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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Jan 19, 2009 - 02:42pm PT
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"The daughters of the high priest Anius changed whatever they chose into wheat, wine or oil. Athalida, daughter of Mercury, was resuscitated several times. Aesculapius resuscitated Hippolytus. Hercules dragged Acestis back from death. Heres returned to the world after passing a fortnight in hell. The parents of Romulus and Remus were a god and a Vestal Virgin. The Palladium fell from heaven in the city of Troy. The hair of Bernice became a constellation ... Give me the name of one people among whom incredible prodigies were not performed, especially when few knew how to read and write."
-- Voltaire, "Miracles and Idolatry"
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micronut
Trad climber
fresno, ca
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Jan 19, 2009 - 02:48pm PT
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Dude, nice reply. I gotta run to lunch for an hour or so, but I'm coming back to "argue" the flipside of some of your points. I still think the argument for delusionality is pretty light.
Dr. F, I think the majority of christian and non christian historians believe Jesus Christ from Nazareth was a real man. He is a historical figure and his existence has been well documented outside of the Bible. I rarely quote the Bible when dealing with those who don't think of it as a valid source of information. The Ceasars of the time through Nero and Augustine all have writings that speak of what a ruckus this "Jesus guy" was creating. I'll look up some text and get back to you on this. Even those who don't like him or believe he was God in carnate believed he walked the earth.
Purdy photo before lunch. Alpine tarn/lake on the way to Matterhorn peak's West Coulior.
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micronut
Trad climber
fresno, ca
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Jan 19, 2009 - 02:53pm PT
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By the way Wes,
Christians who are doing it right are NOT Homophobic. Christ is all about love and grace at the same time as Truth and obedience.
Poorly behaving members of the Church who claim Christianity are to blame for this and it really bums me out. Its sad that the Christian Church has gotten to this point based on the lame actions of some of those who most loudly profess the faith. I would argue that the most vocal of those homophobics who call themselves Christians, are actually not, and would be shocked to be considered so.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Jan 19, 2009 - 03:03pm PT
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" Ask yourself the question: how moral is the following? I am told of a human sacrifice that took place two thousand years ago, without my wishing it and in circumstances so ghastly that had I been present and in possession of any influence, I would have been duty-bound to try and stop it. In consequence of this murder, my own manifold sins are forgiven me, and I may enjoy everlasting life."
-- Chris Hitchens
Now this is a contradiction that "deserves a verdict."
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John Moosie
climber
Beautiful California
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Jan 19, 2009 - 03:55pm PT
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Hi Dana,
You asked,
"How does prayer cure cancer?
Why doesn't it do so consistently and reliably?'
I have been studying this for a few years and have found some answers that work for me. What I am going to attempt is a simple explanation of what it takes books and books to truly explain, so please forgive me if I leave something out that might be important.
I will start with a basic idea that science has in the last hundred years started to understand and which spiritualist have been explaining for thousands of years. Everything is made out of energy. We are energy. The Earth is energy.
Then I wish to give you a premise that I can not explain with words but for the sake of this argument you will need to take on faith. That is that God is Love and Love is the highest expression of energy. The Truth that God is Love, can be demonstrated, but it can not be proved with words, so I will leave you to either accept or dismiss this premise.
From this all life is created. It is created out of energy. There is the highest form of energy, pure love and there are lower and lower forms of energy descending on a scale down to such energies as anger and hatred, fear and pride.
To create the world, the material world, the world of form, the energy of Love must be stepped down. From this we can see that everything is made from Love.
Yet how can cancer exist if everything is Love?
This is a very basic explanation. It would take too long to explain the reasons, so I will just give you the outline.
You are an extension of God. You are made out of God.
You are made in God's image. This means that you have the power to create. You have free will which allows you to create and you have imagination. These are the basics of what God is.
Originally you were not given full knowledge of Life because you were meant to grow in Knowledge. Discovery is a great Joy and God wished to allow portions of itself, meaning us, to discover Life.
Yet all of these gifts have risks. Free will means that you can choose pain and suffering. You may not understand that you chose pain and suffering, but you did. An example is a person who chooses to smoke. They either don't know that it will cause them difficulties, or they choose to ignore the difficulties.
One of the first big choices humans made was to experience separation from God. God had to allow us this choice if He/She was to truly give us free choice, because if this choice was not allowed, then we wouldn't really have free choice and would thus really only be robots. Free will is truly a gift, yet when one makes mistakes one can begin to think that it wasn't such a great gift. So you have to ask yourself what you would rather be, a robot, or a Being with free will/ free choice.
This then leads to what the components of your Being are. You have four main bodies.
1. An identity body which is where your beliefs about yourself reside.
2. A thought body, which is where your thoughts reside.
3. An emotional body, and
4. Your material body.
You are a being through which higher spiritual energy is always flowing. Yet this energy is colored by each of our 4 lower bodies. The high spiritual energy flows first into your belief body, it is colored by the beliefs that you have, then it flows into your thought body and it colored by your thoughts, and so on until it is projected into the material world in the form of your physical existence.
Your being was originally created as pure, so that the final picture of your physical appearance was a pure form of God. Yet because we had free will, we could and did choose to take on different experiences which created different beliefs then what God had originally chosen for us. One such experience as was stated above was separation from God. This experience of separation, this choice, then clouds everything we experience in this world. Because God is Love, pure unconditional Love, and we chose to separate from this Love, we ultimately chose to experience suffering. ( I apologize for how short and incomplete this answer is, but it would takes numerous books to explain this fully )
So this brings us to what prayer is and why is seems to work sometimes and not other times. Prayer is an invocation of higher energy. It is meant to infuse your Being with higher energy that can override any lower energy. Science does a good job of explaining higher energy and how it affects lower vibrations.
Yet because of free will, this higher energy can not truly enter your Being unless you truly choose it. To choose it, one must understand the deepest meanings of this. One must understand that their subconscious mind plays a role in ones choice. You may consciously choose a higher way, but if you subconscious mind is still holding onto lower desires, then the higher energy can not enter your Being and heal you.
To go back to the example of smoking. Your conscious mind may realize that smoking is hurting you, yet in your subconscious there may be the belief that you do not deserve anything better, so it will hold onto the desire to smoke because it just simply can't accept that there is something better and that it deserves this.
The higher energy is of God and because God gave you free choice, then God will not go against your free choice, at least for a time, and thus you will not receive the healing energy, even though consciously you prayed for it.
So what is required of you to receive healing? What is required of you is that you have learned the lessons that you are meant to learn about some experience you chose, such as separation, that you chose differently, ie oneness. That you have resolved all beliefs that stem from this, such as one is not worthy of healing, or that there are not better things in life, thus freeing the higher energy to do its work. The Bible calls a Being who has different beliefs in its subconscious and conscious minds a house divided against itself.
So simply put, some have learned their lessons and have resolved their inner issues and can receive what spiritualist call the gift of the holy spirit, one of which is healing, and thus they will be healed.
And some have not, and thus they will not be healed.
God does not arbitrarily heal some and not others. There is a reason and one must find that reason to receive a true healing. There is one other point to understand. Because everything is energy, one who is skilled in the use of energy can invoke higher energy and produce the appearance of healing, but if the underlaying cause is not fixed, then the problem will return again and again, sometimes in different forms, but with the same root and this is why some healings that one sees only last for a short time. Lasting healing results form finding the root cause. As the Bible says, 'The Truth shall set you Free". If you are not free, then you do not have the highest Truth.
One further thing to understand is that some spiritually inclined people have chosen to take on certain states of consciousness which result in certain forms of illness so that they can work through that consciousness thus showing the way to the rest of the world as to how to overcome. Jesus did this for the consciousness of death, which everyone on this planet has accepted into their being to some extent or another. He showed that death is not real, and thus he showed us the way to overcome the consciousness of death.
There is of course much more to know to fully understand the issues of healing. I apologize again for the length of this post. I have a bookshelf of books on this subject and still there is more to know. haha. I hope that this helps you understand.
