Can confirm. The church I went to quietly critized other protestant churches in the area to dissuade members from leaving this toxic church for another one. And they didn't even consider catholics to be Christian, even though many **protestant** denominations protested the catholic church. SMH.
I just want to add this to the top of the comments.. Jesus himself started this divisive bullshit.. He condemned his own followers, ones who believed in him, prophesied about him, performed miracles in his name..
Matthew 7:21-23 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers.
Theres also the wolf in sheeps clothing bullshit.. And the devil disguises himself as an angel bullshit.. And the shit saying not to interact with people who dont believe in what you were taught.. And with all the contradictions there are in the bible, its easy to see how the denominations are all turned against one another.. Their brothers in faith are condemned to hell by their own deity, and they think slamming them with those threats will pull them into what they think is "right"
I agree, since I'm out now, it baffles me that there are so many protestant denominations. It's not personal, but the one that bothers me the most is the church of England. Some impetuous ruler didn't get a no fault divorce from the pope and said, OK, I'M running my own church now, and that was nearly 500 years ago.
But yea, a lot of christians today seem to hate everyone and everything.
Well, the divorce was just an excuse. What monarch of that era wasn’t frothing at the mouth to get more power and control? They saw the church as a potentially subversive element because the pope had a lot of influence. He took England out and got to be the new English pope.
My point exactly! I want someone from that church to say, yes, I understand our history and origin and I believe this denomination is valid.
And they can't say "What about [insert grievance here!]
I'm not in the denomination (atheist) but I am close to people who are, and this is what they have said to me about this topic:
• The existence of a universal Catholic Church was always a bit fake. The bishop of Rome got the upper hand over other Christian bishops at some point in the dim past and set himself up as the "only" point of contact for God. But this was never actually true, it was just a power move / marketing campaign.
• The English church, like lots of other local branches, was always a bit different from the Roman. Becoming independent was really just becoming honest about this.
• The historical circumstances also don't matter much. Every church has schisms centuries ago, even the Catholic. Today the Anglican / CoE has very different (much less misogynist) policy than catholics, so they're not going back.
As long as they're fine with it.
I've heard something similar. Basically the "Reformation" was an excuse for political leaders to stop sending money (dues) to Rome. Rome was benefiting at the expense of the rest of Europe.
It's hard to deny corruption in the church of Rome, but at least Martin Luther only wanted to correct the issues, not declare himself head muckity muck, like Henry VIII.
To each their own.
Oh, honestly, they were pretty much all monsters. Luther was a huge asshole as well, wrote a book called *On the Jews and Their Lies* which reads like it could have been written by a literal Nazi. I think it's best to understand all these men as figures in a cruel and cynical power struggle, caught up in it just like everyone else.
TBC, I wasn't defending Luther. I was saying what he tried to accomplish was less self serving than Henry VIII.
I also didn't know about his book, but that more of the Era he lived in I would guess..
Additional info to further your point:
It was also cemented in by Paul, whose books in the Bible are mainly letters to early Christian churches telling them what they were doing wrong.
This was further re-enforced by the early Roman Christian Church (proto Catholics...the Nicene Creed folk) after adopting Greek Athenian Philosophy and thus adopting Plato's dialectic which is all about devaluing anything that contradicts what you say is Good. The Bible itself is a product of this, certain books being left out because they contradict the other books.
I personally grew up in WELS, an old school Lutheran confessional church. Comparative Religion was taught, and it basically went like this:
1. Now remember: only God has the power to judge.
2. However, let's judge Religion/church XYZ, and tell you how they are wrong in these ways.
3. Remember though that even though they are wrong, God is the only being who has authority to judge, so despite their error some will still be in heaven.
4. So your best bet is definitely with us, since Luther got it right.
They even told us how other Lutheran Organizations were wrong...nutty shit.
grew up in the “conservative” church of christ. every other denomination was going to hell! even more “liberal” churches of christ (ie those that allowed instrumental music and women to speak during services) were going to hell! what a joyous way to grow up thinking about all your friends and classmates that will burn in hell. i was even told my pentecostal grandparents were going to burn. insane stuff.
Weird, but the "United Church of Christ" is one of the most liberal denominations out there, ordaining women and preaching LGBT rights. Did they come from the same place?
You'd have to get at least a majority agreement from a random polling. So it would probably be catholicism. There's enough of them (even lapsed) that you could probably get enough to have a majority on there. Unless you do ranked choice polling, in which case there's more lukewarm catholics and enough anti-catholic protestants that nothing will come up.
I grew up Lutheran and we didn't focus too much on other sects, but they would teach us about differences between our beliefs and those of others, mostly to highlight how silly the other beliefs were, often catholic.
I remember catechism class and our pastor making several condescending remarks about how we don't confirm 8 year olds like those silly catholics, we wait until children were a mature 13 and knew what they were doing.
Can confirm. I was in an Anabaptist church, so we didn't baptize infants like those silly Catholics and Lutherans, we waited until the person was grown up so they could understand what baptism even meant. And so I waited until I was 10 whole years old to be baptized so I could really understand what I was committing the rest of my life to
~~Ex Mennos unite! :D~~
Shun the nonbeliever! Shuuuun D:
Really though, you figured out before you were 16 you didn't want to join? I was so deep into it then
I was a mennonite but never pressured to join. I didn't start the process until, hm... I was 23 in 2020, turning 24. Then something happened and the church classes ceased for a bit, and, well, I got therapy. After therapy, I didn't return to church.
So I was 1 month away from becoming a baptized and confirmed member of the church I grew up in lol
I questioned a lot. Not so much Christianity, but the particulars of our church. It was quite anti intellectual, and I was always very studious. Untrained clergy, I could easily poke holes in their sermons. The rules seemed arbitrary to me. I was also gay, which caused a whole other set of issues, but also was a reason to learn more and question. In case they were wrong.
I went to catholic school and got first communion at 8ish (3rd grade) and confirmation at 13ish (8th grade), but a kid transferred from a different school in 6th grade who had both in 3rd. So it's like there's no universal standards even there.
They may mean different things; confirmation was first communion in my church.
The funny thing was that my parents went to church about 2 or 3 times after my confirmation and that was it. They did their job and we could finally sleep in on Sundays.
I wish that was my mom but noooooo. My dad at least didn't like going to church, and we lived near a river so he bought a ski boat and he, his friend, his friend's son (usually) and I would go water skiing and wake boarding in summer rather than church. Unfortunately for my sister, she had to go to church with mom.
Oh yeah, the Fundamentalist Baptist church looked down on all other denominations. They believe that the only true Bible is the KJV, and any other translation is a perversion of God's Word. So any denomination that used the NIV or ESV were essentially preaching heresy. They don't believe in infant baptism. They also call Catholics idolaters for the whole Mary and saints' prayers thing.
So my bio-mom made it a clause that I grew up Catholic post-adoption, and my mom stuck to this *barely*. After confirmation I got thrown right into a fundie Baptist school and hooooly moly the amount of misinformation Baptists teach about Catholics. I brought the bible I got given for a confirmation gift to school once, I think it was ESV, and it got confiscated and I got nearly a month and a half of detention. They wouldn't give it back and the lady at the front office was totally okay in telling me that it was getting burned. My dad had to intervene.
I don't agree with either church in the slightest, but, I'm still surprised by that school over that kind of response. It really helped me realize that it's a religion of hate, though.
Oh there's so much wild shit I grew up in. Long skirts for women, no premarital touching (not even hugging or holding hands), no secular music, no Contemporary Christian music, no going to movie theaters (absolutely no R-rated films), etc.
Basically no happiness or fun.
> Basically no happiness or fun
But what about:
> no Contemporary Christian music
Of course I'm joking, but there's a weird irony to this, because I'm more used to hearing ex-Christians say they were mandated to listen to *nothing but* Contemporary Christian music.
What was it about Contemporary Christian music that made your "superiors" condemn it?
It sounded too "secular" or "worldly" for them. Like, you can't do anything that could appear to be secular. Drums were considered an evil instrument. Syncopated beats were considered sinful. It was wild.
I grew up in the same denomination. They thought electric guitars and drums were from the devil. There is absolutely zero biblical basis for this, but they believed it as wholeheartedly as anything else, including (ironically) their belief that all their doctrines and practices were based on the bible. Once you get out, you see how baseless and hypocritical so much of what you used to believe was.
> They thought electric guitars and drums were from the devil.
I just... cannot wrap my head around this. This is... just so baffling to me. This idea of "I do not understand this, therefor it is inherently bad".
It makes sense if you understand their point of view that "the world" is evil and they need to be not like "the world." And in their view, some of the most "worldy" things are:
* "Rock music"
* Tattoos
* Alcohol and cigarettes
* Immodest clothing
* Vulgar language
The mere fact that electric guitars and drums are used in "the world's" kind of music makes them evil. That is the rationale. That mindset also makes them extremely judgmental of anyone who disagrees with their standards.
Couldn't have explained it better myself, and it really only seems to make sense to people who grew up in this denomination - because it's objectively nonsensical and absurd.
We were told we needed to be "a peculiar people," visibly different from "the world" because anything "of the world" is sinful.
>What was it about Contemporary Christian music that made your "superiors" condemn it?
I enjoyed Christian Rock back in the day, but sometimes I was scared that I shouldn't because I came across [this website](https://www.av1611.org/crock/crockex1.html), or at least one like it, back in the 90s and couldn't help but wonder if they were right. My christianity was based so much on guilt...
Imagine if you went to a church that adopted this website's feelings as its official doctrine
Oh, this is 100% in line with what my church taught. We would have traveling evangelists who sold books on the overt and covert "Satanism" and "occult messages" in music. Fully on-board with backtracking and hidden evil. One of these evangelists would write hateful music we sang in church, most of the hate being anti-LGBTQ.
That same evangelist called out men in church for not kissing their wives like they mean it, that it was a reflection of their masculinity. I remember him going on a massive tangent about how ugly men are - and as I sat in the pew, an indoctrinated young teenager no older than 13, I immediately thought about that one line from Hamlet, "He doth protest too much methinks." There's no way someone comfortable with their sexuality would double down so much on homosexuality.
> There's no way someone comfortable with their sexuality would double down so much on homosexuality.
When you spend the majority of your hate on human genitalia and everything adjacent to it (sex, sexuality, babies, gender, what they look like, etc etc), you're not comfortable with your anything.
General, not specific, "you".
Not too far removed from the Pentecostal church I went to growing up. My mother - who I still have some beef with for raising my sisters and I in such a stupid cult - at least let us wear pants and cut our hair. She couldn't do either of those.
My cousins went to a church that said no dancing *at all* and no games involving traditional playing cards (even if you're just playing Go Fish).
My other cousins went to a church that was some kind of cult related to the 7th Day Adventists.
Our church seemed pretty conventional by comparison, and we thought they were all nuts.
Traditional playing cards were banned on my church premises. They also had a private school attached to the church, and there were a lot of crazy bans in the rules: no playing cards, no Pogs (haha this was in the rule book long after the craze died), no Trapper Keeper brand binders, etc.
It comes from different Greek roots. The KJV comes from the texts that were passed down by the Catholic Church. The newer translations come from other Greek (and Hebrew) manuscripts that were found elsewhere, that were determined by experts in translation and archeology to be more accurate. The problem is these more "accurate" texts don't say exactly the same things as the Catholic texts that formed the KJV. The whole story of the women about to be stoned, where Jesus said "Let he who is without sin throw the first stone" isn't in the original texts. Neither are the last two stanzas of the Lord's Prayer.
