I was raised Catholic, went to a Catholic high school (was voted most likely to become a priest), and now I’m firmly an atheist. I read the bible multiple times and had a few bible study classes.
It’s consistently amazing to me how little most christians know about what’s in the bible. It’s always entertaining to see their reactions when I correct them during an argument, or even when they say things like “The Bible says God won’t give you more than you can handle” or “God helps those who help themselves.” Those things, and lots of others that people attribute to the bible aren’t in there anywhere. A lot of times it feels like I’m discussing a movie with someone who only read a review of it.
I was raised catholic. Nursery, primary, high school and sixth form. Church every week. Extra lessons at the church in preparation for the sacraments. I was even an altar server for a time. I think I must have pretty lucky with the parish priest/my teachers though because I the most important thing that was drilled into us was the “golden rule” - treat others as you wish to be treated. Even as a child I knew the Old Testament stories were just that - stories. We were never ever taught that god hated anyone no matter what. We were also taught about other religions and not in “these idiots got it wrong” way. Judaism and Islam were taught as basically the same as Christianity but with a different idea of who Jesus was. I took Christian theology and philosophy A level and had a fantastic teacher. We spent hours debating the existence of god and we were never told we were wrong if we no longer believed by then. There’s a name for it I’ve forgotten now, but we compared the gospels to look for inconsistencies and examined what that meant for their validity. You were never expected just to believe for beliefs sake. I’m not catholic anymore, I have too many issues with the Church. But it’s shocking how unchristian the current brand of American fundamental/evangelical Christians are. It’s just so far from anything I was ever taught.
Most, if not all, monotheistic religions can be very loving or very hateful, depending on what the people make of it. At least that is my personal experience in Catholic Christianity and Islam.
This coming from the politician having orgies and cheating on her husband with her CrossFit gym owner.
I could give a shit, but the hypocrisy is real.
Exodus 20:17
You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
Or seen The Prince of Egypt. “The Plagues” is one of the best tracks on a hell of a soundtrack.
There’s Noah way God would do something like that.
I don’t understand why people say “I trust God”. He had his own son nailed to a cross, FFS.
People in the middle ages got it right. “I do what God tells me because he scares the crap out of me.”
I’ve been reading through the old stories for the first time in my life, and in my view, you can only read them through the lens of a series of allegorical lessons intended to warn about consequences that do take place in the real world, and those consequences can be beyond lethal.
History will wipe your entire bloodline out if you make bad enough mistakes. Ask the Hitlers.
If I run into someone actually named Hitler, he’s probably not related to Adolf, but wishes he was…
That’s because for someone who requires evidence before belief there’s rarely been major unexplained phenomena to convince them of the existance of said power from any source.
I can imagine even the most cognizant person running into problems with assigning things to a god without civilisations aggregated knowledge of concepts like atomic principal, meteorology, astrology, germ theory, social studies.
Imagine seeing tornados, or super cell storm structures, flooding, plague, tsunami’s, all without a hint of understanding of weather, or germs, or global tidal movements, knowledge that’s only been globally accessible to the common man in literally the last 30 years.
The normal person’s aptitude to reject god comes down to the ability to understand and explain anything that would prior be considered an unexplainable phenomena, which relies entirely on their grasp of the combined knowledge derived from all civilisations past.
Education resolves superstition.
That’s the beauty of Christianity.
The Bible is so full of contradictions that you can get it to fit any worldview you want.
“Tattoos are a sin.”
“Dad, you have a tattoo.”
“Yeah, but Jesus forgave me.”
I kind of want a “Leviticus 19:28” tattoo, but a bunch of idiot Christians will think I’m one of them.
I live in a neighborhood with lots of these Christian types. They don’t want “those gays” because Bible but Jesus forgave them for their divorce. They don’t want pride flags on people’s shirts but they wear clothing of different fabrics and different colors other than white because “those laws of God’s aren’t important because Jesus.”
It is just as cognitive trick to make people feel ok about their sins while still getting to point fingers at the rest of the world.
And really … how peaceful are people that think anyone not “with them” are going to suffer eternally ? What they mean is that they are going to torture you in this world while feeling fine about torturing you.
Only if simultaneously being willfully obtuse and ignorant.
For example, in Mark, Matthew, and Luke, Jesus forbids those going out to minister from brining a purse or money.
This necessarily prevents monetary collections.
So why is the church okay with taking your money today?
In part, rationalized by Paul’s arguments in 1 Cor 9 against the earlier Christian community there that don’t think it’s appropriate to profiteer off ministering.
But then even more, at the last supper in Luke, Jesus explicitly says “Hey guys, remember when I said not to carry purses? Let’s reverse that and now definitely carry purses.”
Except this addition to the last super in Luke-Acts is missing in Marcion’s version of that gospel, which is probably preserving the earliest extant version of it.
So while yes, you could in theory fit Jesus in the NT to agree with Paul that churches and those ministering have a right to profit from it and should definitely collect money from people (like they do in Acts 5 where an older couple who holds back money are both struck dead before Peter) - an even halfway critical eye should see that the historical Jesus was far more likely to have been against such practices given the widespread accounts of his ban, the earlier attitudes in Corinth, its embarrassing nature to be added in after already collecting money, and the late nature of the reversal.
And to see that much like biological evolution, ideas evolve over time too, and the version of Christianity we have today isn’t necessarily the one closest to the original form, but simply the form that was most adaptive through the fall of the Jerusalem temple, the endorsement of Rome, etc.
So yes, few people might know or see it this way, but that is largely because they don’t bother looking into their preconceptions and would rather believe a superficial picture that agrees with what they think they know (and I’m not only talking about Christians here either).
Yeah a lot of people miss things like context, knowledge of the time period, and a proper understanding of theology when they talk shit about the Bible. I’m not Christian myself, but a close friend of mine is Catholic, and after hearing his clarifications on supposed Biblical Plotholes and how much more complicated the subject is… Well it definitely made me start squinting at oversimplifications concerning theology with a little more scrutiny.
Also there have been many problems with text being lost in translation or altered like several letters by Paul were merged at some point by a scribe and it was copied over as is.
