The Duggar House Schedule

[catlady]

This is what fascinates me about fundies. They read the same book every. Damn. Day. They sing songs with lines taken from this book. They listen to various preachers on this same book multiple times a week. How dull are their lives? I would have gone postal by now

This could also explain mullets perpetual crazy eyes. She probably remembers her days of being able to read something different

Edited for iPhone typos

DGayle and Kimberm, I feel the exact same way. I have an aunt who left the Catholic Church for a non-denominational and cult-like small church. She's happy there, so I won't fault that, but last summer she came home from service and said, "today I learned a lot about God's love." my sister and I had to hold in our snorty laughing as We both thought, what can a 70-year-old life-long church goer possibly learn as new information?

Disclaimer: although I have shared my atheism here, my sister does believe in God.

My point is not to be mean, just that I don't get it.

Edited to add the last sentence.

[SassyPants]

Reading the same book over and over is the sign of a stunted mind. People who are attracted to this type of lifestyle are people who do no want to think, problem solve or challenge themselves in any way. They want to be told what to do, how to do it and take the easy way out each and every time. They are like Teflon, and nothing is ever their fault because they never make their own decisions.

[Nic]

When homeschool focuses on a single kid, 3 hours is okay. But they've got kids all over the educational chart, making 3 hours not enough.

Exactly. Now because of sheer student numbers and learning levels homeschool becomes a non-credited one room school house with ill-equipped teacher aids running it.

[MatthewDuggar]

... I have an aunt who left the Catholic Church for a non-denominational and cult-like small church. ...she came home from service and said, "today I learned a lot about God's love." my sister and I had to hold in our snorty laughing as We both thought, what can a 70-year-old life-long church goer possibly learn as new information?

Disclaimer: although I have shared my atheism here, my sister does believe in God.

My point is not to be mean, just that I don't get it.

I guess I can understand why you "don't get it" if you are an atheist, but why do you think it's so damn hilarious?? From experience, the Catholic faith tends to focus on the doom and gloom of Christianity, whereas other denominations like your aunt's probably focus on God's love, what the bible says about it, etc.. I think that's great for a 70 year old to enjoy her faith just as you enjoy being an atheist.

[momof2treasures]

Doom and gloom? Are you catholic Matthew duggar?

[SassyPants]

I guess I can understand why you "don't get it" if you are an atheist, but why do you think it's so damn hilarious?? From experience, the Catholic faith tends to focus on the doom and gloom of Christianity, whereas other denominations like your aunt's probably focus on God's love, what the bible says about it, etc.. I think that's great for a 70 year old to enjoy her faith just as you enjoy being an atheist.

I would say the exact opposite. The RCC does not focus on fire and brimstone at all. If this 70 yo never learned about God's love and forgiveness in her decades of attending RC mass, she was not listening.

The best part about the RCC is its focus on love and forgiveness. Hands down, much more + than any Evangelical service I have ever attended. Heck I have heard fire and brimstone preached at wedding services in other Christian denominations.

[MatthewDuggar]

I went to Catholic School K-12, I guess I wasn't listening because we learned far more about sinning than love. Just my experience. I wasn't confirmed and now identify with more mainstream Christianity. I'm glad others have had a better Catholic experience. It was not my intent to say what I did as a blanket statement.

[SassyPants]

I went to Catholic School K-12, I guess I wasn't listening because we learned far more about sinning than love. Just my experience. I wasn't confirmed and now identify with more mainstream Christianity. I'm glad others have had a better Catholic experience. It was not my intent to say what I did as a blanket statement.

K- college degree for me and maybe because I grew up and was educated in CA, I received the kinder, gentler version, but compared to many other faith groups, hate is not generally preached in many RC church sermons.

I am no longer a practicing Catholic because of many of the decisions made at the top, and the do as I say and not as I do mentality, but that's a whole different discussion.

[nst]

we watched 21 jumpstreet in my religion classes :cracking-up:

[Toothfairy]

I dare the Duggars state test their kids then show the results on tv. Then tell everyone how amazing their kids are.