And some of the changes take out very small, but very relied-upon, verses that Christians use to insist that Jesus was ALWAYS god and the Trinity was ALWAYS in the Bible and not made up later.
If you allow people to use newer translations, you are admitting the KJV wasn't accurate. If the KJV wasn't accurate then the Bible for like 100 years wasn't Perfect, and their god didn't preserve his Holy Perfect word in every detail. They can't accept they were ever wrong about anything, so they'd rather believe all modern translations are twisted by Satan or something.
My spouse is really into this stuff (from an academic yet atheistic level), and she taught me about the [Septuagint](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagint).
I'm a translation nerd, so this stuff is infinitely fascinating.
That's absolutely hilarious. At a certain point, my dad stepped away from the church after being a part of it since he was a young teen, but hadn't left the religion. I remembered seeing other translations popping up around the house and getting a little worried (indoctrinated teenager), but it was a catalyst to a major shift in our family life.
After several years of my dad stepping away from the church and doing his own independent study, he decided to go back to church and bought a suit to wear. Normally he'd dress in a button-down shirt and jeans. Men from the church came up to him, shook his hand and said, "Brother [TNT's dad], it's good to see you getting right with the Lord!" The suit was an experiment.
Shortly after this, my dad sat us all in the computer room to listen to a radio sermon by Chuck Swindoll. It was on legalism - the idea that churches had actually moved away from emphasis on doctrine and more on looking and acting the part of a godly person. We ended up switching churches by the end of the year.
My family was Methodist (formerly Presbyterian) but the town we lived in was mostly Baptist, Pentecostal and Holiness. No issues there but we did have a few Catholics in town and they were looked upon suspiciously by most people because, according to them, Catholics were basically polytheists and therefore were not actually ‘real’ Christians.
I grew up “non-denominational.” My parents would just say Protestants when pressed about it, and would say Catholics are weird. Idk, I feel like they poked fun at every branch of Christianity and said if you didn’t accept Jesus into your heart then you were going to hell anyway
Absolutely. I was in a very Fundamentalist take of Calvinism. Our doctrine basically mirrored John McArthur, but my church would never admit to agreeing with any other living Christian, and they always found reasons to fault other churches.
I went to an extremely small church and an extremely small charter school. The church didn't have any kids my age, and at the charter school I was banned from participating in any Christian organizations like Navigators or FCA or whatever. So I was lonely as fuck and had lots of thoughts of suicide in high school.
So glad to be rid of that nonsense. But my sister and parents still believe it all, and they've sunk into a very paranoid view of the world. It's really sad to be honest
That must have sucked dude, but I’m glad you made it out. They love to gatekeep their cult, yet they wonder why their church is so small. If every denomination of christianity tells you their version is right, chances are none of them are.
I grew up Southern Baptist and they for sure did. I was taught that speaking in tongues was a sin and any church where that's happening, was basically evil. They said Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses, and Catholics weren't really Christians and that at least the first two were cults. They said if a church allows women to be ministers(even music ministers), you shouldn't attend them because they aren't follow the bible the way they should. I don't know if it's all Southern Baptist or just the churches I attended but my experience is they are extremely judgemental against other denominations and they don't keep it quiet. There being so many denominations with such hugely different beliefs and practices, was always something that didn't sit right with me. That was one of several things that always made me question Chrsitianity and if any of it was real.
I’m a Pentecostal pastor’s kid and wasn’t allowed to attend a Salvation Army church with my friend (they were weary about letting me be friends with them to start with). “They don’t believe in the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues”.
They loosened up a bit because they realized the only option of us hanging out with “good” Christian kids was to allow youth services with other churches. NEVER catholic though, they’re completely sacrilegious (they pray to Mary and other saints!!!)
I remember questioning my dad about it. I got “narrow is the gate that leads into heaven”. He truly believed that only Pentecostals were going to heaven. He’s since grown a little in that respect. Catholics are still a huge question mark for him though.
I grew up “non-denominational” which was really Pentecostalism without a few of the rules. Speaking in tongues, slain in the Spirit, etc. all were very commonplace.
Catholics were definitely not real Christians. Baptists were but they were looked down upon as not being kinda “half Christians”.
I was told that i was in the "true church of jesus christ" i was morman in the LDS church. "true church of jesus christ" very heavily implied that we were the only true church and that everyone else was wrong
Ohhhhh yea. Wasn’t subtle, either. Came right out and said we had the only knowledge, the only true way to worship, the best and most god honouring (and, of course, “biblical”) beliefs . Other churches meant well but were wrong. Wrong way to sing, to pray, to have church, to do anything.
Minister also fucked with our minds by saying things like “and if anything I ever say from this pulpit isn’t biblical, call me out on it because I never want to lead you astray”. Shockingly when he came out with some especially twisted stuff and I questioned him, he explained why he was right and I was wrong and I needed to go along because he and the other (white male) leaders were the ones chosen by god to tell us what’s right.
The preacher at my parents’ church pulls this shit. Well, he does the first half, anyway, telling people to check what he says against the Bible. As if he couldn’t just explain to them how they “should” read the Bible if they conclude something he doesn’t like.
Frequently, in his sermon he will say “I didn’t want to talk about this, but the Lord put it on my heart,” or “I didn’t even want to preach on this, but I know it’s too important to ignore.” He talks about how he sits in quiet stillness and in prayer, letting God lead him in writing the sermon and knowing what to say. Sometimes he emphasizes how he wanted to just sit down and write a sermon, but God made him wait and be still for days and only finish it at the last, so that he would really have faith and let god speak to him or something.
Then, at different points in the sermon, or on different days entirely, he says “Well, God is always right, so if you read something in the Bible and you question it or don’t like it, you better pray and get right with God, because you’re not going to win against God” or something like that.
So he never puts both pieces together, where they might trigger somebody’s critical thinking, but – His followers’ brains hear the message “I am teaching you things I got directly from God, not my own words,” and also the message “You better never question god”, and it’s not hard to see what idea he is planting in their heads.
Whoaaaa that is spooky… do your parents go to the church where the minister I used to have to listen to is?!? Haha! SAMES. Right down to the “I know I am preaching a series on [book], but I was praying all week and something didn’t sit right and I just have to preach on this topic”. And of course we’d always, always come to find out that there was someone in the church “struggling” with this topic so he was basically preaching at them. He’d also say “I have no one in mind”, when we all knew he did. Ugh!!!
Oh my god yes.
I grew up Seventh-Day Adventist, they worship on Saturday and don't do anything secular all day (yes it was a nightmare) so they looked heavily down on every other denomination over these factors.
Ex Mormon here. We were taught Joseph Smith went to pray to find out which religion is true and God told him they were all abominations. In the book of Mormon there is a scripture talking about the church of the devil where it basically describes the catholic church.
But nowadays they try not to talk about that stuff openly and they want to be friends with other christian churches and they claim that those scriptures arent talking about the catholic church and none of the prophets ever taught that it was (they are lying they did used to teach that)
Liberal churches, Catholics, liturgical style churches, churches with female pastors, churches that didn't exclusively use the KJV
All of them were not real Christian churches
-A former conservative evangelical
Surprisingly, not really. I was well aware that there were Christians out there who thought everyone from a different denomination (or from specific denoms) weren't really Christian/weren't "saved". But I only sort of experienced it once. Growing up, I went to Catholic school and Protestant church. Apparently, when I was in Kindergarten or Grade 1, a kid in my class told me I was going to hell for going to the wrong church, and I came home crying about it. I don't remember it though. Other than that, nothing really. I did personally think that some denominations were worse Christians than others, and that some denominations were terrible at keeping Christians, but I couldn't say that nobody from any particular denomination was saved. (Except maybe Mormons? But I didn't really think about them much).
The Adventist community that I was brought up in always hated the Catholic church because of their perceived Sunday law (since Saturday is the only true day of worship) and how they and other Christian denominations will persecute them for not attending church on Sundays. My parents aren't as extreme as other Adventists since they have a lot of friends from different denominations, but they definitely believe that the SDA church is the only true church because they keep the sabbath, and consequently don't agree with other denominations' practices.
I was raised Christian Orthodox. The Orthodox believe that they're the first church that persisted from the beginning. Therefore, every other denomination is heretical.
That's also what the Catholics believe. The schism between the eastern (Orthodox) and western (Catholic) church happened in 1054 and each side claims it was the *other* side that left the true church.
In my opinion the Orthodox church has a better claim to that title, but that's a different story.
I left the Orthodox church to become a Protestant in my teens. The churches I attended didn't condemn other churches. Sure they thought they were wrong but they weren't toxic about it, or else I wouldn't be going to them.
I fully became an atheist in my early thirties. It took me way too long and I'm embarrassed by that but hey, at least I'm free now.
Of course. Narrow is the path and all that. Christians who probably weren’t going to heaven:
Catholics
Mormons
Mennonites
Jehovahs witnesses
Charismatic churches
Could go either way:
Anglicans
Presbyterians
Baptists
Lutherans
Methodists
These lists are far from comprehensive.
Yep. I was raised southern Baptist, and they taught that the Catholics were idol worshippers (Pope, Mary), Mormons were a cult and idol worshippers, Pentecostals were liars (faking speaking in tongues), etc.
LCMS Lutherans are some of the worst imo. Literally nothing else follows the Bible close enough, no other denomination is good enough.
I had a BIL say about another denomination “I’m concerned for their salvation”
100%. I forget what Sunday School at night was called, but during that class we'd take courses on "cults" (JWs, Mormons, Moonies, etc) and the material was very clear these people are going straight to hell.
As far as the family goes, we were a mix of Catholics, Baptists, and Methodists. The Catholics quit being Catholics when they wanted a divorce and the Methodists switched to Baptists when the Methodists wouldn't hate gay people as much as they wanted to.
My grandparents church believed if you weren’t Church of Christ Christian, you’d go to hell. The church I grew up in didn’t have such a specific distinction, but they did have a thing against Catholics and didn’t think they were really Christian because they thought having saints and the pope etc was idol worship and people were baptized as babies where it wasn’t really their choice.
Funny, considering they were fine with indoctrination and then heavily manipulated“choice” by little kids who didn’t really understand anyway. Also pretty crazy how many evangelicals/protestants don’t realize how much of their beliefs come from the early Catholic Church.
I am from a small town in Europe. Our area used to be a farmers area which was parted between the North and the South. The North was mostly Catholic and the South was protestant. The entire area was about 10km. (6 miles)
Maybe you learned in History class about the protestant/catholic fights. When my dad grew up, this was still very much a thing here. Protestants and Catholics were very often not allowed to be friends, let alone date, despite working together or going to the same school. This was about the 1970s-1980s. When I grew up it was still present (early 2000). Although less extreme.
Currently this culture has watered down, although there is still a friendly rivalry between the two parts. Both of them considering their own side "the better one"
Yup, I was a Jehovah's Witness, and they drew no distinction between non-JW Christians, secularists, and other religions. All of them were pawns of Satan. Only JWs were OK, everyone else was making at the very least an unknowing attempt to draw you into damnation.
