the Hearthwitch

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Posts posted by the Hearthwitch

  1. 14 hours ago, Dan56 said:

     

    How do you help a mugger by willingly becoming his victim? That's like saying your unwilling to let a baby learn to walk because they might fall down and hurt themselves. When a person decides to steal, murder, rape, or harm others, your really not assigning value to their lives by condoning their choices. Your simply tolerating an abusive person because you don't care enough to correct them. Becoming a victim yourself does not make you an advocate of peace, it simply emboldens an abusive person to claim more victims.. jmo

    Yep. Definitely.

    • Like 1
  2. 6 hours ago, cuchulain said:

    The punishment for awful behavior is the same as the reward for good behavior.  We all die.  I think a lot of people believe death is a negative thing, that it's a horror inflicted on us, that...well, you get the idea, I suppose.  A lot of people think coffee is horrible too.  I personally think liver is horrible.

    Having terminal stomach cancer, among other painful illnesses, is also a very negative thing. Having worked in end-care, in the past, death doesn't begin to look like the worst thing that can happen to a person. Just sayin'. 

    2 hours ago, Diego_008 said:

    I DO know about the Valley of Hinnom, later called Gehenna. Jews to this day do not believe in Hell as such. I also know about Sheol, which is known in LXX Greek as Hades.

     

    But that is not the point. The NT does speak of Hell, and at least part of it IS eternal. I am not sure how any Christian can get around that.

    Yet another reason for some of us to entirely avoid the path of Abraham...there's more trees, over here! ;)

  3. 8 hours ago, RevTom said:

    Well, you are correct in that I do not believe a mugger's life has the same value as a doctor. It may sound harsh, but people make choices. If the choices they make are to cause others harm and they are bent on their path of destruction, then yes, I will meet that affront with all the force necessary to subdue it. 

    I concur, RevTom. I have a certain predisposition towards protecting my own, as well. And I do think less, of men who hit women and children. *Shrugs* 

    Never claimed to be perfect! ;)

    • Like 1
  4. 1 hour ago, cuchulain said:

    I can completely respect someone who admits they just believe it but have no proof, so long as they are like you and don't push their belief on others as fact.  I wish more could do that.  Or that more could simply admit they don't know, like Johnathan.  

    I guess that's the point I am at.  I don't know.  Not knowing, I see no reason to act as though a soul exists.  

    Guess I prefer to stir the cauldron in other ways, LOL! I'm allergic to proselytizing, in most of its forms. ;)

  5. 10 minutes ago, Jonathan H. B. Lobl said:

     

    My personal bias here.  If someone wishes to make a claim of objective, verifiable evidence -- no matter what it is -- I would start with the evidence.  Then, I would worry about the classification of the results.

     

    In the same way, if someone actually produces a Big Foot -- dead or alive -- then we can let the zoologists classify it.

     

    I have no objection to let the definition follow the objective results.  As yet, we have nothing, either way.  The soul could still exist.  We don't have convincing evidence.  

     

     

    Then it boils down to belief- which was pretty much what I saw comin' on this thread anyway. :lol:

  6. 17 minutes ago, cuchulain said:

    I don't believe most of them.  I suppose I am the opposite of your spectrum :)  There was a member on this forum that insisted they talked to demons, angels, jesus, god...all the time.  I wrote down a bible verse and set it down on my end table and asked him to ask them what verse I had written.  It got ugly from there, on their part.  That's my usual reaction, when I try to gauge some claim with verifiable evidence.  I don't doubt that many of these people actually believe what they say, but they cannot under any circumstance reproduce their claim or verify it in any measurable manner, which makes the claim useless.

    I think that's totally OK, too- you don't have to believe anything, or you can believe everything. I think most of us are in-between, one way or another. I'll admit, my bias usually tends to be against anyone who declares that they have all of the answers, or the only "right" way of doing any given thing, very much including spiritual doings and religion. Or those who demand cash, to get those answers. Especially those! 

