Why aren't there more healings?

[Fweethawt]

Skankboy, could you explain what is happening on the photo?

To everybody. If you still have a wish to examine the Holy Fire miracle, I found a video that is not on that website. It's on a Russian website, and I think the video is also in Russian but I am not sure, my soundcard failed, so I can't hear it. However, you don't need the comments, the picture tells for itself. Toward the very end there is a group of people washing their beards in the fire. So, here is the website with the video (bad quality):

 

http://www.pravoslavie.udm.ru/sretenie1.htm#n4

 

I think you should take a better look at that video.

 

If you didn't see a man with a great deal of facial hair that was being extremely cautious in making sure that his hair was being kept away from the fire, then you either have something wrong with your eyes, or some bad wiring in your circuit board.

[IAm_Lucifer]

But let us assume that this is a hoax and nothing extraordinary does not happen in the Temple of the Tomb of the Lord. Would people still go there?

 

Yes people would still go there. There is this house in a nearby suburb to where I live where all these Jesus and Mary statues were put up. They were put there because Jesus appeared sitting on the tree in the front yard. They have daily services and guess what they ask for after each one. Donations. Hundreds of people line up to give their money away.

 

 

There are millions of Orthodox people and believers of other faiths and denominations who go there just to see the Fire. And if you have a pretty good video camera, you can get inside and witness the miracle. The website somehow only has unprofessional videos (I guess you need to pay for the professional ones).

 

There are no "professional" videos because it is clearly a hoax.

 

If this was a hoax, they will not let anyone in, but just the Patriarch and the clergy close to him.

 

They don't let anyone in on it because they do not want to lose the benefits they are receiving.

 

It is uncareful to declair this to be a hoax because you did not consider the consequences of it.

 

And thats the difference between Christians and nonbelievers. I declare it a hoax because it seems fake to me. The Christian declares unprovable things true.

[greygirl]

I think you should take a better look at that video. 

 

If you didn't see a man with a great deal of facial hair that was being extremely cautious in making sure that his hair was being kept away from the fire, then you either have something wrong with your eyes, or some bad wiring in your circuit board.

 

Agreed. No one in that video is doing anything with the "holy fire" that you can't do with any fire lit by a plain, old match. Produce a video of someone holding their face directly in the fire, without moving, for several minutes. Then I'll consider that something unusual is going on.

[Wade]

Agreed.  No one in that video is doing anything with the "holy fire" that you can't do with any fire lit by a plain, old match.  Produce a video of someone holding their face directly in the fire, without moving, for several minutes.  Then I'll consider that something unusual is going on.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

 

 

A few minutes.....how about 15 seconds.....it was originally stated as 15 minutes!!!

 

The clip you refered to with the guy holding it under his chin was holding it in front of his chin....a strait on view might appear that it was under it but close scrutiny shows it is not.

 

 

so YES it is a hoax!!!!

[Fweethawt]

I BELIEVE NOW!

 

I have looked upon The Holy Flame,

and have been convinced!

 

 

And I have also seen,

The Flame That Burneth Not!

 

 

 

 

Ain't that somethin'? Ain't that somethin'?!?!?!?

[Guest Euthyphro]

HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

[Eponymic]

Perception is a tricky thing.

 

People often see and reason things as they want to see them.

 

If you want to believe in miracles, you'll see things as miracles.

 

If you want a real answer you'll see that many 'miraculous' events are merely us as humans truly connecting with the energy forces within and around us. Thereby enabling us to do incredible things, like eating glass, sticking large needles through the skin, etc.

 

There's a logical, scientific reason for everything. It's just that we are often not able to see it because we have not learned enough yet, are too jaded and unable to accept the logical result, and/or our perception makes us see what we want it to see.

[pandora]

Oh, I have a harvest of replies here. Ok, here we go.

There is no proof. You know it, we know it. If it was REAL proof then you would show it in a heartbeat.

 

There is.

That is if you were me, but you're not. If you saw a miracle, you are gonna come here and tell everybody. I am not like that. I gonna hold the proof until you get excited about it. If you're not, you will not believe it. I know. I have experience of talking with atheists and agnostics. And actually the miracles in my church are too dear to me, and that is why I am afraid to lay it down here before you so you can step on them with the feet of your suspiciousness.

Jaded, what do you say about a brain damage? The person went to all kinds of doctors, but he still was "twisted": couldn't communicate, didn't smile at all, had short term memory losses, losses of orientation, couldn't understand conversation. He was like that for two years, and now he is a totally normal guy, he is a friend of mine. The accident happened to him 10 years ago, and at that time he had his wife, two grown children, and even grandchildren (now they are with him, and some more grandchildren). They all were witnesses.

Just because something unexplained happened doesn't mean god did it. All it means is something unexplained happened.

 

I aggree, Chef. But I personally feel that something really really unexplained hapened, like the Red Sea got separated, would you at least suspect that this is probably God?

Um, thanks! What's a nick?

 

Nickname, username See my comment to Jaded

Euthypro:

See, God is not a show-man, and he does not perform miracles to amuse, but to strengthen the faith. And so He is going to show His power only to those who will value it. That is not necessarily to the believers, it can be to an atheist (this happened many times) but in a particular time, place, and condition and mood of that atheist. It is really hard to match those to get the right time to perform a miracle so that an atheist would really appreciate it, that is why it does not happen so often.

To EVERYBODY: would the flames that did not burn Jewish children described in the Bible convince you? Is there a modern trick that would make fire not burn your skin and hair if you expose them to it for some time (like minutes)?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Surely you know of the documented medical cases of victims who have been in vegetative states or severely brain damaged (like your friend) who HAVE recovered, and it wasn't credited to faith in God and miraculous healing.

 

The brain is somewhat regenerative and it has self-healing properties, although not to the extent of the liver. Recovering from brain damage is completely within the realm of our bodies' capabilities and hardly a miracle.

 

Here in the US there was recently a man who was in a vegetative state for ten years, then woke up one day and remembered his family and could begin to function.

 

I had a friend in middle school who was in a coma for three months and could barely talk when she woke up. She couldn't walk either. A year later, she was back to her normal self. She was a Christian, I was a Christian, we all prayed for her, but none of us credited her recovery to a miraculous event.

[Fweethawt]

She was a Christian, I was a Christian, we all prayed for her, but none of us credited her recovery to a miraculous event.

 

Well, bless your precious heart.

 

Good for you!

[pandora]

Oh that's nothing, NF.

 

If you want to see 'crazy' you should go to that

Russian website that was posted up there.

 

There are thousands of words there. Thousands

of words that you won't be able to understand.

However, there are a few pictures. And we all

know that a picture speaks a thousand words. 

 

Look! He/she has his/her face buried in the Holy Fire!!!

 

It is so obvious that the candle with the flame is far away from that woman's face. It looks like the holder of the camera held the candle in front of his lens and took a picture of a lady wiping her forehead directly in front of him

 

I also notices that they aren't really candles, they are rolls of something or another that are very wide, and whatever material they are made of plus the large diameter probably explains the lack of the blue portion of the flame.

 

How are people so gullible????

[Cynical Realist]

Preaching the gospel is supposed to be accompanied by healings:

Why don't Christians do this more? Why aren't there hundreds of verifiable, documented instances of healings and raisings from the dead? When did a Christian last even try to raise someone from the dead?

 

Please enlighten me, preachers of the true gospel... 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I guess you never watch Benny Hinn?

[Guest vanesa]

To everybody. If you still have a wish to examine the Holy Fire miracle, I found a video that is not on that website

 

(Learns God Flame)

 

Thanks for the spell Orthodox Xtian!

[orthodox christian]

I'm back! Aren't you delighted?

 

 

About the Holy Fire -- you're unbelievable, guys! I didn't even imagine that ex-christian are soo stubborn and soo biased against Christianity so that they can't do a good envastigation. The Holy Fire is NOT a hoax! That would be just ridiculous! Anybody can go adn check for himself, do you think he wouldn't report? Like I said, there are MILLIONS of people who go there and see for themselves, they stick their heads into the fire and are not burnt! We just don't have good videos on the internet. Hopefully, this year someone would make a video with a guy holding his beard in the fire for a long time. I would suggest just go there and see, would I say that if it was a hoax and the high clergy just ticked everybidy? Would it be so easy to get to it? No, the place would be occupied with religious officials, closed, and only some authorised people could go in in order to prevent the simple folks from finding out that it's a hoax. Everybody, even unbleievers, even Jews and Muslims can go and see for themselves. Figure for yourself, if you saw a miracle with your own eyes, would your camera not shake? Besides, this does not last for long, and you want to see it for yourself, and forget about a good picture. That is why we don't have good videos of it. You're unbelievable! And illogical. Totally

 

OK, I give up on this one, untill I get a kind of picture requested, with a man/woman with his/her chin in the fire for an unusual time.

