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Loneviking
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Username: Loneviking

Post Number: 286
Registered: 7-2000
Posted on Tuesday, November 30, 2004 - 12:45 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

This is one area that my SDA mom didn't agree with. I wasn't raised vegetarian and am thankful for that! I raised cattle (often had a bull or two around) and I've known several that were a genuine pleasure to eat----it was a form of revenge! :-)
Colleentinker
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Username: Colleentinker

Post Number: 1015
Registered: 12-2003
Posted on Tuesday, November 30, 2004 - 9:13 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Ha! Revenge--did those bulls knock you down, Loneviking?

Freeatlast, I'm still laughing over the "image of the beast".

I have to say I'm really not sure if silence is better than verbal outrage. We have experienced both with our Adventists family members, and I almost prefer the verbal stuff because it's then out in the open, and there might even be the possibility of response. The silent treatment--I'd never had any idea that someone keeping quite could be SO disruptive! When it happens with our relatives, no one feels safe to talk, eat normally, say what we would normally say. Disapporval and judgment are palpable "presences" in the room, and it feels as if a dark cloud hangs over us.

Make no mistake--the verbal outbreaks are disruptive, too--but at least no one's pretending!

Praise God for His peace!

Colleen
Flyinglady
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Username: Flyinglady

Post Number: 786
Registered: 3-2004
Posted on Tuesday, November 30, 2004 - 9:04 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I thank God my parents did not raise us strick vegetarians. The sad thing is that I raised my son vegetarian. He drinks milk, eats eggs and cheese, but will not touch meat. As for me, After reading the NT I decided that as long as the food is not offered to idols and it is not strangled and has no blood in it, I will eat what ever is offered to me. So I ate a Caesar salad with bacon. My son and DIL were sitting there. My DIL eats meat, my son does not, but no one made a big thing of it and neither did I. My Grandson likes chicken and I am so glad he is not being raised SDA.
All of you have a tremendous sense of humor. I enjoy reading what you write.
As for the silent treatment, I have not experienced that from my relatives. They were raised SDA but have not practiced it for a long time. They have accepted that I no longer call myself SDA and was baptized into a Christian church. So I consider myself very fortunate that my family has not been silent, nasty or in any way in opposition to what I did in accepting Jesus as my Saviour. God has been very good and is so awesome.
Diana
Loneviking
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Username: Loneviking

Post Number: 288
Registered: 7-2000
Posted on Tuesday, November 30, 2004 - 11:57 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Ha! Revenge--did those bulls knock you down, Loneviking?

Well, one tried. He was a big, black Spanish/Brahma cross that was about as mean as they come. He got a pitchfork in his nose for his efforts and two days later we had the butcher pay him a visit in the pasture. The rest were just obnoxious. I'd get 'em as feeders (just weaned) and raise them 'till about a year old. Then I'd sell them or have them butchered.
Susan_2
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Username: Susan_2

Post Number: 1167
Registered: 11-2002
Posted on Wednesday, December 01, 2004 - 3:13 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I grew up much of my childhood attending a small rural SDA church and also attending a large urban SDA church in the nearest big city. There are also small mountain SDA churches. These various groups are othen as different as night is from day. I know SDA's whos only focus on meat is the unclean/clean issue as set down in the book of Leviticus. I know a very devoted SDA family who own and run a large trukey ranch. We used to get our holiday turkeys from this family. The mountain SDA's are even different from the rural SDA's. I always liked the little country SDA church because instead of the SDA hymnal over at that church we used a small hymnal of only Country and Western Christian songs. One cowboy type of fellow brought his gutiar for us to sing to. The piano was hardly ever used. At the large urban church we'd go to was city people and I was culturally out of place. Loneviking, my sons first ever real job was at the livestock auction. He started at age 12 and worked there every Saturday and Sunday morning through age 18. In my college livestock judging class I placed third in the state of California in judging shorthorns up at the livestock judging competition at the Cow Palace in S.F. I tell some people that and they tell me they thought the Cow Palace was only for rock concerts. No, it's for livestock first, then other uses.
Melissa
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Username: Melissa

Post Number: 603
Registered: 7-2003
Posted on Wednesday, December 01, 2004 - 7:23 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Susan, I have to tell you I had no idea they raised cows in california until they recently started running these commercials here about california cheese coming from california cows. Here in Kansas, we raise a few cows, so it surprised me they weren't regional. I had a friend who moved here from NJ a number of years ago, and he still expected to see cattle roaming the streets. It is very irritating listening to B and those he supports talk about the awful cattle farmers, since I know some personally, and they aren't out there trying to create poison in the food supply. They are amazingly knowledgeable of their cattle and conscienscious of their health since they know it will get them a better price at market.

