Then Peter speaks to each Apostle by name, prophesying what part of the world each will preach in. And that was it. The Great Day of Pentecost treated as if the postman had just delivered the morning mail. — Surfnetter

Surf, that’s just PAINFUL. “Tell, don’t show” just like all those scenes in Left Behind. When I was on a road trip last year, I was in a motel with EWTN and checked it out. Some sort of movie about the life of St Ignatius Loyola. It was AWFUL — St Ignatius, Basque nobleman, professional soldier, swashbuckler, and founder of those “Vatican Green Berets”, the Jesuits — turned into a Pious Plaster Saint from some Victorian holy card. Looks like Evangelicals & Baptists don’t have a monopoly on really AWFUL dramatic productions. We Papists flake out, too.

For the best Upper Room scene in film, check out the first post-Resurrection appearance in that old TV miniseries A.D.. Jesus is dead, Judas is dead, Peter’s in full depresso mode as he and the others hide out. So he decides to start eating, passing a loaf of bread around to the others. Close-up on the bread as it passes around, counting off. And then the last apostle there passes it to another hand — one with a nail-scar. “Come on, Peter, I know you’re stronger than that. After all I taught you?”

Pan up. It’s Jesus, sitting there like nothing’s out of the ordinary, with a “Hi there; remember me?” look.

Apostles freak out. Bad. “Hee… Wah… Gik… Na… Hoo… Ha…”

Jesus calms them down, shows “Yes, it’s Me,” teaches them a bit, then passes the loaf around again.

Again we follow the breadloaf around from hand to hand, counting off until the last one hands it back to Jesus — and nobody’s there.

Great Scene.

Jesus has this posture like he just sneaked in and wanted to see how long before they notice him sitting there, the disciples react like you’d expect real people to (total freakout), and both appearance and disappearance are like actual accounts of paranormal appearances/disappearances — you never see the appearance or disappearance, the apparition is just THERE like you didn’t notice it coming.

You mean there is NO variation among individuals in any given group? I was unaware humans (and other primates) were a hive-mind species…

Then they have no interest in the grand commission, and hence they are not bible-believing Christians, unlike, say, Fred Phelps.

Maybe you’ve heard a lot of Christian hate speech, but you’ve picked the wrong forum to complain about it. IMonk runs a pretty tight ship here, and doesn’t put up with non-Christian bashing. This is a bunch of people, mostly conservative Christians, trying to find their way out of the mess they have been led into by various Christian excesses/heresies/misinterpretations. They’re looking for a different take on Christianity, but not of the bashing-the-heathens variety. While they’re more than happy to teach you about their take on God, nobody here would compel you to worship Him. Peace.