Happy Anniversary?

[myth-one.com]

Today, June 20th 2009, is the eighth anniversary of the sacrifice Andrea Yates made for her children. Had she not murdered them, Noah would be 15 years old, John would be 13, Paul 11, Luke 10, and Mary would be 8. Instead, they were murdered by their mother so they would go immediately to live with God eternally in the paradise of heaven, thus avoiding the possibility of eternal torment in hellfire.

Is this a victory for Christianity?

[myth-one.com]

The author found that not all religious people display psychotic behavior.

That's hilarious!

I hope he wasn't paid for that study.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

[Replying to myth-one.com]

Apparently many religious people that manage to avoid some level of psychosis are afflicted with OCD to varying degrees.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/31/health/oc ... ?hpt=hp_t3

[1213]

Some estimates place the total number of witch executions in Europe as high as 100,000. Whole areas of France and Germany were almost completely denuded of women. So you are suggesting that thousands of women and young girls were executed by Christian authorities because the authorities "misunderstood" and took what Exodus 22:18 specifically says:"Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live," "out of context?" Do you suppose that was of any consolation to the thousands of women and girls who were hung, burned at the stake, and cruelly tortured to death? In fact I would suggest that these actions are precisely the inevitable result of what one should reasonably expect to be the consequence of subscribing with unquestioned devotion to ancient superstition and religious make believe, by doing exactly what your book of ancient superstition and religious make believe commands you to do.

They ignored that the rules were given for the judges that God had set, not all who manage to read one sentence out of about 1000 pages. And then they also ignored the rules that were given for the lawful judges, like for example these:

"Thus has Yahweh of Hosts spoken, saying, 'Execute true judgment, and show kindness and compassion every man to his brother.
Zechariah 7:9
I charged your judges at that time, saying, Hear the causes between your brothers, and judge righteously between a man and his brother, and the foreigner who is living with him. You shall not show partiality in judgment; you shall hear the small and the great alike; you shall not be afraid of the face of man; for the judgment is God's: and the cause that is too hard for you, you shall bring to me, and I will hear it.
Deuteronomy 1:16-17
"You shall not spread a false report. Don't join your hand with the wicked to be a malicious witness. You shall not follow a crowd to do evil; neither shall you testify in court to side with a multitude to pervert justice; neither shall you favor a poor man in his cause.
Exodus 23:1-3
At the mouth of two witnesses, or three witnesses, shall he who is to die be put to death; at the mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death.
Deuteronomy 17:6

It is sad thing if you really think it is reasonable way of reading constructions to take one line out of thousands of lines and then claim to know the rules.

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 58 by myth-one.com]

I still stand by my earlier post that I have yet to see any medical expert point to a causative link between belief in hellfire and baby killers. Just because I don't believe in hellfire I don't feel the need to create hystical claims that it causes diviant behaviour and I have read this thread carefully waiting for credible evidence from mental health experts that claim that is the case.

You do understand what a "causative link" is right? And you do understand that you and nobody in this thread qualifies as a mental health expert.

Just because certain elements are present this does not establish Cause. Women wear dresses. Women have periods. Therefore Dresses cause periods.

Opinion and peer reviewed medical evidence are not the same thing (see your post above)

A link to peer reviewed medical experts that establish that religious belief causes deviant behaviour would be appreciated.


JW

I posted this link in post #36 of this string last Tuesday. You simply did not bother to read it.

I'm not sure how, unless you have a camera link to my compter screen how you would be able to know what I have read or not.

What you do know is that I did not respond. I rarely respond to posts that I regard as irrelevant in relation to the points made and and only took the time to point out the above because I believe myth-one.com has proved from his posting to be a reasonable and intelligent poster. Had any of the studies in this thread actually addressed the point I raised I would have chosen to reply.

If someone is incapable of seeing the information in the studies provided in post #36 and #60 do not even address issue of causality, yet alone establish it, then imho, they clearly would be incapable of discussing the issue further.

JW

[Bust Nak]

[Replying to post 63 by 1213]

I don't see how those verses help at all. They instruct Christians to be just. How are Christians ignoring these laws with their literal witch hunts?

