Christians Mocking Other Christians

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

I think about this off and on... and I really do think it's an interesting phenomenon. Looking back at the experiences I had as a Christian with a fresh perspective, certain patterns of behavior are more visible to me. For example, I remember how frequently and adamantly various sects of christianity talked about, demonized, and mocked other sects of Christianity.

 

I remember as a kid I once ended up going to a Pentacostal-esque church revival meeting at a ski resort. Being Pentacostals, their worship practices were kind of weird. The preachers would like to get really emotional in sermons and then collapse and have seizures, for example. Now, I'm a pretty open minded guy, and if having public seizures makes you feel close to God then you do you (just don't hurt other people or scare children with it). There's another thing they kept doing, though ; they obsessively made fun of mormons for how weird they are. Seriously, there were several sermons a day in these meetings and in almost every sermon they made fun of mormons. Half the time it wasn't even about a theological issue ; it was about how weird their lifestyles and behavior is. Do they not see how crazy they themselves look to other people? Not to particularly defend mormonism, but looking back I can't help but wonder if of that was actually about an unconscious insecurity about their own behavior. 

 

I've been wondering what kinds of experiences other people have had along these lines, and what they thought about it.

[Guest]

This is so common. When you're right, or your little sect is right, and only you're going to heaven, everyone else has to be wrong. And you'll do anything to convince yourself they're wrong. It's easier to do it in a lazy way, so instead of picking apart their doctrine, you look at their lifestyle, and you start there. This was so easy in my church, because many of the rules were lifestyle related. So, for example, if I would had worn makeup or pierced my ears, I would have been revealing my "unbelief" and I'd go to hell. Now where in the bible is that rule written? Nowhere of course. But it's so much easier to label other people as wrong when your own belief is already so limited that almost everyone is different from you.

A few years before I left the church I happened to meet people of another sect, from which mine had separated a few decades ago. They accepted my beliefs, and they saw me as a believer, while I couldn't accept them as saved, even though we couldn't really separate our beliefs or have cause for division on doctrinal issues. When I look back on that experience, it's so clear to me what kind of role this "othering" plays in religion. It only serves to keep up the boundaries and convince people that they're somehow special and unique.

I find it difficult to associate with anyone from my former church, including my own family, because of this issue. Almost 50% or more of the time I spend with them seems to be focused on this, maintaining difference and exclusivity from the outside world.

[MOHO]

19 minutes ago, TruthSeeker0 said:

When I look back on that experience, it's so clear to me what kind of role this "othering" plays in religion. It only serves to keep up the boundaries and convince people that they're somehow special and unique.

 

Nailed it!

[MOHO]

One moment Mrs. MOHO will go on about how cults have bazaar rituals and practices and insist that you don't question the doctrine and ONLY hang out with other cult members.

 

Next moment she'll berate me for reading Carrier and Ehrman and asking questions about dissimilarities between the books in the Bible.

Next day she runs off to the fundy-farm to go drink the blood and eat the flesh of a deceased 2k year old carpenter/rabbi/profit/witch doctor.

 

I do laugh at the Mormon magic-underwear jokes though.

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

2 minutes ago, MOHO said:

One moment Mrs. MOHO will go on about how cults have bazaar rituals and practices and insist that you don't question the doctrine and ONLY hang out with other cult members.

 

Next moment she'll berate me for reading Carrier and Ehrman and asking questions about dissimilarities between the books in the Bible.

Next day she runs off to the fundy-farm to go drink the blood and eat the flesh of a deceased 2k year old carpenter/rabbi/profit/witch doctor.

 

I do laugh at the Mormon magic-underwear jokes though.

Oh, man. My parents were really concerned about my association with any friends I made for this reason (only hanging out with other members). The thing was, in my family's case almost no one constituted a "real" Christian outside of the family, so not being corrupted by non-members actually meant not having friends at all. In fact, I felt safer making friends with atheists because as much as my parents disliked atheists they didn't have the fierce hatred for them that they had for "fake" Christians (I had one great non-believing friend who stuck by me through the whole process). There's just no winning with some people. One way or another you have to figure out how to do your own thing.

[1989]

This is all classic "narrow road" thinking.  When you're taught that most people are going to Hell anyway it's much easier to fall into groupthink.  They either forget or conveniently ignore John 3:16 and condemn everyone not like them.  Lately Ive been hearing this kind of stuff from Conservative preachers attacking Liberal churches.  It's all about the Law, except when it isn't about the Law and about a relationship, which is defined by the Law, which has been fulfilled.  Or something.

[Tsathoggua9]

Oh, the "Church of Christ" is really into this! Every other denomination is completely wrong about everything. The COC is the only true church, and all others deserve mocking!

[mwc]

     "Silly Pharisees!  Let's mock them until one of us gets crucified."  --  Jesus (probably)

 

          mwc

 

[sdelsolray]

Many religious sects promote and practice tribalism, xenophobia and willful ignorance.

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

7 hours ago, 1989 said:

This is all classic "narrow road" thinking.  When you're taught that most people are going to Hell anyway it's much easier to fall into groupthink.  They either forget or conveniently ignore John 3:16 and condemn everyone not like them.  Lately Ive been hearing this kind of stuff from Conservative preachers attacking Liberal churches.  It's all about the Law, except when it isn't about the Law and about a relationship, which is defined by the Law, which has been fulfilled.  Or something.

They like to pretend that their arguments are biblical but if you pay attention you realize their arguments are extremely willy-nilly and self-serving (yes, even and especially the fundamentalists that pride in a presumed objectivity). Funny you mention the narrow road passage because nowadays I interpret it in the "if a bodhisattva crosses your path, kill it" sense. The church members are the ones who are still living the wide and easy path of tribal thinking and leaning on authority, while I take a deeply personal, and sometimes lonely, path.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, DestinyTurtle said:

They like to pretend that their arguments are biblical but if you pay attention you realize their arguments are extremely willy-nilly and self-serving (yes, even and especially the fundamentalists that pride in a presumed objectivity). Funny you mention the narrow road passage because nowadays I interpret it in the "if a bodhisattva crosses your path, kill it" sense. The church members are the ones who are still living the wide and easy path of tribal thinking and leaning on authority, while I take a deeply personal, and sometimes lonely, path.

Yes, I have many times thought this myself. To them it's about the straight and narrow but they have no idea how little thinking work they have actually done for themselves. In some respects, being a fundamentalist is coasting through life with your own ready made community, frame of reference and worldview. Of course, theres a high cost to all of that. 

[Moxie]

When I was in the church of Christ, I remember the members making fun of everyone they assumed was going to hell, which was basically everyone except their little sect. They laughed about people going to hell. That was alarming to say the least. What psychopaths.

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

17 minutes ago, PaganBookworm said:

When I was in the church of Christ, I remember the members making fun of everyone they assumed was going to hell, which was basically everyone except their little sect. They laughed about people going to hell. That was alarming to say the least. What psychopaths.

Fundamentalists are usually like that. My father isn't a church of christ member but he's a fundamentalist, and to this day he writes and publishes articles gloating about how the 'unelect' will go to hell. Since he's branded me as unelect, this basically implies he's gloating about his own son's damnation and eternal punishment. How he can live with himself and his beliefs are beyond me.

[Tsathoggua9]

3 hours ago, PaganBookworm said:

When I was in the church of Christ, I remember the members making fun of everyone they assumed was going to hell, which was basically everyone except their little sect. They laughed about people going to hell. That was alarming to say the least. What psychopaths.

 

Yeah, not everyone I knew was so flippant about this, but plenty were, for sure.

[Guest]

3 hours ago, PaganBookworm said:

When I was in the church of Christ, I remember the members making fun of everyone they assumed was going to hell, which was basically everyone except their little sect. They laughed about people going to hell. That was alarming to say the least. What psychopaths.

Ah, but I was like that. I didn't laugh at them but I was extremely indifferent to the possibility of others' suffering. I didn't even begin to wake up until I had to contemplate the fact that I believed that people I loved would be tortured eternally. It's one of the main goals of othering people: kill all emotion and empathy for others, lest you be tempted away from the true faith.

[ShotoManhattan]

When I was at a Fundamentalist Catholic college, I heard the terms "Prods" used which I learned was a insult for Protestants and my friend who was a Southern Baptist got a lot of crap until she converted. I left that school in the second semestyer and my friend ended up leaving at the end of the second semester.

 

Funny, at Mass and with teachers (went to an all boys Catholic high school), we were always taught to respect other Christians regardless of denominations and the same was with my family (My aunt ended up marrying my uncle who is a Lutheran). Our school choirs always played at Baptist churches.

