u/ColonizerOfBrazil

My father has a Masters in Electrical Engineering. He made over $12,000 a month in take-home pay over 20 years ago. Idk how much his net worth is now.

Long story short, I grew up with my mother and never interacted with my father in middle and high school. My mother admitted she did everything wrong. Those years were horrible. I realize now what I should've done.

What's sad is I work a general labor job in a factory that manufactures electronics. I've met engineers who I wasn't impressed by.

I scored a 27 on the ACT without studying. I distinctly recall being one of only 2 students who got a logic question correct on a Physics test. My 6th grade math teacher said I could skip the grade. I did better than this other guy in my 7th grade math class, and he ended up in Environmental engineering or something.

I had severe anxiety to the point where my hands would tremble uncontrollably. It happened when I was 18. It simply wasn't possible for me to do college after high school because of how broken I was.

I'm now 30, and I feel like a completely different person. I now feel like an extrovert. If I didn't have that trauma I had back then, i know for a fact I could've been an engineer. I absolutely could've had so many accomplishments!

Anybody else descended from a millionaire engineer who excelled at math, and had multiple proofs of their raw intelligence only to have it all wasted?

You believe in a global flood.

You want others to also believe in it.

So why don't you look for evidence to convince others it happened instead of asserting, "Genesis says so" like an idiot?

Why don't I see Flat-Earthers buying a couple plane tickets and recreating Eratosthenes' experiment to prove how he was wrong and that the Earth is flat?

Why don't YEC try to answer questions about biogeography?

Because they literally don't care about evidence!

It's weird how some people do care for evidence, while others are totally apathetic to it.

Do Creationists and Flat-Earthers think hiding from evidence changes reality?

You wouldn't need to hide from evidence and avoid even listening to objections if your beliefs are true. The fact you feel fear and avoidance is a sign that subconsciously you know your beliefs cannot hold up to scrutiny.

Truth doesn't fear investigation.

Question is rhetorical since I already answered it 😉

It makes perfect sense. Why are there flightless birds that have zero defenses against ground predators located on isolated islands in the middle of the ocean?

Because birds flew there then evolved to become flightless. It makes perfect sense.

Evolution explains why there are so many flightless birds in New Zealand. If turkeys and Robins became isolated on an island with zero predators, you can bet that they'd evolve to become flightless since flying is a waste of energy if migration and escaping from predators is unnecessary.

YEC cannot explain how defenseless kiwi birds managed to migrate from Turkey all the way to New Zealand on the other side of the planet. It's not a coincidence Dodo birds are genetically similar to pigeons found around the Indian Ocean. The pigeons evolved into Dodo birds because flying was a waste of energy on that island.

1. Bath toys always make their way to a landfill. They're never resold at yardsales.

2. Bath toys get outgrown faster than most toys. Bonnie played with Bath toys in Partysaurus Rex when she was 4 years old. She likely doesn't play with them when she's 8 in Toy Story 5.

Being a Bath toy means you have a short lifespan, and only get played 15 minutes a day max. Most don't even have arms, so they're only capable of moving in water. If they get to a landfill, they have zero chance of surviving.

Now that I think about it, I only ever witnessed outcasts being bullied. If someone is always hanging out with their friends, I never saw them being bullied.

Strength in numbers. There must be something psychological about being around allies that makes you more confident and makes enemies less confident. How many bullies would approach you and attack you if you are surrounded by your friends?

Bullying is mainly done for the purpose of making someone feel higher than you on the social totem pole. If they're being verbally condemned by others for assaulting you, they won't get that rush of feeling superior.

I'll make sure my kids play many sports, and I'll tell them to always stick with their friends at school. Easy enough.

There's a reason the meme is: "Teachers on their way to save the bully after the quiet kid fights back" specifically says the quiet kid. The quiet kid is the one being targeted because they're an outcast with no friends.

My first week of high school freshman year, a homosexual upperclassmen groped me sexually. I had a cellphone in my pocket, and it was in the hallway, so the cameras must've caught it. I could've easily simply dialed 911, and he would've been at the very least arrested and charged with a crime. That would've been better than nothing.

