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From: aeq@pucc-h (Jeff Sargent)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Sefton on speaking in tongues
Message-ID: <1502@pucc-h>
Date: Tue, 20-Nov-84 02:56:46 EST
Article-I.D.: pucc-h.1502
Posted: Tue Nov 20 02:56:46 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 21-Nov-84 19:06:47 EST
References: <1469@pucc-h.UUCP>, <22200005@ea.UUCP> <1494@pucc-h>, <609@pucc-k>
Organization: Purdue University Computing Crypt
Lines: 34

Response to Laurie Sefton (pucc-k:afo):

> < example of mind-over-matter experiment >

> ... if you get someone in such a psychological state that he/she will
> believe anything you will tell them, you can get them to do the most
> marvelous things, like speaking in tongues.

Here we go again....  The mere fact that some experiment shows that the human
mind is capable of bizarre turnings, such as interpreting ice as white-hot
iron, does not imply that every unusual phenomenon is something similar.

> If you can catch someone whose brain is
> totally out to lunch, consumed with self-doubts and loathing, why
> you can get him or her to do or say just about anything.

I don't think my brain was totally out to lunch even in 1972, and it certainly
isn't now.  Yet I continue to pray in tongues.  (I will admit to some major
lingering self-doubts; but I know at least one incredibly confident person who
also speaks in tongues, so the theory that they are only for the self-doubting
collapses.)

> I am the sword, the spear, the arrow.  You are the flower, the tree,
> the vine!  Never will I, or anyone force you to be other than what
> you are -Never Again!  [from Laurie's .signature]

"I am the vine; you are the branches.  If a person remains in Me and I in him,
he will bear much fruit; apart from Me you can do nothing."  [John 15:5]

-- 
-- Jeff Sargent
{decvax|harpo|ihnp4|inuxc|ucbvax}!pur-ee!pucc-h:aeq
"I'm not asking for anyone's bleeding charity."
"Then do.  At once.  Ask for the Bleeding Charity."