At the risk of offending, I don't think Christians can be trusted

.

to inject whatever perversions. While there were the odd 20th Century Pentecosts and later Charismatics, who shifted to a two-stage Baptism, the biggest loss of Christianity came when the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy was adopted by over 300 ministers. Prior to this time, Innerantists were considered outliers and cultish. Due to pressures of church competition, this belief then spread to the mainstream churches.

The main problem is that there are over 300 errors in the Bible, so it can't be divinely created, or with the Inerrantists, now changing it to Devinely Inspired. So, to get around this, they have to invent fictitious backstories to try and explain away the errors, or just tell congregants to accept the errors, if one should ever mention them. There was pressure at Bob Jones and other universities and churches to force this bullshit onto the educated clergy, doctors of theology and researchers. Almost none of them would subscribe to such tripe, so they were issued an ultimatum, either subscribe to it, or get fired. Most either quit or were fired, causing a brain drain in the church. This was filled with charlatans and hacks who would make up shit along the way.

Their goal shifted from selling God & Christ and making a profit -to- make a profit by selling God & Christ. Whatever to fill the church coffers and their pockets. There are now over 4500 Christian Churches in the USA, because many of these pastors want to control their own flocks and fleece them without others judging them or taking part of the proceeds. Since mainline Catholic and Protestant churches were experiencing loss of members, they started to adopt more of these diverse views, such as inerrancy and the speaking of tongues. While Charismatics view tongues as a brief occurrence to send a message to the congregation, Penetcosts believe that once this happens, the Holy Spirit forever lives within you and whatever you do is sanctioned by God and you will always sit by the right side of Jesus in the afterlife. They view themselves as having a free pass to essentially do whatever. Those, in their church who do not speak must have some reason why the Spirit is not entering them. This leads to competition to pretend to speak to join the club.

As far as the congregants, they are taught to just believe and not to question, leading over a generation to people who just accept whatever shit they are told. This is where we are now.

.

Just like Islamic vs. Islamist

One is a matter of belief, the other a matter of politics.

.



.

Who don’t care about the earth because it is the end times anyway. Hopefully that is a minority.

My mom fits this OP description perfectly and she is mainstream by every measure IMO. She is 84, so I take some comfort in hoping the younger generation will make the beliefs of her tribe inconsequential.

They are hypochristians

Hypochristians

Sid

There's no reason to suppose their faith in Christ is not genuine.

They have hijacked the religion in much the same way the taliban hijacked Islam.

Most of them believe the basic tenets of most Christian sects - that Jesus was the son of God, performed miracles, was crucified, resurrected, ascended to Heaven, and forgives sins.

You don't agree with the way they interpret his teachings, but that doesn't make them non-Christians.

Going to church and saying you’re a Christian doesn’t make you one any more than standing in a garage makes you a car.

That sounds pretty bigoted to me.

They're christians because their parents were christian, or because that's what most people are in the US. If the US were majority Hindu, then they'd be Hindu, if majority Muslim, then they'd be Muslim, but in all those cases they'd likely still be kind of shitty people.

The shitty people I have met have come from many countries and beliefs.

Christians are not even particularly well represented in that group.

It's textbook "No true Scotsman" and you're all whatever you say you are.

When they introduce themselves and very quickly proclaim their “Christianity”, I know it is similar to when someone says “it’s not about money”

I make no claim ... if my life does not reflect my beliefs, I am an imposter ...

there are still many wonderful Christians who I would trust with the lives of my children
but others I wouldn't trust to hang up my coat

Anyone can "claim" to be a Christian, but that doesn't mean anything. Even trump "claim" to be one, but his actions say otherwise. Many of those so called Christians that support trump only want the end of times to come. The earth will be destroyed and they will be the only ones saved by one means or another, and they will rebuild the earth in their own view of how things should be.

The entire history of Christianity tells of Christians doing horrible things to people in the name of their religion. The stories say even the Apostles, who knew Jesus personally, used violence and fear to control the congregation - read the story of Ananias and Sapphira in the Book of Acts Chapter 5.

