A Lapsed Catholic's Sunday Bible Study -- Rayne on EmptyWheel

[erronis]

https://www.emptywheel.net/2025/10/26/a-lapsed-catholics-sunday-bible-study/

Just excerpting the first bit of the post. Many good comments follow.

Hello, I’m Rayne, and I’m a lapsed Catholic. I fell away from the Church over a period of time, beginning roughly with the Reagan years and the uptick in Christian fundamentalism’s influence on politics.

It didn’t happen all at once but I finally had enough when the Church became little more than a crypto-fascist mouthpiece for right-wing ideology, focusing almost exclusively on anti-abortion efforts instead of what I was taught were Christ’s teachings.

And yet more than 10 years of Catholic catechism shaped my values and morals, underpinning my Democratic identity. In hindsight I don’t think I left the Church so much as it left me.

Perhaps I should have nailed a thesis to the the Church’s doors in protest but when the entire Church has been subsumed by a political movement, it didn’t occur to me as an effective option.

Now we may need to figuratively nail a thesis on fellow American Christian citizens who’ve lost their way. They have forgotten altogether what Christ taught while forcing on us their corrupt vision of a white Christian nation.

. . .

[Norrrm]

1. When Christ's teachings are not politically correct, change the context........

https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143553852# post 11

Trivialize them as a 'minor teaching'.
------------------------------------

The Bible has all the answers... IF:
you cherry-pick the parts you like.
you reinterpret the parts that are inconvenient.
you ignore the parts you don't like.

[slightlv]

2. Christ's ministry was ALWAYS politically incorrect.

That's what had him and the Pharisees out of sorts with each other. That's why the Romans were against him. That's why the people followed him. Today's republican xtians have thrown away the New Testament in order to negate the entire span of Christ's ministry. They are actively opposed to what he taught; they spend millions on rallies to denounce his most important "red letter words" and turn Xtians against the Christ they've been taught all their lives to believe in and attempt to emulate. Shame on what is being done in His name. Heck, for that matter, shame on them for what they do in OUR name! Today's Magats are interested only in the Old Testament Yahweh godform. He of the old wargod order... made in the form of others of the time such as Marduk. Give them a blood-thirsty, genocide loving power and they'll follow it to the ends of the earth. Show them the better way Christ taught, and they'd crucify Him again today if they could.