[SassyPants]

I dare the Duggars state test their kids then show the results on tv. Then tell everyone how amazing their kids are.

No- I'd rather not embarrass the kids. I mean Jill outed herself with the rice.

I wouldn't say that any of the kids is especially bright.

Unfortunately, all the curiosity was drained from those vessels at an early age.

Cults are bad, bad news, especially for young kids-

[ILoveJellybeans]

Id feel bad for the kids if there was an episode based on testing their intelligence. I think it would be interesting to find out how the SOTDRT does compared to kids homeschooled by normal parents in an average sized family, as well as kids who went to school. But only in a sense of 90% of Duggars scored below average, 10/19 of them failed, and the average Duggar is a year behind the average kid their age...not "JD scored 10%, making him the dumbest of the Duggar kids, this test is aimed at middle school kids and Jill still failed, Jackson is currently working at a first grade level, 50% of average kindergarteners scored higher than Jessa and Jason cant read". From the bits we have seen of Duggar intelligence-Jill and her rice, Jessa and the scavenger hunt of no problem solving skills, James and his flashcards of multiplication, that episode where Michelle was homeschooling and failed to get her sons to sit at the table.

[purposed2015]

K- college degree for me and maybe because I grew up and was educated in CA, I received the kinder, gentler version, but compared to many other faith groups, hate is not generally preached in many RC church sermons.

I am no longer a practicing Catholic because of many of the decisions made at the top, and the do as I say and not as I do mentality, but that's a whole different discussion.

I'm a retired Catholic because of the same reason as poster above. Catholicism is far from perfect and not to generalize, but from my experience with Catholicism the Catholic Church isn't that interested in bashing other religions. I never heard a priest say the Baptists, Mormons or any other religion is going to hell because they aren't Catholics. Everyone I know that went to Catholic schools has some kind of weird story. About 50 years ago a nun around here was nuts and failed her entire class for the school year. :cray-cray: :cray-cray:

[calimojo]

Id feel bad for the kids if there was an episode based on testing their intelligence. I think it would be interesting to find out how the SOTDRT does compared to kids homeschooled by normal parents in an average sized family, as well as kids who went to school. But only in a sense of 90% of Duggars scored below average, 10/19 of them failed, and the average Duggar is a year behind the average kid their age...not "JD scored 10%, making him the dumbest of the Duggar kids, this test is aimed at middle school kids and Jill still failed, Jackson is currently working at a first grade level, 50% of average kindergarteners scored higher than Jessa and Jason cant read". From the bits we have seen of Duggar intelligence-Jill and her rice, Jessa and the scavenger hunt of no problem solving skills, James and his flashcards of multiplication, that episode where Michelle was homeschooling and failed to get her sons to sit at the table.

Those would be great pop ups during the show!! :lol:

[lisa_m]

Kids who are home-schooled in Arkansas are required to be tested every year. I believe Michelle mentioned once that she gets her kids tested to make sure they are keeping up with other kids their age.

[Coco]

How many hours can someone spend studying the same damned book before they're sick of seeing it? They spend more time in a month on that book than we spent in a quarter on a book in high school, and by the end of the quarter, books that were great at the beginning were so overly analyzed and studied that we came to hate them. And they do that every month, year after year, with that single book. How boring. If you don't know a book well enough to move on and study something else after a year of studying it, then I think you're either pretty stupid or aren't really that interested since you aren't retaining anything. (Barring learning disabilities, which shouldn't have to be disclaimed, but it's 2015, and nobody uses thinking anymore. And disclaimer for the disclaimer, that "nobody" is a general blanket statement.)

