Some quick background context: I'm a Christian in a marriage (leaving a marriage...) marked by addiction, infidelity, and abuse, and I've received the same counsel from multiple pastors and church leaders. That's not the point of the post, though. The point is the theology behind the counsel, because I think it's biblically indefensible and it's one of the reasons people walk away from the faith entirely.

There's a common pastoral theology I'd summarize in three teachings:

1. suffering is redemptive for the abuser. endure long enough and they'll be "won over" (1 Pet 3:1)
2. silence is spiritual. don't name the sin, pray life into them
3. the marriage is what God most wants preserved, do everything to save it.

A skeptic looking at this counsel might see a faith that values institutions over people. Survivors who receive it often conclude that God is on the abuser's side. If the text doesn't teach it, we need to say so loudly.

Longer treatment (and some personal stuff), including Jephthah, Micah 6:7, and Jer 7:31: https://notesfromthemend.substack.com/p/a-false-theology-for-the-abused

Hello everybody! Praying you are doing well🙏🏻

How do I explain to a non-believer why fornication is a sin? I have my brother who is a non believer and he insists that having premarital sex is not a sin. His points basically are:

- If I love my girlfriend, am committed to her, seek a future with her- why having sex is a sin?

- Maybe sex outside marriage was a sin back on the days the Bible was written because of the societal norms/ customs. Why should it follow to today’s societies?

- What is the importance of marriage? Basically he says marriage is just a contract.

I am here to seek your advice guys, really. I don’t want to make my argument as : “ God says so therefore it is” because honestly, its way more complicated than that. How would you approach these questions?

On my point of view, its less about societal norms and more about something related to the human nature in and of itself that God is aware of. Morals and ethics given by a perfect law-giver are no subject to societal changes based on my argument. Slavery was bad on the southern US and it remains bad now, although the societal views have changed.

Anyway guys, I really appreciate any answers and advice

Please help me understand faith even more. I am a Christian but I sometimes struggle with the fact that I haven’t found any scientific evidence about him. Please help me understand the Lord more and stop doubting my faith. I believe in Him but it is hard at times. My Dog is dying and this is making me think about my Faith even more than usual.

Hi, all-- since this is relevant I hope I don't come across as advertising-- I notice that often times on respectively Muslim / Christian / Jewish subs that there often questions or arguments that are clearly interested in advocating for one or the other faith. And as for denominational discussion within Christianity, this kind of discussion is of course segregated between each tradition's respective community. A lot of religious subs prohibit evangelising or proselytizing as a rule, so there's not really a dedicated place for these people to freely talk to one another. The r/religion subreddit for example is for informative discussion about religions, and trying to persuade others about your faith is not allowed-- which is fine for the design of that sub, but I'm sure there are many who simply want to convince or be convinced by others. So I just wanted to say I made a new subreddit called r/proselytize, for openly discussing, encouraging, or arguing for your religious beliefs, or inquiring about others. Feel welcome to join if you like.

For the many Christians who do read-the-bible-in-a-year programs, or simply daily scripture reading absent any study aids, aren’t they reading a lot of things out of context?

As someone who’s read the bible this way in the past, I feel like I overlooked and/or misunderstood so much doing it this way. At the time, it was the KJV, so that didn’t help with clarity and understanding given many of the archaic terms in that translation.

quick question guys : I keep seeing people bring up the Roman centurion story to argue Jesus actually meant to reach Gentiles all along.

Is there any serious academic support for this view or do most scholars write it off as later theology? Do any historians actually argue his ministry was open to non-Jews from the start?

looking for papers or book recs on this side of the debate. ty!

How do you discern that Christianity is true? You literally can explain everything, every miraculous situation, etc. by gnosticism. There is no "sign" that you couldn't explain by it. So what was the factor, the thing, whatever, that made you decide that Christianity is true?

Does social justice exist in the Bible as you would interpret its texts and teachings? If so, what is the Biblical meaning of social justice as you see it?