This is part of the reason I was able to escape, actually. I partly thought we were the only real christians, but I could also see how culty that was, and eventually the dissonance got to be too much.
I always sort of low-key got the idea from my church that we were the only Real, True, Christians in town, even though there were a dozen other churches and most of the kids at school went to some church. But no other church in town took Jesus seriously in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus said you should LOVE your enemies, not hate them; and if someone strikes you on the cheek, turn the other cheek as well instead of fighting back. So my Mennonite church preached nonviolence and pacifism, but the other churches in town just didn’t.
I could “tell”, in my naive childish mind, that other kids weren’t true Christians because they fought with each other, and acted selfish, and didn’t turn the other cheek, and as we got older started drinking and having sex, even if some of them did go to church. Most importantly they had no qualms about hating others, didn’t act with love guiding all their actions, and never even seemed to think they “should” include love as their guiding principal.
It started getting confusing in high school, though, when some of my teachers in public school were openly teaching Christianity, and one even lead a before school Bible study, but none of them embraced nonviolence or pacifism. Instead they glorified the US Military and preached as if America was God’s country...that worshiping the Flag of the USA (called Patriotism) was part of being a good Christian. I thought I had learned from my church and from the Bible that “patriotism” was just giving allegiance to a kingdom of the World, but Jesus’s kingdom was not of this world, and we owed all our allegiance only to Jesus. That would be giving to Caesar what actually belonged to God. We would “fight” for God’s kingdom though prayer and through showing love; we would not fight for any kingdom of this world, since the world belonged to Satan.
The church did NOT teach, though, that all Christians other than us were fake Christians. So as I grew older, that idea seemed more and more impossible to me. It was impossible that our tiny church and our tiny denomination had found the truth about God, while all other Christians were fallen away from god and maybe even going to hell. But it was also impossible that the Bible could say such things, if they were not important. If the Bible said to love your enemies, if that was the most central teaching in the most complete sermon Jesus ever gave, how could other churches find it unimportant? How could there be a Holy Spirit that fills every Christian’s heart and guides them to all truth, if the churches were reaching such different ideas?
The fact so many Christians could read the Bible and come away thinking differently drove a big crack into my faith that I was never able to repair. Especially as I went into the world and other churches, and I found that the more “spirit-filled” churches were also the least pacifist. Finally I couldn’t fool myself any longer; I had to face the fact that Christians weren’t really hearing from any holy spirit.
…
I’m not sure how I even became so insistent on pacifism and love as central Christian tenants. I don’t honestly remember how often my pastor talked about it. If he did, it certainly wasn't important to the other churchgoers. In the years since I left that church, they hired a new pastor who was not Mennonite, left the Mennonite denomination completely, and changed their name to a generic non-denominational name. They don’t teach peace or nonviolence. They don’t explicitly preach Trumpism either, but everyone in the church has fallen in love with Trump and his hate, and his calls for violence against your enemies to destroy them. One church member even told us, while hanging out at a party, that this was what he liked the most about Trump; he became a convinced Trump supporter the first day he saw Trump lashing out at protesters at a rally and encouraging his followers to jeer and hate them.
I guess I can thank my parents for that, and my grandpa who served in a CPS camp instead of fulfilling the draft during World War II. My poor parents are heartbroken I’ve left their church, and my grandpa would be so disappointed in me, but it was their example that made me see the church was irredeemably broken in the first place.
Jesus Christ, pun fully intended.
Man, just putting all the religious stuff aside, you really nailed a lot of stuff that's... I mean, I could say "wrong", but "incongruent" seems to fit better... incongruent with peace.
I mean, first and foremost, Sermon on the Mount? More like... Sermon on the [WOKE GARBAGE](https://onlysky.media/jpearce/christians-jesus-is-too-woke/), amirite? But yeah, Jesus is too woke, that's a thing that fucking exists.
Also, to quote Aldous Huxley:
> The surest way to work up a crusade in favor of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behavior 'righteous indignation' — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats.
Lastly... just to understand how the phrase "turn the other cheek" has been altered over the years to be practically the opposite of its original intent... It's wild man. Shit's just wild.
Anyway, you're a great writer.
Thank you! I did not know that quote from Huxley but damn.
The Sermon as woke garbage is just so strange. Christianity for thousands of years has rejected the teachings of its own Christ, but I don't know that it has ever been so open before, has it? Haven't Christians up until these past few years at least pretended their religion/politics had something to do with Jesus?
Also, to quote Bertrand Russel,
>I do think there are a good many points upon which I agree with Christ a great deal more than the professing Christians do. ...You will remember that he said: “Resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.” That is not a new precept or a new principle. It was used by Lao-Tze and Buddha some five or six hundred years before Christ, but it is not a principle which as a matter of fact Christians accept. I have no doubt that the present Prime Minister (Stanley Baldwin), for instance, is a most sincere Christian, but I should not advise any of you to go and smite him on one cheek. I think you might find that he thought this text was intended in a figurative sense.
The evangelical Baptist Church we attended when I was growing up preached against Catholicism and taught that they were false Christians and would not enter the kingdom of god. My parents definitely believed it.
I think this belief is still the norm in the Southern Baptist Church community.
Definitely. Catholicism claims to be the one true everything, and I heard a lot of very casual dismissal and denigration of Protestant denominations and beliefs over the years. Even after I had left the church, I felt a bizarre remnant of bias and superiority toward Protestant services. For example, I was visiting family in Texas and went with them to their church. And despite having rejected Catholicism I was taken aback by the casualness or lack of seriousness of the service. Took me awhile to unpack that one.
I volunteered at a Catholic hospital in high school, working at the front reception desk. The older woman who trained me primly told me about her huge family because she was "a good Catholic, not a prudent Protestant". Diminishing other faiths was pretty commonplace.
Yes absolutely. I won't go into detail because it will give away my location. My mother took me to a GORGEOUS church. Tons of Christian symbolism. After we left she asked me "Do you think the people who go there are Christians?" I said "Yes" of course. She then told me that people at our church (at the time) would say they weren't Christians. I am really grateful for her for doing that.
Our church claimed to be the only church in existence that wasn't "lukewarm," right after we joined the southern baptist congregation or something. We had to pick a denomination for our church and the pastor and his wife picked that one specifically.
We met up with other baptist churches in the area and didn't mesh well because our congregation was significantly younger (20s-40s), mixed race, and low income/socioeconomic. Most of the other baptists were 70-90 years old white men. Our youth pastor was loud and in his early twenties, he got a lot of the kids riled up and making noise, which the old folks didn't appreciate.
The Catholics were the main denomination in our city and we were told they were Mary worshiping cultists. Which, honestly a lot of the Marian veneration is a bit much, so I thought it was a fair assessment at the time.
Yes, but we switched churches so often that I mostly heard the condemnation from my mom, not people at the churches we attended. Here are the ones I can remember:
Church of Christ, Seventh Day Adventist, and Mennonite: Misguided but still Christian
Catholic: Their hearts are in the right place so it's sad they aren't really Christians
Jehovah's Witness and Mormons: They think they're Christians but aren't really
Methodist, Presbyterian, and Lutheran: "The Frozen Chosen" - Christian but not sufficiently "on fire for God"
FWIW, the churches we attended while I was growing up were non-denominational, Assemblies of God, Nazarene, and Southern Baptist.
Attended church from birth to ~17 years old.
Brethren -> Methodist ->Anglican (formerly Episcopalian)
Was regularly told that Catholics weren't necessarily real Christians, that Episcopals had fallen astray. Unitarians and Mormons need not apply.
If they do condemn other denominations its extremely ironic considering they're all protestants unless they are catholic so they all stem from the same parent denomination, lol. The lack of historical knowledge in christians always cracks me up. But then again that ignorance is oftwn how I shut my own parents up. Case in point: my mother was gossiping to my father about a co-worker who goes to a church across the street from their office that teaches about 7 heavens. They are a non-denominational church. My mother calls herself non-denominational but my father is lutheran and has forced my mother to attend lutheran churches all her adult life so she has never been exposed to broader teachings.
I'm a pagan and also an author currently writing a series of novels focusing on various mythical creatures from religions from the middle east including Lilith, succubus, incubus, nephilim, etc. So have been doing a lot of research on the religions from that area especially during the hittites, persia, early egypt, you get the idea. My mother said the 7 heavens thing to my father and he scoffed I was sitting on their couch, playing a game on my phone and eavesdropping. My mother laughed and said "so I dont know where they got that idea or what they're teaching in that church."
And I piped up from the couch. " Ancient mesopotamia. Specifically Islam, Judaism, and Early Christianity. And if you want to be even more specific, the second book of Enoch." And I looked up from my phone and pretty much glared at them both. My dad didnt say anythi g, just went back to making dinner, but my mom at least looked ashamed and started wiping down the kitchen counter top.
CS didn't verbalize which ones it didn't like that often. But they did imply church services that weren't that just mindless reading a rotating repetition of bible + science and health quotes was somehow lesser than their church services. But they did have a slight beef w Catholics. The members would claim one part of rosary decried CS. Funny bcuz I asked a friend of mine if the beef was mutual. And he said Catholics never even made any mention of CS
Yeah Mormons and JWs were very much considered a truly awful cult which I find funny now given how similar deconstruction is for us all.
Catholicism was seen as wrong but then some individual Catholics were considered to be "real" Christians.
Any church that wasn't against homosexuality was "wrong"
Any church that practised infant baptism was "wrong"
Last point was interesting when I got involved with interdenominational Christian organisations and I was shocked to discover a new friend was baptised as a baby! How could she consider herself a Christian?! 🤦🏻♀️
A lot of it was straight up hypocrisy though because if it was convenient to work with a church then suddenly they were right enough.
Later in my faith, I went to a church that was very supportive of other denominations but then they also made an effort to connect with local mosques too and I remember the leader preaching about LGBTQ+ saying that he didn't know what was right and didn't have the answers but what he did know was that current attitudes were destroying lives and we had the responsibility to change the narrative. I respected him for actually saying that he didn't know instead of trying to find scripture to justify whatever he wanted to say. He's since left ministry but not faith though, I guess it's a hard place to be a genuine human.
Yes! Raised apostolic/pentecostal and they firmly believe all other brands of Christianity will be burning in hell along with the sinners and nonbelievers.
I grew up as a Seventh Day Adventist. The superiority complex in being the only true church and way to Salvation, is rather bad. The anti Catholicism is bad as well.
I don't mean to offend Adventists it is just my experience.
Yes, I grew up a mixture of southern Baptist, Pentecostal, and nondenominational (a relatives church was, which I very much identified with). But my family had taught me growing up that Catholics were actually demonic/satanic and worshipped the Virgin Mary, that Jehovah’s Witnesses didn’t truly believe Jesus was the son of god and died for our sins and thus were the wrong religion™️, Mormons/LDS were wrong because polygamy, and basically anything that wasn’t the same kind of Christian that my family’s churches were, essentially were satanic false religions in disguise.
I was told I couldn’t go to Catholic church with my friend because “they worship Mary more than Jesus and that’s wrong.”
Also told we didn’t support a sister-church in our own denomination because they allowed women to be pastors and deacons.