 

This is not the only one massive miracle we have, though. And all of them you can attend and see for yourself. There are no videos of them, though (there is one, actually, but I need to convert it to DVD, and then present it here, and I don't know how). I guess even if John Kennedy rose from the dead, you still wouldn't believe. You'll say he's a twin or just looks like him. Such is your nature, to not believe. I guess I will never have enough proof, however valid it would be, to convince you guys. You say that you will believe, if you see the evidence, but you won't because the evidence is never enough, you'll say, "No, this evidence is not valid becasue of this or that." What a pity!

[orthodox christian]

So if there are all these conditions (needing to remove non-Christian things from my bedroom, trouble at home), why didn't you mention them at the beginning of the thread when you guaranteed it would work? Is your god really so weak that his miracles can be totally blocked by a deck of tarot cards or a picture of Eliza Dushku? If so, that's a pretty pathetic god you've got there. Not very god-like at all.

 

Greygirl, I'm human too, I just forgot. Is it not acceptable to forget?

 

You need to make the sign of the cross directly above the pillow right before you put your head on it.

As to why Tarot cards and pictures of that person interfere, is easy. It's not about God's power, but about your choice. If you are sick, go to a doctor, get a medicine, and then drink all night long, will you feel better? I don't think so. Especially if you have liver problems. It's not that doctor can't help you, it's just you messing up the medicine. I can't go into detail here because that will sound crazy to you.

I was into black magic before becoming a Christian, and I can tell you that even I was suspicious of the Tarot cards. They can do a lot of harm, like every time my mom would use them (she was a pretty good fortune teller, famous and pretty rich, too), something very bad would happen to us. Those things are dangerous. I would get rid of them even if I weren't a Christian. I think we threw the deck away before we converted.

[orthodox christian]

Hell, yes. There's a tree just a few blocks from my apartment which contains what some people claim is an image of the Virgin Mary. I've seen it. It's a smudge of tree sap. It doesn't look like anything *but* a random smudge of tree sap. And yet, people have set up a shrine in front of the tree, and people make pilgrimages to see it. That one tree has had thousands upon thousands of visitors. People believe because they want to, not because the evidence is convincing.

 

Yes people would still go there. There is this house in a nearby suburb to where I live where all these Jesus and Mary statues were put up. They were put there because Jesus appeared sitting on the tree in the front yard. They have daily services and guess what they ask for after each one. Donations. Hundreds of people line up to give their money away.

 

That's totally different! I'm not talking about something that one can see only under certain conditions! The fire really does not burn! What else do you ask? How much more "miraculous" a miracle can be? I mean, if you stik your head into the fire and it feels cool, and you still are able to say that it's only a miracle if you want it to be a miracle, then you're just nuts. Think for yourself. Can you?

[SmallStone]

Think for yourself. Can you?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Glory! Praise Him! A miracle!

[Kryten]

Fire is God's weapon of choice. Wouldn't the church consider it evil to think He would provide fire that didn't burn?

 

Please do us all a favor and go stick your arm in the fire, without any special fluids or protection, and see if you can count to a hundred before retracting it. Get it on tape and let us take an objective look.

[SmallStone]

Please do us all a favor and go stick your arm in the fire, without any special fluids or protection, and see if you can count to a hundred before retracting it.  Get it on tape and let us take an objective look.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I'll bet the same thing happens to that arm as happens to that fire walkers feet when he walks really slow. The same thing probably happens to that fire breather's face when he doesn't blow.

 

Golly Gee!

 

Orthodox Christian, add yourself to the long list of xtians that make me regret leaving my sales job.

[orthodox christian]

Small Stone, let's look how he puts his hair in there. And why doesn't he show us his feet?

