Strange Religious Book Titles

[kpmom]

9 hours ago, Tjay said:

@kpmom I definitely didn't mean to be insulting to anyone who has an intellectual disability, as someone who is involved in communities with people who have emotional, physical, and intellectual disabilities I sincerely apologise if my post was offensive. I took the reviews to be making a mockery of the book, which is hurtful and offensive in its language and by implying that people with disabilities, intellectual or otherwise cannot have faith or be religious without this book. 

Im really sorry if my post offended anyone, that was not my intention.

@Tjay thanks so much for this post.  I have someone very close to me with an intellectual disability so I tend to get very defensive when I see things like the Amazon reviews.

You are probably right that they are mocking the book and not people with ID, but it's hard for me to be objective about those things.

Thanks again, and thank you for your apology.  I misread your intentions.   I apologize too.

[L1o2u3]

I think the "Shepherding a Child's Heart" title is just cruel. It sounds like love and protection but really is about child abuse (which they regard as love and protection, but still). And now I see that someone I know who is about to give birth soon has rated it 5 stars on Goodreads 

That book went on the index* here in Germany, as did the translation of "To Train up a Child".  (meaning you can't advertise it anywhere and only people over 18 can buy it). And now I've just seen that a new translation under a different title, saying that it was edited, is again available.  I think I need to write an email to the institution that is responsible for putting media on the index. 

*The Index, Germany's List of Media Harmful to Young People published by the Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Medien

[L1o2u3]

But I think Jesus Prom: Life Gets Fun When You Love People Like God Does is a fun title or The New Rules for Love, Sex, and Dating when he really means the New Testament, which is not so new anymore these days. 

The last one on the liberalamerica list, "The Sinner's Guide to Natural Family Planning" actually sounds okay contentwise. It promises to talk about problems that Catholics may have with NFP and from the introduction, it seems good. The author says that each couple decides if they want another child and there's no general opinion on what are legitimate reasons to not want another child or not. Some quiverfull ladies could really benefit from considering that position. Too bad they don't like catholics  

And of course there's Vegangelical and Animals Are Not Ours (No, Really, They're Not): An Evangelical Animal Liberation Theology because did you know God actually wants humans to be vegan. Which is both cool and a little weird at the same time. 

[PennySycamore]

@L1o2u3,  I knew there are Evangelical groups that promote vegetarianism/veganism along with a Jewish group.  They argue that the scriptures that talk about dominion over animals does not mean we should eat them.  Of course, Seventh Day Adventists have a history of seeing vegetarianism as spiritually preferable although many SDAs eat meat.  The plant meat industry was started by SDAs.

[Tjay]

@kpmom that's totally understandable, everyone comes out swinging for the people they care about. I should've worded my first post Better.

Have a great day 

[Joyleaf]

This thread made me think of the following:
I like looking for books on Project Gutenberg and using "missionary" or "mission", "truth" or "Jesus" can bring up some interesting (and often snark-worthy) books.

Sadly very few have funny titles although I liked the sound of A Few Words About the Devil, and Other Biographical Sketches and Essays but haven't read it. And I fear it won't deliver what the title promises to my dirty mind.

I did read Changing China by Lady Florence Mary Cecil and William Gascoyne-Cecil. Interesting descriptions of China at that time and a total inability of self-reflection. ("The Chinese people would prosper if they would all just convert to Christianity. Because Christians are good. The Western (Christian) sailors and traders have such a bad influence on them!")

 

[Seahorse Wrangler]

Awful library books has several interesting books that have been weeded over the years.

[smittykins]

I flove ALB!

WARNING:  You might want to have the rescue ferrets on standby.

ETA again: If you go far enough back, you'll see To Beat Up A Child.

[L1o2u3]

You can also filter for only those that are tagged with religion: http://awfullibrarybooks.net/category/department-of-god/

"Computers and the Beast of Revelation" sounds interesting  

[formergothardite]

On 7/27/2017 at 4:41 PM, L1o2u3 said:

 because did you know God actually wants humans to be vegan. Which is both cool and a little weird at the same time. 

As a vegan I wish more Christians would go this route instead of refusing to even care about factory farming. It only sounds weird because not caring about factory farmed animals is prevalent in American churches, but if there is  a God, it would make sense that a good one would would want you to lean towards being vegan or at least treating animals humanely. But in today's evangelical society, a pastor who got up and said that Christians shouldn't support factor farms because of the suffering and cruelty caused by them would be looked at like he was going crazy. Of course, churches getting people to give up their chocolate and coffee made on the backs of child labor would be a good start, but even that would be a challenge. 

[PennySycamore]

@formergothardite, as I'm sure you know, factory farming doesn't just harm the farmed animals.  It also hurts those people who live near factory farms.  There was drone footage last year of a hog farm in North Carolina spraying waste from the waste lagoon over the nearby land indiscriminately, including over someone's home.  Let me say that again: THEY WERE SPRAYING HOG WASTE OVER SOMEONE"S HOME.   That's vile, disgusting and just plain wrong.  Those of us who are old enough may remember Hurricane Floyd in 1999 where the waste from the many hog farms in eastern NC flowing into rivers contaminated the water supply for pretty much of the entire eastern half of the state.

[formergothardite]

I live in NC and the hog farm situation is just awful for everyone except the people making money off  them. The evil GOP is trying to make it so people harmed by the hog farms can't even sue even if it is proven that the hog farm waste caused health problems. I saw one documentary where the local residents said that the farmers would purposely start spraying if he saw them trying to have  party or a cookout just to ruin everything. These big factory farm industries need to be taken down, but good luck on getting the GOP evangelicals to care. 

[acheronbeach]

Slightly off topic but Fanfiction.net is a treasure trove of bizarre fundie-inspired fanfictions.  I've mentioned this before but just in case you're interested:  

Daniel Fielder, who wrote a fanfiction about early Christians being persecuted by the evil Roman emperor and just swapped out the names so he could post it in seven different fandoms (my favourite is the Star Trek version featuring Captain Sisko as a pastry vendor at the Coliseum)  https://www.fanfiction.net/u/6352176/Daniel-Fielder

The lesser well known Star Trek Voyager story "THE NEW GIRL on Voyager [sic]" about a fundie girl who time travels to Voyager to spread the gospel and kill the Borg: www.fanfiction.net/s/7089561/1/THE-NEW-GIRL-on-Voyager

The classic fundie rewrite of Harry Potter, "Hogwarts School of Prayer and Miracles" - you know why Aunt Petunia was so unkind?  Because she was a socialist who believed in science and evolution!!!  https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10644439/1/Hogwarts-School-of-Prayer-and-Miracles

 

There used to be way more fundie fanfics but no-fun ff.net removed most of them.   

[Walking Cat Bed]

On 7/30/2017 at 4:11 PM, Seahorse Wrangler said:

Awful library books has several interesting books that have been weeded over the years.

 

The end stage of the weeding process is one of my projects at my current job. Some of the books that I send to have a new life are...Well.

 

Most are just old technology/business books, like "how to create and use midi files with your keyboard". 

 

(I did manage to find a collection of poetry in German that still had a punch card for checkout, which makes me happy in nerdy ways, and had to recycle it to my bookshelf instead of the recycling center.)

[PennySycamore]

@Walking Cat Bed, I love that you did that!

I told my daughter about the Awful Library books site and in particular the part where librarians are talking about the weird requests from patrons and their reactions to them.  

My granddaughter (my daughter's daughter) was saying today that she'd try this school year not to get so lost in books.  We both told her that you are supposed to get thoroughly immersed in a good book.  They're about to start reading Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince.  She also got to go to a release party for the latest Serafina book in Asheville which included meeting the author.

[mango_fandango]

Sweet Lordy Lord that Hogwarts School Of Prayers and Miracles is something else. I'm surprised Hagrid was portrayed as so hippy-ish. You'd think he'd be wearing a sharp suit and tie or something. 

Harry goes from knowing nothing about Christianity to suddenly being able to spout things like "birthdays are not of God" and knowing Bible verses like Luke 23:34. HOW???

Apparently you can simply lift your hands to the sky and BOOM you're in the destination of choice. Sounds suspiciously like magic to me. Isn't that what this woman wanted to avoid??

Dumbledore and Minerva (McGonagall) are married and Hermione is suddenly their daughter, who wears pink dresses and bows. NO NO NO NO NO. How DARE she do that to the most badass witch of her age. She did NOT wear pink dresses.

Doors will open if you pray that they will. Again, whiffs of magic here.

Hermione cries "lovely, ladylike tears." AAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Harry exclaims a lot and clasps his hands. He sounds dreadfully irritating.

Dumbledore again prays and stuff appears - this time breakfast, with exacting descriptions. 

'Ronald' is suddenly a 'Slytherin hat' who prays to statues (Catholic, clearly). Harry is dutifully worried about praying to statues, but Dumbledore reassures him that loving God is all you need to do. If the school only had "Gryffindor hats" then there wouldn't be many pupils. 

Harry, Luna and Draco suddenly start having an argument about women. Draco is mean to Ron (finally, some actual connection to canon). Harry says Slytherin hats should become Gryffindor hats because he loves them, and Jesus ate with sinners all the time. (Again, the day before Harry had no knowledge of Christianity. Suddenly, he's an expert. Does. Not. Compute.)

Professor Sprout is now a dude and the head of a completely different house, Seamus Finnegan is now a teacher, and Snape is actually wearing a red tie. 

Harry and Draco end up in a prayer-off. Harry prays that Draco becomes a Gryffindor hat. This happens.

Voldemort apparently wants to make Christianity illegal and chuck them in jail/kill them/make homeschooling illegal. PEOPLE BELIEVE THIS?? I swear, there are some thick, thick people in this world.

The book ends in Chapter Fourteen, with the students praying that Voldy becomes a Gryffindor Hat. Apparently the woman's husband didn't want her to write anymore. 

 

PHEW that was LONG. I don't know if she truly believes this shit or if it's a clever parody. If the former, I weep. As a longtime Harry Potter fan I was intrigued. This was utterly dreadful. I now feel compelled to pick up my copies of the REAL books and re-read them to purge my mind of this utter, utter shite.

[Tjay]

@mango_fandango definitely a spoof, at the end Voldy says something like why do Christians care so much about what someone says on Reddit or the internet, I can't remember that exact quote, I'll have to look it up.  

The quote is "Aren't there better ways to spend your time than preaching to a bored idiot on the internet" then Voldy goes on to say "I am a troll" and "this joke has gone on too far" 

link https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10644439/14/Hogwarts-School-of-Prayer-and-Miracles 

I found it pretty funny. 

[mango_fandango]

I did kinda guess it was a spoof. But the worrying thing is that there are people who believe in the sort of stuff it mentions. 

[Walking Cat Bed]

23 hours ago, PennySycamore said:

@Walking Cat Bed, I love that you did that!

 

I'm just glad that I'm allowed to recycle books with low resale value to myself (if the used price on amazon is less than $10, the resale store can't sell them for more than a few dollars). The entire process is pretty enjoyable if you're a nerd like me.

[Hane]

On 8/1/2017 at 0:20 PM, mango_fandango said:

I did kinda guess it was a spoof. But the worrying thing is that there are people who believe in the sort of stuff it mentions. 

Nowadays it's painfully hard to see the difference between spoof and reality! Still, as a terminally snarky person, I was able to see right off the bat that "Christian Harry Potter" was satire--it contained many heavy-handed references to the fundiedom we all know and love.

[Shoobydoo]

@mango_fandango Oh my, thank you for that. There's not enough money in the world to pay me to read fanfiction but I love reading people riffing fanfiction. Sporking is one of my favorite literary genres. 

[CyborgKin]

7 hours ago, Shoobydoo said:

@mango_fandango Oh my, thank you for that. There's not enough money in the world to pay me to read fanfiction but I love reading people riffing fanfiction. Sporking is one of my favorite literary genres. 

When fanfiction is good, it's as good as any other good fiction, but when it's bad it's its own special kind of awful.   Probably because it has such a low barrier to entry (being able to type and sometimes not even that) and it's easy to publish somewhere that people will find it.  People writing original fiction without a fandom behind it are likely to be less enthusiastic and even if they do try to spread it around it's not so likely to be noticed.  Not to say that there isn't terrible original fiction too, but a much lower proportion of it is visible compared to fanfiction.

[Shoobydoo]

28 minutes ago, CyborgKin said:

When fanfiction is good, it's as good as any other good fiction, but when it's bad it's its own special kind of awful.   Probably because it has such a low barrier to entry (being able to type and sometimes not even that) and it's easy to publish somewhere that people will find it.  People writing original fiction without a fandom behind it are likely to be less enthusiastic and even if they do try to spread it around it's not so likely to be noticed.  Not to say that there isn't terrible original fiction too, but a much lower proportion of it is visible compared to fanfiction.

I don't mean to say that all fanfiction is bad-- I know people who've written some extremely good fanfiction. I just don't personally enjoy it. I've never been interested in producing my own fanfiction or fanart, either. I have always thought I'm a little weird that way. However, I also tend to enjoy bad movie more than I enjoy good ones, so I know I am an odd duck. 

[mango_fandango]

Sometimes bad fanfiction gets published, though. See: Fifty Shades of Shite (ahem, Grey).

[polecat]

On 7/26/2017 at 8:35 AM, EowynW said:

Found Lori Alexander's library, eh?

Well, she'd better stop kicking that cat of hers before God starts giving her what-for!