I agree that studying a regular book day in and day out the same way constantly every single year would be boring and stupid, but with the Bible they can apply it to any part of life. It never is routine, it's always adapting. They just extrapolate wildly beyond the context of verses. They read it and read it and read it until it becomes part of their thoughts, and they believe that God speaks to them in the connections they make back to the scripture in their everyday lives. Like Ps. 1 Blessed is the man who meditates on it day and night, he is like a tree planted by the rivers of water whose fruit does not perish (or something like that)

I love my mom dearly and I believe she is very intelligent. But she believes that God speaks to her directly through the English words in the Bible. She thinks that God almost has jokes with her. For instance, she needed to fly once and she is scared of planes. She opened her Bible and read a verse in Esther that says, "If i perish, i perish." And took that as God telling her that even the worst case scenario would be alright in the end and not to worry so much. It's a very real comfort to her.

So... yes, the same book can take on infinite meanings the more intently someone studies it, if they keep applying new meaning to the same old verses. Especially something as vague and esoteric as the Scriptures. An example of it outside of the fundie world would be in Eat, Pray, Love about the deep experience that Elizabeth Gilbert drew from random Sanskrit (iirc) poetry and mantras when she was on the spiritual part of her journey. Reading her impressions you can get a feeling for where people go with the Bible. It takes on a life of its own in the minds of the readers. "Sharper than any two edged sword, able to divide between the joints and marrow," or something like that. They think it's literally a living book, a direct connection to God. Like saying, "God told me this" but they're using scripture (sometimes out of context, which is when it gets most disturbing) because they think the words on the page connect them to a spiritual all-powerful being. I still can't throw away a Bible (even pages my kids might have ripped out for instance) without feeling like i'm throwing away something sacred. I'd feel the same way about any kind of sacred writing from almost any religion, or even anything old and irreplaceable. My neighbor once let me borrow a scrapbook he found made by a teacher in the early 1900's and i wanted to take digital photos of every page (but i didn't take the time) and i should have offered to mail it to the town hall of the place she had been from as a kind of historical document for them. i hated giving it back to my neighbor because he just kept it in his garage. It just seemed like an actual connection to that lady, like she was still living for a while when people read what she'd made, and saw the flowers that she'd pressed and the photos of her students. I guess that's why there are usually Bibles at secondhand stores. People can't really let go of something they've connected like that with, they can only just pass them on.

/blabfest :lol:

[Letgo]

DGayle and Kimberm, I feel the exact same way. I have an aunt who left the Catholic Church for a non-denominational and cult-like small church. She's happy there, so I won't fault that, but last summer she came home from service and said, "today I learned a lot about God's love." my sister and I had to hold in our snorty laughing as We both thought, what can a 70-year-old life-long church goer possibly learn as new information?

Disclaimer: although I have shared my atheism here, my sister does believe in God.

My point is not to be mean, just that I don't get it.

Edited to add the last sentence.

I have quite a number of relatives, in different families, who left Catholicism. All of them went to nondenominational Christian churches. All of them are very negative about the Catholic faith-it isn't Christian, it doesn't teach from the Bible, Catholics don't read the Bible, they teach false doctrine, Catholics need to be saved, etc. Your aunt's comment is very familiar to me and may well be a part of what her new church teaches or what her fellow church members say about Catholics.

[SassyPants]

Christians dissing on other Christian denominations does nothing to spread the love of Christianity- In fact, it makes Christianity less believable to those on the outside.

Message missed, big time.

[Letgo]

How many hours can someone spend studying the same damned book before they're sick of seeing it? They spend more time in a month on that book than we spent in a quarter on a book in high school, and by the end of the quarter, books that were great at the beginning were so overly analyzed and studied that we came to hate them. And they do that every month, year after year, with that single book. How boring. If you don't know a book well enough to move on and study something else after a year of studying it, then I think you're either pretty stupid or aren't really that interested since you aren't retaining anything. (Barring learning disabilities, which shouldn't have to be disclaimed, but it's 2015, and nobody uses thinking anymore. And disclaimer for the disclaimer, that "nobody" is a general blanket statement.)

There IS a great deal in the Bible! It's a long book. And I am sure they revisit parts repeatedly. What a child hears at age four will be different at ages 9 or 15. They have so many kids I am sure they really focus on certain parts frequently-obedience, purity, 10 Commandments, Proverbs, etc. Plus, they memorize it by chapters and that takes time.