    And it's OK to call crazy, well, crazy. ;) 

  7. 22 minutes ago, mererdog said:

    All of them? No chance at least some of the claims are based on error, deception, or insanity? 

    Maybe not all- we all know that there are reasonable exceptions to any rule- but many of them, yes. My take on it is that yes, it does sound crazy, it feels crazy, but it happens. Perhaps that puts my character (and sanity) in question.

    But I don't automatically disregard it, when someone tells me that they've been spoken to by a god, a goddess, a ghost, what-have-you. Why should I? I don't think that deities are unapproachable, and I think that they approach their chosen people, too, at times, without regard for how those people may react.

  8. 1 hour ago, mererdog said:

    Based on what evidence? What observable phenomenon would the soul necessarily produce? 

    That's the crux of the problem right there, isn't it? 

    It's subjective. I can tell you that what I have seen, felt, and heard. You can choose to believe me or not to...it in no way diminishes the experience, for me. 

    People say that they have heard the Voice of God, or other voices, other gods (lowercase, as a nod to the other discussion). I believe them. It's happened to me, too. 

    But sadly, it doesn't ever seem to happen in a laboratory. Funny, dat. 

    • Like 1
  9. 1 hour ago, Jonathan H. B. Lobl said:

     

    In this matter, I actually am open minded.  I think if you want to take an anti-reiki position, it should be more informed.  You should know why the medical establishment -- and scientists, despise Reiki.

     

    I recommend www.quackwatch.com     Then you will know why you don't believe in Reiki.   While you are at it, see how they attack Therapeutic Touch.  They really, really hate Therapeutic Touch.  Of course, I think they are mistaken, but I am not afraid of opposing views.  Or honest disagreement.  I prefer the people who disagree to be informed.  

     

    Enjoy.

     

    :mellow:

    Wow. Just checked 'em out. The basis for their disdain of divination is, well, unscientific as hell. Just because someone tried to fake some people out does not necessarily mean that others aren't perfectly capable of genuinely being able to perform solid readings. That's like saying that because I'm not fond of performing readings with cards (I don't), all forms of divination (such as pendulum work, which I do like to do) are a fraud. 

    Derp.

    Not sure you can count quackwatch as a good source for solid points of argument! LOL :lol:

     

  10. 33 minutes ago, Jonathan H. B. Lobl said:

     

     

    I suspect that Reiki is a good start for seeing Wicca as it is.  Oh, the symbolism is different, and the vocabulary, and the methods.  In the end, it's largely about awareness.  Awareness of things that other people don't get.  And not getting stuck in the illusion of others.  

     

    I'm clear enough that there is only one reality -- but it gets thin around the edges.       :D   

    Very, very thin. Especially as of late, LOL! 

    • Like 1
  11. *Hee hee* Being a baby creature of the 70's-80's, when I think of Mother Nature, I don't think of some longhaired lady....I think of the Mother in "Year Without A Santa Claus", from 1974 (which played on the TV every winter that I was growing up, during the holiday season). She was ready to kick BOTH of her Sons' butts. She appeared to want nothing more than to attend to her garden. Was this the first pseudo-explanation of El Nino and La Nina, or was it insight into the weirdness that would come in the later years?

    I can soooo relate, to all of the above.

    But I concur, about the dumbing down of our people, in general.

    Contact me, Jonathan H.B. Lobl. I want to know who you are.

     

    BTW- who says Jack Frost is a minor weather deity??? Ever live with the bastard?!  Or at his mercy?

    ;) He's not minor, if you live at his whim. Just sayin'.

  12. 56 minutes ago, Jonathan H. B. Lobl said:

     

    Perhaps I am losing my tactfulness and my patience.  When Christians pray that God will show me the truth -- their truth -- I tell them to go ahead.  That I am not afraid of their coercive magic.  

     

    Did you see my comments on Reiki?  

    No, I hadn't- sorry about that! I'm at work right now, so I get sidetracked easily.

    Uh, I'm not a Reiki Master- you have me mixed up with someone else, I think...? I'm just a hearthwitch.