Reflections on my faith....

[poltr1]

[Updated 00:30 14-Jun] Backstory: I posted a link to an article on yuricareport.com which talked about the rise of Dominionism in America. And one person on Facebook took exception to it.

This response has become so long that I want to make this a LiveJournal entry for posterity.

Over on Facebook, Patt Huttsell wrote: "Jim, it seems you are the one dispensing hate and discontent against Christians of late I have other friends that are Wickens and they have NEVER attacked me for what the past has christians have done nor are you posting the persecution of Christians by the Romans. so what is your real beef with us?"


You got questions. I got answers.

First of all, I don't hate *all* Christians. I like the ones that have chosen to live their lives as Jesus had lived. To quote a verse from a song I wrote many years ago:
"Compassionate and kind, gentle teacher, trusted friend
He radiates an unconditional love
He never gets impatient, and he has no prejudice
I try to live more like him every day."

But where are *those* Christians in my life? There are some -- hello iolanthe95 and smoooom! -- but most of the ones I either hear about or encounter are those of the fundamentalist/evangelical variety. I have my stereotypes and judgments about them, based on my observations. They mindlessly spout Bible verses by rote. They're often closed-minded, refusing to accept or even acknowledge the existence of any other belief system except their own. Having a rational discussion with them would be a waste of my time, and theirs. They may invite me to one of their services, but if I was to counter-invite them to one of my services, they'd say, "Oh, no! We can't do that! We're Christians."

Here's a shining example of the type of Christians I detest: the author(s) of http://www.jesus-is-lord.com/.

In the early 1990s, we had a high-powered evangelical preacher in Dayton named Donovan Larkins. He'd often say things like "God hates Muslims. God hates homosexuals." And "Catholics are not true Christians because Catholics worship saints. Saints are often depicted as statues. And statues are forms of idols. And the Lord said, 'Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image.'" Every year, around Halloween, he'd have a large book-burning, and the members of his congregation would bring in books, record albums, games, and other similar items for the bonfire. He also burned copies of the Koran and the Talmud every year. I think the Anti-Defamation League or the B'nai B'rith tried to stop him one year. In 1993, my girlfriend at the time, her brother, a friend of her brother, and I attended his book burning, stayed in the background, and videotaped it. The local fire department stopped by, and Rev. Larkins showed him his permit. The fire department went away. We took that tape to the local air pollution control agency, who managed to put an end to his book-burning. I may still have a copy of that tape someplace in my collection.

I don't believe in a One True Way. I believe there are many paths to Spirit. I have been asked a few times, "Do you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior?" If I did so, I would have to forsake Buddha, forsake Mohammed, forsake the many gods of Hinduism, forsake the 10 Gurus of the Sikh faith, and forsake any other spiritual path or belief system. I'm sorry, but that's a deal-breaker for me.

I was born and raised Catholic. I went through four of the Seven Sacraments: Baptism (in English), First Communion, Penance, Confirmation. (I skipped Marriage, Holy Orders, and Anointing of the Sick.) I drifted away from the faith in college. I came back to it after I moved to Dayton. But I soon drifted away from it again. I got tired of God as an exclusively masculine figure. I got tired of seeing James Likoudis' regular rants in the editorial page of The Buffalo News. I got tired of the hierarchy's inflexibility on the issues of abortion, birth control, married priests, and women priests. I got tired of people not talking to me after mass during social hours. I got tired of the church building being given a higher priority than the faith community it served. The final straw was their bungling of the pedophile priest problem.

Lastly, pardon the language, but I'm fucking tired of the Christians who have tried to force Jesus down my throat. They love their faith so much that they want to share it with everyone they meet. Or they feel it's their moral imperative to "save" everyone. From my point of view, their so-called "invitation" is more of a hard sell. I don't like hard sells.

When I was in college, I remember having a discussion of faith with one of my fraternity brothers. I was Catholic at the time. He was Jewish. He told me that he was confronted by a street corner preacher just outside of campus, who told him he was going to Hell unless he accepted Jesus Christ as his savior, right here, right then. He was really troubled by this. I could see the fear and anger in his eyes, and hear the fear and anger in his voice. I tried to calm him down as best as I could. Ultimately I became fearful and angry as well.

The bottom line: These people cannot -- and will not -- accept me as I am! That is the biggest issue I have with them.

Comments

[zorya-thinks.livejournal.com]

I wondered what had finally shut down the annual book burnings. Kudos!

There were a few times when Pat Huttsell annoyed me so much with her postings on my Facebook links (I think she followed you over) that I told her I would block her from my page if she didn't quit. I haven't seen anything from her in a while.

I don't have problems with Christians per se. I don't like being preached at, and I think the Christian Dominionists (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominionism) and Christian Reconstructionists (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Reconstructionism) are nutty and dangerous. Otherwise, no worries.

[stevieannie.livejournal.com]

FWIW, I'm a Christian, and I have problems with the same cultists that you do. The guy that I choose to follow on my path to the Divine was pretty clear on the "Love everyone" and "Forgive sins" message.

In much the same way that it's difficult to buy a single shirt and have it fit 100 different people the same way, I think we all need to find our own truths and live by them. There's no room for hatred in my personal faith. No room for bigotry or narrow-mindedness. No room for pettiness and cruelty. There is room for venerating this incredible earth, and trying to fix it (and others) with gentle love and good examples. My old minister maintained that no-one got converted to any faith by someone shouting at them. The best way was to live well and happily, and if any asked *THEN* tell them. Don't hector or preach, just say, "This is what I do and it makes me incredibly happy."

Please don't judge us all by the ranting of morons. There are still a lot of us out here trying to stick to the essential message of love, forgiveness and charity. And many of us get a lot out of hearing about other people's path to the Divine, so please don't stop posting about yours, either :-)

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

I just want to thank you (and the dozen or score) of other Christians I know who embody what The Rabbi preached, rather than the reverse, twisted interpretations that too often make the news. I was born and raised Jewish and had parents who instilled bias and fear, if not worse, of Christians in me; later, having left Jewish spiritual practices behind for something closer to New Age beliefs, I still find myself being targeted by the narrowminded self-proclaimed Christians. It's by recalling the positive examples (particularly in, but not limited to the British filk community) that I remember to center myself and let the hatred pass by so I can recognize it as coming from individuals, and not the institution.

So (tl;dr :-) thanks to you (singular and plural)!

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

I could doubt that anyone who can't spell the name of a religion has friends of that religion, but be that as it may.

I was raised as a Fundamentalist Christian, and I left for all the reasons you describe. I found it incredibly horrible to be required to tell my friends they were going to Hell, to believe that they were. I found it nonsensical to think that people who fell in love with people of the same sex were evil, even before I realized I had that capability myself. I found it illogical to believe that the world was only 6000 years old and evolution didn't happen when we can see it happening. And I will be damned (and I use that term with all due irony) if as a woman I accept that men are more sentient and closer to the Divine than I am because I don't have a penis.

And yet it took me so long to repudiate all this, to stop 'witnessing' and to finally leave, because the hold of religion is so strong and the consequences presented for leaving were so drastic.

Also I have to add, it annoys me so much that whenever one points out the problems with Christianity as it is often practiced, people accuse one of spreading "hate and discontent against Christians" as your interlocutor above phrased it. One would think a religion with such an overweening majority in the US and many other countries could stand a little criticism. No one is advocating throwing Christians to lions anymore, but every day I hear of someone who says that one should be a Christian to hold public office or that homosexuality should be illegal because it's spoken against in the Bible or that evolution should not be taught, or... you get the picture, as you've described it here.

PS I got so caught up in my corroborative rant that I forgot to congratulate you on your part in getting those atrocious book burnings shut down!

[poltr1]

...every day I hear of someone who says that one should be a Christian to hold public office or that homosexuality should be illegal because it's spoken against in the Bible or that evolution should not be taught, or... you get the picture, as you've described it here.

I'm sure you've seen the website http://www.godhatesshrimp.com/. If we were to follow all 600+ rules in Leviticus to the letter, this is what we'd have. And I like shrimp too much to give it up. (But it's high in cholesterol, so I'll eat it in moderation.)

[catalana.livejournal.com]

I decided some time ago that if there is a god/goddess/gods who are worthy of worship (unlike, say, the ancient Greek gods, who were basically toddlers with superpowers), then they would care a whole lot more about whether you are a good person than whether you follow one particular set of rites or called them the right name. Because I simply don't believe that they would be so insecure and petty as to harm a good person for those reasons. (If they would, then I don't really see how they are worthy of worship.)

My friends of all faiths who believe and follow their own paths and are just generally good people reinforce this belief. I simply cannot believe that a good god would, in fact, be vengeful against them.

[poltr1]

I like your assessment of the Greek gods. I know of one man in my community who practices Hellenismos -- worship of the Greek gods. And like me, he's brutally honest with people. Sometimes he's more brutal than honest.

[robin-june.livejournal.com]

I undertand what's driven you to where you're at. While I'm no longer a Catholic, and the Lutheran church I married into is pretty right-wing on the Christian political spectrum, I've been digging in my heels to keep them from tipping over those precipices of crazy you're describing in your post. So far I've managed to keep it so that what is preached from the pulpit (i.e., official stuff from our pastors) is free from hatred, laughs gently at the Rapture and sorrows over those duped into spending all their savings on its ad campaign, and prays for guidance for our politicians instead of naming them Satanic. What gets preached in the narthex (i.e., talk from the church members after services) I have less control over, but I do my best to speak out gently & persuasively.

Where you had Donovan Larkins, I had Brother Jed. He probably lost more converts to Christianity unbeknownst to him than he ever knew the converts that he made. He almost lost me my Christianity, too, by ratifying the labeling as "Satanic," of the pet rats that I used to take to nursing homes as part of a Visiting Pet Program. (Yeah, that Matthew 25:36, "Sick and shut in, and you visited me" thing.)

If you're ever in a place & space that you want to play that song you wrote, and maybe teach it to me, let me know. I've already made a reputation for strangeness at church by playing them songs by Steve MacDonald and Bob Franke, so they expect that sort of thing from me.

[poltr1]

I haven't performed that song since the summer of 1995, at a housefilk in Cincinnati. The host chose to follow it with some other songs mentioning Jesus. I didn't know whether to feel complimented or insulted by that. That's the day that particular housefilk stopped being fun for me.