Coming Out as a Christian in a Atheist Community

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Propaganda by whom?!

May be you mean by missionizing evangelists, yes, this is absolutely deplorable. They chat people in the street up, sometimes singing rocky-poppy songs, people see an opportunity to practise their English, then people are asked "do you belive in God", people say "to be honest no", then evangelists say "but do you know that God is love", people say "now, this is interesting"...

Somebody had to talk them in to the fear needed to seek baptism. Pure manipulation and intimidation. Going to Heaven? That's cool. Going to HELL? That's SCARY!!!!!!! They fuck with people's minds. One of my cousins went to Vienna as a missionary. Luckily her lazy bastard husband refused to get a job and they were kicked out of the country. Unfortunately, that meant they were back here. (She was stupid enough to ask me for money to support her missionary efforts. )

[Gawdzilla Sama]

What? No.

Missionaries tend to provide medicine, shelter, something.

Missionaries who bring nothing get spurned.

The missionaries mission is not to build up the local community, they just use that tactic to weasel into the society. Doctors Without Borders does it right.

[Trolldor]

It may not 'be their mission' but it's the only way the 'locals' will listen. Associating religion with 'food, shelter, medicine' is a necessity.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

It may not 'be their mission' but it's the only way the 'locals' will listen. Associating religion with 'food, shelter, medicine' is a necessity.

Exactly, it's the bait that gets them in the door. Not motivated by altruism, but by the mission to get the missionary's ass into Heaven.

[DRSB]

There certainly are many missionaries, mormons, evangelists and the like, fishing there, however, people go in masses to their local Orthodox churches (in Russia and Bulgaria) as well and have themselves baptized, just like that, without any scares, just for the sake of national identity.

[Trolldor]

Propaganda.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

How do you account for the fact that after 50 years of imposed atheism, people had themselves baptised the moment they deemed it safe? At age 30 and 40? Surely not because of the community, probably some sense of missing identiy, don't know, baffling however what a mass phenoomenon this is.

Are you talking about soviet Russia here? Most Russians deemed themselves christian and raised (indoctrinated) their children as christian despite the official party line. There were secret churches right through the worst of the Stalinist era. They didn't convert. They simply came out of the shadows.

There is no better way to reinforce someone's belief system than by banning it.

[Trolldor]

The thing about belief is that almost anything can be deemed to be 'reinforcing' someone's faith.

But prohibition never works.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

There certainly are many missionaries, mormons, evangelists and the like, fishing there, however, people go in masses to their local Orthodox churches (in Russia and Bulgaria) as well and have themselves baptized, just like that, without any scares, just for the sake of national identity.

You don't think the priests in the established churches don't do the same thing?

[DRSB]

Propaganda.

Again, by whom? The Orthodox church never missionzed, they never reformed either, they've always been aside from RL, in their monasteries, missionizing is one thing they are not guilty of, that's why probably the US free churches are so succesfull in catching the bait, they go there and sing songs about love...

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Propaganda.

Again, by whom? The Orthodox church never missionzed, they never reformed either, they've always been aside from RL, in their monasteries, missionizing is one thing they are not guilty of, that's why probably the US free churches are so succesfull in catching the bait, they go there and sing songs about love...

The message is the same, go to Hell if you don't follow our orders.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Propaganda.

Again, by whom? The Orthodox church never missionzed, they never reformed either, they've always been aside from RL, in their monasteries, missionizing is one thing they are not guilty of, that's why probably the US free churches are so succesfull in catching the bait, they go there and sing songs about love...

When you have religion sewn up and 95%+ of the population attend your church every week, you don't need to advertise. All of the propaganda comes straight from the pulpit.

[DRSB]

How do you account for the fact that after 50 years of imposed atheism, people had themselves baptised the moment they deemed it safe? At age 30 and 40? Surely not because of the community, probably some sense of missing identiy, don't know, baffling however what a mass phenoomenon this is.

Are you talking about soviet Russia here? Most Russians deemed themselves christian and raised (indoctrinated) their children as christian despite the official party line. There were secret churches right through the worst of the Stalinist era. They didn't convert. They simply came out of the shadows.

There is no better way to reinforce someone's belief system than by banning it.

They deemed themselves Christian in as much as to differentiate themselves from Jews. However, what "secret churches" are you talking about? There certainly was no mass religious education or upbringing and people were not baptized and did not practice openly. They kept some knowledge of dates on the calendar but they are very supertitious as well and basically have a penchant for spirituality.

[DRSB]

It may not 'be their mission' but it's the only way the 'locals' will listen. Associating religion with 'food, shelter, medicine' is a necessity.

The mission of the missionaries of the mormon-evangelist kind is to recruit new members that will start tithing as soon as they join in, in other words, to raise funds, not to donate some.

[Bruce Burleson]

I'd like to know how you'd deal with the revelation that a major atheist icon was actually a convert to Christianity? Would you join the metaphoric lynch mob? or take the Bible from the shelf? or not give a damn?

Sometimes, people have personal experiences that create faith. It has nothing to do, necessarily, with dogma or tradition or fear or brainwashing. People have personal experiences that lead them to believe in certain things. I would want to hear from this person why she/he converted. I would be very interested in her/his explanation.