Conservative Christians are sometimes hateful because it’s not about faith or Christ it’s all about being powerful over the “other”. The Muslim, the gay person, the transgender community or just anyone that isn’t them. They are the total opposite of Christ’s teachings. I pray that someday they realize power over faith is not the road to salvation 🙏🏻
The tragedy is that all of this started back in the slaveholding days, when good, "God fearing" white slaveholders were very afraid that the slaves might rise up against them (especially since the slaves were being beaten, mutilated, raped, and killed with impunity, and they were generally outnumbered by them) and at the same time wanted to retain their "godliness" and "salvation." So they came up with a solution: The pastor said that the Bible endorsed and defended slavery. Good works were not what God wanted. The chief "good work" was to save souls, and how would these poor benighted heathen animals be saved unless brought to this country and baptized (even if forcibly)? Besides the real necessity was to accept Jesus as our personal savior, be baptized, and then "once saved, always saved", no matter what our actions. Meanwhile, they could continue with their beatings, mutilations, raping, and killing, separating families and then sleeping like a baby at night, because they had "done nothing wrong".
John I always love your messages, they want to bring out the best in us. I was born Jewish, know that it's my cultural heritage and long to believe in a loving God. (I have no desire to argue about a God that is loving and one who allows horror, like the Holocaust of last century and all the misery His people suffer in this world. Free will gets thrown around a lot, I am not learned enough to delve into that concept.)
I have been reading your words as long as I have been on Substack and you were probably the first author to whom I became a paid subscriber. Keep the hope alive! And please, the adjective of empathy is empathic, no matter what Grammarly says about empathetic and empathic being interchangeable! Plus empathic feels and sounds so much more beautiful than a word that contains pathetic! I know that the rule used to be to not attempt to correct an adult's grammar but I always appreciate someone who cares enough to help me sound less ignorant! Learning should be lifelong and I have learned more about love from you than anyone else who is or has been in my life.
I hope that God is merciful on November 5th and we get Kamala and Tim to take us forward! Thank you with all my heart for your beautiful words and the love you share with our fellow citizens. When we fight we win!
This, as usual needs to be the front page of the NYT and the WP. Then it needs to be sent to every evangelical’s web sight(site) so those who could use a “brush up” on being a Christian actually knows the meaning of Jesus.
Also, maybe they could change wearing the cross to wearing a dollar sign as that is all it’s about with them!
Sad to say, I've abandoned the Christian faith of my youth, because it has been so thoroughly and disgustingly perverted by the Conservative Christian Nationalists of the present day. They disgrace the very God they purport to serve, and they sicken me beyond measure. Thank you for reminding us all what Jesus really stood for, and how his name and his ministry have been so completely and tragically corrupted.
I'm curious if calling someone on the far more loving end of the Christian spectrum "lukewarm" is a thing, as a "christian" in-law of mine did recently (she's called me worse). (As a lifelong, but currently non-church-going, UU, with perhaps a sprinkling of Progressive Christian beliefs, I am no doubt residing in an ice bath.)
It’s the intense judging of the other that makes all this possible…judging as less than. I truly appreciated Pope Francis’ comments about gay people’s rights to access the church…” who am I to judge, that is Gods role.” We r blessed to have him as a Christian leader in this world today. As we are blessed to have you John P.
If more were like you I might not be agnostic
“Love lavishly”-----love that phrase! This is a great essay, too bad the ones who need to won’t come across it.
Conservative Christians are sometimes hateful because it’s not about faith or Christ it’s all about being powerful over the “other”. The Muslim, the gay person, the transgender community or just anyone that isn’t them. They are the total opposite of Christ’s teachings. I pray that someday they realize power over faith is not the road to salvation 🙏🏻
YES!!!! They use their so called Christian faith to CONTROL people (that are usually the most vulnerable populations of people) and to maintain POWER
The tragedy is that all of this started back in the slaveholding days, when good, "God fearing" white slaveholders were very afraid that the slaves might rise up against them (especially since the slaves were being beaten, mutilated, raped, and killed with impunity, and they were generally outnumbered by them) and at the same time wanted to retain their "godliness" and "salvation." So they came up with a solution: The pastor said that the Bible endorsed and defended slavery. Good works were not what God wanted. The chief "good work" was to save souls, and how would these poor benighted heathen animals be saved unless brought to this country and baptized (even if forcibly)? Besides the real necessity was to accept Jesus as our personal savior, be baptized, and then "once saved, always saved", no matter what our actions. Meanwhile, they could continue with their beatings, mutilations, raping, and killing, separating families and then sleeping like a baby at night, because they had "done nothing wrong".
And they are still living by this code.
https://time.com/5171819/christianity-slavery-book-excerpt/
John I always love your messages, they want to bring out the best in us. I was born Jewish, know that it's my cultural heritage and long to believe in a loving God. (I have no desire to argue about a God that is loving and one who allows horror, like the Holocaust of last century and all the misery His people suffer in this world. Free will gets thrown around a lot, I am not learned enough to delve into that concept.)
I have been reading your words as long as I have been on Substack and you were probably the first author to whom I became a paid subscriber. Keep the hope alive! And please, the adjective of empathy is empathic, no matter what Grammarly says about empathetic and empathic being interchangeable! Plus empathic feels and sounds so much more beautiful than a word that contains pathetic! I know that the rule used to be to not attempt to correct an adult's grammar but I always appreciate someone who cares enough to help me sound less ignorant! Learning should be lifelong and I have learned more about love from you than anyone else who is or has been in my life.
I hope that God is merciful on November 5th and we get Kamala and Tim to take us forward! Thank you with all my heart for your beautiful words and the love you share with our fellow citizens. When we fight we win!
"If it's not about love, it's not about God." Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church Michael Curry. So easy. So simple. So necessary.
This, as usual needs to be the front page of the NYT and the WP. Then it needs to be sent to every evangelical’s web sight(site) so those who could use a “brush up” on being a Christian actually knows the meaning of Jesus.
Also, maybe they could change wearing the cross to wearing a dollar sign as that is all it’s about with them!
Sad to say, I've abandoned the Christian faith of my youth, because it has been so thoroughly and disgustingly perverted by the Conservative Christian Nationalists of the present day. They disgrace the very God they purport to serve, and they sicken me beyond measure. Thank you for reminding us all what Jesus really stood for, and how his name and his ministry have been so completely and tragically corrupted.
"God = Love" is my mantra.
But apparently, for the GOP, God = Hate 🙄
As always, beautifully written.
I'm curious if calling someone on the far more loving end of the Christian spectrum "lukewarm" is a thing, as a "christian" in-law of mine did recently (she's called me worse). (As a lifelong, but currently non-church-going, UU, with perhaps a sprinkling of Progressive Christian beliefs, I am no doubt residing in an ice bath.)
Truth
It’s the intense judging of the other that makes all this possible…judging as less than. I truly appreciated Pope Francis’ comments about gay people’s rights to access the church…” who am I to judge, that is Gods role.” We r blessed to have him as a Christian leader in this world today. As we are blessed to have you John P.
Hear, hear!!