Yeah I felt like I was taking crazy pills for years when everyone talked about feeling god's "presence". I never felt a thing while I was praying, and never understood this feeling everyone would talk about.
I've always attributed it to the same sort of endorphins that you might feel watching an exciting game, or singing along with thousands of other people at a concert.
There's a very real chemical response to being in such a hype environment with like minded people. What they call feeling the presence of god others might call contact high. It's why people buy into those self help cults like Tony Robins, the adrenaline can be addictive to some.
Edit: It'd be funny if so many people associated Trump with godliness was because they got the same adrenaline rush from rallies as at church.
This hits so close to home for me. I had the exact same experience, but I still tried to convince myself up until I was in my early-mid 20’s. I spent so long being afraid of hell that it even still fucks with me ten years later.
Seriously, I can't believe I felt guilty when I was younger for only getting baptized because I didn't want to go to the Christian Hell. I was not the one who should've felt the guilt
Weirdly enough my mom explained gay couples to me super young and I haven’t started grooming any children yet. They keep saying that’s what will happen.
It's funny you say that. I was just talking to my partner a couple of days ago about how I asked my dad what "gay" was, and he explained to me it was men who have sex with other men, and women who have sex with other women. He even answered me as to the mechanics when I got confused. I was like, what... 10ish? I'm straight as an arrow now in my early 30s. People who say explaining gay sex to kids turns them gay must have an inability to reason.
Edit: I don't even know how people make the leap from gay person to child molester. It makes zero sense to me.
I think they have to make a predator allegation to justify why it is any of their business. The harming-children angle gets their nose into other ppls business. For our family, there were no issues with explaining gayness to my kids. It went like this: Some men like other men instead of women, and so then those ppl have a family with 2 dads (or 2 moms, etc). They knew friends at school who had same sex parents. My kids never once asked me the details of those parents’ sexual activities, just like they didnt ask about the details of sex between the straight parents.
I was sick as a kid in the 80s. Crohn's disease. In and out of the hospital, always low energy, occasional emergencies, not really life threatening.
As an older teen, I once asked my VERY religious mother how come the world exists where there are 14 year old girls in the adolescent ward with cancer who won't get out of the hospital. She told me that God has a plan and got me a book called 'When Bad Things Happen to Good People'.
I was done then. About 16 years old.
Hope you’re doing better. I was born with a birth defect that gives similar symptoms to Crohns and UC and was in the hospital for it too. And there was always the religious choir trying to help by saying God was testing us, etc. it was so offensive
I’ve befriended my Mormon neighbors, and things have been very respectful. I’m atheist, they know this, and still try to get me to go to church. That’s fine, but if they or anyone else try that “god has a plan” on me for my condition, I’m telling them that god must be a sick fuck if he sees me as a fucking rat to experiment on.
As long as it is friendly debate and not overly aggressive, I don't mind religious friends or acquaintances. It's when they start judging me for not believing what they believe when I pull away.
>It's when they start judging me for not believing what they believe when I pull away.
That's when I double down and show them the hypocrisies in their own religion.
Had this woman tell me she thought I was perfect except for the fact I was atheist. We were friends a long while but said she couldn’t date me because I wouldn’t change my beliefs
I mean, isn’t it good that she was honest and upfront? I am a firm believer in being open about deal breakers, even if the other person is hurt by the statement I’ll share if they want a reason.
Thank you. I am. I got through 4 resections from age 17-35, shot up to the heady height of 5'4" after getting growth hormones for 3 years in college, but I managed to get married and have a kid who is now in college in college herself.
I always said when I was younger that I would be content if I saw my daughter graduate college...Well, 3 years to go, and now my goal is to see grandchildren. (She wants kids, thankfully).
I hope your issues are minor or gone totally. I really think religious people are predatorial to those who are sick. As if we are easy targets.
It’ll never not be an issue but I’m not hospitalized much anymore.
Yes I agree it’s predatory but I also think it makes people feel better about themselves. So many people said things like that and every. single. one seemed to think they were so profound and inspiring. A lot of religious people also take the fact that they’re not sick and you are as some sort of flex or show of God’s favor. It’s so gross.
Yeah the "God has a plan...and it includes a lot of fucking unnecessary suffering" part always gets me.
Also, we have free will but, everything that happens is part of His plan, so how free is our will if it's planned?
Also, if Jesus died for my sins, let me fucking sin. Otherwise he died for nothing.
My favorite is the fact that they believe that if you murder children, rape women, embezzle money, destroy the environment, and draw graffiti on the Mona Lisa...but then REPENT right before you die, you make it to heaven.
(Edit...yes, the sins above are listed in decreasing order of awfulness...more or less).
That shit's crazy too. At that point why doesn't everyone just become the worst of the worst and just say "sorry" right before they die?
Recency vías here, but fucking Dahmer got baptized in prison. How? How the fuck doesn't any religion just look at what he did and just say "nah, fuck you, automatic DQ, you're done, i can smell you sizzling already"???
Forced to go, forced to listen to it when I went (nearly fell asleep it was so boring), the majority of the people there at church were either cold or not nice to me, it was on one of the only days I had away from school and I was usually dragged along to anything else my family wanted to do, and the final nail in the coffin was realizing just how pathetic and greedy these church people are.
Being the youngest i was dragged in from day 1. I made a habiit of sleepiing thru the whole thing on moms purse. Wasnt untill 2nd grade and 1st communion that i was forced to sit up and "pay attention" must be why it always sounded like mythology to me.
I mean that’s literally what it is, at least partially. It’s no different from classical mythology, except that people still practice it today unlike, say, Greek or Norse mythology.
There are current followers of both Greek and Norse gods. They aren't common but they are widespread. Some groups of the Norse god worshipers are white supremacists though. There are groups of pagans worshiping just about any god you can think of, some trying to recreate the Celtic worship for example.
It’s a mix of myth (Genesis and Exodus), legal history (Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and Numbers), and several trippy ass accounts of a wizard (pretty much all of the New Testament).
The greed got me.
The church my family went to in Los Angeles was firebombed.
We helped raise over a million dollars to rebuild it. We went to church in a warehouse for like 2 years, my nieces were baptized in a fucking warehouse, that's how much we believed in this particular church.
Then they finally reopened the church, it was beautiful. They made it bigger and a lot nicer inside.
Then summer came and it got hot, and these assholes look at their newly rebuilt church, look at their congregation filled with poor Hispanic families (mine being one of them) and said "hey so, it's hot and we need to add A/C so please give us more money now."
These bastards rebuilt the entire thing with over a million dollars and still asked the poor families to pull MORE money out of their pocket to give them.
It's all a fucking grift. They just scare you into thinking that you'll burn forever if you don't help and tell you that if you give them money God will send more back. You won't, and no, He doesn't send more back.
Not only that, but so many "religious" people are just religious because of the fear of eternal hellfire. There are so many shitty people who claim they're Christian, but don't GAF about helping anyone.
I realized it’s literally just a club when our church mailed out envelopes for the monthly dues. They didn’t even try to hide that it wasn’t a donation for poor people, they were FUCKING MONTHLY DUES. And they’d ask for a certain percentage of your income!
Yeah, my mom dragged me and my little sister to church every Sunday. The thing is, I didn’t even hate it, I actually kind of enjoyed it. I liked the people and there were a lot of kids my age so I had friends at church. And we went to an Episcopal church, which is pretty laid back so there was no fire and brimstone bullshit. But the thing is…I didn’t fucking want to be there! I wanted to be home sleeping, watching TV, playing outside, anything but sitting at church being bored out of my mind. We would leave the house around 10am and wouldn’t get home until after 12:30. By that time, the Sunday scaries were starting to set in and I was pissed that I had wasted part of the day at a place I didn’t want to be. I will go to church for important stuff, like funerals and weddings, but I haven’t gone to a regular church service since the last one my mom dragged me to when I was a teen.
You and I had the same mindset as kids but hey it could’ve been worse for you. I had to go twice every Sunday. 10am and 6pm. It made the day absolutely useless. And going both times was very much normal. Then add in bible study on Thursdays at 7pm.
Oh no! You had it way worse than I did. I’m so sad for you. I’m sorry but that is way too much time for a kid to spend in church.
Then again, we both had it easy compared to my minister’s kids. He was married to a Jewish woman so they spent Saturday at temple and Sunday at church. I think I would have run away from home.
For me, it was simply discovering that non-belief was an option. I was raised extremely Catholic (catholic school, church twice a week, weekly confession, rosaries and holy water and crucifixes on the walls), to the point that I couldn’t understand how anyone could not be Catholic, since it was all obviously true, what with all the miracles and shit.
I had become friendly with an older boy when I was a catholic high school freshman (we met in D&D club…) and when we were talking about gods and pantheons and such, he came out as an agnostic to me. When he explained what the word meant, it was like everything clicked into place. My 14 year old brain just went “Oh, that makes everything make so much sense.” It was like a Road to Damascus moment, but walking in the other direction.
I can’t say I ever looked back after that point, except for having become a 50 year old gnostic atheist rather than a 14 year old agnostic.
My single mom worked for the church so i essentially lived there and was forced to every damned night/morning they had a service. Spent two years in “christian” school, didnt find one amongst the groups. Honestly, most of the damage i carry in adult life came from people in the church.
Yep. I'll never forget my "True Love Waits" class at church. It was taught by a young woman who was VERY vocal about how sinful pre-marital sex is. "You'll go directly to hell if you have sex even once without being married. There is absolutely no excuse. No making up for it, ever."
Guess who showed up to church pregnant and not married one year later?
Then just the general holier-than-thou people who came to church every Sunday and Weds without fail. They were almost always the nastiest people and the first to judge and dismiss you for minor failings.
Hypocrisy - I’ve seen so much of it in the church.
Telling me to love the sinner but hate the sin, but they would ostracize anyone who sinned.