The only thing that can be said about Christians, is that the word Christian tells you nothing about what kind of person you're dealing with.

than with all Christians. Maybe you need to expand your exposure. Most large groups of people have "good" and "bad" members, but to paint them all with the same brush is bigotry imo.

It tells me several things about a person.

A. They accept mythology as fact.
B. They reject the scientific method.
C. They are gullible.


If a book of mythology written 2000 years ago is the driving force of your life, then ... call me a bigot if you want... you are intellectually lazy, easily duped, And not someone I want in charge of anything that impacts my life.

Sid

"I am a Christian, and I am a devout Christian. I believe in the redemptive deathand resurrection of Jesus Christ. I believe that faith gives me a path to be cleansed of sin and have eternal life."

There are thousands of Christian denominations out there. They are very different from each other, as are the people who belong to them. It's wrong to lump all Christians into one category.

As an atheist, I accept people's claims of being Christians. It's not up to me to decide who is and who isn't one. What I do is look at their behavior as individuals and judge them that way. There are Christians I admire and Christians I detest, based on their behavior.

Christianity is not just one thing. It's a whole department store of things. Choose your department carefully.

The extremist Christian sects are growing in political influence and seek to control other peoples lives. As a result they are tarring the reputations of all Christians. (And the Catholic sexual scandals don't help)

When people do that in negative ways, it destroys the message they're trying to convey. Qualifying words, like "some" modify the statement and remove that problem.

Saying "Some Christians do terrible things" is a far better way to say it.

You're brushing all Christians with the negative behavior of a few.

Many decent people - including liberal Democrats - are Christians. I am one of them.

Having said that, I totally see where you are coming from. Please don't use such broad brush strokes. Jesus was put to death and betrayed by His own people because He taught love and forgiveness. A careful study of the New Testament, the one that applies to Christians, will find that we who believe in Jesus have one commandment: Love your neighbor as yourself. That starts with other Christians but it is expanded to all people. We are to be at peace with all as much as it depends on us. We are even to be willing to love and care for those who are trying to be our enemies.

Jesus said that this Way is difficult and that there are FEW who find it. I believe that still holds true. The tares are vocal. The wheat pretty much keeps on keeping on being misunderstood by both sides but trying to show love and good works as a result of faith. Pretty harmless, I'd say. When done right. Our message is the "Good News". Not bad news. There is no eternal torment only total destruction. The criteria is, seemingly, how we treat our fellow humans. There is room for hope to those who do not believe in Jesus. There is not much hope for those who do not treat others with love.

All will never accept these things. We don't expect them to do so. It IS complicated. Don't judge all of us by the vocal hateful bunch, please.

The eleventh chapter of the Gospel of John explicitly states that the Jewish authorities arrested Jesus because they were afraid that the Roman Army would unleash yet ANOTHER massacre of the Jewish population. "What else can we do?" they say. "If we let him go on like this, gathering large crowds, the Romans will come in and destroy our nation." Trying to run a country that had been CRUSHED by the thuggish Roman occupying army left these poor men few choices. Those who say that Jesus posed no threat to the Romans should consider what bloodthirsty barbarians the Romans really were. The other groups they had massacred, in Israel as well as in other places, also posed no REAL threat to the Romans. The overblown, swollen ego of the Roman Empire demanded total submission by their victims of conquest. Pilate's little show of asking the population what he should do with Jesus looks very different when one considers the very real TERROR that population must surely have felt, surrounded by Roman soldiers who had recently shown how merciless they could be if Pilate issued one short order to kill.

The powerful leaders had much to lose if the Romans cracked down. That was in their minds. I believe they did not care for the common folks. Those are the ones who had flocked to Jesus looking to Him for healing and, possibly salvation from the Romans as the Messiah. He does offer salvation and a chance for eternal life. He never promised that this life would be great from a worldly standpoint.