But the 3 years prior in middle school, I was told by the principals and teachers that if someone hits you, ignore them. Do nothing. Basically freeze like a cowardly miniature goat and never fight back or even run away. Do nothing.

This is despite the fact that this was in a state in which self-defense is legal, and assault is illegal. Nobody was ever punished for assaulting me, but if I fought back, I would get punished. Why is self-defense punished but assault isn't?

Punishing assault requires the principal to do paperwork. Imagine if they suspended everyone who committed assault. That'd increase their paperwork exponentially. I've seen parents review middle schools on the website, Great Schools, and they openly complain about the principals never doing anything about bullying. Do any principals care about negative reviews? No, because they won't get fired based on reviews. Has any principal ever been fired due to not punishing bullying? No.

The principals don't punish assault because they don't have to, and it's easier for them to simply ignore the problem. They didn't care about me. They don't care that I had a bad time at school and regret attending and graduating. They get paid either way.

Why do principals punish self-defense? Because if the victim fights back, the principal has to do paperwork. By punishing Self-defense, the principal is giving themselves less paperwork in the future. The principals are narcissists who act like the victim is the problem if they bring assaults to their attention.

In short, the principals are narcissists who didn't care about me. I sat alone during lunch the first day in 6th grade, and the last day in 12th grade. Did anyone care? No.

It would've been better to scare off anyone who assaulted me, as well as always dial 911. My mother didn't give me a cellphone in middle school nor did she ever tell me what to do if someone assaulted or groped me. She never supported me. Nobody did. My mother won't be invited to my wedding.

If the principals punished me for self-defense, then I should've told them I'm not afraid of them, and that they cannot hurt me. What could they do? Suspend me? Go ahead! Being suspended doesn't hurt me.

There were 3 teachers who asked this question word for word, "[My name], does your father live at home?"

One of them was an older black man from the hood. He was my driving teacher when I was 15 to get my Learner's Permit. I thought it was interesting how he asked the question despite only briefly interacting with me. He asked it far sooner than anyone else did, so I have no doubt that a black driving teacher who regularly saw 15-year-olds from trailer parks would be familiar with Avoidant Personality Disorder.

I was the possibly the poorest kid in the high school I attended as nearly everyone was rich. The driving school was located in a different zone as my high school. When I look at that part of town on Google Maps, its entirely new suburban houses and expensive apartments.

I do recall one other person who seemed to have AvPD despite nearly 100% of my high school being rich kids who moved there. There was a black kid who also had severe anxiety. When I saw him, I thought, "He doesn't have a dad either."

Almost 100% of the people in my high school graduating class had moved to that suburb. The school and the neighborhoods didn't exist when I was born. It was entirely new development. One day a teacher asked anyone who had lived in that city their entire life to raise their hand. I was the only one in the class out of 30 who had always lived there. The city had a population of 5k when I was born. Now it's over 80k.

Turns out fatherlessness is a major cause of AvPD, but literally every other cause I also had. All of the causes including overprotection from having to accomplish things on one's own. Elliot Rodger became a meme, and he had AvPD. I had a remarkably similar childhood as him, including having a millionaire father, but I grew up entirely without a father figure in my life. My father used to work at a nuclear power plant as an engineer since he had a master's degree in electrical engineering, but he abandoned us when I was 8. I would've still been better off with him since my mother neglected me so severely, yet she oddly enough didn't want me to do even the simplest of chores. I spent entire summers on the couch watching TV alone. Not speaking to anyone, not even my mother.

I can understand Arabic since that's the #1 foreign language that'd be important for a Navy Seal to learn, and I can kind of understand Portuguese if he's Brazilian American. But Albanian? It's such a tiny language. How does he know 4 unrelated languages?

If you're standing there, and someone walks up to you and hits you, ignore them. Yep. Just pretend it never happened. The principal told me that in the 6th grade. Ignore it if someone assaults you. I believed back in the 6th grade that people who attack others deserve to be beaten up, but I was bullied by the principal into being submissive. Nobody backed me up.

