quinntar Posted June 6, 2016 Author Share Posted June 6, 2016 Does anyone understand the reason why the church's service is formulaic. They all seem to follow a pattern, and I'd like to learn from Christian's and non christians alike why it has been arranged in that fashion. As far as I know from the bible it doesn't speak about the format of church service, other than the mentality and gifts a teacher of Christ should have. Also I would like to know how the modern priesthood/brotherhood is anything like it was in the 12 Apostle's day, and why Christians never continued the Apostleship. Thankyou. You have to stand up every now and again to wake people up. Pews weren't invented until the Middle Ages and standing to pray was the norm so I would imagine that when pews started to make their way into services it wasn't right to pray, which would include other forms of worship like singing, sitting down. Over the years these things have become acceptable since sitting is now the rule as opposed to the exception. Well, if the 12 apostles never existed except for literature then it's pretty easy to see why they were short lived. However, if you wish to believe that they were all quite real then their tradition lives on in the sense that they were martyrs which meant "witness" (which was later became someone who was killed for their faith and stories were written to reflect this meaning). To be a martyr for jesus meant to go around and tell people about your belief in jesus and this religion. Essentially, what the Acts hints at with what Saul does. This is clearly different from sitting inside a church for an hour or so from week to week. mwc I assume that the church in their day was always open for whomever needed it. But now church is run like a business, it has open and closed times. I thought God worked day and night. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quinntar Posted June 6, 2016 Author Share Posted June 6, 2016 This article has many interesting points. http://www.orange-papers.org/orange-deprogram.html and Mind control: http://www.orange-papers.org/orange-cultinfo.html (hug) Quote: ''Understand the games that the mind-programmers and brain-washers play on people's heads, and the techniques that they use for mind-control. For instance, there is the phenomenon called "cognitive dissonance". What it means is: People want to keep all of their beliefs, actions, thoughts, and feelings in harmony with each other. People want to do what they believe is right and good, and if they do otherwise, they feel bad — they feel "dissonance". The "dissonance" is just like musical dissonance — it feels jarring and discordant and wrong. Brain-washers have discovered that they can use cognitive dissonance to change people's behavior, beliefs, feelings, and thoughts — force a change in one, and the others will follow. If you force people to perform certain actions, they will eventually come to believe that it's okay — it must be okay, because they wouldn't want to be doing bad things all of the time.'' That's what it is (Programming) Like writing over a disc (Mind) 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Furball Posted June 6, 2016 Share Posted June 6, 2016 But you are God’s “chosen generation”, his “royal priesthood”, his “holy nation”, his “peculiar people”—all the old titles of God’s people now belong to you. 1 Peter 2:10 (Phillips) This is speaking of god's elect, not anyone who just shows up to a church service, hence the phrase "chosen generation" - the chosen generation are god's true children, the ones he foreordained before the foundation of the world to be his peculiar people, not just common believers who attend the sunday service. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator TheRedneckProfessor Posted June 6, 2016 Super Moderator Share Posted June 6, 2016 Many are called; bit few are "chosen". You should study the scriptures more, TinPony. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
miamia Posted June 6, 2016 Share Posted June 6, 2016 yes we were talking about this on another thread. i don't know about the sitting and standing, but I believe the group singing has a lot to do with it, not just the music they play, but the power that singing in a group has over the individual. group singing creates a chemical high. It's good for you, it causes bonding, and is a proven way to fend off depression, it's good for your body in many ways. Good! that's really good for your health if once or twice a week you get together with a bunch of people and group sing. you will live longer and you will be happier. I am actually convinced that this is the sole cause of people feeling uplifted after a service, because people who group sing in other settings, school choir, etc, experience the same high. In church they use it as a tool to make people receptive to the message in the sermon. they get everyone buzzing and comfortable around everyone they are surrounded with in the pews, like bees in a hive. tuned into each others vibrations (literally, your heart syncs up with the hearts of those around you, I imagine this has more effects that we have yet to document). Then while you are on this warm fuzzy emotional high, the preacher delivers the sermon, then after the sermon, you sing again. In the church I attended, there was a very large kitchen, where food was served afterward. sharing food with others and just the simple act of eating also has a psychological effect. Couple this with the actual words in the song, and you have an even more pronounced effect. This causes people to associate these good feelings with whatever message the preacher is giving. the implications of this are huge. this is really and truly brain washing. I'm not claiming that its deliberate in all cases, but that's what it is. You are getting someone to be comfortable, at least somewhat more comfortable, with concepts that would normally cause a high amount of stress and anxiety. You convince people that they feel warm and fuzzy because they are experiencing something SUPERNATURAL, when