Why is it okay for missionaries to lie?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

What we have is this:
1. One obvious and big lie(raising the dead).
2. No other sources. At all. The only mention of this incident is on that webpage. None of the names of the involved give any results on google.
3. But we know of several similar stories. Very similar in fact, the biggest difference between them is the names of the involved.

Add them all together, and we have a certain fabrication. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to think otherwise.

The "night of the living dead"-type stories are one of my absolute favourite fabrications though. A close tie with the story about the doctor(usually anonymous, sometimes given a generic name like J. Smith) who measured a soul leaving the body of someone dying "scientifically".

Edit: and if your "ignorant blacks"-theory was correct, it would still be a lie, since the missionaries would know what really happened, but instead chose to spread the lie about raising the dead.

It's just that they're religious, so you assume they're evil rather than just wrong.

You also believe I'm evil, or at least practicing cognative dissonance, because you cannot concieve of how a rational human being could come to believe in miracles.

That's the kind of person you are - but you are wrong to assume everyone's brain works as yours does.

What he's saying is that sometimes people end up in a comatose state with very weak vitals, and can be mistakenly declared dead while in such a state; if and when they recover - especially if it's while in a morgue - it appears as though that individual has "returned from the dead".

As in, without explicit intent to deceive - when it's this sort of situation, at least.

Nice to know I'm not writing Hittite.

[HoreTore]

What he's saying is that sometimes people end up in a comatose state with very weak vitals, and can be mistakenly declared dead while in such a state; if and when they recover - especially if it's while in a morgue - it appears as though that individual has "returned from the dead".

As in, without explicit intent to deceive - when it's this sort of situation, at least.

So, that brings the missionaries up from "lying cheats" to "ignorant idiots". Assuming, of course, that they have no clue as to what's going on and turn to god to explain what they are too dumb to do(as well as being too dumb to seek help).

Now, I do not have educational statistics on western missionaries, but my impression is that they range from educated to very educated. Not ignorant. And their backers, the ones who read their reports, certainly contain a fair amount of highly educated people, including medical staff. And yet, knowing the truth, they still choose to spread the obvious lies.

Sorry, I'm sticking with "lying cheats" over "ignorant idiots".

[HoreTore]

It's just that they're religious, so you assume they're evil rather than just wrong.

You also believe I'm evil, or at least practicing cognative dissonance, because you cannot concieve of how a rational human being could come to believe in miracles.

Evil? I created this thread because I'm having trouble finding an explanation for this behaviour. And for the record, "evil" isn't one of my assumptions, try "con artist" instead. Or "blinded by faith". As for me thinking you're "evil", that's just silly.

I haven't commented on your "miracle"(or whatever it was), have I? I have noted that you don't believe they raised the dead, and as such you don't believe anything I would call absurd. The "smaller miracles" are quite different to the outrageous ones like raising the dead. The motivations of those believing in one but not the other is obviously quite different to the ones believing god raises the dead.

And finally, my mother is quite the New Age-woman, and while I do not believe what she does, I don't view her negatively. Just like I don't view you negatively for your faith, Philipvs.

[Centurion1]

Your somewhat slow witted and dull aren't you my boy. Must be all that snow. Even your Gods were simple beings... just because you can't accept something and think its all a big lie doesn't mean it is. Nor does it mean that for believing it they must be ignorant buffons or liars. If anyone is being simpleminded its you for having such a closeted narrow view of the world and your fellow man.

[HoreTore]

Your somewhat slow witted and dull aren't you my boy. Must be all that snow. Even your Gods were simple beings... just because you can't accept something and think its all a big lie doesn't mean it is. Nor does it mean that for believing it they must be ignorant buffons or liars. If anyone is being simpleminded its you for having such a closeted narrow view of the world and your fellow man.

I'm a little confused here....

Are you suggesting that it's possible for people to be raised from the dead?

Edit: and please, do look over your post before you submit it. When you include so many derogative terms about me, it gets quite hard to grasp your actual point.

