Devil in the details

[anunitu]

I was raised by a mother that went kinda super religious,and dragged us kids through a large number of church's,searching for her best fit. This is not an indictment of Christian beliefs,but just my personal memories of how religion can effect small children. The last Church my Mom stayed in was SDA,and I remember being taught that the Devil was EVERYWHERE..For a while I had trouble sleeping because I thought the Devil was under my bed. I know a lot of very fine and caring Christians,but there are a few that seem to be paranoid of everything having some connection to the Devil. The Harry Potter books come to mind.
Just wondering how any of you might have been effected as children by forced religious exposure.

[B. de Corbin]

Re: Devil in the details

I went to a Catholic school up till 3rd grade. The nuns told us all kinds of amazing things, like that there is an angel on our right side and a devil on our left side. They actually told us not to leave room on our seats for the devil... To this very day I tend to sit on the right side of my seat (but I lean to the left and listen very carefully).

[Just_Wondering]

Re: Devil in the details

My parents weren't religious, which i am thankful for, but i remember getting into an argument with one of my uncles because i bought my kid cousin a book about dinosaurs. My uncle is very well educated so i was shocked when he started telling his kid that dinosaurs were fake and created by the devil to try and disprove the existence of God.

[anunitu]

Re: Devil in the details

I almost got into an argument with my EX about the age of Earth,She being very religious made the statement that the Earth was only 6,000 years old..I bit my tongue on that one,and didn't pursue it further,knowing not to go down that path with her.

[Just_Wondering]

Re: Devil in the details

I guess in those situations it's a case of either ignoring science or admitting that the book you revolve your entire life around is wrong. In that situation i would probably do the same thing.

[Madness]

Re: Devil in the details

I was raised in an atheist household so I had no exposure at a young age. My first memory of anything religious was the annoyance of not being able to play with my Catholic friend on Wednesday evening because she had CCD (or something like that).

My next memory of organized religion was my great-grandmother's funeral at age 11. I also thought she was a 'witch' ( a good one of course). I don't know why, but she was just so mysterious to me and did all sorts of weird things (she was a homesteader...something I aspire to now!). The funeral was open casket and my grandmother dragged the grandkids up there to give Mamba a kiss. So I was already in a bit of a stupor. Then everyone started "chanting". No one was reading, they all had this chant memorized. Scared the crap out of me. My mom explained later it was the Lord's prayer. But it left a terrible creepy feeling about Christianity that I have never been able to shake!

[Just_Wondering]

Re: Devil in the details

I was raised in an atheist household so I had no exposure at a young age. My first memory of anything religious was the annoyance of not being able to play with my Catholic friend on Wednesday evening because she had CCD (or something like that).

My next memory of organized religion was my great-grandmother's funeral at age 11. I also thought she was a 'witch' ( a good one of course). I don't know why, but she was just so mysterious to me and did all sorts of weird things (she was a homesteader...something I aspire to now!). The funeral was open casket and my grandmother dragged the grandkids up there to give Mamba a kiss. So I was already in a bit of a stupor. Then everyone started "chanting". No one was reading, they all had this chant memorized. Scared the crap out of me. My mom explained later it was the Lord's prayer. But it left a terrible creepy feeling about Christianity that I have never been able to shake!

Hahahaja, i had a similar experience as a child. Got dragged to church by a well-meaning friend and her family and they had their hands raised and were stamping their feet muttering some stuff in latin and some people were screaming like monkeys in the amazon and it terrified me.

Funny enough, thats what most public pagan events are like so...

[Moonravenstar]

Re: Devil in the details

I was made to go to church as well baptist, and went while in high school, and I just didnt feel that this was the right relgion for me

[Just_Wondering]

Re: Devil in the details

This thread sort of reminds me of The Waterboy.

"Little girls are da DEBBIL".

[Dez]

Re: Devil in the details

Oh, wow....I've told a lot of stories in my time on this forum in different places.

The LDS concept of the Devil is a bit different...he's presented in adult ceremony as a well-dressed man who promises worldly gains in exchange for one's secret temple signs and tokens. I think that shift filters down into the culture as more of a fear of outsiders and pressure to obey religious authority without question then the more traditional views.

That said, my parents became convinced that they needed to cast Satan out of me, and rededicate their entire home, when I was 14 or 15. At the time, I believed every word they said, including the idea that demons were making me have multiple personalities and I needed to pray to god to heal me.

Amazing how those issues cleared right up after leaving home. Nothing like convincing a child she has a mental illness (and trying to "fix" it yourselves) when she has nothing of the kind.

It's reasons like this why I usually stick with "we just don't get along" when people ask me about my parents.

[thalassa]

Re: Devil in the details

I grew up in the United Church of Christ...which is one of the most liberal of liberal Christianities. But I still went to church every Sunday and Wednesday, I went to Sunday school, I sang in the children's choir, I went through confirmation classes and confirmation, I was in the youth group, I went to church camp in the summer and Vacation Bible school as well. TBH, for me, the Devil was never something discussed; God is about love, not fear; the Bible is not inerrant or to be taken literally, but is instead a divinely inspired guide (and can be both a good and bad example of what to do or not to do); etc. Really, if someone is going to be raised as a Christian (depending on one's family and congregation, since its a Congregationalist church and there is alot of personal variety of belief), its not a bad religious upbringing. I never had to get over a fear of Hell, I was raised with the idea of the Universality of God's Love and Grace...the God that I was raised with gives us free will even to deny Him, and loves us anyhow.

[Just_Wondering]

Re: Devil in the details

I wish more churches were like that. I recently sat with my dad and his brothers at a calvary church with pastor raul ries and he said that "whores, adulterers, gays, sex-before-marriagers and whoremongers" will burn in hell. My father nodded his head in agreement while sitting elbow to elbow with his sex-before-marriage parents.

Then again, i have determined that ries is an obvious quack, judging by his statement in the same service that black hole sin space are portals to hell and that if an intruder broke into his house he would kill them with a samurai sword.

[Dez]

Re: Devil in the details

I agree, Thal, that or a UU congregation is the way to go. It honestly floors me just how different our upbringings were.

And Just_Wondering, that man sounds...unstable.

[anunitu]

Re: Devil in the details

Dez,he does sound a bit over the top,kinda something along the same lines helped me depart the Christian world.

[habbalah]

Re: Devil in the details

Hahahaja, i had a similar experience as a child. Got dragged to church by a well-meaning friend and her family and they had their hands raised and were stamping their feet muttering some stuff in latin and some people were screaming like monkeys in the amazon and it terrified me.

Funny enough, thats what most public pagan events are like so...

Reminds me of the first time I heard someone speaking in tongues. I think I was...14 or 15, and had gone to church with a friend and her family. Scared the hell out of me.

I went to Church and to youth group until I was...probably 13. I stopped going after my youth pastor told the group that gays were going to hell, but we shouldn't be watching Ellen (she had her sitcom then) because it was supporting her sinful lifestyle. Being a young kid already feeling confused and guilty about my sexuality and even my gender, I quit going. Since then, I've lived in fear that every Christian I ever meet is going to immediately start condemning me to hell (despite that not being the case 90% of the time).