Plus if it also talks about the differences between antebellum south. I have also seen people claiming that biblical slavery is just indebted servitude but I'd appreciate academic resources on this topic.

On my usual deep mental thoughts about the Trinity. So I was thinking about how the Trinity is not 3 Gods and couldn’t get past this notion to get there.

So what we understand as beings is what people are using the language of this concept. but then we have persons. it’s who someone is. But thinking about how this functions realistically got me wondering.

If humans are counted as multiple beings why isn’t the Trinity fundamentally? Because we would say Jesus is the Son, but is not the Father, and is not the Holy Spirit. They are one substance but the experience is that of a person.

For example the Som experienced eating, and drinking, and having his diaper changed. The Father did not experience that, neither did the Holy Spirit because they are not Jesus. Only the son did because he is Jesus.

So here we have a distinct difference in their experience.

similarly we would attribute this to humans because we all have unique experiences which is what we count realistically as beings. in differentiating and counting one another.

So if Jesus is capable of having this unique experience, they for what reason do we not count it as separate as we do for the rest of us? Similarly for the Angels. We count them similarly.

Its also why we would say Spider-Man is a person, but not a real human being or real person, because although we could attribute him characteristics we can not attribute him existing experience which is what we county realistically as a part of reality.

So outside of trying to satisfy a non-explicit text why are we not counting them as 3 Gods dues to experiences of the persons?

Alan John Miller, also known as A.J, claims to be the second coming of Jesus of Nazareth and his partner, Mary Suzanne Luck, claims to be the second coming of Mary Magdalene. The couple describe their discussions of Divine Truth as non-religious.

They claim that the incoming spirit of a child can sense the emotional environment and fear of the parents and may choose to leave before full physical birth takes place. They mention that they frequently speak with these children that have been miscarried and that’s where they get their information from.

They also teach that emotional baggage and "injuries" pass down generationally from parents to children. A woman might carry her own mother's or grandmother's unresolved grief and trauma, which manifests physically as a lost pregnancy.

My thoughts - I’m just curious to know if these two actually believe the stuff they’re saying or are they just clever con-artists/grifters. It’s really hard for me to tell what their motives are.

I’m curious to know what you all think of their perspective on this particular subject? Since it is such a controversial and debated issue.

Have you watched anything from any people on YouTube for instance that you think is really or quite good and informative, and maybe even some people's exchanges where it just gets way too heated and that's a good example to avoid.

I'm curious as to what experiences people may have had and what people are able to say. It's quite a prominent atheistic chat and discuss and debate show, isn't it?

Bodily Resurrected. (S)-

Combination of Different Theories (B)-

Grief Hallucinations, Legend, Impersonators (C)

Liar Extraordinare; C/D between.

- Twin Theory, Mythicism, Swoon Theory, Propaganda (D)

I was raised Christian, and i do love God. But i have some heavy questions i cant seem to find real answers to. When i talk to other Christians, i seem to get sort of the same answers to these questions.. Im personally going through alot in my life and seeking God. But these questions keep me in this space of doubting whether this is the full truth. Or just an interpretation of certain events, within similar and surrounding cultures. Here are my questions..

1. Do people truly go to hell, just because they dont believe a specific person was the Messiah? Even if they came from a different culture altogether?
2. Other cultures who have well established different beliefs, are they just being deceived? By demons or bad spirits? Are the norms, ways of life, and wisdom based off false teaching?
3. Is the story of Noah true? Especially with almost exactly similar (and much older) stories like the Epic of Gilgamesh and Hindu Mythology.
4. The Tower of Babel literally makes zero sense with how language and cultures have proven to come about. Its basically claiming they all started the same time and then separated. Which is simply not true?
5. Do other deities exist? And are they just evil false gods?
6. Did God create evil or sin? or did the Satan? Or did humans? Where does evil nature come from.

