests that prayer does, for whatever reason, increase the liklihood
>> that someone in the hospital will have a quick and complete recovery.
>> I agree with Skitt and the others. Let's pray or, if you're not a
>> religious type, at least keep hope alive.
>
>You may have misunderstood me or mixed me up with someone else somewhere
>along the way. I do not believe in prayer, nor do I believe in any
>religion. I'm funny that way.
>
>There was a time for me too when I was not expected to "pull through". I
>did. The unexpected does happen. No prayer was involved (my parents were
>non-religious also).
How do you know there were no prayers involved?
Skitt
> "Skitt" wrote:
>> DE781 wrote:
There was no one who knew of my plight except for five non-religious people,
counting my younger sister, who was also very ill at the time. This was in
Germany, at the time when the Allied forces were about to take and did take
our town in 1945.
rban...@shaw.ca
> Charles Riggs <CHA...@eircom.net> writes:
>
> > On Thu, 22 Apr 2004 17:31:18 -0700, Evan Kirshenbaum
> > <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote:
> >
> >> (I've already sent my regards by email...)
> >
> > How good of you. Me too, since you mentioned it.
>
> I know how you feel about such statements, Charles. Since I was
> commenting on a usage point, though, it seemed a bit callous not to
> mention it, as though all I could see in such a personal tragedy was
> an opportunity to discuss the meaning of a word.
>
On the other hand it's a pity nobody seems to have had a thought for
the poor motorist who did NOT sail through a red light. A candle for
him too.
Charles Riggs
Hershberger) wrote:
True -- it can help the person doing the praying -- plus it hurts
no-one.
Charles Riggs
<kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote:
>Charles Riggs <CHA...@eircom.net> writes:
>
>> On Thu, 22 Apr 2004 17:31:18 -0700, Evan Kirshenbaum
>> <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote:
>>
>>> (I've already sent my regards by email...)
>>
>> How good of you. Me too, since you mentioned it.
>
>I know how you feel about such statements, Charles. Since I was
>commenting on a usage point, though, it seemed a bit callous not to
>mention it, as though all I could see in such a personal tragedy was
>an opportunity to discuss the meaning of a word.
I see your point, Evan.
I don't object in the least, by the way, to personal messages of
condolences or good wishes. As I've said here for years, I think that
is the best way to express them. What I have objected to, and I stick
by my guns, are the 'Good wishes to everyone' type of posts, which do
not impress me by their sincerity.
Raymond S. Wise
news:6q0k801at5rimnnhg...@4ax.com...
> On 23 Apr 2004 07:24:13 -0700, rrh...@acme.com (Richard R.
> Hershberger) wrote:
>
> >Evan Kirshenbaum <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote in message
news:<4qrbsf...@hpl.hp.com>...
> >> de...@aol.com (DE781) writes:
> >
> >> (I've already sent my regards by email. This is one of those
> >> situations in which I envy religious people their belief that they can
> >> actually do something to help by praying.)
> >
> >Oh, prayer certainly helps. You might contemplate whom it helps, though.
>
> True -- it can help the person doing the praying -- plus it hurts
> no-one.
There is no harm in prayer if the people who pray and the person being
prayed for all ensure that effective modern medicine is the primary
treatment being employed, and the people I know who pray are well aware of
that, and would consider it foolish (and morally wrong!) to act otherwise.
For them, "God helps those who help themselves" is not a mere cliché. But
for those people who pray as a substitute for effective modern medicine, the
results can be fatal.
In addition, as it says at
http://www.religioustolerance.org/psy_hoax2.htm
"Amateur exorcists often beat their victims to drive off demons. About once
a year in North America, a person dies from abuse during an exorcism."
Obviously, in both types of harm, the victims did not die from the results
of prayer. They died from the results of a particular mentality: However, if
the idea of prayer were nonexistent, it is likely that fewer people would
develop the mentality to commit such tragic blunders.
--
Raymond S. Wise
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
E-mail: mplsray @ yahoo . com
david56
In case it wasn't clear, I made no comment on this, but fwiw, I agree
with you. The family might benefit even though there can be no
effect on the health of a newborn baby.
--
David
=====
david56
That's the problem with "scientific" investigations into prayer.
There were probably thousands of good English folk praying "for all
the sick little children in Germany".
--
David
=====
Mike Lyle
> Tony Cooper wrote:
> > "Skitt" wrote:
> >> DE781 wrote:
>
> >>> When I was born, I was in "critical condition" for weeks, if not
> >>> months. Outlook was very unfavorable for me. But, what helped me
> >>> survive it? Prayer. You may not believe it, but scientific
> >>> evidence suggests that prayer does, for whatever reason, increase
> >>> the liklihood that someone in the hospital will have a quick and
> >>
> >> There was a time for me too when I was not expected to "pull
> >> through". I did. The unexpected does happen. No prayer was
> >> involved (my parents were non-religious also).
> >
> > How do you know there were no prayers involved?
>
> There was no one who knew of my plight except for five non-religious people,
> counting my younger sister, who was also very ill at the time. This was in
> Germany, at the time when the Allied forces were about to take and did take
> our town in 1945.
BBC TV not long ago broadcast a pair of programmes about an American
double-blind experiment on therapeutic prayer; findings were that
prayer appeared to have no positive effect, perhaps even a slight
negative effect. There was some odd statistical thing about prayer
appearing to work better if there were groups praying for the groups
who were praying for the patients, but I don't think this was followed
up.
What I took away from it was a memory of the Christian Minister who
said he wouldn't have taken part if he'd known that Muslims were going
to be praying along (in another city, I think); pressed, he said the
Muslims were perhaps sincere, but obviously their prayers couldn't
work because they didn't adhere to The One True Faith.
But anyhow, if only one of the patients who recovered claimed publicly
that he owed it to prayer, that would have been enough to get it
trumpeted as a scientific breakthrough in newsmedia for the dumb.
Mike.
Bob Cunningham
<mplsra...@gbronline.com> said:
[much about prayer]
Mark Israel should be amused to learn that the thread
reporting his tragic accident has evolved into a robust
discussion of prayer.
So goes AUE. Next topic under this melancholy subject line,
the ecological peril of the panda?
I keep reading the thread in hopes of reading an update on
Mark's progress. Has anyone asked for one?
Richard R. Hershberger
> "Charles Riggs" <CHA...@eircom.net> wrote in message
> news:6q0k801at5rimnnhg...@4ax.com...
> > On 23 Apr 2004 07:24:13 -0700, rrh...@acme.com (Richard R.
> > Hershberger) wrote:
> >
> > >Evan Kirshenbaum <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote in message
> news:<4qrbsf...@hpl.hp.com>...
> > >> de...@aol.com (DE781) writes:
>
> > >> (I've already sent my regards by email. This is one of those
> > >> situations in which I envy religious people their belief that they can
> > >> actually do something to help by praying.)
> > >
> > >Oh, prayer certainly helps. You might contemplate whom it helps, though.
> >
> > True -- it can help the person doing the praying -- plus it hurts
> > no-one.
>
>
> There is no harm in prayer if the people who pray and the person being
> prayed for all ensure that effective modern medicine is the primary
> treatment being employed, and the people I know who pray are well aware of
> that, and would consider it foolish (and morally wrong!) to act otherwise.
> For them, "God helps those who help themselves" is not a mere cliché. But
> for those people who pray as a substitute for effective modern medicine, the
> results can be fatal.
While there is at least one Christian (or at least quasi-Christian)
sect that uses prayer as a substitute for medical treatment, this is
rare and far out of the mainstream. The vast majority of Christian
sects -- even ones with annoying television preachers -- are
thoroughly pragmatic on this point.
Richard R. Hershberger
Arcadian Rises
>>Oh, prayer certainly helps. You might contemplate whom it helps, though.
>
>True -- it can help the person doing the praying -- plus it hurts
>no-one.
Regardless of the belief in the power of prayer, I think "I pray for you" is
also a matter of ettiquette. What do you say to your neighbor who informs you
that her husband is undergoing heart surgery as you speak?
"And other than that Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the show?"
Tony Cooper
Hershberger) wrote:
>While there is at least one Christian (or at least quasi-Christian)
>sect that uses prayer as a substitute for medical treatment, this is
>rare and far out of the mainstream. The vast majority of Christian
>sects -- even ones with annoying television preachers -- are
>thoroughly pragmatic on this point.
