ONTD Original - Scandals in the Evangelical Church

[ladyjj]

The anniversary of this shitshow is upcoming, so that's why it's being featured in this edition of ONTD Divinity School. Get your calculators out, jackals. Numbers abound!

Welcome to the

Comments

[epicdonald]

I went to evangelical churches in the early 2010s because I had grown up Catholic and really liked going to a church that didn't have all the arbitrary rules & doctrines that the Catholic church has. i liked that they (at least on the surface) encouraged everyone to personally engage with the bible and seemed focused on building real friendships between members and not just being a place you went for an hour once a week then went home.

BUT i stopped going because 1) my reading of the bible was leading me politically to the left and i was shocked at how many people sitting next to me seeming to believe the same things i did were actually trumpers and 2) a lot of evangelical churches are basically just manifestation workshops tbh. they encourage you to do things like come to church, give to the church, join a small group, etc. because it can lead to "blessings" in your life and ~the desires of your heart~ being fulfilled.

i went to progressive mainline churches for a while and appreciated that they treated christianity less as a "what can i get out of this" system and more as an obligation to engage with the community in a loving and welcoming way. but i was at a methodist church for several years and stopped going because apparently methodists are obsessed with committees, and once you agree to be on one you're on the radar to get added to more and i got absolutely overwhelmed by the number of email threads going back and forth & zoom calls i had in the evenings. i just dropped off of all of them at once and stopped going to that church altogether.

that was about a year ago and i have a few churches near me that i'd like to check out but i'm sort of reexamining what exactly i'm looking for. like i don't want to just join a glorified self-help seminar but also don't want to take on what essentially was a second job.

[epicdonald]

oh also the evangelical churches i went to (even the seemingly more progressive ones) ranged from merely heteronormative to outright patriarchal in what they encouraged those "desires of your heart" to be. some were very explicit that women should desire to submit to their husbands and if we don't want that, that's sin we need to work on. others weren't that intense but did at least assume that everyone wants to follow the path of hetero marriage & parenthood, and if you haven't achieved those things then there's probably some sin in your life you need to work on. like they didn't straight up dictate "this is what you're supposed to want" but it was just assumed that you wanted these things & would receive them if you set your heart right or whatever.

at the time i was so steeped in patriarchy that these things barely registered as red flags for me sadly. it was only in retrospect years later that i realized "wait i hated that"

[ladychips]

i went on a date with this guy and we debated baptism, and in my girls bible study they asked how it had gone and i told them that, and one of them was like oh well when you find someone you really like you wont want to argue with them. i was like i think the more i like someone the more open ill be and willing to debate? and she was like no, youll want to submit. GROSS.

[originaru]

i was raised protestant and i'm not religious anymore, if anything i'm agnostic. but there is a part of me that wants to find a church i can just walk in on a sunday service, sit and listen and enjoy the hymns without being expected to become a community member.

i know churches encourage this building of community, but for me i want to just go and enjoy the nostalgic parts of attending church and not like, be welcomed back into the fold lol.

i still go to an evening service with my parents for christmas eve since my parents are regular churchgoers and i actually do enjoy all the christmas songs they sing.

that being said, most churches here are all modernized with live bands and sound systems and i'm a grandma and i actually miss the wooden pews, the organ music and the way music reverberated in old church buildings.

[epicdonald]

yeah it seems like the modernized churches with full bands & light shows are the ones that are growing, and those are the ones where it's easiest to just slip in and out without getting grabbed by someone trying to get your contact info. the ones that meet in more traditional buildings are shrinking so much it's basically impossible to attend one without everyone in the building noticing you and being like "omg a new person"

i've only actually visited one church since leaving my old one and i liked it just fine but could really feel all the eyes on me and someone noticed me as a new person & wanted to give me a tour/introduce me to everyone. i know they mean for it to feel welcoming but it's kind of an overwhelming amount of attention!

[varioussaints]

a lot of evangelical churches are basically just manifestation workshops

This is what really tripped me up as well! As much as I'm not fully on board with Catholicism (and not at all on board with the Catholic Church), I did appreciate how seriously the truly devout Catholics in my life growing up took the sacrament of penance and actively worked to make amends for their sins. I started church-hopping a bit in my early 20s and ended up trying out a bunch of different protestant churches, including a few evangelical ones, and I got whiplash by how different it was. There were, like you said, some great habits that I think Catholics would benefit hugely from picking up (like actually reading their bibles and build friendship and community with each other), but also a lot of what you're describing: a transactional relationship between you and the church you're attending (and not even necessarily God) that would benefit you if you just put in more effort. That the most important thing wasn't to be a good person or try and fix problems in your life and community but instead to just keep showing up and ticking off boxes and eventually you'd get your reward. I remember asking a pastor how I could/should resolve an issue in my life (behaviour that would qualify as sinning under Catholicism) and the advice was pretty consistently to just show up and pray more. If I wanted forgiveness, I could ask Jesus, and then Jesus would work forgiveness in the other person's heart if I truly meant it.

I gave up entirely not long after. I do believe in something, but at this point I don't think I need to put a fixed label on it. Maybe in the future. For now I think I'm happy enough trying to do the right thing and make amends with people directly.

[floatinglately]

i sang in a church choir in an episcopalian church for a while in college and the vibes were p. good tbh. i went to episopalian school for a while growing up so i liked the familiarity but i’m personally agnostic (by which i mean on some days a stone cold atheist and on some days pretty woowoo tbh so it sort of averages out to [shrug] lol) and didn’t feel like it was too intense, and even without a personal connection to the bible i got some real food for thought out of some of the sermons just on things like contemplating my purpose & goals & values & responsibilities as a person. also the pastor was openly gay (in massachusetts, granted, but also in like… 2008? marriage there had been legal but not for long).

[lone_concertina]

If I can, I'd recommend a modern episcopal church. I grew up baptist and went to lutheran schools through 8th grade, so I got indoctrination from all angles. I really love that the episcopal church has the sacred rituals but is also very "we love everyone regardless, come as you are with absolutely no judgement"

[ladyjj]

OMG THE METHODIST COMMITTEES. Jebas H Christmas, Methodists love their effing committees. I was lucky I didn't get roped into any of those during my Methodist tenure. Choir was more than enough, thank you very much.

That's usually what happens with church. There was an article that went around late last year about a pastor who was lambasted by his congregation over a sermon he gave, saying they weren't there for his 'woke doctrine'.

Gurl. He was preaching on the Beatitudes.

THE.

BEATITUDES.