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Pastor Dies Of Coronavirus


Freed

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"Virginia Pastor Gerald Glenn dies of covid-19 after saying 'God is larger' than the virus - The Washington Post" https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2020/04/13/virginia-pastor-church-dies-coronavirus/
 
I am so sad for these poor people and their families. They put all their hope, faith, healing in their Gods name and this is what happens.  More Bible teachers have died from this too. So much for there God protecting them.
 
 
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People of great faith still look both ways before crossing a street. This virus has become a political/religious statement.

 

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There is no defense against willful ignorance and or stupidity.

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I am reminded of the common adage:  "God helps those who help themselves".  Take precautions, not because you lack faith, but precisely because you have an understanding of the natural world.

 

The further away from the faith world you get the sadder it becomes to watch all these people still living in Plato's Cave.  See Republic, Book VII

 

So many preventable deaths and so unnecessary.

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You know what is also bigger than COVID-19?

 

Anthrax.

 

 

anthrax350x190.png

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Back when I was part of the more extreme end of the cult, prior to deconverting, "giving in" to sickness was giving into the devil. The concept was that if we pushed through and still preached and prayed for the sick that God would see the faith and cure us. Instead it was a great way to spread sickness, especially among the indigenous people. The cult leaders even said that if we puked while eating with the locals, we had to eat the puke or it would offend the locals. Impossible when you can't even keep water down. It was pure bullshit, and other missionaries in that region said that was absurd, and to stay home if you were sick. But we said "That's why you're not seeing the dead raised". Of course our folks weren't either, but they still claimed it was happening... because if you act like it did, God would see the faith and... 

 

So much delusion, so much needless suffering, so much spreading the cult to ignorant people instead of giving them learning that could actually benefit them. 

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@Fuego My parents still have this thing where saying "I have x sickness" is confessing to the devil you are sick which then gives the devil an opportunity to make you sicker.

 

Even now when visiting I might say, I feel blah blah, I might have x and mum will say "Oh don't say that" as if saying it will have an effect on whether I have x or not.

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  • 1 month later...
On 9/16/2020 at 7:29 PM, TheRedneckProfessor said:

You know what is also bigger than COVID-19?

 

Anthrax.

 

 

anthrax350x190.png

Before William Cooper was murdered, I'm pretty sure he predicted this virus would come. He also predicted another virus on top of this one and anthrax would come in February or March of 2021. 

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On 9/16/2020 at 1:59 PM, Freed said:
"Virginia Pastor Gerald Glenn dies of covid-19 after saying 'God is larger' than the virus - The Washington Post" https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2020/04/13/virginia-pastor-church-dies-coronavirus/
 
I am so sad for these poor people and their families. They put all their hope, faith, healing in their Gods name and this is what happens.  More Bible teachers have died from this too. So much for there God protecting them.
 
 

 

It is sad. I assume that a lot of us have family members in the churches. They are naive like this. But at the same time, they are our family members.

 

This is where a lesson in cognitive dissonance comes into view. While under the spell of religious belief and indoctrination they are not able to reason through situations like this pandemic. There clearly isn't the protection that they expect there to be. 

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10 hours ago, Joshpantera said:

While under the spell of religious belief and indoctrination they are not able to reason through situations like this pandemic.

The emotional comfort of literalism is a dangerous fantasy.  Biblical miracles are moral parables, not signs of God breaking the laws of physics.  Logic and evidence should be the highest moral values.

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4 minutes ago, Robert_Tulip said:

The emotional comfort of literalism is a dangerous fantasy.  Biblical miracles are moral parables, not signs of God breaking the laws of physics.  Logic and evidence should be the highest moral values.

Keep in mind that this pastor had other health issues. His daughter said, "he had diverticulitis — a digestive condition — and it wasn’t uncommon for him to get fevers and viruses."  Another even bigger problem is that he was a delusional Pentecostal.  

 

Hey Robert,

 

I've been inactive here for a while but since I 'once again' have had another bad experience with 'church' or more accurately Christians, I came up with the very thought that I'm a Christian Atheist.  Is that a contradiction or contra-distinction?  I still believe in the big guy, I just find the bible untrustworthy and fully tampered with.

 

Since I can't stand Christians - (especially Trinitarians, Calvinist and Pentecostals), or MOST Christians anymore, I bought a book by James McDonald called, "Beyond belief - Two thousand years of bad faith in the Christian Church."  I think everyone who calls themselves 'Christian' today needs to read it.  