[ICantSpellDawg]

I'm a little confused here....

Are you suggesting that it's possible for people to be raised from the dead?

Edit: and please, do look over your post before you submit it. When you include so many derogative terms about me, it gets quite hard to grasp your actual point.

It is definitely possible for people to be raised from the dead. Why would you suggest that this is not possible? I think it will become likely as we continue to attain more knowledge of how the body works. Quite a few things are permanent, until they are made temporary.

[Major Robert Dump]

How come everytime someone brings up negatives about Nigeria, someone brings black people into the issue? I bet none of you here have ever even been to Nigeria. There's whites and asians all over the place there, not to mention a rich Chinese Amish community and a Peurto Rican slum.

[Greyblades]

As for me thinking you're "evil", that's just silly.

He's not? Crap, Once again I bought a DIY Exorcism kit for nothing.

[Fragony]

He's not? Crap, Once again I bought a DIY Exorcism kit for nothing.

Heh, back in school we used to give presents to eachother at 'Sinterklaas', our version of Santa Claus. Sounds the same? Yes it does. Anyway, names go on ballot, and out of everyone I got my religion teacher. So I bought him a hammer and some nails and called it a stigmata-kit. I have no idea why but he knew it was me

[Ironside]

It is definitely possible for people to be raised from the dead. Why would you suggest that this is not possible? I think it will become likely as we continue to attain more knowledge of how the body works. Quite a few things are permanent, until they are made temporary.

Negative. Death is to be the point of no return. This point is not a constant, nor a point, but a variying sliding scale, making some people seemingly to be brought back to life.

Well I assume if you can revive someone with severe body degradation, it could be called raised from the dead. Restoring the degradation would fall under ressurection.

For the topic at hand. I'm guessing social pressure. For that missionary, telling the truth would be worse than the lie (and with some after-rationalisation, was it really a lie? Wasn't just a more subtile miracle?). For God, he's an understanding God, of course he can see and forgive you for the sin of lying in this exceptional case.

[HoreTore]

For the topic at hand. I'm guessing social pressure. For that missionary, telling the truth would be worse than the lie (and with some after-rationalination, was it really a lie? Wasn't just a more subtile miracle?). For God, he's an understanding God, of course he can see and forgive you for the sin of lying in this exceptional case.

I can buy that.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Evil? I created this thread because I'm having trouble finding an explanation for this behaviour. And for the record, "evil" isn't one of my assumptions, try "con artist" instead. Or "blinded by faith". As for me thinking you're "evil", that's just silly.

I haven't commented on your "miracle"(or whatever it was), have I? I have noted that you don't believe they raised the dead, and as such you don't believe anything I would call absurd. The "smaller miracles" are quite different to the outrageous ones like raising the dead. The motivations of those believing in one but not the other is obviously quite different to the ones believing god raises the dead.

And finally, my mother is quite the New Age-woman, and while I do not believe what she does, I don't view her negatively. Just like I don't view you negatively for your faith, Philipvs.

I'm sorry - I don't really buy it. The way you talk about religious people indicates a great deal of loathing. Not that that measn you're lying to me, you could just as easily be lying to yourself.

Never assume malice when stupidity is a simpler explanation, but you always seem to anyway.

[Sarmatian]

That's just because religious people believe in God. If it weren't for that, I'd be totally ok with religious people.

Unless they believe in Thor. Thor's cool and then it's okay.

[HoreTore]

I'm sorry - I don't really buy it. The way you talk about religious people indicates a great deal of loathing. Not that that measn you're lying to me, you could just as easily be lying to yourself.

Never assume malice when stupidity is a simpler explanation, but you always seem to anyway.

There's not much for me to say to that, really.

Anyway, you seem to be under the impression that I regard "lying cheats" as a bad/evil. I don't. I don't have I holy book saying that lying is bad. Saying the missionaries are lying cheats is not a moral judgement that they're bad people. Instead, I am much more interested in knowing what motivates them to lie, and how they rationalize their lie with their supposed gods damnation of such acts.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

There's not much for me to say to that, really.

