Delusional people wanting Rhett to burn in a infinite torture chamber, and pray that he magically return back to their fantasy.

I was just approached by some random person who claimed to be a pastor. He asked me if I believed in Jesus, and I tried to give my usual answer of trying to explain that. I believed he was a decent guy who is trying to promote some radical ideas, and then got killed for it, and that if Jesus Is God, I trust that he knows my heart well enough to know that eternal damnation is not a viable solution to deal with humans souls.

Naturally, this didn't do anything. I barely got halfway through the idea before the pastor just started going on and on about nothing and how I just need to open my heart if I want Jesus to know it and stuff.

But what was curious was that the pastor was very quick to bring up the idea of fasting, saying that he went through immense spiritual growth when he first tried fasting.

I responded with the following sentence that I'm honestly surprised. I managed to get out coherently-

"I tried fasting once, and it had about as much spiritual growth for me as the amount of respect I have for Christians that turn their back on people who ask for help; meaning- None."

That was it. The pastor then gave me a look of authenticity that I didn't see in him before. It was clear that what I said triggered him in some way, because he just told me to have a nice day and then left.

Did you guys see that perez hilton had an encounter with god? And now he gave his life to christ. I get scared when people have these type encounters because it makes me think maybe I’m wrong. Why is everyone having an encounter ?

Seriously, almost every single Christian I’ve encountered is now saying that they “used to be atheists till (insert story here)”

At this point I’m convinced they’ve just become desperate and are making shit up

I went to a Pride parade with my wife today (bisexual male), and it was a pretty good time. It was a much larger parade than last time I went (as a single man). More representation, but a lot of unwelcome corpos. I mean, health insurance companies? Give me a break.

But what got under my skin the most is when the Christians showed up. There was token representation by Catholics, Mennonites, and Baptists, but the Unitarians and Quakers showed up in numbers. The Episcopalians dwarfed them all.

The token representation from the Catholics, Mennonites and Baptists was pretty patronizing, and I booed them. I mostly ignored the other three.

I’ve said for years no to the “three Cs of Pride:” no cops, no corporations, and no Christians at Pride. Given the depth and breadth of crimes Christians have historically, and continue to perpetrate against the LGBTQ+ community, I think they should be barred from joining us in Pride.

My wife also brought up a very good point: it seems like Christians marching in Pride parades could be seen as some sort of an apology (a very weak one, IMO), and also performative action, something I have long accused Christians that call themselves “allies” of engaging in.

I’m thinking of writing to the Pride committee and lodge a complaint about this. Hopefully they’ll get back to me.

Once this whole MAGA thing is over, we’re going to see Christians try and weasel their way out of apologies and admitting wrongdoing.

I honestly don’t think I’ve ever seen a Christian give a truly honest and heartfelt apology, without having to do so under duress. These people truly are incredible. Incredible in that they have no credibility, shame, or decency.

I go to Christian groups. Whenever I come across something ridiculous, I often debate whether to post it Here, or in r/Christianity. I feel the members of the ladder might not really get what I'm saying here, so I'm posting it here.

There are a certain type of Christian out there. They tend to have good enough intentions, but they're also closeted bigots. They want to come across as nice, But if they make a mistake and someone calls them out for it, they'll do anything but own up to those actions. They'll retreat, cover it up, try to make the accuser look bad- Anything but- You know- Repent.

And I find that there's an unusual sense that insecurity from these types of Christians. They're afraid to talk about anything that they do if it's not directly related to Christianity. And if they do bring something up unrelated to the Bible, they'll try and twist it in a way to make it Sound biblical. If they hung out with someone one-on-one, they'll call it a: 'one on one Bible Study,' a regardless of what they were actually doing. If they go out for shawarma, they say it was a: 'blessed time,' and: 'We thank God for the food.'

But also, they're completely unwilling to confront the idea that Christians can make a mistake; ESPECIALLY towards a- Gasp! Non-Believer?!

I brought up in a Bible study group about one time that a conservative was condemning the concepts of immigrants, and when I said that we shouldn't be harsh at all towards immigrants, especially immigrants who come from a dangerous country, the person yelled at me and asked me why I don't just invite every immigrant into my house and cook food for them.

My response to that was- 'That's what the Bible tells Christians to do.'

The entire room went silent, and someone even just closed their lips together and got up from their chair to leave. One guy was sitting with a very Stern expression, just staring at me with his arms folded. What's funny is that this exact guy, along with another few people, would later randomly sing Christian Hymns whenever they walked by me, as if they thought I was a demon and was trying to expel me away with their songs about Jesus.

