It's both terrifying and baffling that they're able to rise the way they have in these past couple of decades, and especially since Trump. I'd have a hard time believing it if I wasn't seeing it broadcast all over the place as if it were normal and welcomed.
As a Christian (and daughter of a minister), I'm beyond tired of performative Christians hijacking the religion and claiming it's theirs. It isn't. Have any of them even read the New Testament, the part of the Bible that talks about love, kindness, humility, and taking care of the sick and poor? They seem to truly enjoy trumpeting the idea of their religiosity versus providing actual evidence of it. Of course, as you point out, this is not new behavior. As Gandhi said (I'm paraphrasing), he liked Christ but not Christians. Sadly, that's a fair assessment.
The mystery to me, as I said to Susan, is that the true Christians will stand by silently and let this go on. Isn't it their obligation to speak out about lies and hypocrisy, no matter where they find it?
Part of doing good works should be exposing those who pretend to do them in order to profit from their followers? I'll never understand that silence.
Me neither. I am seeing a tiny bit of pushback, especially amongst the evangelical community, and they're expelling those who are trying to call it out, at least a little. It may take a while, way longer than it should. But it never should've gotten this bad in the first place. I suspect the heady power of political influence really made everything go downhill.
Pat Robertson made religion political on his TV show decades ago, but churches and pastors have invaded government for a century or more. Blue laws come to mind, where bars and stores had to close on Sundays and bars couldn't locate within shouting distance of a church. For fear the parishioners would go to the bar, instead, if it were too close.)
Some communities demanded that there had to be more churches than bars before they would give licenses. It's a myth that we were more secular in the olden days.
No, we were never secular. We need to tax churches though, especially those preaching politics from the pulpit. That's a big problem here. We have mega-churches that are extremely powerful politically as they tell parishioners who to vote for. They also give Republican extremist groups rooms in which to meet. It's a true subversion of Christianity. For true believers, it's outrageous and enraging.
And this is one reason I no longer attend church services, sorry to say. I miss the hymns and some of the wonderful people. I go to special services. It's sad much of "organized" religious Christianity ignores Christ's teachings.
I know how you feel, Susan, though not all churches are like that. I don't understand why those that aren't keep silent about the 'Christian' abusers. Those terrible hypocrites make all religions look bad.
Yes. An even bigger danger is the resistance to the truth about them. We have to speak out while we still can.
It's both terrifying and baffling that they're able to rise the way they have in these past couple of decades, and especially since Trump. I'd have a hard time believing it if I wasn't seeing it broadcast all over the place as if it were normal and welcomed.
Thank you for your thoughts.
As a Christian (and daughter of a minister), I'm beyond tired of performative Christians hijacking the religion and claiming it's theirs. It isn't. Have any of them even read the New Testament, the part of the Bible that talks about love, kindness, humility, and taking care of the sick and poor? They seem to truly enjoy trumpeting the idea of their religiosity versus providing actual evidence of it. Of course, as you point out, this is not new behavior. As Gandhi said (I'm paraphrasing), he liked Christ but not Christians. Sadly, that's a fair assessment.
The mystery to me, as I said to Susan, is that the true Christians will stand by silently and let this go on. Isn't it their obligation to speak out about lies and hypocrisy, no matter where they find it?
Part of doing good works should be exposing those who pretend to do them in order to profit from their followers? I'll never understand that silence.
Me neither. I am seeing a tiny bit of pushback, especially amongst the evangelical community, and they're expelling those who are trying to call it out, at least a little. It may take a while, way longer than it should. But it never should've gotten this bad in the first place. I suspect the heady power of political influence really made everything go downhill.
Pat Robertson made religion political on his TV show decades ago, but churches and pastors have invaded government for a century or more. Blue laws come to mind, where bars and stores had to close on Sundays and bars couldn't locate within shouting distance of a church. For fear the parishioners would go to the bar, instead, if it were too close.)
Some communities demanded that there had to be more churches than bars before they would give licenses. It's a myth that we were more secular in the olden days.
No, we were never secular. We need to tax churches though, especially those preaching politics from the pulpit. That's a big problem here. We have mega-churches that are extremely powerful politically as they tell parishioners who to vote for. They also give Republican extremist groups rooms in which to meet. It's a true subversion of Christianity. For true believers, it's outrageous and enraging.
And this is one reason I no longer attend church services, sorry to say. I miss the hymns and some of the wonderful people. I go to special services. It's sad much of "organized" religious Christianity ignores Christ's teachings.
I know how you feel, Susan, though not all churches are like that. I don't understand why those that aren't keep silent about the 'Christian' abusers. Those terrible hypocrites make all religions look bad.