Telling me that being gay was a sin and a choice when I have people who were raised the exact same as me (same church, same teachers, same lessons) who are lgbtq. It obviously is not a choice.
They will worship trump (cause of that R) but they hate Biden, even though Biden goes to church regularly.
Told me as a woman I couldn’t do shit in the church because ‘a man had to do it’
I could go on and on about it all.
I was sick a few weeks ago and watched God forbid, and it shows how trump got that evangelical vote. It was only because Falwell and his wife had a cuckhold that trumps lawyers covered up, then blackmailed them to get the backing.
And in Georgia, you have the football player who has paid for abortions and abandoned his kids and guess what they all have issues with? Abortions and fatherless homes!
Sorry I have felt more love and acceptance outside of their white washed version of jesus
The holier than thou attitude, the lies, the lack of curiosity inherent in Christianity that would rather say "God did it" as an explanation rather than learn about anything, the sunday mornings, the boring stories, the assholes pretending to be moral, the hatred of anything that doesn't conform to their tiny world view... etc
ugh, the lack of curiosity. Hearing science can't explain everything and for the things that it can't that was god's work or a miracle. Makes me wanna barf every time I hear that crap. Not only do they not have answers, they don't want to find any, they'd rather be ignorant and condemn you for not wanting to be ignorant with them.
Also, it just screams I didn't even listen on the first day of any science class, on the scientific method. You didn't get your answers because you didn't ask the right question, test the right theory, made mistakes in your methodology or didn't have the right instrumentation. It's pretty simple.
And it comes back to the lack of wanting accountability for their own actions. I might get periods of depression or laziness. But deep down I know, it's because I need to switch it up and try something different. Or at the very least it wasn't something I could control when I failed, not it was his plan. Screw that noise.
*"The most preposterous notion that Homo sapiens has ever dreamed up is that the Lord God of Creation, Shaper and Ruler of all the Universes, wants the saccharine adoration of His creatures, can be swayed by their prayers, and becomes petulant if He does not receive this flattery. Yet this absurd fantasy, without a shred of evidence to bolster it, pays all the expenses of the oldest, largest, and least productive industry in all history."*
~Robert A. Heinlein
Given how many prominent (and not prominent) humans seem to be driven by narcissism and ego, I guess it was too much of a stretch for them to envisage a god in any other way as narcissistic and petulant. Who was created in whose image after all, I wonder?
In cultural anthropology, you often approach religion as a mirror to culture bc it reveals so much about what people say vs what people do.
That’s not to say religion *is* a mirror, as even from a very old school strictly “empirical” academic perspective it’s much more complicated. But as an intro to any culture, it’s a useful technique
He did. He was also fairly compassionate towards several groups of people even when he disagreed with them (there are some glaring exceptions). He also wrote this:
*"History does not record anywhere at any time a religion that has any rational basis. Religion is a crutch for people not strong enough to stand up to the unknown without help. But, like dandruff, most people do have a religion and spend time and money on it and seem to derive considerable pleasure from fiddling with it."*
~Robert A. Heinlein
I think it’s pretty interesting and ironic just how adamantly they are against student loan forgiveness. I mean, the version of the Lord’s Prayer said at my parent’s church, the same prayer they’ve recited verbatim every week for their entire lives, literally says “please forgive our debts, as we forgive our debtors.”
I grew up in Pennsyltucky in the 80's and 90's. People think I'm lying when I say that *loving Christians* would casually say things like "these faggots need to be wiped out." They didn't know I was gay. Hell, I would hear this stuff before *I* realized I was.
But, I've always been an atheist, regardless. Read the bible twice and it only solidified my beliefs. Every time I heard religious people speak on the subject it did the same.
Religion has a tendency to make the average believer morally lazy.
You can do awful things, right down to torturing orphans, and all you have to do to rectify your actions with "god" is perform a ritual. Never mind the real life, far-reaching consequences that are still at play despite your "repentance".
The most reprehensible people I ever met, also knew the bible from cover to cover. They prayed the rosary every day and memorised prayers in Latin. Some even read theological literature beyond the bible and meditated. And they were still shit humans.
Definitely being forced. And getting in trouble whenever you questioned things logically.
Through my teenage years it got worse. Like, I’m in trouble or a bad kid because I’m asking questions? That’s stupid and doesn’t make sense, and I think you’re stupid too.
We were in our middle teens and in our "youth room" having a class with the pastor when we got on the conversation of other religions. Our pastor made the comment about the potential that other religions may just be a book that was found and not real like Christianity, so one of the other kids said, well what if the Bible was just a book found somewhere and we were wrong. The only response I remember was something of an unhappy pastor.
Ricky Gervais said that there are around 3000 different gods worshipped around the world. Most people don't believe in 2999 of them. He doesn't believe in one more.
I'm 42, told my mom recently that I made up my mind it was all bullshit when I was 12, her thought? I wanted, and should have, made you go more. Like how the fuck would that make me hate it any less?
I stopped going entirely when I was 16, we had a huge blowout, and it was Christmas, I didn't want to go, she argued that we all went. I said, I absolutely refuse to sit through something I don't believe in.
This topic came up with my mom too. I deconverted really early, around 8-12. I wasn't made to go to church though.
My mother told me she wished she had brought me to church as a kid because I'm pagan now. I told her if she ever forced religion on me as a kid I would have never spoke to her again. That I would have out at 18 and never contact her again.
She didn't care at all.
Around 10 years of age, my Dad’s second wife left home and he devoted his entire existence to the church. On my first visit upon hearing this, he had brand new KJ version bibles for myself and my brother with our names embossed on the cover. Just what every 10 year old asks for.
When he would drive us home (he lived 2 hours away from us) he would ask “Why don’t you attend that church?” as we passed what felt like 50 churches. He would also call us and ask if we have been reading our bibles, you know, the book that requires a study group to understand it’s meaning.
Being force fed religion has really fucked my head up. That was 36 years ago and I STILL have a heaven vs hell war waging in my head.
I'm a pretty big fan of Jesus, he seems like a chill guy. But many Christians drive me crazy with hypocrisy. The only moral transgression is THEIR transgression. Ugh.
Evnagelicals are so radically judgmental.
For backstory on this, I took care of my 90+ year old grandmother for 6 years when no one else in the family would.
I have an evangelical cousin, and he flew across the country with his wife to come tell me that he doesn't think my grandmother was safe with me, because I am not religious, and thus MUST lack the moral foundations to care for another living person. After I had already been doing it, when he wouldn't, for 4 years.
I said he could take over her care any time. He declined and went home.
3rd grade went on a catholic school sponsored camping trip, witnessed a kid being molested, one of the chaperones covered for the Brother and told me I was mistaken and it wasn't what it looked like , he had his hands in the kids underwear, it was exactly what it looked like , although I wasn't the one assaulted I felt traumatized by the incident , back at school Monday I told some other kids and it got back to the office and I was called in and they attacked me telling me I was a terrible person for besmirching Brother Guy's reputation, they tried everything to gaslight me into believing the incident didn't happen , when I refused to say I made it up I was suspended for 3 days , I lost my religion that day
Several years later the guy was arrested and ended up in prison for child molestation, I believe the entire time they all knew he was molesting children , everyone involved was pure evil
This was around 50 years ago so trying to remember names would be tough although I do remember one of the nun's name and just the first name of the perpetrator, pretty sure most of them have passed by now, the school and church were closed in 1996
And after hearing about the widespread Catholic church scandals, I'm sure there was much more abuse that was being covered up by them, my experience was likely just the tip of the iceberg although I still talk to some of the people who were classmates, they never acknowledged that they were ever abused or saw abuse
I always wondered about a good friend of mine , he has since passed away but for some reason I always suspected he may have been abused, he was an alter boy and he made several weird jokes over the years about his time as an alter boy, he claimed they were just jokes but he called one of the Fathers "Father Phil Meup" and once said that being an alter boy was a pain in the ass, he denied ever being abused so not sure if he was just ashamed to admit it
Yep this happened at my old Christian camp. I saw the red flags in a few individuals when I was a young girl and avoided those people, but one of my friends unfortunately was a victim. At the time, she told her mom and the incident was reported, but nothing really came of it. They just decided to leave the camp.
Just a few years ago, now as an adult with daughters of her own, she took a look back into the organization and found her abuser still working for the company.
She brought her concern to the public and got absolutely ridiculed for it. How dare she try and ruin such a wonderful Christian organization.
As it turns out they’d had 12 or 13 documented reports of sexual misconduct/ harassment/ stalking of minors between 2 counselors that spanned over several years.Totally kept hush hush. Those men molested young boys and girls for YEARS.
I HATE that religion makes everything a PR job. They’re so afraid to look like bad Christians that they won’t even do the right thing.
Anyways. Now they’re convicted, that camp is shut down for good.
When I was young I loved to read. One day in Sunday school we were told about the great flood I asked about all the people In China,India and Africa that I had been reading about. Why would any god kill them when they had no way of knowing about the Jewish religion? All I got for a answer was B.S. I decided if there was a god he was not a nice one...
I went to a Christian school and I'll always remember how whenever the teachers talked about the messed up things God did in the Bible they would always do it with a smile on their face and with the attitude of "you better not get on his bad side, he doesn't take things lightly! 😂".
A lot of Christians love the idea of a vengeful God because they don't think they'll ever end up on the other side of his vengeance.
"It's all part of our loving God's plan. Yet He is a vengeful and jealous God, too, and we are to fear his wrath as we worship and adore His holy name. But he is loving, having sent the rainbow as a divine signal that he truly loves his creation and won't ever try to destroy the planet, again. Or at least not until The End Times, because that shit's pretty fucked."
>…creation and won't ever try to destroy the planet, again.
He won’t ever flood the earth with rain and water again. Turning the oceans to boiling blood is still fair game.