Anyway, the Jews offered him up and the Romans drove the nails. Jew and Gentile participated in the sacrifice and both can benefit if they choose to do so. If the Jewish Nation had chosen the teachings of Jesus they would have avoided much in the way of Roman violence. Of course the Romans did destroy the Jewish people and Temple in 70 A.D. after a rebellion and other issues. Romans and Jews both come off looking bad....they represent everyone everywhere. Mostly we come off looking bad unless we are governed by love. Then, to many, we just look weak and foolish. So be it.

You can basically pencil in the fanatical adherents of almost any religion and/or ideology at the beginning of that statement and it will be true.

Even atheists.

It’s my hope that moderates from all can continue to live and let live through mutual progress.

for the people that believe in it.

nobody is born Christian, or Muslim, or Jewish.

They may be born into a faith, but their belief is learned belief. One could make the argument that children are held captive and are brainwashed into a belief system that's not of their choosing.

I have no issue criticizing, mocking, deriding, ridiculing or not trusting any learned belief. We regularly do that to who have learned to be Republicans. Religious beliefs should be no less scrutinized.

Religions get an unearned level of respect and protection from criticism that they don't deserve.

Sid

now best described an apophatic. Organized religion seems to be something originated by mystics, written about and "justified" by
theologians and practiced largely by laypeople who practice a muddled and watered down version of
the original. This is the case with American Christianity, more specifically the case with Protestantism and more particularly what is
termed "salvation theology" of the kind practiced by Southern Baptists, Pentecostals... etc. It's called "free grace" when
actually, it's an obviation of any obligation (esp. ethical obligations) except to "believe." Even some evangelicals have a problem with free grace - see the so-called "lordship controversy."

You are painting Christianity with a broad brush. There are a lot of liberally minded Christians who don't hold with
the practices of southern evangelicals or conservative Catholics.

You're correct that (some) Christians are dangerous for the body politic because their faith is fear driven and
they reject reason. Same can be said for many groups -some of whom are non-religious.

I think it was Ghandi who said something like; "I like this Jesus Christ very much, but I've never met any of his followers that are like him"

A lot of the Christians I know, and I too claim to be one, can be described as "Old Testament Christians".

Old Testament Christians as folks that call themselves Christian, but haven't made it past the Book of Leviticus in Bible Study yet.

between evangelicals and christians. Evangelicals are the ones who are laundering Russian money, because who would ask where that money came from in the collection plate, especially when you don't have to file taxes on it.

Christians are trying to help save the world and all the beings on it. They're the quiet ones.

Wonderful people.

Some of the people I trust least in my life are Christians.

Not such good people.

It's also true that today, most of his remaining ardent supporters are Christian. However, it's impossible to honestly combine Christians into one group and say anything about them. Christianity isn't a single religion. There are more than 1000 denominations of Christianity, plus who knows how many "nondenominational" and "independent" churches, and countless individual practitioners. All of them have their own unique interpretation and practices, and each one is convinced that they are right and that everyone else is doing it wrong. A person can believe or disbelieve just about anything and still be considered one flavor of Christian or another. You should consider them as individuals, because the word "Christian" really is meaningless by itself.

For someone to say “I don’t trust Muslims” or to broad brush Muslims like you did with Christians?

See my comment at 34.

The primary points tend to be a complete lack of guilt for whatever they've done, and an infinite free pass to do more of whatever it is.

There is a word for that in psychology.

It would have been disbanded and prohibited with all the suffering it's caused.
Especially the child molestation and rape.

Leave your Bibles at home, or your Koran for that matter, or whatever religious book you want to promote.

Don't enact laws based on religious faith.

Just don't.

He didn't force his "Christian" doctrine on anybody through legislation.

