A thoughtful piece at Rational Doubt, the Clergy Project blog, reprises a point I’ve made countless times through the years — that the whole of Christianity relies upon you accepting the intensely degrading metaphysical claim that you’re no damn good.
I decided then that as a former bible bigot and user of Evangelical hate speech, I would call out the Evangelicals for their hate speech.
Here are some typical examples of hate speech that Evangelicals direct at their fellow human beings:
“You are born with a sinful evil human nature.”
“You deserve to burn in a fire for all eternity.”
“You need to follow our blood sacrifice religion and forsake your mother, father, sister and brothers if they don’t accept our religion.”
“You are worthless and deserve the torture you will receive in hell.”
I’m uneasy with characterizing this pro forma Christian rhetoric as hate speech, because I’m sure that most of the people who say these things earnestly believe they are doing a good thing — bringing you a gift. The objection remains valid, however, for Christianity has nothing on offer to those who aren’t insecure and damaged enough to accept its demeaning premises.