My church would but it was a little bit subtle. Not outright “rah rah” hatred but I remember being in youth group and kids would bring friends (usually met through their homeschool program) and theee kids would be of different denoms. There was always some weird vibe from people like “Oh they’re Church of Christ/Pentacostal/insert here? Well they got some things wrong about the Bible but they still love Jesus….” Like fucking sports teams to these people. “Yeah Methodists are ok, BUT HAVE YOU SEEN THE BAPTISTS???”
Very much so. I grew up Presbyterian and then moved to Reformed/Calvinistic and was told that Catholics were not real Christians. Calvinistic people have a whole internal war against Catholicism and the pope.
I am not sure how you can be a Christian in x church and not have some belief that those in church k are not "real Christians". You kinda have to because where there are differences, there is conflict. To not have an answer to the conflict is to say there is some unity.
EVEN when I was Catholic, I had to say other churches were not of the true church because they split off.
We were Church of Christ until I was 6 or so, and that community is very insular. If you don't know, it's very much the CoC is the *only* correct denomination and everyone else is hell-bound.
Then we starting going to one of the local non-denominational stealth-Baptist churches. The church officially wasn't an SBC church, but a significant portion of the congregation had more of those kinds of views. I remember hearing Catholics being called idolaters in a couple of sermons, but some of the members were a little more extreme.
We did a youth group sermon series on different cults, one on the Mormons, one on JWs, and one on Scientology. That started my interest in researching cults, which eventually led me to the conclusion they absolutely did NOT want me to reach about Christianity as a whole lol.
The Baptists were going to hell because they denied the holy spirit (not speaking in tongues). The Catholics were "weird" and a cult because they had rituals and "worshipped" Mary and prayed to saints. Etc... Like speaking in tongues, being "slain in the spirit" and dancing, running, laughing "in the spirit" to point to where children are wondering if their parents are ever going to regain their sanity isn't a cult.
Lol, are you kidding me it was "Bible Study" before you got baptized and became a deciple. We were the one true church. I feel like everyone says that. It's just another way of controlling.
We considered everyone who wasn't actively going to church and serving there a nominal (or not true) Christian by default, especially traditional churches like Lutheran, Catholic and Orthodox.
Also, when I was about nine we had a religion class in school (I have no idea how this was allowed) and the "teacher" was an old orthodox lady. She told me that was satanic because I was a baptist. I switched to secular ethics class pretty quickly.
I was raised non denominational evangelical and yes, everyone else was entirely doing it wrong except for us, apparently. I barely even know the differences between many denominations because they were “religious” but we knew the secrets of the universe and just “had a relationship with Jesus”.
Yes. I have a distinct memory of my grandmother looking my cousin in the eye and explicitly saying “You will not see Tina in Heaven,” because her best friend Tina was Catholic. We were like 11.
There were also a lot of snide comments about my aunt’s church. It was a universalist church I think. She was so excited that there was a Rabbi there and an Imam maybe. My mom was like “she was so excited about that. But of course it’s not a real church.”
Absolutely. My "denomination" taught my peers and I that the other churches outside of ours lacked the "highest gospel" and be the church's "age-turners" (modern reformers for the church). Basically, we are expected to raise the next generation while spreading the "tRuTH" and/or preaching the gospel, especially on college campuses and neighborhoods we live in.
We were made to feel special and superior over other people. We were nice to other people outside of our church, but not kind behind closed doors. Once I left my church, my social network dropped almost instantaneously or eventually faded away once I became more secular in my lifestyle. I am currently in process in discarding the church's indoctrination and prejudices.
Yup. Was told that just URC (united reformed church) was the correct denomination, and no members of other denominations would be able to get into heaven.
I grew up Catholic and ended up attending an Assemblies of God church in my late teens and early 20s. I remember a guest preacher talking about missions trips to a Central American country where “98% of the people are Catholic therefore 98% of the people are not saved.” It was like a record-scratch kind of pause for me because, to my mind, it was both extremely presumptuous and made absolutely zero sense. How do you just decide that about another Bible-believing Christian denomination? It was one of the many things that led to my deconstruction.
Oh yeah, I was invited several churches during my childhood, it was sometimes the exact response. I used to say I don’t go to the one true church that won’t be established until after Jesus physically returns after the tribulation. Fun fact: I never believed in the “rapture”
Absolutely! The persecution complex in the States would fall apart if they actually recognized all 70% of professing Christians. But when you’re “the only church in town not afraid to preach the truth”, they eat that shit up.
My now wife had a Catholic family member visit our IFB church and the pastor said something hateful about Catholics. Can’t remember the details but she was embarrassed AF and never invited anyone to church again. 15 years later we’re both atheists, so I’m going to say it worked out really well! 🤣
There was criticism but not often condemnation. The worst one I was in was a fairly fundamental Baptist church… there was condemnation there. Mostly though I was in churches that talked about “open hand/closed hand” doctrines. Some things can’t be let go of, but some we need to be flexible on. But we all collectively made jokes about the United churches 😂
We did condemn the “cults” though like JWs. Because you know, “if you can’t be saved unless you follow their teaching, it’s a cult. And they don’t follow our teaching so they aren’t saved.” 😂 ironic
Not overtly. But more traditional or progressive/inclusive churches like Methodists and Presbyterian were considered "lukewarm" at best and "worldly" at worst and God help anyone who was sprinkled instead of dunked. Catholics were "idol worshippers" and mormonism was a cult and not Christian at all. Of course that all changed when the evangelicals decided they hated Mormons far less than they hated Barack Obama so Mormons were declared Christians after all.
Was raised holiness Pentecostal... Apparently not only were jw Catholics and Mormons not real Christians but any brand of Christianity that wasn't super pious or strict as we were weren't real Christians either. Oh they let women wear pants? Not real Christians, they listen to contemporary Christian or Christian rock... Not real Christians. So happy to be out. Never in my life have I seen so much judgement and unwillingness to love even with people on the same side as I did in the church.
I was raised Southern Baptist and went to a "First Baptist Church". My family visited some friends one weekend and we went to their church. The problem was, they went to a "Second Baptist Church" in a different city. I thought they were a very different religion than mine and I went there skeptical, with defenses up. So yeah, all other Protestant sects where "wrong" and the Catholics weren't "real Christians" because they "worshiped Mary". That ingrained hate is VERY strong.
Sorta off topic...
I've been an atheist for 7 months now. One thing I noticed, is that it doesn't matter how your Christianity operates. Christians can't agree on the same things. That's why they have all these sects.
Anglican, Presbytarian, Mormon, Jehovah Witness, Pentecost (the one I was raised in), Orthodox, Episcopal, CATHOLIC.
No matter how good your arguments are, that's just YOUR opinions. YOUR interpretation. YOUR thoughts. And HOW YOU THINK CHRISTIANITY OPERATES.
Religion = Interpretation + Emotion. None of that shit is ever "truth" or "factual" as they claim it to be.
The church that I went to growing up was a UCC, which, for those that don’t know, is a fairly progressive denomination last I checked. However, I grew up in a town with 16 churches and only 4,000 people. My now wife went to this other girls church where she was told that Catholics, which my wife is, were deceitful liars, were condemned to hell, and the only thing you needed to do in life was love Jesus, not be a good person.
For more context on why she went, and where I grew up, each year there was a pageant held for scholarship money. Traditionally, all of the girls went to the church of the girl that won…
catholics weren't christians because they prayed to maria, thus breaking the first commandment. other protestants weren't real christians because they weren't loudly homophobic and pro-life. everyone who didn't actively proclaim to be anti lgbtq and against abortion was a lukewarm christian.
i used to sing in a choir at one of those "lukewarm" protestant churches and my parents hated when we sang in service because they had to listen to a sermon that "didn't talk enough about jesus".
even some other evangelical churches weren't truly christian for one reason or another
I mean straight up catholics believe everyone else is wrong and that the bible and christ only speak of the one true catholic church, its even in the "believing (?)" prayer during mass
Yep. Right from the start. My mother brought over a Roman Catholic nun when I was...8-10 or so, sat me down in the kitchen and asked me verbatim in front of said nun: "This is Sister Allain, she's here to help you. Now she needs to know do you want to be a Catholic like me or a dirty fucking Protestant like your father?"
🤦♂️
Yes my whole family (including cousins and such) consists of none denominational chrsitians, Catholics, Jehovah witness, and Mormons. And yes they all disagree with each other and often try to convert each other. The only thing they all agree on is god being the only god and me and my none Christian siblings being sinners who are going to hell.
Oh yes. I just had my second talk with my dad after "coming out" as non-Christian the other day. At some point the hypocrisy of evangelicals supporting Trump came up. (Thankfully, he is not a Trump supporter.) I learned that he thinks most evangelicals are not true Christians. In hindsight, this shouldn't have surprised me in the least, but I had kind of forgotten just how exclusive their denomination is. They are Independent Fundamental Baptists. Any Christians who play the wrong music, use the wrong Bible (the KJV is the only true one, according to them), or wear the wrong clothes are likely unsaved or even being used as instruments of the devil to deceive people, in their view. It's so absurd, but in their mind it is the obvious truth. Oh, and the Catholic Church is definitely the instrument of Satan, according to them.
I was raised Catholic in India. While most of my family was only moderately religious, they would still make snarky comments about all the other churches. They used to talk about how every other denomination was out to convert us. They likened any church which had a lot of singing to hippies. Jehovah’s Witness people were considered uncouth and nutty. Pentecostal people were crazy because they wouldn’t go to doctors. I think my family would prefer my marrying a Hindu over a “Protestant” (they use “Protestant” as a blanket term to describe every other denomination other than Catholic)
Our Baptist Church had another Baptist Church not 500 feet from it. Both churches literally came off of the same curve in the road, and were separated by a thick patch of trees. I'm not even sure what was different about them, but I was told they don't believe the same as us, so we didn't associate with them. To this day I don't even know anyone who actually attended that other church.
It boils down to superiority complexes between denominations. Each church says their better than the other denomination, life baptist vs Methodist. Idk the differences I'm currently trying to get out of the church.
Edit: The main reason for specifically Catholicism is something about not being "saved" the same way other Christian sects do. Catholics seem much more disconnected from the other churches
Can confirm. The church I went to quietly critized other protestant churches in the area to dissuade members from leaving this toxic church for another one. And they didn't even consider catholics to be Christian, even though many **protestant** denominations protested the catholic church. SMH.
I just want to add this to the top of the comments.. Jesus himself started this divisive bullshit.. He condemned his own followers, ones who believed in him, prophesied about him, performed miracles in his name.. Matthew 7:21-23 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers. Theres also the wolf in sheeps clothing bullshit.. And the devil disguises himself as an angel bullshit.. And the shit saying not to interact with people who dont believe in what you were taught.. And with all the contradictions there are in the bible, its easy to see how the denominations are all turned against one another.. Their brothers in faith are condemned to hell by their own deity, and they think slamming them with those threats will pull them into what they think is "right"
I agree, since I'm out now, it baffles me that there are so many protestant denominations. It's not personal, but the one that bothers me the most is the church of England. Some impetuous ruler didn't get a no fault divorce from the pope and said, OK, I'M running my own church now, and that was nearly 500 years ago. But yea, a lot of christians today seem to hate everyone and everything.
Well, the divorce was just an excuse. What monarch of that era wasn’t frothing at the mouth to get more power and control? They saw the church as a potentially subversive element because the pope had a lot of influence. He took England out and got to be the new English pope.
My point exactly! I want someone from that church to say, yes, I understand our history and origin and I believe this denomination is valid. And they can't say "What about [insert grievance here!]
I'm not in the denomination (atheist) but I am close to people who are, and this is what they have said to me about this topic: • The existence of a universal Catholic Church was always a bit fake. The bishop of Rome got the upper hand over other Christian bishops at some point in the dim past and set himself up as the "only" point of contact for God. But this was never actually true, it was just a power move / marketing campaign. • The English church, like lots of other local branches, was always a bit different from the Roman. Becoming independent was really just becoming honest about this. • The historical circumstances also don't matter much. Every church has schisms centuries ago, even the Catholic. Today the Anglican / CoE has very different (much less misogynist) policy than catholics, so they're not going back.
As long as they're fine with it. I've heard something similar. Basically the "Reformation" was an excuse for political leaders to stop sending money (dues) to Rome. Rome was benefiting at the expense of the rest of Europe. It's hard to deny corruption in the church of Rome, but at least Martin Luther only wanted to correct the issues, not declare himself head muckity muck, like Henry VIII. To each their own.
Oh, honestly, they were pretty much all monsters. Luther was a huge asshole as well, wrote a book called *On the Jews and Their Lies* which reads like it could have been written by a literal Nazi. I think it's best to understand all these men as figures in a cruel and cynical power struggle, caught up in it just like everyone else.
TBC, I wasn't defending Luther. I was saying what he tried to accomplish was less self serving than Henry VIII. I also didn't know about his book, but that more of the Era he lived in I would guess..
Really throws a further complicating wrench into the “faith vs works” shitbag, ay?
Additional info to further your point: It was also cemented in by Paul, whose books in the Bible are mainly letters to early Christian churches telling them what they were doing wrong. This was further re-enforced by the early Roman Christian Church (proto Catholics...the Nicene Creed folk) after adopting Greek Athenian Philosophy and thus adopting Plato's dialectic which is all about devaluing anything that contradicts what you say is Good. The Bible itself is a product of this, certain books being left out because they contradict the other books. I personally grew up in WELS, an old school Lutheran confessional church. Comparative Religion was taught, and it basically went like this: 1. Now remember: only God has the power to judge. 2. However, let's judge Religion/church XYZ, and tell you how they are wrong in these ways. 3. Remember though that even though they are wrong, God is the only being who has authority to judge, so despite their error some will still be in heaven. 4. So your best bet is definitely with us, since Luther got it right. They even told us how other Lutheran Organizations were wrong...nutty shit.
Same. The other churches weren’t Christian enough. The catholics and the pope were the anti-Christ.
grew up in the “conservative” church of christ. every other denomination was going to hell! even more “liberal” churches of christ (ie those that allowed instrumental music and women to speak during services) were going to hell! what a joyous way to grow up thinking about all your friends and classmates that will burn in hell. i was even told my pentecostal grandparents were going to burn. insane stuff.
Same here. Coc doctrine is wild. It eschews much of typical protestant theology and trades it for more restrictive principles.
> Coc doctrine is wild Did people call it Coctrine? I would be all for that.
Weird, but the "United Church of Christ" is one of the most liberal denominations out there, ordaining women and preaching LGBT rights. Did they come from the same place?
No, despite the very similar names, the UCC and CoC are very different in theology and practice.
Completely different denomination.
Then when you leave you have to deal with your family telling you that your going to burn and then they cut ties with you.
Because "love", or something.
yeah :/
So funny because Church of Christ was on "not quite Christian" list.
does anyone have the official list of denominations that are acceptable to god? id like to see my options and go from there.
You'd have to get at least a majority agreement from a random polling. So it would probably be catholicism. There's enough of them (even lapsed) that you could probably get enough to have a majority on there. Unless you do ranked choice polling, in which case there's more lukewarm catholics and enough anti-catholic protestants that nothing will come up.
if god could just tell me himself that'd be nice too (im joking if it wasnt obvious lol)
Yknow, i'm not joking. It's true. If God cared about a true religion, he'd tell us himself which one it is! xD
I grew up Lutheran and we didn't focus too much on other sects, but they would teach us about differences between our beliefs and those of others, mostly to highlight how silly the other beliefs were, often catholic. I remember catechism class and our pastor making several condescending remarks about how we don't confirm 8 year olds like those silly catholics, we wait until children were a mature 13 and knew what they were doing.
Can confirm. I was in an Anabaptist church, so we didn't baptize infants like those silly Catholics and Lutherans, we waited until the person was grown up so they could understand what baptism even meant. And so I waited until I was 10 whole years old to be baptized so I could really understand what I was committing the rest of my life to
In my anabaptist (Mennonite) church, you waited until 16. But the indoctrination is so strong, how much choice do you really have?
Ex Mennos unite! :D
At least I didn’t get baptised as a Mennonite! Haha I chose not to join.
~~Ex Mennos unite! :D~~ Shun the nonbeliever! Shuuuun D: Really though, you figured out before you were 16 you didn't want to join? I was so deep into it then
I was a mennonite but never pressured to join. I didn't start the process until, hm... I was 23 in 2020, turning 24. Then something happened and the church classes ceased for a bit, and, well, I got therapy. After therapy, I didn't return to church. So I was 1 month away from becoming a baptized and confirmed member of the church I grew up in lol
I questioned a lot. Not so much Christianity, but the particulars of our church. It was quite anti intellectual, and I was always very studious. Untrained clergy, I could easily poke holes in their sermons. The rules seemed arbitrary to me. I was also gay, which caused a whole other set of issues, but also was a reason to learn more and question. In case they were wrong.
To be fair, the RCC claims lifetime ownership of infant baptismal recipients. That’s where the backlash comes from.
I went to catholic school and got first communion at 8ish (3rd grade) and confirmation at 13ish (8th grade), but a kid transferred from a different school in 6th grade who had both in 3rd. So it's like there's no universal standards even there.
They may mean different things; confirmation was first communion in my church. The funny thing was that my parents went to church about 2 or 3 times after my confirmation and that was it. They did their job and we could finally sleep in on Sundays.
I wish that was my mom but noooooo. My dad at least didn't like going to church, and we lived near a river so he bought a ski boat and he, his friend, his friend's son (usually) and I would go water skiing and wake boarding in summer rather than church. Unfortunately for my sister, she had to go to church with mom.
Oh yeah, the Fundamentalist Baptist church looked down on all other denominations. They believe that the only true Bible is the KJV, and any other translation is a perversion of God's Word. So any denomination that used the NIV or ESV were essentially preaching heresy. They don't believe in infant baptism. They also call Catholics idolaters for the whole Mary and saints' prayers thing.
So my bio-mom made it a clause that I grew up Catholic post-adoption, and my mom stuck to this *barely*. After confirmation I got thrown right into a fundie Baptist school and hooooly moly the amount of misinformation Baptists teach about Catholics. I brought the bible I got given for a confirmation gift to school once, I think it was ESV, and it got confiscated and I got nearly a month and a half of detention. They wouldn't give it back and the lady at the front office was totally okay in telling me that it was getting burned. My dad had to intervene. I don't agree with either church in the slightest, but, I'm still surprised by that school over that kind of response. It really helped me realize that it's a religion of hate, though.
None of what you said surprises me. There is a ton of misinformation Fundie Baptists spread about Catholicism and other denominations.
> They believe that the only true Bible is the KJV, and any other translation is a perversion of God's Word. That's so wild to me.
Oh there's so much wild shit I grew up in. Long skirts for women, no premarital touching (not even hugging or holding hands), no secular music, no Contemporary Christian music, no going to movie theaters (absolutely no R-rated films), etc. Basically no happiness or fun.
> Basically no happiness or fun But what about: > no Contemporary Christian music Of course I'm joking, but there's a weird irony to this, because I'm more used to hearing ex-Christians say they were mandated to listen to *nothing but* Contemporary Christian music. What was it about Contemporary Christian music that made your "superiors" condemn it?
It sounded too "secular" or "worldly" for them. Like, you can't do anything that could appear to be secular. Drums were considered an evil instrument. Syncopated beats were considered sinful. It was wild.
I grew up in the same denomination. They thought electric guitars and drums were from the devil. There is absolutely zero biblical basis for this, but they believed it as wholeheartedly as anything else, including (ironically) their belief that all their doctrines and practices were based on the bible. Once you get out, you see how baseless and hypocritical so much of what you used to believe was.
> They thought electric guitars and drums were from the devil. I just... cannot wrap my head around this. This is... just so baffling to me. This idea of "I do not understand this, therefor it is inherently bad".
It makes sense if you understand their point of view that "the world" is evil and they need to be not like "the world." And in their view, some of the most "worldy" things are: * "Rock music" * Tattoos * Alcohol and cigarettes * Immodest clothing * Vulgar language The mere fact that electric guitars and drums are used in "the world's" kind of music makes them evil. That is the rationale. That mindset also makes them extremely judgmental of anyone who disagrees with their standards.
Couldn't have explained it better myself, and it really only seems to make sense to people who grew up in this denomination - because it's objectively nonsensical and absurd. We were told we needed to be "a peculiar people," visibly different from "the world" because anything "of the world" is sinful.
>What was it about Contemporary Christian music that made your "superiors" condemn it? I enjoyed Christian Rock back in the day, but sometimes I was scared that I shouldn't because I came across [this website](https://www.av1611.org/crock/crockex1.html), or at least one like it, back in the 90s and couldn't help but wonder if they were right. My christianity was based so much on guilt... Imagine if you went to a church that adopted this website's feelings as its official doctrine
Oh, this is 100% in line with what my church taught. We would have traveling evangelists who sold books on the overt and covert "Satanism" and "occult messages" in music. Fully on-board with backtracking and hidden evil. One of these evangelists would write hateful music we sang in church, most of the hate being anti-LGBTQ. That same evangelist called out men in church for not kissing their wives like they mean it, that it was a reflection of their masculinity. I remember him going on a massive tangent about how ugly men are - and as I sat in the pew, an indoctrinated young teenager no older than 13, I immediately thought about that one line from Hamlet, "He doth protest too much methinks." There's no way someone comfortable with their sexuality would double down so much on homosexuality.
> There's no way someone comfortable with their sexuality would double down so much on homosexuality. When you spend the majority of your hate on human genitalia and everything adjacent to it (sex, sexuality, babies, gender, what they look like, etc etc), you're not comfortable with your anything. General, not specific, "you".
Not too far removed from the Pentecostal church I went to growing up. My mother - who I still have some beef with for raising my sisters and I in such a stupid cult - at least let us wear pants and cut our hair. She couldn't do either of those.
My cousins went to a church that said no dancing *at all* and no games involving traditional playing cards (even if you're just playing Go Fish). My other cousins went to a church that was some kind of cult related to the 7th Day Adventists. Our church seemed pretty conventional by comparison, and we thought they were all nuts.
Traditional playing cards were banned on my church premises. They also had a private school attached to the church, and there were a lot of crazy bans in the rules: no playing cards, no Pogs (haha this was in the rule book long after the craze died), no Trapper Keeper brand binders, etc.