They seem to have a "holier than thou" attitude that is repulsive. They choose to live in their isolated world with little or no regard for anyone that is not a member of their cult. Don't believe in global warming or just plain do care, love to talk down most, if not all minorities. I never bring up politics when around them but their world view, in my opinion, is insane. I don't really understand it. I was raised in the same environment but I guess the indoctrination didn't take. For years I went along with accepting religion as a choice but these days it seems that it is simply a ignorant and dangerous path for our world. I consider myself open-minded but it is very hard for me to hid my feelings these days - although I still do in the company of others.

to call out those who identify as Christian and are acting as hypocrites. The Christian community must cleanse itself of those who use the name but elect not to follow the teachings of Christ. *

I feel the same way with police. Victims of police violence aren't responsible for acknowledging the fact that there are good police. "Good" police must use their voice to get rid of the bad apples. The organization is corrupt if it fails to hold all its members to the highest standard.

So, Christians CAN'T be trusted when they fail to speak out against their own.

but not if you don’t accept Jesus as your savior. You have to stroke God’s ego, or its off to hell with you.

How very human that is.

Joe Lieberman was a candidate in the primaries and was actually a nominee in the VP slot.

Sanders ran for the nomination in 2016 and he’s Jewish as well.

So was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., so is US Rep John Lewis who was beaten and jailed for you.

And many thousands if not millions of other democrats that demand social justice.

This whole thread would be on fire right now. Let's just not do this type of thing here. What you just said is nothing short of bigotry, and I say this as an Agnostic.

that are not by choice.

Religion is a choice. Religious notions are as much intellectual as are political ones.

Am I bigoted against Christianity? Sure, OK, I admit it... in the same way I'm bigoted against Republicanism.

Sid

Double standards and hypocrisy alive and well here on DU.

But one that will be tolerated and supported

I wonder how many folks who mock and ridicule Christian's for their belief in invisible beings and the writings in old books would include Barak Obama who became religious as an adult and described himself as a devout Christian.

Christians give to charity; money, time, clothing. They visit people in prison. They feed the hungry. They give shelter to the homeless. They take care of the sick. That is a Christian. I am Jewish, but I do try to follow Matthew 25: 35-40

Or promoting trump in their tax-exempt churches.

about 1000 percent. I assume there are still some good ones in some denominations. Evangelicals no none exist. I have been amazed that the "good" one haven't tried to reclaim their brand. As Reagan said verify.

You know, the ones who want to fast track the end times.

You know the ones that want to murder artists who draw caricatures of Mohammad or who feel the best way to deal with gays is to toss them to their deaths from tall buildings.

and I've never seen a muslim protesting abortion providers.

Of all adherents of a particular religion.

Are there anti-Republican bigots here?

As I said in another post.... religious views, political views... these are intellectual notions.

To call me a "bigot" against Christianity but excuse my intolerance of Republicanism without applying that label makes no sense to me.

Every single person has its own beliefs. Whatever the holy book says, in the end we cherrypick what we believe.

Religion does not lead to immoral behavior. It catalyzes already existing immoral tendencies by providing excuses.

No religion in general discussion

You choose to follow the rules or not.

Stay away from churches and you'll be OK...

Though I do realize the convenience of limiting that mistrust only to a particular religion, or a specific political party, or someone who digs the Bare Naked Ladies. Without that opportune, arbitrary and imaginary distinction, we're often forced to take people as individuals-- which has its own host of problems.

They think that this buys them redemption--both with "God" and with the communities the churches "serve."

not one of the club. I am not saying all are like that, but I've encountered enough. I find it difficult for me to be blindly fed beliefs. I went through that as a kid until I woke up one day and realized much of it was bull shit.

Let's not alienate the entire religion. We might need some of them later. They are a sizable group of people and it would be unfair to prejudge them all.

As with any religion, there are all kinds.

I avoid any business that includes a "Jesus fish" in their ads. We have quite a few of those in my town. In my experience, the operators of those businesses turn out to be the biggest crooks. That fish doesn't tell me that you are honest and will do a good job at whatever you are advertising you do. It just says "We're part of the club, and we'll still rip you off, even if you are, too."

As for having that attitude about people in general, yeah it's bigoted.

to believe that the human race can end themselves plays hell with their eternal life.