Anyway, you seem to be under the impression that I regard "lying cheats" as a bad/evil. I don't. I don't have I holy book saying that lying is bad. Saying the missionaries are lying cheats is not a moral judgement that they're bad people. Instead, I am much more interested in knowing what motivates them to lie, and how they rationalize their lie with their supposed gods damnation of such acts.

You are making an assumption of dishonesty, and how can dishonesty not be negative?

You default to the negative judgement about religions and religious people, always.

[HoreTore]

You are making an assumption of dishonesty, and how can dishonesty not be negative?

Whether it's positive, negative or neutral to lie(or "be dishonest" if you prefer) is based on the context. In this context, I'd say it's neutral and more of an interesting feature than good or bad.

You default to the negative judgement about religions and religious people, always.

I see no reason to respond to this statement.

[ajaxfetish]

Your problem, HoreTore, is that you're equating credulousness with stupidity (or perhaps ignorance would be more accurate). On one level, that's fine; you're welcome to think that someone must be daft to believe in something without satisfactory evidence. But on another level, it's simply wrong. Very intelligent people can end up believing in things without evidence, whether it be religion, the benefits of organic produce, some of the more questionable claims regarding climate science, or whatever. The point is, a person doesn't have to be stupid to be irrational.

Yet you're relying on the (false) premise that only stupid people can believe in irrational things. Your argument seems to be: believing these miracles occurred is irrational, western missionaries are not all stupid, only stupid people can believe in irrational things, therefore, the missionaries do not believe these miracles occurred. Then from that, you further deduce that the missionaries must be lying, and since the very religion they espouse is opposed to lying, you find yourself stuck with a paradox: how can people opposed to lying lie so cheerfully? But the whole problem goes back to that one incorrect premise.

Ajax

[classical_hero]

Doesn't their bible say it's wrong to do so?

Almost every missionary report I've read contains accounts of how their god has healed people. Blind people ciuld see again, cancer withdrawing, and even raising people from the dead.

Almost all of these stories come from africa or some isolated community somwhere in the himalayas, the amazon, etc. Needless to say, they can never be confirmed from other sources. And how could they? Raising people from the dead is, unless you're some mad professor with a doomsday machine, quite impossible...

What is the purpose of these gigantic lies? Where is the morality of the people who manufacture and spread them? Why on earth would any sane person believe them?

And why doesn't other missionaries speak out against this nonsense? Are there no sane missionaries, or are they all lying bastards?

You seem to be talking about "faith" healers. They are charlatan the lot of them.

A lot of things that happen in Africa is basically adding "Christianity" to traditional religions of the region, to make them sound like they are, but it has nothing to do with Christianity.

[HoreTore]

Your problem, HoreTore, is that you're equating credulousness with stupidity (or perhaps ignorance would be more accurate). On one level, that's fine; you're welcome to think that someone must be daft to believe in something without satisfactory evidence. But on another level, it's simply wrong. Very intelligent people can end up believing in things without evidence, whether it be religion, the benefits of organic produce, some of the more questionable claims regarding climate science, or whatever. The point is, a person doesn't have to be stupid to be irrational.

Yet you're relying on the (false) premise that only stupid people can believe in irrational things. Your argument seems to be: believing these miracles occurred is irrational, western missionaries are not all stupid, only stupid people can believe in irrational things, therefore, the missionaries do not believe these miracles occurred. Then from that, you further deduce that the missionaries must be lying, and since the very religion they espouse is opposed to lying, you find yourself stuck with a paradox: how can people opposed to lying lie so cheerfully? But the whole problem goes back to that one incorrect premise.

Ajax

Very good post.

So, then the question becomes: how can a medial proffessional discard everything he knows about medicine and "jump on the miracle bandwagon", so to speak?

How fully functional, sane and intelligent people can believe the most absurd things(raising the dead, ET rectal exams, enlightened masters living under the himalayas, etc) is a question that has puzzled me for a very long time.

