Ways you coped with a fundie upbringing

In My Humble Opinion
1

I grew up in the Church of God in Christ, a fundamentalist church based in my hometown of Memphis, Tennessee. (Okay, technically they’re Pentacostal, not fundamentalist, but they share the fundamentalist movements views on Biblical inerrancy, literalism, homosexuality, you name it.) My whole family was very involved in the church: my father was a lay minister, my mother Sunday School superintendent, my uncles pastors, and so forth. We went spent at least 5 hours at church every Sunday.

Around the age of twelve that became a problem for me. I’d started reading the Old Testament while actually paying attention, you see. The stories of all the atrocities God commanded the Isrealites to commit during their conquest of Canaan really bothered me, and neither my parents nor my uncles nor anyone else in the church was willing to explain the matter to me. “It’s not for you to understand, it’s for you to accept,” they’d say when I asked how a good god could possibly sanction the murder of newborn babies. And God help me if I brought up evolution.

So in my heart I stopped being a Christian. (These days I’d style myself a Christian agnostic, but that’s not the point of this story.) But I stil had to go to church, and not participating was not an option. I had to do something or I’d get endless grief.

The favored method of showing piety was testifying–which, for you non-Pentecostals, is a ritual in which a congregant stands, says something like “My name is Maxie Maxwell. I’m saved, sanctified, and filled with the Holy Ghost. Here is how God helped me this week.” I wasn’t about to do that. I didn’t believe in the God the rest of my family did, but I suspected that there might be one somewhere, and I was fairly sure I’d piss him off if I lied. (And even if I were wrong, if the God of COGIC was the real deal, what was the point of lying? He WAS READING MY MIND. Nosy bastard. Worse than Professor X.)

So instead I started volunteering to read Bible verses. Of course, to show your devotion, you were supposed to choose your own selection. For a while I’d just pick a random text, or read something innocuous (“And pre-teen Jesus just amazed all the people at the temple with his learning, having an I.Q. of about 2000”)–but then I got rebellious. it occurred to me that, since my parents and the church leadership all officially believed that the Bible was inerrant, infallible, and internally consistent, they couldn’t really object if I chose one passage over another, right?

So one week it would be Psalm 137. “Yea, we were at the walls of Babylon, crying. So we overthrew those bastards and took the newborn babies and dashed their heads against the rocks.”

People were a little…antsy. But nobody said anything.

Next week, it would be Deuteronomy 21. “If you conquer a city, kill all the men and any women who’s had sex. But if you see a hot chick who’s still a virgin, take her in your house, take her clothes and shoes, then shave her head. Give her a month to mourn her mother and father (whom you killed, good boy!) then treat her like a drunk frosh girl in a frat house. If you like her, marry her! If not, turn her out, but don’t sell her as a slave or anything.”

My father or mother might say, to that one, “Um…why did you choose that chapter, son?”

“The Lord led me,” I said.

“Um–well, maybe next week you could try something else?”

“I’ll try. But shouldn’t I go where the Lord leads?”

Next week I’d start on how to handle rape victims, or disobedient sons. That was always a hit.

And now you know how I made it through high school without having a COGIC induced stroke.

So how did you deal with religious and/or political beliefs among your family you simply couldn’t stomach, Dopers? The more subversive the reply, the better.

2

I became a Catholic.

3

Fabulous: What is a “Christian agnostic” ?

4

[asshole]
Well, me, obviously.
[/asshole]

Now to answer your question more usefully: I’d say a Xtian agnostic is someone who accepts the moral teachings of the carpenter from Nazareth, but doesn’t believe the mythology is literally true. I believe that, for me, the best way to live my life is in accordance to the Sermon on the Mount. But I don’t believe in miracles such as the Virgin Birth, for instance, and probably not even the resurrection. I believe those stories have metaphorical truth and value, but it’s not necessary that you believe them; and I don’t believe that a person necessarily has to accept Christianity to be saved. It might be the wrong religion for you; your spirit may best be served by Judaism or Islam or Jainism or atheism. What you DO is much more important than the creed you parrot. (Not that I’m accusing Jews, Muslims, Jains, or atheists of all parroting creeds.)

