My experience this week with fundamentalists.

This week I was contracted to work for a fundamentalists convention. It was pretty small...just several leaders in the organization from around the globe. I do not want to mention the name of their organization as I think it would be rather unprofessional.

I work in production...and I had been hired to do...well...various production things for their convention. I'm an independent contractor and work is work. I never pass judgment on my clients...again because I believe it to be unprofessional.

I did, however, enter this gig with an enormous amount of trepidation. They are pretty far right. I know that many of their beliefs do not jibe with mine.

So, on with the story.

We loaded in their convention on Sunday. A few lights, a small PA system, projectors, cameras. Only me and another fellow were outside contractors. Everybody else we worked beside was either employees of their ministry or volunteers.

But I'm a friendly guy, so I immediately began conversing with these people as we worked, always careful not to offend, alienate...or let my politics be known.

I struck it up with one guy whose a home builder from Texas. We worked in the truck together fire-lining boxes and boxes of t-shirts, pamphlets and books. He always had a smile on his face. I told him that my new bride and I (we've been married one month) we're in the midst of rehabbing our first home, and that we were in the middle of refinancing to get the rest of our money to finish the house.

On the second day, he sensed that I was stressed.

"You look troubled."

I explained I was nervous about the appraiser coming the next day because he was with FHA and I wasn't sure we'd pass the inspection for FHA (as the tend to be much more stringent).

The next day, he walked up to me.

"Have you had your inspection yet?"

"He'll be there in about an hour."

"Why don't we pray?", and without my approval, he grabbed my hand, put his other hand on my shoulder, and began praying.

I was stunned. I was hoping to avoid something like this. Though I am a spiritual person, I don't consider myself religious at all...and I haven't even been to church in years. But I thought for a second, and came to the conclusion that anything could help. I've only prayed a couple times in my life. Once when my Grandmother was on her death bed. And once when I realized I loved my wife and I prayed to God that one day she would be my bride. And that turned out well.

We need this refinance as a springboard, and we could use ANY assistance we could get. So I said Ok.

I bowed my head and he spoke for a couple of minutes. Amazingly enough, I felt much better. And the more I thought about it, though praying to me is very rare, this was this kindest thing this man could offer me at that point. To offer a prayer for an almost complete stranger.

As the week progressed, I met more and more of the congregation. I did interviews with people from all over the world for their DVD. I ate lunch next to these people. I filmed them as they sang. As they prayed. And at one point even as people began speaking in tongues (a VERY weird situation for an agnostic like myself).

But through the entire week...no one pressured me to join their church. No one asked me my politics. I got to know the leader's son. A very normal guy that has been doing the production for their convention for 15 years. He became my buffer, as he is not a part of their church. I sat with their leader at lunch and swapped stories. They wanted to know about me and my wife.

Their sermons were about helping each other, and their spouses, and their families, and their friends and how to make life more tolerable. They had financial seminars on how to plan for the future. How to get the kids into college. The stuff that all of us are worried about.

What I noticed in this whole thing was that these people, though we shared few if any of the same view points, were nothing but kind and generous to me. They never pressured me. They paid me in cash and never asked for contact information (though I'm sure they could if they wanted to...their Catholic media director contacted me so I'm sure they have my phone number).

At the end, their leader walked up and said, "I want to thank you for all your hard work this week. Everybody raved about you and your colleague (ironically enough...a Jew). You were very kind to all of us.".

And that was it. He shook our hands and it was over.


Though I would never join their organization as I do not agree with many of their political views (though they never once mentioned politics in our conversations nor in their sermons), these people were not the bogey man we make them out to be. We may not agree on everything, but what we do agree on should bring us together, not tear us apart.

About how we can have better marriages, better relationships, better lives, giving to the less fortunate. Nothing about how they could get rid of all Liberals. How they could corner Washington and make them do the things they wanted. Just about making things better all around for all of us.


Just thought I'd share what a week in the lions den was like.




Edited for spelling and continuity of tense.

Isn't it wonderful when we can see one another's common ground, rather than the things that divide us?

For the record: most of the fundamentalists that I know are just like the people you spoke of. Kind, loving, compassionate, and do not need to force their beliefs on others.

Thanks again.