My mother was always submissive and cowardly. Battered-wife syndrome and other things from her childhood. My mother didn't have the gall to stand up to the principal even though she confessed to me she disagreed. When I was a freshman in high school, a homosexual upperclassman groped me in the hallway. I ignored it since nobody ever told me I should fight back or call 911.

If the victim ignores being assaulted, the principal has less paperwork to do. Same salary and paycheck, but less paperwork and effort. The principal therefore wins.

• But if every victim fights back or calls 911, then the principal has to get involved.
• By punishing self-defense, they are encouraging victims to ignore it and therefore give the principal less work to do.

I've heard from many people who regret middle and high school. Do you think the principals or superintendent cares if their former students regret going to their schools? Nope. That's because they get paid regardless.

Until principals get fired over failure to punish bullying, it will never get better. People need to be held accountable for bad performance, otherwise they take the easy route and do as little as possible. Principals get paid good money and still get the summers and holidays off.

Even if someone assaults you repeatedly or gropes you, the principal doesn't care. Expect zero empathy from narcissists who only care about their paycheck.

Teachers and principals don't care about students' wellbeing. They don't care if you live under a bridge after you graduate. You mean nothing to them.

Crypto calls humans monkeys, but Furons were able to breed with humans thousands of years ago, probably during the Toba Catastrophe when only a few thousand humans existed. How did Furons manage to produce fertile offspring with humans? Only explanation is that Furons originated from Earth themselves as a species in genus Homo, or Furons planted humans on Earth.

Coming from a low church and Calvinist background, I have found Catholic Answers and the YouTube channel, How to Christian, to be extremely helpful resources. They explain all the typical objections from Calvinism, OSAS, and Protestantism in general. In fact, I've found that protestants simply ignore their objections entirely. I've been shocked to find even Protestants with advanced degrees from seminaries who have never heard of so many basic things. It's insane just how ignorant I was despite having spent so much time in the Southern Baptist world.

Catholic Answers > GotQuestions

😉

I just wish there was an Orthodox version of Catholic Answers. A website with articles, videos, Q&A, that sort of thing. Why isn't there one? There certainly is a market for it. Will there ever be one?

The majority of objections to Orthodoxy are already thrown at Catholics. Things like, call no man father, iconography, infant baptism, salvation can be lost, etc.

I hope this post, and my testimony, might help others. I was able to help at least one other person, so maybe this will help someone else too.

I realized that the soteriology of my childhood church was wrong, and this led me to realizing that the soteriology of Theosis is correct. My sister's extreme change over the years also helped me see the problems. Ladder of Divine Ascent perfectly illustrates Theosis, and is one of my favorite icons. It should be shown to every convert.

I attended a summer camp in high school.  It was mostly middle and high school, but there were college students as well as many parents and youth pastors. My only knowledge of Orthodoxy in high school was of the East Roman Empire, and Emperor Justinian and Theodora.

The speaker at the summer camp said, "If on a scale of 1 to 10, how certain are you that you're going to Heaven?  If you're a 10, then you're going to Heaven!"  If you're certain you got saved, you got saved, and you will go to Heaven.  It's that simple. He asked to raise your hand if you're a 10.

Many teenagers and college students raised their hand.  I must wonder, how many of those who raised their hand are now atheists?  Statistically, a huge number of people raised Southern Baptist become atheist/agnostic.  Many might be conservative Republicans in high school, but become Democrats shortly after high school.  The math proves this. I've seen so many examples of people who had faith and were certain they were going to Heaven, and their pastor agreed with them and baptized them... yet years later they became atheists.

I'm sure many who raised their hand, had been baptized, and were certain they were saved and going to Heaven could also have passed a polygraph test! Many would've refused to renounce Jesus, even if there was a school shooter who put a gun to their head and threatened to kill them otherwise. Yet how many of the people who raised their hand and were certain they were going to Heaven... have since lost their faith?

What's funny is that Southern Baptist pastors specifically say they'll only baptize someone after they get saved, yet so many turned out to have never been saved, which means the pastors regularly baptize people who are unsaved but appear temporarily to be saved! Even if pastors gave polygraph tests, it wouldn't change the fact that most of them would pass the test only to later fall away. They legitimately had faith and felt saved and produced fruit in their lifestyles.

