The thing that gets me about the religious stuff I was taught (catholic stuff) is like the whole thing with “original sin.” I’m supposed to be tied up in responsibility for a decision that some ancestor made millennia ago. Holding children responsible for the sins of their parents is some real ethnic-cleansing-justifying mindset. Not to mention, the whole story of the “sin” in the first place; in the most charitable interpretation I can think of, they were purposefully tempted and fell to temptation and God was like, yeah, that’s it, you’re done. And then it took a long time and Jesus getting himself tortured to death in order for God to reconsider his stonewalling of humanity. But Jesus is also a part of God, according to catholicism, IIRC; the whole three persons in one thing. So in a way, it seems the catholic God is like those people who can’t empathize with suffering until similar happens to them, then they finally get it. Though considering this is what I was taught in the western empire and considering (in my understanding) catholicism’s historical ties to such levers of power at least in more recent history, I guess it shouldn’t be a surprise if God comes out looking like a sort of Scrooge character who is out of touch with the suffering he is causing and can be moved to charity (not even reform, much less overthrow) only if he suffers first.
The funniest comparison I saw of it was someone likening it to your neighbour constantly sinning against you by parking on your driveway. And the only way you can forgive them is if you break their son’s legs first.
The thing that gets me about the religious stuff I was taught (catholic stuff) is like the whole thing with “original sin.” I’m supposed to be tied up in responsibility for a decision that some ancestor made millennia ago. Holding children responsible for the sins of their parents is some real ethnic-cleansing-justifying mindset. Not to mention, the whole story of the “sin” in the first place; in the most charitable interpretation I can think of, they were purposefully tempted and fell to temptation and God was like, yeah, that’s it, you’re done. And then it took a long time and Jesus getting himself tortured to death in order for God to reconsider his stonewalling of humanity. But Jesus is also a part of God, according to catholicism, IIRC; the whole three persons in one thing. So in a way, it seems the catholic God is like those people who can’t empathize with suffering until similar happens to them, then they finally get it. Though considering this is what I was taught in the western empire and considering (in my understanding) catholicism’s historical ties to such levers of power at least in more recent history, I guess it shouldn’t be a surprise if God comes out looking like a sort of Scrooge character who is out of touch with the suffering he is causing and can be moved to charity (not even reform, much less overthrow) only if he suffers first.
The funniest comparison I saw of it was someone likening it to your neighbour constantly sinning against you by parking on your driveway. And the only way you can forgive them is if you break their son’s legs first.
🤣