"Giving is a way of Grieving" - Amish Receive $700,000 in Donations

Can someone restate this for me so that I might understand it? Sometimes something very simple can evade a simple mind. I just don't understand what this means:

"Members of the Amish have not sought the gifts, in part because their religion teaches them to care for themselves. But they also believe that giving is a way of grieving and say they do not want to deny others that experience. They believe "it would be un-Christ-like to deny other people the blessing that comes from giving," said Herman Bontrager, a Mennonite businessman who is serving as a spokesman." http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15205529/

I am very sincere in this post and really do feel sad that the Amish had to be innocent victims because of some whacko outsider, so don't think anything else into this post than what is stated. Thier position and attitude, and their "immediate forgiveness" of this suicidal-maniac mass-murderer deserves the utmost admiration and respect. They even set up a donor fund for the murderer's family! Wow!

 

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If they really wanted to live like their neolithic ancestors, wouldn't they have sent out a warparty for vengeance? Or at the very least, to show the enemy tribe they are not to be trifled with.

I don't think the Amish are trying to live a neolithic life; they're trying to live an honest religious one. And that means forsaking the pursuit of wealth. Do both neolithic peoples and the Amish lack wealth? Yes. They do share some similarities, but the reasons they are similar are different. The Amish choose to live as they do. Neolithic people didn't.

 

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Thanks Fraggle. Yes, I am very much familiar with Amish values. Having been raised in the suburbs of Cleveland, Ohio, it is just a short jaunt out of town to be at their doorsteps. In fact, my last Norwegian Elkhound came from an Amish family, but because they do not believe in medical testing, he died of genetically-inherited renal failure at an extremely young age, and this was very heartbreaking to me.

Still, I just don't understand what they are saying here:

"They believe that giving is a way of grieving and say they do not want to deny others that experience. They believe "it would be un-Christ-like to deny other people the blessing that comes from giving."

Do you see what I mean here? There seems to be a contradiction in what they are saying. In my simple mind at first they are saying that giving is expressing the grieving process, but then? So I'm trying to be insightful here. I think they are saying that giving is a substitute for grieving, and therefore they do not want people to give because this then denies those other people of the grieving. Do you agree? This is the best that I can come up with?

 

Fraggle: Think through this above statement. Does it mean that they do not want people to give so that those people have the Christ-given opportunity to grieve instead?

I think that this it what it means. Therefore, they are saying that they do not want people to give so that those people can grieve instead.

Now I understand. Don't you agree?

 

Fraggle: Thanks!

As I orinally posted: "Sometimes something very simple can evade a simple mind. I just don't understand what this means."

Now I understand.

 

The Amish believe in technology, just not becoming slaves to it as modern technology ensues, which is why they limit themselves to simple tools. The reason why we're slaves to technology is the amount of upkeep it requires.

As an example, look how scared people get when their electricity goes out. Look how much money we have to spend just to be able to use our cars with gasoline, insurance, and other upkeeps. When you ask one of the things a normal person can't live without, cars is the #1 answer aside from family and whatnot. It's also the reason why some of them say it's faster to walk than it is to drive, even if it's far away. Their meaning is that you have to work so many hours to gain the wealth to first acquire and also operate a car and whatnot. In the hours of work it takes to earn the wealth for it -- the monthly payments, the gas and whatnot -- they could already be at their destination. If you take someone that makes only $100 a day and their car payment alone is $300 a month, that'll be 3 days until they'd arrive at their destination while the person on foot gets there sooner.

And the reason why the Amish dislike modern travel is like as Fraggle said, they're a close-knit community. Modern travel is nice in that it allows us to meet people far away, but that in turn takes away the focus from our family and neighborhoods to search out people from far away. Heck, thanks to technology, I don't know most of my neighbors as most of my friends live far away -- I don't have any in my neighborhood. Without that technology, I'd only know local people and such. With everthing in life there comes a price and you have to learn balance.

- N

 

trying to explain an expresion of the heart is as easy as folding time and space with a peice of chewing gum and toilet brush.
On the assumtion that you are genuine i hope you shall reach a new stage of reality to understand this aspect from a personal point of knowing.

 

i would suggest that they have mearly applied the super seeding law of thus engaging in the philosophical doctrine of the expresion of god and that which defines godlyness.

and
as for moving into their communities, they and others have moved into the Native american lands/communities, i suggest a little more retrospective anaylysis prior to such a comment.

 

"They believe that giving is a way of grieving and say they do not want to deny others that experience. They believe "it would be un-Christ-like to deny other people the blessing that comes from giving."

I said, "Thanks Fraggle, I think I understand it know," but I did not say that I agreed with his or their viewpoint. First, if they are saying that "giving is a way of grieving, and that they do not want to deny others the experience of grieving," then apparently they are selfishly saying that it is alright to give them donations as a way of grieving and as a way of not denying others of being able to grieve for them. This is why I said above that there is a contradiction here.

Then, as the statement follows, they are saying that it would be "un-Christ-like to deny other people the blessing that comes from giving." This selfish philosophical statement is circularly argumentative and implies that all people, including all Amish, should give up all their worldly possessions so that they can acquire the maximum amount of blessing from God.

Say what you mean, and mean what you say!

 

I can say exactly what i mean and i mean it if i say i mean it.
That is not the issue.
The issue is, will you understand it?

To explain it to you i would need to know a couple of things about you.

Do you love your mother and or father unconditionaly ?
Do you have any kids that may fall into this position of unconditional love ?
Do you actualy beleive in love ?

 

Personal questions are irrelevant to the subject matter posted here. So whatever your purpose is in asking these questions, it is senseless and a distraction from the argument at hand.

The Amish are saying: "They believe that giving is a way of grieving and say they do not want to deny others that experience. They believe "it would be un-Christ-like to deny other people the blessing that comes from giving."

Psychologically this is referred to as an "appeal to authority," who in this case is God. It is also known as an "inverted ad hominem argument," or fallacious reasoning:

1. A makes claim B;
2. there is something desirable about A,
3. therefore claim B is true.

or

1. The Amish claim that giving is a way of grieving and it would be un-Christ-like to deny other people the blessing
2. There is something desirable about giving, and not to give would be un-Christ-like
3. Therefore we accept your donations because it is wrong to deny you the right to grieve.

Dah.

Basically, in this case, the Amish are playing on the social sympathy of society and making a culture response that justifies the acceptance of other people's money for their own gains. These children are unfortunately now dead, but giving them donations is not going to bring them back to life. No money in the world is able to do that. So who gains from these donations? Donations that could be much better used to benefit the living that are now suffering and in need of money to buy food and clothing and such in order to survive.

The Amish are playing on society's sympathy to justify the means to an end. In this case, the end being the acceptance of unnecessary donations that benefit no one. This borders on a fallacious attempt to justify the means to a social and religous immoral cause.

Furthermore, giving IS NOT a way of grieving. If anything, giving is a way of alleviating grief - just the opposite from what they are saying here!

 

In all acts of philanthropy and philanthropic funds, we need to know where the money is going, who the ultimate recipient is, and how or what the money is being used for. In this case, if the money is going to pay for the children's medical expenses, or to help care for the needs of the victims or those children who are still hospitalized, then I think no one would argue that this is a very good philanthropic gesture on the part of the American people that shows the fundamental benevolent value of one culture in society helping to care for another.

 

ALL very good points and i understand that there is obviousely a need for those who have a higher understanding of life to know how this money is going to be used.

that aside when you define the human expereince to be devoid of money,
what system is it that you are suggesting as the actual model in operation ?

To many people (an overwhelming majority in the world)
money comes before all things, this is the capitalist ethic.
The amish are supposedly not capitalisticly founded.
The armish acceptance of the capitalistic nature of the rest of society, who expres emotion with money as being a right to belief in their own right (i assume to some extent as this is all conjecture unles, you get an armish elder post in reply to you, and also those giving the money, you will never know either side of the story for its own "reality").
note the use of the word "reality", this is infact very important as the emotion or personality of the person is defined by their own perception OF reality.
I.E the world turns and revolves around money.

are you suggesting that the proces of greif is one devoid of relevant interaction with victims of the "event" causing the greif ?
AND...
Are you stating that the proces of greiving is the same for everyone ?

Note TV evangelism.
This proces of asking for money takes billions of dollars per year and wastes it on building innane buildings and funding extravergent life styles of people to go around preaching to those already converted.
Misionary work could be defined as exactly the same, exploiting a need to use to promote a religous belief.

is there any concept of comparative evaluation of expres terms in ends ?
Someone offering words of "im sorry for your loss"
what good is that ?
how does it bring the person back ?
Obviousely there is a measure of relative interaction in the world around you.
just like the armish having lights on their horse and carts and the likes.
the relative value of collective areement to follow one law regardles of religion.

IF personal perception and the greiving process is not one that is "personal and private" then what is ?

 

indeed,
and criticising the serious lack in mental health services that could have prevented this from happening.

if it was me and i lived near them i would donate something like a tree or some such plant.
Give life for the loss of life.
i doubt they grow their own wood so will need to buy it for cash to re build the school.
and i certainyl would not support children going back into a building like that.
obviousely when it is a public school like columbine then no one realy cares enough to build another one, more soo when it is government money.

atleast the cost is small enough for them tomanage to afford to build another.

one thing that has bothered me about this
the armish wish to not use modern technology.
and
soo those children injured should in line with their religion not have gone to hospital.
much like all other religions of that nature.
although i do not blame the kids and would use military force if required to facilitate medical care for the children i do find it all rather odd when there is no free health system yet the expectation is to pay for the hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical costs for those children.

whos picking up that bill for the kids ?
life support for a few days would be many many thousands per day.
Who is paying the bills ?

 

I don't know what you mean by this. I am not describing a "human experience devoid of money." Nor am I criticizing people for giving to the Amish as Fraggle just said. As is in my original post, I am emphasizing the contradiction in their statment that:

"They believe that giving is a way of grieving and say they do not want to deny others that experience. They believe "it would be un-Christ-like to deny other people the blessing that comes from giving." Giving is not a way of grieving, nor is any of what they are saying "un-Christ-like."

This statement is a bunch of bunk that the Amish are using just to rationalize the acceptance of these donations. I'm emphasizing the contradictory nature of their reasoning and the illogical fallacy in it.

Again, I am not criticizing making these donations to the Amish, as long as it is being used for the medical expenses. And it is also a notably admirable act of goodwill and charity on their part that they used some of this money to set up a separate donation for the shooter's family.

Further, we are not talking about people with a "higher level of understanding." We are talking about normal people with common sense who are normally concerned about how they spend their money and where it goes.

 

Giving to those who have lost.
feeling greif for others (empathy) and feeling that greif themselfs also or just feeling greif for the situation.
in times of people losing things it is a common human traite (of more emotionaly advanced humans) to give in some way, be that emotional with emotional support to giving food so they do not need to cook for themselfs (an important part in extreem greif as the apetite tends to be lost often and the effort required to cook and look after yourself is often lost for a certain time or deminished).

now when we examine the term "christ-like" one must interpret that as an ethic of a certain convition,
and the act of giving to support someone in trouble times is in essence
giving charity to those who need it or are perceived to need it.
this charitable act is a 2 or more way of benificial interaction of the community aspect.
soo..
we get to denying the act of giving to those who are perceived to be worthy of charity.
note many religions have charity aspects, deeds or coming of age or coming of awarenes within them.
buhdism has a counter point of abandonment where it is the event of receiving only charity and owning nothing.

If the armish were to deny peopel the act of charity in a time when charity is in its self deemed very worthy and required by religous conviction then that act is in its self a religios act and thus christ being a deity or such liek is termed within the "God" aspect, thus to praise, celebrate or recognise God or Christ or such others in an act.