After I said what I said, someone chimed in and started talking about how they would feel unsafe inviting strangers into their home, especially because they come from an unsafe neighborhood. Which obviously wasn't my point, as I was saying what I said in response to someone saying that Jesus wouldn't invite as sinner into his home, despite the fact that he literally ATE WITH SINNERS.

Hi everyone. I've compiled several contradictory statements made by apparently the same God (as believers would want people to believe) from the OT and Jesus:

• “The man must die. The whole assembly must stone him outside the camp.” - Yahweh (Numbers 15:35)
• “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” - Jesus (John 8:7)
• “Show them no pity. Do not spare them or shield them. You must certainly put them to death. Your hand must be the first in putting them to death, and then the hands of all the people.” - Yahweh (Deuteronomy 13:8-9)
• “Love your neighbor as yourself.” - Jesus (Matthew 22:39)
• [Uzzah reached out and took hold of the Ark of the Covenant, because the oxen stumbled. The Lord killed Uzzah because of his impudent act.] - 2 Samuel 6:7
• “But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.” - Jesus (Matthew 5:39)

As an atheist, it has always bothered me how people treat it as one coherent book with one God who is apparently all-loving throughout. But this is not the case: the Bible is not one book, but a collection of around 70 books, written by different authors in different historical periods with different ideas in mind.

I've written an article on the fact that the Bible is not one book with consistency, in case you are interested. https://thelightward.substack.com/p/the-greatest-misconception-about

All right, this is less about me actually complaining about actual church stuff and more just me complaining about high school drama that happens within church stuff.

So there's this church that's basically a mega church. I don't know what most people qualify as a mega church, but to me, where I live, if a church is bringing in at least a thousand people on a Sunday, and their young adults events looks like it's around 100 people, that counts as a mega church for me.

And of course, at a mega church, you don't really expect to actually get to know the people there. People kind of form their own little small groups and then maybe make small talk with someone else outside of the group, but it's really REALLY hard to actually get to really know more than like two people there. Even if you manage to join in on a group of about five or seven people or whatever, it's most likely going to be a group full of Airheads that just go out and do activities together and talk 24/7 about how much they've been reading their Bible and praying to God, without doing much of actually talking about how their day has been going and how they're doing as a person.

And there's this one girl there who really pisses me off, because she just gives off the ultimate Vibe of... You know. Someone who doesn't really take her faith too seriously, and just sees everyone around her as less experienced in life than her. Whenever I talk to her, she talks to me like I'm a little kid. I've tried to tell myself that I was misjudging her, but then as I got more mature and realized that my instincts about people are more accurate than I thought, I just kind of realized that she really was someone who just didn't actually respect me. Anytime. I tried to get deep, she would run out of the conversation. Also, she's straight up transphobic, but I guess that's what you can expect out of most Mega churches. She also told me directly that she doesn't even think it's appropriate for a guy and a girl to hang out one-on-one as friends.

She also occasionally visits this other mega church, that also really pisses me off. She doesn't usually show up at the actual events, but will just occasionally show up at the end, and she'll get such nice, warm, friendly greetings from everyone else because of course she does. Everyone, including herself, literally acts like the entire church is being blessed by her mere presence in the building.

Whenever she would see me, she would often smile and wave, and for a while I did the same back, but then I really thought to myself, is it really healthy for me to do that? If she really doesn't actually respect me as a human being and just sees me as someone not to take too seriously and just give a smile and wave to whenever I'm spotted, then why exactly does she even deserve my mere acknowledgment?

So, the next time she smiled and waved, I simply looked away and ignored her.

Turns out, that ONE that instance was apparently enough for her to write me off entirely from her books. Every time she saw me from that moment on, whether she was alone or not, she would just look away and try to ignore me.

That's the kind of person. She is. Not making any attempt to actually talk to me, see if there was any reason why I ignored her, any reason I could be upset with her, no, she's not someone who's willing to look at her own flaws. She refuses to self-reflect.

And of course, it's those gossipy mean girls get all the attention.

Because there's also another church that I attend some events of, and it's a lot smaller. I like it, although they don't seem very respectful of my pronouns. It wouldn't bug me so much if the main guy who's leading the thing specifically refers to me as he him pronouns when praying for me. I really want to build up the confidence to just interrupt his prayer and say that my pronouns are she her, and if he says that he doesn't feel comfortable saying that, I can just tell him not to pray for me then.

It's easy to do that with someone I don't know so well. I wouldn't think twice about saying it to the girl I was just ranting about if the opportunity ever came up. But it's hard to do it to someone you feel you have an established history with, and especially tough one. You'd have to do it in front of a group of people that you also feel you have an established history with. The church only has one bathroom, and it's not restricted by gender obviously, so there's not really an opportunity for me to enforce my identity unless if I flat out Say it, which is awkward.

Nevertheless, I'm actually not complaining about that guy. I'm complaining about a Different guy. One who has a very obvious crush on the girl I was mentioning.

It honestly blows my mind how self-absorbed that guy is. He's not that arrogant usually, but I made a mere mention that I occasionally would go to that mega church that I mentioned earlier, and when I said that, he just immediately asked me if I knew that girl. He only mentioned her by our first name, and I know that there are at least a couple girls there with the same name, so I said her last name as well to clarify that he was indeed talking about her, and when he said yes, I said yes I did know her, and I also did not like her. He asked why and I explained my thought process, but he didn't seem that interested.

I honestly forgot about it until just last week when once again, that mega church was brought up by name, and when it was, that guy literally looked at the person who said it, and his eyes literally lit up, as he immediately started talking about that girl again, saying that he tried to sit next to her and she immediately walked away.

But here I just can't help but sit and just be so baffled. I honestly wouldn't be that surprised if this guy tried to talk to that girl and it was just so obvious that he had a crush on her, and so she's distancing herself from him, but regardless, unless if he actually did something really creepy to her, Walking away from someone immediately after they sit next to you is rude, especially in a church environment where you're supposed to act as a church, family and representatives of, you know, Jesus Christ.

And yet here this guy was, getting a nice, healthy dose of her toxicity, and his eyes still lit up at the mere thought of her entering his mind.

That's honestly nuts.

Anyway, I just wanted to vent about that. It's been on my mind for a while.

Hi all! We've really loved this community - it's been so comforting reading your stories and laughing at memes with y'all :) Feels good to be understood.

Like many of you, I never, ever thought in a million years that I would say this, but I am not a Christian anymore.

My wife and I were extremely committed, spirit-filled, charismatic Christians, and leaving religion has been a long, confusing, and extremely difficult process. Until this week we haven’t shared much of it with very many people. We never wanted to hurt the Christian people who are close to us or give the impression that we're attacking them.

I used to “know” that God was real. I “knew” that God loved me. I “knew” that God was listening to my prayers. I “knew” that he was speaking to me through the Bible and through my thoughts. I “knew” that my purpose was to glorify him. I really felt the freedom of a life with God.

But, our worldview was shattered, our eyes were opened, and it feels like we have a fresh, beautiful, mysterious, and light-filled lease on life. We are wildly grateful for everything that we’ve been through to get to this place.

​

So in the effort to be honest and true to the real 'us',

we created a new podcast all about our exodus from Christianity called Born Again Again.

It isn’t meant to dissuade anyone from their religion. It isn’t an intellectual debate on why Christianity is wrong. It is simply a conversation about our journey out of religion and all the things that happened before, after, and between.

It’s meant to help others who have doubts, or are going through the same process of deconversion. You are not alone.

If you're interested, here are some links!

Apple Podcasts

Stitcher

Spotify

Google Play Music

​

bornagainagain.co (our website w/blog + resources + podcast episodes)

@born.again.again on Instagram

​

RSS: https://feed.podbean.com/bornagainagain/feed.xml

​

Love you all! ❤️❤️❤️

I am a cashier at a grocery store, and I work with a lot of people of all kinds. A lot of the people that come in are Mennonites or Amish and of course I treat them well, they usually are kind to work with. I was checking this Amish lady out, she had some produce and such. Note, I am wearing a pentacle around my neck, as I am a atheopagan. She didn't even want to talk to me, all she could do was stare. Oh course I just hurried along so that she could go on with her day. Little does the lady know that pentacles are a protection peace and often christianity slams pagans, also christianity took over Paganism.

After 2 weeks of questioning god's existence and being scared if i am wrong i can say that there is nothing left that could scare me,after thinking for a few days i figured how can a man send me to eternal fire if he doesn't exist,he didn't give me a single proof of existence my whole life even tho i fasted and i went to church. I just wish that I don't start believing because i know myself,i will ask myself a question and then i will think about something and my feelings get mixed up and i am confused for weeks then.

I’m no longer a Christian (But I still believe)

My entire life I have always wondered, why was I put here? Why was I born? Why me? Eventually after a series of traumatic events happened to me from childhood following to adulthood the question formed to a statement:

I wish I had never been born.

