Megachurch In Alabama May Get Its Own Police Force

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Sometimes, the lines between the mainline and the evangelical can become blurred, especially in the deep south. Oral Roberts had been an ordained Presbyterian minister, and remained one, despite his faith healing and speaking in tongues scam.

Which denomination do you most resemble, if I may ask?

I'm a mainline Protestant. A Lutheran, to be exact.

I was raised Southern Baptist.

Do you still practice that faith?

The short answer is yes.

I relate to traditionalist Catholics, who seem to be particularly honorable, different kinds of fundamentalists, who stuck to their guns, and were left behind, by churches gone liberal.

I felt that observant, Southern Baptists used to be notoriously-clique-y money interests. When insulting bearded men, in sandals, they have apparently forgotten about Jesus and their too-frequent cruises to the Holy Land. This appears in your overpriced curios.

Southern Baptists used to be the same exact kind of people, who you would not want to have a police force.

We have what amounts to a Pope and a Vatican, and, while I did not mind that such an office exists, the church, as a corporate presence, began to make serious compromises.

I follow Jewish holidays, much in the same respect that Italians, Germans, or Mexicans would observe their own traditions.

I do not believe that miracles have ceased, necessarily, however, they should be orderly.

One Baptist pastor was forever retelling the story of the lame man, being healed. Seeing as how he was a mathematician, by hobby, he would try to guesstimate the number of pounds, gained by a man as he stood upon withered legs. I asked whether he had ever prayed for a sick person, said, that is what he should expect, and was accused of being a witch; Baptists traditionally believe that miracles ceased at the original Pentecost.

The fact that Baptists supposedly believe in predestination, which is to say that people are chosen by God, escapes them, when soliciting the disinterested, door-to-door.

These money interests were nowhere to be found, when I came of age and wanted to physically earn my keep. They would tell you that you were ignorant, when trying to take any kind of legal responsibility, whatsoever, but would not educate you, on trading or the running of a business, on clear and decisive terms.

I feel that one of the things that keeps me grounded, that is to say, from becoming a zealot, is I have a strong distaste, for people who do not meet me halfway or do not take care of their own.

Most charlatans, in life, are operating in a sort of lala land, where nothing objective can be put to the test and, while they would like to beat you, will not uphold the customary standards of living, in their own workplace. At least the ascetics, like at Qumran and Masada, who were no friends of this world, would have been independently-productive, able to feed and shelter eachother.

501c3's are generally along the lines of a financial instrument, used to shelter moneys, in trust, and occasionally pay dividends. If it feels like a Ponzi scheme, trust your gut. I have been a laborer and fly on the wall. I put my back into it, and was perhaps one of the few people, who understood what I was hearing, in their business meeting. If you come, on a bicycle, they'll appraise it, and every button on your shirt.

I belong to the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, which is conservative compared to the larger Evangelical Lutheran Church In America, though if the truth be known, that conservative outlook exists mostly in the center of the country, whereas the church on the coasts is more moderate. I view myself as a religious moderate, rejecting both fundamentalism on the right, and liberal modernism on the left. I very much love the Lutheran grasp of unconditional grace, earned for us by Christ. We believe faith is an essential part of our salvation, but that faith is actually part of the gift of grace, rather than a choice on our part. The sacraments of baptism and communion are very important to us as means of grace, as we see them as physical manifestations of the word, by which grace is given to us.
I do not agree with my church body on every social issue. I am a believer in LGBT rights, and I see the Biblical creation story as more allegory than fact, as I believe in a universe that is billions of years old, and in biological evolution. I have made my viewpoints known at church, and no one tries to threaten me into silence.
As most Lutherans today, I feel a kinship to Vatican II Catholicism, as we see those reforms as similar to those that had created our own church. As traditionalist Catholics are ready and eager to damn everyone not belonging to Catholicism to hell, and insist that only churches using the Latin Mass are legitimate, I can't help but feel a great antipathy for them. While I believe my particular denomination has the truth, I am hardly going to say that all others are without Christ, as that's clearly untrue.

I am surrounded by those types here in Central Texas and they are why organized religion has a bad taste for me. They think anyone who isn't a Baptist isn't a "troo Christshun", are completely intolerant of LGBT people, tend to lean towards white supremacist views as well as think only white people are "troo Amuricans", and think Hinduism is the same as Islam. Ironically, their communities have the highest rates of domestic violence, pre-marital sex, teenage pregnancy, divorce, and other "ungodly" behaviors despite claiming to be moral and upright. In my experiences, their churches and services are also really boring. They seem to lack interesting rituals, aesthetics, and interesting tales like the Apocrypha. Everything about them feels so cheap and hollow.

I am told that the Apocrypha are all wrong, that they seem to be coming up with new stories, to fill in the blanks, even though the 66 books would have been adequate.

But, from what I have seen, so far, it never expressly contradicts the Gospel, as it was traditionally taught, in mainline denominations. Maybe, there is a story I haven't read, yet, that is completely blasphemous. I just didn't find that, so far.

I differentiate, between what is commonly discussed, and what is not, to stay intellectually-honest.

I don't have a problem with your basic fundamentals. If you don't believe the basic premise, you shouldn't be in a church, at all, much less as an authority figure.

I am reminded of a Clockwork Orange, where the criminals become the police, and the remorseful person is criminalized. It's been called ponerization.

Has it occurred to you that, while there is such a thing as normative beliefs, and there is such a thing as traditions of men, the bad pastors are just pretending? My problem is with hypocrites, not with Christianity. They consider it, in the abstract, and are leveraging it, for wealth and influence.

The problem is not their extreme sincerity. They don't really believe it, and might just soon use Tales of the South, or Grimm's, as a cultural platform, if there was a bustling venue for those. They might just as well be bronies, and guilt those people into a ditch.

I am not familiar with the expression "normative beliefs", but I do know there is definitely a huge difference between the traditions of men in relation to Scripture and what we can actually read there.

Reference: "...the church at Ephesus is commended for 'hating the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate', and the church in Pergamos is rebuked: 'So hast thou also [worshiping in their midst] them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate.'" --Revelation 2:14-15

Hear me out, I don't hate Jesus. My issue is with a huge section of his fan club.

Most of the Baptists I run into are hypocrites. They go on about how Christianity is a religion of love and peace but if you are not heterosexual, practice a different religion, and, to a lesser but growing extent, non-white (Or atleast not white of Anglo-Saxon descent), you are a terrible sinner who is going straight to Hell. They also think other denominations of Christianity are wrong and are from the devil as well.