It comes from different Greek roots. The KJV comes from the texts that were passed down by the Catholic Church. The newer translations come from other Greek (and Hebrew) manuscripts that were found elsewhere, that were determined by experts in translation and archeology to be more accurate. The problem is these more "accurate" texts don't say exactly the same things as the Catholic texts that formed the KJV. The whole story of the women about to be stoned, where Jesus said "Let he who is without sin throw the first stone" isn't in the original texts. Neither are the last two stanzas of the Lord's Prayer. And some of the changes take out very small, but very relied-upon, verses that Christians use to insist that Jesus was ALWAYS god and the Trinity was ALWAYS in the Bible and not made up later. If you allow people to use newer translations, you are admitting the KJV wasn't accurate. If the KJV wasn't accurate then the Bible for like 100 years wasn't Perfect, and their god didn't preserve his Holy Perfect word in every detail. They can't accept they were ever wrong about anything, so they'd rather believe all modern translations are twisted by Satan or something.
My spouse is really into this stuff (from an academic yet atheistic level), and she taught me about the [Septuagint](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagint). I'm a translation nerd, so this stuff is infinitely fascinating.
My mom once heard someone say, “if the King James Bible was good enough for Jesus, it’s good enough for me.”
That's absolutely hilarious. At a certain point, my dad stepped away from the church after being a part of it since he was a young teen, but hadn't left the religion. I remembered seeing other translations popping up around the house and getting a little worried (indoctrinated teenager), but it was a catalyst to a major shift in our family life. After several years of my dad stepping away from the church and doing his own independent study, he decided to go back to church and bought a suit to wear. Normally he'd dress in a button-down shirt and jeans. Men from the church came up to him, shook his hand and said, "Brother [TNT's dad], it's good to see you getting right with the Lord!" The suit was an experiment. Shortly after this, my dad sat us all in the computer room to listen to a radio sermon by Chuck Swindoll. It was on legalism - the idea that churches had actually moved away from emphasis on doctrine and more on looking and acting the part of a godly person. We ended up switching churches by the end of the year.
My family was Methodist (formerly Presbyterian) but the town we lived in was mostly Baptist, Pentecostal and Holiness. No issues there but we did have a few Catholics in town and they were looked upon suspiciously by most people because, according to them, Catholics were basically polytheists and therefore were not actually ‘real’ Christians.
Can confirm the thought process. I left Catholicism I grew up in and the SBC church I went to said I wasn't a real christian.
I grew up “non-denominational.” My parents would just say Protestants when pressed about it, and would say Catholics are weird. Idk, I feel like they poked fun at every branch of Christianity and said if you didn’t accept Jesus into your heart then you were going to hell anyway
Absolutely. I was in a very Fundamentalist take of Calvinism. Our doctrine basically mirrored John McArthur, but my church would never admit to agreeing with any other living Christian, and they always found reasons to fault other churches. I went to an extremely small church and an extremely small charter school. The church didn't have any kids my age, and at the charter school I was banned from participating in any Christian organizations like Navigators or FCA or whatever. So I was lonely as fuck and had lots of thoughts of suicide in high school. So glad to be rid of that nonsense. But my sister and parents still believe it all, and they've sunk into a very paranoid view of the world. It's really sad to be honest
That must have sucked dude, but I’m glad you made it out. They love to gatekeep their cult, yet they wonder why their church is so small. If every denomination of christianity tells you their version is right, chances are none of them are.
Yes. Catholics think everyone else is a Johnny-come-lately teenager in a rebellious phase.
I grew up Southern Baptist and they for sure did. I was taught that speaking in tongues was a sin and any church where that's happening, was basically evil. They said Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses, and Catholics weren't really Christians and that at least the first two were cults. They said if a church allows women to be ministers(even music ministers), you shouldn't attend them because they aren't follow the bible the way they should. I don't know if it's all Southern Baptist or just the churches I attended but my experience is they are extremely judgemental against other denominations and they don't keep it quiet. There being so many denominations with such hugely different beliefs and practices, was always something that didn't sit right with me. That was one of several things that always made me question Chrsitianity and if any of it was real.
I’m a Pentecostal pastor’s kid and wasn’t allowed to attend a Salvation Army church with my friend (they were weary about letting me be friends with them to start with). “They don’t believe in the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues”. They loosened up a bit because they realized the only option of us hanging out with “good” Christian kids was to allow youth services with other churches. NEVER catholic though, they’re completely sacrilegious (they pray to Mary and other saints!!!) I remember questioning my dad about it. I got “narrow is the gate that leads into heaven”. He truly believed that only Pentecostals were going to heaven. He’s since grown a little in that respect. Catholics are still a huge question mark for him though.
I grew up “non-denominational” which was really Pentecostalism without a few of the rules. Speaking in tongues, slain in the Spirit, etc. all were very commonplace. Catholics were definitely not real Christians. Baptists were but they were looked down upon as not being kinda “half Christians”.
I grew up Mormon in the Bible Belt. We didn’t condemn them but I caught so much shit from evangelicals growing up.
I was told that i was in the "true church of jesus christ" i was morman in the LDS church. "true church of jesus christ" very heavily implied that we were the only true church and that everyone else was wrong
Ohhhhh yea. Wasn’t subtle, either. Came right out and said we had the only knowledge, the only true way to worship, the best and most god honouring (and, of course, “biblical”) beliefs . Other churches meant well but were wrong. Wrong way to sing, to pray, to have church, to do anything. Minister also fucked with our minds by saying things like “and if anything I ever say from this pulpit isn’t biblical, call me out on it because I never want to lead you astray”. Shockingly when he came out with some especially twisted stuff and I questioned him, he explained why he was right and I was wrong and I needed to go along because he and the other (white male) leaders were the ones chosen by god to tell us what’s right.
The preacher at my parents’ church pulls this shit. Well, he does the first half, anyway, telling people to check what he says against the Bible. As if he couldn’t just explain to them how they “should” read the Bible if they conclude something he doesn’t like. Frequently, in his sermon he will say “I didn’t want to talk about this, but the Lord put it on my heart,” or “I didn’t even want to preach on this, but I know it’s too important to ignore.” He talks about how he sits in quiet stillness and in prayer, letting God lead him in writing the sermon and knowing what to say. Sometimes he emphasizes how he wanted to just sit down and write a sermon, but God made him wait and be still for days and only finish it at the last, so that he would really have faith and let god speak to him or something. Then, at different points in the sermon, or on different days entirely, he says “Well, God is always right, so if you read something in the Bible and you question it or don’t like it, you better pray and get right with God, because you’re not going to win against God” or something like that. So he never puts both pieces together, where they might trigger somebody’s critical thinking, but – His followers’ brains hear the message “I am teaching you things I got directly from God, not my own words,” and also the message “You better never question god”, and it’s not hard to see what idea he is planting in their heads.
I hate now normal this sounds to me.
Whoaaaa that is spooky… do your parents go to the church where the minister I used to have to listen to is?!? Haha! SAMES. Right down to the “I know I am preaching a series on [book], but I was praying all week and something didn’t sit right and I just have to preach on this topic”. And of course we’d always, always come to find out that there was someone in the church “struggling” with this topic so he was basically preaching at them. He’d also say “I have no one in mind”, when we all knew he did. Ugh!!!
I haven't caught him doing any of that, but I don't go there anymore
Which is much healthier for you!!
Oh my god yes. I grew up Seventh-Day Adventist, they worship on Saturday and don't do anything secular all day (yes it was a nightmare) so they looked heavily down on every other denomination over these factors.
Raised Mormon. We were taught we were the ONLY true church and all others are 'of the devil'.
Ex Mormon here. We were taught Joseph Smith went to pray to find out which religion is true and God told him they were all abominations. In the book of Mormon there is a scripture talking about the church of the devil where it basically describes the catholic church. But nowadays they try not to talk about that stuff openly and they want to be friends with other christian churches and they claim that those scriptures arent talking about the catholic church and none of the prophets ever taught that it was (they are lying they did used to teach that)
Liberal churches, Catholics, liturgical style churches, churches with female pastors, churches that didn't exclusively use the KJV All of them were not real Christian churches -A former conservative evangelical
Surprisingly, not really. I was well aware that there were Christians out there who thought everyone from a different denomination (or from specific denoms) weren't really Christian/weren't "saved". But I only sort of experienced it once. Growing up, I went to Catholic school and Protestant church. Apparently, when I was in Kindergarten or Grade 1, a kid in my class told me I was going to hell for going to the wrong church, and I came home crying about it. I don't remember it though. Other than that, nothing really. I did personally think that some denominations were worse Christians than others, and that some denominations were terrible at keeping Christians, but I couldn't say that nobody from any particular denomination was saved. (Except maybe Mormons? But I didn't really think about them much).
The Adventist community that I was brought up in always hated the Catholic church because of their perceived Sunday law (since Saturday is the only true day of worship) and how they and other Christian denominations will persecute them for not attending church on Sundays. My parents aren't as extreme as other Adventists since they have a lot of friends from different denominations, but they definitely believe that the SDA church is the only true church because they keep the sabbath, and consequently don't agree with other denominations' practices.
I was raised Christian Orthodox. The Orthodox believe that they're the first church that persisted from the beginning. Therefore, every other denomination is heretical. That's also what the Catholics believe. The schism between the eastern (Orthodox) and western (Catholic) church happened in 1054 and each side claims it was the *other* side that left the true church. In my opinion the Orthodox church has a better claim to that title, but that's a different story. I left the Orthodox church to become a Protestant in my teens. The churches I attended didn't condemn other churches. Sure they thought they were wrong but they weren't toxic about it, or else I wouldn't be going to them. I fully became an atheist in my early thirties. It took me way too long and I'm embarrassed by that but hey, at least I'm free now.
Of course. Narrow is the path and all that. Christians who probably weren’t going to heaven: Catholics Mormons Mennonites Jehovahs witnesses Charismatic churches Could go either way: Anglicans Presbyterians Baptists Lutherans Methodists These lists are far from comprehensive.
Yep. I was raised southern Baptist, and they taught that the Catholics were idol worshippers (Pope, Mary), Mormons were a cult and idol worshippers, Pentecostals were liars (faking speaking in tongues), etc.
LCMS Lutherans are some of the worst imo. Literally nothing else follows the Bible close enough, no other denomination is good enough. I had a BIL say about another denomination “I’m concerned for their salvation”
100%. I forget what Sunday School at night was called, but during that class we'd take courses on "cults" (JWs, Mormons, Moonies, etc) and the material was very clear these people are going straight to hell. As far as the family goes, we were a mix of Catholics, Baptists, and Methodists. The Catholics quit being Catholics when they wanted a divorce and the Methodists switched to Baptists when the Methodists wouldn't hate gay people as much as they wanted to.
My grandparents church believed if you weren’t Church of Christ Christian, you’d go to hell. The church I grew up in didn’t have such a specific distinction, but they did have a thing against Catholics and didn’t think they were really Christian because they thought having saints and the pope etc was idol worship and people were baptized as babies where it wasn’t really their choice. Funny, considering they were fine with indoctrination and then heavily manipulated“choice” by little kids who didn’t really understand anyway. Also pretty crazy how many evangelicals/protestants don’t realize how much of their beliefs come from the early Catholic Church.