[Tired of the Nonsense]

Some estimates place the total number of witch executions in Europe as high as 100,000. Whole areas of France and Germany were almost completely denuded of women. So you are suggesting that thousands of women and young girls were executed by Christian authorities because the authorities "misunderstood" and took what Exodus 22:18 specifically says:"Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live," "out of context?" Do you suppose that was of any consolation to the thousands of women and girls who were hung, burned at the stake, and cruelly tortured to death? In fact I would suggest that these actions are precisely the inevitable result of what one should reasonably expect to be the consequence of subscribing with unquestioned devotion to ancient superstition and religious make believe, by doing exactly what your book of ancient superstition and religious make believe commands you to do.

They ignored that the rules were given for the judges that God had set, not all who manage to read one sentence out of about 1000 pages. And then they also ignored the rules that were given for the lawful judges, like for example these:

"Thus has Yahweh of Hosts spoken, saying, 'Execute true judgment, and show kindness and compassion every man to his brother.
Zechariah 7:9
I charged your judges at that time, saying, Hear the causes between your brothers, and judge righteously between a man and his brother, and the foreigner who is living with him. You shall not show partiality in judgment; you shall hear the small and the great alike; you shall not be afraid of the face of man; for the judgment is God's: and the cause that is too hard for you, you shall bring to me, and I will hear it.
Deuteronomy 1:16-17
"You shall not spread a false report. Don't join your hand with the wicked to be a malicious witness. You shall not follow a crowd to do evil; neither shall you testify in court to side with a multitude to pervert justice; neither shall you favor a poor man in his cause.
Exodus 23:1-3
At the mouth of two witnesses, or three witnesses, shall he who is to die be put to death; at the mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death.
Deuteronomy 17:6

It is sad thing if you really think it is reasonable way of reading constructions to take one line out of thousands of lines and then claim to know the rules.

[Replying to post 63 by 1213]

"Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." (Exodus 22:18)

This is a very specific command which is very difficult to take out of context, or to reinterpret in any way OTHER than what these few words very specifically say. So how do we deal with this command today? We ignore it entirely. People in the past were less willing to simply ignore the things that are specifically written in the book that they believed without question to be the words and commands of the living God, however. Inevitably they tired to live their lives by following the commands of their book of revealed "truths" to the letter. And in doing so they went right down the rabbit hole into madness. Because the Bible IS NOT the revealed word of any Supreme Being. It's a composite of ancient superstitious make believe developed by ancient superstitious people. Trying to rigidly follow it as a guide to God inspired living is madness, which can only inevitably lead to madness. Because the entire belief is and always was based on make believe. And rigidly following make believe and madness cannot help but lead to madness. As the historical record of the witch trials clearly shows that it inevitably did. So how do we deal with those parts of the Bible which require actions that we today consider excessive and untenable? We simply ignore them, or declare then to be the result of "being taken out of context." Which of course leads to millions of varying interpretations and thousands of different Christian denominations. And every one of them correct, naturally. Which can be easily verified by simply asking the individuals who hold them.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

I still stand by my earlier post that I have yet to see any medical expert point to a causative link between belief in hellfire and baby killers. Just because I don't believe in hellfire I don't feel the need to create hystical claims that it causes diviant behaviour and I have read this thread carefully waiting for credible evidence from mental health experts that claim that is the case.

It's a conclusion reached when you post statements such as this one.

JehovahsWitness wrote:
"A link to peer reviewed medical experts that establish that religious belief causes deviant behaviour would be appreciated."

This was written AFTER I posted the following link:
http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?pid=S01 ... xt&tlng=en

Which then caused me to suppose that you had not bothered to check out the link that you were asking for.

[myth-one.com]

And you do understand that you and nobody in this thread qualifies as a mental health expert.

I did not know that.

How do you?

Just because certain elements are present this does not establish Cause. Women wear dresses. Women have periods. Therefore Dresses cause periods.

Some men wear dresses. Do they have periods?

Just because certain elements are present this does not establish Cause.

Newsweek Magazine reported that "About 200 children are killed by their mothers every year, according to Justice statistics. Sometimes moms blame the devil. Or they think they are saving their children from a hellish life by sending them to heaven."

Consider the cases of those moms who think they are saving their children from a hellish life by sending them to heaven.

To my knowledge, paranoia was never mentioned in any of these killings. That is, they did not kill their children out of fear that they were going to harm them.

Where did their belief of sending their children to Heaven come from, if not from some religious source?

In fact, many considered their crimes as altruistic acts! The children were in their innocent years, and their "souls" would be immediately received by God to live with Him for eternity in heaven.

Mrs. Yates informed psychiatrist, Dr. Park Dietz, that she wasn't thinking about Satan at the time of the killings but was praying that her four sons would go to heaven. Apparently she was not certain that all of the boys were still "in their innocent years." However, she had no concern about six-month old Mary, because "she was the most innocent of all of them."

[Tired of the Nonsense]

And you do understand that you and nobody in this thread qualifies as a mental health expert.

I did not know that.

How do you?

Just because certain elements are present this does not establish Cause. Women wear dresses. Women have periods. Therefore Dresses cause periods.

Some men wear dresses. Do they have periods?

Just because certain elements are present this does not establish Cause.

Newsweek Magazine reported that "About 200 children are killed by their mothers every year, according to Justice statistics. Sometimes moms blame the devil. Or they think they are saving their children from a hellish life by sending them to heaven."

Consider the cases of those moms who think they are saving their children from a hellish life by sending them to heaven.

To my knowledge, paranoia was never mentioned in any of these killings. That is, they did not kill their children out of fear that they were going to harm them.

Where did their belief of sending their children to Heaven come from, if not from some religious source?

In fact, many considered their crimes as altruistic acts! The children were in their innocent years, and their "souls" would be immediately received by God to live with Him for eternity in heaven.

Mrs. Yates informed psychiatrist, Dr. Park Dietz, that she wasn't thinking about Satan at the time of the killings but was praying that her four sons would go to heaven. Apparently she was not certain that all of the boys were still "in their innocent years." However, she had no concern about six-month old Mary, because "she was the most innocent of all of them."

Paranoia concerns feelings of persecution and ongoing threat. A person who believes that they are being constantly stalked by Satan would certainly be classified as paranoid. But this is just symptomatic of a larger condition. And that is psychosis, or being out of touch with reality,i.e., living entirely in a world of fantasy.

Wikipedia
Psychosis
Psychosis refers to an abnormal condition of the mind described as involving a "loss of contact with reality". People with psychosis are described as psychotic. People experiencing psychosis may exhibit some personality changes and thought disorder. Depending on its severity, this may be accompanied by unusual or bizarre behavior, as well as difficulty with social interaction and impairment in carrying out daily life activities.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychosis

Now, imagine rounding up and sentencing tens of thousands of women and girls to horrible deaths on the charge of witchcraft. That is the very definition of psychotic, and it was derived entirely from religious beliefs which were taken to be valid and therefore to be followed to the letter. An entire society made psychotic as a result of their ancient superstitious religious beliefs.

[myth-one.com]

Wikipedia
Psychosis
Psychosis refers to an abnormal condition of the mind described as involving a "loss of contact with reality". People with psychosis are described as psychotic.

Great and powerful men of God make statements such as the following:

The Bible teaches that you are an immortal soul. Your soul is eternal and will live forever. In other words, the real you -- the part of you that thinks, feels, dreams, aspires; the ego, the personality-- will never die. The Bible teaches that your soul will live forever in one of two places -- heaven or hell. If you are not a Christian and you have never been born again, then the Bible teaches that your soul goes immediately to a place Jesus called hades, where you will await the judgment of God. The moment a Christian dies, he goes immediately into the presence of Christ. There his soul awaits the resurrection, when the soul and body will be rejoined. The scriptural doctrine of hell is an awesome one which must be taken very seriously. God, in His mercy and love, watches over little children who are taken by death, and they go to be with Him in heaven.

Are evangelists who preach the above theology psychotic by definition?

That is, do the above statements of theology represent a "loss of contact with reality?"