How come Republicans are the most fervent Christians?
How come Republicans are the most fervent Christians?
[Disclaimer] - I am not an American and I consider myself atheist, I am Caucasian and born in a pre-dominantly Christian country.
Based on my limited knowledge of Christianity, it is all about social justice, compassion and peace.
And I was always wondering how come Republicans are perceiving themselves as devout Christians while the political party they support is openly opposing those virtues and if this doesn't make them hypocrites?
For them the mortal enemy are the lefties who are all about social justice, helping the vulnerable and the not so fortunate and peace.
Christianity sounds to me a lot more like socialist utopia.
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There's a real cognitive dissonance there. Their version of Christianity takes a back seat to politics because they've been told all these visions of grandeur about how "Jesus is coming back" and how they are the "sheep" and all those godless liberals are the "goats. They've been trained to look for reasons to feel persecuted even if they don't come directly out and say it, even if they don't realize it themselves. There's a real "us vs. them" mentality in a lot of those types of churches and they'll gladly go rub one out to stuff like where Jesus said to his disciples in one of the gospels that if people aren't for him then they're against him. Nevermind that one of the other gospels says the opposite. A lot of Christians I've come across just have this persecution fetish where any slight inconvenience or call for accountability from pretty much anyone (because their church won't take them to task over things) turns into a 'righteous' cry to their lord about how the godless Philistines around them are normalizing oppression and sodomy and trans rights or whatever and these holy little Christian's are the only beacon of hope in society even though they insist on treating anyone who isn't like them like absolute garbage. I'm not a social scientist or anything like that, hopefully people smarter than me chime in. But conservatives treat equity in a community like a zero sum game, you know? If poor people are given a hand up by the government then it's interpreted by these (at best) middle class Christians as an affront to their hard earned money. They worked for their income but "these filthy poors just get handouts at MY expense?" You can tell by their actions that they have absolutely nothing to do with Jesus regardless of how they try to present themselves. They're full of crap and they deserve to be treated as such.
Source: Grew up in a very conservative farming community, did all the church stuff, then moved away and found myself.
Also, I know I abused quotation marks but my bad on any grammar or spelling errors or general incoherence. I treated myself to vodka for dinner.
I enjoyed your vodka-fueled walk of text. I’ve had a lot of the same observations of religious people in my state.
I have made similar observations in a rural area in Germany. Christian Traditions are highly valued. Christian Values do only apply to non-immigrants, people that work a lot and therefore are considered worthy and other conservatives in general. I consider myself a christian myself somehow and these people gave me the creeps. How can they go and listen to someone preaching about humbleness and being kind and whatever and afterwards keep on being racist and prejudiced against anyone?
I've also remained a Christian in spite of evangelicals. I think the worst dredges of those kinda people are really only focused on having more and looking better than others, so we're back to the zero sum game. They don't want to change to better reflect the Jesus we can read about in the Bible, they just wanna be garbage during the week and go spend an hour or two on Sunday mornings listening to someone tell them that they're okay and that God loves them. Not enough pastors have the stones to tell their congregants that sure, God loves them, but that's not a license to be a real prick to everybody they view as "lesser" than them. Maybe someday the voices behind the pulpit will grow a spine and call for accountability, but they definitely aren't saying it loud enough
they are the "sheep" and all those godless liberals are the "goats"
How is that supposed to be a good thing..? Goats are way smarter than sheep, make better cheese, and can eat almost anything and climb trees and almost vertical surfaces!
It's a religious reference used in the Bible, emphasizing the obedience of sheep and the stubbornness of goats. I don't think I've ever had sheep cheese but I know I don't like goat cheese so I'm gonna call that part a draw. Goats are absolutely better climbers though!
But being stubborn is much better than being obedient! (And don't get me wrong, sheep cheese is good, better on average than cow cheese, but you clearly haven't tried a good goat cheese...)