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splinteredstarSo. I just finished watching Jesus Camp.
Well that's the creepiest fucking thing I've ever seen.
WARNING: RANT
What makes it worse, almost, is how *familiar* it is to me. I never had to go through anything like that - but I was in a similar stream of crazy when I was a kid. I grew up wondering why I couldn't feel the same all mighty power of God that everyone else could. Why I didn't have as much fun as everyone else at Church. Why everything I wanted to do or thought cool was wrong or sinful somehow.
I grew up parroting the opinions of parents and pastors because I didn't know any better. I grew up thinking that there was something *wrong* with me because I liked girls, because I couldn't hear God the way I was supposed to be able to. Because I, apparently, was so fucking sinful that even *god* didn't want to talk to me. Because I didn't want to read my bible, that meant I had betrayed god.
As you can tell, I think a lot of my current emotional issues stem from this. I've grown up knowing on an elemental level that there is something wrong with me that can't be fixed, can't be overcome, and I still believe it sometimes. It's only in the last couple of years - as I've started cheerfully calling myself an apostate - that I've realized that it's a false belief.
Now. No problem parents teaching their kids what they believe. But teaching is different than training them to be warriors - even warriors of God. Suddenly there's an opposition - suddenly you have to *fight*. That's where the problem comes in, telling them that they have an enemy - and that enemy is hidden in everyone who doesn't believe like them. You understand? It's not abortion or creationism or homosexuality that fucks things up for these people - it's the need to fight, the need to go out and convert people and that is their only purpose in life. It's that salesman mentality - everyone is either a coworker or a mark, a customer, and it stops them from identifying with others as equals. In some causes, it stops them from identifying others as human beings at all. And religion - even extreme religion - doesn't have to be that way.
No one has blown up anyone else's clinic or place of business because of the teachings of the Amish.
Also: DEAR EVERYONE. AMERICA IS BIBLICALLY NOT THE COUNTRY OF GOD. THAT'S ISRAEL, THANK YOU VERY MUCH. Patriotism is very well and religion is very well, but can we please not combine the two?
So. Yeah. I'm going to go watch me some Stephen Fry until my head stops hurting.
Well that's the creepiest fucking thing I've ever seen.
WARNING: RANT
What makes it worse, almost, is how *familiar* it is to me. I never had to go through anything like that - but I was in a similar stream of crazy when I was a kid. I grew up wondering why I couldn't feel the same all mighty power of God that everyone else could. Why I didn't have as much fun as everyone else at Church. Why everything I wanted to do or thought cool was wrong or sinful somehow.
I grew up parroting the opinions of parents and pastors because I didn't know any better. I grew up thinking that there was something *wrong* with me because I liked girls, because I couldn't hear God the way I was supposed to be able to. Because I, apparently, was so fucking sinful that even *god* didn't want to talk to me. Because I didn't want to read my bible, that meant I had betrayed god.
As you can tell, I think a lot of my current emotional issues stem from this. I've grown up knowing on an elemental level that there is something wrong with me that can't be fixed, can't be overcome, and I still believe it sometimes. It's only in the last couple of years - as I've started cheerfully calling myself an apostate - that I've realized that it's a false belief.
Now. No problem parents teaching their kids what they believe. But teaching is different than training them to be warriors - even warriors of God. Suddenly there's an opposition - suddenly you have to *fight*. That's where the problem comes in, telling them that they have an enemy - and that enemy is hidden in everyone who doesn't believe like them. You understand? It's not abortion or creationism or homosexuality that fucks things up for these people - it's the need to fight, the need to go out and convert people and that is their only purpose in life. It's that salesman mentality - everyone is either a coworker or a mark, a customer, and it stops them from identifying with others as equals. In some causes, it stops them from identifying others as human beings at all. And religion - even extreme religion - doesn't have to be that way.
No one has blown up anyone else's clinic or place of business because of the teachings of the Amish.
Also: DEAR EVERYONE. AMERICA IS BIBLICALLY NOT THE COUNTRY OF GOD. THAT'S ISRAEL, THANK YOU VERY MUCH. Patriotism is very well and religion is very well, but can we please not combine the two?
So. Yeah. I'm going to go watch me some Stephen Fry until my head stops hurting.
