Guest Cerebral Stasis Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 I recently recieved a chainmail from my fundamentalist parents with the following story: THE ANT AND THE CONTACT LENS A true story by Josh and Karen Zarandona Brenda was a young woman who was invited to go rock climbing. Although she was very scared, she went with her group to a tremendous granite cliff. In spite of her fear, she put on the gear, took hold of the rope, and started up the face of that rock. Well, she got to a ledge where she could take a breather. As she was hanging on there, the safety rope snapped against Brenda's eye and knocked out her contact lens. Well, here she is, on a rock ledge, with hundreds of feet below her and hundreds of feet above her. Of course, she looked and looked and looked, hoping it had landed on the ledge, but it just wasn't there. Here she was, far from home, her sight now blurry. She was desperate and began to get upset, so she prayed to the Lord to help her to find it. When she got to the top, a friend examined her eye and her clothing for the lens, but there was no contact lens to be found. She sat down, despondent, with the rest of the party, waiting for the rest of them to make it up the face of the cliff. She looked out across range after range of mountains, thinking of that verse that says, "The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth." She thought, "Lord, You can see all these mountains. You know every stone and leaf, and You know exactly where my contact lens is Please help me." Finally, they walked down the trail to the bottom. At the bottom there was a new party of climbers just starting up the face of the cliff. One of them shouted out, "Hey, you guys! Anybody lose a contact lens?" Well, that would be startling enough, but you know why the climber saw it? An ant was moving slowly across the face of the rock, carrying it on it's back. Brenda told me that her father is a cartoonist. When she told him the incredible story of the ant, the prayer, and the contact lens, he drew a picture of an ant lugging that contact lens with the words, "Lord, I don't know why You want me to carry this thing. I can't eat it, and it's awfully heavy. But if this is what You want me to do, I'll carry it for You" I think it would probably do some of us good to occasionally say, "God, I don't know why you want me to carry this load. I can see no good in it and it's awfully heavy. But, if you w ant me to carry it, I will." God doesn't call the qualified, He qualifies the called. Yes, I do love GOD. He is my source of existence and my Savior. He keeps me functioning each and every day. Without Him, I am nothing, but with Him...I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me. (Phil. 4:13) This is a simple test. If you love GOD and are not ashamed of all the marvelous things he has done for you, send this to ten people and the person who sent it to you. Now, I would like to know your opinion on the matter. This is one case that would certainly appear to be some kind of answer to prayer, but I'm doubtful in that matter, so feel free to post your explaination on how this practically impossible series of events took place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fweethawt Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 The events didn't take place. Or should I say, it can't be proven that they took place? That piece is taken from a book. See links below: http://www.positiveatheism.org/mail/eml9680.htm http://www.breakthechain.org/exclusives/contactlens.html http://www.snopes.com/glurge/antcontact.asp http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/a/antandcontactlens.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Shiva H. Vishnu Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 Why would anyone other than a credulous christian believe this story anyway? This sounds like every other bullshit preacher's anecdote I've heard and I never believed those stories. If we had to postulate a rational explaination for every outlandish yarn employed by the faithful to lend credence to their religion there'd be no time left over for autoerotic asphyxiation or snorting fish tranquilisers or whatever it is you do. It's much wiser to assume it's a lie, because it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♦ ficino ♦ Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 Fundies circulate many urban legends like this. Anyway, think of all the contact lenses that aren't recovered! Don't get me started on how many things Christians pray for that NEVER happen. God's percentage is really low. That's the realization that prompted many of us to start realizing the whole religion is a crock. Think of all the things billions of people pray for every day. Probability would say that some correlation between prayer and outcome will occur sometimes. For Christianity's promises to be true, "whatever you pray for in my name" should be accomplished. There's no reason to suppose that occasional correlation between prayer and outcome demonstrates anything. A very common answer to prayer is basically, "you're totally fucked." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 So the lady in the story gets popped in the eye with a rope when it breaks hundreds of feet in the air and her first thought is "oh no, my contact lens!" and not "ahhh! I'm gonna die!" She can still see out of one and and climbs to the top of the mountain and is still going on about that stupid lens. Is this thing made of gold or something? They then climb back down and miracle of miracles her lens is found and so, what, she pops it back in? She's been pining away for it all day so I assume she must have. Anyhow, I read the links by Fwee and they don't say it's a flat out fraud they say someone took credit for it being true but it was falsely attributed to the people at the top of the message. So the message also says the woman's dad was a cartoonist and made such a clever little drawing. I guess she'd have no problem passing that along if it really did happen. What are the odds anyone will ever see that? The funniest part is if you send off this junk mail you are to send it off to 10 other people AND the idiot that sent it to you in the first place (I guess to punish them for being an asshole for sending you shit like this). mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vigile Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 It's refreshing that god is so concerned with that good white American woman's eye. It's great that he does not waste his concern on the evil black heathen starving in Africa and directs it toward that which is obviously much more important. Just think about the implications. She might have suffered a semi blurry weekend, and god forbid, might have even contracted a slight headache had the lord not intervened so gracefully. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Antlerman Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 It's refreshing that god is so concerned with that good white American woman's eye. It's great that he does not waste his concern on the evil black heathen starving in Africa and directs it toward that which is obviously much more important. Just think about the implications. She might have suffered a semi blurry weekend, and god forbid, might have even contracted a slight headache had the lord not intervened so gracefully. What this story proves is that God can only communicate with North American ants to get them to do his will. The ants in Africa have a hard time understanding God's plain English instructions to them. The children starve because the ants refuse to obey God over there. The real miracle of these blatantly fabricated stories is the gullibility of people to buy into them. At least with Bible myths I think they came out of people's beliefs, but this story is crap from the word go. I could easily create a cute little country-song like heart-tugger story like this to make the little old lady's wipe a tear from the corner of their eyes, and foist it upon the masses, then sit back a laugh wildly at the masse's gullibility, but I have a conscience. The person who fabricated this clearly must be quite amused at the power he has to get people talking about his “miracle”. Note: Anytime whatsoever you see, "email this to others", go to urband lengends or snopes and 99.99% of the time you'll find it exposed there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NotBlinded Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 THE ANT AND THE CONTACT LENS A true story... This right here says it all! What's the truth and what they claim is the truth are entirely different things. They take what someone tells them is the truth and believe it instead of finding out if it really is the truth. It's sad that we have to be suspicious of everything, but we can't be blindly led either. Fundies circulate many urban legends like this. But it's supposed to take...what...500 years or so for a legend to develop?? It seems like it can develop as soon as someone hits "send". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MQTA Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 what about the ant and the rubber tree plant? is this the Actual Ant? is this Brenda's father's? LOL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
white_raven23 Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 There is only one way I can see this happening. A contact lens has no food value for an ant, so an ant would never voluntarily pick it up. BUT and this is a major but..... Someone could have a contact lens pop out. And it could just happen to land on an ant. I don't know about the hard lenses, but I can tell you the soft ones are "sticky" thanks to the moisture on them whe they come out of the eye. So the contact gets stuck to the ants back. Ants don't carry shit on their backs (even though sometimes it looks like it). They carry things in their jaws. If it's a hard lens, I don't see how the ant would be able to get a hold of it (too smooth), and a soft contact lens (depending on the size of the ant) would likely be damaged by the ant jaws, rendering the lens useless. So here's what I think may have happened. Contact lens flies out, gets stuck to an ant. Ant is going nuts. It can't get this thing off him. The original climber goes on his/her way. Another climber is going along, and the movement of the ant struggling to free itself from the contact lens catches the climber's eye. The climber pulls the "thing" off the ant, and is amazed to see it's a contact lens! The finding climbers imagination takes over from there. The part where the contact lens is miraculously returned to it's owner is easily a fanciful invention. Not to mention the notion that the ant was deliberately carrying the thing, instead of trying to escape from it. That is the only way I can see this story coming to be, and being based on a "real" experience (surrounded by fluffy christian-ese). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
narcissist Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 3 things: 1) That ant's got high hopes, 2) Lucky Brenda wasn't an Atheist Professor, 3) This is the sort of stuff rich and powerful christians in authority make up to discourage the poor and powerless christians from asking tough questions that could eventually reveal the fallacy of their faith and the wastefulness of their lowly position. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Antlerman Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 There is only one way I can see this happening. A contact lens has no food value for an ant, so an ant would never voluntarily pick it up. BUT and this is a major but..... Someone could have a contact lens pop out. And it could just happen to land on an ant. I don't know about the hard lenses, but I can tell you the soft ones are "sticky" thanks to the moisture on them whe they come out of the eye. I like your natural explanation behind the myth, and I'm sure if it was found it was something like this. However, I'm going to go with the miracle spin instead and tell it another way: Billy the Ant was feeling depressed and was wishing to die, feeling unloved in the world. A great lens fell from the sky before him, tempting him to end his life. Billy crawls beneath it, waiting for the angle of the sun to amplify the rays into a point of scorching heat to burn his hard shell around his body to a crisp. Instead the light reflection catches the eye of another climber, moments before the fateful rays snuffed Billy's body into darkened ash. The climber lifts the lens up, and Billy see's this as a sign from God that he is loved! Billy becomes a born again ant and serves the Lord the rest of his days, which totaled another week or so. The woman who had lost the lens felt this was a miracle for her, but the rope in her eye was God just choosing to use her pain and distress as an object of his will to speak to Billy the Ant of his love for him. The woman however all on her own interpreted all these events as being about her, when the truth is it was about the ant. Once Billy's predestined fate of being eaten by a bird occured, he now crawls about happily in heaven with the Lord who saved him. The End Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NotBlinded Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 There is only one way I can see this happening. A contact lens has no food value for an ant, so an ant would never voluntarily pick it