Longtime readers know what I think of Christianity’s claim to be the locus of “family values” — it’s a marketing lie. The 1st-century Christian church was a cult, the New Testament is the literature of a cult, and like all cults it recognized that healthy marriages and families undermine its ownership and control of its members. Today brings two good examples.
First, a re-publication of a nice confessional piece by Bruce Gerencser, a former pastor who abandoned the faith when he realized he no longer believed what he preached and, worse, living according to Christian teachings did a lot of harm to those around him.
It’s time for me to come clean.
I can no longer hide from my past.
The ugly, awful truth must come out.
I had an affair.
Read the entire thing.
Second, a reader sends a link to a disturbing report about the quaint, bucolic lives of the Amish.
Over the past year, I’ve interviewed nearly three dozen Amish people, in addition to law enforcement, judges, attorneys, outreach workers, and scholars. I’ve learned that sexual abuse in their communities is an open secret spanning generations. Victims told me stories of inappropriate touching, groping, fondling, exposure to genitals, digital penetration, coerced oral sex, anal sex, and rape, all at the hands of their own family members, neighbors, and church leaders.
None of this will surprise anybody whose understanding has grown past Christian marketing lies. As with Donald Trump, a lot of Pious howling about the wickedness of “the world” is, in fact, neither more nor less than projection by severely screwed-up people.
Seriously: What you need to do next Sunday morning is bundle-up your spouse and children and dog and head to a park. If Our Invisible Friend is all that believers claim He is, then He can find you there, too, if He’s got anything to say to you.