Ministry Members Charged in Baltimore After Baby's Body Is Found

[Are_grits_groceries]

Members of One Mind Ministries drew little notice in the working-class Baltimore neighborhood where they lived in a nondescript brick rowhouse.

But inside, prosecutors say, horrors were unfolding: Answering to a leader called Queen Antoinette, they denied a 16-month-old boy food and water because he did not say "Amen" at mealtimes. After he died, they prayed over his body for days, expecting a resurrection, then packed it into a suitcase with mothballs. They left it in a shed in Philadelphia, where it remained for a year before detectives found it last spring.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/28/AR2009032801936.html?hpid=moreheadlines

Plea Deal Includes Resurrection Clause
Accepting a plea bargain that her attorney described as unprecedented in American jurisprudence, a 22-year-old Maryland woman yesterday agreed to cooperate in the prosecution of other defendants in the death of her son under the condition that charges against her be dropped if the child rises from the dead.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/story/2009/03/28/ST2009032802114.html?sid=ST2009032802114

Speechless............

[smoogatz]

1. Another one for the "religion as mental illness" file.

Cripers.

[Renew Deal]

4. Nice cheap shot at believers.

[Teaser]

6. I'd rather take my shots at God.

He's the one that's got it coming.

[smoogatz]

12. Are you saying these people weren't religious?

Or that they weren't mentally ill?

[Renew Deal]

14. I'm saying that your comment is a broad brush smear.

And that they're not the only ones showing their mental illness in this case.

[smoogatz]

16. So you're suggesting that these are isolated incidents?

Because it seems to me that shit like this happens all the time. But yeah, I'm the one who's crazy.


:crazy:

[imdjh]

13. I'll grant you that I don't know where the line is.

And someone can make me out a hypocrite with things I say about various religions, but I see a difference between someone who believes that God is going to destroy the world soon and is making plans for it, and someone who takes the word of a human being that god wants him to kill a child and then does it.

[Warpy]

15. From the article

"Silverman said he and prosecutors think Ramkissoon was brainwashed and should have been found not criminally responsible; prosecutors declined to comment. Although an inability to think critically can be a sign of brainwashing, experts said, the line between that and some religious beliefs can be difficult to discern.

"At times there can be an overlap between extreme religious conviction and delusion," said Robert Jay Lifton, a cult expert and psychiatrist who lectures at Harvard Medical School. "It's a difficult area for psychiatry and the legal system."

I know it's uncomfortable for believers to admit this, but there is no crazy like god crazy. It's responsible for a great deal of evil in this world.

[Kali]

8. I can't believe they let the resurrection bit be included

the mother isn't the only freak in this deal

[TahitiNut]

10. Hell... I couldn't care less if that was a STANDARD part of all plea bargains.

:shrug:

[smoogatz]

17. It's just weird

taking the criminal's delusion into account in a plea bargain. But yeah, for all the good it'll do them...

[ogneopasno]

2. That poor little boy.

[Teaser]

3. goddammit I just want to hit something right now

a little boy. goddammit. goddamit.

fuck humanity.

[Solly Mack]

5. Woah

Damn

WTF

Geawwds

[Marrah_G]

7. I hope there is a way to take down that monster " queen antoinette"

[Blue_Tires]

9. ugh..words fail me

[TahitiNut]

11. I wonder if they caught all the moths and castrated them themselves.

:eyes: