Large numbers of members apostatizing - says Marlin K Jensen

[_bcuzbcuz]

Frank[/quote]Many say they are spiritual when in fact they are very carnal. It is like someone who projects a fake shell around them. ..................

You must cut the ties that bind with the world. Your own body is of the world and is not you. It is a shell and nothing more.[/quote]

Shell, shell........it's all a shell game.


Frank[/quote]
3. We trust God - With a mixture of fear for the power of God and the love of God for allowing us this life in the flesh we trust that He has our best interest at heart.

Everything around you has been placed there by God so that you can enjoy it or as a test for you. [/quote]

Ah, yes, the old "in the world but not of the world" You have a god you both fear and love. You can either enjoy what god has placed here....or it's hidden test. But if you're not "of the world", how can you enjoy anything that has been placed here? Enjoy it from a distance. A banquet placed before you but you are forbidden to eat? You can appreciate all that is around you, but only in a ethereal way?

And if it's not to enjoy, then it's a test??? Evil then is a creation of god? placed here to test us?

I'm having more and more trouble distinguishing between god and satan.

[_Franktalk]

What I was trying to say, Franktalk, is that magic and the supernatural aren't real.

That is the reality that you have chosen for yourself. It is not my reality. You can deny my reality till the cows come home it will not change what is true.

Have atheist lined up to be slaughtered for their beliefs? Please tell me in history where vast numbers of people were killed for their beliefs rather than change them. Please point the area of history where atheist did this? I know that millions of Christians have become martyrs for Christ. Please point me to the section of history where millions of atheist lined up to be slaughtered as martyrs for their beliefs? If indeed what you say is true then where is the evidence you always seek from me about my beliefs? Support your beliefs with strength and determination. Or do your beliefs have a limp wrist and have no strength? Please direct me to the national organization of atheist and their hospitals and general welfare offices. If you can.

[_Buffalo]

What I was trying to say, Franktalk, is that magic and the supernatural aren't real.

How do you know? I mean let's assume that your statement is true (I don't think that it is, at least not in the way that you mean it, but let's assume that you're right). How would you know that it is true? On a related note, how do you define "magic" and how does what is "natural" differ from what is "supernatural"?

All evidence we have so far points to magic and the supernatural not being real. Where we're able to falsify any of it, it is inevitably falsified. That's how we disprove scientific theories, and that's also how we disprove magic and the supernatural.

Wiki's definition of magic is pretty good:

"Magic is the art of manipulating aspects of reality either by supernatural means or through knowledge of occult laws unknown to science.[1] Magic has been practiced in many cultures, and utilizes ways of understanding, experiencing and influencing the world somewhat akin to those offered by religion, though it is sometimes regarded as more focused on achieving results than religious worship."

So when you try to put olive oil on someone's head and recite an incantation in order to heal them, that's essentially magic. More specifically, it's God magic, where the source of the power is said to be God rather than the ritual/incantation itself.

Supernatural I think is self explanatory. It's anything beyond what is natural. I realize many believers think that God's power is entirely natural, but using scientific principles we aren't aware of yet. My statement still holds in that case - we simply substitute "supernatural" for "God's power."

[_Buffalo]

What I was trying to say, Franktalk, is that magic and the supernatural aren't real.

That is the reality that you have chosen for yourself. It is not my reality. You can deny my reality till the cows come home it will not change what is true.

Have atheist lined up to be slaughtered for their beliefs? Please tell me in history where vast numbers of people were killed for their beliefs rather than change them. Please point the area of history where atheist did this? I know that millions of Christians have become martyrs for Christ. Please point me to the section of history where millions of atheist lined up to be slaughtered as martyrs for their beliefs? If indeed what you say is true then where is the evidence you always seek from me about my beliefs? Support your beliefs with strength and determination. Or do your beliefs have a limp wrist and have no strength? Please direct me to the national organization of atheist and their hospitals and general welfare offices. If you can.

I'm not sure what the willingness to be slaughtered for you beliefs has to do with truth value of your beliefs. Indeed, it would seem that if your beliefs lead you to be slaughtered, they're doing you a disservice, and you can't even claim that they hold practical value, let alone supernatural value.

[_Samantabhadra]

All evidence we have so far points to magic and the supernatural not being real.

And what evidence is that?

And how would you respond if I told you that I had performed e.g. Buddhist ritual magic, and that it had "worked" in a rather dramatic fashion? Am I necessarily lying or deluded, or is the fact that I am an anonymous voice on the Internet enough to discount my testimony? NB I'm not saying that you are in any way obligated to believe me, only that your claim to "evidence" seems as weak to me as my claim to personal experience in this area must seem to you...

[_Buffalo]

All evidence we have so far points to magic and the supernatural not being real.

And what evidence is that?

And how would you respond if I told you that I had performed e.g. Buddhist ritual magic, and that it had "worked" in a rather dramatic fashion? Am I necessarily lying or deluded, or is the fact that I am an anonymous voice on the Internet enough to discount my testimony? NB I'm not saying that you are in any way obligated to believe me, only that your claim to "evidence" seems as weak to me as my claim to personal experience in this area must seem to you...

I'd be interested in hearing about it, even if you can't document it or replicate it.

Examples of strong evidence against two forms of magic:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/31/healt ... wanted=all

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrology# ... experiment

[_Samantabhadra]

Yes, the studies on prayer are notoriously flawed, and I don't personally take much stock in Western astrology.

Here is an example of what I mean (this isn't the only time I've had some kind of experience like this, but it was probably the most dramatic experience of its kind that I've ever had).

