Oakspear

Dee Snider from Twisted Sister and House of Hair and the rest of TS. (Before they were famous) Matt "Guitar" Murphy from the Blues Brothers and Chicago blues fame (interviewed him when I was a radio deejay) Rafael Olmeda

damn reporters :P-->

...and their opening act, The Pauls?

What's your point Oldies? That I really received "something of value", but have talked myself out of it? Can you clarify please? I'll continue as if that was your point, correct me later if needed.And by the way, the question being asked is not whether there was or wasn't anything beneficial about being involved in TWI, but whether it was worth it in light of negatives associated with it. I got involved in TWI because PFAL seemed like a cool bible class. I was interested in the bible, wanted to know more about it. I believed that it was truth back then, I longer believe that it is. Therefore any perceived benefits (to me) based on my opinion that PFAL was teaching truth are now null and void in my opinion. I liked many of the people who I encountered in TWI, but fellowshipping with loving, like-minded people was an experience that pre-dated my TWI involvement, and continues to this day. I learned a lot of things while in TWI, but I don't believe that any of them were unique to TWI, nor do I believe that I would have never learned them without my TWI involvement. There were good times, good people and some learning while I was involved in TWI, none of it was worth the crap I went through later, and certainly not worth it in light of the other abuses that took place. But then, I said this already, didn't I?

Raf started the "Actual Errors in PFAL" thread.

Was it worth it? Was what worth it? What "benefits" did I receive that were "worth" something? Learned to love God - I learned that from my parents first Learned that the bible was the Word of God - Learned that from my parents too Great fellowship - Had this with my parents and siblings and cousins, and some of my friends. Had it with some of the parents of the other Boy Scouts. Have it with some of the people that I work with, and with my lovely fiancee Learned to "work the Word" - That's not worth a rat's foot IMHO - I learned how to make the bible reflect Wierwille's opinion, there's plenty of folks out there who "work the Wrd" and come up with other points of view In retrospect, there really wasn't anything that I got out of TWI that I hadn't already gotten before.

CG: You referred to reasons that people give for posting here and rejected them. So you've heard the reasons, and if you hear them again you'll in all likelyhood reject them again. That's your privelege. Honestly, I don't understand why you're asking the question...you already know the answers that folks will give :D--> - you just don't agree with 'em...again, your privelege. Heck, I don't understand why you start so many threads with titles that give no clue as to what the topic actually is, but I'm not criticizing...oops, I guess I just did :o-->

YES...I'd told her ...I just hadn't been very clear about the date...especially since we hadn't set it yet :D-->

Any of you GSers who attend will get to meet the lovely and talented Oakmom (who emailed me about the contents of this thread today :D-->) as well as the equally talented but not as lovely Oakdad ;)--> (Hi Mom!)

What else can you tell us about it, def?

I'm more of an information junkie; I read quite a bit. Back in my TWI days I worked for a newspaper (circulation - I was not one of the princely reporters :D-->) and read 2 or 3 papers a day, but not so much any more

Oh my non-pineapple-pizza-eatin', ex-New Yorker, Florida resident, Baruch alumni...I am very concerned

Even Oakie, huh? :P--> By the way, you mentioned that Lucifer wanted to exalt his throne above God. The verse quoted says the stars of God. Is there any source other than Wierwille (and later Martidale) who translated that verse as "above THE star: God"? Seems to me that the genetive of possession in Hebrew was expressed by placing the possessing noun immediately after the object of possession (I know, I'm setting my self up for "possession" jokes) In other words the Hebrew words for stars God would be translated stars of God.

My good man: my drivel is very responsive!

Just so, Lindy, ya nailed it If someone describes a phenomenon, and claims it is God, or the devil, oe ESP, or aliens, or the IRS, my doubt does not mean that it can't be any of those things, just that I don't see any evidence to support the contention that it is. I can't remember where I saw this, but unexplained phenomena are usually explained by way of whatever pet belief the believer believes in. ;)--> The Christian believes that the unexplained event is evidence of God, the psychic believes that it is evidence of psychic phenomena, the UFO enthusiast that aliens were involved, a Hindu might credit Krishna or some other deity, etc. All we really know is that something apparently unexplainable happened

Wrong again Penta breath! -->

http://www.despair.com/cluelessness.html

Del D was quoted in Karl K's The Cult That Snapped as heading up a "rescue team" that broke into houses and hotel rooms and such to rescue those being "deprogrammed". Other than what Lifted Up has shared, I have only met one other person who had been abducted for a deprogramming. This person escaped on his own. Wierwille wrote a By The Way paid editorial in 1980 or 81 about another deprogramming attempt. The abductee also ecaped on his own. If TWI was kidnapping back the kidnapped they never made it public as far as I know.

Lindyhopper: Good questions!

I couldn't care less about oxy water. I come here for the entertainment

Oops...the second link uses the term "evolved"...my mistake :o--> He is quoted as saying "Follow the evidence, wherever it leads." - which IMHO, many more biblical literalists fail to do than scientists

Mr. Flew, according to the first link, has changed his mind several times, and has admitted that his opinion that life couldn't have begun on it's own without divine intervention was based on a misunderstanding of what a physicist said about biochemistry. He did not address evolution, but the appearance of DNA in the first self-reproducing life form. His concept of God as he describes it is nowhere near the Christian or biblical one; he envisions God has the initiator who sat back and refused to get involved...like the Deists' God.

Oops, missed that when I first looked, you're right...Bullinger says that christos should always be translated "messiah" - seems a bit straining-at-gnatish, but that's Bullinger -->

Thanks for checking and posting the results --> It's all implication and assumption, but it well thought out implication and assumption. :D-->

I just looked at the Companion Bible and don't see where Bullinger would translate the first "Christ" as Messiah. And why would he? "Christ" is the anglicization of the Greek christos, while Messiah is the anglicization of the Aramaic meshichah(sp?), both which mean the same thing: "annointed". Undoubtedly, the word translated "Christ" in the verse is christos, since the KJV translators were using a Greek text.