#then again is it 'my religion' anymore

[jewishcissiekj]

ever since I was a little kid I've felt fear and guilt thinking the Messiah won't come because of me

[shalom-iamcominghome]

Before I continue with this ask, I want to make it very clear that this is not supposed to be a hateful or homophobic ask, i am myself a gay man and am looking to convert. I know you are just a convert student and don’t know everything but you seem very knowledgeable.

As someone who’s grown up Christian I’ve always had the Leviticus verse thrown at me about man lying with man being an abomination. Why do I never see jews use that verse in the way Christian’s do ? Was it a mistranslation or ?

That's a complicated question, and one that I'm not quite qualified for, despite, also, being queer/LGBT in general. Just like xtians aren't a monolith, so too are jews not a monolith. I want to make my intentions clear because I don't hate xtianity and do not want to caricature the umbrella faith that is xtianity.

If you want my personal opinion, I think a lot of it comes from the differences of approach that xtians and jews tend to have. In my experience as an ex-xtian, the overall consensus was that you don't really... question doctrine. You don't explore any deeper meanings, at least where I grew up. It wasn't a question, it was literal.

In my experience with judaism, we (in general) have different interpretations and questions. Debate in my shul is lively when we do debate, for example - a few of the members literally talked for hours at lunch because they were debating a topic. I think for many, there's an openness to asking and exploring the word of g-d and it isn't seen as Disrespectful Of G-d to wonder what He means. Therefore, you do have some people who don't focus on that passage, or take it as Literal™

I will clarify that many of my memories as an xtian were from a rather progressive church, all things considered, so I definitely am not of the belief that all xtians are magically homophobic. But when there is an xtian who is, I have noticed it's because they tend to interact with doctrine in different ways than jews might.

[sexynugget]

not to be a complete mess online and look farther into "i'll find you in any world, phil" than i should and much deeper than what dan was thinking

but it's so integral to their story that dan is the one to find phil. in every universe. after those horrid teen years, dan turned 18 and dared to want something. after so much rejection, dan dared to put himself out there. and got something better than he could have dreamed. fate isn't real, dan is the master of his own destiny. in any world. so if it's not written in the creation, then dan will make it happen. every dan will find their phil.

[lilleputtu]

~Business~

[spineless-lobster]

*rocking back and forth in a corner* this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass this too shall pass

[spinchs-field]

you think it’d be weird if i did start believing in god again? because the thought feels comforting. it’s nice believing there’s someone who loves me no matter what. yknow.

[comfortstars]

no actually. Can I be honest for a second. I know I said I wasn't gonna talk about it anymore but idgaf

[squirmydonnie]

CW: thinking things are real but the aren't ( forgot how to describe it )

Um.

It hurts when an imaginary persons leaves you

:(

Its very odd.

I would think of her as real. I would mostly only ever see her in my room.

I had her first as a character.

I drew her in class.

I started imagining her beside me.

I think that was part of the problem. I kept thing her as someone who would help me and stick my my side.

She was what my NBB wasn't. She was a true friend. She was my girlfriend :(

I don't know if you can tell, but the lines started to get pretty blurred here. Between seeing her and drawing her so often it felt like she was there.

When she left I was quite confused. I had assumed she was imaginary in way, while still thinking she was real. Thought I could just imagine her back.

It had been 3 days of this.

When she came back I was upset but I got over it. And then she never appeared again.

At least not that year. I was sad. I tried to draw us doing things, but it was no use. It wasn't real anymore.

Now I was really alone.

At least I was until someone else filled her place. In fact it was a whole world that did.

To bad it's not real. To bad I'm not out of it enough to feel it anymore.

I'm just an apple and apples an apple.

[sethdomain]

Why do my mom always purposefully cook shit that i purposefully and actively say i fucking hate and make me pukes, then come at me and say im a fucking picky eater and the most ungrateful human being ever. Is it so fucking hard to not cook a literal specific food that is literally fucking hard to make and forcing me to fucking like it, i literally am not that fucking picky i just hate eating fucking liver and that stupid broth that makes me pukes

[chaos-coming]

And now for my weekly sunday complaint post about how much i hate hate hate christianity

(The church bells woke me up way too early, again)

Good morning, happy lack of sleep and high blood pressure, the christians are rhythmlessly banging metal for three!! entire!! minutes!! They have to make sure you cant go back to sleep because its their God Time.

And since they need to insert themselves into every facet and moment of your life, you are also having Their God Time now. Fuck you nobody gets to sleep on sunday this is europe, conform or be destroyed.

[were--ralph]

i think i said this one before but i remember we used to go to church and one day on the way i just out of the blue asked the car "how do we know god is real? what if people just made him up" and the adults all got super mad at me and gave me generic answers like "we just know" and stuff and my ass was fucking CURIOUS so when church started i asked the Sunday School teacher and she was like "well the bible was written about him" or something like that and i was like "but someone wrote Curious George and hes not real, what if someone made him up too" and she was like irritated but was like "he's a talking monkey of course hes not real, children just like fun stories" or something like that and i don't remember exactly what i said but it was something very close to "but adults like stories too! how do you know he's not made up so because adults want to believe in something too?" and she got SUPER mad and i had to apologize in front of the church but i saw an opportunity so i was like "but no one answered me so i still dont know and i guess you guys don't either" and [everyone] got super mad and none of us could go to that church anymore

the adults were okay to go to church again but me and my siblings had sundays off from that point on and that was kind of a catalyst for the way my brother and sister perceived religion

[snapbackslide]

and one last thing; i do not like talking about my origins or disclosing personal information, but i have a lot of family in the middle east, and watching my parents stress over what's going to happen to them is sickening. since that day last year and watching the horrors through social media and the news, i feel very desensitized from it all at this point. from everything, really. life on earth has gotten severly worse than what it was when i was a kid.

