fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #3035 ]

⌈ Secret Post #3035 ⌋

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Notes:

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Anon from below.

It's not about being a good one or a bad one, it's more about picking and choosing. American is not a good analogy because it's a legal status and not something one has to opt into being. Would you call a feminist who claims to be for gender equality but opts to think trans people are mentally ill or ignore black women or rage against random men "a true feminist, just a bad one"? She's still for gender equality, though!

At some point, you have to say "you don't fit any more," and following the respective Book is one of the core tenets of lots of theist religions.

Yeah I knew American was a bad analogy but I'm too tired to think of a good one.

Actually I do think a feminist like that is still a feminist. There's a long tradition of racism and transphobia and other nasty things in influential feminist writing and activity. I don't want to associate with them but they are feminists.

I know there's a point where someone just doesn't fit a definition anymore, but before that often comes the No True Scotsman Argument.

I still don't see how I can be called anything other than a Christian when my god is the person that the religion is named for. What do you propose I call myself instead if I'm breaking too many of the rules Paul and the others laid down? I still wonder if there's even such a thing as a Real Christian under this definition when there are so many little rules that only smaller sects follow, like women covering their hair when they pray.

AYRT

I'm not sure, as I don't subscribe to either side. I'm trying to explain it as I've heard friends who do subscribe to the anti-theist side explain it.

Would you call someone "Christian" who claims they follow Christ but believes nothing of the Bible and thinks the whole thing is a load of bull? Or would you say following the holy book is a core tenet of being a Christian that can't be ignored?

but the question of "What the Holy Book says and what that means" is by no means something that can be taken as a given!!!

Then what's the point? If your own religion is self-contradictory and requires interpretation to function and nothing can be taken as a given, then why even follow it?

I guess that explains all the schisms and sects, though.

Well, there are a million reasons, I suppose, but I would imagine the most basic is because you think it's true.

All of it? Even the parts that contradict itself?

And people tell me comic books are hard to understand!

Especially the parts that contradict themselves.

The comparison between comic books and religion isn't bad, really

I guess the difference is I don't believe Superman is real and Marvel and DC fans have never waged holy war on each other.

Well, I can't deny there have been times I've wanted to wage holy war because of comics from time to time...

I'd be okay if we just hung Dan Didio and Joe Quesada from a cross.

Finally! A compromise everyone can get behind.

Except Didio and Quesada I guess.

I think it doesn't matter if someone calls themselves a Christian but somehow "isn't really". I don't see what I get out of calling someone fake or whatever. I think it's up to Jesus to decide who is a Christian and who isn't.

To answer your particular example, I actually know people who call themselves Christian but see the whole thing as a metaphor and don't believe a single bit of it is literal truth. I have no problem calling them Christians since they feel that colors their actions and world view enough for them to take on that label.

I think the holy book has to not be mandatory since people couldn't read it for so long. I doubt people before the invention of the printing press and widespread education were hearing every single rule from their local priests or ministers.

But the way I see it is that it comes down to how good a person you are. People who try to follow everything in the Bible often make a really bad impression on me--it seems like they care more about the letter of the rules than the spirit. People who just try to follow general Christian values like mercy and charity often seem a lot nicer to me.

(I have the same attitude towards strict and lax Wiccans, but that's another shitstorm.)

My personal judgment of a person would depend entirely on how good of a person they were regardless of religiosity, I agree.

I don't think "how good a person you are" is in any way related to "how religious a person you are" or "how true of a Christian/Muslim/Wiccan/other" you are, though.

I definitely think that's the more important thing. I keep wondering why people even care if someone fits their definition of a religion they don't follow. But then that's pretty hypocritical of me since I think about all kinds of things that people could say don't really matter.

The problem is that there's so much complexity in the interpretations of the various Books - and so much validity on most sides of the argument - that it's extremely difficult for me to say which interpretations fundamentally are and are not valid, especially as someone outside of the religion. How are you going to say which symbolic readings and which textual variants are and aren't valid?

Certainly, there are probably some people for whom it's true that they don't really care about the tenets. But there's also a lot of justificatory arguments on all sides of most of these questions, and I at least don't see the need to be an arbiter there.

Like, just because someone has to make an argument for a reading or a position, that doesn't mean it's a stretch. I think there's a lot of care and thought in those arguments (at least, when those arguments are at their best) which this line of thought tends to skim over.

AYRT

Yup, I'm agreed with you on all that. This isn't a stance I hold myself, I'm more apathetic toward it all. I grew up with the opposite extreme religious version of the same with family that called other self-identified Christians not True Christians (see below thread). I was just trying to explain the anti-theist stance the way I've heard it from friends who hold it.

Ah, sorry, I definitely took you to be advancing the theory yourself.

No, I agree, that's definitely the idea that's out there. I just don't agree with it.

AYRT

Ha, I see how it looks that way since my initial reply was the thread below and this one blew up a little bit, lol.

[ SECRET POST #3035 ]

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