ShotoManhattan

I'm not able to post in the sex section so I wanted to post this. How did you ever come to terms with accepting masturbation being ex-Christian? I was raised to believe it was a mortal sin and it seems other churches have a kinder view towards it. I never thought of it as selfish, it keeps me from getting someone pregnant or getting an STD. It's healthy to have sexual releases.

I find most of the Christian music to be awful even the Catholic ones. The Orthodox Church always has that ancient feel to it with their music.

I have studied other religions including the other Abrahamic religions (Judaism and Islam) as well as Buddhism. Ironically, it was my experiences at a Catholic fundamentalist college and arguments with Fundamentalist Evangelicals is what got to me to research other religions. I go to Mass in body, but mind I'm not there. I followed Wicca for a while, but started to get into the Law of Attraction as I find that philosophy much more self-empowering and helped me with life more than Mass ever did. I've been doing that for about a year now.

Hi, it's been a while since I posted. I came back to this forum because I wanted to. There was something that came into my mind. Do you think Jesus would honestly recognize his own church today? I don't think he would. He would see good things in all of the churches, but wonder why there are so many denominations. He might see the Catholic Church as being the church Peter was meant to run, but would probably drive out all of the child molesters in that place and see how the Church was used in War time. He might see the Evangelical Fundamentalists as worshiping him but would also be appalled at the mega churches built with businesses inside of them and the prosperity gospel. I don't think most Christians would recognize him. Most of the Western art depicts him as a white guy with brown hair when in reality he would look Middle Eastern and would be mistaken for a terrorist by American Evangelicals. These are just my thoughts, what do you guys think?

Having gone back to school for graduate studies, I've been having nightmares of a fundamentalist Catholic college I went to in my first semester. It was very cultist and people were doing a lot of weird shit. My nightmares involve me leaving the place and as soon as I get home, I wake up. This was back towards the end of 2002 and I left in the beginning of 2003 after having a breakdown. I am at a Jesuit College now, so they're pretty much to the left of this place, I'm going because they have a good reputation with their MBA programs. Has anyone ever been at a fundamentalist college whether Christian or Catholic and had bad experiences?

How does the end times compare to the carrot on a stick or hamster wheel?

No, I just looked up sites for people who weren't Christian anymore. The fundamentalists pretty much love to rag on non-fundamentalist Christians (especially Catholics) and thought Islam was Devil Worship. The depressing ones pretty much think every decade is the End Times and hides behind Bible verses to justify their views.

Like I mentioned, I don't think ideological purists have major power in other countries. I read a book about the downfall of moderates and progressives in the Republican Party over the last 50 years. It wasn't always the party of the Religious Right. There' was always a moderate/liberal wing and a conservative wing. Oddly, the conservatives like Robert Taft believed religion to be a personal matter and not in politics. They managed to find common ground despite not agreeing with each other. It's just the conservatives got mad back in 1952 when their guy, Robert Taft, didn't win and got revenge with Barry Goldwater in the 1964 election. To me, that's when the polarization started. Moderates and liberals got marginalized, some retired and some were forced to become Democrats. There are few moderates or liberals left in the GOP in terms of representation in Congress and the Senate and tend to get labelled RINOs. With the Democrats, the Blue Dog (conservative) Democrats barely exist too but they're vehemently hated like Joe Manchin. The Democrats really only have the Bernie Democrats (far-left) and the New Democrats (Democrats with the ideology of an organization called The Democratic Leadership Council). There was diversity of all types in both parties, but since 1964 it's been more extreme as I've seen since I became aware back in 2004. But to the purists, a Republican supporting LGBT rights shouldn't exist or a Democrat who wants school prayer and is a nativist. These types of people are not allowed to exist because of the wealthy who insist on ideological purity. I could go into pitting demographic groups against each other and themselves, but that's for another time.

Sometimes the sadness comes and sometimes it doesn't. I've been very sad about comic books and the pissing contest going on with comic book films with the media (specifically film and comic book fandom media groups). The fans are only hurting themselves and giving into fanrage. Just try to do something to forget about is all I can say.

I remember reading about some candidates in the Republican primaries for 2008 and 2012 who were excluded by news networks like CNN because they didn't fit the mold of a stereotypical Republican that talks about Ronald Reagan ,Jesus and getting into a pissing contest over whose more right wing. One of them was Gary Johnson, he eventually became the candidate for the Libertarians in 2012 and 2016 and stopped running after 2016.

The afterlives of the other religions are intriguing to say the least. If there was a Hell, it probably would resemble Dante's from the Inferno.

ContraBardus Best Chick Tract Spoof ever!

Fuego, that's the best explanation to my question, thanks!

There is a reason why I deactivated Facebook back in 2015 and this only affirms why I'm not going back to it.

I agree with your statement on the voters remain loyal to a party regardless of performance but history plays a huge role in it but no one really questions "What have you done for me lately?" or tries to defect. The voting results from 2008-2016 showed huge divides in demographics. I mostly brought up ideological purity because the purists are the ones who get involved in local politics.