Poster- Christianity inherently abusive

[Arete]

From our theological corner, we were taught hell was for the unrepentent child murderer, not someone who had sassed their mother 3 seconds before being struck by lightening. Some of our theologians do believe in the end their will be a universal reconcilliation, and even the unrepentent murderer who is not in the presence of God after death (that is hell to us, no flames or pitchforks or cackling devils) will have his chance to come back into God's presence. Either way, we are taught not to speculate on hell and keep our eyes on the prize so to speak.

Jesus's words about lusting after a woman in your head have never been extrapolated in our denomination to mean if you think of stealing some candy or even a pair of pants, it is the same as actually doing it. Ditto we are not taught that feeling angry is the same as acting out in anger. In fact we are taught that a lot of feelings, anger, despair, fear, even appreciating a well shaped rear end, are quite normal. We get into trouble when we act out these feelings in destructive ways.

Hell, you should see our churches on Easter Sunday. Gold, hair ornaments, perfume, makeup, all those things Paul said a woman shouldn't have on in church. We read Paul and recognize he was addressing specific problems in specific church communities at the time. Not everything is read and applied verbatim. As to different people reading the Bible and getting different interpretations, of course that is going to happen, it happens with any book. That is why the majority of the world's Christians do not believe in Sola scriptura. Scripture is only one facet, together with tradition, local custom, time and place.

[Arete]

Yeah, to touch on something that OKTBT said, there are very few things we can be sure of about salvation, but making your grandmother cry is culturally felt to be the equivalent of locking yourself out of the kingdom of heaven. :lol:

[AVENues]

The Christian god is a narcissistic, rigid, cunning, savage, entitled, beastly, blood thirsty, vindictive, unappreciative, un-loving, self-adoring, condescending, manipulating piece of shit, If he was a real person, he would be diagnosed as a narcissistic psychopath. "You can only love me and no one else. You are worthless. You are impure. Everything you do is wrong, but *I* forgive you and you need that forgiveness from me. I'm a generous, perfect, wonderful person, and you don't even deserve me. Keep giving me your money and pray for my forgiveness. Look at you. You're filthy. Your thoughts must be filthy because mine are so unbelievably filthy that I cannot imagine people thinking about anything else but sex and killing. If you behave and worship me, I *might* forgive you all the acts you did I think are sins. And I keep watching you. I'll be always watching you, no matter what you do."

If that was a real person, would you advice anyone to be close to them? Or would you warn them to stay the hell away from them?

If that was your man, how would you feel? Would you feel safe and loved or would you think you might never get out of that relationship alive?

If you heard a person talk to their women like that, what would be your first thought? Mine would be, that it's a mad man, and I would change countries and name and RUN! for my life.

[maybeizfundie]

.,

Exactly. I never thought the idea of obeying the commandments was so that God doesn't look down on you and smite you - I thought the idea of the commandments was to have a set of pretty basic ethics to live by. Not that falling short in following them will lead to eternal damnation. And the commandments if you look at them are mostly basic common sense - don't steal, don't kill, don't cheat etc

This. And I was raised variously in conservative Anabaptist circles, then moved to charismatic evangelical churches as a teen.

No question that some use Christianity in the way the meme described. But I agree that it doesn't describe the totality, or even the majority (just talking sheer numbers of believers over the centuries) of Christian doctrine and theology.

[Renting with Raggles]

If you believe in a literal hell, then your god is an abuser, on the Josef Fritzl x a billion scale.

Most liberal Christians, which includes all Eastern Orthodox and Catholics in the industrialized world (but excludes their hierarchy - whatever niceties their local priest may speak - and those in developing nations) and the more traditional, non Calvinist Protestants have such a nebulous, deistic god that they can read almost all of the Bible as metaphor. The whole 'fire and brimstone' simply becomes figurative language for 'lost', or 'cut off from god' because who wouldn't want to spend eternity with such a cool guy, right? So what happens to, say, atheists would just be what they think is going to happen anyway - they just die, that's it. And they will tell you that HazyLiberal Deity will let in people of other faiths or no faiths if they tried to do good, etc.