And the fire breathing, it's no miracle, everyone can do that. But it's dangerous, if you are not careful, it can burn your mouth.

 

 

Kryten:

 

Of course that is one of the big draws of any religion, cult, or church. The family atmosphere and sense of belonging. You have close friends with much in common, have social events, do things together, hug each other, etc. Yes, we did all that. I had no problem with that part of it. But once you discover it is based on something false, you aren't one of them and don't belong. I don't miss it. There is too much pressure to conform and submit, although I was pretty immune to that part. I am much happier NOT being part of a church or group.

 

I mean in terms of teaching, not the group? In Orthodoxy, you never are a member of a group, but you are one to one with God (maybe, only the priest is closer to you than other Christians). Although we have friends in our parishes.

 

 

Xians have a cow when one of their own rejects their beliefs. They like to think that once you "know Jesus" you cannot "unknow" him-- that once you believe you cannot stop believing.

 

That's strange, because we can't believe without God's help. When He doesn't want us to believe, we don't.

 

 

Don't jump to conclusions or judge. I would never reject God.

 

See, in Orthodoxy we meet God personally, in our hearts. It's called grace. He visits, and tells you stuff, most often He just softly and with infinite patience shows you your own mistakes, how totally wicked you are. His touch is sweet, sweeter than any pleasure on earth, and that makes you want to serve only Him, and everything else seems pale in your eyes. You also meet deamons, but I will not talk about them because you even have a hard time believing in God. But even those who met God face to face, saw Him with their physical eyes and talked to Him like two people talk in real life, they can stop believing and become atheists even though the evidence was right there before them. That is because we need God's grace to constantly be in us in order to believe. We can't believe by ourselves.

 

 

I don't know if He/She exists or not, but I know for certain that the diety described in the Old Testament is illogical, petty, quick to anger, unforgiving, racist, and inconsistant.

 

Orthodoxy teaches that God is never angry. Even with sinners and deamons. The Scripture can be read in millions of ways, and only one is true. I loved one story an Anthropologist told. She went to Africa with a theory in mind that everyone has about the same picture of the world and everyone reasons in the same way. She decided to prove it. She brought Hamlet with her and translated it to a native tribe overthere. Surprizignly, they did not get any of the original idea Shakespear had in mind, and they interpreted the story in such a manner that Hamlet turned out to be the most evil one! They saw nothing wrong in his mother marrying her dead husband's brother in one month (they said she waited too long), and many more stuff like Hamlet did a spell on Ophelia and such. That was amazing, and it was for real. She did a field study and reported it with all the details.

 

 

If God exists, I don't think He/She is guilty of all that crap.

 

We call God "He" because in a patriarchycal society we tend to think that a person in authority should be male. Although the views are changing, it's still more convenient to use "He" and "Father" because in this case we would have more respect for God. But in reality, God does not have a gender.

When you read the Bible with an Eastern mindset, it makes a lot more sense, and there are hardly any contradictions. Also, God is not a tirant. It's legalistic West that makes God into that.

 

 

If you accept on faith that He is with you, then you believe it. If you believe it, then it is true to you. Did I reject Santa? No, I just don't believe he exists. Big difference. Have you rejected Santa?

 

See, Orthodoxy and Protestantism have totally different approaches to faith. In Orthodoxy you are concidered a true believer when you recognize the work of grace within you. If you "just believe", you are not a "true believer". You gotta have evidence I always thought belief in Santa was a pegan influence. And there is no Santa in Orthodoxy.

 

 

 

Please do us all a favor and go stick your arm in the fire, without any special fluids or protection, and see if you can count to a hundred before retracting it. Get it on tape and let us take an objective look.

 

I need to go to Jerusalem for that! Will you fund the trip?

 

 

Fire is God's weapon of choice. Wouldn't the church consider it evil to think He would provide fire that didn't burn?

 

"Weapon", there is no such thing in my religion. Remember the unburning bush which Moses saw? Remember the Jewish children unburnt in the furnace? Same thing here.

[SmallStone]

Small Stone, let's look how he puts his hair in there. And why doesn't he show us his feet? And the fire breathing, it's no miracle, everyone can do that. But it's dangerous, if you are not careful, it can burn your mouth.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Now you are starting to get it. If you start applying the type of reasoning you've demonstrated in these few sentences to your holy fire, you'll look considerably less gullible than you do now.