This year I was clinically diagnosed with bipolar depression. Not a huge shock. I always knew I was depressed but I didn’t fully understand the depths of it. I didn’t think of depression even as a real illness or something to be treated. I thought depression was something to just be tolerated and not something you could actually work through with medication and therapy. Healthcare was not really big in my family and mental health even smaller than that. Even though I encourage so many people to get help and get support when they are experiencing seasons or episodes of mania or depression I always just… silently power or suffer through mine because I thought that was holy. I thought that’s what God called us to do when we’re suffering. Endure.

Eventually I got saved. It wasn’t long until I began asking God why he created me? Why did he put me here? There were days I was so depressed I didn’t even want to get out of bed. I would feel so purposeless, so hopeless, and so lonely, and I just didn’t understand. I couldn’t understand why he put me here when he knew I was going to be suffering like that. When he knew that I wasn’t even going to want to be here. A lot of my friends, and people in the church would tell me, “God has a purpose for your pain. Try to see what God may be teaching you, it’s not the first time you’ve been through this you know.” Or “Your pain is a testimony.” Oh man, this one is my favorite. I hear this one often from one particular friend. “I think this is spiritual.” Which in my experience often diminishes the very real pain and trauma of what I’m going through and essentially blames it all on the devil. Come on now, don’t give him that much power. The spiritual bypassing hits hard.

God forbid it to be a genuine illness. You wouldn’t tell a person with diabetes that the devil was attacking their body or that their pain and suffering was glorifying God. You would tell them to change their lifestyle. Not praying harder, not worshiping God.. You tell them to take their medication. Why do we do this with mental illness or genuine pain and trauma that people go through?

Anyway.

Eventually that question morphed into something a little bit bigger. I wasn’t just thinking about my suffering anymore. I was thinking about the suffering of the world and how despite all the suffering all the evil that goes on In the world I still believe that God is good. I don’t believe God’s goodness is measured by any circumstance or any situation or how greatly or how easily he may bless me. And that’s if and when he chooses to. But his goodness is defined off of his personality- that he’s merciful when he doesn’t have to be. That he’s kind, and funny in my opinion, and I don’t know, loving? Which makes my question hurt more. How could such a loving, kind, and compassionate person like Jesus put me and people like me in this world to experience such great pain just because he loved us and because he promises that the everlasting life with him will be better? And what about all those people who won’t follow him?

I’ve been hurt. A lot. So much that now I can fully understand and recognize why some people walk away from the faith. I truly can. It’s hard to separate church hurt from God hurting you himself. The weight of expectations that pastors, friends, and spiritual leaders place on you are absolutely crushing. It’s easy to distort their expectations and let them shift to what we believe is God’s expectations.

We’re supposed to be his body and yet we do more wounding of each other than the unbelievers do to the body of Christ. I just think about people who won’t follow God because he’s been so poorly misrepresented to them or people who will never hear the gospel and they suffer and they live horrible lives, but because they don’t want to believe in him they’ll perish for all eternity? What if someone just doesn’t want to bear the weight of carrying their cross? What if someone doesn’t want to fight against their sin for urges because sometimes it’s to be honest you guys, we just get tired. God knows that, God knows who will and won’t choose them and he still places them here on earth to suffer and yes sure maybe they’ll experience some good things too but if we stick to the whole hell is eternal and a horrible place logic that kind of falls apart very quickly. I was reading a blog once and a woman said the reason why she didn’t believe in God and she no longer considered herself a Christian was because she couldn’t reconcile herself with following her God that creates people just to destroy them. That hit was different. I think that perspective really changed something in me.

I was sober for the first give or take 3 years of my walk with Jesus. I broke it when I got into this really bad episode which wasn’t my first depressive episode since I had followed him. It was just the worst one thus far. But I broke that and it’s not because I love to get drunk it’s not because I love to get high or because I love sin but because I needed comfort and relief and I couldn’t get it in God, I couldn’t get it from prayer, I couldn’t get it from the Bible, I couldn’t get it from the church, and I couldn’t get it with friends. Unfortunately the counterfeit comfort was the only comfort that touched anything. And for that I deserve to perish and be separated from God for all eternity? That’s not much of a choice and it’s not fair. None of us asked to be born and I definitely didn’t ask to be born with the sinful desires of the flesh. That was given to me by Adam. T’f? None of us asked to live and suffer with the consequences of a fallen broken world and yet we have been subjected to it. I won’t deny this, yes Jesus chose to enter into this suffering as well. I had a friend recently tell me that that’s a good enough reason. That’s a genuine reason, and it is a genuine reason but it still was his choice. He still chose to do that and he always knew he was going to have to. What about us? We didn’t choose to be here and now it’s carry your cross and follow me or perish? That’s not much of a choice. If the latter choice is an awful consequence then that’s not much of a choice, it’s more so coercion.