The threat of hell is more like adolescent hyperbole: "My dad's going to kill me if I don't..." However, many of these same liberal believers do believe in a literal heaven. This " the carrot is totally real, the stick is not" is really confusing to non-believers and literalists alike. :confusion-scratchheadblue: :confusion-scratchheadyellow:

[Rachel333]

And the commandments if you look at them are mostly basic common sense - don't steal, don't kill, don't cheat etc.,

Don't kill, lie, cheat on your spouse, steal are all good ones, but 4/10 are pretty much just God being vain and jealous and have nothing to do with actual morality--no other gods, no graven images, don't take God's name in vain, remember the sabbath. These are supposed to be the 10 most important rules, yet "don't rape" isn't in there. I feel like most people would come up with a better list than that. God doesn't even really seem to follow the "don't kill" law.

I really had trouble reading the Old Testament when I was a Christian because I felt like the more I read the less I believed. So much of it went against my own moral code, and when I'd bring that up all I got was "Well, God is a loving God and we're under a new covenant now, and look at all the good stuff in the Bible!" I genuinely am glad that most Christians don't emphasize that part of the Bible, but it's all still in there and ignoring it doesn't change that fact.

[yewchapel]

The Christian god is a narcissistic, rigid, cunning, savage, entitled, beastly, blood thirsty, vindictive, unappreciative, un-loving, self-adoring, condescending, manipulating piece of shit, If he was a real person, he would be diagnosed as a narcissistic psychopath. "You can only love me and no one else. You are worthless. You are impure. Everything you do is wrong, but *I* forgive you and you need that forgiveness from me. I'm a generous, perfect, wonderful person, and you don't even deserve me. Keep giving me your money and pray for my forgiveness. Look at you. You're filthy. Your thoughts must be filthy because mine are so unbelievably filthy that I cannot imagine people thinking about anything else but sex and killing. If you behave and worship me, I *might* forgive you all the acts you did I think are sins. And I keep watching you. I'll be always watching you, no matter what you do."

If that was a real person, would you advice anyone to be close to them? Or would you warn them to stay the hell away from them?

If that was your man, how would you feel? Would you feel safe and loved or would you think you might never get out of that relationship alive?

If you heard a person talk to their women like that, what would be your first thought? Mine would be, that it's a mad man, and I would change countries and name and RUN! for my life.

That's not my God.

[yewchapel]

Don't kill, lie, cheat on your spouse, steal are all good ones, but 4/10 are pretty much just God being vain and jealous and have nothing to do with actual morality--no other gods, no graven images, don't take God's name in vain, remember the sabbath. These are supposed to be the 10 most important rules, yet "don't rape" isn't in there. I feel like most people would come up with a better list than that. God doesn't even really seem to follow the "don't kill" law.

I really had trouble reading the Old Testament when I was a Christian because I felt like the more I read the less I believed. So much of it went against my own moral code, and when I'd bring that up all I got was "Well, God is a loving God and we're under a new covenant now, and look at all the good stuff in the Bible!" I genuinely am glad that most Christians don't emphasize that part of the Bible, but it's all still in there and ignoring it doesn't change that fact.

The sabbath is for people, to give them a rest. But the commandments about God, I don't really see the issue with. I don't think it's wrong for God to expect people to worship Him. The whole point is that God is not a human being, so comparing Him to a jealous boyfriend doesn't make much sense. Of course you wouldn't worship another person, because they're not any better than you, but the whole point is that God is.

But I believe that the Bible was written by people, and I'm not from a tradition that uses Scripture alone - we use Scripture, Tradition and Reason together. I think that the passages in the Bible about smiting are about natural disasters and people imagining it as God's smiting, using metaphor.