• Every time a pastor baptizes someone, they have no clue if they're truly saved since the person being baptized might later lose their faith! It forces them to acknowledge that unsaved people can temporarily have the same faith & fruit as a saved person!
• Not a single pastor at my large childhood Southern Baptist church had ever heard of Evanescent Grace. This is despite them having advanced degrees from seminaries. This fact alone proves they don't ask questions, and they certainly don't have answers!

My sister was very religious throughout high school. She had already been baptized, went to church regularly, and hung out with her church friends. She prayed in private regularly, and she was certain she had gotten saved and would go to Heaven. Once you're saved, you're already saved, so you're guaranteed to go to Heaven. At least, that's what the pastors all said. The pastor was certain she was saved and would go to Heaven since he wouldn't have baptized her otherwise.

Now my sister is atheist/agnostic. She supports same-sex marriage and abortion. She has changed drastically in both her behavior and beliefs. According to that pastor, she was NEVER saved in the first place. Yet those Southern Baptist pastors all believed in baptizing someone AFTER they get saved, so they were wrong to baptize her even though she appeared to be saved.

If you can lose salvation, then you cannot be certain you will go to Heaven since it would in fact be possible for you to lose salvation from now to the moment you die. Since they want to be 100% certain that they're going to Heaven, they deny one can lose salvation.

Yet my sister acted like a sheep for years, and the pastor saw it. Everyone saw it. How many others did the youth pastor see over the years go from super faithful to liberal atheist despite having been baptized and spending so many years as a devout Christian? A typical Southern Baptist youth pastor must witness this happening dozens of times

Fact is, what you believe now might not be what you believe in the future, and how you behave now might not be how you behave in the future.  Beliefs and behaviors can change drastically over time. I used to like Kent Hovind and believed in Young Earth Creationism. Not anymore.

How many of those teens at the summer camp are now atheists? Yet they had years ago been certain they'd go to Heaven, and they had gotten baptized. How many were certain they were saved, when in reality, according to the pastors' theology, were unsaved all along? Unsaved people who felt saved, raised their hands, said they were 10 out of 10 certain they were going to Heaven, and had been baptized, had fruit like a sheep... yet it was all temporary.

All in all, this means that even if someone has faith, has fruit, and gets baptized... they might be an unsaved person who is temporarily under some sort of delusion. They think and act identical to a sheep, but they are actually a goat. Even if someone appears to be sheep, and believes themselves to be sheep and gets baptized, they can actually be a goat that is under a delusion of being a sheep.

How can an unsaved person have faith and appear to have all the fruits of a sheep without grace? Evanescent Grace, in which God tricks someone by giving them a fake grace so that they think and act like a saved person when in reality they're unsaved all along?

If you choose to have faith, God might give you an Evanescent Grace to trick you into thinking you got saved. How else can unsaved people temporarily have the identical fruit of a persons saved by grace?

The point is, it's logically impossible. Not a single one of the pastors at my childhood Southern Baptist church had ever heard of Evanescent Grace. They refused to ask questions, like what about all the kids that we baptized and who had been certain they were saved only to years later become atheists? Every time you baptize someone and see that they have faith, it never occurred to those pastors to ask, "What if their faith and fruit are only temporary? What if they become an atheist, which means I just baptized an unsaved person!" The pastors refuse to baptize Hindus, yet they'll baptize dozens of unsaved people unknowingly! How are unsaved people temporarily having faith & fruit identical to saved people?

Interestingly, those same pastors also refused to admit that Once Saved Always Saved makes it ok to sin. The speaker at the summer camp brought up suicide, and he point-blank said that if a saved person commits suicide, they're still saved. Not a single one of the youth pastors at that summer camp disagreed, and the head pastor at the church also agreed. It was ok to sin, including the sin of suicide.

It's logically impossible to be certain if you or someone else is going to Heaven in their Soteriology because even if someone is acting and believing like a sheep, and if someone infallibly judges themselves to determine that they've changed and are acting like a saved sheep, they have no way of knowing if their faith & fruit are permanent or temporary. It's logically impossible because you don't know the future. Matthew 24:13, 2 Peter 2:20.