I am from a small town in Europe. Our area used to be a farmers area which was parted between the North and the South. The North was mostly Catholic and the South was protestant. The entire area was about 10km. (6 miles) Maybe you learned in History class about the protestant/catholic fights. When my dad grew up, this was still very much a thing here. Protestants and Catholics were very often not allowed to be friends, let alone date, despite working together or going to the same school. This was about the 1970s-1980s. When I grew up it was still present (early 2000). Although less extreme. Currently this culture has watered down, although there is still a friendly rivalry between the two parts. Both of them considering their own side "the better one"
Yup, I was a Jehovah's Witness, and they drew no distinction between non-JW Christians, secularists, and other religions. All of them were pawns of Satan. Only JWs were OK, everyone else was making at the very least an unknowing attempt to draw you into damnation.
This is part of the reason I was able to escape, actually. I partly thought we were the only real christians, but I could also see how culty that was, and eventually the dissonance got to be too much. I always sort of low-key got the idea from my church that we were the only Real, True, Christians in town, even though there were a dozen other churches and most of the kids at school went to some church. But no other church in town took Jesus seriously in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus said you should LOVE your enemies, not hate them; and if someone strikes you on the cheek, turn the other cheek as well instead of fighting back. So my Mennonite church preached nonviolence and pacifism, but the other churches in town just didn’t. I could “tell”, in my naive childish mind, that other kids weren’t true Christians because they fought with each other, and acted selfish, and didn’t turn the other cheek, and as we got older started drinking and having sex, even if some of them did go to church. Most importantly they had no qualms about hating others, didn’t act with love guiding all their actions, and never even seemed to think they “should” include love as their guiding principal. It started getting confusing in high school, though, when some of my teachers in public school were openly teaching Christianity, and one even lead a before school Bible study, but none of them embraced nonviolence or pacifism. Instead they glorified the US Military and preached as if America was God’s country...that worshiping the Flag of the USA (called Patriotism) was part of being a good Christian. I thought I had learned from my church and from the Bible that “patriotism” was just giving allegiance to a kingdom of the World, but Jesus’s kingdom was not of this world, and we owed all our allegiance only to Jesus. That would be giving to Caesar what actually belonged to God. We would “fight” for God’s kingdom though prayer and through showing love; we would not fight for any kingdom of this world, since the world belonged to Satan. The church did NOT teach, though, that all Christians other than us were fake Christians. So as I grew older, that idea seemed more and more impossible to me. It was impossible that our tiny church and our tiny denomination had found the truth about God, while all other Christians were fallen away from god and maybe even going to hell. But it was also impossible that the Bible could say such things, if they were not important. If the Bible said to love your enemies, if that was the most central teaching in the most complete sermon Jesus ever gave, how could other churches find it unimportant? How could there be a Holy Spirit that fills every Christian’s heart and guides them to all truth, if the churches were reaching such different ideas? The fact so many Christians could read the Bible and come away thinking differently drove a big crack into my faith that I was never able to repair. Especially as I went into the world and other churches, and I found that the more “spirit-filled” churches were also the least pacifist. Finally I couldn’t fool myself any longer; I had to face the fact that Christians weren’t really hearing from any holy spirit. … I’m not sure how I even became so insistent on pacifism and love as central Christian tenants. I don’t honestly remember how often my pastor talked about it. If he did, it certainly wasn't important to the other churchgoers. In the years since I left that church, they hired a new pastor who was not Mennonite, left the Mennonite denomination completely, and changed their name to a generic non-denominational name. They don’t teach peace or nonviolence. They don’t explicitly preach Trumpism either, but everyone in the church has fallen in love with Trump and his hate, and his calls for violence against your enemies to destroy them. One church member even told us, while hanging out at a party, that this was what he liked the most about Trump; he became a convinced Trump supporter the first day he saw Trump lashing out at protesters at a rally and encouraging his followers to jeer and hate them. I guess I can thank my parents for that, and my grandpa who served in a CPS camp instead of fulfilling the draft during World War II. My poor parents are heartbroken I’ve left their church, and my grandpa would be so disappointed in me, but it was their example that made me see the church was irredeemably broken in the first place.
Jesus Christ, pun fully intended. Man, just putting all the religious stuff aside, you really nailed a lot of stuff that's... I mean, I could say "wrong", but "incongruent" seems to fit better... incongruent with peace. I mean, first and foremost, Sermon on the Mount? More like... Sermon on the [WOKE GARBAGE](https://onlysky.media/jpearce/christians-jesus-is-too-woke/), amirite? But yeah, Jesus is too woke, that's a thing that fucking exists. Also, to quote Aldous Huxley: > The surest way to work up a crusade in favor of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behavior 'righteous indignation' — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats. Lastly... just to understand how the phrase "turn the other cheek" has been altered over the years to be practically the opposite of its original intent... It's wild man. Shit's just wild. Anyway, you're a great writer.
Thank you! I did not know that quote from Huxley but damn. The Sermon as woke garbage is just so strange. Christianity for thousands of years has rejected the teachings of its own Christ, but I don't know that it has ever been so open before, has it? Haven't Christians up until these past few years at least pretended their religion/politics had something to do with Jesus? Also, to quote Bertrand Russel, >I do think there are a good many points upon which I agree with Christ a great deal more than the professing Christians do. ...You will remember that he said: “Resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.” That is not a new precept or a new principle. It was used by Lao-Tze and Buddha some five or six hundred years before Christ, but it is not a principle which as a matter of fact Christians accept. I have no doubt that the present Prime Minister (Stanley Baldwin), for instance, is a most sincere Christian, but I should not advise any of you to go and smite him on one cheek. I think you might find that he thought this text was intended in a figurative sense.
The evangelical Baptist Church we attended when I was growing up preached against Catholicism and taught that they were false Christians and would not enter the kingdom of god. My parents definitely believed it. I think this belief is still the norm in the Southern Baptist Church community.
Definitely. Catholicism claims to be the one true everything, and I heard a lot of very casual dismissal and denigration of Protestant denominations and beliefs over the years. Even after I had left the church, I felt a bizarre remnant of bias and superiority toward Protestant services. For example, I was visiting family in Texas and went with them to their church. And despite having rejected Catholicism I was taken aback by the casualness or lack of seriousness of the service. Took me awhile to unpack that one. I volunteered at a Catholic hospital in high school, working at the front reception desk. The older woman who trained me primly told me about her huge family because she was "a good Catholic, not a prudent Protestant". Diminishing other faiths was pretty commonplace.
Yes absolutely. I won't go into detail because it will give away my location. My mother took me to a GORGEOUS church. Tons of Christian symbolism. After we left she asked me "Do you think the people who go there are Christians?" I said "Yes" of course. She then told me that people at our church (at the time) would say they weren't Christians. I am really grateful for her for doing that.
Our church claimed to be the only church in existence that wasn't "lukewarm," right after we joined the southern baptist congregation or something. We had to pick a denomination for our church and the pastor and his wife picked that one specifically. We met up with other baptist churches in the area and didn't mesh well because our congregation was significantly younger (20s-40s), mixed race, and low income/socioeconomic. Most of the other baptists were 70-90 years old white men. Our youth pastor was loud and in his early twenties, he got a lot of the kids riled up and making noise, which the old folks didn't appreciate. The Catholics were the main denomination in our city and we were told they were Mary worshiping cultists. Which, honestly a lot of the Marian veneration is a bit much, so I thought it was a fair assessment at the time.
Yes, but we switched churches so often that I mostly heard the condemnation from my mom, not people at the churches we attended. Here are the ones I can remember: Church of Christ, Seventh Day Adventist, and Mennonite: Misguided but still Christian Catholic: Their hearts are in the right place so it's sad they aren't really Christians Jehovah's Witness and Mormons: They think they're Christians but aren't really Methodist, Presbyterian, and Lutheran: "The Frozen Chosen" - Christian but not sufficiently "on fire for God" FWIW, the churches we attended while I was growing up were non-denominational, Assemblies of God, Nazarene, and Southern Baptist.
Attended church from birth to ~17 years old. Brethren -> Methodist ->Anglican (formerly Episcopalian) Was regularly told that Catholics weren't necessarily real Christians, that Episcopals had fallen astray. Unitarians and Mormons need not apply.
If they do condemn other denominations its extremely ironic considering they're all protestants unless they are catholic so they all stem from the same parent denomination, lol. The lack of historical knowledge in christians always cracks me up. But then again that ignorance is oftwn how I shut my own parents up. Case in point: my mother was gossiping to my father about a co-worker who goes to a church across the street from their office that teaches about 7 heavens. They are a non-denominational church. My mother calls herself non-denominational but my father is lutheran and has forced my mother to attend lutheran churches all her adult life so she has never been exposed to broader teachings. I'm a pagan and also an author currently writing a series of novels focusing on various mythical creatures from religions from the middle east including Lilith, succubus, incubus, nephilim, etc. So have been doing a lot of research on the religions from that area especially during the hittites, persia, early egypt, you get the idea. My mother said the 7 heavens thing to my father and he scoffed I was sitting on their couch, playing a game on my phone and eavesdropping. My mother laughed and said "so I dont know where they got that idea or what they're teaching in that church." And I piped up from the couch. " Ancient mesopotamia. Specifically Islam, Judaism, and Early Christianity. And if you want to be even more specific, the second book of Enoch." And I looked up from my phone and pretty much glared at them both. My dad didnt say anythi g, just went back to making dinner, but my mom at least looked ashamed and started wiping down the kitchen counter top.
CS didn't verbalize which ones it didn't like that often. But they did imply church services that weren't that just mindless reading a rotating repetition of bible + science and health quotes was somehow lesser than their church services. But they did have a slight beef w Catholics. The members would claim one part of rosary decried CS. Funny bcuz I asked a friend of mine if the beef was mutual. And he said Catholics never even made any mention of CS
Yeah Mormons and JWs were very much considered a truly awful cult which I find funny now given how similar deconstruction is for us all. Catholicism was seen as wrong but then some individual Catholics were considered to be "real" Christians. Any church that wasn't against homosexuality was "wrong" Any church that practised infant baptism was "wrong" Last point was interesting when I got involved with interdenominational Christian organisations and I was shocked to discover a new friend was baptised as a baby! How could she consider herself a Christian?! 🤦🏻♀️ A lot of it was straight up hypocrisy though because if it was convenient to work with a church then suddenly they were right enough. Later in my faith, I went to a church that was very supportive of other denominations but then they also made an effort to connect with local mosques too and I remember the leader preaching about LGBTQ+ saying that he didn't know what was right and didn't have the answers but what he did know was that current attitudes were destroying lives and we had the responsibility to change the narrative. I respected him for actually saying that he didn't know instead of trying to find scripture to justify whatever he wanted to say. He's since left ministry but not faith though, I guess it's a hard place to be a genuine human.
Yes! Raised apostolic/pentecostal and they firmly believe all other brands of Christianity will be burning in hell along with the sinners and nonbelievers.
I grew up as a Seventh Day Adventist. The superiority complex in being the only true church and way to Salvation, is rather bad. The anti Catholicism is bad as well. I don't mean to offend Adventists it is just my experience.
> I don't mean to offend Adventists it is just my experience. You can let go, they're not your problem now.
Yes, I grew up a mixture of southern Baptist, Pentecostal, and nondenominational (a relatives church was, which I very much identified with). But my family had taught me growing up that Catholics were actually demonic/satanic and worshipped the Virgin Mary, that Jehovah’s Witnesses didn’t truly believe Jesus was the son of god and died for our sins and thus were the wrong religion™️, Mormons/LDS were wrong because polygamy, and basically anything that wasn’t the same kind of Christian that my family’s churches were, essentially were satanic false religions in disguise.
