How do you measure your 'recovery' ?Umm....I think that's a personal choice and for me one of the demonstrations of that recovery is how I feel when I see a 'triggering' movie. I don't much like the word 'triggered' but ya know what that means.This weekend I watched the The Exorcist (1972) and didn't flich one a bit. I haven't seen it since the early 70's so I haven't been conditioned at all. In the more recent past someone put a picture of Lynda Blairhere that scared me half way to Rome.Nope I'm curedIts a great movie!...exorcism (accompanied by blasphemies, obscenities and graphic physical shocks), was supposedly based upon an authentic, nearly two-month long exorcism performed in 1949 on a 14-year old boy (with pseudonym "Robbie Mannheim") in Mt. Rainier, Maryland by the Catholic Church (in the form of a fifty-two year old Jesuit priest named Fr. William S. Bowdern and Fr. Raymond Bishop). The official exorcism was reported in Thomas B. Allen's and Carl Brandt's 1993 bookPossessed:The True Story of an Exorcism. [Possessed (2000)was also a pay-TV-cableShowtimemovie of the same name, starring Timothy Dalton.] The film's plot was also partially inspired by a similar demonic possession case in Earling, Iowa in 1928.sourceMovie's are not effecting me at all these days. No old pain or feelings. Its good to know the difference between old pain and current feelings.Are you still 'triggered" and what does it for you?How do you comfort yourself?
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In exchange for obedience, Christianity promises salvation in an afterlife; but in order to elicit obedience through this promise, Christianity must convince people that they need salvation, that there is something to be saved from. Christianity has nothing to offer a happy person living in a natural, intelligible universe. If Christianity is to gain a motivational foothold, it must declare war on earthly pleasure and happiness, and this, historically, has been its precise course of action. In the eyes of Christianity, woman(man) is sinful and helpless in the face of God, and is potential fuel for the flames of hell. Just as Christianity must destroy reason before it can introduce faith, so it must destroy happiness before it can introduce salvation.
-- George H Smith, Atheism: The Case Against God
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(Date Posted:09/18/2005 06:58:29)
Reply to : snakechic
How do you measure your 'recovery' ?
I don't much like the word 'triggered' but ya know what that means.
Hi Snakechick -
I like your definition of a "cure" - not being triggered by rememberances of it anymore. Another good indication of a cure is thinking of and describing yourself as something other than a former fundy, or recovering fundy, or the like.
I have been out from under for many years now, and I occasionally visit the WA board just to see what is up (and comment where I think I can add value). Being out for a long time now I can even visit my sister's fundy church for family things like baptism, etc. without feeling the pangs. In fact, I can remember what was good and attracted me to it in the first place, without having any desire to re-enlist as it were. True, I come away shaking my head at the pathetically closed minds of the congregants and their need to stuff the vast wonder of teh universe into little packets of circular reasoning so that they can function in life. But the more I live, the more I see that that is not a failing peculiar to fundys. It is a universal human tendancy.
Anyway, I am glad you have found that things that used to trigger you have now lost their power. Congratulations!
You trigger new thoughts from old memories with this post.
The Exorcist. Never saw it. Because, I am extreemly impressionable and anything that is horror causes weeks of fear and depression for me.
I have to honestly say that when the exorcist came out I never once thought of it as "real" or "religious" or have any real basis in religion. Instead I believed it to be horror and based on conjecture from some obscure religious texts. Imagination and horror. Simple as that and I was going to stay away from it. I still have not seen it and never plan to. I was 16, non-Christian, and relatively new to this world.
Now interestingly, Tubular Bells by Michael Oldfield, was one of my favorite albums at the time. I played it constantly and it would often send me into euphoric states of spiritual imaginings. I never once associated the music with the movie nor with ideas of horror.
Years later I read an interview with Oldfield and he said that he too had never seen the movie and never planned to.
Leave it to the church to come up with such an idea of horror. And let there be proof of such nonsense. Can they prove this? Can they win James Randi's one million dollar paranormal challenge? I doubt it. Just one demon possessed person would be good enough for most of us. How come there can't be JUST ONE? Because there isn't one. The stories of demons in the bible and of Jesus and the pigs are just stories and nothing else. It never happened.
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She said something like, "Well, now that you've forced me into this tiny little box, I guess your explanation is that it is the only one I can choose." -post by phoenixgirl
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(Date Posted:09/20/2005 08:08:57)
I'm glad to hear you're feeling cured, snakechick. Maybe I should rent the movie myself and see if I am. After all, I was taught that that movie was more or less an actual depiction of demon possession. To look back and realize that I used to believe in a god that would allow Satan to run around and do horrible things just makes me realize how thoroughly brainwashed I was.
For me a tough test of whether or not I was "cured" was attending two funerals last winter, one for my sister and one for my great aunt. Adventist pastors gave both services and I think I did pretty good, although it was hard to tell between my grief at my lost relatives and my feelings revolving around the faith I have abandoned.
Leave it to the church to come up with such an idea of horror.
Exactly! And how is it that some people seem to revel in that stuff. I don't understand that; I was always very disturbed hearing about satanic manifestations.
And let there be proof of such nonsense. Can they prove this? Can they win James Randi's one million dollar paranormal challenge?
Amen, sista! So far they've never proved a single instance of a supernatural power. I love it that they can't prove anything; it goes to show they're full of shit. I also like James Randi a lot; he was one of my liberators.
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Zombies, Unicorns, Devils, Sea Monsters, Satyrs, Dragons, Six Winged Angels, Gods, Demons, Witches, Astrologers, A walking & talking snake, Magical fruit, Talking donkeys, human headed six-winged beasts, Ghosts. All that stuff is in the Bible and yet they tell me it"s not mythology?
