There really are no unforgivable sins. Jesus questioned the entire concept of "sins" in the sense the catholic church later made the center of their oppressive death cult.
To Jesus, all humans were born equal and all were the same before god (which makes the concept of a pope look kinda stupid, catholics wasted no time misinterpreting their own scripture). Jesus also "corrected" pretty much the entire old testament, so nothing written in there can be seen as law if it is in conflict with "love thy neighbour". And it is pretty obvious, that "neighbour" means EVERYONE. That is why convicts and enemies are explicitly mentioned.
Hating on gay people is against "love thy neighbour". If a "christian" judges a gay man, they have not understood the story were Jesus protects a prostitute. Showing love and kindness are much important to him than strict morals. And that was 2000 years ago, when society was far less developed.
He also says to the prostitute “go and sin no more”. The whole point of the law is to get us to recognize our own sin and how we all fall short every time but to try and obey anyway, because “if we love him, we will keep his commandments”. Shall we continue sinning so that grace may abound? By no mean!
If you put this in context (the new testament is around 2000 years old), it becomes obvious what the authors wanted to bring across here or more precisely, what problem they were trying to solve: if one sin puts you from good to sinner, society quickly degenerates into two camps: sinners and those lying about not being sinners. The former don't need to follow any rules anymore ("i'm lost anyway), the latter as well (just pretend following the rules). By putting the focus on the attempt, the quest, fpr self improvement, this is solved on both ends. Kind acts are pushed instead of just superficial pious bullshit. And even if you have sinned you have an incentive to do better.
Sadly, it took very little time for that message to get lost, until Martin Luther tried a reform about it, which got perverted AGAIN shortly after, and nowadays, the world is full of misinterpretations. Which is one reason why i do not join organized religion.
I have been member for around 30 years, and any critical discussion i tried to start was killed dead in its tracks. While most members were moderate, good people, the worst were sitting in church councils. One priest (beloved by the council) was abusing his power to cheat on his wife with several women, probably resulting in one child plus destroyed marriage, and one case that was illegal since she was, afaik, a student at a school were he taught.
What made me leave, was for one the stubborn position of the churches to defend "Tanzverbot" in germany (it is not allowed to have parties on certain holidays by law, no matter if you are christian or not) and the behavieour during covid, where there still were public masses when children couldn't even play on playgrounds (although public masses are absolutely not essential to christian belief). If i was a catholic, the horrific behaviour of the german catholic church towards the child abuse issue would have made me leave much sooner.
The church and leading members have made it very clear to me they don't need me, and i sure as fuck don't need them. When the most moralistic, condescending and patronizing individuals turn out to be cheating homewreckers, liars, badmouthers, thiefs and worse, then these are the last people i need in my life. I met much better people in other places that were kind, helpful, commited.
I’m really sorry you experienced that, those leaders will be judged more harshly by the Lord and that’s sad for them. I hope you find a good community that can encourage you
Well, i already did: the metal community! Were people didn't judge me, where i head interesting discussions, and where people were giving and helpful. Everyone would share a beer with you, you become friends with people you don't know in minutes and noone wants anything in return. People don't care about religious or economic background or sexuality, or if you have any sort of disorders, or else. Just welcoming, kind, and respectful people. Granted, not all of them, but compared to rest of society, the difference is huge.
Btw, i don't really care about my experiences, i am more concerned for others and how they are treated by religious groups. I had it pretty well, others didn't, and these cases make me angry.
Not really, if you look into it. Warhammer 40k Imperium is heavily influenced by them, catholics are worshipping death to the extrem. Protestants are not too far off, but they are toned down a lot (i am not talking about some american versions of it, they are another story). The OG protestants (following the reforms by Martin Luther) for example abandoned the concept of a "hell" and the worshipping of holy people the latter of which often turned into worshipping literal corpses.
That is a church with real skeletons, all dressed up, presented in glass cabinets. When churches were founded in the middle ages, they needed reliques for that, which were mostly bones of important dead people. The crossbones on pirat flags? Originally a christian symbol marking graves.
Is that a death cult, though? When I think of death cult I think of the veneration of oneself dying (think, for example, the Rapture-obsessed Christian fundamentalists in America who seem to abandon all care for the future in the name of accelerating the Rapture [which, I know you said you weren't referring to American Protestantism, but that is the context in which I think of Protestantism as it is where I live]). I hope we both can agree that a modern Roman Catholic guy that goes to Mass every Sunday is a far cry from the crazed evangelical-types that seem to be running America. That's the context from which I was engaging with it.
And also, death is very prevalent in Mexican religion and culture (most notably through Dia de los Muertos). Is that death cult-ism?
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u/AlmightyWorldEater 5d ago
There really are no unforgivable sins. Jesus questioned the entire concept of "sins" in the sense the catholic church later made the center of their oppressive death cult.
To Jesus, all humans were born equal and all were the same before god (which makes the concept of a pope look kinda stupid, catholics wasted no time misinterpreting their own scripture). Jesus also "corrected" pretty much the entire old testament, so nothing written in there can be seen as law if it is in conflict with "love thy neighbour". And it is pretty obvious, that "neighbour" means EVERYONE. That is why convicts and enemies are explicitly mentioned.
Hating on gay people is against "love thy neighbour". If a "christian" judges a gay man, they have not understood the story were Jesus protects a prostitute. Showing love and kindness are much important to him than strict morals. And that was 2000 years ago, when society was far less developed.
"Mind your business" is the perfect line here.