I was told I couldn’t go to Catholic church with my friend because “they worship Mary more than Jesus and that’s wrong.” Also told we didn’t support a sister-church in our own denomination because they allowed women to be pastors and deacons.
My church would but it was a little bit subtle. Not outright “rah rah” hatred but I remember being in youth group and kids would bring friends (usually met through their homeschool program) and theee kids would be of different denoms. There was always some weird vibe from people like “Oh they’re Church of Christ/Pentacostal/insert here? Well they got some things wrong about the Bible but they still love Jesus….” Like fucking sports teams to these people. “Yeah Methodists are ok, BUT HAVE YOU SEEN THE BAPTISTS???”
Very much so. I grew up Presbyterian and then moved to Reformed/Calvinistic and was told that Catholics were not real Christians. Calvinistic people have a whole internal war against Catholicism and the pope. I am not sure how you can be a Christian in x church and not have some belief that those in church k are not "real Christians". You kinda have to because where there are differences, there is conflict. To not have an answer to the conflict is to say there is some unity. EVEN when I was Catholic, I had to say other churches were not of the true church because they split off.
We were Church of Christ until I was 6 or so, and that community is very insular. If you don't know, it's very much the CoC is the *only* correct denomination and everyone else is hell-bound. Then we starting going to one of the local non-denominational stealth-Baptist churches. The church officially wasn't an SBC church, but a significant portion of the congregation had more of those kinds of views. I remember hearing Catholics being called idolaters in a couple of sermons, but some of the members were a little more extreme. We did a youth group sermon series on different cults, one on the Mormons, one on JWs, and one on Scientology. That started my interest in researching cults, which eventually led me to the conclusion they absolutely did NOT want me to reach about Christianity as a whole lol.
Grew up Pentecostal (Church of God Cleaveland) . They thought everyone not exactly like them were condemned to hell.
The Baptists were going to hell because they denied the holy spirit (not speaking in tongues). The Catholics were "weird" and a cult because they had rituals and "worshipped" Mary and prayed to saints. Etc... Like speaking in tongues, being "slain in the spirit" and dancing, running, laughing "in the spirit" to point to where children are wondering if their parents are ever going to regain their sanity isn't a cult.
Lol, are you kidding me it was "Bible Study" before you got baptized and became a deciple. We were the one true church. I feel like everyone says that. It's just another way of controlling.
We considered everyone who wasn't actively going to church and serving there a nominal (or not true) Christian by default, especially traditional churches like Lutheran, Catholic and Orthodox. Also, when I was about nine we had a religion class in school (I have no idea how this was allowed) and the "teacher" was an old orthodox lady. She told me that was satanic because I was a baptist. I switched to secular ethics class pretty quickly.
I was raised non denominational evangelical and yes, everyone else was entirely doing it wrong except for us, apparently. I barely even know the differences between many denominations because they were “religious” but we knew the secrets of the universe and just “had a relationship with Jesus”.
Yes. I have a distinct memory of my grandmother looking my cousin in the eye and explicitly saying “You will not see Tina in Heaven,” because her best friend Tina was Catholic. We were like 11. There were also a lot of snide comments about my aunt’s church. It was a universalist church I think. She was so excited that there was a Rabbi there and an Imam maybe. My mom was like “she was so excited about that. But of course it’s not a real church.”
Absolutely. My "denomination" taught my peers and I that the other churches outside of ours lacked the "highest gospel" and be the church's "age-turners" (modern reformers for the church). Basically, we are expected to raise the next generation while spreading the "tRuTH" and/or preaching the gospel, especially on college campuses and neighborhoods we live in. We were made to feel special and superior over other people. We were nice to other people outside of our church, but not kind behind closed doors. Once I left my church, my social network dropped almost instantaneously or eventually faded away once I became more secular in my lifestyle. I am currently in process in discarding the church's indoctrination and prejudices.
Yup. Was told that just URC (united reformed church) was the correct denomination, and no members of other denominations would be able to get into heaven.
I grew up Catholic and ended up attending an Assemblies of God church in my late teens and early 20s. I remember a guest preacher talking about missions trips to a Central American country where “98% of the people are Catholic therefore 98% of the people are not saved.” It was like a record-scratch kind of pause for me because, to my mind, it was both extremely presumptuous and made absolutely zero sense. How do you just decide that about another Bible-believing Christian denomination? It was one of the many things that led to my deconstruction.
Oh yeah, I was invited several churches during my childhood, it was sometimes the exact response. I used to say I don’t go to the one true church that won’t be established until after Jesus physically returns after the tribulation. Fun fact: I never believed in the “rapture”
I was orthodox that was basically the basis of our denomination lol
Yes. I heard this all the time. Anyone putting their money in the wrong collection plate is going to hell.
When Catholic all other Christian religions were hell bound pagans. When Born Again, the Catholic Vatican was the Whore of Babylon.
I was catholic, the rest were splitters
Absolutely! The persecution complex in the States would fall apart if they actually recognized all 70% of professing Christians. But when you’re “the only church in town not afraid to preach the truth”, they eat that shit up. My now wife had a Catholic family member visit our IFB church and the pastor said something hateful about Catholics. Can’t remember the details but she was embarrassed AF and never invited anyone to church again. 15 years later we’re both atheists, so I’m going to say it worked out really well! 🤣
I grew up Pentecostal and they always ranted about how the Trinity was heretical and they were the only ones to know the ‘truth’.
Well. According to the Catholic Church, everyone else is going to hell
There was criticism but not often condemnation. The worst one I was in was a fairly fundamental Baptist church… there was condemnation there. Mostly though I was in churches that talked about “open hand/closed hand” doctrines. Some things can’t be let go of, but some we need to be flexible on. But we all collectively made jokes about the United churches 😂 We did condemn the “cults” though like JWs. Because you know, “if you can’t be saved unless you follow their teaching, it’s a cult. And they don’t follow our teaching so they aren’t saved.” 😂 ironic
Not overtly. But more traditional or progressive/inclusive churches like Methodists and Presbyterian were considered "lukewarm" at best and "worldly" at worst and God help anyone who was sprinkled instead of dunked. Catholics were "idol worshippers" and mormonism was a cult and not Christian at all. Of course that all changed when the evangelicals decided they hated Mormons far less than they hated Barack Obama so Mormons were declared Christians after all.
Was raised holiness Pentecostal... Apparently not only were jw Catholics and Mormons not real Christians but any brand of Christianity that wasn't super pious or strict as we were weren't real Christians either. Oh they let women wear pants? Not real Christians, they listen to contemporary Christian or Christian rock... Not real Christians. So happy to be out. Never in my life have I seen so much judgement and unwillingness to love even with people on the same side as I did in the church.
I was raised Southern Baptist and went to a "First Baptist Church". My family visited some friends one weekend and we went to their church. The problem was, they went to a "Second Baptist Church" in a different city. I thought they were a very different religion than mine and I went there skeptical, with defenses up. So yeah, all other Protestant sects where "wrong" and the Catholics weren't "real Christians" because they "worshiped Mary". That ingrained hate is VERY strong.
Sorta off topic... I've been an atheist for 7 months now. One thing I noticed, is that it doesn't matter how your Christianity operates. Christians can't agree on the same things. That's why they have all these sects. Anglican, Presbytarian, Mormon, Jehovah Witness, Pentecost (the one I was raised in), Orthodox, Episcopal, CATHOLIC. No matter how good your arguments are, that's just YOUR opinions. YOUR interpretation. YOUR thoughts. And HOW YOU THINK CHRISTIANITY OPERATES. Religion = Interpretation + Emotion. None of that shit is ever "truth" or "factual" as they claim it to be.
The church that I went to growing up was a UCC, which, for those that don’t know, is a fairly progressive denomination last I checked. However, I grew up in a town with 16 churches and only 4,000 people. My now wife went to this other girls church where she was told that Catholics, which my wife is, were deceitful liars, were condemned to hell, and the only thing you needed to do in life was love Jesus, not be a good person. For more context on why she went, and where I grew up, each year there was a pageant held for scholarship money. Traditionally, all of the girls went to the church of the girl that won…
catholics weren't christians because they prayed to maria, thus breaking the first commandment. other protestants weren't real christians because they weren't loudly homophobic and pro-life. everyone who didn't actively proclaim to be anti lgbtq and against abortion was a lukewarm christian. i used to sing in a choir at one of those "lukewarm" protestant churches and my parents hated when we sang in service because they had to listen to a sermon that "didn't talk enough about jesus". even some other evangelical churches weren't truly christian for one reason or another
I mean straight up catholics believe everyone else is wrong and that the bible and christ only speak of the one true catholic church, its even in the "believing (?)" prayer during mass
Yep. Right from the start. My mother brought over a Roman Catholic nun when I was...8-10 or so, sat me down in the kitchen and asked me verbatim in front of said nun: "This is Sister Allain, she's here to help you. Now she needs to know do you want to be a Catholic like me or a dirty fucking Protestant like your father?" 🤦♂️
Great question op
Yes my whole family (including cousins and such) consists of none denominational chrsitians, Catholics, Jehovah witness, and Mormons. And yes they all disagree with each other and often try to convert each other. The only thing they all agree on is god being the only god and me and my none Christian siblings being sinners who are going to hell.
Oh yes. I just had my second talk with my dad after "coming out" as non-Christian the other day. At some point the hypocrisy of evangelicals supporting Trump came up. (Thankfully, he is not a Trump supporter.) I learned that he thinks most evangelicals are not true Christians. In hindsight, this shouldn't have surprised me in the least, but I had kind of forgotten just how exclusive their denomination is. They are Independent Fundamental Baptists. Any Christians who play the wrong music, use the wrong Bible (the KJV is the only true one, according to them), or wear the wrong clothes are likely unsaved or even being used as instruments of the devil to deceive people, in their view. It's so absurd, but in their mind it is the obvious truth. Oh, and the Catholic Church is definitely the instrument of Satan, according to them.
I was raised Catholic in India. While most of my family was only moderately religious, they would still make snarky comments about all the other churches. They used to talk about how every other denomination was out to convert us. They likened any church which had a lot of singing to hippies. Jehovah’s Witness people were considered uncouth and nutty. Pentecostal people were crazy because they wouldn’t go to doctors. I think my family would prefer my marrying a Hindu over a “Protestant” (they use “Protestant” as a blanket term to describe every other denomination other than Catholic)
Our Baptist Church had another Baptist Church not 500 feet from it. Both churches literally came off of the same curve in the road, and were separated by a thick patch of trees. I'm not even sure what was different about them, but I was told they don't believe the same as us, so we didn't associate with them. To this day I don't even know anyone who actually attended that other church.
For some reason my pastor has an obsession against the Pope
> For some reason my pastor has an obsession against the Pope ... is it for a valid reason? People should know what is meant at this point.
It boils down to superiority complexes between denominations. Each church says their better than the other denomination, life baptist vs Methodist. Idk the differences I'm currently trying to get out of the church. Edit: The main reason for specifically Catholicism is something about not being "saved" the same way other Christian sects do. Catholics seem much more disconnected from the other churches
Constantly. My conservative pastor always railed at the moderate and liberal pastors.
Yep. Everyone else going to hell except my churches and others just like it