John
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micronut
Trad climber
fresno, ca
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:17pm PT
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I agree Weschrist, those who attempt to "accomplish "God's work" while turning a blind eye to the meat of the teachings" are not only missing the point, they, in most religions, will face some pretty harsh consequence.
Christianity is centrally about learning to be less selfish.
At the core of Christianity is humility, being aware that the sin of seeking self is the fastest way to be separated from God.
So many self professed Christians are spinning their wheels trying to "better themselves" that they miss the meat of the teaching. They often end up unhappy and broken after spending a life in false optimism, tragically leaving behind them a wake of people they have offended or embittered.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:21pm PT
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No offense and nothing personal to JM but I find this kind of thing so depressing. We could create such a great world if we could just abandon the slave morality of our superstition. Our planet, our existence are sublime treasures; we should celebrate them without the fear and the superstitions that so often lead to disaster. It was, after all, the disciples of love that gave us the exquisite tortures of the Inquisition.
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micronut
Trad climber
fresno, ca
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:25pm PT
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Paul, I assume you are referring to the cruxifixion of Jesus. A human sacrifice? mmmm....yeah I suppose. It seems like you are relating it to something like the Aztec practices. I assure you, it was very different.
Is there a problem in one man sacrificing himself for something or someone? Isn't that bravery or possibly heroic? The guy running up the North Stariwell of Tower Two on 9/11? He didn't plan the act or fly the plane. Not what I'd casually call a human sacrifice to Allah.
Jesus had his out to stop it when Pilate asked him if he wanted to be set free. Even if you don't buy the whole faith, Jesus chose to die for his reason, which He stated was for the redemption of mankind.
Do you think he was a liar, a lunatic, or something else? I'm interested in what you think.
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John Moosie
climber
Beautiful California
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:29pm PT
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"It was, after all, the disciples of love that gave us the exquisite tortures of the Inquisition."
I am sorry, but this is not true. The teachings of the disciples were taken and twisted. Twisted by the very thing that twists everything in this world, and that is the carnal mind. The mind of the anti Christ. Jesus never taught war. He taught to love your enemies.
If by disciples you mean those who claim to follow Jesus, then one only has to read Revelations to see that most who claim to follow Jesus have lost their first Love. They are the blind following the blind leaders. Jesus did not teach war. He taught the antidote to war, which is Love.
Do not make the mistake of believing that religion defines God. It is merely mans attempt to define God, yet it is often clouded by the ego/ the carnal mind and many are blind and follow blind leaders. Wide is the way that leads to death, but narrow is the way that leads to life and few there are that find it.
Simply because people make mistakes in their understanding of God, does not make God wrong. It means that peoples understanding is wrong.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:36pm PT
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Isn't the execution of an innocent human being murder ( Thou shalt not murder)? Wouldn't you as a faithful believer be duty bound to stop such an event? At the same time if you stopped said murder you'd be preventing your own and the worlds salvation. Do you see the solipsistic nature of Christianity here? Augustine did in his oxymoron "O felix Culpa." Found in Romans 11:32 where Paul tells us God condemns humanity that they might be redeemed.
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Jaybro
Social climber
wuz real!
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:40pm PT
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Dr F, Christianity has been called, uncharitably, "The Death Cult." While I think that that harshes a lot of sincere, well meaning people, it' hard to refute the logic, for me, anyway.
-you really never knew what 'MOT' stood for? Did you never read Rear Abbey, while growing up?
I have a lot of common ground with Moosie. It strikes me somewhat differently, and my conclusions are not always the same, as his. But that we're both looking at a lot of the same things, albeit in a different idiom, could be presumptive of me, but it might mean that we will meet on a common level of Dante's Circles some 'day'. Worse people to spend eternity playing hackey-Sack with...
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John Moosie
climber
Beautiful California
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:44pm PT
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" Why would him dying forgive mine or anyones sins. "
Once again, do not confuse religion with Truth. His death did not forgive your sins, though he did carry some of the karma of this world so that it would be easier for people to see. His death and return to life showed that death is not ultimately real. It is real for your body, but not your spirit.
As for why he had to die. The spirit of life did not kill him. The spirit of death, the anti Christ did. So people of Love did not kill him. People of fear did. If there were only people of Love on the planet, then there would be no reason for him to die because people who truly embody Love know that death is not real for the spirit and they know that they are spirits, thus death is not real for them.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:50pm PT
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Hey, d'you know the Anti Christ quit drinking whisky?
know why?
...because It made him mean.
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Jaybro
Social climber
wuz real!
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:53pm PT
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The anti-christ quit drinking Whiskey?
Quite!
I hear he has a 30 day chip. And is more efficacious, in his life's work...
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Jan 19, 2009 - 04:58pm PT
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whoops! I quit.
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micronut
Trad climber
fresno, ca
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Jan 19, 2009 - 05:03pm PT
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Here's my source for saying Jesus had a choice. Lets assume he was fully human.
Luke 23
1Then the whole assembly rose and led him off to Pilate. 2And they began to accuse him, saying, "We have found this man subverting our nation. He opposes payment of taxes to Caesar and claims to be Christ,[a] a king."
3So Pilate asked Jesus, "Are you the king of the Jews?"
"Yes, it is as you say," Jesus replied.
His out would have been to simply say "My bad, I'm not really a King, I'm just a nice dude tryin' to make a difference."
Sorry to use the Bible as my sole source here, but I don't really know much about the extrabiblical accounts of the crucifixions done that day. As a historical text/doccument, the Bible has pretty strong sauce, whether or not you belive its contents, the authenticity as a text is pretty hard to argue.
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micronut
Trad climber
fresno, ca
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Jan 19, 2009 - 05:11pm PT
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Paul, I think you are taking the "Thou shalt not Kill" commandment out of context. Christ came to rid the current thought that you could know God and get to heaven by obeying the 10 Commandments, or any part of the given law for that matter.
He came to say that obeying the Ten Commandments is impossible, cause He said if you have done any of these in your heart, you have as good as done them in real life. You think about adultry, you've done it. Thought about coveting your neighbors stuff. As good as going to his garage and taking it.
He came to set people free from the Law.
I can't say what I would've done that day, but knowing what I know now, I would not have tried to prevent his death. And I wouldn't have been breaking the law for my actions.
Current day.....I'd do my best to take a bullet for my fellow man or an innocent victim if it came down to it. But I've always wanted to be a hero. I loved Braveheart and BlackHawk Down and I think secret service guys rock.
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micronut
Trad climber
fresno, ca
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Jan 19, 2009 - 05:14pm PT
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Yeah Dr. F, the wheels were definitely in motion, the people wanted blood, but they may have been ok with getting Barrabus. You know mob mentality.
13Pilate called together the chief priests, the rulers and the people, 14and said to them, "You brought me this man as one who was inciting the people to rebellion. I have examined him in your presence and have found no basis for your charges against him. 15Neither has Herod, for he sent him back to us; as you can see, he has done nothing to deserve death. 16Therefore, I will punish him and then release him."[c]
18With one voice they cried out, "Away with this man! Release Barabbas to us!" 19(Barabbas had been thrown into prison for an insurrection in the city, and for murder.)
20Wanting to release Jesus, Pilate appealed to them again. 21But they kept shouting, "Crucify him! Crucify him!"
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Jaybro
Social climber
wuz real!
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Jan 19, 2009 - 05:15pm PT
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So, Jesus was into pilates?
a joke,
But really, that kind of "Quote" seems a bit presumptuous. And not in the part of the myth ( myth means story, not lie) that seems to lend 'Him' most credence. I find it easier to contemplate the dictums of the humble, 'Jesus', than the arrogant one. Those aspects are ones I tend to assume a frustrated follower added to his cannon, centuries, later.
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micronut
Trad climber
fresno, ca
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Jan 19, 2009 - 05:15pm PT
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Would have been an interesting turn of events. But I think it was set in motion from the beginning of time to play out just like it did.
This discussion needs more cowbell.
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