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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsHad A Talk With My Former Pastor This Morning
I decided to do a phone reach out to my former Southern Baptist pastor who I had a lot of respect for until this morning.
We got talking about this years Presidential election and so I came through the backdoor to see who he was voting for. In 96 he voted for Clinton. So I asked him if his church still teaches that Mormons are a cult, he said yes, I asked are you still telling the parishioners not to invite them into your home to talk to thim. YES.
I then said are you voting for Obama this year...NO, Romney. I then said why are you voting counter to your spiritual beliefs and what you teach others. He asked what I meant.. I said why do you want a cultist running the country and why do you want to allow him to occupy the peoples home. Also how can you vote for a person who LIES every chance he finds it politically beneficial?
We all LIE he said, and I separate my spiritual values from my political values. I had to get away from this conversation quick as I felt like I was going to lose my breakfast so I asked one last question. I asked.... Which candidate best reflect the values of Jesus Christ,that's who I am voting for, I'll have to think about that he said.
I offered up the closing and hung up and wanted to scream my lungs out...my mouth hurts to much from oral surgery yesterday.
They are not voting their values they are voting against Obama... They are LIARS to themselves.
Tigress DEM
(7,887 posts)Hopefully you found a spiritual home where the REAL values of Christ are valued.
sibelian
(7,804 posts)but it's almost entirely meaningless to try and relate to such people. Essentially they are playing two different games, one is the game of "see, everybody, how interested in good and evil I am" and the other is the game of "what can I get?" They don't see that the games even overlap, let alone contradict each other. They aren't interested in reality.
I sympathise with your loss of respect for this individual. It's very upsetting when a figure from one's past turns out to be smaller than you thought.
phylny
(8,380 posts)And yes. It's meaningless. They are non-thinkers, low information voters. I've just purged three off my Facebook "friends" list. Cannot stand it anymore.
sibelian
(7,804 posts)they've made up their minds, they don't want to talk to you, they want to talk AT you. Any concession to anything you say would be losing "points".
Tennessee Gal
(6,160 posts)stuff (bullshit) on his personal Facebook page. He believes Obama is a Muslim.
How he can reconcile what he is doing with his position of Christian leadership is beyond my comprehension.
It is sickening.
lunatica
(53,410 posts)How disheartened you must feel!
Warpy
(111,261 posts)I find all bigotry to be distasteful. It's especially distasteful in someone who tries to con people into thinking he's Christlike.
Schema Thing
(10,283 posts)so I wouldn't expect much.
Response to rsmith6621 (Original post)
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tavernier
(12,388 posts)Response to tavernier (Reply #10)
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treestar
(82,383 posts)wow he needs to lose his job.
NMDemDist2
(49,313 posts)Jesus was the very first Socialist. Got your attention with that statement, didnt I?
Over the past several months, many of my more politically right friends and family members have grown quite bellicose during discussions about the current administration and in particular the current President. One of the most frequent slanders I have heard is, Obama is a Socialist! Well, as I have heard this label more than once applied to this President, to many Liberal Democrats, and to others myself included who believe there are better options than flat out capitalism I decided to look into the situation and determine for myself the following:
A) Is Obama really a Socialist?
B) Is Socialism an entirely bad economic framework?
C) What was the basis of Socialism, where did it start?
In the West, we have peculiar views of Socialism. In fact, all too often, we wrongly equate Socialism with Nazism, the Third Reich, and post WWII Russia Communism / Marxism, in truth many pundits, those talking heads where so much of our social views seem to be derived from have put horns, cloven hooves, and a tail on socialism and call it evil. Further, we wrongly connect Socialism with a political movement, which it is decidedly not. Consider the definition of Socialism, there are many however, for the purpose of this discussion I will use the following classic definition:
We People
(619 posts)Looks like there are other good articles there, too. Even though it wasn't intended for me, I'm glad you posted it. Thanks!
We People
(619 posts)Thanks for sharing. I've been similarly shocked and sickened on FB by a few former classmates who later became clergy, I understand how disheartening this kind of thing is.
I assume by your comments that he must have voted GOP in '00 and '04. Do you know about '08? Just wondering just what his problem would be with Obama, besides listening to the right wing media propaganda or falling in line with his fellow pastors. Let's face it, it would be rare for really any of them to vote Dem, since the moderate pastors left the SBC for the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship years ago.
You may be the only one who has asked him which one reflects the values of Jesus. He may think about it, but it sounds like other forces in his life have persuaded him to compromise on that. Maybe he doesn't take Matthew 25 ("...the least of these..." passages) as seriously as he may have at one time.
DryHump
(199 posts)has always more closely reflected Christian/compassionate values than the Repub's. You will be fine without that relationship.
uponit7771
(90,339 posts)...and doing the moral equivalency thingy some of the false teachers in 2nd Peter would do