"When they shall say unto you, Seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and that mutter: should not a people seek unto their God? for the living to the dead?" Isaiah 8:19
Yep..I was also lectured many, many times on the ways people are 'possessed'. Remember all that Ouija board stuff...quote....The Ouija Board is not harmless just because it is marketed as a game. Satan, the master of deception and seduction, is good at twisting the truth into lies (Gen. 3:1-6; Jn. 8:44). Satan likes disguises and his lies are often disguised as games. The next time you are tempted to play the Ouija Board as a game, look beyond its disguise and see it for what it really is"
The movie followed the same myth to a tee. Lynda found an old ouija board in the attic so that's how it starts...watch out kiddies.. You know what?...I don't think I'd play with that game, not that I'm chicken..(laughs at self)
For me a tough test of whether or not I was "cured" was attending two funerals last winter, one for my sister and one for my great aunt. Adventist pastors gave both services and I think I did pretty good, although it was hard to tell between my grief at my lost relatives and my feelings revolving around the faith I have abandoned.
Yes that would have been one of the toughest moments and no wonder, mixed with grief. But I don't mean to suggest that 'cure' is necessarily the proper word. At my father's funeral, the old adventist pastor was invited out of respect for my father, his position in the church was quite valued. THe old coot took over the service but I was too shattered to do anything or feel anything until years later. The Baptist pastor took it rather well I thought, however I don't think he was expecting the length of time the old coot took to delivery his message in a Baptist church....that's kinda funny considering how the Baptist feel about the SDA'st I wish him well and don't want to blow up his car so I guess I'm over it.
P.S. here's another adventist link for you...I gather the SDA'ist differ (my parents were very old fashioned and spoke of angels and satan etc.) also its interesting to read what current adventist think about the revival movement http://www.sdanet.org/steve/articles/albanyrevival_S.Timm -
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In exchange for obedience, Christianity promises salvation in an afterlife; but in order to elicit obedience through this promise, Christianity must convince people that they need salvation, that there is something to be saved from. Christianity has nothing to offer a happy person living in a natural, intelligible universe. If Christianity is to gain a motivational foothold, it must declare war on earthly pleasure and happiness, and this, historically, has been its precise course of action. In the eyes of Christianity, woman(man) is sinful and helpless in the face of God, and is potential fuel for the flames of hell. Just as Christianity must destroy reason before it can introduce faith, so it must destroy happiness before it can introduce salvation.
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(Date Posted:09/23/2005 03:22:02)
What a great question: how do you know you're cured?
I'll tell you when I knew it. I found myself defending Christian fundamentalists in my grad school comparative religious ethics couse the other night. It's not that I admire my fundamentalist past or the theology it represents, but I get pretty worked up when it is misrepresented by people who look down on those who were fundies (as though we were dopey or not spiritual or somehow unable to think clearly about issues of life). A whole raft of Catholics were saying things like fundies just listen to church leaders whereas Catholics are guided by conscience... I wanted to stand and say, "Hello? Who has a pope?"
What I've come to see (like we all have here) is that Christianity (in any expression) is a construct that people adopt to help them address the meaningful issues of life. What I've come to feel about my fundamentalist past is that it offered the best answers for me at the time and just doesn't any more.
Ex
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I'm not easy on my knees. (Love and Peace or Else, U2)
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(Date Posted:09/23/2005 18:15:28)
Yeah, I'm to the point where I really, really hate to label myself as anything because I am many things at once (I'd say I'm a Christian meaning in the liberal, non-literal, cultural way, and also an atheist, or perhaps just an agnostic, and probably a secular humanist, although none of these is quite right -- I am just what I am), and they all carry different connotations to different people. I think if somebody were to ask me about my religion or faith I'd just say, "I don't believe in believing in the supernatural." That's what I said to my husband when he asked me if I believed in ghosts the other night. I'm not saying that I know for certain what does or doesn't exist out there, just that I don't see myself subscribing to anything beyond this material world.
"I am influenced at the present time by far higher considerations and by a nobler idea of duty than I ever was when I held the Evangelical belief." George Eliot
"I have one great fear in my heart, that one day when they are turned to loving, they will find we are turned to hating." Alan Paton's Cry, the Beloved Country (I promise I read this before it was an Oprah book club book)
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(Date Posted:09/23/2005 19:54:00)
A whole raft of Catholics were saying things like fundies just listen to church leaders whereas Catholics are guided by conscience... I wanted to stand and say, "Hello? Who has a pope?"
When I read this I just busted out laughing. Isn't it Catholics that vehemently have insisted for over a thousand years that it's the place of the Church to interpret the Bible and in general determine what their faith consists of? That's the very essence of blindly following the leadership. Of course this view itself has been largely shaped by the anti-Catholic stance of Adventism. Maybe they're more enlightened now?
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Zombies, Unicorns, Devils, Sea Monsters, Satyrs, Dragons, Six Winged Angels, Gods, Demons, Witches, Astrologers, A walking & talking snake, Magical fruit, Talking donkeys, human headed six-winged beasts, Ghosts. All that stuff is in the Bible and yet they tell me it"s not mythology?
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(Date Posted:09/24/2005 20:21:45)
The way I measure whether I'm cured or not...if I can set foot into a church.
I haven't been able to do it yet. Wanted to last Easter but bagged off at the last minute. Just the thought made me feel panicked and enraged.
The Exorcist never really did it for me. Probably because I didn't watch it until after I walked away, but the ending seemed so nonsensical...you think God wins and then the Devil throws that priest out the window...kind of pissed me off. And I thought "The Phrophecy" was better...no body can beat Christopher Walken at his creepiest.
But I gave it away after listening to it along with the movie. We were at a drive in, remember those?..heehee