I realize these days Methodists are pretty liberal as far as churchy people go, but in this rural backwater back in the 60s, my experience was pretty far the other way. Sunday school teaches drilled in a pretty strict view of God, Bible and Jesus.
And Methodism was about as good, true and pure as any church was going to get. We did have a 'glasnost' period as the 70s rolled around, the local churches got the ecumenism bug as they all noticed it worked better when they all went in together to approach the city council, or the public schools on whatever corn cob of an issue was up their ass at the time.
(I don't remember the JWs being much part of that, and the Lutherans were conspicuously reluctant to get too chummy with the unSaved filth they had to put up with)
We had RLDS in the area, but I don't recall ever encountering any actual Mormons until much later in life. I've sat through a bunch of RLDS funerals, but I don't recall ever being exposed to any of the Joe Smith bullshit during one, just the generic Jesus pap you hear at any of them.
As a grown up, I moved on to Unitarian/Universalist, and my, my, my, they are an interesting bunch. I can't say even the pastor himself believed in any remotely recognizable god concept. After I moved a couple times, I stopped going to church at all, other than tagging along a few times to some Metropolitan Community Church services with some friends that take it seriously. It's a tough sell for the MCC types to make to me, but I admit I love having them around, a gay denomination to aggravate the other Christians is pretty enjoyable. And it's amazing, opponents of MCC aren't at all bashful about having a fit about MCC for what is their biggest (besides dirty filthy naked homo sex) sin, cherry picking the WRONG Bible verses, LOL !!
And I think you know what I've moved on to since . . . .
And Methodism was about as good, true and pure as any church was going to get. We did have a 'glasnost' period as the 70s rolled around, the local churches got the ecumenism bug as they all noticed it worked better when they all went in together to approach the city council, or the public schools on whatever corn cob of an issue was up their ass at the time.
(I don't remember the JWs being much part of that, and the Lutherans were conspicuously reluctant to get too chummy with the unSaved filth they had to put up with)
We had RLDS in the area, but I don't recall ever encountering any actual Mormons until much later in life. I've sat through a bunch of RLDS funerals, but I don't recall ever being exposed to any of the Joe Smith bullshit during one, just the generic Jesus pap you hear at any of them.
As a grown up, I moved on to Unitarian/Universalist, and my, my, my, they are an interesting bunch. I can't say even the pastor himself believed in any remotely recognizable god concept. After I moved a couple times, I stopped going to church at all, other than tagging along a few times to some Metropolitan Community Church services with some friends that take it seriously. It's a tough sell for the MCC types to make to me, but I admit I love having them around, a gay denomination to aggravate the other Christians is pretty enjoyable. And it's amazing, opponents of MCC aren't at all bashful about having a fit about MCC for what is their biggest (besides dirty filthy naked homo sex) sin, cherry picking the WRONG Bible verses, LOL !!
And I think you know what I've moved on to since . . . .
The granting of a pardon is an imputation of guilt, and the acceptance a confession of it.
