Why do some Christians threaten some people that they will burn in Hell?

I was reading today about a Christian preacher shouting at two homosexuals that they would burn in Hell. I wonder why anyone would do this. Do they think that what they say will scare 'sinners' into giving up their 'sin'? - Surely they know that that is not at all likely to happen. - Most people these days do not believe in God, and an even larger majority of people do not believe in Hell, or that homosexuals will go to Hell. - And why would a preacher who believes in God want to make unbelievers start to believe in a God who punishes 'sinners' to an eternity in Hell? Do these Christians want non-believers to believe in such a cruel God and to become as hate-filled as they are?

Years ago, crazed with long, unbearable toothache and months of inadequate sleep and insufficient food, because of the long, cruel negligence of senior dental staff at the Charles Clifford Dental Hospital, I became suicidal. It seemed to me that death was the only way to end the pain. A retired vicar who lived near to me at the time wagged his finger at me, and with a face contorted with anger told me that if I killed myself I would go straight to Hell!

I was already in Hell. See here and here.

Why, I wonder, did the retired vicar not direct his remonstrations and threats to the dental staff who were responsible for my continued suffering and who could easily have dealt with the abscesses for me and ended my pain and sleeplessness? - That's an easy question to answer: he didn't have the guts. - He did say to me once that he had written to an important churchman he knew - a Dean of a Cathedral - and asked him if he would help me to get the treatment I was being refused! - This other guy - the Dean - also lacked guts. - He'd written back that he would ask the negligent dentists to deal with the toothache for me if I would first obtain a certificate of sanity that he could show people so that he didn't get into trouble for intervening on my behalf! - The retired vicar then toddled round to me and asked me if I'd let him have a certificate of sanity!

An American assessment of the UK phonehacking scandal

Here's an American assessment of the UK phonehacking scandal. This thoughtful article is followed by equally thoughtful and pertinent comments by George W. Drance and "Lynn", the former drawing attention to the fraud and corruption perpetrated by rogue lawyers, who, like the British press, lack an independent regulatory body, and the latter pointing up the harm done to society when members of the professions, by dint of being accorded unmerited respect, are allowed to practise dishonesty and get away with it. I have myself come to realise that massive flaws in the practice of Law play a huge part in the ever-increasing instances of Medical Negligence and the avoidable suffering that results from it (See, for example, Lawyers Can Seriously Damage Your Health, by Michael Joseph). And I whole-heartedly agree with Lynn on the widespread suffering caused by professionals' dishonest behaviour. My own experiences illustrate the truth of both George W. Drance's and Lynn's Comments. See Fighting the System and Long in the Toothache.

Taking Amitriptyline for oral/mouth pain is not a good idea

Taking Amitriptyline for oral/mouth pain is not a good idea in my opinion. Amitriptyline is a tricyclic antidepressant that is sometimes prescribed as a painkiller, particularly when the pain is in the mouth. This is often because the prescribing doctor doesn't really believe that the patient actually is in pain, especially if the patient is female.

Doctors who prescribe amitriptyline for pain sometimes explain to the patient that amitriptyline is an antidepressant drug that can help with pain, but often these doctors deliberately deceive the patients into believing that amitriptyline actually is a painkiller and do not mention that it is an antidepressant, and that they are prescribing it because they have decided the patient is 'a depressive', not a person in pain. Doctors often confuse depression and pain, unfortunately.

Whatever the ins and outs of the matter, amitriptyline is not a good idea for mouth pain. - For one thing antidepressants work no better than dummy pills for depression. For another thing, they usually cause unhealthy weight gain and all its attendant health problems. And amitriptyline in particular causes 'dry mouth', which patients are told will stop when their body has got used to the drug, but which often does not stop however long they are unfortunate enough to be on the drug.

Now 'dry mouth'/lack of saliva obviously makes dental decay more likely, especially of the lower teeth, since normally many of these are bathed in saliva most of the time, and this inbuilt natural 'mouthwash', therefore, protects the teeth to some extent from food residue clinging to them. Furthermore, saliva is a buffer solution which chemically protects teeth from acid attack. So existing mouth pain is likely to be augmented by the development of dental caries, making matters worse, not better.

Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday is the first day of Lent, the Christian season that is customarily a time of reflection, repentance and self-denial. It symbolises the 40 days in which Jesus fasted in the wilderness and was tempted by the Devil. He withstood the three tests and banished the devil with the words, "Get thee behind me, Satan."

It was on Ash Wednesday years ago that the then Bishop of Sheffield, David Lunn, came to see me in my home.

I had been seeking his help in my endeavours to put an end to the appallingly cruel treatment being meted out to some patients at the Charles Clifford Dental Hospital in order to cover up sustained clinical negligence. See the account of my personal experience of this. He had not wanted to help, but had not wanted to admit that he did not want to help. He had made several excuses first. Then at last he had had me to see him at the Bishop's Palace. I was shown into the library there, and waited a little while there, on my own, until he came into the room. I found it a forbidding room, with its daunting collection of commentaries on St Paul. I'd have felt happier with books about Jesus.