If you are referring to the Church of Christ, Scientist, (Christian
Scientists), the members do use prayer as a substitute for medical
treatment, but they do not *always* use it as a substitute.
Mary Baker Eddy wrote: "A Christian Scientist, like anyone else, is a
free moral agent. When he joins the Church of Christ, Scientist, it's
understood that he will rely on God instead of drugs for healing. ...
But if in extreme circumstances or under heavy family pressure he
resorts to material means, he won't be treated as an outcast by the
Church,"
Some Christian Scientists use medical treatment only in dire
emergencies, and some routinely accept medical treatment. As "free
moral agents", each member sets his/her own rules on this subject.
The general rule seems to be that medical treatment is acceptable, but
the use of medication is a last resort. In other words, surgery is
OK,, anesthesia is OK, life saving drugs are OK, but pain killers are
not.
A member of my family married a Christian Scientist and converted to
that religion. He was a dentist, and his practice consisted of mostly
other Christian Scientists. His patients had routine dental care, but
did not accept Novocain. He was a diabetic, and took insulin.
Unfortunately, my family sent me to him as a dentist because it was
free. To this day, I have a terrible aversion to dentists that a
result of having dental work with no pain killers used when I was a
small kid. I get numbed when I have my teeth cleaned because I'm so
jumpy. I had to go to several dentists before I found one that would
go along with this. Even "laughing gas" won't keep me calm in the
chair. I can have an x-ray without a shot, but that's about it.
CyberCypher
[...]
> While there is at least one Christian (or at least
> quasi-Christian) sect that uses prayer as a substitute for medical
> treatment, this is rare and far out of the mainstream. The vast
> majority of Christian sects -- even ones with annoying television
> preachers -- are thoroughly pragmatic on this point.
I assume that you are referring to Christian Scientists here, but what
about Seventh-Day Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses, both groups that
generally refuse blood transfusions (although there seem to be some
change occurring among the JWs on blood products that are acceptable
[1])? In these circumstances, they use prayer and not medical
treatment.
--
Franke: EFL teacher & medical editor.
For email, ehziuh htiw rehpycrebyc ecalper.
Philip Roth: "There is truth and then again there is truth. For all the
world is full of people who go around believing they've got you or your
neighbour figured out, there is really no bottom to what is not known.
The truth about us is endless. As are the lies."
david56
> >From: Charles Riggs
>
> >>Oh, prayer certainly helps. You might contemplate whom it helps, though.
> >
> >True -- it can help the person doing the praying -- plus it hurts
> >no-one.
>
> Regardless of the belief in the power of prayer, I think "I pray for you" is
> also a matter of ettiquette. What do you say to your neighbor who informs you
> that her husband is undergoing heart surgery as you speak?
It would be considered bad taste, at least in the circles I move in,
for an atheist to say that he will remember somebody in his prayers,
or that he is praying for her husband's quick recovery. I have never
suggested that I am praying for somebody and I can't imagine ever
saying it.
My choir is part of a Cathedral, so when individuals are ill or
bereaved, we are sometimes asked to "remember them in our prayers".
I nod politely, of course, but I really don't grok it.
"We're thinking of you" is a form of words acceptable from and to
all, and has the benefit of being true.
--
David
=====
Tony Cooper
wrote:
>Richard R. Hershberger wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
>
>[...]
>> While there is at least one Christian (or at least
>> quasi-Christian) sect that uses prayer as a substitute for medical
>> treatment, this is rare and far out of the mainstream. The vast
>> majority of Christian sects -- even ones with annoying television
>> preachers -- are thoroughly pragmatic on this point.
>
>I assume that you are referring to Christian Scientists here, but what
>about Seventh-Day Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses, both groups that
>generally refuse blood transfusions
The SDAs have no objection to blood transfusions. This is a common
"urban myth" about the SDAs. Any basic fact-finding about the SDAs
will tell you this. From one of their websites: "The Adventist
Church is not the same thing as the "Jehovah's Witnesses." We do
believe in blood transfusions and our hospitals provide them thousands
of times each day, 365 days a year! We proudly salute the flag and say
the pledge of allegiance."
Areff
> The SDAs have no objection to blood transfusions. This is a common
> "urban myth" about the SDAs. Any basic fact-finding about the SDAs
> will tell you this. From one of their websites: "The Adventist
> Church is not the same thing as the "Jehovah's Witnesses." We do
> believe in blood transfusions and our hospitals provide them thousands
> of times each day, 365 days a year! We proudly salute the flag and say
> the pledge of allegiance."
So there are no non-American Seventh Day Adventists?
--
Tony Cooper
I would never mention saying prayers for someone, but if it's said to
me my response is just "Thank you." I would be grateful for the
thought, and my response would merely recognize that the speaker has
good intentions. It's no time to discuss the validity of the concept
behind the intentions.
What does frost me is when the person is one of those types that wants
people to clasp hands, screw their eyes shut, and say some prayer
aloud. I don't like to offend sincere people, but I don't appreciate
being asked to join in. It seems hypocritical.
We do say grace before dinner when the family assembles. Old habits
are hard to break. It's more the ritual beginning of a family affair.
My DIL, the Russian, does not participate, but politely sits there
quietly. We are not hand-holders; we just duck heads and mumble.
With a new grandchild, the question of baptism has come up. Oddly
enough, it is the DIL that is pushing for it. She doesn't believe in
it, but says that since the father was baptized, the tradition must be
kept up. The father - my son - could care less.
CyberCypher
> On 24 Apr 2004 13:56:46 GMT, CyberCypher
> <cyber...@e-garfield.com> wrote:
>
>>Richard R. Hershberger wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
>>
>>[...]
>>> While there is at least one Christian (or at least
>>> quasi-Christian) sect that uses prayer as a substitute for
>>> medical treatment, this is rare and far out of the mainstream.
>>> The vast majority of Christian sects -- even ones with annoying
>>> television preachers -- are thoroughly pragmatic on this point.
>>
>>I assume that you are referring to Christian Scientists here, but
>>what about Seventh-Day Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses, both
>>groups that generally refuse blood transfusions
>
> The SDAs have no objection to blood transfusions. This is a
> common "urban myth" about the SDAs.
Like all cults,
they are easily
mythified
urbanly, urbanely,
sanely, and insanely,
and also
here
in the countryside.
> Any basic fact-finding about the SDAs will tell you this.
Not true. I looked, found a creed statement, but could not find
anything in it about blood transfusions. I found nothing else of
interest in my search, but I did look. It happens.
However, I did find the SDAs mentioned in a court transcript as not
allowing blood transfusions. Obviously, the lawyer was misinformed.
Thank you for clearing this up
> From one of their websites: "The
> Adventist Church is not the same thing as the "Jehovah's
> Witnesses." We do believe in blood transfusions and our hospitals
> provide them thousands of times each day, 365 days a year! We
> proudly salute the flag and say the pledge of allegiance."
You didn't include the URL. Not a good tactic when quoting from a
Website.
david56
I wasn't aware that blood letting was an integral part of pledging
allegiance (to the wall).
--
David
=====
CyberCypher
[...]
>
> I wasn't aware that blood letting was an integral part of pledging
> allegiance (to the wall).
>
Only if one is sent to Iraq or Afghanistan (these days).
david56
That's presumably because you have a Catholic history. I have a CoE
history which was largely ignored for a few generations.
> With a new grandchild, the question of baptism has come up. Oddly
> enough, it is the DIL that is pushing for it. She doesn't believe in
> it, but says that since the father was baptized, the tradition must be
> kept up. The father - my son - could care less.
When singing at a service (which I do rarely, but have no objection
to), I do not speak the prayers unless we are being televised. I am
perfectly happy to engage in a discussion about why I do not speak
the prayers, but it seems a little mean on the BBC to sit on Songs of
Praise with my mouth clamped shut, which might upset little old
ladies all over the land.
--
David
=====
Robert Lieblich
[ ... ]
> I keep reading the thread in hopes of reading an update on
> Mark's progress. Has anyone asked for one?
I've taken to checking the San Diego Union's website for Mark's
name. Nothing so far. Let's hope no news is good news.