[formergothardite]

In all the years (some twenty) of attending a catholic church, being educated in catholic schools, going on retreats, the nuns, the priests the whole catholic shebang. I have never read the bible. I was never instructed to read the bible. Parts of it maybe. But not to the extent of 'Bible Study' I see mentioned here. Even then I assumed, or I assume I was led to believe it was a guide not a literal instruction in how to live. How could it be, it was interpreted by men. Honestly no idea wether I had a shockingly lax religious upbringing or I was asleep.

Hell was only for those who did not repent. Oh and Glaswegian protestants who supported Rangers Football club :lol:

That right there would be enough to send you to hell in the churches around here! :lol: Men were not interpreting the Bible! God was speaking to us through men!

Not only did we have Bible studies, we had to memorize whole books of the Bible and at one point my parents wanted us to copy the entire Bible by hand. Luckily they gave up on that idea. :lol:

[miffy]

In all the years (some twenty) of attending a catholic church, being educated in catholic schools, going on retreats, the nuns, the priests the whole catholic shebang. I have never read the bible. I was never instructed to read the bible. Parts of it maybe. But not to the extent of 'Bible Study' I see mentioned here. Even then I assumed, or I assume I was led to believe it was a guide not a literal instruction in how to live. How could it be, it was interpreted by men. Honestly no idea wether I had a shockingly lax religious upbringing or I was asleep.

Hell was only for those who did not repent. Oh and Glaswegian protestants who supported Rangers Football club :lol:

I can remember teachers reading parts of the bible out loud during RE. I do read parts of the bible on occasion, but no memorisation, i've never been told to do anything like that. The main focus was the life of Jesus & then 'good stories' from the rest of the bible. It always seemed like a given that nobody would take the bible literally, particularly Genesis. I believe that Jesus was real & I have fanciful ideas about Noah.

I didn't go to a Catholic school but my school had an High Church Anglican chaplain so its pretty much the same. I actually prefer a Catholic mass or High Church service because I like the pageantry. :lol:

A friends devout Catholic mother used to go to bible study. But I think it was just a more advanced version on school RE, not trying to memorise the sermon on the mount.

[Arete]

In terms of "Thou shall have no other God before me", as a monotheist, I don't see the issue, or the abuse. When we get married in a monogamous relationship, aren't we promising we will have no other wives or husbands? We do that because we consider the marriage bond to be that important. It is the same with a monotheist's "relationship" with God. I put "relationship" in quotes because it is not in an evangelical Protestant, God is telling me how to run my life down to the minuitia kind of thing. The purpose of that commandment is to set the person apart as a monotheist, and to commit them to the worship of only one God.

I'm never going to complain about the concept of a day of rest, and in the society that first wrote it down, that concept was revolutionary. Ancient nomadic people, hell, all ancient people, worked unless they dropped dead or were about to.

There is no commandment against rape because let's face it, the world the books were compiled in had no concept of rape as bad. Nor of hitting a child as bad. The Bible represents the writings of men and women trying to work out the concept of divinity and its relationship to humanity. Sometimes they made huge breakthroughs, in other things they were limited by the the societal norms they lived by. That alone tells me the Bible is not a book of cosmic dictation.

[browngrl]

This is one thing I have noticed about abused women who don't want to leave their abuser just yet. Someone will point out some terrible thing the abuser said or did and the abused will interpret it in a much more positive light. For example: an outsider says "he called you a *%##! whore" and the woman will say "but he really meant he loves me" or an outsider will say "he beat you to a pulp" and the abused will say "but he tells me he loves me and takes care of me and it is for my own good".

As an outsider to Christianity I see the same thing. The Bible says some pretty dreadful things (IMO) for example: kicking out Adam and Eve for eating from the tree of knowledge, sending a flood to kill most of humanity, destroying Sodom, asking Abraham to sacrifice his son, Lot's daughters having sex with their father, etc. Most of the Christians I know (these are all reasonable, educated people not fundies) will say the Bible is all allegory and metaphor and must be interpreted properly. There always seems to be a way to spin what I consider to be an unreasonable act by God into something positive. I see the same sort of thing in most other religions - but I have not studied them enough to give specific examples.