A while back, I started buying "natural" milk and meats with no antibiotics and only grass-fed to try to appease Bs concerns for those things, but those are just some of the excuses he uses to say meat is bad. When you take away that ammunition, he still attacks meat. He told me a few weeks ago that chicken is considered 30% fat and beef is considered 50% fat. I did some research and the best I could find was that most chicken pieces without skin were 3 grams of fat, and there were at least 12 cuts of beef that were 4.5 grams of fat per serving or less. For my height, I am supposed to get 45-51 grams of fat per day. His statistics didn't measure up by any standard I looked at. Even organics sources, which are not particularly pro-vegetarian, said the same thing about chicken and beef. If you leave on the skin, chicken can be a whapping 8 grams of fat, but that still isn't even close to 30% fat. When I provided that information back after I reseached it, siting my sources including MayoClinic nutrition website (an incompentent source to him, I'm sure), all I got was silence.

The milk comes from a farm less than an hour from here, so he could even probably go tour it if he were so inclined, but his "sources" say milk is just pure poison and that many diseases are caused by drinking it.

I've just concluded that no matter what the many "health" reasons sited by the SDAs I know, they are vegetarians because the church says you should be if you are really "spiritual". I can't see anything that overall proves vegetarianism is "healthier" than a well-balanced diet that doesn't include a daily trip through the golden arches....but they still make the best fries in town.

I told B that I always considered myself health conscious and had worked for an organic newspaper for a while a number of years ago, so was more aware than some of the issues or potential issues in the food supply, but after I met B, I decided I was a rank amateur in the area of health concern. He is definately on the polar extreme of that fence.
Loneviking
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Username: Loneviking

Post Number: 289
Registered: 7-2000
Posted on Wednesday, December 01, 2004 - 7:36 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Well, a chicken may be only 30% fat, but a chicken will eat darn near anything--so if he's worried about contaminants he won't like that!
The cleanest meat is goose but it has a lot of fat.

The Cow Palace? Back in '79 I saw a great rodeo there. A black Spanish bull shook his rider off. The poor bull was confused and couldn't find his way back to the holding pen. Instead he went over a gate into the stands---what a site! Black bull running around in the stands looking for an exit with people screaming and running everywhere. Fortunately, he wasn't a mean one and a couple of cowboys went up and chased him back down to where he was supposed to be....
Colleentinker
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Username: Colleentinker

Post Number: 1017
Registered: 12-2003
Posted on Wednesday, December 01, 2004 - 8:46 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Melissa, you're right in your assessment of SDA vegetarianism. B's sources, as I recall, have a major agenda, and they are not balanced in their data. The meat phobia with staunch Adventist vegetarians is very deeply ingrained, and it really has nothing to do with health. It has to do with negative brainwashing that creates fear and revulsion in people when they are children. I suspect most of us have areas in our lives that demonstrate to us how hard it is to react logically when our deepest, pre-consious feelings tell us something is repulsive. I don't even think those feelings are grounded in a fear of sin; they're grounded in revulsion.

Richard has been an interesting study in the phenomenon. He absolutely believes meat is a non-issue, and he cooks and serves it in our house. But he can't bring himself to eat it. As he said to me, "I grew up believing it was not food. Would you eat dog poop? To me, eating meat was like eating dog poop." Even though his head is clear on the subject, his preconscious emotions are not. (And I have to confess that I actually have similar feelings about shrimp; I have a sense that I'm eating those ugly, fat garden grubs! If I don't know it's shrimp, I love it. If I see it, I'm done.)

I actually feel angry when I think of the manipulation strict SDA parents wreak on their kids when they teach them things such as "meat is not food; it's like eating feces". It's so wrong, so unbiblical.

So, Melissa, B's feelings about the subject are not based in any percent on rational logic. They are based on a cultic teaching which has been attached to quite an arrogant feeling of supriority over the benighted public who doesn't share the "special knowledge".

Praise God that the kingdom of heaven is not about eating or drinking!!

Colleen
Chris
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Username: Chris

Post Number: 471
Registered: 7-2003
Posted on Wednesday, December 01, 2004 - 3:19 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Melissa, when I was SDA I would always explain my vegetarianism to others by saying, "It's just a health thing. I just think it's a healthier diet." People would usually shrug and leave it alone. If the the healthiness of my diet was ever questioned, as it once was by a dietician I work with, I would resort to "Well, it's a matter of taste that I just prefer not to eat dead animals."

Both of these responses were half truths at best. The real underlying foundational truth was that I did not believe I could be totally right with God and be eating meat in defiance of the inspired word given to his end time prophet.

In my mind, my diet was a barometer of my spiritual status. When I went through rebellious phases I would eat meat. I felt guilt about it, but also a odd thrill that comes from doing something bad. Then I would decide it was time for me to straighten up and get right with God and I would revert to vegetarianism. This made me feel very pious and very much superior to my non-vegetarian fellow SDAs (not all SDAs are vegetarian). I would actually lecture other SDAs about this and even get angry if my wife ate meat when at her family's house.

Strangely enough, this is the very first place in my life where God cracked my SDA armor. The first real problem with Adventism that became terribly apparent to me was the SDA stand on clean vs. unclean meat. I first became painfully aware that SDAs didn't TRULY follow clean and unclean laws as outlined in the OT or currently followed by Jews. Then I discovered that it was treated as a non-issue in the NT. This rocked my world because it brought EGW and her supposedly "inspired" writings into question.

I think you could rightly say that understanding SDA flaws in the area of diet opened the flood gate that would eventually lead to my leaving (seems silly, but true). However, even after understanding it, I still struggled for a long time with associating the eating of meat with something "bad", "sinful", or "decadent". Quite frankly, I still do struggle with this odd feeling from time to time......there's something almost thrilling about a porkchop.......maybe that's the sensation of freedom :-)

Chris
Susan_2
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Username: Susan_2

Post Number: 1173
Registered: 11-2002
Posted on Wednesday, December 01, 2004 - 6:34 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Melissa, Did I read right that B does not use dairy? Did he attend a SDA boarding high school? I don't know about any of the other SDA boarding high schools but Monterey Bay Academy is very renouned in its local area for its high quality dairy product and this includes several varieties of cheese. The hay stacks behind the dairy are also a highly saught after location for elivating those hormonal surges the high school kids are prone to experience. Today I was reading the menu at a local seafood restruant.It had grilled octupus on it. I'll pass. Some things just don't interest me enough to even want to try. My granddaughter attends a SDA school. She brings her lunch. Every day she has chicken nuggets and potato cchips. I think I counted only five things that child will eat and chicken nuggest and potato chips are two of those five. These people are unaware of the vegetarian bent of a lot of SDA's. They only have heard about the ban on pork and that's not a problem because tey don't like pork anyway. Loneviking, my son has partisipated in the Running of the Bulls in Spain. He loved it. One of my closest friends raises pigedons to sell to the restruant supplier. She thinks by the time they get on the menus they are called chicken.
Flyinglady
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Username: Flyinglady

Post Number: 791
Registered: 3-2004
Posted on Wednesday, December 01, 2004 - 9:06 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Melissa,
Where I grew up in California it used to be cow country. Dairies every where. And orange groves. Then Los Angeles started spreading, the dairies and orange groves were pushed out and the freeways and people moved in. I would much rather have the smell of cows then the fumes of cars. Of course, I do not live in California any more. So, you see, there used to be cows in Southern California.
Just a bit of history.
Diana
Madelia
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Username: Madelia

Post Number: 102
Registered: 2-2003
Posted on Thursday, December 02, 2004 - 7:50 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Chris,
I really appreciated your post above. This is what I observed in my husband: he claims he can think more clearly when he eats only vegetables and fruits. When we were dating, he was quite ambivalent about the church, didn't regularly attend services. At that time he would eat fish, poultry and very occasionally a McDonald's hamburger. I remember once getting some carryout chinese food and ordering something with shrimp. I had no clue that shrimp was "unclean"; in my mind fish and seafood are all the same. Sam had a fit and wouldn't touch it. Once we were married and had kids, his diet is stricter and stricter. It used to be one of our treat to eat out and have a salmon dinner. Now he states he's "overcome" that.
Colleentinker
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Username: Colleentinker

Post Number: 1022
Registered: 12-2003
Posted on Thursday, December 02, 2004 - 8:58 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

You're right, Chris. When I was an Adventist, my feelings about meat were tied to Ellen. The revulsion part of the equation (in those that experience it) is what shows up after realizing Ellen was wrong! While an Adventist, Richard had that revulsion, but then it was a good thing because it ensured he would remain spiritually pure in the area of diet. Now that he no longer believes meat is a spiritual issue, the revulsion is visible for what it is: a phobia based on early imprinting.

My mother occasionally cooked fish, and we ate meat at my relative's houses if they had it. Yet I did usually call myself a vegetarian. You're right--how schizy that is! Even though I actually liked meat because of my few encounters with it as a child, I usually felt too guilty to order it at restaurants. I did fear that I would not be fit to be translated. And, Chris, I completely relate to your description of feeling that daring "thrill" of occasionally eating meat during my Adventist days!

Ultimately, all our twisted beliefs were linked to Ellen. It still astonishes me how complete our "brainwashing" was, and how powerfully it imprinted us for life, even though we have found Jesus.