--
Bob Lieblich
Wishing Mark well, of course
Donna Richoux
All you have to do is copy a phrase from the quotation like "blood
transfusions and our hospitals provide them thousands" and paste it into
Google. It pops right up, the only one.
I probably provide more URLs than not in my own posts, but not every
single time I quote something, and I can sympathize with others who
don't provide one every single time, either. Where is it written that
we are required to leave a complete audit trail?
--
Best -- Donna Richoux
Mike Lyle
> "John Dean" <john...@frag.lineone.net> wrote in message
> news:c6cbd6$oru$1...@news7.svr.pol.co.uk...
[...]
> > "They seem to want to have a presence almost everywhere in the world,"
> says
> > Jean-Pierre Levesque of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
> >
> > Mr Levesque is the world's leading police expert on biker gangs and he
> > believes the Hells Angels - and rival gangs - are one of the fastest
> growing
> > organised crime threats in the world. >>
> > --
> > John Dean
> > Oxford
>
> 'ere hin Kebec, dey har call de 'ells (but we spell it Hells).
Hostie! Eh?
Mike.
Areff
> We do say grace before dinner when the family assembles. Old habits
> are hard to break.
Aha! I knew you weren't a real Catholic, Coop!
--
CyberCypher
> CyberCypher <cyber...@e-garfield.com> wrote:
>
>> Tony Cooper wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
>
>> > From one of their websites: "The
>> > Adventist Church is not the same thing as the "Jehovah's
>> > Witnesses." We do believe in blood transfusions and our
>> > hospitals provide them thousands of times each day, 365 days a
>> > year! We proudly salute the flag and say the pledge of
>> > allegiance."
>>
>> You didn't include the URL. Not a good tactic when quoting from a
>> Website.
>
> All you have to do is copy a phrase from the quotation like "blood
> transfusions and our hospitals provide them thousands" and paste
> it into Google. It pops right up, the only one.
Ya know, Donna, if I thought that you really really really imagined
that I wasn't aware of how to use a search engine, I would be really
really really pissed at the implication of your really really really
ironically officious advice here.
> I probably provide more URLs than not in my own posts, but not
> every single time I quote something, and I can sympathize with
> others who don't provide one every single time, either. Where is
> it written that we are required to leave a complete audit trail?
As T.E. Lawrence is alleged to have said after his altruistic journey
into a "Muslim hot"[1] desert to save a man he later had to kill for
thievery, "Nothing is written".
Why are you intruding in the dust of my little Web-ship with Tony
Cooper? You cannot infer anything of substance from what I say to him
or what he says to me. You , of all people, ought to understand that.
[1] The ultimate level of spiciness in my favorite Pakistani curry
restaurant in Takadanobaba, Tokyo.
Tony Cooper
wrote:
>Tony Cooper wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
>
>> On 24 Apr 2004 13:56:46 GMT, CyberCypher
>> <cyber...@e-garfield.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Richard R. Hershberger wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
>>>
>>>[...]
>>>> While there is at least one Christian (or at least
>>>> quasi-Christian) sect that uses prayer as a substitute for
>>>> medical treatment, this is rare and far out of the mainstream.
>>>> The vast majority of Christian sects -- even ones with annoying
>>>> television preachers -- are thoroughly pragmatic on this point.
>>>
>>>I assume that you are referring to Christian Scientists here, but
>>>what about Seventh-Day Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses, both
>>>groups that generally refuse blood transfusions
>>
>> The SDAs have no objection to blood transfusions. This is a
>> common "urban myth" about the SDAs.
>
>Like all cults,
Cults? Are you unaware of the meaning of the word or deliberately
denigrating a major religious group?
I really don't understand this type of thinking. Richard refers to
"quasi-Christian sects" and you refer to "cults". Where is the
respect for other people's convictions?
>they are easily
>mythified
>urbanly, urbanely,
>sanely, and insanely,
>and also
>here
>in the countryside.
>
>> Any basic fact-finding about the SDAs will tell you this.
>
>Not true. I looked, found a creed statement, but could not find
>anything in it about blood transfusions. I found nothing else of
>interest in my search, but I did look. It happens.
>
>However, I did find the SDAs mentioned in a court transcript as not
>allowing blood transfusions. Obviously, the lawyer was misinformed.
>Thank you for clearing this up
>
>> From one of their websites: "The
>> Adventist Church is not the same thing as the "Jehovah's
>> Witnesses." We do believe in blood transfusions and our hospitals
>> provide them thousands of times each day, 365 days a year! We
>> proudly salute the flag and say the pledge of allegiance."
>
>You didn't include the URL. Not a good tactic when quoting from a
>Website.
Tactic: a device for accomplishing an end. There was no tactic
involved, nor should there have been. If you doubt that what I have
written is an accurate representation, then Google it up. That's how
I found it. I don't expect to be doubted, but don't give a damn if
you do doubt me.
Tony Cooper
<bass.c...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
>> The SDAs have no objection to blood transfusions. This is a common
>> "urban myth" about the SDAs. Any basic fact-finding about the SDAs
>> will tell you this. From one of their websites: "The Adventist
>> Church is not the same thing as the "Jehovah's Witnesses." We do
>> believe in blood transfusions and our hospitals provide them thousands
>> of times each day, 365 days a year! We proudly salute the flag and say
>> the pledge of allegiance."
>
>I wasn't aware that blood letting was an integral part of pledging
>allegiance (to the wall).
If you are really not aware of the "why" of this disclaimer, it's
because the JWs oppose both transfusions and pledging allegiance.
At least I've been told they won't recite the pledge of allegiance.
I've never actually asked one to do so. When they come to the door, I
just politely say "No thank you".
Tony Cooper
All of these points are basic etiquette. Religion is not like an
email-sent virus that infects if opened.
Tony Cooper
Non-practicing or lapsed are the terms. It's like the Mafia....once
in, never out.
david56
> On Sat, 24 Apr 2004 16:40:38 +0100, david56
> <bass.c...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
>
> >> The SDAs have no objection to blood transfusions. This is a common
> >> "urban myth" about the SDAs. Any basic fact-finding about the SDAs
> >> will tell you this. From one of their websites: "The Adventist
> >> Church is not the same thing as the "Jehovah's Witnesses." We do
> >> believe in blood transfusions and our hospitals provide them thousands
> >> of times each day, 365 days a year! We proudly salute the flag and say
> >> the pledge of allegiance."
> >
> >I wasn't aware that blood letting was an integral part of pledging
> >allegiance (to the wall).
>
> If you are really not aware of the "why" of this disclaimer, it's
> because the JWs oppose both transfusions and pledging allegiance.
I was not aware - it's not something which ever comes up with UK
Jehovah's Witnesses. The close proximity of these two statements was
a little incongruous.
> At least I've been told they won't recite the pledge of allegiance.
> I've never actually asked one to do so. When they come to the door, I
> just politely say "No thank you".
They seem to have given up on my road - I am frequently at home
during the day and I haven't been invited to discuss the Bible for a
few years now.
--
David
=====
Donna Richoux
> Donna Richoux wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
>
> > CyberCypher <cyber...@e-garfield.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Tony Cooper wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
> >
> >> > From one of their websites: "The
> >> > Adventist Church is not the same thing as the "Jehovah's
> >> > Witnesses." We do believe in blood transfusions and our
> >> > hospitals provide them thousands of times each day, 365 days a
> >> > year! We proudly salute the flag and say the pledge of
> >> > allegiance."
> >>
> >> You didn't include the URL. Not a good tactic when quoting from a
> >> Website.
> >
> > All you have to do is copy a phrase from the quotation like "blood
> > transfusions and our hospitals provide them thousands" and paste
> > it into Google. It pops right up, the only one.
>
> Ya know, Donna, if I thought that you really really really imagined
> that I wasn't aware of how to use a search engine, I would be really
> really really pissed at the implication of your really really really
> ironically officious advice here.
So you didn't mean a word of it, you were just looking for any excuse to
jump on Tony. OK.
>
> > I probably provide more URLs than not in my own posts, but not
> > every single time I quote something, and I can sympathize with
> > others who don't provide one every single time, either. Where is
> > it written that we are required to leave a complete audit trail?
>
> As T.E. Lawrence is alleged to have said after his altruistic journey
> into a "Muslim hot"[1] desert to save a man he later had to kill for
> thievery, "Nothing is written".
>
> Why are you intruding in the dust of my little Web-ship with Tony
> Cooper? You cannot infer anything of substance from what I say to him
> or what he says to me. You , of all people, ought to understand that.
Oh, I thought you were expressing a strong preference for seeing URLs
provided for quotes. Please forgive me for assuming there was actually
some meaningful content there.
--
Officially officious -- Donna Richoux.
CyberCypher
> On 24 Apr 2004 15:21:57 GMT, CyberCypher
> <cyber...@e-garfield.com> wrote:
>
>>Tony Cooper wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
>>
>>> On 24 Apr 2004 13:56:46 GMT, CyberCypher
>>> <cyber...@e-garfield.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>>Richard R. Hershberger wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
>>>>
>>>>[...]
>>>>> While there is at least one Christian (or at least
>>>>> quasi-Christian) sect that uses prayer as a substitute for
>>>>> medical treatment, this is rare and far out of the mainstream.
>>>>> The vast majority of Christian sects -- even ones with
>>>>> annoying television preachers -- are thoroughly pragmatic on
>>>>> this point.
>>>>
>>>>I assume that you are referring to Christian Scientists here,
>>>>but what about Seventh-Day Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses,
>>>>both groups that generally refuse blood transfusions
>>>
>>> The SDAs have no objection to blood transfusions. This is a
>>> common "urban myth" about the SDAs.
>>
>>Like all cults,
>
> Cults? Are you unaware of the meaning of the word or deliberately
> denigrating a major religious group?
"major religious group"? I wasn't aware that they were a "major
religious group". They've always seemed to me to be as off-the-wall
as the JWs and all those other twisted fundamentalist evangelical
cults that find the strangest things imaginable in their holy books.
Are you sure you're talking about about the religion of the prophet
Ellen G. White, demonstrated to be a plagiarist and to have a damged
temporal lobe that was more than likely the cause of her
(hallucinatory) "visions" and "voices"?[1] You're talking about the
weirdos that drone on and on about "The Rapture" and "The Mark of the
Beast"? A major religion? Gimme a break. The Southern Baptists are a
major *American* religion. They're everywhere down where you live,
but the SDAs are a drop in bucket of twisted theologies. See, for
example:
_Beware This Cult! An insider exposes Seventh-day Adventism and their
false Prophet, Ellen G. White_ By Gregory G. P. Hunt, M.D., B.Sc.,
F.R.C.P. Copyright ©1981
http://www.ellenwhite.org/btc/index.html
> I really don't understand this type of thinking. Richard refers
> to "quasi-Christian sects" and you refer to "cults". Where is
> the respect for other people's convictions?
You have no respect for anybody's convictions, Cooper, so why should
ask such a question? Come on, now. Deny that you have dissed Rey
countless times for his.
Besides, I've decided to become a Saudi-type Muslim; you know the
kind. They don't allow anyone in Saudi Arabia to wear crosses or
Stars of David or any other religious symbols because they are
offensive to Islam, and don't even allow Christmas trees or
decorations to be seen because they're offensive to Islam. Or maybe
one of them Iranian Shiites, the kind that like to kill Bahais for
kicks because they insult Islam by their very existence. Now, Muslims
*are* a major religious group, and I've yet to see that their
followers have any "respect for other people's convictions". Neither
did the Calvinist Puritans that colonized Massachusetts Bay Colony in
the 17th century. They used to drown Quakers for fun during their
summer doldrums. But I won't go on. I'm sure that a certified
theologian and ethicist like yourself knows all about that skeleton-
filled closet called "organized religion". Just read a little bit of
European and American history, especially the parts about the
Catholic missionaries offering all the pagans the choice between
accepting Catholicism or dying back in the early days of Western
imperialism, like in the 16th-19th centuries.
>>they are easily
>>mythified
>>urbanly, urbanely,
>>sanely, and insanely,
>>and also
>>here
>>in the countryside.
>>
>>> Any basic fact-finding about the SDAs will tell you this.
>>
>>Not true. I looked, found a creed statement, but could not find
>>anything in it about blood transfusions. I found nothing else of
>>interest in my search, but I did look. It happens.
>>
>>However, I did find the SDAs mentioned in a court transcript as
>>not allowing blood transfusions. Obviously, the lawyer was
>>misinformed. Thank you for clearing this up
>>
>>> From one of their websites: "The
>>> Adventist Church is not the same thing as the "Jehovah's
>>> Witnesses." We do believe in blood transfusions and our
>>> hospitals provide them thousands of times each day, 365 days a
>>> year! We proudly salute the flag and say the pledge of
>>> allegiance."
>>
>>You didn't include the URL. Not a good tactic when quoting from a
>>Website.
>
> Tactic: a device for accomplishing an end. There was no tactic
> involved, nor should there have been.
You have such a suspicious mind and such an incoherent grasp of the
language that you have no imagination at all. I assumed you had an
"end" (a "goal") when you wrote that post. If you had no end in mind,
then why did you write it? Are you really a random monkey at one in a
million typewriters pecking random letters out for bananas?
> If you doubt that what I
> have written is an accurate representation, then Google it up.
> That's how I found it. I don't expect to be doubted, but don't
> give a damn if you do doubt me.
You must, or you wouldn't have bothered to reply with those words. I
certainly don't doubt what you said about the SDAs in your previous
post. Didn't you see my "Thank you for clearing that up" remark? Did
you think that was a false statement? Where are your brains, monkey
drummer man?
Oh, sure, I doubt your ability to read and write well enough to
understand anything more profound than a good Dave Barry column ---
and I love good Dave Barry columns --- but that SDA quote would be
understandable to any 4th-grader in the USA.
But it's a bit out of character for someone who claims not to take
anything in this NG seriously to suddenly take umbrage at his own
inference of his own lack of honesty. You aren't smart enough to be
intellectually honest or dishonest, so I never worry about serious
stuff like that.
[1] "Many false prophets are gone out into the world." 1 John 4:1
Areff
What I meant was that your saying grace seems un-Catholic to me. I
associate saying grace with the Prods. I've never known any Catholics who
said grace, anyway. Could be a regional or other sort of t'ing, I
suppose.
--
CyberCypher
[...]
> So you didn't mean a word of it, you were just looking for any
> excuse to jump on Tony. OK.
You got it.
[...]
>
> Oh, I thought you were expressing a strong preference for seeing
> URLs provided for quotes. Please forgive me for assuming there was
> actually some meaningful content there.
Well, since I always provide URLs and Tony always used to rag me for
it, I thought I'd jump on his butt for not doing it. I do like to see
those URLs, of course. They often lead to interesting reading. But I
did find something interesting about the SDAs on my own.
Tony Cooper
wrote:
>>
>> Cults? Are you unaware of the meaning of the word or deliberately
>> denigrating a major religious group?
>
>"major religious group"? I wasn't aware that they were a "major
>religious group". They've always seemed to me to be as off-the-wall
>as the JWs and all those other twisted fundamentalist evangelical
>cults that find the strangest things imaginable in their holy books.
Nothing like a snap judgement, is there? The SDAs have 11,300,000
adherents, which puts them not that far behind the Southern Baptists
at 15,000,000 and just behind the Mormons and the Methodists in size.
They are the ninth largest international denomination, and one of the
top six most likely to have a church near you. There are 4,000 SDAs
in Taiwan. It's on a website that I'm sure you can Google up with
your self-professed skills.
Orlando has a very high SDA population, and the SDAs run most of the
hospitals in this area and many other areas. Those in LA area may
know of Loma Linda and the medical center there. My own heart surgery
was done at Florida Hospital, which is run by the SDAs. At no time
during my stay was there any religious contact made. The food is
vegetarian crap, but meat is available if the patient insists. I did,
and they cook it badly.
Not having attended a service, I don't know all that much about the
faith, but they seem rather white bread as far as churches go. The
major difference seems to be the recognition of Saturday as the day
they go to church, but the Jews are "different" there, too. Like the
Jews, they have dietary restrictions but - again, like the Jews - all
members don't observe them. "Different", BTW, in that I personally
think of Sunday as church day as so do most of the Christian
denominations.
I know several SDAs, and none have ever discussed religion around me.
My kids went to a SDA summer camp one year. Basically, my experience
has been that they are just normal people that go to a particular
church.
