Angry Baptists

[IslandBreeze]

I LOVE Rush Limbaugh! He's not arrogant, he is absolutely positively right on track! Wish there were more like him!

Susan, you speak of anger so harshly, so I'm not sure why you look so angry in your self-portrait...not trying to flame...just questioning...

 

[Susan]

Because my family had had a fight that day. and we were all mad at each other when the photo was taken

 

[Susan]

And for the Rush fans, there is NO clause in Galatians 5 that proclaims "fits of rage" to be acceptable as long as the motive or message is good.

This logic is akin to saying fornication is OK as long as both involved love each other or that murder is OK if the other person has wronged you.

 

[seebs]

My only real complaint with Rush is that I've seen him take a statistic, alter a few words, and offer the changed one as if it were the result of research. It's pretty depressing.

 

[Susan]

My point is that the acceptance of him and his tirades (and of other people who seem to build careers on being filled with "righteous indignation") is a sign of a larger problem, an undercurrent of anger in Christian culture in America, at least in what I have seen of it and experienced.

For example, I have not met one Christian person around here that opposes war or at the least thinks that maybe we are moving toward it hastily and without sufficient provocation.

As another example, among people I know, people will freely admit to things like "I guess I threw a fit," or "I had a right to be mad, that person was/is/did. . ." or "I had some words with. . ." and this is actually laughed about sometimes, and it is never brought up in any conversation that this is something to be grieved over or repented over.

Sadly, anger (and even hurtful expressions of it such as screaming, threatening, or even outright verbal abuse) is not considered a sin by many Christians that I know and have seen. It is at most considered a personality foible, something explainable or justified. Only the most liberal of denominations treat other sins the same way.

 

[Susan]

double post, sorry

 

[seebs]

I think you're quite right, Susan. I think anger is a more dangerous thing than a lot of the stuff people worry about. Wrath, I think, was the formal term.

 

[A Sheep]

Many Christians view anger as sinful and do indeed oppose war as the murder of others, therefore being sinful as well.

Someone should make two polls in this forum.

 

[Blackhawk]

I do not think anger is sinful in itself if just stated like that. I think how one expresses anger can be sinful and what one gets angry about can make it sinful. If I get angry because of this world's sin then it is not a sin unless I express it in a wrong way. So that is why scripture can say be angry but do not sin.

 

[sklippstein]

I know a lot of Baptist..........and none of them are what i would describe as "angry".

 

[A Sheep]

We are allowed to hate beliefs, sin, sins, actions, material objects, but never, NEVER are we allowed to hate people. Hating a person is equal to murder.

 

[Blindfaith]

And here I thought we were all on the same side

**bf slaps herself on the head ~ silly me**

 

[kern]

Originally posted by Blackhawk
I do not think anger is sinful in itself

Both God and Jesus were angry multiple times in the Bible, so I think this goes without saying. Jesus went into something that could be described as a "fit of rage" -- he overturned the tables of the moneychangers in the temple and yelled at them.

-Chris

 

[Caedmon]

I know that my parents' Southern Baptist preacher can get pretty spiteful, yelling about Catholicism and evolution. But I can't say this for all Baptists.

 

[seebs]

Yeah, I've seen some people pretty upset about Catholicism. They get all fussy, and then they start yelling about mixed scents. "Potpourri! Potpourri!" I never did understand.

 

[Annabel Lee]

Originally posted by seebs
Yeah, I've seen some people pretty upset about Catholicism. They get all fussy, and then they start yelling about mixed scents. "Potpourri! Potpourri!" I never did understand.

You found a good place to use it Seebs.

 

[Caedmon]

"We ain't got no Jesus on ire craus cuz he's in Hevin, and the Bibel 'n' Jins's ain't no myth, wut all dem liers try tah say bout evil-ooshun."

That kind of thing...

 

[PastorFreud]

Originally posted by Susan
My point is that the acceptance of him and his tirades (and of other people who seem to build careers on being filled with "righteous indignation") is a sign of a larger problem, an undercurrent of anger in Christian culture in America, at least in what I have seen of it and experienced.

For example, I have not met one Christian person around here that opposes war or at the least thinks that maybe we are moving toward it hastily and without sufficient provocation.

I think we have met Susan, but a while back and when I was by folks in the thread to NOT be a Christian because I believe that homosexuality is a rare, but normal expression of sexuality.

 

[Blindfaith]

What does that have to do with this thread?

 

[PastorFreud]

Probably nothing, bf, but I just thought I would mention to Susan that there are Christians here who oppose war and think Rush Limbaugh is an idiot.

As far as Baptists, I used to be one over 20 years ago. I still do a good imitation. The last time I attended a Southern Baptist church was two years ago. Nothing was different in that particular church. Still screaming and pounding the pulpit and focused on being saved from Hell.

My SBC pastor gave me my first anti-Catholic propoganda. (And my last, I'm happy to say.) I was also taught to fear (hate? same thing?) Mormons, JWs, Methodists, regular Baptists, smoking, drinking, loose women, the color purple, and air conditioning. Now, I have attended other Baptist churches that were nice. I think the particular church in my backwards thinking home town is not generalizable to all. I have mixed feelings on whether the town would be better off without a church at all.

But Baptists aren't the only angry ones. I think every denomination has it fringes. I was just reading about the Presbyterian association that is ultra right wing the other day. I hear Methodists have a looney fringe too. Thre are charismatics, and charismaniacs. So I'm not sure singling out Baptists is fair.