Don't think for yourself any more. Thinking for yourself leads you astray.

Second rule of Christianity: Don't question. Just do what the male leaders of the church tell you to do and don't ever question them. Even if they are molesting your kids or your friends' kids, don't question them. They have their godly reasons. It is sinful to question them in any way, no matter what they are doing, especially if it doesn't make any sense.

If you can't live by at least those two rules, Christianity is going to be very hard to understand. Those are really the first two unwritten commandments. I cannot live by those two first commandments. That is why Christianity kills me. I can't get with it. I don't even want to understand it any more.

Then again, I went to a Baptist school growing up. At that school, Catholics were considered heathens; dirty, woman worshiping, idol clutching, misguided heathens. Still, I have to give the Catholics credit. That one Catholic gay organization was the only one in NC at the time when I came out that wasn't about preaching hate the sin, love the sinner. I still resented the religious stuff, but at least it was less harsh and hateful than the Baptists who had control over me in my formative years at that hideous school my mother insisted I attend. The Catholics, in my mind, were much nicer than the Baptists, in my case.

Later, I met a Methodist who said there are too many Baptists walking around who weren't held under the water long enough. Yes, there are even Christian "in jokes." I think they were joking. They were joking, I'm sure of it, or no...

See what happens when you try to understand Christianity? It just ruins your day. Accept it or not and move on, or buy stock in headache medicine. Yer gonna need it.

Thanks!

I was raised a humanist, by humanists, attended a Unitarian Universalist Church as an adult with my daughter who is now a humanist (as you probably know UU encompasses many who have migrated from other faiths under their umbrella, e.g., UU Jews, UU Buddhists, UU Humanists). I *think* I am now an agnostic pagan, but ask me again tomorrow.

So you are definitely talking to one who did NOT drink the koolaid - and none of the Christianity stuff makes any sense to me!

However...I can still see beauty in someone like Pope Francis and am very moved by the reactions of the faithful to him, and his interpretation of his fath. From his order (Franciscan) to many of his positions, to me he embodies much of what is positive in religion.

Still some things I cannot reconcile, however.

and all about the positive. Same with the Presbys and MC churchgoers too. It's the others I have dealt with that I'm still trying to recover from. I have always seen Catholics as a sort of in between. I mean, the Baptists don't consider them "real" Christians. The Methodists barely do. But, they were the one group that helped gay people in NC back in the 80s that wasn't all about hating gay people. They were one of only 2 at that time and the other was the Boys Club thing, very religious in that hate the sin, love the sinner kind of not helping way in NC. They were a no go from the get go for me. So, the Catholic group was the one that I talked to. That is pretty amazing that the Catholic group didn't hate gay people. They even had a nifty explanation of why I was having trouble with the religion stuff; they said a dog bitten by a snake is not going to be comfortable in a room full of snakes, or even ropes or anything else that resembles a snake, for that matter, for a long long time. That DID seem to fit my situation.

I still like that Methodist joke. I hear it often from my Methodist family. What's weird is that my mother is not religious at all, but the rest of my family are Methodists. My mother just wanted me to have an education starting as young as possible and to have one that allowed me to go at my own pace. The thing she did not realize was that the school she sent me to had some serious problems with a child molesting preacher who ran the good guy who used to be the principal out and took over the school. It wasn't until I outright rebelled and refused to do any more work after the special PTA meeting that my mother finally took me out of that shitty school.

The special PTA meeting was about the "problem" of a black kid wanting to attend the next year. They were actually trying to figure out ways to keep the kid out and some were even using the slavery parts of the Bible to defend their indefensible position. This was in 1980, not 1950 or 1960, but 1980. My mother didn't like that too much either, but left me in there for another year and a half while she tried to look for another school to send me to. Meanwhile, I was pointing out the public schools available to everyone if only she would let me go to public school. Well, I had to act really bad to get to go to public school. There was no way I was ever going to get along at that Baptist school. That is why I still wonder if that Methodist joke is really a joke.

"When ideas fail, words come in very handy."

Overpopulation is a huge part of the ongoing destruction of the earth.

People are not going to stop having sex.

Therefore one tenet must yield.

Matter-antimatter.

While it is my understanding that this Pope is open to groundbreaking ideas like contraception (sarcasm thingy), it would not appear the Church itself has moved from its middle ages position.

talk of population control. The idea is that you get it to be a Church issue. That's the whole point of having Francis as Pope, he is getting half of DU to swoon for his anti gay and anti choice policy, they are willing to trade those rights of others away to serve their own agenda, just to have a priest who takes no actual action speak some words they like they will sell us out to the right.

He's anti choice, he's anti gay. He sees no need to reconcile any of that with anything.