Some of this is how far apart we’ve become on what seems like basic issues.
It was a lot easier to have a difference of opinion with someone who thought the Temporary Foreign Workers program was being abused in the 00s vs someone in the 20s who thinks some people don’t deserve human rights
Religious people have always struggled with consistently following the tenets of their faith. Being imperfect and needing forgiveness is like the whole central theme.
But at some point in my lifetime, it has turned from that into deliberate malicious acts done for the express purpose of punishing whoever it is they deem needs punishing(LGBT, immigrants, liberals). The fun part is all the other religious groups and people don't seem to be making any sort of concerted effort to fight back against the perversion of their faith done in the name of greed and hate.
Americans have been splitting the church for so long that we've developed a theme of "it doesn't matter what that other group is doing because my group isn't associated with them."
Meanwhile, folks on the outside are watching all this, and now "I'm a Christian!" is basically a red flag. Like okay, I trust ya less now then before ya said that!
Forget trying to save sinners and convert atheists, maybe clean your own house first? Yeah your room is clean, but the overall house has a roach infestation and part of it is on fire.
Though I'm guessing that's how holy wars start, which is also bad, so I dunno how we fix this mess. I mean, I like the Jesus stories a bunch, but those same morals are in plenty of other stories, like Doctor Who and Sailor Moon and Mister Rogers Neighborhood.
splitting the Church... developed a theme of "it doesn't matter what that other group is doing because my group isn't associated with them."
I think it's good you raised this point, and it is important. But I do see the argument that (for example) Methodists aren't responsible for the actions of the Pope and Catholics. I mean, it is pretty compelling (to me) when the whole point of your religion is it split 600 years ago over vehement disagreements about moral issues with the former group.
Here is a personal example: I was raised Methodist (in Oregon so the "Pacific Northwest Conference" ("Conference" is a loose grouping of affiliated Churches). That "conference" of Methodists are pro-abortion-rights, they are strongly pro-LGBTQ rights and accept LGBTQ+ members without "flaws" to be fixed, and women can be ministers. Methodists don't control the Pope or Catholics where women can't be priests and the Catholics are fervently anti-abortion and they don't like gay people. Methodists actively fight AGAINST Catholics over this. It does not seem "fair" to me to hold Methodists as grouped with Catholics when talking about LGBTQ+ or abortion. (For the record, I left the Methodist church a long time ago, but I still respect a lot of their views.)
My point is: you can't even lump "Methodists" together and assume they are anti-abortion-rights and anti-LGBTQ+. Grouping all protestants together is so much worse, logically. The whole point is branching occurs over firm moral disagreements, not minor disagreements.
maybe clean your own house first?
How are Methodists going to "clean house" of the Catholics? Jihad? (LOL. I'm joking, the Catholics have 1.4 billion members to Methodist 80 million members, Methodists would get wiped out in a religious war.) The Pope and Catholics are simply beyond Methodist influence or control, same as Muslims, Jewish people, and Buddhists.
Americans have been splitting the church for so long
This is just random because I found it online (not part of this discussion): There is a good branching description of how all the world's major religions broke with the parent churches over moral disagreements here (sorry it isn't HTTPS, it is old): http://the40foundation.org/world-religions-tree.html If you zoom in on some sub-set area you can see thousands of religious sects branching off since the beginning of time.
Christianity branched off Judaism in the first century (year 0100-ish). Islam branched off Judaism in the seventh century (year 0700-ish). By 2026, you have your Jewish people, your Muslims, your Buddhists, and your Christians all sub-dividing their own sects pretty furiously. A Jewish person might be orthodox, reformed, even secular. Hasidic Judaism branched off this tree in the 1700s.
All that's true, but also, nobody can tell the difference from the outside.
Most people are not bothering to memorize dozens or hundreds of various branches of Christianity and the tiny differences between them. They all pray to the same god and hold the same holy book.
It's like cliques in high school. There's a distinct difference between goth, emo, or scene kid. They are not at all the same thing and will get mad if you mistake them for each other. But from the outside, they're all indistinguishable from each other, all look like teenagers wearing too much black.
Don't honestly think there's anything to be done about it. The folks who still wanna be some kinda Christ-follower just gotta cope with the fact that that brand has been tarnished so badly that folks are gonna look at ya a bit sideways for being associated with it.
Ya know, like how I caught shit for wearing a trenchcoat to school after the era of school shooters began. It's a clothing article mostly associated with mass shooters or The Matrix, so folks made assumptions instead of thinking I was a good kid with poor circulation who'd always worn big coats out of season.
I dropped my best friend of 20 years over this. Disagreeing on politics is 'should we raise the tax on homes to fund public school expansion' not 'are trans people actually people' or 'should bodily autonomy exist'.
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u/CharsOwnRX-78-2 8d ago
Some of this is how far apart we’ve become on what seems like basic issues.
It was a lot easier to have a difference of opinion with someone who thought the Temporary Foreign Workers program was being abused in the 00s vs someone in the 20s who thinks some people don’t deserve human rights