(December 1, 2017 at 11:09 am)drfuzzy Wrote: Hmm.
I was raised Holy-Roller Pentecostal Funditard. (Think Westboro Baptist with snake-handling, speaking in tongues, and rolling in the aisles.) The Bible was the INERRANT WORD OF GOD, every word, "jot and tiddle". If you found a contradiction in your assigned daily Bible readings and memorization, then it was YOUR fault. You weren't trusting God enough, you didn't have enough faith.
This mindset is closed. It is tribal, racist, and judgmental. It denies science, global warming, evolution, etc., etc. The outside world is evil and that is a reason God created hell - evil humans could not possibly be allowed into their heaven. And Jesus is coming to take them away in the Rapture any day now.
These people get their "morality" from the Bible. If church leaders told them that God has said that they should go out and kill a group of people, they just might do it.
I play organ for Catholic Masses. I have quite a few Catholic friends. How the Bible should be interpreted varies from person to person. The priest is more or less a guide, but if he says something "wrong" they'll call him on it. Beliefs vary -- even on subjects like abortion, tho' the ones who are actually pro-choice usually don't say it out loud. These people, for the most part, take what they are told and use their own judgment.
So I think the distinction is between Fundamentalists and non-Fundamentalists of any religion, not the religion itself.
So very much this. It is fundamentalism which stifles moral evolution and lowers the IQ of the people infected.
