oldsailor,

That's a fair question. I think a lot of us former Adventists have recognized that we will never stop being Adventist in a cultural sense. I happen to get a number of emails letting me know that my thoughts provide a lot of relief and affirmation for those who have gone through similar experiences as I have.

I know the Adventist culture quite well since I grew up in it. I happen to believe that there were some extremely harmful practices and approaches that caused a lot of pain for my generation. I have found some relief from that and part of the relief has been debunking the mythology around religious belief.

Some former Adventists become believers in other congregations. That didn't work for me because many of the same toxic and frankly cultic social structures exist in most churches. It's also part of humanity in general.

Adventism has a very complex form which few people understand unless you grew up in it. And for many ignorance is bliss. And I'm not saying that's a bad thing.

You may like this or not, but that's my reasons.

Doug,

I think if you read back you will see that my point all along has been that you can't reconcile the loss of that many people. The suffering has occurred. You can't take it back no manner how many times god dies.

Forgiveness is simply giving up the need to punish. It doesn't make it all good. I think forgiveness is a good thing because it really is the only option we have. And if you read back you will see that I appreciate the contribution Jesus gives to this philosophical approach to moving on. I just don't happen to believe that Jesus was Divine or here to be a sacrifice. Jesus may be a blending of several ancient teachers including John the Baptist who we do have a fair amount of evidence for outside the Bible.

And the difference between an atheist who does evil things and a Christian who does evil things is that the historical Christian claims that the Bible justified all these killings and it's not hard to see how they might read it that way.

And it doesn't matter who killed more, the fact is the number has exceeded all resemblance to anything good.

Rich, I WAS a wiccan. Wiccans are not afraid of Christians burning them. Wiccans do not identify with witches of the past, except for the passing on of spells and so forth. Wiccans do not worship Satan either. They can belong to covens or they can be solitary. I do not know of ANY Wiccan who has ever been killed by Christians. Wiccans are not in Africa, as far as I know. It is a North American and European phenonemon. So, unless you can prove it, you had better be more careful on what you postulate as fact.

rudywoofs,

Well you might want to get your facts straight.

I did not say that wiccans are afraid of Christians.

I did not say wiccans worship satan.

And some wiccans do identify with witches of the past. I would put some quotes down, but we are not supposed to quote in this forum.

Plus just because you were a wiccan doesn't make you an authority on all wiccans. It is a rather loose formation of beliefs including Christian wiccans.

This is a rather minor point. I can substitute the Jews is you need another group that was killed by Christians and continues to get death threats.

This is still deflection.

ewaye, my little omelet.

Tis not a minor point. You make claims that are not true. I know more about Wicca than you could even pretend to know. Wiccans do not get death threats from Christians. And wiccans are not killed by Christians.

You take pride in being a former Adventist and knowing so much about the Adventist faith. It would behoove you to be accurate in things you state, otherwise, other things you state will also come into question.

If you want to call "getting your facts straight" as being deflection, then so be it.

rudywoofs,

Well, I actually did a search on this and the facts are this:

Driven by a number of factors, verbal and physical attacks against Wiccans appear to have risen precipitously, starting in mid-1999. To date, where the religious faith of perpetrators can be identified, they all appear to be conservative Christians.

And this is really a drop in the bucket. I would hardly call my lack of complete fact checking a major fault compared to the death of 50 million people.

And I have no pride in being a former Adventist. That is simply a fact. Again you are making this stuff up in your own head.

You are deflecting because the horrible crimes committed in the name of Christianity are of such a large scale. I understand why you might want to point out one minor point to deflect from the much larger tragedy of death in the name of god.

cardw, since we get sternly rebuked for quoting on this thread, it's too risky to remind you of what you did say. But I think you've made it quite clear that you don't believe that the Jesus of the Bible actually existed. This seems to be quite a trend among "intellectuals" (Christopher Hitchens for one) these days so I guess you're in good company.But why can't you admit that whoever created the myth of that Jesus was an absolute genius, instead of running down it's deceptive nature? You have to admit that it's power to completely change the course of history is stunning,particularly considering that it's only an illusion! Consider all the otherwise brilliant people who,while solving other of the world's impossible delemna's, bought into this mind numbing deception. Think of the millions who have actually had positive life changing experiences because they were duped into believing this story.If,as you allow,ignorance may be a good thing, why not concentrate on all the peace and contentment that this fabrication has brought to so many who may have otherwise been living a life of crime or despondency? Can you offer a suffering world a better hope? Can you come up with a better story?

Rich, how many Wiccans have been *killed* by Christians? That's what you said happened.

And there is no such thing as a Christian wiccan. Some have tried to meld the two, but it is impossible.

I'm not deflecting. You are. If you're going to start making accusations, do your homework. No Wiccan has been killed by Christians. Wiccans are basically tree huggers who do Magick. My statements about wicca were purely informational. I did not say you called them Satan worshippers. I merely pointed out that they are not. Yes, they can get harrassed by Christians. So what? It didn't bother me and my fellow wiccans.

When you state that 50 million people died at the hands of Christians, I say, what's your point? And where's your proof? And what does it profit you to say such manner of things?

You evidence pride of knowledge of Adventist history by all your statements thereof. I'm not making this up.

What I am glad about is that you seem to have found a "way" that suits you. I truly am glad for that. I like people to be happy.

rudywoof,

Now look. You stated that I had pride in being a former Adventist. You would have to be able to read my mind to determine if it was pride or not. You simply have no way of knowing that, so you are making this up in your own mind.

The same thing goes for pride of knowing Adventist History. I simply stated it as a fact because I have spent thousands of hours study Adventist theology and history. I made no comparison of my knowledge with anyone else, unlike yourself. Again, you are making this pride thing up in your own mind. I think there may be a fair amount of projection going on as well.

These were statements of my own history. That's it. I think it's helpful background for those who dialog with me.

And I admitted that my use of wiccan was not the most accurate. I should have used the term witch. And this is a minor point compared to the death of 50 million people. I would think that even you could see that.

This focus on this one point is deflection because it ignores the far stronger arguments that I have presented. This is a flagrant form of intellectual dishonesty.

Doug,

You asked me why I couldn't admit that whoever created the myth of Jesus was an absolute genius. I have. It's an amazing myth, but it's still a myth.

It's probably the product of many minds. And both Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens state that the understanding of the Bible is essential to understanding western thought. But this is not only because it's amazing. A lot has been due to its ideas being promoted through force. And because we had 1200 years of Christian tyranny, we have to start there. I also think that there have been some very creative ways of reading the bible by theologians through the years and I consider these just as amazing as the myths within the Bible.

Now its influence has also been recognized by deists such as Thomas Jefferson, but he also dismissed some of the more silly ideas both in the OT and NT.

When we look at the philosophy of Jesus we see most of his ideas coming from the basis of empathy and reasoning from there. I have stated over and over that I think this is a great idea. And these IDEAS have the power to transform a life. They don't require a god to work.

As far as suffering, I have said over and over that no one has a satisfactory solution to the problem of suffering. So asking me if I have a better solution is really pointless. It's like you aren't even listening to what I'm saying.

Now I have some ideas on how to make it through suffering, which I think is our only option at this time. And I have outlined these many times.

As far as considering ignorance as bliss, I would see this as a temporary state for those who lack any immediate options. I fully agree with the statement attributed to Jesus, that the truth does set us free.