i_have_words jennifer I have words and I wish I could say them so completely (sp) that you would listen and smile and know what I really meant by I'm sorry 000428 ... Chrity Look, I get a lot of crap from people for being a Christian; for being so faithful. Sometimes, I admit, I even think that I may be wrong. But then I remember the all the things that God has done for me. He made me, He loves me. He loves me enough that he died a shameful and horrible death as a sacrifice for every sin that I would commit in my life. And then there are days when even that seems totally unreal and distant. But that’s not all. There’s this girl I know who has been through a lot in the last couple years. She became a Christian in 7th grade when her parents joined this church. Some of her friends went there, and when she moved to another city and school district, that was the only time she really had to hang out with them, so she got involved. Mostly to be with her friends, though. She didn’t really understand that other stuff. In 11th grade, her church started a new program for teens to be involved with the kids in the church. It was called TIM Team (“TIM” standing for Teens In Mission), and she and her friends got to go to Camp Wapo, the Bible camp their church was affiliated with, for free! They arrived at the camp on the Friday before the last week of July, 1999. They put their stuff away and started getting to know the people from other churches whom they would be spending the week with. Some of these people, although she didn’t know it yet, would change her life forever. One of the counselors who worked with them that week, Mike Campbell, led Devotions one night. Everyone could tell that he was down about something, he had been all week. Although Mike didn’t really tell us directly what had been bothering him; by the end of our meeting, he had many of us in tears. Before the week was over he told us something else, something this girl would never forget; he said that Satan was trying to interfere with something there that week, that God must have something really great planned for someone there. Camp ended, and this girl got a new job, started her senior year in high school, and went on with life. Everything was fine until the middle of October that year. This girl was sitting at home when she came to the realization that she hated herself. She felt like she didn’t deserve anything that she had in her life. She didn’t feel like she deserved to have God love her. Then she started hating everything and everyone around her, for loving her as worthless and stupid as she was. Then she hated herself for hating everything and everyone. She wanted to hurt herself, to inflict physical pain in order to relieve the emotional pain. She tried to think about something else, she tried to keep busy so that maybe this feeling would go away. But it didn’t go away. She went into the bathroom with a scissor and she cut herself. Slowly, deliberately; not deep enough to do any real damage. It relieved the pain – but only to replace it with shame… and the pain always came back. She knew that what she was doing was crazy; but she had no control over it, no understanding of it. She went on like this, not living, just existing, and always hiding behind the mask of her former self – or at least trying to. She stopped really talking to people, stopped caring about the things she had always cared about; until she noticed scars and cuts like hers on someone she knew. On several people she knew. She wasn’t the only one going through this. Now she wanted to know more about it. She read up on it, she remembered that for some strange reason God loved her, that Jesus died for her, regardless of how worthless she thought she was. Knowing this had been the only thing that kept her alive. She started talking to the people around her again, talking to those who were going through what she had gone through. She realized that if God loves her, and He is perfect, then she must be worthy of his love. She had always loved him; but now, finally, she started loving herself again, too. She shared this love with the people around her, and slowly she stopped cutting, stopped scratching, and slowly, her scars healed, and her shame faded with them. This girl is me. I am asking you to give God a chance - if you haven’t already – and I am asking you to not be ashamed of what you find. (you can email me if you want to, I love email. Spam sucks though. My address is hami0144@tc.umn.edu) 010408 ... dB Ok, god didn't get nailed to the tree, it was Jesus, y' know, his son? anyway, good on ya for voicing that. I believe people should be able to believe what they want, as long as they don't go fanatical and start pusing other people into it. I think your faith is misplace, you think mine is. Let's leave it at that. Much Respect. 010408 ... Bat Qol not to rain on anyone's parade or anything, but there is a balance that has always been kept a deal that was made under the table years ago, millenia ago, eons if you will for everyone who gains or regains their faith, some other soul loses it or suffers their first lapse it's all politics. it always has been. He doesn't talk to me anymore. before He raised you from the dust, He knew my brothers would make trouble He let it happen Our kind wasn't given free will like you it was even predestined and known by Him that i would slip away long enough to do this, to say this this whole chess game is one big charade You'll all get to meet him eventually, even the damned you people got it wrong it's more like a stay in detention than an eternity even He isn't cruel enough to subject you that but the fact remains, the Zoroastrians were closer to the mark than anyone else even evil is His, my brother the light-bearer was programmed to his very core to turn on the Father, their fight has no basis in fact and big brother is just a pawn like me. 010408 ... monde when i was 4 years old my parents put me in a nursery school run by a church. we lived in a small town (well, it was small then, not any more) and i think it was the only nursery school around. my parents were atheists. every day the little kids had to get in a circle and sit on their prayer mats. the teacher told us to fold our hands so they looked like a church. When we did that we were supposed to talk to god, and that was called praying. you talked to god inside yourself, without making sound. we did it for 5 minutes a day. after about a week of this i went to the front of the class and asked the teacher "why isn't god talking to me? i thought when you talked to someone they were supposed to answer you. my mom told me it's not polite to not answer someone when they are talking to you. so is god rude, or is god pretend? i was kind of a precocious kid i guess you could say. the teacher was in tears. the other kids looked at me with varying wary levels of contempt. soon mom came to get me. she and the teacher had a short talk and i thought sure i was going to get severely punished. i had done something BAD but i didn't understand what. my mom said "no, you didn't do a bad thing, you did a very good thing". i loved flowers. she took me to a nursery (the other kind, with plants) and got me an azalea bush with pretty red flowers. since then i've always been an atheist, as far as God(tm) goes. I made up my own religion instead because that one explains the world around me fairly well, without a story of the bloody sacrifice of an "only begotten son" at the core center of the belief system. this "jesus died for me" is supposed to make me feel GOOD?! look, if you took out GOD and JESUS and substituted some pagan god or goddess names, or something to do with Satan, the whole thing would sound like it was glorifying ritual abuse! drinking the blood of jesus? i prefer my deities abstract: CON = ORDER DE = CHAOS they don't love me they don't hate me they don't give a damn if i worship them. i just like to watch them tear each other up, build each other down, tear each other down, build each other up and fuck and generally be adversaries who are lovers. for some odd reason, the solacelessness of all this is such solace to me. 010409 ... The Truth Before committing to any "Belief System" think about the obvious. The universe is based on a system of it's own, consisting of infinite variations of positive and negative. (Such as:right and wrong, light and dark, ascend and descend, good and evil, Punishment and reward, truth and lies.) We live within this natural order. Now, there is the fact that all of us have within ourselves a conscious. An instinctive knowledge of right and wrong, this does not fit in with natural logic, but it's definately there. The bible refers to this as "God's law written in all of our hearts." But wait, before we cover that, we must mention LOVE! Love is the seventh sense. We all need it to survive. Many of us deny that but We all know it's true. Love is what makes us human. It cannot be explained by science or math. Love is as real as God, if you have never known Love, odds are, you don't believe in God. (These are just facts, not trying to coerce anyone) Ok, ignorance is abound, and is committed by anyone who judges, or comments on a Book they've never read. So do the research, we have a recorded history. Make up your own mind. The bible has never been wrong. The "Christians" who claim to follow Jesus are more ignorant than some non-believers. I know many "christians" in America who just "play church". They never truly live. To experience your true purpose, you must know first what it is. The Truth is: Jesus is the son of God. God is our Eternal Father. He Created Humans as Children of God, that is why we are so different from every OTHER LIVING THING ON THIS PLANET! We have an immortal Soul within us, We are here take part in the morality experiment known as life. If you give, love, live, grow, and do good you will attribute a postive energy to your soul. If you take, hate, kill, destroy and do evil, you will deteriorate your soul with negative energy. When you die, your soul is released and there are natural phenomenon that will either attract or repel a soul and God (Judgment). It's so clear, simple, and logical. Please. There is more at stake here than you realize. Try to love one another for just 7 days, and if you feel that it's right, then proceed. If not, hey, at least you were good for one week, right? 010410 ... unhinged see cut 010410 ... Chrity "see cut" -that is what I went through. I feel for those individuals still dealing with it. - I've gotten a few email responses so far, and this is one of them. I would like to post my response to it in this forum... You know, that story on that BLATHER site is pretty good, but it sounds to me like you just had some insecurities about yourself that were treated by someone else's advice. I've had problems in the past, just as EVERYONE does. Don't think you are an exception. Those are just things that you need to deal with yourself or with a friend. I usually find that talking to a friend or a family member makes me feel like I've got all of my problems solved. Try it. E-mail me back if you'd like. Regards, Steve The message I was trying to communicate was this: It was my faith that saved my life because without it, I probably would've committed suicide. You "find that talking to a friend or a family member makes [you]feel like [you've] got all [your] problems solved." Exactly. I am a child of God, and he is the best friend anyone could ever have. You totally understand (or at least it seems that way). 010411 ... bluechicken get over it. get a grip, maybe? life isn't that bad. when it's over, it's over. that's it.