God's plan for the O'Donnell campaign?

"Spong's never gotten anything back from his relationship with God? Is Spong seriously telling us that he became a minister without feeling a calling from God? That just seems unimaginable to me. How can he function as a minister if he has no belief that he's doing God's work?"

tomtildrum:

I'm an unaffiliated, non-religious person who had no religious upbringing whatsoever, and I've lived that way quite happily for nearly 54 years.

But even I know that a "calling from God" doesn't mean that you hear God talking in a human voice -- or any voice, for that matter.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you're just being willfully ignorant. Or perhaps a little passive-aggressive.

How about when an angel was send by g-d to speak to an arab in a cave?

If I told you I heard voices and they were telling me to do things, you would recommend a visit to a psychiatrist, who would likely put me on a regimen of Haloperidol (an antipsychotic for treatment of schizophrenia) or one of the newer neuroleptic drugs.

But when religious people tell you THEY hear voices and claim they emanated from a mythical being in the sky who was written of in an anonymously-penned artifact from the Bronze Age of civilization, we are supposed to respect them all the more for it, and elect them to high office.

If anyone can explain this discrepancy in a way that a truly objective person would be convinced by, I will give you a million dollars. You simply cannot.

And yet, this mental illness carries on in our population in high prevalence rates and people keep pretending it is not a malady.

O'Donnell is one such unmedicated schizophrenic whom the Tea Party deems fit for office. She claimed to LITERALLY be hearing audible voices that she identified as "God". But apparently this is a plus among the tea partiers.

Can anyone help these people, and maybe drag them to a psychiatrist?

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/09/christine_odonnells_sexual_evolution.php

"During the primary, I heard the audible voice of God," she said. "He said, 'Credibility.' It wasn't a thought in my head. I thought it meant I was going to win. But after the primary, I got credibility."

When God speaks, his children understands while idiots don't.

"My sheep hear my voice"

Spong cannot hear God's voice because he is the leader of the idiots.

Everybody has access to the words of God. It's called the Bible.

But the Bible was not written for monkeys or those who came from chimps.

"When I speak to God, it is called prayer. When God speaks to me, it is called paranoia. Mental illness is not absent when it is covered with religious words."

So...what do you call speaking to someone who never responds? Delusional?

It is pseudo-christians such as this that Dawkins/Dennett/Harris and Hitchens use to sell millions of books.

Spong's never gotten anything back from his relationship with God? Is Spong seriously telling us that he became a minister without feeling a calling from God? That just seems unimaginable to me. How can he function as a minister if he has no belief that he's doing God's work?

Or is he just saying that hte line between God's grace and mental illness is demarcated by Spong's personal political beliefs? Either way, this is a lot more revealing about Spong than O'Donnell.

Good to hear from you, Rev. Spong.

I'd add this to your post: When God speaks to Christiane O'Donnell, it's called campaigning.

Hi, short and sweet this week ;-) i see. I agree many times in many places when human being talk about hearing God's word's it can often be the sign's of a mental illness bit not always.. I have actually read great portions of the dsm iV the psychiatrist bible maybe, and i have the scientific background and education and the intelligence to understand what all the words mean.. while a great part of diagnostic book is widely overlapping differential diagnosis criteria that allow a doctor to truly and honestly or dishonestly use to label to a diagnosis on a human being that is based more on gut feeling and personal experience than actual standardized scientific guidelines. One area I do agree wholeheartedly is in exception written in the differential diagnosis of both schizophrenia and the manic state of manic depression the exception for auditory or visual "hallucinations" if they are in a person with strong religious or spiritual convictions. This is high praise from scientist toward acknowledging the spiritually of mankind i think. AS for politicians going to religious groups and suddenly having "found the lord" i think it is in many cases a calculated part of the personality that would covet or want the role of representative in our era were the representative is mainly a financial and power thing rather than true representation. I see God as working on big picture things sometimes choosing the most unlikely individual human to express what he wants to say to make changes in our society and the world. I also see some people as being lucky rather than destined by God or perhaps with a great people around them that make up for thier flaws. Sometimes old football coaches find out it has been the ast. coaches more than themselves that had brought the success . Of course if the coach picks the ast. he should still get the credit a leader and for getting the job done which is the measuring stick of any one. People that knows thier limitations honestly and picks people stronger than themselves in some areas are always the most successful. Most people are to afraid of not being all things to all people when the opposite is actually more important in a leader or representative... I think a lot of people call this humility.. people who brag God talks to them may not be humble people .. or like you pointed out they could just possibly be mentally ill

Being religous does not mean a person is crazy, but a lot of religious people end up going crazy over God.