• **"We determine if someone has made changes in their lives and if they have faith. That's when we're certain they've gotten saved, and we will then baptize them." -**the pastor at my SBC church.

That quote requires the following:

1. God isn't judge.
2. We infallibly judge ourselves subjectively.
3. It's ok to sin. When a saved person sins, they're still saved.
4. Even if you could infallibly judge yourself and determine that you are acting like a sheep like the sheep in the Sheep & Goats Parable, you cannot prove if your fruit & faith are going to continue for the rest of your life until you die since you don't know the future, and there have been scores of people before you, such as Charles Templeton, who were certain they were saved and got baptized only to years later become atheists or leave the faith.
5. Evanescent Grace is therefore the only way to explain how some have faith & fruit of sheep while secretly being goats all along, yet one cannot know if someone or even themselves have Evanescent Grace because you don't know the future.

The Orthodox icon, Ladder to Heaven, perfectly illustrates Theosis. We have free will to fall off whenever, and it therefore means we must continue to try avoiding sin, and that God is ultimately the judge. Evanescent Grace makes God into a monster who dishes out a grace to some faithful people to trick them into thinking they're sheep when they're really goats! That means the god of Calvinism and Once Saved Always Saved is like Descartes' Evil Demon that supernaturally forces people to believe in lies.

Not a single one of the pastors in my childhood Southern Baptist church had ever heard of Evanescent Grace, despite the fact they had degrees from seminaries. None of them asked about those who did make changes to their lifestyles, did have faith, yet later became atheists. They simply don't ask questions. Anti-intellectualism.

If God tricks people into thinking they're saved by dishing out Evanescent Grace, then we are left with nothing but ignorance and despair. A deity of deception likes Descartes' Evil Demon. What would prevent such a god from making Last Thursdayism true, or letting lies be written in the Bible, or giving everyone Evanescent Grace? Nothing, since God would be a liar and a sadist that brainwashes us. Quite scary to think about.

My heart aches for my sister and all those people who were once so faithful, only to later lose all faith and fruit. How can a youth pastor ignore such an obvious problem as people having faith and believing they're saved only to later become an atheist, so they were never saved despite appearing identical to saved people albeit temporarily? Can't fix stupid or apathy. Those pastors witness so many kids getting baptized only to become atheists years later. How can they choose to ignore it? Like a Flat Earther ignoring the 24-hour sun.

• Ladder of Divine Ascent shows that when people fall away, they did experience God's grace, it was real, not Evanescent or fake grace. The reason they fell away isn't because God dished them a fake grace to trick them, but rather it was their own fault for choosing to leave and become lost like the lost sheep. Sure, it's possible to get back onto the ladder, just as a lost sheep can come back. But it's important to do it before you die.

The Orthodox and Catholic view of Theosis makes perfect logical sense, and it gives a reason to try one's best to avoid all sin. Once Saved Always Saved is illogical and makes it ok to sin. Theosis explains why people fall away, and it gives motivation to try one's best to avoid sinning.

Ironically, Once Saved Always Saved cannot give one assurance that one is going to Heaven, since it is logically impossible. For some reason, the people who subscribe to it choose to ignore the future. They only think of the present and go, "I'm certain I'm acting like a sheep now, therefore I am sheep. I'm the judge, and somehow I know I'll persevere until the end even though I don't know the future and scores of people before me were just as faithful & fruitful but only temporarily."

• Dr. Steven Lawson admitted that Eternal Security made him unafraid to lose his salvation, and he said this while he was in a secret adulterous relationship with one of his students at his Seminary. He knew that this doctrine makes it ok to sin, and so did his student.
• Charles Templeton was certain he was saved yet didn't become an atheist until he was 41. One's beliefs and behaviors can and often do change over time.

Conclusion: Once Saved Always Saved only works if you don't ask questions about it. Turn off your brain and just say, "I'm going to Heaven because I got saved. The end." I am a critical thinker, so it was inevitable I would've left because I ask questions and do research 😉