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RE: Questions about Belief and Personal Identity
June 8, 2021 at 9:49 am
I tried the 'I'm not particularly religious' tack when questioned about my religious stance by people whose business it wasn't. However, I live in South Carolina and they rarely settled for that answer, they almost always wanted to know particulars. So for years when asked what church I go to I said I don't go to church, I'm an atheist. Then I got involved with a Untiarian Universalist fellowship, so now I say I go to that sometimes. The conversation is much less likely to turn personal and more likely to turn to 'what's a Unitarian Universalist'?
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RE: Questions about Belief and Personal Identity
June 8, 2021 at 11:49 am
"There ought to be a term that would designate those who actually follow the teachings of Jesus, since the word 'Christian' has been largely divorced from those teachings, and so polluted by fundamentalists that it has come to connote their polar opposite: intolerance, vindictive hatred, and bigotry." -- Philip Stater, Huffington Post
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RE: Questions about Belief and Personal Identity
June 8, 2021 at 11:54 am
(June 8, 2021 at 9:49 am)Mister Agenda Wrote: I tried the 'I'm not particularly religious' tack when questioned about my religious stance by people whose business it wasn't. However, I live in South Carolina and they rarely settled for that answer, they almost always wanted to know particulars. So for years when asked what church I go to I said I don't go to church, I'm an atheist. Then I got involved with a Untiarian Universalist fellowship, so now I say I go to that sometimes. The conversation is much less likely to turn personal and more likely to turn to 'what's a Unitarian Universalist'?
When I was in SC my son played baseball and football so I met a lot of the other parents. I noticed that after the exchange of names the next step was about your church affiliation...always. I always found it rather rude. My usual answer was that I was raised Catholic and with enough of the typically Southern flavors of faith...that was enough said.
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RE: Questions about Belief and Personal Identity
June 11, 2021 at 1:26 pm
(June 8, 2021 at 11:54 am)arewethereyet Wrote: (June 8, 2021 at 9:49 am)Mister Agenda Wrote: I tried the 'I'm not particularly religious' tack when questioned about my religious stance by people whose business it wasn't. However, I live in South Carolina and they rarely settled for that answer, they almost always wanted to know particulars. So for years when asked what church I go to I said I don't go to church, I'm an atheist. Then I got involved with a Untiarian Universalist fellowship, so now I say I go to that sometimes. The conversation is much less likely to turn personal and more likely to turn to 'what's a Unitarian Universalist'?
When I was in SC my son played baseball and football so I met a lot of the other parents. I noticed that after the exchange of names the next step was about your church affiliation...always. I always found it rather rude. My usual answer was that I was raised Catholic and with enough of the typically Southern flavors of faith...that was enough said.
Seems like a Southern thing. I have never experienced anything like that elsewhere, particlarly in the Midwest.
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RE: Questions about Belief and Personal Identity
June 11, 2021 at 1:50 pm
(This post was last modified: June 11, 2021 at 1:51 pm by The Grand Nudger.)
The question is more important and more relevant the more religious a place is, and the south does have some pretty thick concentrations of churches. We all know what kinds of people go to each kind of church in our area.
They're just feeling people out.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
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RE: Questions about Belief and Personal Identity
June 11, 2021 at 7:43 pm
(This post was last modified: June 11, 2021 at 7:43 pm by vulcanlogician.)
(June 8, 2021 at 11:54 am)arewethereyet Wrote: (June 8, 2021 at 9:49 am)Mister Agenda Wrote: I tried the 'I'm not particularly religious' tack when questioned about my religious stance by people whose business it wasn't. However, I live in South Carolina and they rarely settled for that answer, they almost always wanted to know particulars. So for years when asked what church I go to I said I don't go to church, I'm an atheist. Then I got involved with a Untiarian Universalist fellowship, so now I say I go to that sometimes. The conversation is much less likely to turn personal and more likely to turn to 'what's a Unitarian Universalist'?
When I was in SC my son played baseball and football so I met a lot of the other parents. I noticed that after the exchange of names the next step was about your church affiliation...always. I always found it rather rude. My usual answer was that I was raised Catholic and with enough of the typically Southern flavors of faith...that was enough said.
When my sister lived in SC, she said that she had people simply stop the conversation and walk away when she said she was Catholic. (This was late 90s. Hopefully the culture has shifted a little bit since then.)
My sister also said she drove by signs advertising a KKK picnic. I hope that sort of thing just doesn't happen anymore. But maybe it does...
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RE: Questions about Belief and Personal Identity
June 11, 2021 at 7:51 pm
(This post was last modified: June 11, 2021 at 7:52 pm by The Grand Nudger.)
It does, and yes, being catholic in the south is something like and akin to (and very often is) being a hispanic who's wrong about god. Two things you don't really want to be affiliated with in places where this would be an issue.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
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RE: Questions about Belief and Personal Identity
June 11, 2021 at 8:28 pm
(June 11, 2021 at 7:43 pm)vulcanlogician Wrote: (June 8, 2021 at 11:54 am)arewethereyet Wrote: When I was in SC my son played baseball and football so I met a lot of the other parents. I noticed that after the exchange of names the next step was about your church affiliation...always. I always found it rather rude. My usual answer was that I was raised Catholic and with enough of the typically Southern flavors of faith...that was enough said.
When my sister lived in SC, she said that she had people simply stop the conversation and walk away when she said she was Catholic. (This was late 90s. Hopefully the culture has shifted a little bit since then.)
My sister also said she drove by signs advertising a KKK picnic. I hope that sort of thing just doesn't happen anymore. But maybe it does...
I left in 2006 - asking about your religious affiliation was still a thing. I had one lady who came to the door from a Baptist church actually gasp...audibly, when I said I was raised Catholic. Mind you, she was standing in my damn house as I had invited them in since the night was chilly when they came to recruit me.
Just off the highway between our tiny town and a bigger town was a sign for the Girl Scout camp. I nearly drove off the road the first time, right next to it, was a sign that read: KKK Rally, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, public invited.
That sign popped up every month like clockwork for several years. That's not to say that after the signs stopped going up the rallys stopped....oh, no. They were just a little more on the down low since Horace King was in deep doo doo with the police. He was the Grand Dragon of the KKK. He seriously had life-sized Klansmen in their robes depicting status in his front yard.
Seeing caravans of vans and trucks bedecked with rebel flags pulling into the area one weekend a month was unnerving at best.
What fresh hell can this be? - Dorothy Parker
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