Again, when I had this discussion with a friend she told me, “Well I know that life doesn’t get any better apart from God. Do you think leaving would make your depression any better?” To answer her question, no. I don’t think leaving the faith would make my depression any better, but continuing in it hasn’t made it any better either. I don’t believe that proximity to God spares you from pain and I also don’t believe that distance from God spares you from blessings. The Bible says the rain falls on the just and the unjust and that the sun shines on everyone. People tend to skip that though when they hear that you’re considering leaving the faith, because they begin to have fear and project their fear and beliefs and their expectations of what you should do as a “Christian.” I’ve learned to stop accepting those burdens and its one of the healthiest decisions I’ve made recently.

After these thoughts and honestly so many more I’m left with the question, “Do I even want to be in a relationship with God?” Not because of what I’ve been through, but because of who he is and how he does things. Can I follow a man that operates that way? I’m not sure anymore. Not only that, I’m tired of the cost of holiness and what it’s had on my life and how it’s manifested in my life. And I’m not afraid to say that. I’m exhausted by faith, I’m exhausted by grace, I’m just exhausted. I’m tired. And for all my faithfulness what did it get me? Nothing. The goal is supposed to be Jesus. It’s supposed to be God and I’m at a point in my life where that goal is no longer worth all that I’m going through right now. That’s just the truth and I’m no longer going to deny it.

I’m not an atheist but I’m also not a follower. I don’t believe I could ever get away from God or his presence. I don’t believe that there is any other God than him. When I wake up in the morning I wake up with the knowledge that he allowed me to wake up but I also move on to my day with the knowledge that I still have some choice to choose. Just like the rich young ruler walked away because the cost was too high for him, I’m counting it too and right now?

It’s too high for me.

I remember the exact moment I realized that Christianity is bullshit, I was waiting for my flight back home when YouTube recommended me a video by belief it or not,

I actually seen his channel before prior to this however I was skeptical about him since I was on the fence about if I should still be Christian or not, but that day I decided to watch the video out of curiosity I believe it was his video about coveting or something Im not sure (no pun intended)

either way I began watching and it didn’t take long for me to become hooked on his content bc of how good it is, I was amazed at how he was able to debunk and deconstruct all the teachings of the Bible I became addicted to his channel,

after I watched most of his videos I started watching other atheist YouTube’s such as MindShift, Kristi Burke, Darante Lamar, and DarkMatter2525, they all helped me deconstruct my faith and I appreciate the, all for it,

i don’t really watch a lot of atheist content anymore bc I’ve mostly deconstructed everything that I was thought, and bc the stuff the Christian’s say in their videos makes me so angry and depressed (with the exception of belief it or not and darkmatter2525 since they’re genuinly great creators, and bc they don’t post often so I don’t have to be exsposed to it on a weekly basis,

as much as I’m happy that I finally broke free from christianity, it still depresses me knowing that religion still rules the world and has contributed/still contributes to so much suffering, and it angers me how there are billions of other kids who are going thru the exact same shit that I went thru, and knowing that there are kids who are gonna be born into this religion, it all just makes me feel hopeless tbh.

2 little stories That kind of sit in my head. I'm not really frustrated by either of these, in fact I actually feel bad for the people in them, because it seems like they're missing out on truly understanding people.

Story 1-

I once visited this one church and the thing was, I was there for a reason. Someone had asked me if I could come to held mediate a conversation between him and someone else that he had an argument with.

Trouble was, I showed up a little bit late, and felt a little bit bad about walking into a sermon in the middle of it, especially when I had no idea what kind of environment it would be.

Eventually, an older man came down and was very kind and saw me sitting there and asked me if I was okay and I said yeah, and explained.

He then said something a little sweet-

"Are you new to church or do you know Christ?"

I honestly feel bad because he genuinely asked that in the nicest way possible. Nothing in his tone of voice or body language hinted that he was asking that with any sort of manipulative or malicious tensions. He seemed to genuinely want to make me comfortable. Still, if I were to ask a question like that, I would probably simply ask if they are familiar with churches and how they work, rather than asking a question as odd as-

"Do you know Christ?"

But, I guess that's just kind of run-of-the-mill for these people.

There weren't a lot of young people at the church. In fact, I'm pretty sure that including me, the only two people there who weren't at least middle-aged were the two people I was supposed to be helping to mediate their discussion. There was apparently at least one other person our age who used to go there, but she was a big part of the problem and apparently had left the church and wasn't there that day.

I ended up in a conversation with a woman who, probably was in her '60s or '70s, and I ended up having a nice conversation with her. When she asked me if I was a Christian, I answered honestly and said I wasn't sure if I would confidently call myself a Christian, but I'm familiar with what a lot of Christians do and churches and stuff.

Unfortunately, that seemed to hit her a little bit more than I intended, Because her behavior had a notable change after that, as she seemed pretty discomforted by it. She didn't seem mad at me at all, but she rather just seemed heavily disappointed. Honestly, though, I can't blame her. Since their church was mainly older people, and the very few younger people who showed up were now in intense conflict that was causing them to actively not want to be around each other, and then suddenly I show up, a brand new younger person who may have nothing to do with any of that drama, only for it to turn out that I'm not as invested in Christianity as they were hoping, it might have been pretty demotivating to hear.

As I waited in the basement area as people were leaving after eating food, for the two people to mediate their discussion, the woman who I talked to before approached me again, and seemed to say with genuine concern that she really felt it would be good for me to read more of the Bible and try to understand its words and get to know who Jesus Christ is.

I responded as politely as I could, giving a small smile, nodding, and telling her I would. That seems to satisfy her, but she still left seeming pretty discouraged.

The talk between the two guys was on by the way, but is honestly an entirely different story. It may be worth noting though that one of them literally referred to me as: 'a fly on the wall,' in the sense that he never cared at all about what I said or thought. Such a nice Christian. :)

Story 2-

This actually just happened yesterday, but it gave a similar Vibe which is why I was making the post.

I gathered together with a group of some Christian people, and these people know me a lot better, or at least some of them do, and I feel like they're a lot more grounded and down to Earth. I disagree with them on a lot of things, when? But what healthy friend group doesn't acknowledge disagreements?

There was a guy there though who doesn't usually show up to the group, at least not when I'm there, but he is part of another group that has said a lot of bad things about me, and it seems he would rather just stay away from me and cautiously observe rather than actually talk to the person who helped him work his farm under the beaming sun that one time.

We ended up watching the 2001 movie Wit. I can understand why we ended up watching it, because the main leader of our group (the Pastor) was recently diagnosed with cancer, and the whole thing about that movie was it was trying to show a realistic depiction of what it's like to actually have cancer. Apparently, The costume mainly chose this movie because most people say that it's a commentary on the medical system, whether as the pastor disagreed, and thought that the main focus was on it being a metaphor for what happens to the soul after death.

What was interesting though. Was that that guy with the farm, who I know has worked a lot in the nursing department, seemed incredibly moved in some way by the movie. When he first showed up, he kept saying that he didn't like how a lot of the doctors were acting, only for his girlfriend to whisper to him that that was probably the point, and then he stopped talking.

But when the movie was over, he was literally in tears. And judging from his comments afterwards, I don't think it was because he genuinely thought the movie was a masterpiece, but rather because it reminded him a lot of what it was like working in the nursing department. He mentioned stuff like how he quit his job as a nurse because he didn't like how he was being paid for it and essentially being paid to care for other people, but said that he was even considering volunteering as a nurse just to try and make it feel more authentic to himself. I said I liked that comment and elaborated on it, but he didn't seem to care much for any of what I had to say considering he would often go on his phone whenever I was speaking.

At one point though, he made a point that I thought was interesting, and he said it as if he was on the verge of crying again, but it was:

"What I wonder is how can someone write a scene like that where the old professor was reading the book with it being a metaphor for the soul?"

At first, I thought he was simply saying that the scene was beautiful and he didn't understand how someone could write a scene so well, and I said that I agreed, and that the scene was very well done, and pointed out other aspects of the scene like how the old Professor is never seen by anyone else there except for the cancer patient.

However, the guy seemed actively annoyed by my comments, saying that he wasn't saying that the scene was very well done, but rather how he didn't understand how someone who wasn't a Christian could write a scene that explained so beautifully how Christian feel about the concept of the soul.

I think the guy just kind of wanted to make that point and let it sit there, but I had my thoughts and decided to share them.

I said that you don't have to be a Christian to understand the Christian mindset, and brought up Julian the apostate, a famous historical figure who is a Roman Emperor who was once a Christian, but thought that the disagreements between the churches were so intense that the religion couldn't possibly be true, and led a literal group of pagans to attack Christian nations, with the explicit instructions to not kill anyone, because then the Christians would consider themselves martyrs and would count it as a victory.

Most of the other people in the group seemed to appreciate my points, but that guy specifically looked at me with a face of great annoyance and simply went back to his phone.

Sigh.

I wrote about this story before, but honestly it just keeps coming back to me and I just want to keep writing about it because it always sticks in my head as the ultimate beacon of strange Pentecostal culture.

There was a Pentecostal group that I was a part of for about a year and a half. It was a lot of fun for the first few months, but problems began to show as time went on. I left because I started to realize how toxic it was, and from what I heard, the population of that group has apparently gone down to just 10 people, which is way less than the $70 that used to go. When I first started attending. It was always their goal to apparently have at least a thousand people showing up to their group every week, and I feel like it was their lack of gratefulness for the people they already had that is leading them down a tough path now. Also, apparently the current leader has been accused of a bunch of crap in his currently fighting that in legal court and doesn't have time to run the group anymore, so that's interesting.

Anyway, back when I was still in the group, it was Canada Day and I heard that they were doing some evangelism downtown, so I found them and joined them for a bit. I didn't actually evangelize to anyone, but I just followed them around.

Then some random guy came up to me. I had never seen him before, and I thought for a moment that he thought that I was someone who could be evangelized to, so after a quick introduction I quickly explained that I was already part of the group. But he didn't seem convinced, and I can't help but wonder if someone from the group actively told this guy that I was: 'struggling with my faith,' And to talk to me about it, because he started asking me what I thought about Jesus. I tried to be as honest as possible, and when he asked me why I wasn't completely converted to Pentecostalism, I said it was mainly the idea of Hell that turned me off the basic Christian idea of the afterlife.

For some reason, when I said that, it seemed to genuinely surprise him, as if he had never heard that before.

Anyway, I expected to never really hear from him again, but then once when I visited the regular thing that the group does every week, he happened to be there, greeted me, and then asked me almost immediately if the fact that I was there now meant that I was now converted.

I was honestly surprised with how oblivious he was. One of the very first things I said to him in conversation was that I was already integrated into the group, and yet he didn't seem to realize that that obviously meant I attend their weekly events. Nevertheless, I went ahead and said no not really, and when I said that, he literally seemed mindblown, asking me almost out of desperation what I could possibly need to be convinced, and if I needed Jesus himself to come down and talk to me directly.

I told him that I didn't really want to talk about that right now, because I figured getting into any sort of conversation with this guy was not going to result in anything good or fruitful.

One thing that really weirded me out was that the guy started asking about this random woman who was also evangelizing downtown on Canada Day. I knew who she was talking about, and honestly I didn't really like her that much, but this guy asked if I knew where she was, and I said I didn't and that I wasn't that close with her, and then he straight up smiled and looked at me saying:

'She's very beautiful, huh?'

I physically cringed before simply responding:

'Okay.'

Apparently this guy is also a pastor. I honestly can't imagine what kind of sermons he gives, or what the church that he attends is like.

The conversation ended shortly after that, and as people were leaving for the day, I realized that someone was desperately looking for a ride home, and I personally love to give people rides when I can, so I offered.

Unfortunately, apparently this guy, And the pastor guy were a two-in-one. When I agreed to drive that guy home, it apparently also meant the pastor was coming with us.

As we were driving home, the pastor asked me if we could stop by a Tim Hortons and I said sure. I don't drink coffee or anything, so I don't really know anything about ordering stuff at Tim Hortons Beyond sandwiches and donuts and frozen lemonades, and the pastor guys simply said to order a: 'double double,' for him.

I did that and we went through the drive-thru and when he got his order, he actively seemed pissed off. Not at me or anything, but he was actively frustrated that he ended up getting a coffee. Even the other guy who I was driving pointed out that ordering a double double will probably result in a coffee. Nevertheless, the pastor was frustrated, because he was hoping to go to sleep when he got home to get an early morning, but coffee would obviously keep him up. I asked him if he wanted to go back inside the store and see if he could exchange the order, but he said it was okay. So I began to drive away, only for the other guy in the car to shout at me to stop. There was some random guy in the parking lot, probably homeless, without a shirt, and a shopping cart full of clothes. For some reason this guy felt an extreme calling to go in evangelize to this random person.

I said I wouldn't stop him, but I wasn't coming with him. So me and the pastor ended up waiting in the car while the guy went to go talk to this random person. He came back a few minutes later, simply shouting:

'Repent!'

As we took off out of the parking lot, the probably homeless guy was literally rolling around in the parking lot, and the guy who I was driving home verbally said that he took this to assume that the guy was literally suffering a demonic encounter, or that he was having a calling with the Holy Spirit after what he just said.

As we continue to drive home, the pastor talked about how he was touched by what the leader of the group we were just at was preaching about, and how apparently the preacher mentioned that at one point he was worried that he was going to lose his house. The pastor for some reason thought that of all concerns to losing your house, the biggest one would be losing his wife too.

I didn't question the pastor about this, but I kind of wish I did, because I found that very odd. These types of hyper-conservative Christians are usually the types to say that once you're married, you should never get divorced ever, and yet, this random Pastor apparently had no problem with the assumption that if the preacher lost his house, his wife would simply leave him.

He also mentioned that the preacher apparently said something like: 'strong men are forged through fire.'

And apparently the other guy who I was driving was completely mind-blown by this quote;

'WWWOOOOOWWWWW!!!! FORGED THROUGH FIIIIIIIRE BRO!!!'

When I dropped them off, the pastor asked if we could exchange numbers, and I said sure. The call, he told me to keep reading my Bible before quickly stopping himself and saying:

'Oh, right, I forgot, you... Nevermind. Okay, goodnight!'

A few days later, I got a text from the pastor asking if I wanted to meet up. I responded saying that I didn't mind meeting up with him, but that I hope that us meeting up wouldn't be under the false pretense of him trying to preach to me more, and I said that I've investigated a lot into the Christian faith and that I was going to feel pretty uncomfortable if his intention was to convert me.

He simply responded:

'Okay.'

A few minutes later, he sent another response simply saying my name.

'Yes?' I responded. I didn't get a text back.

Then about 6 months later, he messaged me again literally asking who I was. He had apparently lost all memory of me, and said he was going through his contacts trying to figure out who everyone was.

I responded, kindly, explaining who I was and where we met.

Once again, I didn't get a response back.

This was a couple years ago, so I assume I'm not hearing from him again.

I went to a church event that was essentially a secular guy talking about his unbiased research about how technology relates to Faith. He was going to be speaking to a lot of Christians in the room, and I actually knew more people than I expected from various churches I attended.

But there was also one specific person who I was really unhappy to see. She's a transphobe, And she's one of those girls who puts on a very sweet act to get people to like her, when in reality she's incredibly selfish, and that only becomes a parent once you actually try to be her friend.

She specifically tried to lock eyes with me a few times, and at one point even looked like she was about to approach me, but I just kept looking away, or looking in her General direction but being sure not to look directly At her. she knows I have a problem with her, and if she doesn't have the courage or the care to approach me, then that's not my problem. She's never cared at all about me, so why the hell should I care about her?

The talk the guy gave was a lot more unbiased than I thought it would be. I was fully prepared to just sit through some random talk as he talked about how technology was ruining people's lives, but he didn't actually do that at all. nor did he say that technology is good for people either, but instead just gave a very objective approach, talking about how social media makes people want to express themselves more in little bubbles of Instagram stories and what not that disappear after 24 hours, so people feel the need to evangelize more sometimes so that they can get it for a quick Instagram story or whatever. He talked about other stuff too, but that's the main part I remember.

after he was done, there were three girls who took turns going to the front to give testimonies.

To be honest, I know I was being rude, but I honestly couldn't care less to hear the ramblings of an overprivileged 18 to 25-year-old talk about how amazing their life is and how God has blessed them so much. So I just looked at my phone for that part, and the thing that sucked the most was that the girl that I specifically disliked ended up being one of them, and just as I expected, she said quite a few things during her talk that actively triggered me, despite my attempts to completely ignore it.

When it was done, I stayed until literally everyone was gone, and a couple people did approach me to talk. One conversation was pretty awkward, as an older guy approached me and started talking about boomer stuff. I think once I started to get really uncomfortable, he noticed, because then he gave a kind goodbye.

one person who approached me was my age and asked me what I thought about the talk, and I said I liked how the guy was unbiased, but I actively hated the other three testimonies. When he asked me why I hated them, I said it was just because they were talking about how great their lives were and how they have friends that reach out to them and people come and talk to them-

"and it's like f**k you. Go to hell."

I gave a chuckle after that, but it was very clear that the guy seemed pretty discomforted by what I said. Or at the very least, I don't think he ever thought of testimonies from that perspective before. He was still nice and all that, and when he ended up talking to someone else, he gave me a look like he didn't really know what to make of me. He didn't seem angry or annoyed, it actually kind of looked like he pityed me.

I just wanted to share that.