Do You Think That Most Xtians Ignore The Hard Stuff?

[mick]

Sorry for my lack of being articulate this morning.

 

I have been awstrucked recently by my own realization of how rediculous this religion is and was for me. I am now in shock that so many 100s of millions are believers. I am thinking most are utterly nominal.

 

The few that truly believe every word of the Bible (and more importantly KNOW all that is in the Bible) must be truly insane. (I.e defend God for killing babies (god does this over and over and over), ordering people burned alive for sexual sin, floods the whole world, sends Bears to rip apart little children, dashed pregnant women against the rocks and rips them apart, and the biggest; sends 90% of all people to eternal torture and we deserve it even for telling jsut one lie, WTF!!!!!? ... WTF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

 

I must add that I don't think most are insane. My feeling right now is that most who believe in total innerrancy don't know of, or have ignored the horrible parts of the Bible. And they also have buried some of it, don't even realise the sheer volume of attrocites commited by God. Even I, after 17 years of Discipleship and Bible Study, have not read every word in the Bible.

[Amethyst]

Yes, I think they do stick their fingers in their ears and go "la la la la la, I'm not listening" when it comes to that sort of thing. They just don't want to hear anything negative about their religion, even if it is in the Bible.

 

This is why most Christians today are cherry pickers. They listen to what appeals to them, not what they don't want to hear.

 

I read the entire Bible at the age of 12 or so and haven't believed it literally since, although I tried to convince myself at times that parts of it were still true.

[Taphophilia]

When I was a Christian, I thought the attrocities were beyond my understanding. As in, it's god, who am I to question what he did. I think if someone would have discussed with me the things we discuss on the board, I would have deconverted much, much sooner.

I was surrounded by others who believed it and accepted it as true, and when I had doubts about it, it's Satan attacking my mind. It's the message of "guard your thoughts". It works well!

 

Taph

[Lycorth]

When I was Xian, I really fell for the brainwashing about the atrocities in the OT. Yahooweh™ was Lard and what he wanted was done - and just because of that, any and all amounts of rape, murder, and theft against non-Israelites was a-ok. It even gave me an outlet for my angry youth; the OT provided everything I needed to vent all my hate on, like gays, Pagans, heretics, etc.

 

I think a lot of Xians either find some way to enjoy that sick shit, or else do just stick their fingers in their ears. Most Xians, those who don't bother reading the Babble aside from at the usual Sunday gathering, probably aren't even aware of this stuff, and aren't apt to want to hear it. Those that do, either find a way to accept it or listen to their reason and good sense and ditch the cult altogether.

[Rosa Mystica]

I think I'll add another thing: some Christians like to gloss over OT atrocities. You know, with the typical, "Well, that was before Jesus' time, but when Jesus came, things changed". Uh...right. Nice excuse there. Or else you'll hear people say, "But what about all the *good* things in the Bible?" So yeah, when Christians aren't totally ignorant (which many are), then they're glossing stuff over to make it appear minimal. It's their way of reducing the inevitable cognitive dissonance that would result if they were to think about it in detail.

 

And yes, Taph, that "Guarding your thoughts" thing works so well it's disturbing.

[Amethyst]

I think I'll add another thing: some Christians like to gloss over OT atrocities. You know, with the typical, "Well, that was before Jesus' time, but when Jesus came, things changed". Uh...right. Nice excuse there. Or else you'll hear people say, "But what about all the *good* things in the Bible?" So yeah, when Christians aren't totally ignorant (which many are), then they're glossing stuff over to make it appear minimal. It's their way of reducing the inevitable cognitive dissonance that would result if they were to think about it in detail.

 

And yes, Taph, that "Guarding your thoughts" thing works so well it's disturbing.

 

You know, that "before Jesus' time" exuse is really a crappy excuse. Because to a Christian, Jesus is god, so there is no "before his time." So essentially, they're admitting that they don't think Jesus is really god!

 

Ironic, huh?

[pandora]

Yes and no... the "hard things" were always in the back of my mind and they were the catalyst for my deconversion, but when I was in denial, I just took the party line, so to speak.

 

 

I am unsure of how others do this... some do, some don't. But I do think that most just are in denial and take the apologists' word at face value and dont' seek academic and scholarly takes on the issues.

[willybilly30]

the common excuse i hear is those were man made laws not gods (funny how many verses in the bible have god ordering people to do those things) i think alot of them probally havent read the whole bible and really thought about it the bible lays on the shelf till sunday and is put back their after the sermon. i have never read the whole bible i doubt many people have.

 

does it ever get interesting? i have tried but its really confusing and what isnt confusing is boring.

 

 

 

I read the entire Bible at the age of 12 or so and haven't believed it literally since, although I tried to convince myself at times that parts of it were still true.