>Are you sure you're talking about about the religion of the prophet
>Ellen G. White, demonstrated to be a plagiarist and to have a damged
>temporal lobe that was more than likely the cause of her
>(hallucinatory) "visions" and "voices"?[1] You're talking about the
>weirdos that drone on and on about "The Rapture" and "The Mark of the
>Beast"?
Dunno. I've never attended a service. I generally reserve calling
someone a "weirdo" unless I've observed something about them that
calls for that judgement. Your standards are evidently lower.
> A major religion? Gimme a break. The Southern Baptists are a
>major *American* religion. They're everywhere down where you live,
>but the SDAs are a drop in bucket of twisted theologies. See, for
>example:
Did you deliberately try to be wrong in all aspects of your statement?
>_Beware This Cult! An insider exposes Seventh-day Adventism and their
>false Prophet, Ellen G. White_ By Gregory G. P. Hunt, M.D., B.Sc.,
>F.R.C.P. Copyright ©1981
You can find a book exposing *any* religion as some kind of fraud.
>> I really don't understand this type of thinking. Richard refers
>> to "quasi-Christian sects" and you refer to "cults". Where is
>> the respect for other people's convictions?
>
>You have no respect for anybody's convictions, Cooper, so why should
>ask such a question? Come on, now. Deny that you have dissed Rey
>countless times for his.
Whole cloth. I've dissed Rey for being Rey, for writing what he does,
for putting up a glitzy website, and for making a career out of
scribbling on the bathroom wall, but never for his convictions. I
don't even know what they are.
I'll snip the side trip and the TUB ad hominem.
Tony Cooper
I've never known any Catholics that aren't from a family that does or
did. Find me a Catholic that can't recite:
Bless us, O Lord, and these
thy gifts which we are about
to receive from thy bounty,
through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Whether they do or not is another story.
The older ones might even say:
Bénedic, Dómine, nos et haec
tua dona quae de tua largitate sumus sumpturi.
Per Christum
Dóminum nostrum. Amen.
Frances Kemmish
Jehovah's Witnesses don't swear oaths. My daughter's best friend in
elementary school was a Jehovah's Witness. They used to stand together
during the Pledge of Allegiance every morning, since neither of them
recited it. It helped them both to do what their parents expected of
them, despite being different from everyone else in the class.
This girl and her sisters weren't able to be Girl Scouts because that
involved oaths too.[1] They didn't celebrate birthdays after they were
about eight years old. They weren't supposed to celebrate birthdays at
all, but their mother found it too hard when they were small.
Fortunately, the ban on blood transfusions didn't come up.
Fran
[1] I don't know if there is some kind of workaround in the Girl Scouts
for people who won't swear oaths. My son managed to get as far as Life
(or was it Star? - the one before Eagle, anyway) without reciting the
Pledge, and without saluting the flag, because he had an understanding
Scoutmaster, who found ways around those requirements.
Frances Kemmish
My mother's family - Dutch Catholics - said grace at every meal. They
crossed themselves at the begining and end of the grace too. They didn't
hold hands or say it aloud, though.
Fran
Frances Kemmish
At my school - not a religious school, but a state grammar school - we
had to sing "Benedictus Benedicat per Iesum Christum Dominum Nostrum
Amen", before being allowed to gather food in the canteen. It was led by
a Prefect (a Sixth-Former), who would get through it as fast as humanly
possible.
We had to sing the Lord's Prayer at morning assembly too, but we sang
that in English.
Fran
J. J. Lodder
> Evan Kirshenbaum <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote in message
news:<4qrbsf...@hpl.hp.com>...
> > de...@aol.com (DE781) writes:
>
> > (I've already sent my regards by email. This is one of those
> > situations in which I envy religious people their belief that they can
> > actually do something to help by praying.)
>
> Oh, prayer certainly helps. You might contemplate whom it helps, though.
It certainly helps researchers with no better idea of what to do
to find some paid wwork.
Some people (Americans of course) have indeed been crazy enough
to conduct a large scale double blind experiment
to investigate the efficacy of prayer as a cure for disease.
Best,
Jan
Richard R. Hershberger
> Richard R. Hershberger wrote on 24 Apr 2004:
>
> [...]
> > quasi-Christian) sect that uses prayer as a substitute for medical
> > treatment, this is rare and far out of the mainstream. The vast
> > majority of Christian sects -- even ones with annoying television
> > preachers -- are thoroughly pragmatic on this point.
>
> I assume that you are referring to Christian Scientists here, but what
> about Seventh-Day Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses, both groups that
> change occurring among the JWs on blood products that are acceptable
> [1])? In these circumstances, they use prayer and not medical
> treatment.
I didn't name any specific sect out of laziness, as I would have felt
obliged to actually research their doctrines before posting so as to
make sure I wasn't repeating an urban legend. But all of the sects
you have named are well outside the mainstream of Christian thought.
Richard R. Hershberger
Richard R. Hershberger
> "Charles Riggs" <CHA...@eircom.net> wrote in message
> news:6q0k801at5rimnnhg...@4ax.com...
> > On 23 Apr 2004 07:24:13 -0700, rrh...@acme.com (Richard R.
> > Hershberger) wrote:
> >
> > >Evan Kirshenbaum <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote in message
> news:<4qrbsf...@hpl.hp.com>...
> > >> de...@aol.com (DE781) writes:
>
> > >> (I've already sent my regards by email. This is one of those
> > >> situations in which I envy religious people their belief that they can
> > >> actually do something to help by praying.)
> > >
> > >Oh, prayer certainly helps. You might contemplate whom it helps, though.
> >
> > no-one.
>
>
> prayed for all ensure that effective modern medicine is the primary
> treatment being employed, and the people I know who pray are well aware of
> that, and would consider it foolish (and morally wrong!) to act otherwise.
> For them, "God helps those who help themselves" is not a mere cliché. But
> for those people who pray as a substitute for effective modern medicine, the
> results can be fatal.
As a follow-up to my previous response, I want to add that prayer
doesn't only help the person doing the praying. The family of the
injured party, if religious, can also be consoled. For that matter,
if the patient is religious and aware of being prayed for this might
have psychological benefit which in turn might assist recovery.
None of this is intended to make any comment on the truth value of
religion in general or prayer in particular.
Richard R. Hershberger
Tony Cooper
<fkem...@optonline.net> wrote:
>My mother's family - Dutch Catholics - said grace at every meal. They
>crossed themselves at the begining and end of the grace too. They didn't
>hold hands or say it aloud, though.
We don't do the hand-holding bit. That seems rather showy to me. We
say the blessing aloud, but admittedly mumble. We never say grace in
a restaurant. If my wife "thinks" it, she's never mentioned it.
Tony Cooper
Hershberger) wrote:
I don't know that much about the actual services, but why do you
classify the Seventh Day Adventists as "well outside the mainstream"?
They seem rather mainstream to me.
david56
> [1] I don't know if there is some kind of workaround in the Girl Scouts
> for people who won't swear oaths. My son managed to get as far as Life
> (or was it Star? - the one before Eagle, anyway) without reciting the
> Pledge, and without saluting the flag, because he had an understanding
> Scoutmaster, who found ways around those requirements.
Daughter was never in the Brownies or Guides, but she joined the
Venture Scouts at 17. I was present at her investiture - she swore
"by Almighty God", about which I later questioned her. "I had my
fingers crossed behind my back" was her explanation.
--
David
=====
david56
> At my school - not a religious school, but a state grammar school - we
> had to sing "Benedictus Benedicat per Iesum Christum Dominum Nostrum
> Amen", before being allowed to gather food in the canteen. It was led by
> a Prefect (a Sixth-Former), who would get through it as fast as humanly
> possible.
And at my grammar school we said "For what we are about to receive,
may the Lord make us truly thankful. Amen".
> We had to sing the Lord's Prayer at morning assembly too, but we sang
> that in English.
Every day? We sang a different hymn every morning; by convention
the choir (sitting at the front) sang the penultimate verse without
the groundlings, in four-part harmony. I have a tolerably good
singing voice, but I am ace at sight reading - it may be that five
years of daily hymn reading contributed to this.
--
David
=====
Martin Ambuhl
> Cults? Are you unaware of the meaning of the word or deliberately
> denigrating a major religious group?
Why don't you try checking the way the word "cult" is used by the
mother-of-all-major-Christian-religious-groups, the Catholic church?
