Mr_Stranger wrote:
BecauseImArtistic wrote:
Welcome! I find Christianity to be fascinating for study, but I personally was raised (and identify as) Wiccan. I've found though that the christian people in my life do not seem to approve of my study...do you encounter this in your family/at church? Like they [EDIT: by "they" in the sentence I mean my family members, not all Christians!] just want me to stop believing the things I believe and convert to christianity, not study it (can a person even consciously "decide" what to believe??). I wonder if it is part of Christian beliefs that it is a sin to simply study them? I haven't come across anything in my studies to suggest that though. If you ever want to discuss religious studies I would be interested.
That's the weird part about me, no matter how head bashing everybody is to me, I constantly study what I believe in. Honestly a lot of Christians only name themselves as such because it's the common religion and it's just really bestowed when they are a mere baby who has no ability to decide yet. My family thinks how my brain mechanism work is preposterous, sincerely I know better on how I think and how I relay my thoughts. Besides who sets the standards to normal-ness?
I just leave the dissenters out of my studies...if they don't want me studying it, well, they don't have to know about it. I believe in the power of knowledge *pushes glasses up* lol...but really, I do. In my eyes, anything that allows me to learn is a friend and everything that tries to stop me learning something I want to know is an enemy (or, you know, an obstacle). And I know a lot of Christians are not bible-thumpers...when I meet someone new and they say they are Christian, they usually follow with "Oh I mean we don't like,
go to church or anything like that! We just celebrate Christmas" and I can kind of get that. They are basically non-religious, they just got baptized as a baby, like you said. Also, I mean, my stepmom is a devout Christian who actually works at her church, but she is also buddhist and very accepting of all religions, and has never attempted to convert me at all. It's just that other side of my family (my stepDAD's side, actually), they are the ones who like to thump bibles. The last time I ever went over there was when I was in elementary school, and my stepgrandma told me I couldn't come over anymore unless I started going to church with her. I was so hurt (I didn't realize that she didn't really see me as "family"), they really colored my view of Christianity. I'm quite glad I got to meet some nice Christians like my stepmom's side to help balance that out. ...Too bad they live at the other end of the country :/