Maybe Bible time has changed because so many of the children are older and have other things to do; midwifery, flying, towing, photography. It may be easier to get together right before or after dinner. And 8:30 would have been far too late for my young children. Maybe they actually learned something through the years. Or, they moved it up so that JB and Michelle have more time for sweet fellowship to try for #20.

I don't think they need the schedule as much now because the youngest child is five. No diapers, no naps, everyone can get dressed without help, SHOULD be able to eat by herself, and so on. The buddy system is largely unnecessary at home. Hannie is nine and Jana and Jill had their own buddies by that age. I think Jill was around 7 when Joy would have been handed off to a buddy and Joy was her first. Jenny is seven now, so only the last couple of girls should need help. The system would still be helpful when they are out and about so that someone actually watches the children, but at home most of those younger children should be responsible enough to take care of themselves. If their buddies did their jobs right!

[jarona]

I went to Catholic School K-12, I guess I wasn't listening because we learned far more about sinning than love. Just my experience. I wasn't confirmed and now identify with more mainstream Christianity. I'm glad others have had a better Catholic experience. It was not my intent to say what I did as a blanket statement.

I, too, attended Catholic school back in the 1960's. Those nuns certainly put the fear of God into us; the Sisters of Mercy were extremely focused on all the horrors of sin rather than the "joy" and "blessings" of love! The priests were worse! I remember many homilies where I was sure I was going to Hell to join the rest of the heathenly party people!

Although I'll still consider myself "Catholic" , I have serious issues with the Church. Serious. I do like and respect Pope Francis though--If any one person may be able to get my ass back to Mass--it's him! 8-)

[SassyPants]

I, too, attended Catholic school back in the 1960's. Those nuns certainly put the fear of God into us; the Sisters of Mercy were extremely focused on all the horrors of sin rather than the "joy" and "blessings" of love! The priests were worse! I remember many homilies where I was sure I was going to Hell to join the rest of the heathenly party people!

Although I'll still consider myself "Catholic" , I have serious issues with the Church. Serious. I do like and respect Pope Francis though--If any one person may be able to get my ass back to Mass--it's him! 8-)

I also respect Pope Francis.

[SoybeanQueen]

I'm a pretty non-denominational person, so the whole fighting between groups who have such imilar beliefs at the heart confuses me.

That said, we have friends who have been coming on strong with attempts to get us to convert to Catholicism lately. We have zero interest anyway, but even less so when the say stuff like "your baptism would be valid if you were Catholic." Yeah, see, it's already valid. I don't need someone else's church to bless it to make it legit.

[LogansMama]

Jessa had taken over the homeschooling while M was dealing with premie Josie...and she continued playing teacher even when M was back on her feet and able. Now that Jessa is gone, I'm concerned that there is even less attention being paid to the remaining homeschoolers. When was the last time you saw a kidlet wearing a chore pack??? I haven't seen one since James was a little.

Good god I wish I could be a fly on the wall in their house for a day!

[LogansMama]

I guess I can understand why you "don't get it" if you are an atheist, but why do you think it's so damn hilarious?? From experience, the Catholic faith tends to focus on the doom and gloom of Christianity, whereas other denominations like your aunt's probably focus on God's love, what the bible says about it, etc.. I think that's great for a 70 year old to enjoy her faith just as you enjoy being an atheist.

I was raised Catholic (even attended catholic school), but am now agnostic/atheist. There was no doom & gloom.

[SassyPants]

Jessa had taken over the homeschooling while M was dealing with premie Josie...and she continued playing teacher even when M was back on her feet and able. Now that Jessa is gone, I'm concerned that there is even less attention being paid to the remaining homeschoolers. When was the last time you saw a kidlet wearing a chore pack??? I haven't seen one since James was a little.

Good god I wish I could be a fly on the wall in their house for a day!

I thought when Jessa started a relationship with Ben, Mrs Query stepped in to teach?