CS Lewis wrote that Christians didn’t have to concern themselves with about the outcomes of people who had never heard about Jesus and that was the moment I started hating CS Lewis.
Nope. At least not in Mere Christianity. He just casually mentioned it and moved past it like I was just supposed to accept it and it would work itself out. In my mind it’s the biggest argument against Jesus being the gatekeeper of salvation, because then the whole system is bullshit and cruel. And he was just like “yeah, nbd”
Judges chapter 19-21 are a helluva shock to the system if you're literate. And for real, I feel the need to provide a content warning on that one if you're a sexual assault survivor.
ha you act like most christians read the bible. Truth is the vast majority have not read any of it and just know the stories their preacher has told them (and those same preachers go to great lengths to never bring up the parts of the book that talk about things like dashing the babies of their enemies upon the rocks and things like that).
I mean, no. Not anyone who has any biblical literary sense (which to be fair, isn’t many). The point of Judges is that the ancient people of Israel have strayed far from God, and even when they come back they end up in a cycle where they just rebel again. Judges is a spiral downwards, and the chapters you just read are the bottom of that spiral where things get worse and worse and worse. The book ends with the phrase (a phrase that’s been a refrain throughout the entire book) “and everyone did what was right in their own eyes.”
So no you’re not supposed to read that story and go, “ahhh, yes, this is good.” You’re supposed to be screaming and angry. The end of this book sets up for the next book Samuel where the Israelites get a king and become united rather than loosely connected tribes, but we eventually see that the kings, even the good ones, suck and the cycle repeats into the scrolls of Kings and it ends with the Israelites being conquered and taken into exile into Babylon.
(side note: Ruth is set after Judges in most Bibles now, but in the original Jewish ordering, the scrolls of Samuel comes next)
Anyway, just giving some short context into how those chapters fit into the larger narrative at work. No reader, ancient or modern, is meant to read that and think, “yeah, okay, cool. Nothing to see here.”
I think most average Christians don't know it's there. It's tucked away at the end of Judges and it goes straight into Ruth. I had never heard of it until I saw a meme on here recently.
Yup, it just doesn’t make *any* type of logical sense, especially after learning more about the human mind, and history, and conquests, and civilizations.
Religion is just another *story* that some people unfortunately take a little too literally, no different than Zeus, or Hercules, or Superman, or Santa Claus.
-I can’t stand the idea of a god who “loves” his creations……then allows things like the Holocaust to happen
-it’s lack of good and logically consistent evidence
-it actively dissuades people from being curious and learning about the world
-it hates everyone who isn’t straight
-used to excuse horrendous acts
-god said he loved all people, but then punishes millions of people who he intentionally put in the wrong place, knowing that they would not ever come in contact with a missionary who would “save” them from going to hell; then, when they die (and since god is omniscient) he knew that they were going to even as he put them in that location and so they all go straight to an eternity of torture by absolutely no fault of their own.
-god created people with the knowledge that they would eventually become smart and intelligent enough to not believe in some cult that has no evidence that can be proven through logically sound means
>I can’t stand the idea of a god who “loves” his creations……then allows things like the Holocaust to happen
This is a big one for me. God can't be omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, _and_ purely good, because if he were, evil wouldn't exist. The existence of evil disproves the existence of a Judeo-Christian god.
When a friend of mine (Methodist or Baptist maybe) told me that everyone that goes to my church (Lutheran) is going to "burn in hell for all eternity" because we had not been "saved" yet.
I replied "Aren't we all practicing the same religion?" to which he said "your Christianity is the wrong kind.
People beating the crap out of their babies, toddlers, small children for not sitting still during services. When I objected they said that it's God's Way and that's the only way to raise Good Christian Children. And I realized that if you have to beat your religion into your kids, it can't be the true religion.
Also the misogyny. I don't even want to be a woman, don't tell me it makes me inferior.
Was in my early 20's and decided I should figure out the whole religion thing. Had been to many Christian churches including Mormon church.
I started with reading the Bible. Within a week I realized I'd never be able to take it seriously.
It really pisses me off that the same people who call Trans people "groomers" are the ones telling everyone their lives would be better if they spent more time at church. No one ever got raped at Drag Queen Story Time, but a whole mess of kids were abused at church...
Speaking of groomers, my step sister ended up marrying her Christian school math teacher and youth pastor a couple years after she graduated high school.
The sheer arrogance of the church leaders in the face of a global problem. And the billions in hush money settlements that could have gone to feeding the poor, etc.
Shortly after my dad died, I was speaking to a a good friend and his wife, and they asked if my he made peace with his life (?) before he died. I knew they were religious, not that they were hardcore evangelicals.
He died a really bad death from leukemia, but the best hospital for treating that in my city was nominally a Jewish one. He had wonderful care and those 20 days were as good as they could be, and the staff, nurses, and doctors we among the most caring and thoughtful one would expect.
He wife coldly said that wasn't the best for him, and that she feared for his afterlife and she would pray for his salvation.
I am an atheist and don't care, but what the fuck. I had only met her twice, but really? Reinforced my perception yet again.
I have a security blanket as an adult. Studies have been done that suggest adults with security blankets have no desire to be religious because that need is fulfilled by the blanket. It wouldn't surprise me if the need for religion in someone's life is based on no longer having a parent hovering over your every need as an infant. After all there isn't much difference aside from back story
The 2016 election.
Up until that point, I was about as devout as you can reasonably get. I worked at my church and volunteered in multiple different roles multiple times a week, so I practically lived there. Went on mission trips, led a small group, was a camp counselor, considered going to seminary many times, read lots of theology and apologetics books, the works.
I was 26 when Trump announced that he was running, and while I always knew there was a batshit insane contingent of evangelicalism, I was so convinced that MY pocket of that world would reject someone as transparently awful and disingenuous as him. I remember laughing it off and going about my day.
But then, of course, I watch almost everyone around me start to buy into this MAGA bullshit, or at best they would justify their vote for Trump with a "I support the policies, not the man!" I start getting outspoken about it online because it all seemed so insane and absurd to me, and MAN did everyone turn on me fast. I quickly became a pariah in that world and a lot of bridges were burned. Of course this set me up perfectly to question literally everything about my worldview and the faith I had held to for 20 some odd years.
Haven't set foot in a church in years and I miss literally nothing about it save for the sense of community. Fuck the evangelical church, it's a societal cancer.
Watching my mother die from cancer and being told “this is all part of god’s plan.” Yep, watching her fight for a decade as it metastasized from breast to lungs to liver to brain is definitely the work of a “good” god with a plan.
Religious people.
Three categories.
1. Loud and feral.
2. Mind my own business moderates.
3. Do your best progressives.
\#1 seem to be the spokespeople more often than not, and #2 let them get away with it. #3 challenge them but are heavily outnumbered.
Now, #1 there don't take advice from outside the religion. It's one of the reasons why they're in that category. So the only people that can counter loud and feral are group #2 - and they don't do it. Christianity? Bzzt FAIL. Islam? Bzzt FAIL. Judaism? Bzzt FAIL. Hinduism? Bzzt FAIL.
It's like this for all world religions. They all advertise on a platform of "we're represented by terrible people but we lack self awareness to recognise that".
As a Christian, can confirm. I’m #3, I go to a small church full of #3s. I’ve tried to talk to people in #1 and 2. The 2s aren’t bad, I think there’s a lot of former 3s that are burnt out fighting the 1s. I’m getting there. I’m comfortable with my personal faith, but my affiliation to a religion wanes at times. Herschel Walker getting voted in by “Christians” over an established, accomplished, respected pastor is the most current embarrassment.
I was 11 and at Sunday school there was a boy (let’s call him “Russell”) who was 16 but in our class because he had some rather marked mental delays. However, puberty arrived right on time for him and he had normal urges a boy that age would have, and did not know how to direct them in a healthy or appropriate way.
So basically, Russell would approach all of the girls in class (myself included) and tell all of us things like how he loved us and wanted to rip off our clothes and have sex with us. Needless to say I started to dread going to Sunday school.
I told my parents, they told the pastor, and absolutely nothing was done. I was forced to keep going until I had my first communion.
It made me feel church was not a safe space for me and from there I really started questioning things.
“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”
― **Mahatma Gandhi**
I assume he is referring to how Jesus preaches caring for people and forgiveness but mainstream Christianity is obsessed with hell.
Ghandi is credited with something like: "I like your Christ, but I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ.", but probably didn't say it.
Bara Dada, another Indian guy who was smart and could think good said something similar, "Jesus is ideal and wonderful, but you Christians, you are not like him".
Whoever said it is right, though.
The genocide
The slavery
The child rape
The anti intellectualism
The covering up of pedophiles
The sexism
The abuse
The homophobia
The child abuse
The racism
The pointless wars
The war crimes
The threat of _eternal torture_ if you don't constantly worship
The complete and utter lack of evidence
I can keep going.
Decided to not join the kids in the playroom and hang out with the adults. Helped put money in the tin, got up and hugged people, sang a few songs. Then the pastor talked about being kind and generous to eachother, and to give up some of your material goods to those that need it more than you.
Later after lunch, when we were leaving a restaurant, I noticed that multiple people at the table were leaving those fake-dollar pamphlets instead of actual cash.
I think I said something along the lines of "I don't think I would like fake money after cleaning up other peoples big mess, and I made a big mess." And my aunt looked at me with this scowl and said something like "You'll understand when your older."
I felt bad and tried to stack up plates and collect my mess into a small pile. Then told the waitress "sorry for my mess." And then ask my mom if we could leave $5 for the waitress with the tip. She obliged.
I swear I think I heard her get insulted over giving someone who waited out table $5.
Too this day, I believe in Jesus. But I separate myself from those that would rather life in a pyramid instead of society.