I was walking down a desolate road just after sunset, on the outskirts of the Kathmandu Valley. The power was out and it was pitch black. I had two companions with me: my future wife (although we weren't dating at the time), and a small dog who was escorting us through the desolate darkness.

Suddenly, out of absolutely nowhere, an enormous Tibetan mastiff--don't know if you've ever seen one of these, but they are enormous, more bear than dog--appeared, snarled exactly once, and then leaped and buried its fangs into the neck of our little friend.

To this day I still don't even know exactly what gave me the idea to do this, but I instantly began reciting some wrathful mantra (in Tibetan, as in Sanskrit, mantra often simply means just "magic spell") and making the special hand-gesture for subjugating demonic forces. I won't (can't) say anything other than this, obviously there's a bit more to it than that, but you get the idea.

Anyway, after about 20 or 30 seconds of this--during which time I had the mastiff's attention, but it was still menacingly poised to attack--this enormous black dog took a few steps backward, put its head on the ground, and started gently coughing up a hairball (or something). It stayed there, gently coughing, completely calm and subdued, and we left.

My wife, who is an Orthodox Christian by the way, and who (up until that point) did not believe in such things as magic because she is an extremely level-headed legal professional, was white as a sheet, absolutely terrified, and begged me to promise--PROMISE--that I would never ever ever use anything like that on her.

As I said, I know "what I did," in the sense of the steps that I took, because I learned them in such-and-such a way and performed them in such-and-such a way. But I couldn't tell you "how it worked" far less "why it worked." All I know is that "it worked" and that from that day, there has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that "magic"--sometimes I prefer the term "ritual technology"--is efficacious. Full stop.

[_Buffalo]

Yes, the studies on prayer are notoriously flawed,

Why? Because you didn't like the results?

and I don't personally take much stock in Western astrology.

Are other types more accurate?

Here is an example of what I mean (this isn't the only time I've had some kind of experience like this, but it was probably the most dramatic experience of its kind that I've ever had).

I was walking down a desolate road just after sunset, on the outskirts of the Kathmandu Valley. The power was out and it was pitch black. I had two companions with me: my future wife (although we weren't dating at the time), and a small dog who was escorting us through the desolate darkness.

Suddenly, out of absolutely nowhere, an enormous Tibetan mastiff--don't know if you've ever seen one of these, but they are enormous, more bear than dog--appeared, snarled exactly once, and then leaped and buried its fangs into the neck of our little friend.

To this day I still don't even know exactly what gave me the idea to do this, but I instantly began reciting some wrathful mantra (in Tibetan, as in Sanskrit, mantra often simply means just "magic spell") and making the special hand-gesture for subjugating demonic forces. I won't (can't) say anything other than this, obviously there's a bit more to it than that, but you get the idea.

Anyway, after about 20 or 30 seconds of this--during which time I had the mastiff's attention, but it was still menacingly poised to attack--this enormous black dog took a few steps backward, put its head on the ground, and started gently coughing up a hairball (or something). It stayed there, gently coughing, completely calm and subdued, and we left.

My wife, who is an Orthodox Christian by the way, and who (up until that point) did not believe in such things as magic because she is an extremely level-headed legal professional, was white as a sheet, absolutely terrified, and begged me to promise--PROMISE--that I would never ever ever use anything like that on her.

As I said, I know "what I did," in the sense of the steps that I took, because I learned them in such-and-such a way and performed them in such-and-such a way. But I couldn't tell you "how it worked" far less "why it worked." All I know is that "it worked" and that from that day, there has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that "magic"--sometimes I prefer the term "ritual technology"--is efficacious. Full stop.

So you stared down the dog and it backed off? I hate to sound dismissive, but I've done that before too. No magic necessary.

[_Samantabhadra]

Why? Because you didn't like the results?

Um, I didn't mean the ones you cited, but the ones purporting to show that prayer has some beneficial effect. Sorry, I guess that could have been more clear. But in any case, I don't think prayer works that way (i.e. that telling a random group of people to pray for something will have the desired effect, far less in such an obviously unethical way as denying the "control group" that same courtesy), so the studies you cited really don't bother me.

So you stared down the dog and it backed off? I hate to sound dismissive, but I've done that before too. No magic necessary.

Guess you had to be there! But I will say that if I had just stared the dog down, my companion would not have been so frightened. She saw my lips moving, and my hands doing something, and the dramatic (almost instantaneous) change in the dog, and she knew something was up, even if she didn't know what it was and didn't even believe it was possible.

[_Buffalo]

Why? Because you didn't like the results?

Um, I didn't mean the ones you cited, but the ones purporting to show that prayer has some beneficial effect. Sorry, I guess that could have been more clear. But in any case, I don't think prayer works that way (i.e. that telling a random group of people to pray for something will have the desired effect, far less in such an obviously unethical way as denying the "control group" that same courtesy), so the studies you cited really don't bother me.

Regardless of questions of ethics (and whether denying something like a prayer is really unethical in the same way as denying actual treatment), the method was sound. The people doing the prayer were believers - three congregations of Christians. It was a long study involving a large test group. Prayer had no positive effect on health outcomes.

Guess you had to be there! But I will say that if I had just stared the dog down, my companion would not have been so frightened. She saw my lips moving, and my hands doing something, and the dramatic (almost instantaneous) change in the dog, and she knew something was up, even if she didn't know what it was and didn't even believe it was possible.

Well, I wasn't there. Maybe it was very impressive.

But do you suppose you could replicate that in a clinical trial, say, 8 or 9 times out of 10, with a variety of vicious animals?