Oakspear

Theists behave pretty much the same as non-theists in this regard.

Buddhism in it's original form did not. Many Buddhists in Japan, where it was influenced and combined with Shinto, recognize a pantheon. Some Taoists also believe in gods, but the main body of Taoism recognizes an impersonal force (The Tao, or Way). Confucianism is a philosophy that advocates obedience to duly constituted authority. No gods needed.

They had a 'WOWvet" program that year where WOWvets weresent out as WOWs, I believe Knoxville was the main destination.

If you are talking about western society, I might agree with you. Christianity is the dominant philosophy in the west, and it was preceeded by various forms of paganism, also theistic. Not all "major" religions, however, are theistic. Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, for example, do not have a god or gods, and are the basis for large segments of world society.

Since most of the apostles didn't write anything down, and some of what is credited to apostles may be pseudonymous, I would say, we really don't know. (Okay, I really don't know!The only thing that we do know about the apostles is enshrined in writings published by the winning side. (Just a friendly point, Mark...you and I are on different sides of this...and probably always will be...respectfully disagreeing as always

That's because you're not dead

I did not. I do not receive the alumni mag. Although I attended Baruch, I did not graduate from there. What do you think it is?

Thank you, yes, okay, I get it... I just get a little b*tchy when remarks like "I don't want to hear your comments", or "I don't care what you have to say about it" or "la la la...I can't hear you" are included in posts, regardless of the position the poster is taking. If her uterus got healed by a stranger at the ROA after she supposedly used abortion as birth control, hooray. I am all for healthy uteri. I am also highly in favor of guys named Rocky who are from New Orleans listening to their god and healing women at the ROA. Youse guys have a fine Friday and a good weekend.

You are correct...and I am one of those folks "in the know"

Yes, it's a reasonable assumption that what Simon saw was speaking in tongues, but it's plausible that it wasn't. Same with Saul on the road to Damascus. When he wrote Corinthians, he spoke in tongues more than "ye all", but it's an assumption that he spoke in tongues initially...maybe a reasonable assumption, but an assumption just the same. An assumption can be made in these cases based on other supporting evidence, namely the records in Acts 2, 10, and 19. But what Wierwille is doing is using the assumptions as proof. Every man who graduated from Baruch College had a moustache on graduation day. Look at these five graduation day photos. In three of them we clearly see moustaches. In this fourth one his face is covered by his hand, but what's under there? It has to be a moustache! In the fifth, we have a photo from years later. Look! A moustache! See: five graduates, five moustaches. Score: Five to Nothing

"I just wanna say what I wanna say, but I have no interest in hearing what you wanna say" No, nothing wrong with that.

A representative example. Karl Kahler does a great job describing the inconsistancies in this "teaching" in The Cukt That Snapped. There are definitely some athletic metaphors in th epistles, but there are also farming, building (wise master builder, i.e. architect), parenting, sheep-herding, and bond-slave comparisons as well. But for some reason military analogies are to be hunted down and eliminated. There are plenty of examples in TWI doctrine. Jesus Christ Is Not God is full of misrepresentations of what Trinitarians believe as well as some scripture contorting. Or how about the old "Score Five to Nothing" segment of PFAL from RHST? Not all of the five records cited mention speaking in tongues, but the assumption that SIT is there is used as proof that SIT was there.

:wacko:

I was between a believer and an atheist once...oops, wrong forum ...but seriously folks... While personal attacks usually indicate that we've run out of good arguments, it should be possible to vehemently disagree without mud-slinging. And it should be possible to present the rationale behind one's beliefs without getting defensive.Too often I see discussions ended because one person declares: "that's what I believe and nothing you can say will change my mind". Okay, great, but why are you in a discussion forum if you don't want to discuss? <_< I've learned a lot about why some people believe as they do becuase they have patiently explained their position. I've also learned to patiently explain my own position as a result of questions from the peanut gallery.

Mark O'Malley made a point in the "Are The Dead Alive" thread: (bold type added by me) The overwhelming majority of us who were involved in TWI had no prior experience studying or researching the bible. Few of us had ever encountered anyone who had, or read a theological work of any kind. Once exposed to PFAL, we learned some rudimentary biblical research skills, while at the same time the idea that no one (or hardly anyone) outside of TWI was even doing biblical research was hammered into our little minds. The bolded section of Mark's quote illustrates a frequent method for making a doctrinal point in TWI. Remember the "key" that the few unclear verses must be understood in light of the many clear ones? It sounds like common sense, and almost axiomatic, but is it really true? Perhaps we're not really getting what the supposedly "clear" verses are saying and the "unclear" one is not an anomaly, a "proofreader's oversight" or a "forgery", but a red flag that maybe we should rethink what we believe about this particular subject. I'm not saying that there aren't situations where an "unclear" verse is an anomaly, a "proofreader's oversight" or a "forgery", but that Wierwille, (and us too), were too quick to dismiss biblical evidence that disagreed with Way doctrine once his mind was made up. To this day, ex-wayfers reject opinions that disagree with what was learned in PFAL without ever having seriously examined what was learned. Or compare what Wierwille taught with what Wierwille said others taught.

Excellent observation, Mark. Unfortuneately, that is precisely the type of research that we all were schooled in while in TWI.

I think there's a sculpture of "The Mitigated Gaul" in the Vatican.

You don't really know if they are "truths" unless you do the work and research it yourself I would be very surprised if you did anything more than skimming over what you learned from Wierwille and uncritically accepting it. Most of us didn't. Have you considered Bullinger's (or anyone else's) arguments against speaking in tongues being available in this "administration"?Much of what Wierwille taught was dependent on accepting definitions of words that could be found nowhere except in Wierwille's writings, and believing concepts that are declared as true without any supporting documentation. So if they're true, they should STILL be true if arrived at independently of Wierwille. Wierwille taught that experience was worthless if it contradicted the written "Word". If something is true because it "works" for you, then other things should be equally true because they "work" for me.

I wasn't in the Way Corps, but the training I received at various times in my Way career was both helpful and harmful in my career. Helpful in that I am very attentive to detail and extremely organized, mainly due to the what semed like millions of meetings and events that I organized and set up for. Harmful in that the management style that I learned in TWI was dictatorial, "my way or the highway", which hindered me until I learned more effective ways of dealing with people.

Must be out of fllowship

Is this a misprint of yours, or is it written this way in Way material?Howard replaced Harry Wierwille on the BOT, Don Wierwille replaced Ermal Owens

Okaaaay... God loves and accepts us all BUT there are consequenses to our actions wherein he will KILL us and our wives and children and cattle sounds conditional to me Oh, wait...he loves us as he's having his "chosen people" burn our city. Sounds about right to me. :blink:

The greatest unknown guitar player...as someone once said!

It doesn't look like they were given an opportunity to repent either.