I guess that this might be a key point of difference between myself (an atheist) and believers: they can read/hear about terrible things from their holy book and interpret them kindly or excuse them and I can not. For believers the good outweighs the bad but for me it does not. Maybe that is what faith really is?

[AVENues]

That's not my God.

That IS the Biblical god. But then again, you're free to come up with the god of your own, many people do that. Actually, there's an uncanny resemblance between people and what they imagine their gods to be like.

[debrand]

It seems to me that the religious people who aren't 'bible only' worship the most compassionate god.

So, for those who don't believe that the meme applies to their view on god, do you believe in a literal hell? What about other faiths and nonbelievers, do they go to heaven? Are you evangelical in your beliefs?

[OnceModestTwiceShy]

That IS the Biblical god. But then again, you're free to come up with the god of your own, many people do that. Actually, there's an uncanny resemblance between people and what they imagine their gods to be like.

Exactly. Look, you can make your imagined deity look however you want. That's your thing. But when you start superimposing your deity onto the Bible and claiming that all inconsistencies can be explained away, there's a problem of cognitive dissonance happening.

[Arete]

It seems to me that the religious people who aren't 'bible only' worship the most compassionate god.

So, for those who don't believe that the meme applies to their view on god, do you believe in a literal hell? What about other faiths and nonbelievers, do they go to heaven? Are you evangelical in your beliefs?

Oh yeah, I believe you can be evil enough to earn getting cut off from God. What I am not sure about is whether it is forever or you get parked for a certain amount of time and then let back in. I lean toward the latter. Other faiths and believers go to heaven. If by evangelical you mean thinking that everyone must convert to Christianity or they will be cut off from God or that they are bad people, the answer is NO.

[Rachel333]

Regarding the monotheism--I never said at all that it was abusive (some of it comes across as narcissistic, though), just that there's nothing moral about that unless you already believe. I don't think the 10 Commandments are wrong, but they're not exactly all common sense moral rules.

Actually, I think some of the verses in the OT commanding monotheism are pretty interesting. Some seem to come from the view that those other gods do actually exist. For some reason I always liked the Dagon story, too.

[debrand]

That IS the Biblical god. But then again, you're free to come up with the god of your own, many people do that. Actually, there's an uncanny resemblance between people and what they imagine their gods to be like.

Damn. I had a long response and it just disappeared. Honest, I hit something and it is gone.

You are correct, biblical god is an ass. The bible states that god does not change so the Old Testament god is the New Testament god. The meme fits a biblical view of god. The reason that many Christians don't recognize it is because they worship a god more in line with who they are as a moral person

Not only do people design a god in their own image but so do entire cultures. Europe is more compassionate toward their poor perhaps because they follow Jesus a bit more than Paul. What is ironic is that the cultures that actually try to follow the bible seem less concerned with the poor and the needy. That seems odd to me.

[debrand]

Oh yeah, I believe you can be evil enough to earn getting cut off from God. What I am not sure about is whether it is forever or you get parked for a certain amount of time and then let back in. I lean toward the latter. Other faiths and believers go to heaven. If by evangelical you mean thinking that everyone must convert to Christianity or they will be cut off from God or that they are bad people, the answer is NO.

See, that seems more just. If you're an evil person who tortures others, you spend time in a place of misery and then you go to heaven-or maybe you get reborn. Someone who held such views would probably be a kind person.

[AVENues]

http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/scumbag%20god

And this is just the very first one of his little stunts. I really think I had my say and I just would continue repeating myself.

[LeatherCouch]

The sabbath is for people, to give them a rest. But the commandments about God, I don't really see the issue with. I don't think it's wrong for God to expect people to worship Him. The whole point is that God is not a human being, so comparing Him to a jealous boyfriend doesn't make much sense. Of course you wouldn't worship another person, because they're not any better than you, but the whole point is that God is.