The RCs have a Passion- and Church-centered cult, the protestants a
Bible-centered cult. Some folks, afraid of ignorant responses regarding
the word "cult" as denigrating, have taken to using the Latin "cultus"
instead. You have fallen into the trap of considering a derivative use
as the core meaning ...
[COD10]
cult
· n.
1 a system of religious devotion directed towards a particular figure or
object.
> a relatively small religious group regarded by others as strange or
as imposing excessive control over members.
2 something popular or fashionable among a particular section of society.
– DERIVATIVES cultic adj. cultish adj. cultishness n. cultism n. cultist n.
– ORIGIN C17: from Fr. culte or L. cultus ‘worship’.
Frances Kemmish
> Frances Kemmish typed thus:
>
>
>>We had to sing the Lord's Prayer at morning assembly too, but we sang
>>that in English.
>
>
> Every day? We sang a different hymn every morning; by convention
> the choir (sitting at the front) sang the penultimate verse without
> the groundlings, in four-part harmony. I have a tolerably good
> singing voice, but I am ace at sight reading - it may be that five
> years of daily hymn reading contributed to this.
>
As far as I can remember, we sang a hymn (different each day); a pupil
(or occasionally a teacher) read a lesson; the Head read a prayer, and
we sang the Lord's Prayer. Then the deputy Head read notices. That was
the point at which kids who were excused Assembly came into the hall.
On Thursdays, a pupil did some kind of musical turn. The only one I can
recall is the bassoon trio, but I don't remember the piece.
I was reminded of this on Monday, as I was driving home from West
Virginia, because there was an hour devoted to bassoon music on WV
Public Radio. One of the pieces was a quartet played by what sounded
like the Caliban Quartet (is that possible?) They played "A Farewell to
Stromness"). There was a Weber piece too.
I hadn't realised that there was so much bassoon music available.
Fran
Tony Cooper
<mam...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>Tony Cooper wrote:
>
>> Cults? Are you unaware of the meaning of the word or deliberately
>> denigrating a major religious group?
>
>Why don't you try checking the way the word "cult" is used by the
>mother-of-all-major-Christian-religious-groups, the Catholic church?
>The RCs have a Passion- and Church-centered cult, the protestants a
>Bible-centered cult. Some folks, afraid of ignorant responses regarding
>the word "cult" as denigrating, have taken to using the Latin "cultus"
>instead. You have fallen into the trap of considering a derivative use
>as the core meaning ...
>
Read the word in the context used, Martin. If you then feel it wasn't
used in a denigrating fashion, come back and let's talk.
Tony Cooper
>Cooper:
>
>>Find me a Catholic that can't recite:
>>
>>Bless us, O Lord, and these
>>thy gifts which we are about
>>to receive from thy bounty,
>>through Christ our Lord. Amen.
>
>I can't. I just kind of sit there silently and then say, "Amen" at the end.
>They neved taught us anything useful in CCD.
>
If your parent used this blessing, or your grandparents, you'd know
it. If you paid attention. In general, you confuse "taught" with
"learned".
Skitt
> That was the point at which kids who were excused Assembly
> came into the hall.
Just wondering -- was that an inadvertent omission of "from", or is "excused
Assembly" part of some local (wider than local?) idiolect?
--
Skitt (in Hayward, California)
www.geocities.com/opus731/
Robert Bannister
> Fontana:
>
> LOL, you so cray-zay:
>
>
>>Did I hear you right, Joey? Are you part of the latter-day bicyclist
>>subculture? One of those people who wear Spandex and use a *helmet* when
>>they ride a bike? Because I think that's really, if anything, worse than
>>the various motorcycle subcultures out there. To paraphrase Dr. Zaius,
>>bicycling was once a paradise; your kind turned it into a desert.
>
>
> No, Fontana, THANK GOD I am not one of those kinds of bikers. I've actually
> never biked anything so major before, but Boo thought this NYC Bike Tour would
> be interesting (plus, it's to raise money for the NYC 2012 Olympics [I *can't
> wait* to go see them...but, I'll be (gasp!) **30**!!]).
>
> I do use a helmet though. Don't you?
Aren't they compulsory? They are here.
--
Rob Bannister
W Australia
Frances Kemmish
> Frances Kemmish wrote in very small part:
>
>
>>That was the point at which kids who were excused Assembly
>>came into the hall.
>
>
> Just wondering -- was that an inadvertent omission of "from", or is "excused
> Assembly" part of some local (wider than local?) idiolect?
Not an inadvertent omission - a perfectly natural way for me to express
the thought. I don't know how local/regional it might be.
Fran
Robert Bannister
>>From: Charles Riggs
>
>
>>>Oh, prayer certainly helps. You might contemplate whom it helps, though.
>>
>>True -- it can help the person doing the praying -- plus it hurts
>>no-one.
>
>
>
> Regardless of the belief in the power of prayer, I think "I pray for you" is
> also a matter of ettiquette. What do you say to your neighbor who informs you
> that her husband is undergoing heart surgery as you speak?
Well, I certainly wouldn't tell her I was going to pray. That would be
the height of hypocrisy as well as a downright lie. There are many ways
of expressing sympathy, or even better, ways of actually helping whether
by keeping the person company, helping round the house, picking her kid
up from school, etc. that do not entail lying.
--
Rob Bannister
Skitt
I see -- similar to "graduated high school", it seems. OK. I guess the
assembly needed excusing. ;-)
Areff
He probably means it in terms of the whole culture of Christianity as it
exists in the world and in the US today. I'd have to agree with him
there.
I'd say that the SDAs are non-mainstream, FMPOV, even in a more general
sense. Your insistence to the contrary makes me wonder whether this is
your Orlando experience entering into the picture here, Coop, if you're
right when you say that there are lots of SDAs in Orlando, to the point
where, I think you said, they run most of the hospitals. I'm dead sure
that's not true of, say, New York or Chicago, the Largest and Third
Largest cities in America, respectively. New York has tons of
Catholic and Jewish hospitals, not to mention a number of
non-religious ones. I know there's one hospital that specializes in
"bloodless medicine" or something like that and I wonder whether that's a
hospital that's affiliated with the SDAs. I've always seen the SDAs as a
sort of peripheral, non-mainstream sect of Christianity, whose adherents
tend to be economically marginalized as well.
Orlando's an important place, Coop, but only because of Walt Disney
World, let's face it.
I'd also say that Scient*logists are well outside the religious mainstream
(Not Counting Los Angeles Of Course!) in the US. But I can think of
plenty of mainstream-seeming Hollywood actors and actresses who happen to
be adherents of Scient*logy (NTTAWWT). So maybe you mean "mainstream" in
that sort of way.
--
Areff
> Fontana:
>
>>What I meant was that your saying grace seems un-Catholic to me. I
>>associate saying grace with the Prods.
>
>
>>I've never known any Catholics who
>>said grace, anyway.
>
> don't do it on any random night, or when we just have the grandparents over for
> dinner or something. But, on Xmas, Xmas Eve, Thanksgiving, Easter, etc, we say
> grace before eating. I can't believe your family doesn't.
You sure your family isn't trying to act like Prods? Some sort of upward
mobility/assimilation to WASP norms sort of thing?
Can't be a New Jersey thing, since my maternal grandmother, as religiously
Catholic as you can get, never said grace.
--
Carmen L. Abruzzi
> DE781 wrote:
>
>>>"Biker" connotes a subculture, not just a mode of transport.
>>
>>I wouldn't have ever considered that. To me a "biker" is a "biker".
>>I am going to be "biking" in the tour of NYC next Sunday. That makes
>>me a "biker". I don't know what you old hippies used to think of when
>>you heard the word, but I can guarantee you, FEW of those people exist
>>anymore.
>
>
> Don't be too sure, Young Joey. I don't know from the Worcester region of
> Massachusetts, but go down to neighboring Connecticut on any Sunday
> afternoon and you'll see thousands of bikers (motorcyclists) slowing down
> traffic on the highways and byways, as they all head for the Red Dog
> Saloon or wherever it is that these people meet up. Most of them do seem
> to be approximately over 55 years of age, yes.
>
>
>>And the ones who do are lost in a timewarp worse than The
>>Brady Bunch.
>
Don't you have those wholesome bikers out there back East? The kind who
wear a full Cleveland while riding their silver and gold-metallic
painted bikes with a muffler, and those big fiberglass boxes on the
sides and back and a windscreen in front, and a big radio antennae off
the back wheel so they can talk to their fellow riders through the built
in headset in their full-head covering helmets?
Or those young, rich, teenage motorcyclists who ride their Suzukis lying
on the gas tank with their feet way out back on the rear axle, taking
curves with one shoulder about a foot off the asphalt, wearing BadBoy
shorts and t-shirts?
R J Valentine
} Tony Cooper wrote:
...
}> I don't know that much about the actual services, but why do you
}> classify the Seventh Day Adventists as "well outside the mainstream"?
}> They seem rather mainstream to me.
}
} He probably means it in terms of the whole culture of Christianity as it
} exists in the world and in the US today. I'd have to agree with him
} there.
}
} I'd say that the SDAs are non-mainstream, FMPOV, even in a more general
} sense. Your insistence to the contrary makes me wonder whether this is
} your Orlando experience entering into the picture here, Coop, if you're
} right when you say that there are lots of SDAs in Orlando, to the point
} where, I think you said, they run most of the hospitals. I'm dead sure
} that's not true of, say, New York or Chicago, the Largest and Third
} Largest cities in America, respectively.
It's true enough of the Laurelplex (Fourth Largest Metropolitan Area in
America). We used to live across the street from a nurse who worked at
Eugene Leland Memorial Hospital, right neat the northern county police
headquarters, and I hear they got a lot of business from prisoners falling
down stairs (back in the day). I think that Washington Adventist Hospital
is one of the most respected hospitals around. Who could be more
mainstream than Willard Scott, weatherman emeritus for NBC, former member
of the Joy Boys (googlable), the original Ronald McDonald, and before that
Bozo the Clown (not to be confused with Smokey Bear, another Laurelplex
(former) resident, who was voiced by Jackson Weaver of Harden and Weaver
fame, arch-rivals of the Joy Boys). I think that Mr. Scott Is a member of
the Seventh Day Adventist family. No doubt someone will correct me if I
am wrong.
I vote at Eisenhower Middle School (nee Junior High School) and have since
it was built. But back in the sixties I voted at an elementary school
that is now a Seventh Day Adventist church or school. We're practically
related.
--
R. J. Valentine <mailto:r...@smart.net>
Heck, there are people who correct me when I am right. Willard Scott's
replacement was baptized at the same church I was baptized at.
John Varela
wrote:
> I don't believe that prayer helps the person being prayed for, but I
> do firmly believe that praying *can* help the family pull through a
> difficult situation. When a loved one is ill, the family feels so
> completely helpless. If praying gives them solace and a sense of
> doing something positive, it is helpful to them.
Getting even further off topic...
(Is there a theologian in the house?) Time and again, at a funeral or
memorial service, the priest/minister/preacher/ in charge will say something
to the effect that "old so-and-so is looking down on us right now and
smiling". What happened to the concept of Judgement Day? I thought all the
corpses are to stay on the ground until JC returns in glory sitting on the
right hand of God to judge the quick and the dead, whereupon everyone will be
resurrected in the body. But here are these religiouses saying oh no, they
are in heaven right now already.
Can anyone resolve this mystery for me? Other than that it's just a platitude
to make the survivors feel better.
--
John Varela
(Trade "OLD" lamps for "NEW" for email.)
I apologize for munging the address but the spam was too much.
Arcadian Rises
Good for you.
I always suspected that one can rely on people who lack social grace.
Forgive me, but I consider equally annoying to make a big stink about one's
religion, or lack thereof. A born again Christian who preaches about the
benefits of the Baptism annoys me the same way as an atheist who complains
about the omnipresence of the Nativity scene during a private Christmas party.
But then again, social grace is a superficial quality compared to actually
helping your friends in distress, instead of giving them only some words of
comfort.
Tony Cooper
Why? What is there about the SDA form of religion that you find
non-mainstream? Where do they differ? Is this just an impression
based on not knowing anything about them, or a knowledge based on some
information not revealed?
>I'd say that the SDAs are non-mainstream, FMPOV, even in a more general
>sense. Your insistence to the contrary makes me wonder whether this is
>your Orlando experience entering into the picture here, Coop, if you're
>right when you say that there are lots of SDAs in Orlando, to the point
>where, I think you said, they run most of the hospitals.
Strange deduction. To the point of....?
> I'm dead sure
>that's not true of, say, New York or Chicago, the Largest and Third
>Largest cities in America, respectively. New York has tons of
>Catholic and Jewish hospitals, not to mention a number of
>non-religious ones.
The Adventists own 155 hospitals around the country and around the
world. Not having a presence in Chicago or New York is rather
insignificant. An overview of their hospital systems is at
http://tinyurl.com/37dfv Many of their hospitals are teaching
institutions, and New York and Chicago surgeons may well be products
of, say, Kettering Medical Center.
> I know there's one hospital that specializes in
>"bloodless medicine" or something like that and I wonder whether that's a
>hospital that's affiliated with the SDAs.
The medicine practiced at the SDA hospitals is conventional medicine.
> I've always seen the SDAs as a
>sort of peripheral, non-mainstream sect of Christianity, whose adherents
>tend to be economically marginalized as well.
Again, based on what?
As I said, I've never attended a SDA service or talked religion with a
SDA. I haven't heard or read anything that would indicate that the
SDA form of religion is anything less mainstream than your average
Lutheran or Presbyterian. My opinion is formed by their low profile.
What is your opinion based on?
The "economically marginalized" comment is equally strange. How do
you arrive at this?
Like any religion, they've produced the ordinary (John Kellogg,
Kellogg cereals), the not-so-ordinary (Little Richard), and the
bizarre (David Koresh).
Michael West
> As I said, I've never attended a SDA service or talked religion with a
> SDA. I haven't heard or read anything that would indicate that the
> SDA form of religion is anything less mainstream than your average
> Lutheran or Presbyterian.
You may not have read any such thing, but surely
your observations of society and demographics
in "mainstream" America would suggest that
the evangelical Christian movements are on the
fringes, however respectable some of them may be.
--
Michael West
Bob Cunningham
<bass.c...@ntlworld.com> said:
> Frances Kemmish typed thus:
>
> > At my school - not a religious school, but a state
> > grammar school - we had to sing "Benedictus Benedicat
> > per Iesum Christum Dominum Nostrum Amen", before being
> > allowed to gather food in the canteen. It was led by
> > a Prefect (a Sixth-Former), who would get through it
> > as fast as humanly possible.
>
> And at my grammar school we said "For what we are about
> to receive, may the Lord make us truly thankful. Amen".
While we're on the subject of prayer, I think we should say
a few words to God about the plight of the pandas.
As I understand their situation, they depend upon moving
from one bamboo forest to another as each forest enters a
stage of growth that provides proper food for them.
Different bamboo groves have different cycles of growth, so
that when one grove is not suitable, another is.
Humans are seriously interfering with that ecology by
splitting one grove from another with their development.
Pandas need at least corridors between groves.
It may be an impossible problem for humans -- or pandas --
to solve, but maybe if we tell God about it, he can figure
something out. Some of you people who believe there is a
God could ask him. It couldn't hurt.
CyberCypher
> On 24 Apr 2004 18:12:49 GMT, CyberCypher
> <cyber...@e-garfield.com> wrote:
>
>>>
>>> Cults? Are you unaware of the meaning of the word or
>>> deliberately denigrating a major religious group?
>>
>>"major religious group"? I wasn't aware that they were a "major
>>religious group". They've always seemed to me to be as
>>off-the-wall as the JWs and all those other twisted fundamentalist
>>evangelical cults that find the strangest things imaginable in
>>their holy books.
>
> Nothing like a snap judgement, is there?
You're excellent at such things, so I will take this as an
endorsement and high praise.
> The SDAs have 11,300,000
> adherents, which puts them not that far behind the Southern
> Baptists at 15,000,000 and just behind the Mormons and the
> Methodists in size. They are the ninth largest international
> denomination, and one of the top six most likely to have a church
> near you.
Pardon me if my whoopdedoos turn into yawns at this point.
> There are 4,000 SDAs in Taiwan.
Despite Taiwan's small size, I don't know a single one, thank GOD.
> It's on a website that
> I'm sure you can Google up with your self-professed skills.
If I cared enough, I might, but I found everything I wanted to know
about the cult.
> Orlando has a very high SDA population, and the SDAs run most of
> the hospitals in this area and many other areas.
I always knew that Florida was a place to stay away from.
> Those in LA area may know of Loma Linda and the
> medical center there.
Loma Linda was just another placename when I lived in LA, America's
first largest (Kook) City.
> My own heart
> surgery was done at Florida Hospital, which is run by the SDAs.
No wonder you're so respectful of everyone else's religious beliefs
but not of their convictions.
> At no time during my stay was there any religious contact made.
I assume that you were anaesthetized during the operation and are not
aware of all the stuff they put into your body while you were out of
it there, and that now that you're no longer asleep, you're still not
aware in your everyday out-of-it condition.
> The food is vegetarian crap, but meat is available if the patient
> insists. I did, and they cook it badly.
Ellen G. White is reported to have been a voracious and insatiable
meat eater despite her recommendations that her people eat only
vegetables. Turns out that 50% of the SDAs eat meat.
> Not having attended a service, I don't know all that much about
> the faith, but they seem rather white bread as far as churches go.
> The major difference seems to be the recognition of Saturday as
> the day they go to church, but the Jews are "different" there,
> too.
Despite your self-professed ignorance, you are still willing to make
sweeping statements like this? Very interesting.
> Like the Jews, they have dietary restrictions but - again,
> like the Jews - all members don't observe them.
That's "not all members observe them", if you want what you said to
make sense.
> "Different", BTW, in that I personally think of Sunday
> as church day as so do most of the Christian denominations.
And I know what an expert you are about Judaism too, living in a city
with JCC within osmotic distance of your house, so I will give all
that you've said here the great credence it deserves.
> I know several SDAs, and none have ever discussed religion around
> me. My kids went to a SDA summer camp one year. Basically, my
> experience has been that they are just normal people that go to a
> particular church.
Tell that to Gregory G. P. Hunt, M.D., B.Sc., F.R.C.P. He were one.
>>Are you sure you're talking about about the religion of the
>>prophet Ellen G. White, demonstrated to be a plagiarist and to
>>have a damged temporal lobe that was more than likely the cause of
>>her (hallucinatory) "visions" and "voices"?[1] You're talking
>>about the weirdos that drone on and on about "The Rapture" and
>>"The Mark of the Beast"?
>
> Dunno. I've never attended a service. I generally reserve
> calling someone a "weirdo" unless I've observed something about
> them that calls for that judgement. Your standards are evidently
> lower.
When I "communicate" with you, I have no standards; it would be
pointless.
>> A major religion? Gimme a break. The Southern Baptists are a
>>major *American* religion. They're everywhere down where you live,
>>but the SDAs are a drop in bucket of twisted theologies. See, for
>>example:
>
> Did you deliberately try to be wrong in all aspects of your
> statement?
I'm not perfect, so I'm sometimes wrong even when I don't want to be.
Shit happens, ya know.
>>_Beware This Cult! An insider exposes Seventh-day Adventism and
>>their false Prophet, Ellen G. White_ By Gregory G. P. Hunt, M.D.,
>>B.Sc., F.R.C.P. Copyright ©1981
>
> You can find a book exposing *any* religion as some kind of fraud.
That's good, because they are all frauds of one kind or another, but
I don't need published exposés to figure that out.
>>> I really don't understand this type of thinking. Richard refers
>>> to "quasi-Christian sects" and you refer to "cults". Where is
>>> the respect for other people's convictions?
>>
>>You have no respect for anybody's convictions, Cooper, so why
>>should ask such a question? Come on, now. Deny that you have
>>dissed Rey countless times for his.
>
> Whole cloth. I've dissed Rey for being Rey, for writing what he
> does, for putting up a glitzy website, and for making a career out
> of scribbling on the bathroom wall, but never for his convictions.
> I don't even know what they are.
See? You know that Rey was "convicted" and sent to prison once, and
that was the allusion, but you have no imagination.
> I'll snip the side trip and the TUB ad hominem.
But that was the best part of the post and the only part that was
meant to be taken seriously! Party pooper! Spoilsport!
--
Franke: EFL teacher & medical editor.
For email, ehziuh htiw rehpycrebyc ecalper.
CyberCypher
No more denigrating that my use of "religion" or "faith" or "belief" in
the context of discussions of such superstitions and absurdities,
praise the lord.
Martin Ambuhl
> (Is there a theologian in the house?) Time and again, at a funeral or
> memorial service, the priest/minister/preacher/ in charge will say something
> to the effect that "old so-and-so is looking down on us right now and
> smiling". What happened to the concept of Judgement Day? I thought all the
> corpses are to stay on the ground until JC returns in glory sitting on the
> right hand of God to judge the quick and the dead, whereupon everyone will be
> resurrected in the body. But here are these religiouses saying oh no, they
> are in heaven right now already.
Luke23:43 And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt
thou be with me in paradise.
Tony Cooper
I really dunno, Michael. I'm really not sure what "evangelical
Christian movements" are. I could look it up, but without doing so my
thought would be that these are sects that believe in the acceptance
of Jesus Christ, the need to be "born again", and the acceptance of
the Bible as written.
I don't know if the SDAs believe in the "born again" rule. However,
most Baptists do, and I wouldn't consider the Baptists as fringe. I
don't know if the SDAs are fundamentalists in the acceptance of the
Bible as written.
You kind of imply that you know these things about the SDAs, since
you've brought up the inference that they are part of the "evangelical
movement". What about them places them in this area?
I really can't think of a denomination as large as the SDAs - only
about 15% smaller than the Baptists - as a fringe group. A fringe
group wouldn't be the 9th largest group internationally.
What I objected to is Franke's categorizing them as a "cult" and that
they are not a major religious group.
Maybe I don't understand what you mean by "fringe group". To me,
that's some group with bizarre practices (like snake handling) that
has some major aspect of the religion that is different from other
religious practices in some major way. If the SDAs fit there, then I
just don't see it.
Basically, I'm saying that the SDAs - as far as I know - are as
conventional a denomination as Lutherans, Methodists, or any other
major religion. I suspect that the SDAs have more in common with
other faiths than they have differences.
Carmen L. Abruzzi
> On 25 Apr 2004 00:10:04 GMT, Areff <m...@privacy.net> wrote:
>
>
>>Tony Cooper wrote:
>>
>>>I don't know that much about the actual services, but why do you
>>>classify the Seventh Day Adventists as "well outside the mainstream"?
>>>They seem rather mainstream to me.
>>
>>He probably means it in terms of the whole culture of Christianity as it
>>exists in the world and in the US today. I'd have to agree with him
>>there.
>
>
> Why? What is there about the SDA form of religion that you find
> non-mainstream? Where do they differ?
Well, besides their observance of Saturday as the Sabbath, they have
their roots in an Arian sort of theology; one that taught that Jesus is
subordinate to the Father God--that he is not one with God, but a
creation of God. This does not jibe with (small "o") orthodox Christian
Trinity of God.
This was one of the biggest controversies of early Christianity, which
was thought to be resolved by the year 400, but reared its head again in
the last century or two. As far as I can tell, this didn't stem from
any direct study of Arian theology, but from a analysis of Christian
scripture and theology that came to the same conclusions as had Arius,
way back when. This idea, that Jesus was basically just an especially
blessed messanger from God, leaves the door open to other messangers,
who do not have to claim divinity for themselves--viz David Koresh.
But nowadays, it seems that many or most 7DAs do preach the
Trinity--what their theory may be I do not know.
Well, they're pretty wild, theologically, but most people don't judge
religious groups on their theology but on their practice. Practically
speaking, the 7DAs are prolly not so wild as they once were. But there
are some subgroups reaching back to the wilder aspects of their
origin--Koresh was just one of the more prominent.
Tony Cooper
<mbw...@remove.bigpond.com> wrote:
Following up my own post, I looked up the SDAs and found at
http://www.religioustolerance.org/sda.htm a synopsis of their
beliefs. I don't see much different there than most other major
Christian denominations. A few tweaks, but all denominations vary in
some way from the others.
They do believe in the inerrancy of the bible, but there's always
weasel room in that. The inerrancy refers to the bible, or
scriptures, as originally written. Anything disagreed with can be
shrugged off as something added since the original writing.