Do you think of Mormons as Christians?

i was trying to think of a jewish analog to this kind of boundary-making identification but afaict jewish ethnic divisions are much older much more about family groups than ideological posturing. is there a modern equivalent in jewish culture i wonder.

idk do Xtians care if Orthodox Jews consider converted Reform Jews actual Jews? (they do not btw)

lol xp

I really can't conceive of a rationale for saying an individual who professes to be a Christian is somehow wrong or mistaken about that. Contrariwise, while I profess to be a Jew and was raised Jewish, some Orthodox Jews wouldn't consider me Jewish based on the rules of matrilineal descent (my mom isn't Jewish), and we're all familiar with the phenomenon of people who profess not to be Jewish being told that they are by various authorities (including Jewish ones).

i was trying to think of a jewish analog to this kind of boundary-making identification but afaict jewish ethnic divisions are much older much more about family groups than ideological posturing. is there a modern equivalent in jewish culture i wonder.

― mattresslessness, Tuesday, September 2, 2014 11:57 AM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It's the "did you know [X famous person] is Jewish?" game.

my take is that if you're not of a religion, and someone says "I'm a <X>" then whatever, they can be whatever they say they are

if you're part of <X> then in some small way, everyone is doing <X> wrong and you can make whatever metrics you need to decide if they're actually <X>

Can I be a buddhist that eats brisket? That would be awesome!

I really can't conceive of a rationale for saying an individual who professes to be a Christian is somehow wrong or mistaken about that.

the rationale is that they're weird sicko heretics. duh

Up the heretics imo

here tics

*vapes*

this clip explains rationale p well imo:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBKIyCbppfs

i was trying to think of a jewish analog to this kind of boundary-making identification but afaict jewish ethnic divisions are much older much more about family groups than ideological posturing. is there a modern equivalent in jewish culture i wonder.

i think this is chassidim v. misnagdim probably tho very few jews would say that the other isn't actually jewish.

and of course this is at play in conversions today - orthodox doesn't accept conservative conversations, conservative doesn't accept reform, reform probably accepts any conversion

When I was a fundamentalist, our youth group leader showed us Anti-Mormon propaganda and essentially told us to be 'closed-minded' to this un-Christian form of thinking. It wasn't until later that I learned 20% of the propaganda video was 20-30 years out of date. Not to say that the Mormon religion view on Blacks wasn't completely o_O anyway but there's a lot of that anti-Mormon sentiment still circulating more traditional forms of Christianity

if yr Christian upbringing was only 20 yrs out of date with crucial info you got off lightly son

lol

tbf religion in america remakes itself at like 100x the speed of the rest of the world

I don't remember seeing any anti-unitarian propaganda when I was a kid/christian. How did they get off so easy?

do you think of steve jobsians as christians? why yes i do, i am open-minded that way

there's a lot of that anti-Mormon sentiment still circulating more traditional forms of Christianity

if you're a non-Mormon Christian it seems to me like you should at least firmly believe that Mormons are going to Hell, but my ideas of Christianity come from Baptists + evangelicals + King James onlies, not huggy liberal all-inclusive new agey types

i went to a mainline methodist church as a kid, they mostly seemed to believe in agape. and youth groups.

yeah, i kind of self-raised myself Methodist and we seemed to be pretty chill and not much hell stuff in there

i found a thread for unitarian jokes on the simpsons, and they found over the expanse of the series, there were four.

I never even heard of Unitarians until I was an adult in NYC! My impression is that they're a Northeast thing?

lol my mother was raised Methodist and then decided it was too much about doing good in the world and not enough about one's personal relationship with Jesus Christ, ever-present in your heart. Sealed my fate right there.

iirc aside from their internal problems with splitters and all-includers and gradual disappearance due to indefinite vagueness, unitarians had a hard time weathering the periodic religious revivals over the 19th/20th c and u.s. expansion

i told my grandfather he was going to hell when i was like 5. grandmama was delighted.

i went to a unitarian congregation in slc once, i was very put off by the western white liberal subaru w obama sticker congregation and sermon, made me think of crazy grandpas with "get US out of the United Nations!" bumper stickers with fondness

lol otm

i sometimes think about going to a Unitarian meeting, they seem like people i'd vibe with, but i don't really want to tourist other people's faith so i dunno

My impression is that they're a Northeast thing?

My impression is that they're "always within a mile of a college campus" thing.

I can immediately think of where the Unitarian congregations meet in both my hometown and college town, and that's definitely true for the latter but not for the former. Definitely near a historically edgier neighborhood, though.

Both in the midwest, naturally

i sometimes think about going to a Unitarian meeting, they seem like people i'd vibe with, but i don't really want to tourist other people's faith so i dunno

Oh god no they'd fucking love it, seriously.

Talked about this elsewhere but I went to a Unitarian church here in Chicago for a little while. They were so earnest and sincere. It was really sweet, actually.

Then they had this dramatic internal rebellion against the minister because she talked about God and Jesus too much (lolllll Unitarians) and it got weird plus I stopped wanting to get up so early so I quit going.

"I'm here to talk to you....about God."
'AGAIN?'
"And our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ."
'Can't we explore some of the ancillary characters for once?'

"Listen lady, stick to 'Spirit of Life' and we'll all get along just fine."

I tried attending a Unitarian church once a while back during a period when I was really lonely and looking for some community in my life. First sunday went okay. Second sunday the sermon was about tithing. Third sunday it was themed around the football and I just peaced.

i only went to church when there was free food eventually

and even then Swayzed out when the youth group leader began insisting a fucking baked potato was a *meal*

I mean, a baked potato will fill you up pretty good.

in my house they were sides. I mean I won't shit on a baked potato or nothin cos I fuckin love em but they're an "and" for me

Neither here nor there, but I was talking to someone recently who spent her freshman year of college at a midwestern liberal arts school that has some reformed church linkage (and iirc, a link to an ilxor) and she told me that her roommates sat her down and tried an intervention because her family was Catholic and they thought she was going to hell.

once she was at liberal arts school her card was well marked anyways I'd say

that kind of thinking is rampant. our youth group leader loudly pronounced one night that she didn't want any of us to be Catholics, only to have one of the attendees blow up because he was Catholic (not a member of the church, but an occasional visitor).

besides Hell is gonna be rad

hell is other potatoes

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Funeral_potatoes

^^^one of the best parts of my childhood years in Utah

I don't have any experience with Mormon communities outside the Big U. I wonder about the differences.

Oh wait I went to Colorado City once, but those folks are pretty far outside of mainstream Mormonism. It was fucking scary.

there's a unitarian church in cambridge, the vicar or whatever he is is very "I play the drums in a local combo" (he may actually play the drums in a local combo)

When it's not too hot to turn the oven on we have baked potatoes for dinner once every couple of weeks but we're atheists so it follows.

It took a lot of explanation to convince him that no, the mainstream Mormon church has not endorsed polygamy and has in fact condemned it since before 1900.

Guessing, but I reckon you'd find a lot of australians would think this of mormons too tbh.

plus I stopped wanting to get up so early so I quit going

Why I Am Not A Christian

(well, nearly everything else as well, but that is how my apostasy began)

yes, they are christian. in a way that will likely prevent me from ever identifying as christian.