For a much better explanation than I’m prepared to give now, check out this book. (Of course it might not be the right book for you. :wink:

5

You’re my hero!

6

Er…thanks. But for explaining Christian agnosticism or for mocking fundamentalists and living to tell the tale?

7

I ran far, far away. And never went back.

Actually, I started asking embarassing Old Testament questions in primary-age Sunday School. By the time I was nine my mother was asked to keep me out of two different churches.

And for the record, Pentecostalist Charismatics are the bar-none worst of the lot. Sadistic hippy dogmatists are as obnoxious as they are peculiar, even by the standards of Pentecostalists.

Stranger

8

Thanks for the laugh. I’m trying to imagine the look of growing horror on your parents’ face as you read.

Here’s my story:

Mom was raised Baptist and remained so until she married my Dad. Dad was raised in the Worldwide Church of God, but was poor, wild and a townie so it didn’t take so much. They decided that they needed to find neutral religious ground, so they both left their respective religions and became (wait for it) Methodists. I have no idea what they could have been thinking.

We moved to Belgium two years after I was born. The only English speaking church they could find was ecumenical and the best English speaking school for my age group was… Catholic. I attended until the end of second grade when we came back to the states and switched back to Methodist. When I stayed with my grandparents during the summer, we went to a hard-core country Baptist church.
I made some hysterical mistakes thanks to the confused upbringing. I asked the Baptist minister why they don’t use wine for communion like the Catholics do. I led the fastest responsive prayer that St. John’s has ever held. I accidentally signalled the minister that I wanted to be the sole participant in an “altar call” because I didn’t want to be arrogant. I accidentally brought my brother’s hard core skin mag to a week-long Methodist youth retreat. I started a nervous giggle during my first communion that spread through the entire class for 10 minutes while we were at the altar!

My most consistent religious influence came through my mother, who, no matter what she calls herself, remains a Baptist to this day. She’d try to hold the party line of whatever church we were attending at the time, but it was pretty obvious to me where her opinions differed. The exposure to a bunch of different doctrines all supposedly inspired by the same person/being/book was one of the earliest things that started me questioning.

I don’t think I would have had the strength of will to buck them as directly as you did and fortunately didn’t have to. Thanks again for the laugh.

9

You’re preaching to the choir, brother. F’rinstance, I not long ago had a conversation with a COGIC coworker about a passage in I Samuel in which God unambiguously orders Saul (via Samuel) to destroy the nation of amalek, kill everybody, but keep the gold. God was vexed because Saul failed to kill everyone. My coworker said, without blinking, “Oh, that was because those people didn’t have souls, you see. That’s why good wanted them called. And because Saul didn’t kill them all, they eventually became the Nazis, and the Jews were punished for Saul’s disobedience by the Holocaust.”

He was quite serious.

10

I dealt with it by comparing what is said, what is written, and what is done. All is contradiction. There was too much “do as I say, not as I do”. “Do as I say” too often was on the condition that if you don’t, you go to hell. Whatever happened tp the salvation and the Good News they keep pitching? Then I decided to chuck it and do what I think is right instead.

11

To be fair, despite my parents’ rather devout beliefs, they thought academics were still an incredibly high priority. When they moved me to a Christian school in 3rd grade, it was only six weeks before they discovered I was learning absolutely nothing (“easy” couldn’t even begin to describe it), so they put me back in the public school system.

So, when high school came around, I would always say that I had homework (it was believable with multiple AP classes, etc.) so I couldn’t go to this function or that youth group or whatever. Avoiding Sundays wasn’t an option, but I didn’t mind the church so much as all the social stuff that I just could not relate to at all. I wouldn’t say I went through the motions (and some core beliefs remain unaltered), but I very gradually learned that Christianity needn’t be about political affiliations or literal truths or single-minded interpretations.

12

*Called * should be *killed * of course. :smack: If God had wanted them called, I bet Saul woulda done it.