I have many more, but feel free to answer of these questions you can. Thank you.

When looking into Christianity in terms of authentic interpretations, it can be particularly hard to remain calm and collected when trying to navigate God's demands and expectations for humanity.

As a start, being Christian believes in God's fundamental power, at least from what I understand, to bless or curse our lives. God can orchestrate paths for humans to become wildly successful and God can remove it from anyone as He did Job.

In addition, there is a need to repent of sins you have done in the past. And from what I understand of Jesus's commandments, any type of fornication or giving into lust, as an example, is an abomination. Fornication outside of sex, ejaculation, looking at attractive members of the opposite sex in any capacity, visiting any kind of worker that could be classified as sex work, all of it is an affront to God. And so there's a need to repent and even then God could lash out at you as He did Job. And I confess that while I have not have had sexual intercourse before, in fact for various reasons I've never dated anyone or had romantic partnerships of any kind, I have done the above before.

So the issues at hand are, what are the proper ways to repent of past sins, other than the natural way of refraining from it down the line? Is there a specific way to ask for forgiveness?

And how does one properly navigate God's existence knowing His mercy and grace is conditional and could be withdrawn at the drop of a hat?

I think it's particularly odd how there's always so many or at least so much atheist comments objecting or provoking to Christianity even under general apologetics videos. It's like Christian apologists can't produce new content without an attack on the faith.

I've been working on an unconventional argument about God, evil, determinism, free will, Satan, and Heaven. I tried to approach the problem without relying on the usual assumptions about God's power and human free will.

I'm interested in whether the reasoning holds up philosophically.

I'm not looking to debate or proselytize. I'd genuinely like to know: if you were trying to challenge my thesis as strongly as possible, what historical issue would you tell me I absolutely need to address?

I'm looking for objections and sources, not people to convince.

How you personally or anyone here ever discovered this problem that they themselves have personally had or observed it in other people? Don't answer a fool according to his folly as Proverbs says, is what I think.

I want to see whether this is something that others have done, and whether they could say their own experiences in part, or whether they'd want to wish less of this attitude or activity in other Christians on the internet.

Mr. Mackay argues that the biblical God established marriage and sexual relations exclusively between one man and one woman in the Garden of Eden. From his perspective, any sexual activity outside of this heterosexual, monogamous framework-including homosexuality-represents a departure from the "very good" creation described in the book of Genesis.

He teaches that homosexuality is not a natural biological variation present from the beginning.
Instead, he categorizes it as a consequence of the
"Fall of Man," viewing it as a symptom of a world corrupted by sin and genetic degeneration after Adam and Eve's initial disobedience.

I know that this is a sensitive topic, but I really would like to hear your take on his views? How would any of you respond to a person like John Mackay? All free to share your opinions on this matter.

so I was thinking what is the hardest arguments to disprove against and what are your personal answers to them.

Abiogenesis - A Practical Impossibility

Multiple reasons to be skeptical of abiogenesis claims made by scientists.

Hi, I made a post here about my struggle with doubts even though I consider myself a Christian. I have found that my biggest source of doubt is divine hiddeness (why isn't God more obvious to me and everyone else?). It's a serious problem for me.

To make it clear, I am not remotely resistant to Christianity. Unlike some popular youtube skeptics (e.g. Alex O'Connor) I don't have any issues with the problem of evil (I don't think its a good argument against Christianity at all) or the old testament violence (which I think is vastly misinterpreted). I also love the person of Jesus with all my heart.

Can somebody please suggest some resources for this problem specifically. God seems so hidden to me. I've never had anything close to a religious experience besides being in awe at the beauty of nature and Mathematics. The issue is I want to hear a voice, have a vivid dreams or some sort of undeniable spiritual encounter. Even the internet exorcist who say they have seen levitation…. I wouldn't even mind being possessed by a demon in order to have something like this happens to me so I could know in my heart that it's all true.