Most non-Christians would simply say that they want the most crazy and superstitious teachings of Christianity, like Noah’s Ark and the Apocalypse of St. John, to disappear. Few atheists are protesting at the Unitarian Church.

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I know some Unitarians. They accept atheists, buddhists, muslims, and spaghetti-monster followers with equal openness. What they don’t accept is someone who thinks one of these truth-claims is actually umm, true.

One thing Jesus did not say was “follow me, or whatever feels good to you”. He made claims that are either true or completely absurd. Of course, my faith in their truth is a difficult thing for many non-believers. How could it be otherwise? But to use Unitarians as an example of those you admire is to say that you will only admire us when we give up our faith in the truth of Jesus life, death and resurrection. I can assure you that this will not happen.

In fact, I am starting to wonder if the need to be loved and be accepted by the world and by even atheists, is not being used here, and in the culture in general, to try to strip people of their faith? If so, it is devilish in its source and vastly worse than the intolerance and occasional bad-behavior it claims to address.

I’d say they’re just as Godly as the folks at the local fundamentalist mega-church over in the rich part of town. As are atheists, for that matter.

We’re all sinners, but from where I sit, Jesus never mentioned homosexuality but he said a lot about greed and love of power. But it’s easy to ignore that beam in our national eye.

Most non-Christians would simply say that they want the most crazy and superstitious teachings of Christianity, like Noah’s Ark and the Apocalypse of St. John, to disappear. Few atheists are protesting at the Unitarian Church.

Every group has their lunatic fringe and high-profile jerks. (If anything, the no-life jerks have an advantage because 100% of their being gets channeled into their jerkness. With no jobs or lives on the Outside, they can be that way full-time instead of part-time.)

The danger is when the jerk types end up taking over and start running the lunatic asylum without any reality check.

Could you write me at iMonk57@gmail.com?

The guys at my group blog, The Boars Head Tavern, have enjoyed your posts and would like to invite you over.

peace

ms

Your blog post on the collapse of Evangelical Christianity made it to the CSMonitor online oped section so I followed the backlink here.

I’ve grown up Catholic, dismissed it in eighth grade is irrelevant to my life (it truly was) and then fell for the trap of a sense of community at the youth group of an Evangelical Church.

My problems were two-fold. First, my family was so dysfunctional that none of us kids could trust an enabling mom and a verbally abusive father and tormented each other as a way to cope.

My second problem is that I was and am gay. This was long before Exodus or any other form of church sponsored response was formulated and I fell into that class of “stubborn problem” people that elders and others avoided because they had no answer.

As I became more open about that and family related issues, I was even marginalized in the youth group. Having grown up in the Midwest, I was indoctrinated by the larger community – including the church – and my family to believe I was inherently defective and disposable.

Except for the last church I attended, I continued to receive this kind of treatment at every church I tried. As is usually the case, those of us considered “failures” by the others tended to find each other and form supportive friendships where possible.

The last church I attended was a “Fellowship Bible Church” – pretty much adhering to the focus on grace that was the driving force for that movement.

I benefited a great deal from a sort of ersatz friendship with the counseling pastor and, for the first time, felt like I was making some progress in a sense of self respect and appreciation for my own judgment.

So why did I leave? It’s because of a handful of issues that you captured in the blog posting about the self-serving nature of people who tend to flock to such churches, the bigotry I was exposed to outside of the church pastors and one more thing. Suicidal depression over the innate contradiction between my sexuality and my faith.

As much as they try to deny it, Evangelicals by their very actions teach revulsion and hatred of anything homosexual in nature.

They teach that because that’s really how they feel. You talk about how much you’re hated by non-Christians but you refuse to take the log out of your eye and see why.

I’ll admit that it’s guilt by association and therefore reflexive bigotry, but those attempting to impose their world view and ethos through legal means is nothing short of Pharisaical.

Those who do this while claiming to be Christians are anything but. Instead of getting out of your comfort zones and welcoming relationship with the very people you see as sinning (like Jesus), you’re drawing thick, black circles of exclusion and telling us that our behavior is the only thing you care about.

Guess who did that in Jesus’ day? Guess who he spent the largest amount of time being publicly critical of? People like them – the Pharisees.

He did it publicly for a reason. He was trying as hard as he could to discredit that mindset so he could finally get them to understand that welcoming, loving actions were the essence of what he was teaching and THAT was what God wanted.

The bizarre thing to non-Christians is that you are all so clueless. You’ve managed to convince most of us that, at best, you’re totally indifferent to our well being and, more likely, hate us.

When was the last time YOU (any of you) actually visited someone in prison? When was the last time YOU took care of a non-christian who was sick? When was the last time any of YOU invited an abortion doctor, prostitute or homosexual over for dinner?

Most of you won’t even get out of your comfort zone enough to actually evangelize even. Oh – and God forbid that one of you would be willing to admit to your own problems!

Is the rate of divorce for Evangelicals still higher than the overall average? The counseling pastor once told me that the incidence and severity of dysfunctionality in families was just has high in the church as out.

Yet the only people I ever heard publicly admitting that their lives weren’t perfect were the counseling pastor and the founding pastor.

Am I sounding angry? I believe I have reason. Do I hate you with a broad brush stroke? Yeah, I have to admit I do as a gay man these days.

But I’m far from alone. I’m also far from alone in seeing you as followers of the hypocritical Pharisees rather than the guy you name yourselves after.

You want cultural relevance? You want us to stop angry with you and hating you? Stop trying to run our lives. Start loving us where we are by what you DO rather than just mouthing the words.

Finally, stop hiding your own problems from each other and us. It’s painfully obvious you ALL have them. How can you expect us to trust you when you’re so dishonest even with each other?

I hope I’ve answered your question about why you provoke such a strong reaction from so many of us non-christians. If you want to talk further, you have my email.

Chris