[Antlerman]

I haven't read all the posts on this thread, and I'm sure someone’s already said this, but I just have to say it anyway:

 

If something is not easily explainable, or even if the best of the scientific community is unable *at this time* to provide an answer for something, WHY does the answer then have to equal a miracle of god??? Furthermore, why does that answer always equal the God of the religion of the observer, and not some god that you don't believe in?? To someone who believes in extraterrestrials, this is proof of aliens to them.

 

Good god... don't tell me you don't realize how superstition has always tried to fill the gap when scientific knowledge lacked? Why is it that superstition’s bizarre answers are then conveniently forgotten by the believers once they're disproved. Do you not see this happening yet today?

 

Why are these oddities (if they're even really legitimate) always somehow proof of someone's deity or faith system? My answer to that question is simple: Fear and desperation to find affirmation of one's leaps of faith. You're grasping for affirmation. I'll give it this though... it's far less work then having to think. Believe in the tooth fairy if you will, but honestly don't embarrass yourself trying to prove he's real.

[SmallStone]

Antlerman, I think the answer lies in the fact that humans are intrinsically rational (as well as emotional). Any little shred that somehow can be used to rationalize an irrational belief will be used.

[orthodox christian]

OC, nice story but I am still a sceptic.  I am curious as to what you mean by "blood spesis"  I am familiar with sepsis and septic shock, and yes, I know that the infection can get into the bloodstream and spread, but I have never heard of blood spesis.  I looked it up, no one else has either... 

 

You said that your mother had this disease for six months?  How much of that time was she in ICU?  Sepsis is a pretty serious problem and you are either in ICU or you don't have a septic issue.  Do you think that the 24 hour a day IV antibiotic drip could have had something to do with her healing? 

 

Either that or blood sepsis is something else that no one else (including doctors) has heard of.  http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/sepsis.html

 

Healing is a quesiton of faith?  What about the parents who let their children die while praying over them for a healing?  Face it, nobody wants to lose a child.  They chose prayer because they believe it is there best chance, that their is no way that god could let them down.  In far too many DOCUMENTED cases, god does precisely that.  Was their faith not strong enough?  Did god say, "I know you loved me and trusted me, but oops, you chose the wrong church?"

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I looked at the website, and I guess either American and Russian doctors understand sepsis differently or I just did not know what it really means. Anyway, she had a decaying organ within her, and when the product of that gets into the blood, you die soon. That is what I thought sepsis is. I just put there "sepsis of blood" to get the idea where the problem lies. It affects the whole body and poisons it. If you are exposed to it long enough, your brain starts working funny, and many organs fail. That is what was supposed to happen to her. I did not know any of this before they did a sergery on her and took out the decayed organ. They said she was supposed to die after a week her fever started. She lived 6 months. There is no medication against that poisoning, but only a surgery can help, and only within a limited time period. I know in Siberia if you get an arm or a leg too cold, it can start decaying (gongrena it's called), and you have to cut it off before the poison of decaying flesh gets into your whole body and you die. That is what happened to her, only inside of her. I do not know the cause in her case.

 

 

 

 

 

Brain damage is a tough one. Some people get better, some people get worse. Mostly it depends on the part of the brain damaged, type of damage, and severity of damage. While brain tissue doesn't grow back new neural pathways often develop and allow people to re-learn skills that they lost when the incident occurred. I don't know what type of damage or the severity of your friends injury, but my guess is he probably made a slow recovery and had plenty of therapy to help him along.

 

Is it any different from an accident victim or stroke victim that can't even get out of bed learning to walk with two people helping, moving to a walker, and eventually graduating to a cane (or nothing)? That happens pretty regularly. It has nothing to do with regaining strength, they really are relearning how to walk. The same things apply to speach recognition, emotional interaction, and pretty much all voluntary muscle control.

 

Perhaps your friends complete recovery is rare with the extent of damage, it's hard to know that without the particulars (and I'm not really qualified to tell you), but it is not unprecendented for people to recover from brian injuries.

 

Usually you have a pretty good chance of recovery, unless you show no progress for a long time. If you are the same after at least a year, and no theraphy helps, doctors give up on you. My friend was in that situation (2 years in same condition). The doctor said to his wife: "keep him as a pet". Also, in most cases you never become the good old guy you were, but there are still some effects shown. In the case of my friend, all he has to remember his sickness is the huge scar on his head. He is totally normal as if nothing ever happened to him. He's pretty funny, too.

 

His recovery was instant, and all his relatives (including his wife, two grown children and their adolescent children) were witnesses to this. Whole his family converted, and his son even became a clergy. I see them every sunday. My friend also has a big pile of documented miracles: photos, videos, books, etc.

 

As with dimentia (the brain damage caused by a stroke or a number of small strokes), it is incurable, as I learned recently at my university and had a final exam last week on it. In severe cases, the mind is totally gone, with all emotions, reasoning, memory, etc. You can relearn to do some things, but not in all cases, and not completely. You know how they talk about people who had a stroke: "Oh, he had a stoke, that's why he can't do [this or that] anymore."

[orthodox christian]

Now you are starting to get it. If you start applying the type of reasoning you've demonstrated in these few sentences to your holy fire, you'll look considerably less gullible than you do now.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I was just saying it's not the same, that's all.

 

 

Antlerman, I think the answer lies in the fact that humans are intrinsically rational (as well as emotional). Any little shred that somehow can be used to rationalize an irrational belief will be used.

 

I don't think humans can ever be rational. There is no such thing as absolute and universal logic. You gotta know at least two cultures to understand this.

[pandora]

I looked at the website, and I guess either American and Russian doctors understand sepsis differently or I just did not know what it really means. Anyway, she had a decaying organ within her, and when the product of that gets into the blood, you die soon. That is what I thought sepsis is. I just put there "sepsis of blood" to get the idea where the problem lies. It affects the whole body and poisons it. If you are exposed to it long enough, your brain starts working funny, and many organs fail. That is what was supposed to happen to her. I did not know any of this before they did a sergery on her and took out the decayed organ. They said she was supposed to die after a week her fever started. She lived 6 months. There is no medication against that poisoning, but only a surgery can help, and only within a limited time period. I know in Siberia if you get an arm or a leg too cold, it can start decaying (gongrena it's called), and you have to cut it off before the poison of decaying flesh gets into your whole body and you die. That is what happened to her, only inside of her. I do not know the cause in her case.

Usually you have a pretty good chance of recovery, unless you show no progress for a long time. If you are the same after at least a year, and no theraphy helps, doctors give up on you. My friend was in that situation (2 years in same condition). The doctor said to his wife: "keep him as a pet". Also, in most cases you never become the good old guy you were, but there are still some effects shown. In the case of my friend, all he has to remember his sickness is the huge scar on his head. He is totally normal as if nothing ever happened to him. He's pretty funny, too.

 

His recovery was instant, and all his relatives (including his wife, two grown children and their adolescent children) were witnesses to this. Whole his family converted, and his son even became a clergy. I see them every sunday. My friend also has a big pile of documented miracles: photos, videos, books, etc.

 

As with dimentia (the brain damage caused by a stroke or a number of small strokes), it is incurable, as I learned recently at my university and had a final exam last week on it. In severe cases, the mind is totally gone, with all emotions, reasoning, memory, etc. You can relearn to do some things, but not in all cases, and not completely. You know how they talk about people who had a stroke: "Oh, he had a stoke, that's why he can't do [this or that] anymore."

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Which organ "decayed"? If it was the appendix, then there are lots of cases of appendicitis where the patient lives with the infected organ for months.

 

Sepsis is by definition an infection with sytemic inflammatory responses. "Blood sepsis" (septicemia) is actually more common than you would think, and the conditions range from being a mild case called bacteremia (where the patient might actually resolve the infection on their own through their own immune system) to complete sytemic shock.

 

I don't think you have provided enough details to explain the nature of this miracle.

 

As for brain damage, I would like to know what your major is. It just isn't true that it is incurable.... there are major differences between the brain damage caused by stroke, alzheimer's, etc... neural pathways can be re-networked. In some cases, brain tissue is destroyed. The damage isn't always permanent... technically speaking it is (the same connections are never regained) but as far as clinically speaking (measuring the ability to regain certain functions) improvements are often made.