The flip side of this is of course that our destruction of the Earth is part of the path to the Rapture and we can't have that being interfered with either.

anyone publicly identifying themselves as Christian are doing so to provide "evidence" they are good people. Especially political candidates. The question should be why does someone feel the need to announce they are Christian?

Each and every one of us are free to make OUR OWN decisions on religious freedom. NOW i feel the RUMPS and PUTINS (FALSE PROPHETS) have chosen THIS as a way to divide and conquer! If you are NOT a Christian makes NO difference to me. YOU CHOOSE! BUT we CANNOT let these people divide us!

But that's probably just me.

If you have strong negative reactions to any and all Christians and believe that all fit the stereotype that members of your family have displayed to you, then there may be bigotry at work.

It can be very frustrating to see people who claim to belong to a group with a set of beliefs and principles and not acting according to those values. I have certainly been there.

A major problem with Christianity is that there are so many interpretations and people act upon their personal interpretations of other groups or people's interpretations and all claim to be able to justify all actions based on those interpretations and interpretations of interpretations. People say, "they aren't Christian" but it is difficult to prove that, they may truly believe they are acting according to some value of Christianity even though they may be wrong.

Another problem with Christianity is that it has been used, as have other religions, by people who want to motivate people to act in certain ways. Leaders with bad intentions are more likely to use religion to carry out their own agenda because they find that people who are very religious are easy to manipulate.

I think a lot of people use religion to try to make sense out of the world and in doing so, they can be vulnerable to exploitation and manipulation into doing some really bad things.

1) How can the Christian religion be the Christian religion when Jesus was not a Christian?

2) Why are there so my books in the NT written by Paul who never met Jesus. And it is Paul writing that he saw Jesus in a vision. No witnesses. How convenient.

3) If the Christian religion is such a great religion then why was it necessary to co-opt the Hebrew Bible as their Old Testament?

4) Why are interpretations of the Old Testament by Christians given preference over the interpretations of Rabbis that lived during the period. Again, the Old Testament is the Hebrew Bible. It is just formatted differently.

5) The genealogy of Jesus is meaningless if Mary was a virgin and Joseph had nothing to do with impregnating Mary.

6) Mark, John, and Paul mention nothing of Mary being a virgin.

7) The thirty pieces of silver -- Silver as currency was no longer in existence. It was eliminated 300 years prior.

8) Why are the majority of books in the NT written by Paul?

9) Why did Paul preached it was his gospel and not the gospel of Jesus?

There are 2.2 billion Christians in the world, nearly a third of the world's population. Do you distrust them all? Your statement is as meaningless as if you had said that you don't trust humans since humans have done bad things.

And if you don't understand the difference between, for example, right-wing evangelicals, which is only one subset of Christianity (although one with an unfortunate stranglehold on the GOP) and other groups of Christians (many of whom also have serious problems, as all human institutions tend to do, but not necessarily the same political ones you mention), then perhaps your opinion is based simply on stereotypes based on limited exposure.

My family is heavily Christian, I am not. My family members are compassionate people that don't hesitate to help someone that is in need. They don't hate LGBTQ people, in fact one of my Christian nieces employs an LGBTQ person as her most valued employee.

So, I all depends upon where your vantage point is.

And it’s all based on make believe.

... unless you're asking for The Powers That Be to delete/lock.

But also FWIW... DU has many people who are Christian. Not all Christians ignore bigotry and racism -- see, for example, the Quakers, but also progressive congregations in many other denominations exist.

I've had issues with some people who, IMHO, lose sight of the "loving each other as themselves" part of Jesus's two commandments, and feel that they can't love God without judging other humans.

But that is not all of Christianity.

Or, "I don't think Jews can be trusted." Or Hindus, etc.

I believe the response would be quite different.

Bigotry is bigotry. Your statement is bigoted.

Signed,
A lapsed Catholic

Thete are many fine ones who walk the walk, and are very trustworthy.

Forum Hosts have written to you advising you of the SOP restrictions in the General Discussions Forum, you've not responded.

From the SOP of the General Discussions Forum