[Japedo]

 

 

This reminds me about a bible study. One of the lady's say's.. "isn't just so amazing to see god grow with man thru each chapter, praise god!!!" I was puzzled and said.. if god is infinite and never changing how is it he grows and changes? I never did get a reply.. someone else spouted up and AMEN hallelujah about how god's grown with man, and that we've been a learning experience for him... Fundy Logic = Oxymoron

[Amethyst]

the common excuse i hear is those were man made laws not gods (funny how many verses in the bible have god ordering people to do those things) i think alot of them probally havent read the whole bible and really thought about it the bible lays on the shelf till sunday and is put back their after the sermon. i have never read the whole bible i doubt many people have.

 

does it ever get interesting? i have tried but its really confusing and what isnt confusing is boring.

 

 

Only if you consider lots of blood and gore interesting. If so, read the Old Testament.

[willybilly30]

i might sometime just to get some ideas on debating with fundies and now that i see it as a story book i can skip over those long boring begat this begat that parts and the book of numbers thats just boring as it can get.

 

 

 

 

 

 

the common excuse i hear is those were man made laws not gods (funny how many verses in the bible have god ordering people to do those things) i think alot of them probally havent read the whole bible and really thought about it the bible lays on the shelf till sunday and is put back their after the sermon. i have never read the whole bible i doubt many people have.

 

does it ever get interesting? i have tried but its really confusing and what isnt confusing is boring.

 

 

Only if you consider lots of blood and gore interesting. If so, read the Old Testament.

[Asimov]

Only if you consider lots of blood and gore interesting. If so, read the Old Testament.

 

Yes blood and gore is interesting, but like an Oliver Stone movie it's really badly done and ruins the whole thing.

[Rosa Mystica]

 

You know, that "before Jesus' time" exuse is really a crappy excuse. Because to a Christian, Jesus is god, so there is no "before his time." So essentially, they're admitting that they don't think Jesus is really god!

 

Ironic, huh?

 

You know, I never thought of it that way. That's actually quite interesting. And yes, it *is* a lame excuse. Someone not being there is not a justification for violent acts.

 

I just thought of another thing in response to the OP: What if most Christians don't believe these atrocities actually happened, but are simply used to describe God's wrath in a poetic way or something like that? I know that Open_Minded is a non-literalist Christian. Perhaps her input might be helpful.

[mostlyharmless]

I read the entire Bible at the age of 12 or so and haven't believed it literally since, although I tried to convince myself at times that parts of it were still true.

 

This was pretty much my experience, too.

 

I have this friend who is brilliant at maths and science, so you'd think she'd think more rationally but she is a regular church goer and when I mentioned that part of my doubt in god comes from bits in the bible like where it says the jews had to "give" their sons to god (i.e. human sacrifice / burnt offering).She told me she had a good book that would help me out. It ended up being an apologetic's argument that god has this 'grand plan'.

 

I don't know how she thought it was supposed to help. I admit, I only started reading it but didn't finish it and I gave it to a charity. It didn't mean anything to me. It just spouted on about 'when Peter does this' or 'when Jesus said that'. I couldn't see anything that pointed to a grand plan and I sure couldn't be bothered reading it from cover to cover as it only make sense to you if you've been attending sanitised sermons all your life (like my friend).

 

I don't know how she splits her brain in half on these matters but it seems to me, that's what she's been conditioned to do. In her work, things must follow logic and evidence, but when it comes to church, she accepts whoever is an authority on church matters without question. (She's not the type to question authority unless, for example, the authority breaks the law.)

 

I don't think she'll ever make any break-throughs in her research because she is very much a 'think inside the square' and 'stickler for rules' person.

[mostlyharmless]

I think most Christians go to church and accept the dogma that goes with it because of 'group think'. No one wants to be the one to stick their neck out and say, "Hey, are you for real?" When your family, your friends, and in a lot of cases, even your country and culture surround you with Christian mentality, it's hard to think unorthodoxically and even harder to speak out if you do have an unorthodox thought.

[Guest Emerson]

Because there's not an answer to the many questions people have especially if they follow a religion they just try to have faith that the God they believe in knows what he's doing. That there is a reason and a purpose for everything even if their not revealed to us. That's why you see verses like "God's ways are higher than man's" and people live and breathe by them. That's why regular people believe that Abraham or whatever that guy's name was, was "right" to have followed god in preparing to have his son sacrificed before the angel stopped him.

 

Its all just a sick mind game, and that's always bothered me. Even if the angel stopped him in the story, it still bothered me that the guy in the story was willing to sacrifice his own child. Which makes Yahweh or YHWH no different than the Mayan gods who required child sacrifices, or certain religions in Ancient Greece that required sacrifices. You have people today claiming that "god" told them to kill their children like Andrea Yates.