RC

but your story is beautiful. These people sound much more like the charismatic groups who are NOT evangelical. Very interesting.

but the speaking in tongues thing seemed pretty extreme to me.

my husband picke out for us. More conservative that I would like, but overall a generally friendly experience. Certainly none of them are cut from the same cloth as that Phelps nut. (Although many do like Dobson. *sigh*)

I have a friend that I know is a fundie, but we never talk politics or religion. He has never once asked me to join his church, and I'd trust him completely.

But I do know others who are not so kind. These are the people who declare that they are Christian, and when they do, I know to hang on tight to my purse, because I'm going to get robbed. I have been taken too many times by "Christians", now I know what to look out for.

I've met many a good church people, and I deal with them every day with my business. Not one of them knows that I'm not Christian. But, they all know I'm honest, and that's good enough for them.

zalinda

yes.

I've updated my wife as the week has gone on. Though I haven't yet given her the overall summary you read here.

Why do you ask?

Despite the popular conceptions that about, on a one-on-one basis they are fairly ordinary in their daily lives. They fuss over which value meal to order at Wendy's, sigh at the price of gas, and put their socks on before their shoes.

It's what they do in large groups, what they do with political and social power, that is offensive and dangerous.

EOM.

Thanks for sharing your experience. I want to beleive what you say is true. I don't think you're lying, I just find it difficult to comprehend. These people's compassion almost always comes with conditions attached. Had they known your political views, your sexuality if you happened to be gay, etc...I suspect these shiny, happy people would quickly lose their religion (to borrow a few song titles from R.E.M.) and become much less warm.

That was my first thought too, and the prayer incident sort of confirmed it -- had he recoiled or declined the prayer opportunity, things might have gone differently.

On the other hand, not every religious group is rabidly evangelical.

I'm also reminded that the Nazi camp guards and their families were probably seemingly decent people -- had families, laughed, shared meals, raised kids -- all in the shadows of the death camps.

In other words, people not acting like monsters all the time does not necessarily mean anything. Get them into a discussion about, oh, say, Bush or abortion and you might find the outcome more revealing.

If they offended him enough to walk off the job, then it would be bad for their convention or whatever.

So, if anything, it means they know how to stay professional. Except for the part, of course, where he grabs the guy's hand and tells him to pray.... A-W-K-W-A-R-D

You can be sure their personal politics were as RW as you can get.

Individual humans can be pretty cool.

It's humans as a mob or as a goose-stepping army that worry me.

More and more, the entire country seems to be deteriorating into and Us and Them mode.
You started out your week working for Them...but it turns out that they are people just like Us, and not the enemy at all.

:yourock::toast:





:kick: and recc

There are people just as offensives as fundamentalists who are offensive about things other than religion.

It's about the harmful influence on society as a whole that these subgroups represent. Your pleasant experience was at least in part due to the fact you had to repress part of who you are. The reality is fundamentalist religious groups are typically at odds with secular political values and progressive social values. If they had their way you would have to repress yourself in society at large.

And they encourage bad moral thinking, and discourage critical thinking.

They're human beings and therefore (at least IMHO) on a personal one-on-one basis for the most part they are good people. I agree we can't just label them bogey monsters and just dismisses them or blindly attack and repress them yet we still need to recognize the threat they poss as a group to progressive secular society.

As for the "lion's den", I'm in it every week. I attend my wife's Four-Square evangelical church. Just to keep peace in the family, and since she would never attend a service of the Methodist Church, in which I grew up. The people who attend this church are, to a person, all of them, wonderful, warm, generous, loving, thoughtful and kind. The pastor is one of the most learned and inspiring men of God I have ever known.

Problem is, most of them are right-wingers, and even the pastor occasionally talk from the pulpit about how "liberals hate Christ". It is on those occasions that church is not a joyful, inspiring time for me. I hate that. :( I think God is testing me, though. I think He's teaching me to love people with whom I have nothing in common but our faith. Not politics, not ideology, not social outlook, nor economic issues. It's tough, but I think I'm becoming a better Christian for it.

I think this may have been a way for you to see that even most conservative Christians aren't irredeemable monsters, but just people. And it's true: Get 'em alone, and they're mostly okay; get 'em in a mob situation, and they become frightening.

Peace, my friend.

Pentecostals and some evangelicals speak in tongues, and you see it more in the non-denominationals (with their given number of Pentecostals).

Yes, they can be amazingly nice people. I went to an evangelical college, and most everyone there was really nice and supportive, even of me, and I was known as a feminazi. *sigh* Anyways, they can be really nice. I'm glad they were nice and respectful of you and your partner. That was good.

Oh, and it's usually okay to decline to pray with someone. Just say in as nice a tone as you can, "I'm really uncomfortable with public prayer. If you could keep us in your prayers, though, I'd appreciate it." Most evangelicals get that.

The fundamentalists at New Life (formerly Haggard's flock) apparently do speak in tongues. I've never been there, but several of my friends have gone there with their friends and they have told me about speaking in tongues. I'm 99% sure it goes on there, as I've heard it from multiple sources.

Charismatics do, and there's considerable animosity between the two because of it. Many mega churches are mislabeled fundamentalist when they are not.

Guess I was wrong. I don't know a whole lot about the particulars myself, just what I've heard from friends.

They really are quite different. Fundies are the ones who are much more into a literal interpretation of the Bible. They are usually NOT "health and wealth" types, i.e., if you're truly a believer, God will bless you with material wealth (think TV preachers). They sometimes are very strict about their clothing and hair length on women (both long) - but not always. They will never speak in tongues, and they don't believe in modern day miracles as proof of God's presence as Charismatics do. They often have churches with "Bible" in the name - Westminster Community Bible Church, Berean Bible Church, whereas Charismatics have more trendy names like New Life Christian community or heh Tongues of Fire Christian Witness Center.

Veny intersting read on how one church is trying to close the gap between Charismaticatic and dispensationalist evangelicals

These are all Protestants, btw, most not around until the 1800s or later.

Fundamentalists believe that only the King James is the real Bible, and they believe that it is all literal truth. In Revelations, when it says that the streets of Heaven are pure gold as clear glass, some really think that it'll be clear gold, totally missing the simile. The usual fundamentalists are Baptists and variations of Baptists. They often have behavioral restrictions, they don't let women preach, and they usually don't do baptisms until the person is of age (so no infant baptism). Their churches are usually more plain, and everyone carries a Bible to church. They used to do more missions in the 1800s, but there are still some big missions groups run by fundamentalists.

Evangelicals believe that the Bible has metaphor and symbol in it and that, since men wrote it, some parts can be ignored (or at least not studied very much). The evangelical movement mostly started with the Methodists (who were veeeeerry conservative in behavior in the 1800s), and it has branched out since, mostly through revivals (which evangelicals have two to three times a year). Evangelicals tend to be against infant baptism, too, but most allow women preachers (some churches have a strong tradition of women preaching) and aren't quite as strict on behavior (though they are at the colleges). Everyone carries a Bible to church, and the service tends to be more emotional and a bit louder with bands, choirs, singers, and such. They're also big into missions, often working to translate the Bible into local languages, and spreading the Gospel everywhere.

Pentecostals have a different take on theology. They believe that the sign of truly being a Christian (having the infilling of the Holy Spirit, as they say) is being able to speak in tongues or being able to interpret. Most churches don't believe this at all, and you will even run into some who think Pentecostalism is a cult. They only baptize in the name of Jesus, not in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (as most Christians do, which dates way back to the early Church), and they also tend to wait until a child is of age to make a real decision. Some pentecostals are against women preaching, but most aren't, and it's not unusual to see women heading up large congregations. Pentecostal services tend to be rather loud, emotional, and not quite as planned out as evangelical services, preferring to let the Holy Spirit run the show (they can also run long).

Of course, the differences are only important to Christians. :) There are so many different versions of Christianity that even most Christians can't keep it all straight. It's not like in Islam, with only four major groups--Christianity has exploded into literally thousands of denominations. Interesting history, though.

when Judd Hirsch's character was gathering everyone around to pray, and one guy said, "But I'm not jewish..." and Hirsch replied, "Well, nobody's perfect." :)

assuming these people are as RW as you say they are, they and their paid representatives have foisted fascism on America, illegally invaded and occupied (and effectively destroyed) a weak country, killed hundreds of thousands of people, siphoned multi-trillions of dollars out of our economy and made America the most hated country on earth.

I frankly don't give a shit how polite they were to you. They are fucking fascists.

I have to admit I was waiting for someone to say this.

I have a hard time giving a s++t if people are polite to me when they've just enabled a psychopath to kill thousands of people for no good reason.

I have daughters; I have a hard time feeling congenial about people who would pass laws forcing my daughter to carry a rapists' baby.

Who cares how "nice" the people who are shredding and burning our constitution are?

I was raised Southern Baptist and while I eventually had to leave because I couldn't stomach the politics and the angle of the religion, the people were very kind most of the time. Deluded but kind.