A question for Christians- is anti-christianity offensive?

[MyDoorsAreOpen]

the whole point of christianity, like its predecessor religions, is salvation.

Yes, but not from a painful afterlife of fire and brimstone and endless suffering. It offers deliverance from this painful earthly existence, whose merits and purposes are not patently obvious.

your comment is flat out wrong... biblical scholars may be ahead of normal religious folk on this issue (i don't know, my parents aren't biblical scholars), but churches indoctrinate the fear of hell into each new generation regardless.

Whoa there Kimosabe. I thought we were talking about official top-down church doctrines, not bottom-up popular folk beliefs. As for the latter, I think there are lots of people whose only functional level of morality is the drive to avoid pain out of fear. If you look at the people who attend and are attracted to the sorts of churches you speak of in Indiana, I think you'll find that they've spent their whole lives socialized into institutions, sacred and secular, that use fear of punishment to keep people in line. So why wouldn't they seek out a religious community that does the same? It's what's familiar to them.

There are plenty of active Christian communities that interpret Jesus' message very differently, and don't pander to this basest form of morality. Why tar them all with the same brush?

 

[qwe]

as an atheist, i have no reason to be anti-biblical-scholar. as a human who makes rational beliefs from evidence, i have every reason to be anti-organized-religion.

I thought we were talking about official top-down church doctrines, not bottom-up popular folk beliefs.

thread title: "A question for Christians- is anti-christianity offensive?"

who holds the political reigns, mdao? biblical scholars, or the masses of fearful servants of "god," and the church leaders who guide them and use hell as an existential torturous tool?

perhaps we should rethink the title to "is anti-fundamentalism offensive?" because this fundamentalism has wide memetic avenues into all churches, which in turn influences votes, wars, currencies, and more.

 

[MyDoorsAreOpen]

thread title: "A question for Christians- is anti-christianity offensive?"

Yes, I'm aware we're getting off topic. I'd say the answer to this question is clearly yes. No one likes to hear anything that means a lot to them poormouthed.

who holds the political reigns, mdao? biblical scholars, or the masses of fearful servants of "god," and the church leaders who guide them and use hell as an existential torturous tool?

False dilemma. Both groups (and many more) do their thing alongside each other, and both influence each other and fail to influence each other in many subtle ways. The situation doesn't reduce to the analogy 'reins of power', really.

perhaps we should rethink the title to "is anti-fundamentalism offensive?" because this fundamentalism has wide memetic avenues into all churches, which in turn influences votes, wars, currencies, and more.

Now you're talking. If I were still a mod here, I'd grant you this.
Is anti-fundamentalism offensive to whom, though? To fundamentalists, or to all Christians? I think this is a much easier matter. Certainly it's offensive to fundamentalists, since by definition they have no tolerance for those who differ. I think you'd find many liberal Christians, however, are themselves anti-fundamentalist. After all, there are a lot of things Jesus [supposedly] said that really don't support fundamentalism or authoritarianism at it exists today at all.