 

I don't think they per se ignore them, I think that they tend to think about things just like we do a lot of times but rationalize it away with their theology. But I also can't deny that a lot of them are just idiots who don't think about this and who let the church do their thinking for them.

[pandora]

I read the entire Bible at the age of 12 or so and haven't believed it literally since, although I tried to convince myself at times that parts of it were still true.

 

This was pretty much my experience, too.

 

I have this friend who is brilliant at maths and science, so you'd think she'd think more rationally but she is a regular church goer and when I mentioned that part of my doubt in god comes from bits in the bible like where it says the jews had to "give" their sons to god (i.e. human sacrifice / burnt offering).She told me she had a good book that would help me out. It ended up being an apologetic's argument that god has this 'grand plan'.

 

I don't know how she thought it was supposed to help. I admit, I only started reading it but didn't finish it and I gave it to a charity. It didn't mean anything to me. It just spouted on about 'when Peter does this' or 'when Jesus said that'. I couldn't see anything that pointed to a grand plan and I sure couldn't be bothered reading it from cover to cover as it only make sense to you if you've been attending sanitised sermons all your life (like my friend).

 

I don't know how she splits her brain in half on these matters but it seems to me, that's what she's been conditioned to do. In her work, things must follow logic and evidence, but when it comes to church, she accepts whoever is an authority on church matters without question. (She's not the type to question authority unless, for example, the authority breaks the law.)

 

I don't think she'll ever make any break-throughs in her research because she is very much a 'think inside the square' and 'stickler for rules' person.

 

I have a friend that did the same to me... ex-best friend that disowned me because of my doubts.

[Thurisaz]

...My feeling right now is that most who believe in total innerrancy don't know of, or have ignored the horrible parts of the Bible...

 

Absolutely.

 

And that's not too surprising, is it? Okay, I'm a German, the only version of the wholly babble I ever read in full was the German Luther babble, but if this can be any measure to judge the quality of the babble as a whole...

 

...then the book in and of itself is a terribly huge volume, written in a weird outdated language which is... understandable... but only with much determination. Much of it is simply boring beyond belief.

 

Naturally, or so it seems to me, even a believer doesn't really want to read it all by himself - just listening to what a preacher (whom you trust) tells you about the book is thought of as perfectly sufficient.

 

I honestly wonder how many of the nominal christians here in Germany would stay in their respective church if they knew about the disgusting stuff in the babble... the parts the preachers don't tell you about, for reasons which are perfectly understandable.

[Amethyst]

I just thought of another thing in response to the OP: What if most Christians don't believe these atrocities actually happened, but are simply used to describe God's wrath in a poetic way or something like that? I know that Open_Minded is a non-literalist Christian. Perhaps her input might be helpful.

 

I tried to believe it that way myself for a while, but it was like trying to believe that while Santa existed, Christmas was metaphorical. Or something like that. I do know quite a few Christians who believe it like that, but they do still believe that there is a god and an afterlife.

[LosingMyReligion]

When I was a Christian, I thought the attrocities were beyond my understanding. As in, it's god, who am I to question what he did. I think if someone would have discussed with me the things we discuss on the board, I would have deconverted much, much sooner.

I was surrounded by others who believed it and accepted it as true, and when I had doubts about it, it's Satan attacking my mind. It's the message of "guard your thoughts". It works well!

 

Taph

 

 

There it is in a nutshell. I was taught that, "We should not question God. We have to just believe that he is all wise and all powerful..."

When I was in Sunday school classes the teachers told us to never ask questions. The insanity of trying to learn without questioning put me on the road to deconversion.

 

Lastly, I would sit and read the bible and I had the "lalalalalalala...I'm not listening!" attitude about it as well. I read the passages of regarding, Genocide, infanticide, incest, and various other things...I just chose to believe that god was just having a really bad day and changed his ways in the new testament. However, I wondered if God was so perfect then why did he have to change and atone for his mistakes? and why is he so gung ho on making sure everyone rots in hell?

 

God of the bible is a gargantuan asshole with great spin doctors.

 

I can't believe I ever believed in that crap. And I feel so bad that so many people still do...And they believe out of FEAR. Most Christians look at accepting Jesus as an insurance policy against hell. They don't love or respect him. They kiss his ass out of fear, plain and simple.

 

 

 

I think most Christians go to church and accept the dogma that goes with it because of 'group think'. No one wants to be the one to stick their neck out and say, "Hey, are you for real?" When your family, your friends, and in a lot of cases, even your country and culture surround you with Christian mentality, it's hard to think unorthodoxically and even harder to speak out if you do have an unorthodox thought.