13

My family wasn’t Fundie, but they sent me to a Christian school. Their intensity ranged from moderate to mildly scary. Oh, the stories I could tell . . . .)

I coped in several ways:

  1. Reading. I was always a voracious reader, and I thank Og for it, because otherwise I would be an utter ignoramus. The education I recieved there was truly sup-par.

  2. Subtle sarcasm and mockery. Fortunately for me, irony tends to sail right over the heads of some in the Fundie persuasion, nor are they particularly articulate. The English language is rich in synonyms, and I took full advantage of this fact. I also used cultural references which sailed right over their heads. (I used Ezekial 25:17 as the Favorite Scripture beneath my yearbook picture.) Petty, I know, but it gave me some satisfaction at the time, to outwit these credulous dullards.

  3. Repeating to myself several times daily: this will all be over soon, and I’ll never have to see these people again.

14

Oh, I think I could handle it. I made it through this one: The End of Faith

I’m hoping the one you suggested is more uplifting.

15

::sigh::

Suggesting it might not be the right book fo ryou was a joke. Wry allusion to universalism and all that. Clearly not a good joke since i’m explaining it.

16

As a kid, I was brought up in a mostly Chinese and Chinese-American congregation associated with the Southern Baptist Convention. Our Pastor was a nice Caucasian Southern gentleman, who somehow managed to make long sermons about eternal damnation and the signs of the End Times, etc. incredibly boring. He definitely was no Jonathan Edwards.

Anyway, sometime around 5th grade, I started asking loads of questions about evolution, Biblical literalism, Islam, sexuality, Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, you name it. I was incredibly inquisitive, and of course Pastor Ray couldn’t answer all my questions by himself, so guess what he gave me?

That’s right, Chick tracts! He gave me Chick tracts on most every topic around!

While I liked them as a kid, sometime around middle school, I realized these Chick tracts were pretty darn awful, and along with the unfolding realization of my homosexual orientation, I decided that atheism was the way to go.

But Chick tracts were still much fun to read, and I shared them with as many friends as I could- something Jack Chick would approve of, although he probably expected more repenting and less laughter.

Now, after much soul-searching, I’m getting baptized in my local Congregational church (United Church of Christ), which Pastor Ray would probably consider even worse than atheism, what with the false doctrine of universalism, non-literal reading of the Bible, and inclusion for everyone (including gays and lesbians) my new church embodies.

I liked your method more though. I’m afraid I rank pretty low on the subversion scale!

17

Always glad to hear from a fellow UCCer.

18

I was raised Baptist, and went to a Christian school/brainwashing facility until the sixth grade. I can’t remember when I didn’t have serious doubts about Christianity, but I was really cowed by that whole hellfire thing. I kept my doubt to myself until I realized that if God could read my mind, I was going to hell anyway.

When I was in my teens, I moved in with my Godfearing grandma. She (figuratively) dragged me to church kicking and screaming every Sunday. The more she tried to ram the Bible down my throat, the more it repulsed me. I would go to church without bothering to shower and sit in the last row radiating defiance. One day, after I had pelted the Sunday school teacher (a sweet little old lady who didn’t know her ass from her elbow) with angry questions, Grandma said I didn’t have to go anymore “because I could see the Devil in your eyes”. But she got over it and forced me to go again next Sunday. By this time, I was reading the Satanic bible, listening to e-e-evil heavy metal rock music, wearing black, you get the picture. Grandma blamed herself for allowing me to read “all those books about the supernatural, like The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe.”

I eventually moved in with my boyfriend, knowing he wasn’t anything special but wanting to get out of the house. Then I, uh, misbehaved for a few years (nothing too serious). When I had had enough, I came home, got a job, went to school, and generally pulled myself together. I still don’t love Jesus, but I will attend church with the family on Easter Sunday for Grandma’s sake, and they all pray for me.

19

Sorry, but that’s pretty damn funny. Wardrobe is a Christian allegory. It is most definitely not pagan or satanic. :smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

20

I know. You can see why she makes me want to scream!