Religious People
I was hanging around some Christians yesterday. It was weird. There was a person who'd been through some horrible stuff who had left the church and doesn't believe in God now (or rather, doesn't know if God exists or not so he's really an Agnostic, not an Athiest) and the Christians were ripping him apart the way they do, saying everyne's had it bad, not just him, and he has no right to turn away from God, and he was just whining and looking for attention and he didn't really want help or advice, and "we're not here to pat you on the back and say 'poor thing' when what you really need to do is repent." That kind of thing.
For the record, sometimes people do want attention. Despite what people may tell you and what they told you for years, that's not a bad thing. Humans crave attention it's a fact of who we are, and wanting attention is NOT a sin. But this guy wasn't just looking for attention. Someone challenged him and said he had no real reason to reject God, and he said "I have my reasons, you don't know the whole story," etc, and the other person challenged him to tell his story, so that's why he shared it with everyone. He wasn't trying to debate or argue anything (though of course it turned into a bloodbath later on) he was just explaining why he doubted God's love and thus God's existence (because the bible says God is love, so if you doubt that, it's easy to doubt the rest).
I don't agree with everything this guy said to people...he did attack some people, and everyone was wrong in the way they acted in the debate and the discussions afterward. But that's just it, EVERYONE was wrong, not just this guy. And the Christians saw no reason why they were wrong and why people would say what they said and did was unloving, because they meant it in love and you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink and a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, blah blah blah.
...
I'm just really tired right now. Every time this happened in the past, when there was a big brawl and Christians acted this way, I was one of them. It's weird being on the outside and seeing how it looks to others. I used to justify and rationalize that God was good no matter what people did or said (and I still believe that) but looking back over what I had to rationalize away, the behavior I tried to ignore from people who were supposed to be speaking for God...I know what it's like to hear people pay lip service to God's love all the while they're crushing someone's spirit; I've had it happen to me countless times when I was one of the "religious people." But seeing it from the other side is heartbreaking. It makes me want to puke.
For the record, sometimes people do want attention. Despite what people may tell you and what they told you for years, that's not a bad thing. Humans crave attention it's a fact of who we are, and wanting attention is NOT a sin. But this guy wasn't just looking for attention. Someone challenged him and said he had no real reason to reject God, and he said "I have my reasons, you don't know the whole story," etc, and the other person challenged him to tell his story, so that's why he shared it with everyone. He wasn't trying to debate or argue anything (though of course it turned into a bloodbath later on) he was just explaining why he doubted God's love and thus God's existence (because the bible says God is love, so if you doubt that, it's easy to doubt the rest).
I don't agree with everything this guy said to people...he did attack some people, and everyone was wrong in the way they acted in the debate and the discussions afterward. But that's just it, EVERYONE was wrong, not just this guy. And the Christians saw no reason why they were wrong and why people would say what they said and did was unloving, because they meant it in love and you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink and a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, blah blah blah.
...
I'm just really tired right now. Every time this happened in the past, when there was a big brawl and Christians acted this way, I was one of them. It's weird being on the outside and seeing how it looks to others. I used to justify and rationalize that God was good no matter what people did or said (and I still believe that) but looking back over what I had to rationalize away, the behavior I tried to ignore from people who were supposed to be speaking for God...I know what it's like to hear people pay lip service to God's love all the while they're crushing someone's spirit; I've had it happen to me countless times when I was one of the "religious people." But seeing it from the other side is heartbreaking. It makes me want to puke.