[steviescrystals]

my tags on the post i just reblogged got me thinking so here’s my current stream of consciousness

[maganne-bonete]

Actually I'm coming into terms that I might have a divinity kink in this fine early start of the lenten season

[yokelfelonking]

Post 9/11 Trivia

Most folks on this site were either children on September 11, 2001, or weren’t even born yet.  But America went crazy for about a year afterwards.  Here’s some highlights that I remember that might not be in your history books:

There was national discussion on whether or not Halloween should be canceled because…fuck if I know why.  After planes crashed into buildings in NYC it follows that 6-year-olds in Iowa shouldn’t be allowed to dress up like Batman and ask their neighbors for candy, I guess.  (Halloween wasn’t canceled, by the way.)

On a similar note, people asked if comedy - any sort of comedy - was appropriate anymore, ever.

People sold shitty parachutes to suckers “in case your building gets attacked and you have to jump out the window.” There were honest-to-God news reports warning people not to jump out of the window with shitty mail-order parachutes because they wouldn't work.

As a follow-up to the attacks, someone mailed anthrax to some prominent politicians and news anchors - you know, famous people - along with some badly-written notes about “you cannot stop us, death to America, Allah is good” and after that every time some random dumbass found a package in the mail they didn’t recognize they thought that the terrorists were targeting them, too.

Everyone was similarly convinced that their town was going to be the next target, even if they were a little town in the middle of nowhere. "Our town of Bumblefuck, South Dakota (population 690) has the largest styrofoam pig statue west of the Mississippi! Terrorists might fly planes into that too! It's a prime target!"

People started taping up their windows and trying to make their houses or apartments airtight out of fear of chemical and biological attacks. There were news reports warning people that turning your house into an airtight box was a bad idea because, y'know, you need air to breathe.

"[X] supports terrorism!" and “if we do [X], the terrorists win!” were used as arguments for everything.  "Some rich Arab you never heard of donated to his organization that backs Hamas which backs al-Queda, and also owns stock in a holding company that has partial ownership of the Pringles company, so if you eat Pringles you're supporting terrorism!" "The terrorists want to tear down our freedoms and our way of life and rule us through fear! Eating what you want is one of our freedoms as Americans! If you're afraid to eat Pringles, the terrorists win!" (I promise you that this sort of argument is in no way hyperbole.) (This argument is how Halloween was saved, by the way.  “If we cancel Halloween, the terrorists win!”)

People worked 9/11 into everything, and I mean everything, whether it was appropriate or not.  If you went to the grocery store the tortilla chips would remind you to support the troops on the packaging. Used car sales would be dedicated to our brave first responders. You couldn't wipe your ass without the toilet paper rolls reminding you to never forget the fallen of 9/11, and again, this is not hyperbole. My uncle, who lived in Ohio and had never been to New York except to visit once in the 70′s, died of a stroke about 8 months after 9/11, and the priest brought up the attacks at the eulogy.

On a similar local note, on the day of 9/11, after the towers went down, gas stations in my home town immediately jacked up gas prices.  The mayor had the cops go around and force them to take them back down.  I doubt any of that was legal.

Before 9/11, Christianity in America - and religion in general - was on a downward swing, with reddit-tier atheism on the upswing. Religion was outdated superstition from a bygone age. The day after 9/11? Every single church was PACKED. (This wasn't a bad thing, but the power-hungry on the Evangelical Right saw this as a golden opportunity to grab power and influence.)

EDIT: By Popular Demand - Freedom Fries. I initially left these off because they came a couple years after the initial panic and most people thought they were kind of absurd (and I don't recall anyone really going along with it other than maybe some local diners here and there). France didn't want to get involved in our world policing so some folks were like "TRAITORS!" and wanted to call french fries "Freedom Fries" instead, so as to stick it to the French.

Besides dumb shit like that…it’s really hard to overstate how completely the national mood and character changed in the span of a day, or how much of the current culture war is a result of the aftermath. (9/11 was the impetus for the sharp rise in power of the Evangelical Right, who made themselves utterly odious and the following backlash helped the rise of the current Progressive Left, for instance.)

And if all of this seems batshit...well, it was. But I want you to think for a moment how people react today over even trivial shit. People send death threats over children's cartoons. They call for blood if the maker of a video game had an opinion they don't like. If someone made a racist joke a decade ago when they were a teenage edgelord, folks will go after people who even associate with them. "DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND ALL THE HARM THEY'RE DOING!?"

Now take that same level of over-the-top histrionics and apply it to the unprecedented event of passenger planes crashing into crowded buildings in America's most populous city and killing thousands of people all at once. "DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND THAT WE WERE ATTACKED!?"

[literary-cremling]

Just listened to Which Witch by Florence + The Machine for the first time….. literally life changing.