He had already checked up on me with Professor Eric Wilkes, whom we both knew and respected: checked that I was a person who told the truth, and Prof had assured him I was. I had told Prof that I was seeking the Bishop's help. At that meeting in his library, I left some further information with him and he later wrote to me arranging the Ash Wednesday visit.

He arrived in his purple bishop's cassock and stayed a long time - I forget how long. He said he would need some of the lords in the House of Lords to help him to deal with the matter. I had asked him to ensure that patients with agonising toothache, needing dental help, would not be told at that dental hospital (or indeed any other) that they were not in pain and were 'just depressed', without properly examining the patients' teeth! and to give the dentists a statutory duty to examine the patients' teeth. Mr Reg Dinsdale, the negligent consultant dentist who did me the most harm, had told me he was not going to 'indulge' me by having necessary X-rays done! (I have written about him in my short story, Long in the Toothache.)

So I set about getting some lords to help the bishop. I was already in contact with the secretary of a society - I think it was called something like The Human Rights Society. I had already helped her to help a guy in the North-East who had been so atrociously treated in his dealings with the NHS and was so sick of being ignored or insulted (but never helped) by the useless NHS Complaints Procedures, and by his MP, that he had gone to London to the Houses of Parliament and had nailed his hand to a door there! to try to get someone to do something about all the NHS cruelty. - He still didn't get any help... - I had talked about him on local radio, and sent him a recording of the interview, and it had lifted his spirits to know that his shocking treatment was at least no longer completely ignored.

I asked that secretary if she could help me. She said the society was only small and not very active, but it had several lords among its membership. She asked these lords if they would help and they said they would, but that the Bishop would have to introduce the matter in the House of Lords and then they would support him in the matter. When the Bishop had left me that Ash Wednesday, he had said to me that in approaching anyone about the matter after that day, I could quote him at any time and in any context (I remember those were his exact words) that he had investigated the matter and knew that I was telling the truth and he would support me in the matter. I asked him to write me a short note to that effect and sign it but he said that that would not be necessary; I could trust him to keep his word.

Excitedly, I wrote to him to tell him that there were these lords happy to support him in the House of Lords. I never heard from him again!

I wrote to him again. He did not reply. I rang him. His newly-appointed secretary had clearly been told by him that I was a nutter, and she spoke to me as though I was half-witted. Neither she nor he answered my letters and he refused to speak to me on the phone. I can only surmise that he had supposed that I would be unable to get any lords to back him up in the House of Lords and so had felt safe in assuming that his promise to speak on the matter would never need to be kept. And he had most shamefully lied to me when he had told me that I could quote him at any time and in any context that he had investigated the matter and knew that I was telling the truth and he would support me in the matter.

Organ meat is very nutritious and also inexpensive

Organ meat is very nutritious and also inexpensive. My favourite is lamb's liver, which is very easy to cook. - Just pan-fry it lightly. - But my friend, Bill, recently told me about a good way of cooking lamb's heart. This is what he wrote:

"I have a really easy way of cooking.

I made a deep slit in one of the hearts and stuffed in 3 or 4 crushed garlic cloves, sprinkled with ground black pepper and wrapped in tin foil.

Then baked in the oven for one and a half hours at 170 centigrade.

The meat is so tender and full of flavour, and does not need chewing."

When I tried it, I baked it for an extra half-hour because of my constant toothache. It certainly was tender and full of flavour. You may like to try it.

David Tench, solicitor and consumer rights champion, who died last month, was remembered on Radio 4's "Last Word" today

David Tench, solicitor and consumer rights champion, who died last month, was remembered on Radio 4's Last Word today, along with four other people. I well remember That's Life, the TV consumer programme from the 70s, for which he worked as legal expert. Until hearing Last Word today, I had not realised that it is David Tench to whom we should all be very grateful for pushing through the Unfair Contract Terms Act of 1977 and the Consumer Protection Act 1987. (See the obituary in the Independent for further details of his life and work.)

We need another such campaigning, public-spirited solicitor/patient rights champion today, to work to reform the appallingly unjust, unfair laws that obtain with regard to medical and surgical treatment both by the NHS and by private healthcare providers. As things are, when patients are harmed by health professionals, they and their families find that the professionals who have harmed them are almost wholly safe from punishment. They are, to all intents and purposes, above the Law. Complaints Procedures are futile and civil court cases are ruinously expensive for the victims who have to pay court costs and wait weary, costly years to get to court at all, if they can manage to stay alive that long.

We need to reduce the terrible toll of suffering and cost that this unaccountability of the medical profession results in. To do that, we need a Law of Contract to apply to doctors and their patients/victims. A law that is not written in such complicated language that lay people cannot understand it, and does not contain terms that are unfair to the patient. We need some lawyers who are on the side of the patients to have a hand in drafting all legal stuff to make sure it protects patients. As it is, there is, effectively, no protection whatsoever for patients against negligent or even deliberately malicious treatment from health professionals. I speak from personal experience on this matter. - Read Fighting the System, which is my online account of my experience. I also wrote a Short Story about this, called Long in the Toothache.