It amazes me, the deep indoctrination self- indoctrination I had growing up. My Christan/church school had mandatory chapel in the morning and Bible classes, each class was led in prayer and we were all expected to have personal devotions. Each Bible song was taught passionately, each story was truth, each personal testimony was a "miracle". (To me at that time, all statistical anomalies were miracles). Even salvation was considered a miracle!
Anyway, I think what keeps this indoctrination going on and on is the emotions behind it all. It could be a song or story sung or told with passion or zeal combined with a family vibe. My family is all completely entrenched in Christian fundamentalism because of a family friend who was quite zealous for the Christian god. She would paint is an image in our minds of a loving God and Jesus, and would ignore all the ugly things about the deity/ies. Either that or she dismissed it and gave the best apologetics she could come up with. But I remember one day in Bible class someone brought up the argument about God not being able to lift a rock. And the answer to that was "It's not in his nature. Why would he want to?" (This is why apologetics is so deceptive!)
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It took years of introspection, deprogramming and relearning to conclude what my avatar so succinctly said, "My own mind is my own church."
p-nullifidian
Level 8
Feb 19, 2020
0
I was also brought up with the fam believing crazy, seemingly koolaid ridden things. Ever wonder how some people, otherwise quite intelligent, can believe such shit?
BradleyBell
Level 4
Feb 19, 2020
0
"Personal Devotions"; I hope to god this crap ends soon.......
PondartIncbendog
Level 8
Feb 18, 2020
1
A pastor and a hypnotist use similar techniques but with the hypnotist you know what you are getting into when you go. Church is covert hypnotism
abyers1970
Level 7
Feb 18, 2020
3
The purpose of Church is to elevate the happiness that is unnatural in real life.
When you go out in reality, you think the Church is the only haven. So the brainwashing is evident.
And the hypnotist and the chants are timed to keep your attention and distract from reality and what is really going on in the real world. POOF!! MAGIC!! It's all in the timing and the technique.
ok just bc they call it church does not mean it is yeh
As a child I was brainwashed to exercise blind faith in the church and its leaders, and to not put any trust in science, facts or evidence. What a horrible scam.
BestWithoutGods
Level 8
Feb 18, 2020
4
We are now in the day and time that believers have put their god in another dimension so you cannot touch him in any way. Not only would this prevent such a god from lifting the rock, it would also prevent us from knowing anything about him.
Imagine 2 fish bowls with fish in one and god is in the other. Believers now claim their god can jump in and out of dimensions like jumping in and out of fish bowls and leave no evidence at all of doing it. Isn't that lovely. How did the believers ever come to this knowledge in the first place?
DenoPenno
Level 9
Feb 18, 2020
1
Exactly How did they "know" anything? The truth is they are just repeating B.S. or pulling it of their asses.
zealots can accomplish things that normal, "unzealoted" people tend not to do.
JeffMesser
Level 8
Feb 18, 2020
1
And why wouldn't they...its worked for thousands of years...if it ain't broke...don't fix it.
phoenixone1
Level 8
Feb 18, 2020
2
In retrospect, I think church service was a place where people could let loose their emotions and get a release of sorts. It was ‘ok’ to weep at the altar, to shout ‘amen’; to babble in tongues, etc.
In my house, it was NOT acceptable to be emotional...except for my narcissistic mother; she was drama personified, but the family ‘overlooked’ her behavior. Big difference in what was acceptable in each setting.
Plus God was there perfect patsy. Prayer not working? God answered, he just said NO. Or you ain’t living right.
A baby dies? God needs another angel. ‘But...can’t god just make angels instead of taking...’—SHUT UP, that’s blasphemy!!
You find out you have a painful chronic illness? God is testing you. It’s all in his plan.
Yup. A metric fuckton of total BULLSHIT.
CarolinaGirl60
Level 8
Feb 18, 2020
3
God's got more important things to do than make rocks so big he can't lift them. He's got worlds to create, with but a wave of his hand and people to make then destroy for not pleasing him despite the fact that being omniscient he knew in advance they weren't going to please him so why make them in the first place? He's also got toast to burn his image into and virgins to impregnate immaculately and all those prayers to not answer.
God's a busy guy.
Sgt_Spanky
Level 8
Feb 18, 2020
3
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