what they are experiencing is the power of being connected with the people around them, taking deep breaths, relaxing their muscles, and getting those feel good chemicals flowing. People convince themselves that this can only be found at church, when in fact, this effect is easy to duplicate in a more healthy setting, with no mental strings attached. I imagine it would be very therapeutic to organize secular choirs for therapy reasons specifically for recovery from religion. a black mass if you will, as I recall they originated as a cathartic mockery of the formulated sermons of christianity. so something like that, just not necessarily satanic in theme. I would suggest that people who are really struggling from the loss of this weekly sync up with other human beings should find, or create, another way to group sing. or at the very least sing as much as you can by yourself. literally, live life to your own beat. if you don't, you may fall prey to someone else's. *edit* ha! posted this before I saw Quadshet had posted something similar. Didn't they do hypnotic tests in the 60's and discovered that a person can't be mind controlled? But religion seems to do that.those tests they did back then we're mostly hogwash, but have you heard of the little Albert experiment? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Albert_experimentPeople can be conditioned to fear and detest things that are not dangerous, by using innate fears as a tool of conditioning. "The wages of sin is death" people fear death. The fear of death is an innate fear. It can be overcome, but it's roots run deep. People already WANT to belive there is an escape, that is a biological fact, a driving force of survival. When threatened with the idea of death, the fight or flight response kicks in, a chemical haze falls between you conscious mind and your center of reasoning (oversimplified) It is a very simple matter to then condition people to associate normal behaviors and feelings (lust,selfishness,skepticism, stubbornness, pride,) with the intense fear of death. But this alone is not as successful as paring such conditioning with a strong incentivization. A sense of community which you perhaps havent felt before, a soothing forgiveness and acceptance for the "sins" you have associated with the fear of death, creating an OCD like complex of fear, doubt, relief. Fear doubt, relief. Wash, rinse repeat. And lastly the idea of heaven,a promise of a final cessation to that endless cycle of inner turmoil. Conditioning exists in some level in all aspects of society. Religion is the cancerous version. Can't they see that? I was in church Sunday gone and I could feel crazy, but no one seemed to mind how nutz they looked. The pastor there is a very aware guy, I've been visiting him in his home for weeks and he doesn't act brainwashed. Hmm, I have to think. brainwashing in the hollywood , "programming code words into someones brain to cause amnesia and make them perform specific tasks on command" type of brainwashing, does not exist. Social conditioning doesn't just turn people into zombies. You are conditioned, I am conditioned. It's natural social mechanism. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NwOePZA-6_c hahahah thats funny Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted June 7, 2016 Share Posted June 7, 2016 I assume that the church in their day was always open for whomever needed it. But now church is run like a business, it has open and closed times. I thought God worked day and night. The church was always a massive business. It owned lots of property. It introduced the laws that forbade priests from marrying to take their property. If it's ever been about peace and love, and that's kind of a big if, it was likely forgotten before a formal church structure formed. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quinntar Posted June 7, 2016 Author Share Posted June 7, 2016 I read qadeshet's "15 Signs Your Church is a Cult" link and the one about guilt trips struck a chord. My church (the one I used to attend, but no longer do when I'm not at home) isn't a cult in the sense that they bleed people of their money, but it's as much a cult as the rest of Christianity, in that it keeps people stuck believing in Jesus. The pastor loves guilt trips about your relationship with god, are you following god enough, are you really thinking about god at church or are you just waiting for it to end so you can go home and watch football? Whether he intends to or not, based on my experience, it plants the idea that you aren't passionate enough and must re-evaluate your life to become even more committed. He said nonsense like "prayer is a two-way conversation," which made me feel guilty that I wasn't literally hearing god talk back to me, and I did not have a healthy relationship with Jesus. "Putting god on the back burner" is one of his favorite phrases. My church definitely loves the narrative that non-Christians are "unsaved," "of the world," "those who have no hope." That they're just completely selfish and materialistic, obsessed with sex and drugs, and of course secretly miserable. They keep talking about compassion and god's love, but for a bunch of super-compassionate people, they enjoy painting anyone who doesn't believe their religion as shallow and unhappy because they refuse to give up their non-Christ-centered "lifestyle." Yes they are like that, but I have never met a fair dinkum christ like christian (I mean miracles and all) I spent years looking for proof from them. Basically their religion is an all talk and no show pal system. Bloody hell. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quinntar Posted June 7, 2016 Author Share Posted June 7, 2016 Many are called; bit few are "chosen". You should study the scriptures more, TinPony. That's very inventive Professor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quinntar Posted June 7, 2016 Author Share Posted June 7, 2016 I assume that the church in their day was always open for whomever needed it. But now church is run like a business, it has open and closed times. I thought God worked day and night. The church was always a massive business. It owned lots of property. It introduced the laws that forbade priests from marrying to take their property. If it's ever been about peace and love, and that's kind of a big if, it was likely forgotten before a formal church structure formed. mwc Well why the fuck are they talking about peace and love, you know what I mean. Peace and love don't put food in the mouths of people who are starving Keep eating your kfc and maccas (Australian slang for MacDonald's) you overweight and out a shape bible pushers. I'm a bit pissed now, but I'll be ok once I get some subway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted June 7, 2016 Share Posted June 7, 2016 Well why the fuck are they talking about peace and love, you know what I mean. Peace and love don't put food in the mouths of people who are starving Keep eating your kfc and maccas (Australian slang for MacDonald's) you overweight and out a shape bible pushers. I'm a bit pissed now, but I'll be ok once I get some subway. Don't forget that the Acts has Peter work over those two old people for their property. He tells them god is pretty upset that they lie about not giving the whole amount and so they're both killed off. We're supposed to think that it's about holding back, lying, but it's about that and not simply putting out. Giving it all up. Because jesus says give it all up. The logical conclusion is to give it all away but the church, being communal by this point, is give it all into to communal pot. If we assume that Peter descended directly from jesus then he forgot that lesson in the course of a few years. Things like this could happen but it makes more sense if placed into the later setting of the second century (like with the later usage of the word martyr). The peace and love jesus didn't really exist until the 1960's and the movements that came along with it. Fire and brimstone jesus was pretty much par for the course until that time (not saying there weren't exceptions but they weren't commonplace). But the hippies really liked that interpretation. It obviously went along with what they stood for at the time and it has come to dominate. People don't like the old school preachers that are still around talking about how jesus is kind of a hard ass that hates on everyone except his pals but that's the sort of jesus that was running the world for a very long time not happy smiling jesus that digs everyone. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quinntar Posted June 7, 2016 Author Share Posted June 7, 2016 Well why the fuck are they talking about peace and love, you know what I mean. Peace and love don't put food in the mouths of people who are starving Keep eating your kfc and maccas (Australian slang for MacDonald's) you overweight and out a shape bible pushers. I'm a bit pissed now, but I'll be ok once I get some subway. Don't forget that the Acts has Peter work over those two old people for their property. He tells them god is pretty upset that they lie about not giving the whole amount and so they're both killed off. We're supposed to think that it's about holding back, lying, but it's about that and not simply putting out. Giving it all up. Because jesus says give it all up. The logical conclusion is to give it all away but the church, being communal by this point, is give it all into to communal pot. If we assume that Peter descended directly from jesus then he forgot that lesson in the course of a few years. Things like this could happen but it makes more sense if placed into the later setting of the second century (like with the later usage of the word martyr). The peace and love jesus didn't really exist until the 1960's and the movements that came along with it. Fire and brimstone jesus was pretty much par for the course until that time (not saying there weren't exceptions but they weren't commonplace). But the hippies really liked that interpretation. It obviously went along with what they stood for at the time and it has come to dominate. People don't like the old school preachers that are still around talking about how jesus is kind of a hard ass that hates on everyone except his pals but that's the sort of jesus that was running the world for a very long time not happy smiling jesus that digs everyone. mwc Killing in the name of Jesus, I guess you become what you believe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quinntar Posted June 8, 2016 Author Share Posted June 8, 2016 Does anyone understand the reason why the church's service is formulaic. They all seem to follow a pattern, and I'd like to learn from Christian's and non christians alike why it has been arranged in that fashion. As far as I know from the bible it doesn't speak about the format of church service, other than the mentality and gifts a teacher of Christ should have. Also I would like to know how the modern priesthood/brotherhood is anything like it was in the 12 Apostle's day, and why Christians never continued the Apostleship. Thankyou. There are people, processes, and technology within any human organization, churches included. How those are implemented is dependent on ideology. In America, the church lives in the shadow of the Second Great Awakening (which was isolated as an American cultural experience). The emotional preaching of Charles Finney which emphasized a personal conversion to Christianity, has been the model in some sense ever since. The intellectually guided episcopalian model became less popular, and the Pentecostal movement of the early 20th Century eventually furthered that model even further. Protestants believe in the priesthood of all believers, and does not recognize an organized exclusive priesthood, nor modern Apostles as they were messengers of the risen Jesus being personal witnesses (allegedly). Yeah I know, they all believe opposite things while all having the truth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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