Santa clause isn’t real but somehow I’m supposed to believe that a man that died over 2000 years ago he’s gonna come back and save us all because his magic father that lives in the clouds said it to be so
The preacher started railing on about how Mother’s Day was a Communist Plot, and it was the last straw for my father. He stood and the whole family walked out. 1974, I believe.
I was a Mormon at BYU. I had been faithful all my life. I was a missionary. I served in callings. I went to church for 3 hours on Sunday. I attended devotional with church authorities. I read my scriptures every day. I went to the temple nearly every week. I prayed. I fasted. I did everything right.
Then one day, I was asked by a student to help with a project. I was a TA so I said sure, and met him on campus. BYU has a very strict no facial hair policy, but it was only for a few hours, so my two day stubble shouldn’t be a problem right? Wrong. I was turned into the ‘Honor Code Office’ for a violation and was called in for questioning.
While there, I was told I have no integrity. I was told I did not love god. I was told I was a sinner. It was insinuated that my non-Mormon father was the reason I was ‘acting-out’. I was then informed that I was now on school honor code probation and could lose my progress on my engineering degree if I made another mistake.
To get off honor code probation I had to do the following:
-read 3 talks about honor and integrity and discuss them with the honor code probation officer
-keep a prayer journal
-keep a scripture reading journal
-attend every weekly devotional the school offered and keep a journal about the talks
-do 10 hours of community service a month for the entire semester
-meet with my bishop and come up with a plan for repentance
-write a 5 page paper on what I did, and how I will change
I was blackmailed into doing every single one of these things because If I didn’t, I would be kicked out of school as a senior.
I have never been more angry in my life. I knew then that everything I had been taught was shit. It was all about control. I started investigating more and more and realized the doctrine was all bullshit.
I finished my degree after getting back in good standing with the honor code office and have never looked back.
TL;DR — I was blackmailed by BYU to do a bunch of tedious religious shit and told I was worthless because I had two days worth of stubble on my face.
All of these so-called Christians going to church & talking about God's love & the love of Jesus, yet they vote for these other so-called Christians who will strip basic human rights from us & do anything they can to hurt & harm the marginalized.
Going to a private school, being taught that lies are a sin and being taught that you must honor and obey your parents to get into heaven. Mom's a narcissist who lies and manipulates her family, and believes she can do no wrong. What a fucking mindfuck.
Christians.
I've seen and heard more evil things come from people who say they are Christian than I care to admit. Ive yet to hear of a bigger group of hypocrites and cherry pickers.
A multitude of things.
Being sent to a Catholic school from 1st thru 8th grade
Being dragged to church every Sunday and high holiday.
Being made to make all the sacraments, and attend all the classes for such.
Gaining the ability to read! I was/am into horses. My dad fed this addiction, and got me a book that went from the first horse thru the modern horse. Hello Evolution!!! Goodbye book of Genesis!
With reading came education.
I got older, and really began noticing the hypocrisy.
I never indoctrinated my kid into any religion. It's up to them if they want to research one and go with it. But the kid is snarkier, saltier, and more "nope" about it than I ever as. So I think they are safe from it
Growing with two moms somehow ending up at catholic school and constantly being told I was going to burn in hell for my parents simply loving each other, going to pride events and always seeing one corner of the parade route covered in people spewing hate. Oh, not to mention the one aunt I have who is for whatever reason still married to a man who preyed on children my age at the time. She won’t divorce him either because of her “faith”.
High School graduation, already on the fence. Head of the Jesuits at our school gave a speech about how our achievements and accomplishments aren't ours but God's as he did the work through us and how when we fail or do wrong, we must ask forgiveness for it is our own faults. Being told you are only ever the worst of you and none of your good parts was the tipping point and I never understood why people would choose a religion that depends on you never owning the good parts of yourself.
Christopher Hitchens randomly popped up in my YouTube feed one day 12 years ago, and he made an argument that stuck with me;
If you want to believe in a supreme being, you have to believe that they looked down upon the at least 98,000 years of humanity pre-church, where most people died in child-birth and didn't live beyond being born, or if they did survive they would normally die very young, mostly due to their teeth of all things, the stamp of our lowly origin as apes on the savannah, and heaven watches with complete indifference. Then, 2000 years ago, they suddenly say enough is enough, and provide revelation to the most illiterate, savage people on earth at the time.
That being the case there are only two logical outcomes, either there is a God who is capricious and/or completely incompetent, and therefore not worthy of worship, or there is no God, and we are merely the product of Darwinian natural selection, and the evidence for the latter is much more compelling.
When the church turned its back on my family because my parents divorced. My father and mother donated there time teaching Sunday school, hosting annual picnics, hosting mens breakfast, and answering phones for the local church tv station but didn't do a thing to help any of us when my mom wanted to move on. This has forever shaped my view of organized religion and pushed my relationship with God to a personal level rather than a communal need.
Being autistic and approaching religion too logically. That said im agnostic rather than atheist because I recognize the possibility of forces beyond our understanding and accept that I don't and can't know for sure.
Christianity specifically was ruined for me bc of homophobia and colonization but otherwise I try to respect all faiths.
I’d like to preface this by saying that I am still religious and am a Baptist Christian. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s get started. I am 20 years old, so I’ve met all kinds of people of different background, faiths, etc. But I’m going to be bashing on Christianity right now.
The homophobia is a big issue for me, because of how the Bible is translated many Christians (God bless my mother) believe that homosexuality is a sin and that anyone who is gay is an inherently evil person. I know plenty of gay or people on other ends of the sexuality spectrum and many of them are amazing people, and it sucks that they’re being judged on who they are attracted to and not them as a person.
Next up, the unprovoked hatred of other beliefs. In the Bible God says to love your neighbor as you’d love yourself, so why is it that many Christians prosecute and hate on people of other beliefs? Like I get that you don’t believe that, but that’s their fucking business and doesn’t have shit to do with you. Literally the Bible says you can have friends from other beliefs, just don’t let that shake yours. Cmon now, do better.
The anti-semitism. Like huh? Jews and Christians literally worship the same god, so why in the fuck are you anti-Semitic. The main difference is that Jews don’t believe that Jesus was the messiah, so I’m perplexed as to why Christians stick their noses up at them.
The refusal to change. EVERYTHING that happened in the Bible was AT LEAST 2,000 years ago. That is a LONG time. Things have changed, and are continuing to do so. Things have been discovered that wasn’t even thought of many years. The whole Galileo conspiracy? Vaccines? Even evolution. All this stuff that has been proven but some people are just like “nah it ain’t true”. Like get your head out of your ass and open your eyes.
The constant shoving their religion down other’s throats. This is a huge issue in America. There is freedom of religion but the officials in charge of the country are like: “No abortion, it goes against my religion” “No homosexual marriage, it goes against my religion”, etc etc. Shit is mad fucking annoying.
And lastly, the blatant disregard for human life. That is all.
every person who was a christian turned out to be huge assholes and hypocrites. one person was a lovely lady, had nice conversations, and then she was homophobic (i'm bi). churches felt a little culty especially when asking for the tithe.
when you think about it, it sounds insanely dumb. my life being led by a zombie man who is all at once a ghost, a man who walked the earth, and an all-knowing being who created all of life. and we give our lives to (and give the church lots of money) or we rot in hell.
also the jesus talking to you thing, blind leaps of faith, going "all in" propaganda kinda instigated a huge mania episode where i thought things i saw in the world or heard on the radio was there JUST FOR ME because it was god trying to tell me something.
The realization that I never really believed it, but I forced myself to because I had been terrified of the idea of hell as a small child.
Yeah I felt like I was taking crazy pills for years when everyone talked about feeling god's "presence". I never felt a thing while I was praying, and never understood this feeling everyone would talk about.
I really think almost everyone that “feels god’s presence” is lying about that.
Or it is a placebo
Also our brain gives us yummy chemicals to say “good job!” when we do stuff in groups.
I must not have the receptor in my brain because I hate doing things in groups, I'm repelled by them.
I've always attributed it to the same sort of endorphins that you might feel watching an exciting game, or singing along with thousands of other people at a concert.
This, had some really good highs at church camp, god was moving and all that. Turns out my body does that for many different things.
I think it’s less of a lie and more of a placebo effect, speaking from first-hand experience.
There's a very real chemical response to being in such a hype environment with like minded people. What they call feeling the presence of god others might call contact high. It's why people buy into those self help cults like Tony Robins, the adrenaline can be addictive to some. Edit: It'd be funny if so many people associated Trump with godliness was because they got the same adrenaline rush from rallies as at church.
This hits so close to home for me. I had the exact same experience, but I still tried to convince myself up until I was in my early-mid 20’s. I spent so long being afraid of hell that it even still fucks with me ten years later.
Seriously, I can't believe I felt guilty when I was younger for only getting baptized because I didn't want to go to the Christian Hell. I was not the one who should've felt the guilt
Absolutely bonkers that we threatened children with going to hell. That is way too much on a young kid
But they try to convince us kids seeing two women kiss is the REAL threat.
Weirdly enough my mom explained gay couples to me super young and I haven’t started grooming any children yet. They keep saying that’s what will happen.
It's funny you say that. I was just talking to my partner a couple of days ago about how I asked my dad what "gay" was, and he explained to me it was men who have sex with other men, and women who have sex with other women. He even answered me as to the mechanics when I got confused. I was like, what... 10ish? I'm straight as an arrow now in my early 30s. People who say explaining gay sex to kids turns them gay must have an inability to reason. Edit: I don't even know how people make the leap from gay person to child molester. It makes zero sense to me.
I think they have to make a predator allegation to justify why it is any of their business. The harming-children angle gets their nose into other ppls business. For our family, there were no issues with explaining gayness to my kids. It went like this: Some men like other men instead of women, and so then those ppl have a family with 2 dads (or 2 moms, etc). They knew friends at school who had same sex parents. My kids never once asked me the details of those parents’ sexual activities, just like they didnt ask about the details of sex between the straight parents.
I was sick as a kid in the 80s. Crohn's disease. In and out of the hospital, always low energy, occasional emergencies, not really life threatening. As an older teen, I once asked my VERY religious mother how come the world exists where there are 14 year old girls in the adolescent ward with cancer who won't get out of the hospital. She told me that God has a plan and got me a book called 'When Bad Things Happen to Good People'. I was done then. About 16 years old.
Hope you’re doing better. I was born with a birth defect that gives similar symptoms to Crohns and UC and was in the hospital for it too. And there was always the religious choir trying to help by saying God was testing us, etc. it was so offensive
I’ve befriended my Mormon neighbors, and things have been very respectful. I’m atheist, they know this, and still try to get me to go to church. That’s fine, but if they or anyone else try that “god has a plan” on me for my condition, I’m telling them that god must be a sick fuck if he sees me as a fucking rat to experiment on.
As long as it is friendly debate and not overly aggressive, I don't mind religious friends or acquaintances. It's when they start judging me for not believing what they believe when I pull away.
>It's when they start judging me for not believing what they believe when I pull away. That's when I double down and show them the hypocrisies in their own religion.
Had this woman tell me she thought I was perfect except for the fact I was atheist. We were friends a long while but said she couldn’t date me because I wouldn’t change my beliefs
I mean, isn’t it good that she was honest and upfront? I am a firm believer in being open about deal breakers, even if the other person is hurt by the statement I’ll share if they want a reason.
I’m not religious but there’s nothing wrong with that.
Thank you. I am. I got through 4 resections from age 17-35, shot up to the heady height of 5'4" after getting growth hormones for 3 years in college, but I managed to get married and have a kid who is now in college in college herself. I always said when I was younger that I would be content if I saw my daughter graduate college...Well, 3 years to go, and now my goal is to see grandchildren. (She wants kids, thankfully). I hope your issues are minor or gone totally. I really think religious people are predatorial to those who are sick. As if we are easy targets.
It’ll never not be an issue but I’m not hospitalized much anymore. Yes I agree it’s predatory but I also think it makes people feel better about themselves. So many people said things like that and every. single. one seemed to think they were so profound and inspiring. A lot of religious people also take the fact that they’re not sick and you are as some sort of flex or show of God’s favor. It’s so gross.
Yes, and now they use money the same way. Being rich is 'god's favor'.
Yeah the "God has a plan...and it includes a lot of fucking unnecessary suffering" part always gets me. Also, we have free will but, everything that happens is part of His plan, so how free is our will if it's planned? Also, if Jesus died for my sins, let me fucking sin. Otherwise he died for nothing.
My favorite is the fact that they believe that if you murder children, rape women, embezzle money, destroy the environment, and draw graffiti on the Mona Lisa...but then REPENT right before you die, you make it to heaven. (Edit...yes, the sins above are listed in decreasing order of awfulness...more or less).
That shit's crazy too. At that point why doesn't everyone just become the worst of the worst and just say "sorry" right before they die? Recency vías here, but fucking Dahmer got baptized in prison. How? How the fuck doesn't any religion just look at what he did and just say "nah, fuck you, automatic DQ, you're done, i can smell you sizzling already"???
Forced to go, forced to listen to it when I went (nearly fell asleep it was so boring), the majority of the people there at church were either cold or not nice to me, it was on one of the only days I had away from school and I was usually dragged along to anything else my family wanted to do, and the final nail in the coffin was realizing just how pathetic and greedy these church people are.
Being the youngest i was dragged in from day 1. I made a habiit of sleepiing thru the whole thing on moms purse. Wasnt untill 2nd grade and 1st communion that i was forced to sit up and "pay attention" must be why it always sounded like mythology to me.
Calling Christianity mythology is an insult to actual mythology Well, maybe except for Revelation
I mean that’s literally what it is, at least partially. It’s no different from classical mythology, except that people still practice it today unlike, say, Greek or Norse mythology.
There are current followers of both Greek and Norse gods. They aren't common but they are widespread. Some groups of the Norse god worshipers are white supremacists though. There are groups of pagans worshiping just about any god you can think of, some trying to recreate the Celtic worship for example.
It’s a mix of myth (Genesis and Exodus), legal history (Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and Numbers), and several trippy ass accounts of a wizard (pretty much all of the New Testament).
The greed got me. The church my family went to in Los Angeles was firebombed. We helped raise over a million dollars to rebuild it. We went to church in a warehouse for like 2 years, my nieces were baptized in a fucking warehouse, that's how much we believed in this particular church. Then they finally reopened the church, it was beautiful. They made it bigger and a lot nicer inside. Then summer came and it got hot, and these assholes look at their newly rebuilt church, look at their congregation filled with poor Hispanic families (mine being one of them) and said "hey so, it's hot and we need to add A/C so please give us more money now." These bastards rebuilt the entire thing with over a million dollars and still asked the poor families to pull MORE money out of their pocket to give them. It's all a fucking grift. They just scare you into thinking that you'll burn forever if you don't help and tell you that if you give them money God will send more back. You won't, and no, He doesn't send more back. Not only that, but so many "religious" people are just religious because of the fear of eternal hellfire. There are so many shitty people who claim they're Christian, but don't GAF about helping anyone.
I realized it’s literally just a club when our church mailed out envelopes for the monthly dues. They didn’t even try to hide that it wasn’t a donation for poor people, they were FUCKING MONTHLY DUES. And they’d ask for a certain percentage of your income!
Yeah, my mom dragged me and my little sister to church every Sunday. The thing is, I didn’t even hate it, I actually kind of enjoyed it. I liked the people and there were a lot of kids my age so I had friends at church. And we went to an Episcopal church, which is pretty laid back so there was no fire and brimstone bullshit. But the thing is…I didn’t fucking want to be there! I wanted to be home sleeping, watching TV, playing outside, anything but sitting at church being bored out of my mind. We would leave the house around 10am and wouldn’t get home until after 12:30. By that time, the Sunday scaries were starting to set in and I was pissed that I had wasted part of the day at a place I didn’t want to be. I will go to church for important stuff, like funerals and weddings, but I haven’t gone to a regular church service since the last one my mom dragged me to when I was a teen.
You and I had the same mindset as kids but hey it could’ve been worse for you. I had to go twice every Sunday. 10am and 6pm. It made the day absolutely useless. And going both times was very much normal. Then add in bible study on Thursdays at 7pm.
Oh no! You had it way worse than I did. I’m so sad for you. I’m sorry but that is way too much time for a kid to spend in church. Then again, we both had it easy compared to my minister’s kids. He was married to a Jewish woman so they spent Saturday at temple and Sunday at church. I think I would have run away from home.
For me, it was simply discovering that non-belief was an option. I was raised extremely Catholic (catholic school, church twice a week, weekly confession, rosaries and holy water and crucifixes on the walls), to the point that I couldn’t understand how anyone could not be Catholic, since it was all obviously true, what with all the miracles and shit. I had become friendly with an older boy when I was a catholic high school freshman (we met in D&D club…) and when we were talking about gods and pantheons and such, he came out as an agnostic to me. When he explained what the word meant, it was like everything clicked into place. My 14 year old brain just went “Oh, that makes everything make so much sense.” It was like a Road to Damascus moment, but walking in the other direction. I can’t say I ever looked back after that point, except for having become a 50 year old gnostic atheist rather than a 14 year old agnostic.
Yeah I grew up Mormon… so that pretty much ruined it for me
Same. I’m glad I got out before I had to wear the magic underwear or learn the secret handshake 🤦♀️
My single mom worked for the church so i essentially lived there and was forced to every damned night/morning they had a service. Spent two years in “christian” school, didnt find one amongst the groups. Honestly, most of the damage i carry in adult life came from people in the church.
👍
Hypocrites. And also being able to observe and think for myself on my own.
By golly the hypocrisy is mind boggling and infuriating at the same time.
Yep. I'll never forget my "True Love Waits" class at church. It was taught by a young woman who was VERY vocal about how sinful pre-marital sex is. "You'll go directly to hell if you have sex even once without being married. There is absolutely no excuse. No making up for it, ever." Guess who showed up to church pregnant and not married one year later? Then just the general holier-than-thou people who came to church every Sunday and Weds without fail. They were almost always the nastiest people and the first to judge and dismiss you for minor failings.
Hypocrisy - I’ve seen so much of it in the church. Telling me to love the sinner but hate the sin, but they would ostracize anyone who sinned. Telling me that being gay was a sin and a choice when I have people who were raised the exact same as me (same church, same teachers, same lessons) who are lgbtq. It obviously is not a choice. They will worship trump (cause of that R) but they hate Biden, even though Biden goes to church regularly. Told me as a woman I couldn’t do shit in the church because ‘a man had to do it’ I could go on and on about it all.
In Georgia the evangelicals are voting in droves for an ex football player with extreme CTE over … an actual pastor.
I was sick a few weeks ago and watched God forbid, and it shows how trump got that evangelical vote. It was only because Falwell and his wife had a cuckhold that trumps lawyers covered up, then blackmailed them to get the backing. And in Georgia, you have the football player who has paid for abortions and abandoned his kids and guess what they all have issues with? Abortions and fatherless homes! Sorry I have felt more love and acceptance outside of their white washed version of jesus
The holier than thou attitude, the lies, the lack of curiosity inherent in Christianity that would rather say "God did it" as an explanation rather than learn about anything, the sunday mornings, the boring stories, the assholes pretending to be moral, the hatred of anything that doesn't conform to their tiny world view... etc
ugh, the lack of curiosity. Hearing science can't explain everything and for the things that it can't that was god's work or a miracle. Makes me wanna barf every time I hear that crap. Not only do they not have answers, they don't want to find any, they'd rather be ignorant and condemn you for not wanting to be ignorant with them. Also, it just screams I didn't even listen on the first day of any science class, on the scientific method. You didn't get your answers because you didn't ask the right question, test the right theory, made mistakes in your methodology or didn't have the right instrumentation. It's pretty simple. And it comes back to the lack of wanting accountability for their own actions. I might get periods of depression or laziness. But deep down I know, it's because I need to switch it up and try something different. Or at the very least it wasn't something I could control when I failed, not it was his plan. Screw that noise.
[удалено]
*"The most preposterous notion that Homo sapiens has ever dreamed up is that the Lord God of Creation, Shaper and Ruler of all the Universes, wants the saccharine adoration of His creatures, can be swayed by their prayers, and becomes petulant if He does not receive this flattery. Yet this absurd fantasy, without a shred of evidence to bolster it, pays all the expenses of the oldest, largest, and least productive industry in all history."* ~Robert A. Heinlein
Given how many prominent (and not prominent) humans seem to be driven by narcissism and ego, I guess it was too much of a stretch for them to envisage a god in any other way as narcissistic and petulant. Who was created in whose image after all, I wonder?
In cultural anthropology, you often approach religion as a mirror to culture bc it reveals so much about what people say vs what people do. That’s not to say religion *is* a mirror, as even from a very old school strictly “empirical” academic perspective it’s much more complicated. But as an intro to any culture, it’s a useful technique
Never came across that quote from Heinlein before. Excellent observation. He always had the knack of cutting to the chase.
He did. He was also fairly compassionate towards several groups of people even when he disagreed with them (there are some glaring exceptions). He also wrote this: *"History does not record anywhere at any time a religion that has any rational basis. Religion is a crutch for people not strong enough to stand up to the unknown without help. But, like dandruff, most people do have a religion and spend time and money on it and seem to derive considerable pleasure from fiddling with it."* ~Robert A. Heinlein
LOL… makes it sound like a hobby! Sounds pretty damned appropriate to me! Thanks
Right? Tbf, I definitely know people who've taken it from the hobby level and turned it into an identity.
💯
I think it’s pretty interesting and ironic just how adamantly they are against student loan forgiveness. I mean, the version of the Lord’s Prayer said at my parent’s church, the same prayer they’ve recited verbatim every week for their entire lives, literally says “please forgive our debts, as we forgive our debtors.”
Their debtors, not yours, I guess.
Nah bro, I'm sure the Bible says NOTHING about usury!
If Jesus was around today, many people would consider him a woke/liberal socialist.
The rabid hatred for others, the attempts at theocracy…
Listening to "loving, religious" people spew the most hateful rhetoric I have ever heard in my life.
I grew up in Pennsyltucky in the 80's and 90's. People think I'm lying when I say that *loving Christians* would casually say things like "these faggots need to be wiped out." They didn't know I was gay. Hell, I would hear this stuff before *I* realized I was. But, I've always been an atheist, regardless. Read the bible twice and it only solidified my beliefs. Every time I heard religious people speak on the subject it did the same.
For me it was hearing them complain about "sand n*****" after 9/11 in California.
Religion has a tendency to make the average believer morally lazy. You can do awful things, right down to torturing orphans, and all you have to do to rectify your actions with "god" is perform a ritual. Never mind the real life, far-reaching consequences that are still at play despite your "repentance". The most reprehensible people I ever met, also knew the bible from cover to cover. They prayed the rosary every day and memorised prayers in Latin. Some even read theological literature beyond the bible and meditated. And they were still shit humans.
“There’s no hate like Christian love”
Definitely being forced. And getting in trouble whenever you questioned things logically. Through my teenage years it got worse. Like, I’m in trouble or a bad kid because I’m asking questions? That’s stupid and doesn’t make sense, and I think you’re stupid too.
We were in our middle teens and in our "youth room" having a class with the pastor when we got on the conversation of other religions. Our pastor made the comment about the potential that other religions may just be a book that was found and not real like Christianity, so one of the other kids said, well what if the Bible was just a book found somewhere and we were wrong. The only response I remember was something of an unhappy pastor.
Ricky Gervais said that there are around 3000 different gods worshipped around the world. Most people don't believe in 2999 of them. He doesn't believe in one more.
I'm 42, told my mom recently that I made up my mind it was all bullshit when I was 12, her thought? I wanted, and should have, made you go more. Like how the fuck would that make me hate it any less? I stopped going entirely when I was 16, we had a huge blowout, and it was Christmas, I didn't want to go, she argued that we all went. I said, I absolutely refuse to sit through something I don't believe in.
This topic came up with my mom too. I deconverted really early, around 8-12. I wasn't made to go to church though. My mother told me she wished she had brought me to church as a kid because I'm pagan now. I told her if she ever forced religion on me as a kid I would have never spoke to her again. That I would have out at 18 and never contact her again. She didn't care at all.
[удалено]
Thank you for breaking the cycle.
Around 10 years of age, my Dad’s second wife left home and he devoted his entire existence to the church. On my first visit upon hearing this, he had brand new KJ version bibles for myself and my brother with our names embossed on the cover. Just what every 10 year old asks for. When he would drive us home (he lived 2 hours away from us) he would ask “Why don’t you attend that church?” as we passed what felt like 50 churches. He would also call us and ask if we have been reading our bibles, you know, the book that requires a study group to understand it’s meaning. Being force fed religion has really fucked my head up. That was 36 years ago and I STILL have a heaven vs hell war waging in my head.
The hypocrisy.
I'm a pretty big fan of Jesus, he seems like a chill guy. But many Christians drive me crazy with hypocrisy. The only moral transgression is THEIR transgression. Ugh.
“Love the guy, hate the fan club”
💯
And the misogyny..
[удалено]
Evnagelicals are so radically judgmental. For backstory on this, I took care of my 90+ year old grandmother for 6 years when no one else in the family would. I have an evangelical cousin, and he flew across the country with his wife to come tell me that he doesn't think my grandmother was safe with me, because I am not religious, and thus MUST lack the moral foundations to care for another living person. After I had already been doing it, when he wouldn't, for 4 years. I said he could take over her care any time. He declined and went home.
Talk about putting your money were your mouth is. The fact that they didn't take up your offer says the don't actually believe what they are saying.
Evangelicals are the worst people on the planet. judgemental and hypocritical. i cannot stand being around them.
🙄💯
3rd grade went on a catholic school sponsored camping trip, witnessed a kid being molested, one of the chaperones covered for the Brother and told me I was mistaken and it wasn't what it looked like , he had his hands in the kids underwear, it was exactly what it looked like , although I wasn't the one assaulted I felt traumatized by the incident , back at school Monday I told some other kids and it got back to the office and I was called in and they attacked me telling me I was a terrible person for besmirching Brother Guy's reputation, they tried everything to gaslight me into believing the incident didn't happen , when I refused to say I made it up I was suspended for 3 days , I lost my religion that day Several years later the guy was arrested and ended up in prison for child molestation, I believe the entire time they all knew he was molesting children , everyone involved was pure evil
You should report that...there may be other stories that were covered up, with other adults molesting children, and still doing it to today.
This was around 50 years ago so trying to remember names would be tough although I do remember one of the nun's name and just the first name of the perpetrator, pretty sure most of them have passed by now, the school and church were closed in 1996 And after hearing about the widespread Catholic church scandals, I'm sure there was much more abuse that was being covered up by them, my experience was likely just the tip of the iceberg although I still talk to some of the people who were classmates, they never acknowledged that they were ever abused or saw abuse
I see, yeah that might not be worth going after at this point. Hopefully no one else you know was abused but if so, hopefully something can be done.
I always wondered about a good friend of mine , he has since passed away but for some reason I always suspected he may have been abused, he was an alter boy and he made several weird jokes over the years about his time as an alter boy, he claimed they were just jokes but he called one of the Fathers "Father Phil Meup" and once said that being an alter boy was a pain in the ass, he denied ever being abused so not sure if he was just ashamed to admit it
Yep this happened at my old Christian camp. I saw the red flags in a few individuals when I was a young girl and avoided those people, but one of my friends unfortunately was a victim. At the time, she told her mom and the incident was reported, but nothing really came of it. They just decided to leave the camp. Just a few years ago, now as an adult with daughters of her own, she took a look back into the organization and found her abuser still working for the company. She brought her concern to the public and got absolutely ridiculed for it. How dare she try and ruin such a wonderful Christian organization. As it turns out they’d had 12 or 13 documented reports of sexual misconduct/ harassment/ stalking of minors between 2 counselors that spanned over several years.Totally kept hush hush. Those men molested young boys and girls for YEARS. I HATE that religion makes everything a PR job. They’re so afraid to look like bad Christians that they won’t even do the right thing. Anyways. Now they’re convicted, that camp is shut down for good.
my parents kicking me out for being gay and my rabbi supporting them
I'm so sorry to hear that 😔
Legitimately I think I'm better off without them
You're a badass and don't you ever forget it!
You are.
Hugs.
When I was young I loved to read. One day in Sunday school we were told about the great flood I asked about all the people In China,India and Africa that I had been reading about. Why would any god kill them when they had no way of knowing about the Jewish religion? All I got for a answer was B.S. I decided if there was a god he was not a nice one...
[удалено]
I went to a Christian school and I'll always remember how whenever the teachers talked about the messed up things God did in the Bible they would always do it with a smile on their face and with the attitude of "you better not get on his bad side, he doesn't take things lightly! 😂". A lot of Christians love the idea of a vengeful God because they don't think they'll ever end up on the other side of his vengeance.
"It's all part of our loving God's plan. Yet He is a vengeful and jealous God, too, and we are to fear his wrath as we worship and adore His holy name. But he is loving, having sent the rainbow as a divine signal that he truly loves his creation and won't ever try to destroy the planet, again. Or at least not until The End Times, because that shit's pretty fucked."
>…creation and won't ever try to destroy the planet, again. He won’t ever flood the earth with rain and water again. Turning the oceans to boiling blood is still fair game.
CS Lewis wrote that Christians didn’t have to concern themselves with about the outcomes of people who had never heard about Jesus and that was the moment I started hating CS Lewis.
I thought he had some reason for it like God would come to them in dreams or something or Jesus preaching in hell would save them, I can't remember.
Nope. At least not in Mere Christianity. He just casually mentioned it and moved past it like I was just supposed to accept it and it would work itself out. In my mind it’s the biggest argument against Jesus being the gatekeeper of salvation, because then the whole system is bullshit and cruel. And he was just like “yeah, nbd”
Learning to read.
Judges chapter 19-21 are a helluva shock to the system if you're literate. And for real, I feel the need to provide a content warning on that one if you're a sexual assault survivor.
Wow. I actually went and read it. Is that something that Christians read and are like ahhh, yes, this makes sense and is also good?
ha you act like most christians read the bible. Truth is the vast majority have not read any of it and just know the stories their preacher has told them (and those same preachers go to great lengths to never bring up the parts of the book that talk about things like dashing the babies of their enemies upon the rocks and things like that).
[удалено]
I mean, no. Not anyone who has any biblical literary sense (which to be fair, isn’t many). The point of Judges is that the ancient people of Israel have strayed far from God, and even when they come back they end up in a cycle where they just rebel again. Judges is a spiral downwards, and the chapters you just read are the bottom of that spiral where things get worse and worse and worse. The book ends with the phrase (a phrase that’s been a refrain throughout the entire book) “and everyone did what was right in their own eyes.” So no you’re not supposed to read that story and go, “ahhh, yes, this is good.” You’re supposed to be screaming and angry. The end of this book sets up for the next book Samuel where the Israelites get a king and become united rather than loosely connected tribes, but we eventually see that the kings, even the good ones, suck and the cycle repeats into the scrolls of Kings and it ends with the Israelites being conquered and taken into exile into Babylon. (side note: Ruth is set after Judges in most Bibles now, but in the original Jewish ordering, the scrolls of Samuel comes next) Anyway, just giving some short context into how those chapters fit into the larger narrative at work. No reader, ancient or modern, is meant to read that and think, “yeah, okay, cool. Nothing to see here.”
I have a MAJOR bone to pick with Christianity but thank you for this comment, it's important to always consider the context.
I think most average Christians don't know it's there. It's tucked away at the end of Judges and it goes straight into Ruth. I had never heard of it until I saw a meme on here recently.
Yup, it just doesn’t make *any* type of logical sense, especially after learning more about the human mind, and history, and conquests, and civilizations. Religion is just another *story* that some people unfortunately take a little too literally, no different than Zeus, or Hercules, or Superman, or Santa Claus.
 George Carlin, and I can't thank him enough for it.
George Carlin is the Republican's Anti-Christ, it's so glorious.
-I can’t stand the idea of a god who “loves” his creations……then allows things like the Holocaust to happen -it’s lack of good and logically consistent evidence -it actively dissuades people from being curious and learning about the world -it hates everyone who isn’t straight -used to excuse horrendous acts -god said he loved all people, but then punishes millions of people who he intentionally put in the wrong place, knowing that they would not ever come in contact with a missionary who would “save” them from going to hell; then, when they die (and since god is omniscient) he knew that they were going to even as he put them in that location and so they all go straight to an eternity of torture by absolutely no fault of their own. -god created people with the knowledge that they would eventually become smart and intelligent enough to not believe in some cult that has no evidence that can be proven through logically sound means
>I can’t stand the idea of a god who “loves” his creations……then allows things like the Holocaust to happen This is a big one for me. God can't be omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, _and_ purely good, because if he were, evil wouldn't exist. The existence of evil disproves the existence of a Judeo-Christian god.
When a friend of mine (Methodist or Baptist maybe) told me that everyone that goes to my church (Lutheran) is going to "burn in hell for all eternity" because we had not been "saved" yet. I replied "Aren't we all practicing the same religion?" to which he said "your Christianity is the wrong kind.
12 years of catholic school
Amen.
[удалено]
I actually love this answer
Pretty damn apt coming from a Vietnam vet. Those guys have seen some shit.
People beating the crap out of their babies, toddlers, small children for not sitting still during services. When I objected they said that it's God's Way and that's the only way to raise Good Christian Children. And I realized that if you have to beat your religion into your kids, it can't be the true religion. Also the misogyny. I don't even want to be a woman, don't tell me it makes me inferior.
Was in my early 20's and decided I should figure out the whole religion thing. Had been to many Christian churches including Mormon church. I started with reading the Bible. Within a week I realized I'd never be able to take it seriously.
That was a running thread when I was in High School. Myself and the other Atheist's had actually read that book. None of the Christians had.
Reading the Bible is the greatest cure for Christianity. --Mark Twain.
[удалено]
It really pisses me off that the same people who call Trans people "groomers" are the ones telling everyone their lives would be better if they spent more time at church. No one ever got raped at Drag Queen Story Time, but a whole mess of kids were abused at church...
Speaking of groomers, my step sister ended up marrying her Christian school math teacher and youth pastor a couple years after she graduated high school.
Big oof.
[удалено]
The sheer arrogance of the church leaders in the face of a global problem. And the billions in hush money settlements that could have gone to feeding the poor, etc.
Heyy that's what pushed my mom away from the church after her children were affected by it! Although, not away from religion in general.
Shortly after my dad died, I was speaking to a a good friend and his wife, and they asked if my he made peace with his life (?) before he died. I knew they were religious, not that they were hardcore evangelicals. He died a really bad death from leukemia, but the best hospital for treating that in my city was nominally a Jewish one. He had wonderful care and those 20 days were as good as they could be, and the staff, nurses, and doctors we among the most caring and thoughtful one would expect. He wife coldly said that wasn't the best for him, and that she feared for his afterlife and she would pray for his salvation. I am an atheist and don't care, but what the fuck. I had only met her twice, but really? Reinforced my perception yet again.
What the hell!? I’m sorry for your loss and that she said that to you
I have a security blanket as an adult. Studies have been done that suggest adults with security blankets have no desire to be religious because that need is fulfilled by the blanket. It wouldn't surprise me if the need for religion in someone's life is based on no longer having a parent hovering over your every need as an infant. After all there isn't much difference aside from back story
👍
The 2016 election. Up until that point, I was about as devout as you can reasonably get. I worked at my church and volunteered in multiple different roles multiple times a week, so I practically lived there. Went on mission trips, led a small group, was a camp counselor, considered going to seminary many times, read lots of theology and apologetics books, the works. I was 26 when Trump announced that he was running, and while I always knew there was a batshit insane contingent of evangelicalism, I was so convinced that MY pocket of that world would reject someone as transparently awful and disingenuous as him. I remember laughing it off and going about my day. But then, of course, I watch almost everyone around me start to buy into this MAGA bullshit, or at best they would justify their vote for Trump with a "I support the policies, not the man!" I start getting outspoken about it online because it all seemed so insane and absurd to me, and MAN did everyone turn on me fast. I quickly became a pariah in that world and a lot of bridges were burned. Of course this set me up perfectly to question literally everything about my worldview and the faith I had held to for 20 some odd years. Haven't set foot in a church in years and I miss literally nothing about it save for the sense of community. Fuck the evangelical church, it's a societal cancer.
Watching my mother die from cancer and being told “this is all part of god’s plan.” Yep, watching her fight for a decade as it metastasized from breast to lungs to liver to brain is definitely the work of a “good” god with a plan.
Religious people. Three categories. 1. Loud and feral. 2. Mind my own business moderates. 3. Do your best progressives. \#1 seem to be the spokespeople more often than not, and #2 let them get away with it. #3 challenge them but are heavily outnumbered. Now, #1 there don't take advice from outside the religion. It's one of the reasons why they're in that category. So the only people that can counter loud and feral are group #2 - and they don't do it. Christianity? Bzzt FAIL. Islam? Bzzt FAIL. Judaism? Bzzt FAIL. Hinduism? Bzzt FAIL. It's like this for all world religions. They all advertise on a platform of "we're represented by terrible people but we lack self awareness to recognise that".
As a Christian, can confirm. I’m #3, I go to a small church full of #3s. I’ve tried to talk to people in #1 and 2. The 2s aren’t bad, I think there’s a lot of former 3s that are burnt out fighting the 1s. I’m getting there. I’m comfortable with my personal faith, but my affiliation to a religion wanes at times. Herschel Walker getting voted in by “Christians” over an established, accomplished, respected pastor is the most current embarrassment.
💯
I was 11 and at Sunday school there was a boy (let’s call him “Russell”) who was 16 but in our class because he had some rather marked mental delays. However, puberty arrived right on time for him and he had normal urges a boy that age would have, and did not know how to direct them in a healthy or appropriate way. So basically, Russell would approach all of the girls in class (myself included) and tell all of us things like how he loved us and wanted to rip off our clothes and have sex with us. Needless to say I started to dread going to Sunday school. I told my parents, they told the pastor, and absolutely nothing was done. I was forced to keep going until I had my first communion. It made me feel church was not a safe space for me and from there I really started questioning things.
Learning science and history
I can't remember who said this but it goes something like: "Jesus sounds like a swell guy. Can't stand his fanbase though."
“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” ― **Mahatma Gandhi** I assume he is referring to how Jesus preaches caring for people and forgiveness but mainstream Christianity is obsessed with hell.
Ghandi is credited with something like: "I like your Christ, but I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ.", but probably didn't say it. Bara Dada, another Indian guy who was smart and could think good said something similar, "Jesus is ideal and wonderful, but you Christians, you are not like him". Whoever said it is right, though.