 

I would ask the moderators to eventually remove the "Authentic Christian Believer" logo from my avatar.  

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4 hours ago, reverendturmoil said:

Keep in mind that this pastor had other health issues. His daughter said, "he had diverticulitis — a digestive condition — and it wasn’t uncommon for him to get fevers and viruses."  Another even bigger problem is that he was a delusional Pentecostal.  

I hope you don't think I was mocking this poor mans death? I was not. That would be wrong.

 

What makes Pentecostal Christians delusional? What about Baptists or Catholics?

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16 hours ago, reverendturmoil said:

I would ask the moderators to eventually remove the "Authentic Christian Believer" logo from my avatar.  

 

If you're not a christian believer anymore, that change can happen. 

 

@florduh

 

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20 hours ago, reverendturmoil said:

I'm a Christian Atheist.  Is that a contradiction or contra-distinction?

Hello Rev, my view is that we can legitimately assign numerous attributes to our glorious heavenly father, but existence is not among them.  God is a construction of human transcendental imagination, a mythological invention designed to identify and promote the features of reality that are conducive to human flourishing, as an adaptive evolutionary meme. 

 

As such, worship of God can be a perfectly reasonable activity, supporting essential cultural functions, as long as the poetic language of praise and prayer is understood as metaphor, not literal description. 

 

If current theories about God are not adaptive, then the theories need to change.  As in genetic evolution, cultural adaptation is cumulative, building upon precedent. This means that in religion it is important to respect past approaches, even while a new covenant aims to supersede them. The emerging Christian paradigm in my view should adhere to the scientific ethic that accepts the truth of any statement that has sufficient evidence and coherence.  That pretty well excludes every allegedly factual statement in the Bible, but does not exclude how the Bible provides a basis to consider values and meaning and purpose.

 

Jesus tells us that the truth will set us free.  Since we have no way of knowing if God is a personal intentional entity, as conventionally portrayed, we should rather look to the truth as discovered in philosophy and science and literature as the real source of human liberation.  The truths of the Bible are far better explained as inventive parables of human wisdom than as divine revelations from an eternal God.

 

Supernatural superstition is an obsolete way of thinking. While emotionally comforting for many people, believing claims that lack evidence is dangerous as a basis of public policy and personal ethics.  

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On 11/13/2020 at 7:02 AM, reverendturmoil said:

 

I still believe in the big guy, I just find the bible untrustworthy and fully tampered with.

 

That was one of the first steps I took in my journey to agnosticism.  Keep studying!

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On 11/13/2020 at 9:19 AM, Freed said:

What makes Pentecostal Christians delusional? What about Baptists or Catholics?

 

Pentecostals are always looking for the magic of God. They focus on Pentecost as the magic coming into all believers, and from that they keep expecting miracles. Even after decades of no miracles at all, they still believe it will happen. Stupid little things are turned into "miracles" while all the obvious stuff that Jesus was said to have done (healing the blind, raising the dead, feeding thousands) remains undone. The stupid little things are turned into miracles so they will keep believing and not see through the clearly false claims. Some dress it up in false prophecies that are supposed to be God speaking through a person. (I pointed out once to some friends that an Aussie preacher in one of these cults would adopt an American southern accent during his "prophecies", because the leaders of that cult were from the south, and that is how they sound when prophesying. They also randomly mix in old English for the King James Bible sound). Some will handle rattlesnakes and call it a miracle, some of them are bitten and die. Every year quite a few people are scammed by telephone callers telling them they've won a million dollars, and they just need to pay a thousand dollar claiming fee to get it. Visions of that big payout blind them to the obvious reality that they are being scammed. Same with religions.

 

Baptists that I knew had settled for an essentially dead god who has been replaced with the Bible. They of course would not phrase it that way at all, but he doesn't speak to believers and will certainly not heal anyone. If those happened, then the "canon of the scriptures would not be closed", and that is a cardinal doctrine for them (that the Bible is finished and perfect, all that we ever need to know about God is there). 

 

Catholics come in a spectrum of beliefs, from radical Latin-only types (Mel Gibson is one) to very loosely believing types that go because it is their social circle and their family always was part of it (I know at least one, maybe two like this). The Catholics I know at work are somewhere in the middle, making trips to places where visions are said to have happened, or where statues are said to weep. Different kind of scam, but same sort of motivation. 

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