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Right, this "not a real Christian" bullshit that Christians use to brush away the hateful people and teachings within your religion.
Own up to these people, they're your fellow Christians no matter how much you claim they aren't. Own them and fix them, instead of sweeping them under the rug and claiming they aren't real
If they have to tell you they are Christian, they are not. If they have to tell you they are honest, they are not. If the have to tell you that they don't watch porn, they do.
There's no Christian stamp of approval. Your are the religion you say you are
Calling yourself a Christian is not the same as being a Christian.
It's the only requirement
Nope.
Ok but also if you think that being a good person is correlated with being a Christian that’s also a problem. I’m a heretical apostate to Christianity but I act more in line with the teachings of Jesus than many Christians. Does that make me more Christian than them despite me having different gods? Or is it just that they’re bad at following the rules of their religion? I think it’s the latter. I think most if not all religious traditions place some weight on and expectations around being halfway decent, and Mike Johnson is a shitty person. He’d be shitty in any religion.
I see a lot of Christians say that they should “show you’re a Christian instead of saying it”, but like how about just be a good person and I won’t infer your religion off of it
The problem is that this basically can't be the case, because all the rules are made up pretty much ad hoc and everyone can just justify whatever interpretation cause the holy spirit told them that was the right way, and they're more in touch with god than you, yadda yadda.
Definitions of who is and isn't a shitty person is also kind of up in the air. This guy definitely is, but the christian who's been brainwashed into believing that gay people are sinners as a matter of the rules of the universe by their god? I dunno. Plot twist, though, this guy and the brainwashed guy are the same guy. YMMV depending on whether or not you believe it's intent, or action, that specifically causes harm, though, cause lots of people can walk around thinking that and never attain positions of power like what this guy has, even if they might end up performing the same given the role.
I'm not given to thinking that all of christianity is bad or whatever, that would be throwing out the baby with the bathwater. But I've been raised in the religion, I've seen a lot of it, and there's a much, much higher proportion of what people would call "fake" christians, in proportion to the ones that are nice and accepting and whatever. I dunno if they're fake, at that point, just by sheer numbers, just by the fact that that's what exists in the common consciousness as a "christian" way more than some nice dude.
In many cases, they created these monsters
If they're not following the teachings of the founder of the religion, they're not part of the religion. It's not the No True Scotsman fallacy, because being a part of the religion requires them to do something (repent and love others) which they refuse to do.
Incidentally, I'd love to "fix them," but they don't think that I'm a Christian because I don't worship Trump.
That's very nice, but we've still got to contend with the reality that an entire political party in the US is using Christianity as an excuse to do horrifically evil shit, and a sizeable contingent of everyday people who also claim the label are in support of that. As an outside observer and not a Christian myself, it seems like a semantic distinction that ultimately misses the forest for the trees.
Yes, we do have to contend with that. And one thing they are counting on is that the excuse of Christianity carries with it a benefit of the doubt that they can trade on extensively with the "middle ground" Christians who are only supporting them because of the assumption of shared faith. But if we (meaning Christians who see the hypocrisy in their claims) can draw a sharp line of distinction between the two, perhaps we can prove that it was all a sham and turn the middle ground against them as well.
By your definition, but there are plenty of people who seem to have other definitions, enough that he is publicly labeled as a Christian. It would seem the strict biblical definition of who is a Christian does not apply, like many other biblical rules, such as not wearing clothing of mixed fabrics.
You're not going to convince non Christians he's not one you with denial alone. You can either own him and better him, or suffer the changing public perception of your religion.
It's not my definition. It's explicitly the founder's definition. There's not really any room for interpretation in "by this they will know you're my disciples: if you love one another." Not loving? Not Christian.
Maybe not for them, but words mean things, and I'm not going to accept their redefinition of a term that applies to me.
I'm really not sure what the other option is, but I'm not trying to convince non-Christians that he's not a Christian. I'm trying to convince other Christians that he isn't.
Love to, but he (and those like him) doesn't believe I'm a Christian, because I'm not a Republican. So they won't listen to people like me. Excommunication and public repudiation is a badge of honor to them. About the best I can do is try to say to other Christians, as loudly as I can and with as much Scripture as possible, that he's a heretic.
I totally grant that we haven't done much to change that perception in recent years, and I'm far from trying to demand (or assume) that it should change overnight.
There is room for interpretation in every statement, and that is far from the only quote in the Bible that defines what a Christian is.
Then nobody else needs to accept your definition either.
You are literally trying to convince me, an atheist, right now.
You can't do anything about it and it's his fault that you can't? Because that's a really pathetic defense.
This is a really dumb slapfight you've picked and you should apologize to this guy.
It seems you just want to argue. If he said that grass was green, you’d come back with “well actually it’s all colors EXCEPT for green. Green is what’s reflected back to your eye.”
The fact is there are basic truths. Christians believe and follow the teachings of Jesus. If someone is not following those teachings, they are not Christian.
I can say I’m a purple elephant and I hate all pink mice because my savior in the Book of Phants told me to. None of that is any more true just because I said it. Likewise, for Mike Johnson. He and his friends can say whatever they want. Their actions show their true beliefs.
Not if you're intellectually honest. Which...ok, fair enough, but I stand by my statement.
Very true. But the guy who started it all said it quite clearly, and everything else he said that drew edges around this thing points to or flows out of that statement. It's not like there's some arcane other thing people can do that's completely unrelated; there's no secret magic. It's all pretty straightforward.
I'm not asking non-Christians to. I'm asking people who claim to be Christians to understand what that term has historically meant, and what it meant at the beginning.
You're the one asking.
I mean, if you've got any better ideas, I'm all ears. Seriously, I'm willing to try quite a lot at this point.
I do want to point out that this is a standard that most groups are not held to. Dog lovers are not called to "come get your boy" anytime sometime who claims to be a dog lover kicks a puppy. I'm all for Christians being called to a higher standard—I think we should be, and I think we should rise to it—but I'm really not sure what you think the options are here.
"The Protestant Reformation was a mistake. " -Martin Luther
You literally are acting against the teachings of Christ if you act like Johnson, which is the entire point of the op-ed you didn't read.
He isn't "sweeping them under the rug" but rather calling them out as heretics, and calling out Christians to do the same.
Before writing a big emotional response like this, I'd recommend reading the linked content.
I have mixed feelings about that instinct. Calling out and distancing from the religious hypocrites is a Jesus thing to do. But also when non Christians fear Christians they need to understand why we feel that way and many Christians don’t seem to understand that I’m even scared of Christianity at it’s best.
So in short, do they just disavow or do they adamantly oppose as well? If they do the latter I’m happy they do the former, but I’ve seen far too many think the former is enough before they start shit talking atheists
No True Scotsman.
Maybe you should set an example and "fix" all the edgelord atheists.
Atheism isn't a religion, it's the absence of it. I can't fix them because they're not a group or club. Also, they don't follow a book with a god that tells them to "take the dust out of your own eye first", Christians do. So maybe follow your own teachings, instead of trying to impose them on others
Atheism isn't a religion, but it's a belief system, and edgy atheists who pick fights for no reason are indeed annoying.
I'm not an "edgy atheist" if anything I'm an anti theist, who used to be an evangelical Christian, until I got out of that cult after two decades of sexual abuse, brain washing and hate filled teachings. So now that I'm out, naturally not only do I not believe in a god, but I straight up despise religion and the damage it does to people
Lol how do you even write this with a straight face.
You sound like a brain washed cultist
I'm not even Christian lmao you're just being extra edgelordy
Improve your vocabulary
Nah.
And "Christian" isn't a homogeneous group -- it's also something anyone can claim membership of. By itself the label doesn't tell you if someone is a good person or an asshole.
Apart from "this person believes Jesus Christ was real" it doesn't tell you anything.
It doesn’t have to be homogenous. The belief that you mention, though, is based on someone from a book without evidence who is supposedly quoted as giving the rules that those people are to live by. You can’t claim to be part of that group and also claim that you don’t believe the person who is the figurehead of the belief. That idea has to be shared in order to claim membership in that group.
Good thing you told us - it wouldn't be obvious otherwise.
The whiny ones sure do seem like they desperately want their own club.
Oh, I don't know... dust in the eye can be a pretty uncomfortable thing.
They're not mine.
Yeah you sound worse than annoying atheists, like, a lot worse. If you can’t understand why they’d feel alienated by a society that loudly declares itself Christian then you need to get out of your bubble.
My beef with annoying atheists is how much many of treat it like a sect of Christianity instead of dechristianizing, but they’re typically new to their belief system, that’s ok, converts and apostates alike tend to be annoying for a while.
Oh, the poor things... at least they still have white supremacism, nationalism and capitalism to cling onto, eh?
Nice of you to admit that they haven't really managed to escape the whole "belief system" thing... in spite of their claims.
Anyway next time you wonder why people don’t associate religion with morality and why many who seek religion write off Christianity check the mirror
People are supposed to associate religion with morality? What a Christian thing to say.
Yikes...
You have a selection bias going on, there. You will tend to notice the "whiny ones" more often, because they are whiny. This is the same reason as to why, to you, it's not obvious that it's not a religion.
You're also going line by line on the comment which I should tell you is omega cringe and completely misses the main thesis of the comment in exchange for being kind of smarmy and quippy, which I would say is very unchristlike. Their point is that self-identifying as christian is a positive group, it's a group you choose to identify as. Being an atheist is something you are because you don't identify as belonging to any religion, it's a negative group. Atheists are the non-black non-ravens, they constitute literally everything that isn't. Which one do you think would be the more coherent, singular group, there? It's like if you had a classification of all chairs being, things with four legs that you sit on. Atheists, in this metaphor, would be everything that isn't a chair. Even with that shitty definition of a chair, that includes horses, chairs will still be a more coherent and singular group, than "everything that isn't a chair". That's their point.