Again, a few "Christians" who give the rest a bad name

The BBQ Pit
1

My BIL owns a shop here in town. I guess you call it a gaming shop, there’s a lot of figurines to buy and paint, like Warhammer, and he has rooms for people to play MagiNation and role-playing card games like that. He also sells painting supplies and holds tournaments.

Both of my BILs, their wives (Ivylad’s sisters) and my daughter go to the same church. Ivylad and I aren’t churchgoers, but my daughter likes to go, as much as to see her cousins and aunts and uncles as anything else. We’ve been a couple times, mainly to see our daughter sing in the choir.

My SIL (married to the BIL who owns the gaming shop) also teaches at the church school.

Now, apparently, a group of their fellow church members have decided that my BIL is a Satanist because of his shop and are going to try to shut down his business.

The business that supports his wife and two children.

Another group at the same church tried the same thing and didn’t get very far, so now another group of “Christians” are trying.

A lot of teenage boys from the church hang out at the shop as well. Perhaps that’s why the parents are worried…I mean, why hang out at a shop to play games and paint figurines when you could be out smoking crack and knocking up the head cheerleader?

I know all Christians are not like this, but for crying out loud, how goddamned narrow minded can you be? He’s not doing anything illegal. He’s trying to run a small shop to keep a roof over his children’s head and feed his family. Can you imagine the group of people you see weekly and worship with can be so nasty? What a betrayal!

My BIL plans to talk to the pastor about this. There are rumours the pastor does not support the movement to shut down his store (as if they’d get very far) and I suggested that the pastor do a sermon about the sins of gossip and remind everyone of the Golden Rule.

It seems to me that the fundies have one huge flaw, the denial of imagination. There cannot be anything to deviate from what their own petty minds can dredge up, and those who think and dream and reach for that something that can’t be found in the bible, chapter and verse, are Satan’s minions.

I will let you know how it goes.

2

That’s the thing about a lot of fundies: they do not possess the ability to think for themselves. That is why they live their entire lives out of one book. They cannot have imagination because imagination requires one to think for themselves. I think it’s dispicable what the “Christians” are doing, although not overly suprising. In my experience, Christians (and some Mormons I have met- note I said some, Monty) believe that religion is of such a high importance, that the welfare of people don’t matter anymore. I saw it in the Mormon missionaries that tried to convert a friend after she was in tears worried about how her family would never speak to her again (if she converted). They didn’t even address her worries, their minds were so focused on converting her. I had to remind them of the “honor thy father and mother” commandment that they were convienently forgetting to follow. I see it in this situation. Who cares if this family ends up on the street? As long as they’re not selling their “evil” figurines.

Ahh, Christian (and other) charity at it’s finest.

:rolleyes:

3

Hey, they might have a point. I became a puppy-raping baby-eating cat-shaving murderous Satanist because a once purchased an elf figurine. Hey, who can resist the corruption of pewter?

4

Um, every religion has those that are extremists…

I guess those people forgot to pull the that big ol’ board outta their eyes first…
I say enjoy the free press!

5

Not quite. They have an imagination, it just is a little too fruitful.

Some years back, I was living in West Texas, in a town noted for religious and social conservatism. I was going through a divorce, the filing of which had been published in the local paper, had just lost my older child, and because of those two issues, wasn’t dating anyone and didn’t seem to want to date anyone. What’s more, I wasn’t Christian.

Therefore, I must be a lesbian and a Satanist. After all, what woman didn’t want to be a wife and mother? If they didn’t, well, put two and two together. The rumors about me started to fly.

The end result was that by Halloween weekend, the rumors had taken on a life of their own. I was a lesbian, a Satanic witch, and a baby-killer. Therefore, I was a threat. The most outlandish of the rumors was that I had somehow targeted people for assault for my Halloween “ritual”. That I didn’t know any of these people and they didn’t know me didn’t stop their imaginations from running wild; I was a threat to be dealt with. Management called me in for a meeting and told me about these rumors. I was so shocked that I didn’t know what to say. I felt so awful that I asked to go home on the basis that if people thought I was out to beat the shit out of them, there was no telling what I was going to find when I walked out of the building at the end of the day. I didn’t know if my car windows would be intact, if my car would be keyed or my tires slashed. Hell, I didn’t even know that someone’s boyfriend or husband might be waiting for me to teach me a “lesson” about messing with his girlfriend/wife.

The end result was that I decided to leave town and took a transfer to a different office in East Texas.

So take heart. Their imaginations, as destructive as they can be, are about all they have.

Robin

6

How very sad.

I disagree with the fundies that a gaming shop is an evil in need of purging from the city, but:

If it is evil, and the owner is a member of their own congregation, wouldn’t the right thing be to approach the owner and try to convince him to shut down the store (or stop selling whatever’s objectionable)? I mean, he’s right there in the next pew and all.

That would certainly change – being there in the next pew – if it were me. Your BIL ought to leave that congregation. What a shitty thing to do. Sounds like not-nice people.

7

In case you’ve been living under a virtual rock, here is the definative example of the horror that is gaming groups.

D&D.mp3
Mods - This is a legit MP3 link from the creators of the MP3. I had to tinyURL it because the original link has “” symbols which totally screws up the coding.

8

You know, as a practicing Christian and a role-playing gamer, I can find nothing justifiable in the behaviour of these fundamentalists. Nothing at all.

9

That’s the idea I see in Matthew 18:15-17. Though, I imagine it’s talking about real sins and not entertainment choices.

10

My BIL believes his shop could get free publicity out of it, but there’s the children to keep in mind.

Between Ivylad’s two sisters, they have four children, all under the age of five. I can just see the sweet, cherubic offspring of such narrowminded twits giving my nieces and nephews a hard time.

And that, I can tell you, will not be tolerated.

On top of that, their religious beliefs are important to my BILs and SILs. I would hate to see their love of God tainted because of some fundies with too much time on their hands.

11

Ivylass – Is the pastor of the Church involved? On biblical grounds, he should be, and clergy are very often more broadminded than their parishoners. See if the BIL can get the parents and/or pastor to come to the shop and watch kids playing the games.

Anecdote:
I was into D&D in my teens, and my parents were a bit worried (My dad is a Southern Baptist minister), so one night my mom sat in the living room knitting and listening in (without our knowledge) on me and my freinds playing. After a few hours, she concluded it was harmless, and I never heard a word against it again.

12

Just… make sure nobody’s playing the Chaos Space Marines that day. I suggest a nice Tau army, perhaps.

Seriously. Warhammer and 40K can get a bit… ah… well, it’s british.

13

Ivylass, I agree with you that anyone who tries to shut down that shop is wrong. However, I believe by using hate speech (“fundie”), you have violated pit rules. I am sorry, but I am reporting your post to the moderators.

14

Millen, are you completely serious here? I can understand that some consider “fundie” to be a derogatory term, but hate speech?? That seems to be going way too far. And did you truly report ivylass to the mods over it or am I being whooshed? If not, color me totally baffled for the day and eagerly awaiting your explanation.

15

And include in the above, especially in the Pit, where invective comes with the territory like sunshine with the dawn.

::: scratches head and patiently holds breath:::

16

I had a sinking feeling this was coming (and I initially assumed ivylass lived in Salem, a long time ago). It’s still pretty conservative in Texas - born and raised here, and I keep thinking it’s going to change. Someday.

A “fundie” is a fundamentalist, how on earth could that be viewed as a posting crime? Shall we stop picking fights for the sake of it?

17

Leonardo Leonardo: Plug, have him killed.
Plug: Sir, I’m your publicist.
LL: Then kill him with bad press.
P: Sir, there’s no such thing as bad press.
-another gem from Clerks: The Animated Series. Stupid ABC. :sigh:
Robyn, :eek:. I hope all is well now. That sounds like a bad sitcom plot. Actually it was a Doug episode, one of the Disney ones.

ivylass, hang in there. I’m sure someone will be along with the Chick tract “Dangerous Dungeons” to cheer you up. I would post it, but I’ve lost Mr. Chick’s website address.

18

hopefool, this is not a joke, and I did report the post.

19

Well, it is a joke, just not one that you intended.

20

Well, I suppose then that I’ve now officially seen everything. Tell me though, if you don’t mind me asking, is it because you are a fundamentalist yourself, or is this merely a “devil’s advocate” position? (No pun intended.) :slight_smile: