Fake Ass Christians

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heelinhell said:
"Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful,"

- Seneca
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Got bad news: Edward Gibbon "mis"-attributed that quote to Seneca, which appears nowhere in the Roman's writing. The giveaway that something is amiss is ancient Greeks did not think have a concept of religion that resembles modern Protestantism.
 
breepf said:
Judaism does not prize sincerity (I DECLARE BANKRUPTCY!) to nearly the degree that (Protestant) Christianity does.
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bad, bad take and common to folks who don't understand Judaism. I'd suggest your study intention of focus.
 
Batt Boy said:
bad, bad take and common to folks who don't understand Judaism. I'd suggest your study intention of focus.
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I don't think you understand my argument, which is probably my fault for being too glib.

The point is that Judaism can have ideas like kavanah but it ties those ideas to participation in covenantal practices. Christianity has reached a point where people can regard themselves as believers exclusively through a sincere belief in Christ and without any practical demands.

On those same lines, Judaism has never had the same doctrinal burdens of Christianity.
 
Turd Ferguson said:
It's always been a problem, but they feel more comfortable saying it out loud since Trump has been president. They lost their minds when Obama was elected twice and really came out of hiding then for Trump.
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As someone who grew up in a fundie Southern Baptist church, a big part of right-wing Evangelical Christianity is that it is a very public, not private, faith. Appearances and boasting about your church-going and love of Jesus is often more important than practicing what you preach. Add in the emphasis on the repression of normal sexual drives and feelings, the inevitable having premarital sex anyway and the consequent guilty conscience, and you've got a religion that is bound to create enormous amounts of hypocrisy, not practicing in private what you preach to others, cognitive dissonance, and projecting your own sins onto other people. And my guess is that it's been this way in America for centuries - it's just that with the interwebs it's now more visible than ever.
 
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breepf said:
Got bad news: Edward Gibbon "mis"-attributed that quote to Seneca, which appears nowhere in the Roman's writing. The giveaway that something is amiss is ancient Greeks did not think have a concept of religion that resembles modern Protestantism.
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Still a good quote, no matter the origin.
 
breepf said:
Judaism does not prize sincerity (I DECLARE BANKRUPTCY!) to nearly the degree that (Protestant) Christianity does.
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(Protestant) (American) Christianity prizes sincerity?

I’m thinking of the Falwells, Robertsons, Jim Bakker, Tammy Faye Bakker, and numerous other Protestant Fundamentalist “Christians.”

I never thought they were sincere. Same goes for today’s prosperity gospel “Christians.”
 
Zoo_View said:
A friend converted to Judaism in the ‘80’s before she married her fiancé, who was Jewish.

She went to his synagogue, a reformed temple, and met with the rabbi. She said she wanted to convert. The rabbi said, “No.”

She went home. Upset as hell. Her fiancé told her, “I thought about telling you that this would happen. Then, I figured you’d be even more upset. The rabbi is going to tell you no 3 or 4 times. And X number of days (at least a month) have to be between each meeting. Then, you can begin converting.”

Converting was more complicated than saying, “Praise Jesus.”
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" The rabbi is going to tell you no 3 or 4 times."

Season 5 No GIF by The Office
 
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Zoo_View said:
(Protestant) (American) Christianity prizes sincerity?

I’m thinking of the Falwells, Robertsons, Jim Bakker, Tammy Faye Bakker, and numerous other Protestant Fundamentalist “Christians.”

I never thought they were sincere. Same goes for today’s prosperity gospel “Christians.”
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To say that Protestantism values sincerity is not to say that every Protestant (or every televangelist huckster) is sincere. It's to say that the criteria for membership in the club demands the religious adherent to insist on the authenticity of belief. So long as people profess their authentic belief, we're stuck with pointless discussions about hypocrisy.

This stress on sincerity/authenticity is part of the reason why so many Protestant denominations eventually disavow infant baptism: for them, the efficacy of the ritual inheres in the disposition of the believer; the efficacy of the ritual does not stem from the fact that it yokes the believer (willingly or otherwise) into a sacred order beyond themselves. An awful example of how this can play out: the Mortara case in Italy in the 19th century.

Jews and Catholics don't completely disavow ideas related to sincerity (who does anymore?), but those religions still have a participatory metaphysics (halakha, sacraments like confession, etc.) that displaces the Protestant stress on sincerity.
 
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So much organized religion now is

1. A competition of who is more devout,
2. Performative.

I'm certain that most religious people are sincere in their beliefs. But I'm just so exhausted by so many of them being performative. We get it--the cross you're wearing told us all we needed to know, dude. You don't have to tell us that you're praying for us.
 
theel4life said:
This is one of my biggest pet peeves. We have a huge problem in this country with people who go to church every Sunday and declare themselves Christians, yet then Monday thru Saturday are racists, bigots, homophobes and xenophobic. Has this always been such a huge problem and when did it start?
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It literally started the day that religion was invented. Here is how the earth was created, and here is the way to salvation when you die. If you don't do these things and don't believe these things, you won't achieve salvation. You'll be one of the "others." And we don't like their kind.

Now, start with the first step and open up your bag of coins.
 
Trump's claim that he was depicted as a medical doctor and not Christ might be better illustrated if he had a stethoscope hanging from his neck.
 
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