My experience with Christians has been very negative. When my disability benefits were wrongfully stopped, after selling all my possessions I ended up so destitute I couldn’t afford food. The local food bank is very time consuming and difficult to access, and often closed. After relying on the food bank for a while I fainted in the street and ended up being diagnosed with multiple nutritional deficiencies. In desperation I turned to Christian organisations. I tried local churches but was very rudely turned away. I tried a huge Christian forum with thousands of members - just asking for help accessing Christian food pantries if there are any - and was insulted and given no help. I was told to “man up and sort your own problems out,” told that I shouldn’t even get disability benefits in the first place because “that’s socialism,” and when I told them I was so desperate for food that I had turned to shoplifting, I was told to repent and confess my crimes or I would deservedly go to hell. They would not help me. I got so desperate that I joined an online suicide pact forum, wanting someone to help me take my life (I had tried before an failed, so wanted to make sure it got done properly.) Several people made pacts with me but they always let me down at the last minute. Starving and totally desperate, I offered for sale on the forum the only thing I had left, my prescribed medications. For that, I was banned, but just before I got banned one of the members told me about mutual aid and suggested I try hexbear, (which is also how I came to find lemmy.)
The response from people here couldn’t be more different than the Christians. The vast majority of people have been empathetic and unjudgmental and multiple people have helped me out with food and other items I need. Sometimes it can take weeks and multiple posts to get a response, but usually someone eventually comes through. I can’t even imagine what I would have done without the help from here. People here have shown more kindness and solidarity than any of the Christians.
I’m sorry you’ve struggled so much with that, but I’m glad you’ve consistently found help on here and on hexbear. ❤️
As shitty as it is, it makes a kind of sense to me why Christianity is in such a dismal state: in order for an institution that influential to be allowed to exist under capitalism and imperialism, it gets warped into another extension of it. Or in the best case, such as the Catholic Church, might do some stuff for charity but gets defanged of any revolutionary potential. Though “best case” feels weird to say in reference to the Catholic Church when also considering its history of abuse. As I understand it, they are being more diligent now with hiring standards and the like to try to stop the problem from continuing, but that doesn’t undo the damage already done.
Anyway, yeah, a Christianity under communism would probably look much more like the stuff about “when I was hungry, you gave me to eat; when I was thirsty, you gave me to drink” kind of spirit of it. I still wouldn’t personally believe in the Christian faith, but it’d have to change from the capitalist attitudes to co-exist with a more AES state vanguard type of situation.
My experience with Christians has been very negative. When my disability benefits were wrongfully stopped, after selling all my possessions I ended up so destitute I couldn’t afford food. The local food bank is very time consuming and difficult to access, and often closed. After relying on the food bank for a while I fainted in the street and ended up being diagnosed with multiple nutritional deficiencies. In desperation I turned to Christian organisations. I tried local churches but was very rudely turned away. I tried a huge Christian forum with thousands of members - just asking for help accessing Christian food pantries if there are any - and was insulted and given no help. I was told to “man up and sort your own problems out,” told that I shouldn’t even get disability benefits in the first place because “that’s socialism,” and when I told them I was so desperate for food that I had turned to shoplifting, I was told to repent and confess my crimes or I would deservedly go to hell. They would not help me. I got so desperate that I joined an online suicide pact forum, wanting someone to help me take my life (I had tried before an failed, so wanted to make sure it got done properly.) Several people made pacts with me but they always let me down at the last minute. Starving and totally desperate, I offered for sale on the forum the only thing I had left, my prescribed medications. For that, I was banned, but just before I got banned one of the members told me about mutual aid and suggested I try hexbear, (which is also how I came to find lemmy.)
The response from people here couldn’t be more different than the Christians. The vast majority of people have been empathetic and unjudgmental and multiple people have helped me out with food and other items I need. Sometimes it can take weeks and multiple posts to get a response, but usually someone eventually comes through. I can’t even imagine what I would have done without the help from here. People here have shown more kindness and solidarity than any of the Christians.
I’m sorry you’ve struggled so much with that, but I’m glad you’ve consistently found help on here and on hexbear. ❤️
As shitty as it is, it makes a kind of sense to me why Christianity is in such a dismal state: in order for an institution that influential to be allowed to exist under capitalism and imperialism, it gets warped into another extension of it. Or in the best case, such as the Catholic Church, might do some stuff for charity but gets defanged of any revolutionary potential. Though “best case” feels weird to say in reference to the Catholic Church when also considering its history of abuse. As I understand it, they are being more diligent now with hiring standards and the like to try to stop the problem from continuing, but that doesn’t undo the damage already done.
Anyway, yeah, a Christianity under communism would probably look much more like the stuff about “when I was hungry, you gave me to eat; when I was thirsty, you gave me to drink” kind of spirit of it. I still wouldn’t personally believe in the Christian faith, but it’d have to change from the capitalist attitudes to co-exist with a more AES state vanguard type of situation.
Check out https://redsails.org/western-marxism-and-christianity/
Edit: put in a newline.
I guess capitalism really does warp everything.