[◊ DestinyTurtle ◊]

1 hour ago, ShotoManhattan said:

When I was at a Fundamentalist Catholic college, I heard the terms "Prods" used which I learned was a insult for Protestants and my friend who was a Southern Baptist got a lot of crap until she converted. I left that school in the second semestyer and my friend ended up leaving at the end of the second semester.

 

Funny, at Mass and with teachers (went to an all boys Catholic high school), we were always taught to respect other Christians regardless of denominations and the same was with my family (My aunt ended up marrying my uncle who is a Lutheran). Our school choirs always played at Baptist churches.

It is so trippy to hear about extreme Catholic perspectives, because I grew up in a protestant family that just flippantly assumed the Catholic Church the The Whore of Babylon and that they spewed obvious heresies. It didn't occur to me until much later that from the Catholic perspective, WE were heretics. lol. How can anyone be sure they're not the heretic?

[ShotoManhattan]

17 hours ago, DestinyTurtle said:

It is so trippy to hear about extreme Catholic perspectives, because I grew up in a protestant family that just flippantly assumed the Catholic Church the The Whore of Babylon and that they spewed obvious heresies. It didn't occur to me until much later that from the Catholic perspective, WE were heretics. lol. How can anyone be sure they're not the heretic?

 

The Orthodox Church thinks the Catholic are the real heretics, it makes you wonder, would Jesus honestly recognize his church today?

[Geezer]

1 hour ago, ShotoManhattan said:

 

The Orthodox Church thinks the Catholic are the real heretics, it makes you wonder, would Jesus honestly recognize his church today?

 

That assumes much. 1. That Jesus actually existed. 2. That Jesus had anything to do with Christianity. According to the Gospels Jesus endorsed Judaism as the true religion. 3. Paul, or more likely Marcion, created Christianity a decidedly Gnostic religion. Jesus wasn't a Gnostic. 4. Paul, if he even actually existed, never met Jesus face to face at least according to Paul's "authentic" writings. The book of Acts is recognized by historical scholars as Fiction. The only Jesus Paul knew was a Spiritual Jesus that he encountered in dreams and visions. As per his own writings, or whoever wrote the Epistles. 5. The fact that Jesus never said a word about a new religion that would replace Judaism, for some reason, doesn't bother Christians. And most of them don't even know that. 

 

When Christianity, and the bible, is dissected by historians they both fall apart like a house of cards. Christians are left with nothing but rubble. 

 

[Anushka]

On 24/02/2018 at 8:22 PM, Geezer said:

 

That assumes much. 1. That Jesus actually existed. 2. That Jesus had anything to do with Christianity. According to the Gospels Jesus endorsed Judaism as the true religion. 3. Paul, or more likely Marcion, created Christianity a decidedly Gnostic religion. Jesus wasn't a Gnostic. 4. Paul, if he even actually existed, never met Jesus face to face at least according to Paul's "authentic" writings. The book of Acts is recognized by historical scholars as Fiction. The only Jesus Paul knew was a Spiritual Jesus that he encountered in dreams and visions. As per his own writings, or whoever wrote the Epistles. 5. The fact that Jesus never said a word about a new religion that would replace Judaism, for some reason, doesn't bother Christians. And most of them don't even know that. 

 

When Christianity, and the bible, is dissected by historians they both fall apart like a house of cards. Christians are left with nothing but rubble. 

 

Where in the scripture does it say that Jesus endorsed Judaism as the true religion?

[Geezer]

3 hours ago, Anushka said:

Where in the scripture does it say that Jesus endorsed Judaism as the true religion?

 

Matthew 5: 17-18 "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them.

For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished."

The heart of Judaism is the law. Christians want to say in Matt 18, "until all is accomplished", means until Jesus is resurrected. But Jesus didn't establish a kingdom, He returned to heaven to reign with His father forever, and ever. In Revelations the words "Until all is accomplished" would seem to indicate that means when God establishes a New Heaven and a New Earth. 

 

Christians believe the Church is the new Kingdom, but if that is true then what changed? There is still suffering, disease, and violence everywhere in the world. The Apostle Paul is credited with creating Christianity, but many historians believe Paul, like Jesus, was a literary figure not a real person. Evidence suggests the real authors of the Epistles was Marcion and Simon Magus. Christianity is clearly a Gnostic religion and Marcion was the leading proponent of Gnostic teachings and belief. He also established a large number of Gnostic Churches that were much more popular than the orthodox (Catholic) Churches. The concept of grace is a Gnostic idea. Paul is credited with saying the Law was nailed to the cross, but the evidence suggest Marcion was the real author of those words.Marcion also believed there were two Gods. He did not believe the God of Jesus was the same God of Moses and Abraham because that God was so evil. Marcion believed there had to be another God, the God of Jesus, that overpowered the God of Moses and Abraham because that God was too evil to be a God of mercy and grace. 

 

Historical evidence indicates everything written in the Bible is fiction. Many of the stories are edited and redacted versions of other cultures myths that preceded the Biblical writings by hundreds to thousands of years. Dying and rising demigods (A God born to a virgin human female) are found in a number of other ancient cultures. And Yahewa can be traced back to being one of the many Canaanite War Gods. 

 

Yahweh (/ˈjɑːhweɪ/, or often /ˈjɑːweɪ/ in English; Hebrew: יַהְוֶה‬ [jahˈweh]) was the national god of the Iron Age kingdoms of Israel (Samaria)and Judah.^[3] His exact origins are disputed, although they reach back to the early Iron Age and even the Late Bronze:^[4][5] his name may have begun as an epithet of El, head of the Bronze Age Canaanite pantheon,^[6] but the earliest plausible mentions are in Egyptian texts that place him among the nomads of the southern Transjordan

 

[Anushka]

2 hours ago, Geezer said:

 

Matthew 5: 17-18 "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them.

For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished."

The heart of Judaism is the law. Christians want to say in Matt 18, "until all is accomplished", means until Jesus is resurrected. But Jesus didn't establish a kingdom, He returned to heaven to reign with His father forever, and ever. In Revelations the words "Until all is accomplished" would seem to indicate that means when God establishes a New Heaven and a New Earth. 

 

Christians believe the Church is the new Kingdom, but if that is true then what changed? There is still suffering, disease, and violence everywhere in the world. The Apostle Paul is credited with creating Christianity, but many historians believe Paul, like Jesus, was a literary figure not a real person. Evidence suggests the real authors of the Epistles was Marcion and Simon Magus. Christianity is clearly a Gnostic religion and Marcion was the leading proponent of Gnostic teachings and belief. He also established a large number of Gnostic Churches that were much more popular than the orthodox (Catholic) Churches. The concept of grace is a Gnostic idea. Paul is credited with saying the Law was nailed to the cross, but the evidence suggest Marcion was the real author of those words.Marcion also believed there were two Gods. He did not believe the God of Jesus was the same God of Moses and Abraham because that God was so evil. Marcion believed there had to be another God, the God of Jesus, that overpowered the God of Moses and Abraham because that God was too evil to be a God of mercy and grace. 

 

Historical evidence indicates everything written in the Bible is fiction. Many of the stories are edited and redacted versions of other cultures myths that preceded the Biblical writings by hundreds to thousands of years. Dying and rising demigods (A God born to a virgin human female) are found in a number of other ancient cultures. And Yahewa can be traced back to being one of the many Canaanite War Gods. 

 

Yahweh (/ˈjɑːhweɪ/, or often /ˈjɑːweɪ/ in English; Hebrew: יַהְוֶה‬ [jahˈweh]) was the national god of the Iron Age kingdoms of Israel (Samaria)and Judah.^[3] His exact origins are disputed, although they reach back to the early Iron Age and even the Late Bronze:^[4][5] his name may have begun as an epithet of El, head of the Bronze Age Canaanite pantheon,^[6] but the earliest plausible mentions are in Egyptian texts that place him among the nomads of the southern Transjordan

 

Thank you

When we point out to Christians that there are problems in the world even with the existence of a loving Jesus, they either blame humans or Satan or they say that if God erased all problems and removed Satan from our lives, we would not need God. A Christian lady teacher actually taught us this in a Bible study years ago.

[MOHO]

31 minutes ago, Anushka said:

if God erased all problems and removed Satan from our lives, we would not need God.

 

"If I did not torture that little puppy relentlessly it would not need me to stop the torturing or comfort it afterwards."

"If I did not slap my wife around she would not need me to stop the slapping" "She also would not fear me."

"If I did not forbid my wife from leaving the house without my permission she would not need me to giver her permission."

"If I did not prevent my wife from having a job/career then should would not need me to support her."

 

The Bible was written by sadistic controlling fuckheads, wasn't it?