Abandoned Draft Version:
Religion God doesnt listen to the prayers of a Jew bacon Mormonism is a cult catholics candle burners hooted probably be;lieve we have funny hats and saints poetry as part of belief
Present Day:
This is the abandoned draft that popped up when I searched for “bacon burner” as it does indeed contain “bacon” and “burner”.
All I can make out from this is that I was considering how some religions hate other religions. By their hate ye shall know them. A leader of the Southern Baptists I joined in my youth declared that God doesn’t hear the prayers of a Jew. (Why is bacon there? I suppose because God only pays attention if bacon is involved?)
I believe the comment about God abandoning his chosen people came to my attention because another Baptist had recently warned that Mormon presidential candidate Mitt Romney belonged to a cult.
One thing did make it into a post. A Southern Baptist boyfriend was the source of the next phrase, “candle burners” to describe Catholics. Gary hooted when I told him about that. “Did he think we all wear funny hats, like the pope? Do we sacrifice chickens to the graven images of the Saints?”
And then there’s the last line of poetry as part of belief.
No idea. Really no idea. Maybe I was thinking that poetry is deliberately vague, and much of the Bible is written in poetry, and why can’t the Souther Baptists let other people have their own interpretation of the poetry? I don’t know.
Why wasn’t this post fully born? I think what happened is I started to write it and realized it didn’t express how “religions” spend a lot of time hating each other, it worked out so it was Southern Baptists specifically monopolizing the hate. Perhaps I didn’t want to offend.
9 responses to “Stop Me If I’ve Said This Before: religion”
Ah, yes, when “write what you know” ends up being poorly representative of the diversity in the real world…
(that said: I am Christian but grew up in a very liberal and very low-percentage-Christianity area, and totally thought that the Evangelical Voting Bloc was a myth/straw-man [because, like, when voting, you individually look at the candidates and see which is the best – or, I suppose, at present, the definitely-less-horrible] and that surely Rush Limbaugh couldn’t be as uninformed and inflammatory and idiotic as people said he was. Then I was attending a conference (that was *supposed* to be about theology) and I heard the body-of-an-audience react as the speaker pushed buttons, one of which was “stem-cell research” and I’m like “but… but… most stem cell research [and, at that time, the only stem cell research that had positive results!] is from stem cells harvested from adults and that’s totally not a Christian Issue for almost anyone?”… but realized that, no, actually, many people were not self-informed on these things, and they *were* just this-thing-good, that-thing-bad. and after *that* I then went and read a transcript of one Rush Limbaugh show, and after that I read another transcript, because surely that was just an absolute low point and… nope. It’s… bad.)
(and *that* said, I have now seen some push-the-button-for-a-response liberal groups/individuals, who have been trained Pavlov-style to not think but just instinctively respond this-good, that-bad.)
(and all *that* said, I think there *are* some issues that, for an individual, are indeed pretty solid and can be responded to with “this good, that bad” responses. Should presidents be committing crimes [with the possible exception of morally-positive “civil disobedience” items]? NOPE! Should people be shooting other people at random, no matter what their skin color or whether they’re a police office? NOPE! Terrorist attacks? NOPE! Voter suppression? NOPE! Dehumanization of humans, whether the “objects” are Deluded Pro-Trump Sheep or the “objects” are racially defined or immigration-status defined or libr’ls? NOPE! So I am fine with that. If you are against torture, then sure, make disapproving noises in a crowd when torture is mentioned. Or if you really like the USPS (I really like the USPS; they’re not perfect, but man, it’s a really good institution; ditto for public libraries), then sure, cheer them! But… use the brain, go to actual sources to get your facts [interview transcripts! official statistics!], try to avoid anyone who is lying to you (if a news-digest “source” exaggerates things most of the time, find a less exaggerating place for your news?) and don’t be led around by the nose by fallible politicians (they are all fallible, although some are more than others) or a mob mentality…)
KC – I realize now the italics, given the dearth of verbs, could be interpreted to mean those were my current thoughts as opposed to others historical thoughts. They were not. And all those crazy rants are nearer the surface now that the president is the one ranting.
I think the “drafts” format is simply a stream-of-consciousness reminder of (hopefully) enough salient points (what others said; connections made; statements you want to refute; whatever) to give you the blog post, and thus not something implying agreement at that point… and given the nature of long-forgotten drafts, it’s definitely not representative of now.
Ranting seems contagious to some degree. But even if it were not, that particular source would be more than adequate ranting for the world for the year.
KC – I’m daydreaming about growing up somewhere there was a liberal majority.
It was pretty awesome, and also pretty weird with a few bad spots (mostly around the mistaken concept that the sexual liberation of women means they ought to all be sexually available). But yeah, mostly pretty awesome.
I mean, even exclusively from a Christian standpoint: it was not as much of a thing to just float along and be a pew-warming Christian “by default” [unless you stayed in Christian schools and never went outside them, I guess, possibly?] – if you were going to be/stay Christian, you generally had to actually think about it to some degree. This is *really good* in a lot of ways!
Mostly I would endorse a non-homogenous environment, where no one 100% fits in on everything and, if possible, where enough people are thinking a fair percentage of the time. From here, it looks like if an area (or social grouping) is too liberal, you don’t get this, and too conservative and you don’t get it either. But if you’ve got enough variation within a group, then each individual is usually allowed more capability for holding different views, and also tends to think more about what their priorities/morals/etc. are (and why they hold this particular stance, and whether their various positions really fit together or not), and this is… really good, again, from both a Christian and a “I like people to not be duped so easily” point of view.
KC – people need to mix. I hope this starts to happen now that it seems more and more people are expected to go to college.
I am not sure. There was a mix of thinking and not-thinking at university? and the thinking is necessary for the diversity to have good effects rather than just reinforcing things or being the “exception that proves the rule” or whatever. and also you have an easier time avoiding interacting with the “type” of people you don’t like, within college classes (barring assigned group work, which I think never happened for me in college – I had some “eh, I don’t know anyone in this class yet, just match me up with someone” situations, but no These Are Your Groups, Deal things], than in work situations or similar.
Also, there’s still a segment of US society that isn’t going to colleges, and those are the ones that middle-class, never-known-someone-blue-collar college kids desperately need to mix with in some ways. and certain colleges are also very much bubbles even though they try to include some “diversity” (oy, the Ivies. It’s bonkers and insular and very very weird and the people they include to “educate” people have a bit of a rough and lonely ride in a lot of ways)..
But yes, college *can* be educational in tons of ways! It just… doesn’t necessarily have to be as educational as we really need it to be.
KC – all I know is that I met my first Muslims , Hindus, Buddhists and Jewish people when I went to college.
For me, before college. But see: liberal area. (also, mostly non- or semi-non-practicing, see also: liberal area. 🙂 and I’m not sure if the Buddhism-interested person I knew before college totally counts or not, but if not, I may still not know a Buddhist.)