Christianity and its effect on self-worth

[rexbeccarox]

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Oh, please. I'm from East Tennessee. The friendliness is most often times insincere; the drug usage is immense, as well as alcohol abuse; I started smoking with my pastor's daughter who is now a coke addict and alcoholic, all while most of her time is spent in the church. Most of my "good Christian" friends of old are drug addicts, whether it's coke, oxycontin, or meth, among other things, and they all still consider themselves "good Christians". They go to churches all over Knox County.

My mom, who hadn't seen my dad in over a decade, came to his funeral to support my sister and me. Guess what she encountered at the church: most of the congregation ignoring her except to talk behind their hands about her.

There are a lot of reasons my last trip back to East Tennessee was to take care of my dad on his death bed. The biggest is that I have absolutely no use for the people there, for the most part.

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I'm sorry for your loss, I loss my dad several years ago and my sisters church sent deacons to stay at mom's house while we were at the funeral home and the next day when we were at the grave yard. There was enough food from two churches to feed an army. There were more people at the funeral home than I knew were still alive. You see dad had out lived most of his family and friends, or so I thought. My mother had more support than you could imagine. My half brother helped mom by paying for most of the funeral. When my brother in-laws brother died, his neighbor and I help pay for some of the funeral and the church was of great support and service. You see my experience with East Tennessee during these tough times was awesome.

I grew up in north Knoxville and now live in Sevier county. When I first graduated high school, I was buying drugs from a preachers son and getting high with people that went to my church. You know what we grew up and many of us have become preachers, deacons and Sunday School teachers. I have friends who are dead from drugs in one way or another, others are alcoholics and drug addicts. This stuff happens all over this country, I have friends and family all over this country and nothing's any different, actually things are getting worse every where. It's all in who you choose to hang with, there are lots of good Christians in this area and there are those who believe they are in good standing with God, it could be a sad day for a lot of them when judgement comes. Hanging out with Christ will lead people to all those who care.

The reason there are so many drugs in this area has to do with the Interstate system, drugs flow through here like a flooded river. Unfortunately to many stop here.

My niece was addicted to oxy and she went to a Christian rehab in North Carolina, she's clean now and we work together to help people get into these Christian rehabs, it gets to be tough when they say no to a program we know works well, neither of us gets paid a thing we only want to help. I'm sorry you did not get to know the East Tennessee I know, you just might have found real people who care more about others than they do themselves. If you ever want to give it a try again let me know, I'll be glad to introduce you to the East Tennessee I know and love.

GC

I see my point went flying over your head. You're exactly the type of person who keeps me from going back there.