Colleen
Melissa
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Username: Melissa

Post Number: 608
Registered: 7-2003
Posted on Thursday, December 02, 2004 - 12:04 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Chris, that sounds exactly like B. When he first told me he was a vegetarian, he started talking about how he had been away from God and when he started being a vegetarian again, he felt better and was closer to God. I personally thought it was another one of those psychosomatic moments. He talked about God's original diet and how Daniel was supposedly a vegetarian, but I never sat too long on that... I got out the book itself and read exactly what it did say in context and the whole meaning usually changed. Then he'd tap dance about healthier, and I researched some of the "warnings" for vegetarians because of the nutrients they lack, and how would God demand them to eat a diet that could kill them, and again he would tap dance. When I point to 1 Tim about the forbidding of certain foods, he goes running to 2 Tim about all scripture being good for doctrine, and from there directly to Isaiah that calls pork an abomination....and that somehow "proves" vegetarianism. It is very hard following all the leaps and jumps his logic takes, which is why no matter how he tries to make it a personal preference one minute and a spiritual mandate the next, he has done nothing but prove the lengths he will go to to keep adventism true in his mind. He hates it that I characerize him as such a puppet, but that's just how it looks to one who has watched the gyrations for over 5 years now.
Jeremy
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Username: Jeremy

Post Number: 148
Registered: 10-2004
Posted on Thursday, December 02, 2004 - 1:12 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Actually, Daniel ate meat and drank wine regularly. It was an unusual event for him to go 3 whole weeks without:

"I did not eat any tasty food, nor did meat or wine enter my mouth, nor did I use any ointment at all until the entire three weeks were completed." (Daniel 10:3 NASB.)

Once again, the SDA myth does not stand up to the test of Scripture!

Jeremy
Dd
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Username: Dd

Post Number: 234
Registered: 7-2004
Posted on Thursday, December 02, 2004 - 1:25 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

OK Jeremy, I need to ask (because I have been wondering since you joined the forum)...what do you do? You are so young and yet so knowledgeable in regards to Scripture, EGW, where to research info, etc. It is obvious that you are a computer guru. Are you in school? Have a career already? What are your goals?

Hope I am not being too nosy...I think you are remarkable and so way ahead of where I was at your age. God has great plans ahead for you.
Madelia
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Username: Madelia

Post Number: 103
Registered: 2-2003
Posted on Thursday, December 02, 2004 - 1:29 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Thanks for that scripture reference Jeremy. As I read these posts I'm enjoying a nice hamburger . Yummy!
Melissa
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Username: Melissa

Post Number: 612
Registered: 7-2003
Posted on Friday, December 03, 2004 - 7:37 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Yes, Jeremy, I read that to B. Silence is usually his response when he's been disproven by scripture unless he has another one to invalidate the one I have read. There is a hierarchy in scripture, to him, the verses he reads are "right" the ones I read are 'wrong'. It's a fascinating thing to watch him try to discredit scripture and try to say they only use scripture at the same time.
Madelia
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Username: Madelia

Post Number: 108
Registered: 2-2003
Posted on Friday, December 03, 2004 - 9:08 am:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Like I said before Melissa, B and Sam are so alike!
Dennisrainwater
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Username: Dennisrainwater

Post Number: 104
Registered: 8-2000
Posted on Friday, December 03, 2004 - 11:17 pm:   Edit PostDelete PostPrint Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Colleen,

Your words about 'revulsion' and 'imprinting' have really impacted me! I'd never thought about it that way before.

My parents divorced when I was 14 (while I was living with some wonderful SDA folks who were extremely strict in their diet, BTW...), and to my dismay, I watched BOTH of my folks toss a great deal of all their strict ideals (vegetarianism included) right out the window. It was really unsettling to me.

But, my point is that from that time forward, I began accepting the idea that perhaps if both of my previously religiously vegetarian parents no longer saw the need of avoiding all meats, perhaps I didn't either.

But, eating any kind of straight meat was difficult! My first experience with meat was when my dad took me to an Arby's. (Oh, did I love that roast beef sandwich!!) I got so I could stomach a hamburger -- but only if it had PLENTY of "fixin's" on it. Also processed meats in casseroles were okay. But it was all at least a bit uncomfortable -- at least if it was in a form that visually reminded me of its origins.

To this day I'm still a bit squeamish about "direct" forms of meat -- such as a chicken breast or lambchop, etc. It actually takes willpower to put it in my mouth.

But while I can "will" myself to eat a steak or even bacon or sausage -- I simply CANNOT bring myself to address a piece of pork!! Can't do it!

I've wondered why -- and certainly reconciled myself to the fact that it is 'no longer' "sinful". I just can't do it. I've even had a few of my Christian friends quiz me on it occasionally... And, the only answer I could come up with was, "I don't like pork." Which is really a lie of sorts, as I have NO IDEA whether or not I like pork!

Your words about imprinting and it becoming almost a phobia makes me feel a lot better about myself! Thanks for shedding some light, and offering me a rational hook to hang my hang-up on! ;-)

Suppose there'll be meat at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb?? ;-) Can't wait to get there and find out!

Learning, growing, and longing for Heaven!
Den <><

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