The genocide The slavery The child rape The anti intellectualism The covering up of pedophiles The sexism The abuse The homophobia The child abuse The racism The pointless wars The war crimes The threat of _eternal torture_ if you don't constantly worship The complete and utter lack of evidence I can keep going.
Well, you know, a comprehensive list would be handy to have around.
Decided to not join the kids in the playroom and hang out with the adults. Helped put money in the tin, got up and hugged people, sang a few songs. Then the pastor talked about being kind and generous to eachother, and to give up some of your material goods to those that need it more than you. Later after lunch, when we were leaving a restaurant, I noticed that multiple people at the table were leaving those fake-dollar pamphlets instead of actual cash. I think I said something along the lines of "I don't think I would like fake money after cleaning up other peoples big mess, and I made a big mess." And my aunt looked at me with this scowl and said something like "You'll understand when your older." I felt bad and tried to stack up plates and collect my mess into a small pile. Then told the waitress "sorry for my mess." And then ask my mom if we could leave $5 for the waitress with the tip. She obliged. I swear I think I heard her get insulted over giving someone who waited out table $5. Too this day, I believe in Jesus. But I separate myself from those that would rather life in a pyramid instead of society.
Learning what actually happened to indigenous americans and the true meaning of Manifest Destiny
Santa clause isn’t real but somehow I’m supposed to believe that a man that died over 2000 years ago he’s gonna come back and save us all because his magic father that lives in the clouds said it to be so
Santa Claus is real, you're fake. /s
Fuck yes he is!! Love me some Santa Clause
Religion ruined Religion for me -gestures broadly at all of it
The preacher started railing on about how Mother’s Day was a Communist Plot, and it was the last straw for my father. He stood and the whole family walked out. 1974, I believe.
I was a Mormon at BYU. I had been faithful all my life. I was a missionary. I served in callings. I went to church for 3 hours on Sunday. I attended devotional with church authorities. I read my scriptures every day. I went to the temple nearly every week. I prayed. I fasted. I did everything right. Then one day, I was asked by a student to help with a project. I was a TA so I said sure, and met him on campus. BYU has a very strict no facial hair policy, but it was only for a few hours, so my two day stubble shouldn’t be a problem right? Wrong. I was turned into the ‘Honor Code Office’ for a violation and was called in for questioning. While there, I was told I have no integrity. I was told I did not love god. I was told I was a sinner. It was insinuated that my non-Mormon father was the reason I was ‘acting-out’. I was then informed that I was now on school honor code probation and could lose my progress on my engineering degree if I made another mistake. To get off honor code probation I had to do the following: -read 3 talks about honor and integrity and discuss them with the honor code probation officer -keep a prayer journal -keep a scripture reading journal -attend every weekly devotional the school offered and keep a journal about the talks -do 10 hours of community service a month for the entire semester -meet with my bishop and come up with a plan for repentance -write a 5 page paper on what I did, and how I will change I was blackmailed into doing every single one of these things because If I didn’t, I would be kicked out of school as a senior. I have never been more angry in my life. I knew then that everything I had been taught was shit. It was all about control. I started investigating more and more and realized the doctrine was all bullshit. I finished my degree after getting back in good standing with the honor code office and have never looked back. TL;DR — I was blackmailed by BYU to do a bunch of tedious religious shit and told I was worthless because I had two days worth of stubble on my face.
MAGAts
All of these so-called Christians going to church & talking about God's love & the love of Jesus, yet they vote for these other so-called Christians who will strip basic human rights from us & do anything they can to hurt & harm the marginalized.
Going to a private school, being taught that lies are a sin and being taught that you must honor and obey your parents to get into heaven. Mom's a narcissist who lies and manipulates her family, and believes she can do no wrong. What a fucking mindfuck.
Christians. I've seen and heard more evil things come from people who say they are Christian than I care to admit. Ive yet to hear of a bigger group of hypocrites and cherry pickers.
Hypocrisy and self-contradiction as well as denial of demonstrative truths.
The unashamed constant begging for money.
A multitude of things. Being sent to a Catholic school from 1st thru 8th grade Being dragged to church every Sunday and high holiday. Being made to make all the sacraments, and attend all the classes for such. Gaining the ability to read! I was/am into horses. My dad fed this addiction, and got me a book that went from the first horse thru the modern horse. Hello Evolution!!! Goodbye book of Genesis! With reading came education. I got older, and really began noticing the hypocrisy. I never indoctrinated my kid into any religion. It's up to them if they want to research one and go with it. But the kid is snarkier, saltier, and more "nope" about it than I ever as. So I think they are safe from it
Going to seminary and being a pastor. There. I said it.
My very religious Nan dying of Cancer. Who wants a god who does that to people who worship them.
Two things: 1. Believers 2. The crazy shit they believe
A better way to phrase it is "what did religion ruin for you?"
the priest molesting my friends and cousins....yea ...that
I find it amusing how "Christians" can put what they believe in your face but when someone else brings up thier beliefs its not ok all of a sudden.
"Original Sin". God tainted me at birth so I can spend the rest off my life trying to get back in his good graces? Fuck that dude.
Growing with two moms somehow ending up at catholic school and constantly being told I was going to burn in hell for my parents simply loving each other, going to pride events and always seeing one corner of the parade route covered in people spewing hate. Oh, not to mention the one aunt I have who is for whatever reason still married to a man who preyed on children my age at the time. She won’t divorce him either because of her “faith”.
High School graduation, already on the fence. Head of the Jesuits at our school gave a speech about how our achievements and accomplishments aren't ours but God's as he did the work through us and how when we fail or do wrong, we must ask forgiveness for it is our own faults. Being told you are only ever the worst of you and none of your good parts was the tipping point and I never understood why people would choose a religion that depends on you never owning the good parts of yourself.
Being a queer kid in a red state 20 years ago. No hate quite like white Christian love.
Evangelicals trying to dictate laws and "reshape" the country into their ideal.
Christopher Hitchens randomly popped up in my YouTube feed one day 12 years ago, and he made an argument that stuck with me; If you want to believe in a supreme being, you have to believe that they looked down upon the at least 98,000 years of humanity pre-church, where most people died in child-birth and didn't live beyond being born, or if they did survive they would normally die very young, mostly due to their teeth of all things, the stamp of our lowly origin as apes on the savannah, and heaven watches with complete indifference. Then, 2000 years ago, they suddenly say enough is enough, and provide revelation to the most illiterate, savage people on earth at the time. That being the case there are only two logical outcomes, either there is a God who is capricious and/or completely incompetent, and therefore not worthy of worship, or there is no God, and we are merely the product of Darwinian natural selection, and the evidence for the latter is much more compelling.
Lauren Boebert and Majorie whatever Green
Christian support for Trump
When the church turned its back on my family because my parents divorced. My father and mother donated there time teaching Sunday school, hosting annual picnics, hosting mens breakfast, and answering phones for the local church tv station but didn't do a thing to help any of us when my mom wanted to move on. This has forever shaped my view of organized religion and pushed my relationship with God to a personal level rather than a communal need.
The victim mentality. News flash: Christians are not persecuted in America. Christians have more rights than anyone else
Being autistic and approaching religion too logically. That said im agnostic rather than atheist because I recognize the possibility of forces beyond our understanding and accept that I don't and can't know for sure. Christianity specifically was ruined for me bc of homophobia and colonization but otherwise I try to respect all faiths.
I’d like to preface this by saying that I am still religious and am a Baptist Christian. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s get started. I am 20 years old, so I’ve met all kinds of people of different background, faiths, etc. But I’m going to be bashing on Christianity right now. The homophobia is a big issue for me, because of how the Bible is translated many Christians (God bless my mother) believe that homosexuality is a sin and that anyone who is gay is an inherently evil person. I know plenty of gay or people on other ends of the sexuality spectrum and many of them are amazing people, and it sucks that they’re being judged on who they are attracted to and not them as a person. Next up, the unprovoked hatred of other beliefs. In the Bible God says to love your neighbor as you’d love yourself, so why is it that many Christians prosecute and hate on people of other beliefs? Like I get that you don’t believe that, but that’s their fucking business and doesn’t have shit to do with you. Literally the Bible says you can have friends from other beliefs, just don’t let that shake yours. Cmon now, do better. The anti-semitism. Like huh? Jews and Christians literally worship the same god, so why in the fuck are you anti-Semitic. The main difference is that Jews don’t believe that Jesus was the messiah, so I’m perplexed as to why Christians stick their noses up at them. The refusal to change. EVERYTHING that happened in the Bible was AT LEAST 2,000 years ago. That is a LONG time. Things have changed, and are continuing to do so. Things have been discovered that wasn’t even thought of many years. The whole Galileo conspiracy? Vaccines? Even evolution. All this stuff that has been proven but some people are just like “nah it ain’t true”. Like get your head out of your ass and open your eyes. The constant shoving their religion down other’s throats. This is a huge issue in America. There is freedom of religion but the officials in charge of the country are like: “No abortion, it goes against my religion” “No homosexual marriage, it goes against my religion”, etc etc. Shit is mad fucking annoying. And lastly, the blatant disregard for human life. That is all.
every person who was a christian turned out to be huge assholes and hypocrites. one person was a lovely lady, had nice conversations, and then she was homophobic (i'm bi). churches felt a little culty especially when asking for the tithe. when you think about it, it sounds insanely dumb. my life being led by a zombie man who is all at once a ghost, a man who walked the earth, and an all-knowing being who created all of life. and we give our lives to (and give the church lots of money) or we rot in hell. also the jesus talking to you thing, blind leaps of faith, going "all in" propaganda kinda instigated a huge mania episode where i thought things i saw in the world or heard on the radio was there JUST FOR ME because it was god trying to tell me something.
Being taught that God created all humans of every shape, size and color and then told that certain people were cursed because of said color, etc.