Christians refuse to admit that original sin is emotional abuse.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

It's a sick cannibalistic death cult.

Their foundational premise which requires substitutionary atonement DESTROYS peoples' self esteem. It makes a lot of people feel like they will never be good enough. Every time I heard a fire-breathing preacher tell the congregation what a bunch of horrible worthless POS sinners we were, "Our righteousness is as filthy rags" etc., I wanted to crawl into a hole and just die because I couldn't handle the mental anguish. And the preachers all congratulated each other after the sermon for preaching such excellent sermons. Since you can never be perfect, they lay an unearned and undeserved guilt trip on you just for breathing because of a couple of fruit-munching simpletons in a fairy tale.

My mistake was taking that bullshit and the preachers' opinions seriously. I had to get the strength up to walk away from it forever. I'm a UU who studies Buddhism.

I think original sin and substitutionary atonement are a con job, a false problem with an unnecessary and imaginative solution.

I had a Methodist minister who graduated from a Presbyterian seminary tell me that original sin wasn't that bad because of God's grace. Well, I've never felt any different whether or not I prayed or read the bible.

John Bradshaw, Ph.D., a former Jesuit priest, wrote a book about why we are an addicted society. It's called HEALING THE SHAME THAT BINDS YOU. We are addicted to doing things because we never feel we are good enough. Nobody loves us just for being who we are. There is always something WRONG with us. So because we feel horrible and shameful even when we don't deserve it, we perform addictive actions or thoughts to take away the pain.

And I've had Christians on DU tell me, "Well you can believe anything you want and be a Christian." My answer is "Wrong. You have to believe in original sin and substitutionary atonement. You wouldn't need to be saved by Jesus were it not for original sin which is made up bullshit to get you to feel bad and be controllable. That is the definition of a Christian. The foundational premise. And every church I went to recited the Apostles' Creed."

For people who have such great faith, they seem to be awfully dodgy and duplicitous about actually stating what they believe.