[HoreTore]

There's a problem with your post though, ajax.

I don't think just the miracle part isn't true. I think its more likely than not that the entire story is a fabrication. Why? Two things(I've already explained the first, but I'll repeat it):

1. Imagine you're a missionary. Of the kind that believes that the way to get people to believe, and thus be saved, is to have them see miracles performed. Then, you see an incident which you for some reason(see the discussion above) take as a miracle. Not just a regular one either, god has raised someone from the dead! What would you do about it? Of course the only logical answer is "spread the story to as many people as possible". After all, not doing so would condemn people to hell, and you've made it your lifes mission to prevent that. But has this happened in this alleged case? Nope. The only mention of it is on their own website. One would assume that if such an event had taken place, the boy raised from the dead would've been a poster boy for gods work on earth. But we have no knowledge of him, he has not been used in that way.

2. This story is one I have seen before. With slight modifications. It was printed in the newspaper Norge IDAG. It was translated, of course, but that wasn't all. Instead of being raised from the dead, the norwegian version only had her cured from some disease that made her paralyzed(can't remember what it was though). So, for both stories to be true, two nuns living in New South Wales were both visited by a couple in the 50's. Both had been miraculously cured 30 years ago, and their healing had been written in a book, which both couples happened to have with them. They also chose to reveal that it was them the book was about in the same way. The likelyhood of that being true is incredibly low, of course. Thus, we must conclude that one or both stories is a fabrication. I'd say it's most likely both are fabrications. As we now know that this organization has tried to pass fabrications off as truth, this ultimately improves the likelyhood of their other stories to be complete fabrications as well.

So in conclusion: in all likelyhood, the entire story is a complete fabrication.



Which again leads to the question of why they choose to lie when lying is forbidden by their religion.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

So you have one fake - does this story have copies?

And anyway, who said it was OK?

[Fragony]

It's stupid but you only care because it is stupidity that is non-islam, you would be walking on eggs if it wasn't, out of respect. You have respect. You would probably use this as an example that other religions suck as well.

[HoreTore]

And anyway, who said it was OK?

So far, I believe I'm the only one.

[rory_20_uk]

The previous Pope is going through to Sainthood at a rate of knots with a similar amount of "and he appeared to me in a dream, and now I feel better" as cast-iron evidence of a miracle.

Religion is a product. Missionaries are the sales force. You sell by providing what people want. The Catholic Church has set up new orders of Monks when the existing lot became too rich / corrupt for the poor, they slaughtered opposition and they preach poverty and humility whilst accruing wealth and power.

Constantine whose Christianity as it would forgive him whereas other religions refused. Many were converted in the Dark Ages ashaving a powerful God on one's side was a good idea. One Germanic tribe converted after the Missionary cut down Wodin's sacred tree and nothing happened which apparently was sufficient proof.

The Crusades? Leaving aside the murder and pillaging of whoever was in the way, be they Christian or other, there were more events of relics appearing at convenient times..

On the back of this I am frankly incredulous that you ask the question of whether Missionaries can lie. Why would they stop now?

[ajaxfetish]

There's a problem with your post though, ajax.

I don't think just the miracle part isn't true. I think its more likely than not that the entire story is a fabrication.

I suspect you're right that these sort of stories usually start as the fabrications of charlatans, but the people who make them up and the people disseminating them may be quite distinct. Just because somebody else lies and a missionary (perhaps foolishly) believes them, doesn't mean the missionary is also lying. And I think it's probably an aspect of human nature that we tend to be less critical of things we hear that agree with the beliefs we already have. If you believe miracles are possible, and you're trying to convince others of this, and you hear a story of a bona-fide miracle that a friend of a friend of a friend witnessed, it's all too easy to just accept it at face value, since it seems to lend support to what you believed in the first place. On the other hand, if many respectable scientists collect a mountain of evidence in favor of natural selection, and that same person believes deeply that this is in conflict with their faith in God, then they may spend tons of effort trying to debunk the rational, well-sourced claims, in spite of credulously accepting the irrational, poorly-sourced miracle.