up. BUT and this is a major but..... Someone could have a contact lens pop out. And it could just happen to land on an ant. I don't know about the hard lenses, but I can tell you the soft ones are "sticky" thanks to the moisture on them whe they come out of the eye. I like your natural explanation behind the myth, and I'm sure if it was found it was something like this. However, I'm going to go with the miracle spin instead and tell it another way: Billy the Ant was feeling depressed and was wishing to die, feeling unloved in the world. A great lens fell from the sky before him, tempting him to end his life. Billy crawls beneath it, waiting for the angle of the sun to amplify the rays into a point of scorching heat to burn his hard shell around his body to a crisp. Instead the light reflection catches the eye of another climber, moments before the fateful rays snuffed Billy's body into darkened ash. The climber lifts the lens up, and Billy see's this as a sign from God that he is loved! Billy becomes a born again ant and serves the Lord the rest of his days, which totaled another week or so. The woman who had lost the lens felt this was a miracle for her, but the rope in her eye was God just choosing to use her pain and distress as an object of his will to speak to Billy the Ant of his love for him. The woman however all on her own interpreted all these events as being about her, when the truth is it was about the ant. Once Billy's predestined fate of being eaten by a bird occured, he now crawls about happily in heaven with the Lord who saved him. The End I love it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
All Gods Fail Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 There is only one way I can see this happening. A contact lens has no food value for an ant, so an ant would never voluntarily pick it up. BUT and this is a major but..... Someone could have a contact lens pop out. And it could just happen to land on an ant. I don't know about the hard lenses, but I can tell you the soft ones are "sticky" thanks to the moisture on them whe they come out of the eye. I like your natural explanation behind the myth, and I'm sure if it was found it was something like this. However, I'm going to go with the miracle spin instead and tell it another way: Billy the Ant was feeling depressed and was wishing to die, feeling unloved in the world. A great lens fell from the sky before him, tempting him to end his life. Billy crawls beneath it, waiting for the angle of the sun to amplify the rays into a point of scorching heat to burn his hard shell around his body to a crisp. Instead the light reflection catches the eye of another climber, moments before the fateful rays snuffed Billy's body into darkened ash. The climber lifts the lens up, and Billy see's this as a sign from God that he is loved! Billy becomes a born again ant and serves the Lord the rest of his days, which totaled another week or so. The woman who had lost the lens felt this was a miracle for her, but the rope in her eye was God just choosing to use her pain and distress as an object of his will to speak to Billy the Ant of his love for him. The woman however all on her own interpreted all these events as being about her, when the truth is it was about the ant. Once Billy's predestined fate of being eaten by a bird occured, he now crawls about happily in heaven with the Lord who saved him. The End Please send this true story to 10 other people... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Antlerman Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 Please send this true story to 10 other people... Damn! I missed the perfect closing to it. I knew "The End" seemed kind of lame. Yes this story will bring you good luck if you send it to at least 10 people. The last person who didn't send it, had their home infested with millions of Billy the Ant's relatives. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eponymic Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 An Ant carried my books to school for me once. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Astreja Posted August 2, 2006 Share Posted August 2, 2006 The funniest part is if you send off this junk mail you are to send it off to 10 other people AND the idiot that sent it to you in the first place (I guess to punish them for being an asshole for sending you shit like this).I think it would be more appropriate to send it back to the originator ten times. A second. For a solid hour. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Luci Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 Hi, Wouldnt the contact lens be all dirty and germy after falling on an ant and Brenda would have to wash and sterilise it before wearing it? Why did God allow Brenda to get hit in the eye with the rope in the first place...so he could have her beg him for his help to boost his ego? Why would it have to fall on an ant instead of the other climbers hand or even better why didnt it fly back in to brenda's eye? I agree with the other person's post..arent there more pressing matters like people being raped/starving etc? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dr_funkenstein Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 Hi, Wouldnt the contact lens be all dirty and germy after falling on an ant and Brenda would have to wash and sterilise it before wearing it? Why did God allow Brenda to get hit in the eye with the rope in the first place...so he could have her beg him for his help to boost his ego? Why would it have to fall on an ant instead of the other climbers hand or even better why didnt it fly back in to brenda's eye? I agree with the other person's post..arent there more pressing matters like people being raped/starving etc? All of it happened so that a chain email could be propagated around the world bringing more people to the LARD GAWD OWLMAATY! Doncha know anything? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
white_raven23 Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 White Raven...God made it so that ant could carry that girl's contact, it 's a MIRACLE. duh. Meanwhile, across town some twit somehow gets his head trapped in a wet paper bag, and despite his pleas for heavenly aid, he dies becasue god was too busy training an ant to haul a contact lens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
♦ nivek ♦ Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 Difference between a "sea story" and a "fairy tale"? Fairy tale starts with "Once upon a time" Sea story starts with "This ain't NO SHIT!" Hmm, "This ain't NO SHIT! I seen the ant with my one good eye...." Sheeze.. kFL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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