 

So true. It is all about assimilating and fitting in. I would say that probably 10% of the Christian population(and I am being generous with that)are true blue believers...The rest, as I mentioned before, are just in it for the heavenly insurance policy(ie...they can still shake their ass in the club on Saturday night and goto heaven after they die). Most of us grow up in this religion and it is all we know.

It took personal issues for me to finally give up the holy ghost. And it is hard, initially, to let go because you know you don't have the security of the cult anymore.

[chad]

I didn't read all the responses to the main question of this post, so forgive me if the following is simply a repeat of points another already made.

 

At the risk of using what may be a hackneyed, atheist argument against the ignorance of Christians, I think that most Christians are able to remain oblivious to theological irrationalities (i.e. old testament atrocities and blatant contradictions) because the core of their religious commitment is emotional rather than intellectual. After all, life is a real bitch; so the idea of a loving, heavenly father guiding and directing the course of one's life according to some cosmic plan of benevolence or "the greater good" is very apealling on an emotional level. Given the sheer power of these emotional benefits, Christians naturally utilize a number of obvious rationalizations to protect their faith from being destroyed by plain logic or common-sense. The extreme influence of this power is demonstrated by the fact the the majority of ex-christians, including myself, experienced a period of depressive withdrawal symptoms following de-conversion; withdrawal symptoms that are rooted in the tragic loss of such a nurturing/comforting belief-system. Simply put, the pain of losing our most precious crutch--religion--and supporting our own weight in what turns out to be a cold, indifferent universe.

 

And if we remove this Christian rationalization from it's Christian context, the act of selective ignorance to maintain beliefs that are emotionally beneficial is common to the entire human race. For instance, I'm relatively confident that everyone, at least once in their life, has decided to ignore some pretty significant flaws in a romantic partner just to perpetuate the benefits of being in a relationship; despite knowing, deep down, that these flaws deserved serious attention. Viewed from this perspective, the fact that Christians sustain their faith in the face of brazen "stupidities" is not suprising or unusual.

[LosingMyReligion]

I didn't read all the responses to the main question of this post, so forgive me if the following is simply a repeat of points another already made.

 

At the risk of using what may be a hackneyed, atheist argument against the ignorance of Christians, I think that most Christians are able to remain oblivious to theological irrationalities (i.e. old testament atrocities and blatant contradictions) because the core of their religious commitment is emotional rather than intellectual. After all, life is a real bitch; so the idea of a loving, heavenly father guiding and directing the course of one's life according to some cosmic plan of benevolence or "the greater good" is very apealling on an emotional level. Given the sheer power of these emotional benefits, Christians naturally utilize a number of obvious rationalizations to protect their faith from being destroyed by plain logic or common-sense. The extreme influence of this power is demonstrated by the fact the the majority of ex-christians, including myself, experienced a period of depressive withdrawal symptoms following de-conversion; withdrawal symptoms that are rooted in the tragic loss of such a nurturing/comforting belief-system. Simply put, the pain of losing our most precious crutch--religion--and supporting our own weight in what turns out to be a cold, indifferent universe.

 

And if we remove this Christian rationalization from it's Christian context, the act of selective ignorance to maintain beliefs that are emotionally beneficial is common to the entire human race. For instance, I'm relatively confident that everyone, at least once in their life, has decided to ignore some pretty significant flaws in a romantic partner just to perpetuate the benefits of being in a relationship; despite knowing, deep down, that these flaws deserved serious attention. Viewed from this perspective, the fact that Christians sustain their faith in the face of brazen "stupidities" is not suprising or unusual.

 

It is all about emotion, when you get right down to it. Christians believe in shutting down the mind and turning on the heart.

 

And it is really sad.

[Kryten]

. . . You know, with the typical, "Well, that was before Jesus' time, but when Jesus came, things changed". Uh...right. Nice excuse there. Or else you'll hear people say, "But what about all the *good* things in the Bible?"

 

You lost me there.

[Rosa Mystica]

 

You lost me there.

 

What are you lost on? I'm not saying this is my opinion, but rather an opinion that might be held by a Christian who tries to gloss over the negatives.

[JeffXL]

Most Xians, those who don't bother reading the Babble aside from at the usual Sunday gathering, probably aren't even aware of this stuff, and aren't apt to want to hear it. Those that do, either find a way to accept it or listen to their reason and good sense and ditch the cult altogether.

 

That is exactly it-- I utterly swallowed the shit that was spoonfed to me either by pastors or my father. Questions I had were answered with whitewash, and I bought it, for a while. Then I read the Wholly Bile, and that was a major second step (the concept of Hell was the first one).