As to why the charlatans would fabricate the story in the first place, well, not all Christians, or people who proclaim to be Christians, walk the walk, so to speak. I'd expect these folks are more concerned with self-promotion than with being good Christians. The religion is probably more of a convenient medium to call for attention than an actually held belief (which may be true for some of the missionaries as well, though I suspect most are honest in their motives).

Ajax

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

So far, I believe I'm the only one.

Then may I suggest that the answer to your OP is "it isn't"?

The previous Pope is going through to Sainthood at a rate of knots with a similar amount of "and he appeared to me in a dream, and now I feel better" as cast-iron evidence of a miracle.

Religion is a product. Missionaries are the sales force. You sell by providing what people want. The Catholic Church has set up new orders of Monks when the existing lot became too rich / corrupt for the poor, they slaughtered opposition and they preach poverty and humility whilst accruing wealth and power.

Constantine whose Christianity as it would forgive him whereas other religions refused. Many were converted in the Dark Ages ashaving a powerful God on one's side was a good idea. One Germanic tribe converted after the Missionary cut down Wodin's sacred tree and nothing happened which apparently was sufficient proof.

The Crusades? Leaving aside the murder and pillaging of whoever was in the way, be they Christian or other, there were more events of relics appearing at convenient times..

On the back of this I am frankly incredulous that you ask the question of whether Missionaries can lie. Why would they stop now?

Rory, where to you get this Bollocks, seriously?

Leaving aside your general point the specifics are - frankly - malicious falshoods at best.

Constantine did not convert to Christianity because "it would forgive him", nor did he abandon other Gods - such a concept as Monotheism was far too Alien too him.

Now, the Crusades are noted for the discrimination with which the Crusaders slew Muslims and sometimes Jews whilst leaving the Christians largely unmolested, especially during the sack of Jerusalem. The same Christian sources which note that the horses (shamefully) had to wade through blood and gore report that the Catholics protected the Orthodox Christians during the sacking.

You could dispute that, of course, but then you'd have to equally dispute the claimed acts of brutality.

[HoreTore]

Then may I suggest that the answer to your OP is "it isn't"

it's obvious that those who manufacture and spread such lies have no problem with it. Nor does the ones reading it, but who remain silent about it, have any problems.

Yet they have a commandment from their god which specifies that such activity is NOT okay. As they do it anyway, I'm interested in knowing why.

[Kralizec]

One Germanic tribe converted after the Missionary cut down Wodin's sacred tree and nothing happened which apparently was sufficient proof.

Bonifacius tried that with the Frysians. Before that he had converted some other tribes by cutting down sacred trees and other acts which were considered blasphemous by pagan standards, following Elijah's example. When he travelled to the pagan Frysians, he was ambushed and murdered - and they were only converted after Charlemagne conquered them all.

Allthough not exactly a considerate approach, you can't doubt the logic behind it. I've often wondered wether christians and muslims who vehemently protest against blasphemous or sacriligious acts do so out of an unconscious fear that Baal, Wodan and their friends are not the only false gods.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

it's obvious that those who manufacture and spread such lies have no problem with it. Nor does the ones reading it, but who remain silent about it, have any problems.

Yet they have a commandment from their god which specifies that such activity is NOT okay. As they do it anyway, I'm interested in knowing why.

The people who read it and have no problem with it most likely believe it.

The people who make it up aren't very good Christians, but as already noted, some of the stories (like the one about the African boy) are probably true, it's just that the boy was never actually dead.

Or... maybe he was.

I mean, come on, we're talking about a religion founded on the belief that you CAN do these things. What sort of Christians would we be if we didn't believe it was possible?

For the record - yes, I believe it is possible for God to raise someone from the dead, it must be if he is Omnipotent - but that's not going to be my first answer to a given question.

[HoreTore]

After reading "maybe he was", I can't be bothered anymore.