In Texas, Christianity is when you lock the doors of your mega church (a ginormous concert hall you bought) to the public during one of the worst natural disasters in recent memory
The MEGACHURCH that basically convention centers being closed during emergencies (and in general, Church could be a great "commons" and could serve so many people in so many ways if they weren't only open on Sunday service) should be a direct ticket to Turbo Hell. Like the Deluxe, Members Only, Black Card level of Hell.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa there! I'm as Christian as they come and I don't remember anyone ever saying anything about HeLpInG pEoPlE"Jesus really just needed his friends to hold him accountable, this is why Judas turned him in, he did the right thing
or something
look, jesus was guilty of crimes against property and stuff like that. inciting the mob. Don't do the crime, if you can't do the time
Christianity is about vibes-based consumerism masquerading as holidays stolen from pagans.
The bible is full of stories about refugees, from the Israelites making their way out of Egypt to Jesus himself. There's a lot of very valid criticisms to be made about Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular, but helping refugees is literally hardwired into the faith and an obligation to any practicing Christian and it's sign of how fascist immigration policies are completely normalized that the time-honored tradition of using churches as shelters for those seeking asylum is under attack all across the imperial core. This isn't just a thing in Texas, i know several stories from Germany about refugees using church asylum as a last resort to avoid deportation, with examples including an Afghan family or a lesbian woman from Morocco who had already been on trial for her sexual orientation.
Most american evangelicals actually worship their idea of satan they push onto others so this tracks.
indeed, since according to his holiness st bhagavan shree matt christman (sallalhu alayhi wasallam), the type of twisted pro-capitalist christianity practiced in america at large can be categorized as worship of satan, an inverted mockery of the religions original teleology
I concure, I did the math and independently arrived at this conclusion; Christian Fascism is the worship of Satan as understood by mainline Christsians.
Personally I argue that Christian Fascism should be studied as a neo-religion that, like Mormonism, has very limited relation to any mainline form of Christianity. Even it's shared common origins are sketchy as much of its core beliefs were developed in America by people who explicitly said you didn't have to be able to read the bible to "understand" it and basically made up their own thing using the bible as a prop. Trying to treat Catholicism, mainline Protestantism, Orothodox Christianity, and Christian Fascism as if they all share core beliefs and practices confuses far more than it enlightens. Christian Fascism is best studied in contrast to preceding and contemporary Christian Religions.
Christians read about the Pharisees and think "god I wish that were me"
I can't put into words how much of a mindfuck it was to grow up and realize that the church in America tends to not actually do/believe in all the kind, generous, forbearing things I'd been taught as a child. It really spun my head around, and did the same for my childhood friends I'm still close to. I was so incredibly lucky to have people to go on that journey with, I know for others it's very lonely.
The rapture already happened but Jesus only took a couple dozen people back with him and nobody noticed
I remember a Matt Christman point (I think) that in most of the western world, especially europe, the largest religion is not christianity but islam, because it really cannot be said that religion or spirituality plays a role in the life and decisions of most european christians rather than capitalism, like at all.
But most muslims, even if increasingly less, do get influenced to do this or don't do that by what islam teaches them, and due to increasing muslim migration to european countries it probably means there are more of these people that "real christians" at this point.
Can confirm that here in Portugal, a lot of christians (catholics of course) are utter sex pests but still go to church or whatever because that's how they were raised and that's the community they are in.
Gonna disagree with Matt on what might be a technicality, but Protestantism is to a large extent a religious expression of capitalism in the 20th century. Or, like, Capitalism is secular protestantism. Europeans are still fanatical "Christians" but the nature of the religion as practiced is wildly different from teh way people conceptualize the religion. When Protestants, and Christians more generally, behave violently towards poor people and refugees their actions are consistent with the Capitalist Protestant beliefs regarding deserving and undeserving poor, etc. f
Yeah, I think that's right. Protestantism, and especially Calvinism within Protestantism, was uniquely birthed with capitalism's individualism and drive towards greed vs other older sects
Worry about what dead female relatives would think of you for not going through the motions is a main driving factor in keeping Catholicism alive.
Westerner christians doing the biggest form of cultural appropriation
I don't think we should no true scotsman christianity. Sure they ignore their theory but everything else except theory is consistent, real christianity is precisely that one we see.
They ignore their theory AND their practice, and do things that would be anathema to older christians. They're still christians my point is that christianity now isn't as actually influenced by belief in god and spirituality than islam is.
AND their practice
No, practice is by definition what they actually do.
But they don't do charity and stuff which is what their theory entails
Only if you assume that practice is only practice if it's in accordance with theory. In theory they should practice charity and forgiveness while in real practice they embezzle the money and rile up the bigots (not in the OP case apparently but mostly).
Silver lining, if the republicans get their way, a fewer number of vulnerable little boys will be brought into the grooming station of the Catholic church.
Republicans want to protestantize their right to be demons, so no. There's no silver lining here.
Oh yeah, those ones... honestly, these people ought to be gulag'd
When was the last time a major christian denomination followed even half the empathy and love Jesus preached and they teach?
My fundamentalist protestant upbringing made me a socialist with their teachings and an atheist with their actions
Are we allowed to criticize this or would that be anti-American/anti-Western cultural marxism?
The catholic churches I attend constantly promote and asks the congregation to volunteer to help feed migrants nearby and donate unneeded clothes. I don’t know how successful they are, but I do know that family members who are also catholic despise the migrants for “taking jobs” and “committing voter fraud” and “getting biden checks while the rest of us break our backs”
Idk about USA but in Poland catholic charity is unbelivably massive fraud and money laundering scheme, and it's happening on every level, mainly thanks to the Caritas having hands in organizing most of things.
I don’t think their volunteer service is connected to any larger organization. I think it’s literally just the priests and whoever show up
Then it might be better, depending on structure. In Poland it would only change the pocket being lined since it's hierarchical mafia-like structure and only poor and shitty parishes can sometimes see a parish priest that isn't scum or buisnessman in cassock, because the the competition for better parishes is fierce so one must earn the bishop nomination. And while parish priests can sometimes be still decent, bishops and above are scum with zero exceptions.
Sounds miserable. Do they have non roman catholic churches lol
Other christian denominations are tiny minorities in Poland, i can think of two other catholic ones out the top of my head, Polish-catholic and Greco-catholic but those are just like tiny local gangs compared to central mafia. Maybe even worse since Greco-catholic is use as wedge against Ukraine and Russia by the pope, and Polish-catholics are wacko sect which only beef with r-c they had is that for them r-c is way too progressive.
Catholic charity, that probably matters. Demon worshiping papists yadda yadda, though I'm sure they'd do the same thing to Lutherans.
...Is it in bad taste to start referencing Hunchback over this
"Will do."
