[rant; religion] {faith is both a prison and an open hand}

[kaberett]

Content notes: evangelism, mention of non-current suicidality.

Proposition: I should be able to walk into my workplace without being fucking evangelised at. I expect it from the Jehovah's Witnesses (misc) and the Mormons (home of Creepy Sexy Jesus across the way from work); I don't bloody want it inside my department building.

It's the Christian Union's ~themed week~, you see, and it's entirely possible that I'd object less if it weren't such trite, shame-based theology. "I'm not that bad, so why do I need Jesus?" Oh, fuck off.

And fuck off even more for your reaction to "I'm queer, trans, and ex-Catholic; you don't want me" being "actually, yes we do". At which point (late, stressed, underslept) I snapped back that they didn't want me in any meaningful way that wouldn't render me suicidal, all while continuing to walk away, and I kind of hope it ruined her day, to be honest, because she fucking oughtn't get away with making my work space hostile to me and thinking that doing so is ~purely and wholly loving~, because it goddamn isn't.

(See, this is why I fall down on the Captain Awkward maxim that it's a potential red flag if people aren't kind and decent to everyone around them, because fuck that.)

Comments

Re: content note: Christian Union bullshit, threats of violence, homophobia

[davidgillon]

Dear god, either it's got worse since I was a student, Lancaster was too far north for their message, or I was lucky.

Appalled.

[liv]

I think any of your suggestions may be true, but I would also gently point out that as a basically Christian straight man you probably didn't see the worst of how affiliated Christian Unions behave. And I know these Evangelical types don't always like Catholics very much, but it's nothing on how they feel about Jews. Well, in theory they "love" Jews, but love in the sense of really passionately wanting to save our souls even beyond how much they want to save atheists, liberal Christians etc.

[legionseagle]

They were pretty fucking dreadful in Oxford in the 1980s but I get the impression they've got much, much worse since then.

[davidgillon]

Oh, absolutely, I think one off the girls I knew was in CU, but it never came up as an issue, so that was about the extent of my contact, so feel free to suggest, point out, or beat into my skull with a lump of 2 by 4 as needed!