But I believe that the Bible was written by people, and I'm not from a tradition that uses Scripture alone - we use Scripture, Tradition and Reason together. I think that the passages in the Bible about smiting are about natural disasters and people imagining it as God's smiting, using metaphor.

Except all of that God-ordered genocide? The killing of animals, women and children (except sometimes the little girls...they were saved for sex slaves)... No need to answer, I've heard it all explained away many times, I just wanted to point out that it's not just natural disasters. There were bloody, brutal wars, and people used God as their excuse for atrocities, just like they do today.

I find it interesting that it seems to be mostly those who haven't read and studied the Bible extensively that are able to maintain their faith. It strikes me as a little funny that we are here to snark on those who actually try to follow the Biblical text, even the parts that are unsavory, while having this discussion.

[LeatherCouch]

Oh yeah, I believe you can be evil enough to earn getting cut off from God. What I am not sure about is whether it is forever or you get parked for a certain amount of time and then let back in. I lean toward the latter. Other faiths and believers go to heaven. If by evangelical you mean thinking that everyone must convert to Christianity or they will be cut off from God or that they are bad people, the answer is NO.

I'm asking sincerely, since I am still trying to wrap my brain around non-literal Christians. In light of the statement above, how do you interpret Mark 16:16, Luke 13:3, John 8:24, John 3:16-17, Romans 6:23 and 2Thessalonians 1:8?

[formergothardite]

Damn. I had a long response and it just disappeared. Honest, I hit something and it is gone.

You are correct, biblical god is an ass. The bible states that god does not change so the Old Testament god is the New Testament god. The meme fits a biblical view of god. The reason that many Christians don't recognize it is because they worship a god more in line with who they are as a moral person

Not only do people design a god in their own image but so do entire cultures. Europe is more compassionate toward their poor perhaps because they follow Jesus a bit more than Paul. What is ironic is that the cultures that actually try to follow the bible seem less concerned with the poor and the needy. That seems odd to me.

God is designed in the image of the people who worship him. The God of the Bible is pretty darn horrible, even in the New Testament. So it sounds like many denominations of Christians just decided all the bad parts of God revealed in the Bible were man made and all the good parts were actually real. If you are going to worship God it is better to worship a nicer one, but it really is just creating the God you want and not the Biblical God. In the process of leaving God I did this. I started believing in universal salvation, but eventually I realized I was just deciding what I wanted God to be because the other versions made me feel uncomfortable.

[dpndetfarm]

Basically the only reason we have god(s) is because humans needed a way to govern the masses (including getting them to stop eating each other), explain the scary/horrible/tragic/unknown aspects of life, and justify behaviors the elites wanted to keep.

This is why it baffles my mind that grownups the world over actually will tell you straightfaced they believe in god.

Sure, follow the teachings of Jesus if you like. We can determine historically that this man existed and was a good teacher, but when looked at logically god is just a Santa Clause for grownups.

I will add that if you want to believe in god and it helps you in your life more power to you. Heck my kids are 20 and 22. They will tell you they still believe in Santa, but that's because they know that when they stop believing Santa stops delivering.

[AVENues]

Basically the only reason we have god(s) is because humans needed a way to govern the masses (including getting them to stop eating each other), explain the scary/horrible/tragic/unknown aspects of life, and justify behaviors the elites wanted to keep.

This is why it baffles my mind that grownups the world over actually will tell you straightfaced they believe in god.

Sure, follow the teachings of Jesus if you like. We can determine historically that this man existed and was a good teacher, but when looked at logically god is just a Santa Clause for grownups.

I will add that if you want to believe in god and it helps you in your life more power to you. Heck my kids are 20 and 22. They will tell you they still believe in Santa, but that's because they know that when they stop believing Santa stops delivering.

:agree: