#like i dont believe in the Christian god or whatever

[siriuslygay1981]

MY HANDS R SO SHAKY IT MAKES ME MAD, LET ME WRITE GAY FANFICTION.

This is some gods punishment fr 😭🙏🏼

[spinchs-field]

you think it’d be weird if i did start believing in god again? because the thought feels comforting. it’s nice believing there’s someone who loves me no matter what. yknow.

[birdmenmanga]

birdmen as presented by my bestie beloved @ashe-is-here​

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

[snekdood]

idk but the way evangelicals talk about the anti christ, he kinna seems like a dope dude. cares about equality... nature... helping people..... reeeally struggling to see the issue here

[tuliptiger]

On a completely totally unrelated note to the last post... When I was younger and raised evangelical Christian my family kept telling me how god loves me, is all powerful, and can just make whatever he wants happen at anytime because hes all powerful or whatever. I decided that that meant he could turn me, a 11 year old girl, into a tiger while retaining my thoughts and human mind.

I prayed for 7 days and fasted (I snuck snacks so maybe the point didn't translate like I needed it to) for him to turn me into a tiger and when I didn't that was the start of me losing my faith in traditional Christian god. Which, to this day, I think is so incredibly funny and cool of me.

[sun-3-160]

some of my irls are arguing about whether its okay to dress up as a wendigo for halloween and one is saying that its disrespectful or whatever?? but what if i dont think theyre real. the same way i dont think the norse gods are real. im not religious so its all the same to me, and i see no difference between someone dressing up as thor and someone dressing up as a wendigo

its your religion and you can believe it but I DONT. and you cant hold me to your religions standards. like ok you dont think YOU should be talking about them, okay whatever. but you cant impose your religious beliefs onto ME.

[foxstens]

had a weird experience on the train

[queenie-blackthorn]

tips for writing muslim characters

except im a muslim, born and raised

dont mix it up with arab characters, yes a muslim can be arab and muslim but theres a difference. the link to my post abt writing arabs is here

first and foremost, not all muslims are arabs, and not all arabs are muslims. yes, most terminology and the holy book is in arabic, but that doesnt mean its exclusively arabs

indonesia (not an arab country) has the highest population of muslims worldwide

the arab country with the most christians is egypt, but the arab country with the highest population of christians is lebanon 

not all practicing muslim women wear hijab (some extremely religious women might not wear a hijab)

five prayers a day: fajr (before sunrise), zuhr (midday), asr (afternoon), maghreb/maghrib (sunset), ishaa (nighttime)

call to prayer is known as 'azan', you can listen to it on youtube

muslims use the lunar calendar (known as the hijri calendar), which also has 12 months but its around two weeks shorter than the gregorian calendar. most people only remember the ninth month: ramadan

fasting consists of not eating/drinking from fajr until maghrib. you stop as soon as the azan for fajr sounds, and you can start again as soon as the azan for maghrib sounds. you fast for the entire month of ramadan, but its also encouraged to fast on mondays, thursdays, and the 14th/15th/16th days of each month of the hijri calendar

allah isnt the name of god. allah is the arabic word for 'god'

women dont have to cover up completely until puberty, athough some girls cover up before then and other women dont cover up at all

women can be religious and not cover up

the word 'hijab' doesnt show up in the quran, its 'khimar'. hijab is to cover up completely, not just hair. you cant wear a headscarf with a short sleeved shirt

men have to cover up too. from their navel to their knees absolutely has to be covered up, and (in most islamic cultures, not necessarily exactly religious) they cover up their chests as well 

also men are told to avert their gazes from women more than women are told to cover up. youd find a lot of men in muslim countries not looking up from the floor when walking, especially in areas w a lot of women

kids by the age of eight can usually recite at least four chapters from the quran (the first one and the last three, mostly. it doesnt matter if theyre not arab)

if you want to use verses from the quran for whatever reason, i recommend quran.com

theres only one version of the quran. the same copy thats existed for 1400 years and millions of people have memorized it

on that note, people who memorize the quran are called hafiz, and there isnt a particular age. theres a three year old hafiz and a woman who didnt memorize it until age eighty three

there are two different sources for islamic law: the quran (holy book), and hadith (quotes of the prophet). dua' is completely different, its a prayer used to ask help from god, but unlike the five prayers, it doesnt really require a specific ritual. you just sit, face the direction of mecca, and say the dua'

superstitions are haram, but muslims do believe in black magic (its sihr in arabic and its one of the biggest sins) and djinn (there are djinn muslims but theyre widely regarded somewhat like monsters who encourage/help you to do black magic)

allahu akbar means "god is greater" or "god is the greatest". it isnt used as a signal to blow people up, and it isnt a term used purely by islam extremists

assalamu aleikum / waaleikum assalam mean, respectively, "peace be upon you" and "and peace be upon you too" basically just our way of just saying "hi" along with the reply

subhanallah means "glory be to god" usually when witnessing a miracle or when amazed

mashaallah - there arent any exact english equivalents but it means "what god wills". usually for compliments or to protect someone from evil eye

insha'allah - simply "god willing" but we use this when talking about the future (like "will you come to school?" "insha'allah" or "we'll get the gift, right?" "insha'allah"). can be replaced by the lesser used "bi'ithn illah"

alhamdu lillah - "praise be to god" or "thanks be to god. used in the way you might imagine, but also as a way to express that youre doing fine. "how are you doing today, sister?" "alhamdu lillah" (also when finishing a meal / finishing drinking water)

astaghfir ullah - "i seek forgiveness from god" whenever we see someone do something haram or when we ourselves do something haram and wish to repent

bismillah - "in the name of god" we use this whenever we begin something. a lot of arab literature starts with this. every chapter im the quran starts with this. every meal starts with saying this before eating

you can submit asks if you have any questions, but try to be a lil specific !!

feel free to rb with more info :)

[thrashkink-coven]

okay I don’t love ranting about Christians on this page because I try to keep this space free of religious shenanigans but I need to rant about this because it’s actually SO irritating. This is coming steaming hot right off the top of the dome so excuse my grammar and all caps.

Lately my instagram page (thrashkink_art check me out I’m awesome) has been getting a lot of attention from Christians for some reason, and I’ve been getting dmd by people wanting desperately to debate and/ or convert me. They all come at me with the assumption that I’m either an extreme atheist that’s just super mad at God or a complete dumbass that’s simply never read the first few pages of Genesis. I must either be angry or stupid. There’s no way I could have read the Bible and known the story of Jesus without subscribing to it. Anyone who isn’t Christian must not know the story! “Have you heard about JESUS? DID YOU 🫵 KNOW He died for your sins? 😃” Whatever

The thing that is so frustrating is that, EVERY SINGLE TIME I share some information with them about the Bible or religion that they didn’t know, they immediately BLOCK ME. EVERY TIME. And it’s like??? If you want to have a debate and go bar for bar then I’ll humor you. Hey, who knows! Maybe I’ll even learn something new and convert! I’m always open to new information! I love learning about religion! But apparently it doesn’t go both ways because the second I present information they can’t grapple with, they IMMEDIATELY BLOCK ME. AAAAAA

Some Christian dude: If you read the Bible you’d know that doing witchcraft will land you in Hell!

Me: well if we’re really going based off of the Bible, the entire concept of Hell doesn’t originate in the Isrealite religion. Actually, there’s no mention of a Hell in the OT at all, Hell is a Greek concept and so is Lucifer.

Christian: What? No?? That can’t be true it completely distorts my worldview

Me: You… don’t have to believe me just look into it yourself

*You can no longer message this person*

LIKE WTF.

Some Christian dude: Women are just naturally subordinate to men, if they weren’t then we would have worshipped a female Goddess alongside YHWH.

Me: Well… They did. The Israelites worshiped Asherah alongside YHWH before her worship was abolished

Christian: This is blasphemy *you can no longer message this person*

RRRRRRRRAAAAAAAA. I have countless examples like this! A dude called me evil because I told him Jesus was Jewish. I’ve been called a degenerate for explaining how YHWH originated in Canaan. Im so tired of ignorant Christians shitting my pants because they’re too lazy to do any research on tHEIR OWN RELIGION!! IF YOU NEED TO HAVE AN EXISTENTIAL CRISIS BECAUSE YOU JUSG LEARNED ABOUT THE HISTOY OF YOUR RELIGION THEN THATS ON YOU BITCH! DONT GET MAD AT ME BC YOUVE BEEN FED A LIE !!!!!! THATS NOT MY PROBLEM !!!!!!!!!!

There have been so many times when I’ve taken the time to go through all this bullshit with people because I really don’t want to be close minded. But holy shit it’s like they’re allergic to conflicting information. They immediately accuse me of trying to push blasphemy onto them. and when i’m like hey dude don’t take my word for it, please I encourage you to do your own research, they’re immediately so offended and appalled. How dare I tell them something about the Bible that they didn’t know.

Listen bro, I’m fully supportive of your Christianity, live your life, worship your God, I honestly do not care. But if you’re going to try to convert me at least be somewhat prepared for an actual discussion. Don’t block me because you can’t handle the reality of the situation mother fucker.

LIKE LISTEN IM USUALLY NOT SO PRESSED AB SHIT LIKE THIS BUT THE THING THAT DRIVES ME UP THE WALL IS THAT I USUALLY TRY TO IGNORE THESE PEOPLE BUT THEN THEYRE ALL LIKE “Aha! 😌 You don’t want to hear me out because you know I’m right! You’re afraid of the truth!” SO THEN IM LIKE

*SIGGGGGHHHHHHH*

OKAY! Let’s go! Let’s hear it! We can debate because you’re so desperate to change my mind! ILL WASTE THREE HOURS OF MY LIFE GOING THROGH THIS SHIT WITH YOU SO YOU CAN JUST CALL ME A BLASPHEMOUS WHORE AND BLOCK ME. I LOVE WASTING MY TIME I LOVE GOING IN CIRCLES I LOVE POINTLESS DISCUSSIONS I LIVE FOR THEM

DO NOT!!! DM ME IF YOURE A CHRISTIAN !!!!YOU WILL NOT COME OUT THE SAME AFTER HEARING THE THOUGHTS FROM MY EXPANSIVE SEXY SLUTTY BRAIN YOU WILL NEVER BE THE SAME!!!!

RRRRRAAAAAAAAA

ok. I’m better now. Merry Venus Day! Ave Lucifer! 🔱 💀

[blessedarethebinarybreakers]

(I’m popping a extra disclaimer here because I don’t know if I worded this very well, and I understand if this isnt the kind if question you feel comfortable answering, but this is a genuine question made in good faith. I also apologise if this sounds really stupid)

I read one of your recent asks about inclusivism and it reminded me of something that always sat in the back of my mind with this train of thought.

If we say that everyone regardless of religion, or absence of it, gets into heaven, doesn’t that seem disrespectful to their faith. By saying that people of other religions get into christian heaven, is that not inadvertently telling them that their religion or their gods are fake, and that when they die it’ll be okay because they’ll learn the real truth? I hope this doesn’t come across as blunt or disrespectful to anyone, I’ve just never be able to come to a conclusion that isn’t exclusive (which is kind of a depressing thought), but is also respectful. Because it’s a beautiful idea that god loves us all regardless of who we are or what we believe, but what about people who have the kind of faith we do in a completely different god, or multiple gods, do they have the same thoughts about us? that their god loves us even though we dont believe?

I feel like I’m asking questions I’m not supposed to but I’m just really curious about your perspective if this is something you’re comfortable answering.

Hey anon, this is an important question, so thanks for asking it! You don't sound "stupid"; you're thinking like a theologian :) I'm probably not going to do it justice, I'm afraid, but maybe folks will hop on with more ideas or resources?

This got really long, so the TL;DR: I agree with you, and so do a lot of theologians and other thinkers!

In a religiously diverse world, it makes sense that people of various religions ponder where people outside their religions "fit" in their understanding of both the present world and whatever form of afterlife they have.

If someone has a firm personal belief in certain things taking place after death (from heaven to reincarnation), I don't think it's inherently wrong to imagine all kinds of people joining them in that experience, when it points to how that person recognizes the inherent holiness and value of all kinds of people, and shows that they long for continued community with & flourishing for those people.

However, this contemplation should be done with great care — especially when your religion is the dominant one in your culture; especially if your religion has a long history (and/or present) of colonialism and coerced conversions.

Ultimately, humility and openness are key! It's fine to have your own beliefs about humanity's place in this life and after death, but make yourself mindful of your own limited perspective. Accept you might be wrong in part or in whole! And be open to learning from others' ideas, and truly listening to them if they say something in your ideas has caused them or their community tangible harm.

In the rest of this post, I'll focus on a Christian perspective and keep grappling with how to consider these questions while honoring both one's personal faith and people all religions...without coming to any solid conclusions (sorry, but I don't think there's any one-size-fits-all or fully satisfying answer!).

I'll talk a bit about inclusivism and how it fails pretty miserably in this regard, and point towards religious pluralism as a possibly better (tho still imperfect) option.

And as usual I'll say I highly recommend Barbara Brown Taylor's book Holy Envy: Finding God in the Faith of Others to any Christians / cultural Christians who want to learn more about entering into mutual relationship with people of other religions.

In previous posts, I brought up the concepts of exclusivism, inclusivism, and religious pluralism without digging into their academic definitions and histories — partially because it's A Lot for a tumblr post, but also because it's by no means in my sphere of expertise. I worried about misrepresenting any viewpoint if I tried to get all academic, so I just stuck to my own personal opinions instead — but looking back at some posts, I see I didn't do a great job of clarifying that's what I was doing!

So now I'll go into what scholars mean when talking about these different viewpoints, with a huge caveat that I'm not an expert; I'm just drawing from notes and foggy memories from old seminary classes + this article from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), and anyone interested in learning more should find scholarly articles or books rather than relying on some guy on tumblr!

Defining exclusivism, inclusivism, & religious pluralism

When we encounter traditions that offer differing and often conflicting "accounts of the nature of both mundane and supramundane reality, of the ultimate ends of human beings, and of the ways to achieve those ends" (IEP), how do we respond? Do we focus on difference and reject any truth in their views that conflicts with our views? Do we avoid looking too closely at the places we differ? try to find common ground? try to make their views fit ours?

Exclusivism, inclusivism, and religious pluralism are three categories into which we can place various responses to the reality of religious diversity.

It's important to note that this is only one categorization system one can use, and that these categories were developed within a Western, Christian context (by a guy named Alan Race in 1983). They are meant to be usable by persons of any religion — all sorts of people ask these questions about how their beliefs relate to others' beliefs — but largely do skew towards a Western, Christian way of understanding religion. (For one thing, there's a strong focus on salvation / afterlife and not all religions emphasize that stuff very much, if at all!)

Drawing primarily from this article on the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (IEP), here are basic definitions of each:

Exclusivist positions maintain that "only one set of belief claims or practices can ultimately be true or correct (in most cases, those of the one holding the position). A Christian exclusivist would therefore hold that the beliefs of non-Christians (and perhaps even Christians of other denominations) are in some way flawed, if not wholly false..." . (From my old class notes — Exclusivist Christians believe 3 things are non-negotiable: the unique authority of Jesus Christ as the apex of revelation; Jesus as normative; salvation exclusively through repentance and faith in Christ's work on the cross. Some will allow that God does provide some truths about Godself and humanity through general revelation, including truths found in other religious traditions, but the Biggest most Important revelation is still Jesus.) .

Inclusivist positions "recognize the possibility that more than one religious tradition can contain elements that are true or efficacious, while at the same time hold that only one tradition expresses ultimate religious truth most completely." . Christian inclusivists tend to focus on salvation, claiming that non-Christians can still achieve salvation — still through Jesus Christ. Sometimes they hold that any non-Christian whose life happens to fit Jesus's call to love God and neighbor, etc., will be saved. Other times they hold that only non-Christians who never had the chance to learn about Jesus can be saved; if you know about Christianity and reject it, it doesn't matter how "good"you are, you're doomed. .

Pluralist positions hold that "more than one set of beliefs or practices can be, at least partially and perhaps wholly, true or correct simultaneously." For Christian pluralists, that means believing that Jesus is not the one Way to God / to heaven/salvation; Christianity is one way of many, usually conceived of as all being on equal footing, to connect to the Divine. .

(These three categories are not all encompassing; the IEP article also brings up relativism and skepticism.)

Issues with Exclusivism & Inclusivism

I hope the issues with exclusivism are clear, but to name a few:

Christians who are taught that all non-Christians (or even the "wrong kind" of Christians) are doomed to hell are taught to see those people as Projects more than people — there's a perceived urgent need to convert them asap in order to "save them." The only kind of relationship you'd form with one of them is centered in efforts to convert them, rather than to live and learn alongside them as they are.

Doesn't matter if they are already happily committed to a different religion. In your eyes, they're wrong about feeling fulfilled and connected to the Divine.

Doesn't matter if you have to resort to violent and coercive practices like wiping out all signs of non-Christian culture or kidnapping non-Christian children to raise Christian — the ends justify the means because you're looking out for their "immortal souls."

...But what about inclusivism? If you're a Christian inclusivist, you aren't forcing anyone to convert to Christianity right now! You acknowledge that non-Christians can live holy and fulfilling lives! You even acknowledge that there's scraps of value in their valid-but-not-as-valid-as-Christianity religions! So what's the problem?

Turns out that this is a major case of one's good intentions not being nearly as important as one's impact.

You may be pushing back against exclusivism's outright refusal that non-Christians have any connection to the divine at all, which is nice and all — but by saying that non-Christians will basically become Christian after they die, you are still perpetuating our long history of coercive conversions.

There's a reason some scholars argue that inclusivism isn't actually a separate category from, but a sub-category of, exclusivism: you're still saying everyone has to be Christian, "so luckily you'll See The Light and become Christian after you die :)"

This is very reasonably offensive to many non-Christians. If nothing else, it's ludicrously smug and paternalistic! I won't get into it here but it only gets worse when some inclusivist positions try to get all Darwinian and start arranging religions from lower to higher, with Christianity as the "evolutionary" apex of religion ://

For now, I'll only go into detail about Catholic Jesuit theologian Karl Rahner's particular version of inclusivism, because it's quite common and really highlights the paternalism:

Rahner's Anonymous Christians:

A question that Catholics and other Christians struggled with in the 20th century was this: If non-Christians cannot be saved (because they held firm in believing that salvation must be in and through Christ), what happens if someone never even had the chance to learn about Christianity? Surely a loving God wouldn't write them an automatic ticket to hell when they're non-Christian through no fault of their own, right?

German Jesuit Karl Rahner's response was to conceive of a sort of abstract version of Christianity for non-Christians who lived good, faithful lives outside of official (what he called "constituted") Christianity:

"Anonymous Christianity means that a person lives in the grace of God and attains salvation outside of explicitly constituted Christianity. ...Let us say, a Buddhist monk…who, because he follows his conscience, attains salvation and lives in the grace of God; of him I must say that he is an anonymous Christian; if not, I would have to presuppose that there is a genuine path to salvation that really attains that goal, but that simply has nothing to do with Jesus Christ. But I cannot do that. And so, if I hold if everyone depends upon Jesus Christ for salvation, and if at the same time I hold that many live in the world who have not expressly recognized Jesus Christ, then there remains in my opinion nothing else but to take up this postulate of an anonymous Christianity." - Karl Rahner in Dialogue (1986), p. 135.

So someone who has intentionally devoted themselves to another religion, someone who does good work in that religion's name, is...secretly, unbeknownst to them, actually Christian?

I hope the offensiveness of that is clear — the condescension in implying these people are ignorant of what religion they "really" belong to! the assumption that Good deeds & virtues are always inherently Christian deeds & virtues! the arrogance of being so sure your own religion is The One Right Way that you have to construct a "back door" (as Hans Küng describes it) into it to shove in all these poor people who for whatever reason can't or don't choose to join it!

One theologian who criticized the paternalism of "anonymous Christianity" is John Hick, who was one of the big advocates for religious pluralism as a more respectful way of understanding non-Christian religions. So let's finally talk some more about pluralism!

Religious Pluralism!

As defined earlier, religious pluralist positions hold that there are many paths to the divine, and that all religions have access to some truths about the divine.

For Christians, this means rejecting those 3 non-negotiables of exclusionists about Christianity being the one true religion and Jesus being the one path to salvation. Instead of claiming that Christianity is the "most advanced" religion, pluralism claims that Christianity is just one religion among many, with no unique claim on the truth.

Some other pluralist points:

Pluralism resists antisemitic claims that Christianity is the "fulfillment" of (or that it "supercedes") Judaism.

Various religions provide independent access to salvation rather than everyone's salvation relying on Christ. (Note the still very Christian-skewed lens here in emphasizing salvation at all though!)

When we notice how different religions' truth claims conflict with one another, pluralists reconcile this by talking about how one's experience of truth is subjective.

Pluralism tends to give more authority to human experience than sacred texts

John Hicks' pluralist position

I mentioned before that Hicks is one of the big names in the religious pluralism scene. The IEP article I drew from earlier goes into much greater detail about his views and responses to it in the section titled "c. John Hick: the Pluralistic Hypothesis," but for a brief overview:

His central claim is that "diverse religious traditions have emerged as various finite, historical responses to a single transcendent, ultimate, divine reality. The diversity of traditions (and the belief claims they contain) is a product of the diversity of religious experiences among individuals and groups throughout history, and the various interpretations given to these experiences."

"As for the content of particular belief claims, Hick understands the personal deities of those traditions that posit them...as personae of the Real, explicitly invoking the connotation of a theatrical mask in the Latin word persona."

"Hick claims that all religious understandings of the Real are on equal footing insofar as they can only offer limited, phenomenal representations of transcendent truth."

We must accept that world religions are fundamentally different from each other, rather than falling into platitudes about how "we're all the same deep down"

Each religion has its own particular and comprehensive framework for understanding the world and human experience (i.e. we shouldn't use the normative Christian framework to describe other faiths)

Another angle: hospitality

As various philosophers and theologians have responded to and expanded upon pluralist frameworks, one big concept that some emphasize is hospitality: that all of us regardless of religion have an obligation to welcome others to all that is ours, if and when they have need of it — especially when they are of different cultures or religions from us.

Hospitality requires respect for those under our care, honoring and protecting their differences.

When we are the ones in need of hospitality, we should be able to expect the same.

Hospitality implies being able to anticipate our guest's needs, but we need to accept the impossibility of being able to guess every need, so communication is key!

Liberation theology & Pluralism

I also appreciate what liberation theologians have brought into the discussion. Here's from the IEP article:

"Liberation theology, which advocates a religious duty to aid those who are poor or suffering other forms of inequality and oppression, has had a significant influence on recent discussions of pluralism. The struggle against oppression can be seen as providing an enterprise in which members of diverse religious traditions can come together in solidarity.

"Paul F. Knitter, whose work serves as a prominent theological synthesis of liberation and pluralist perspectives, argues that engaging in interreligious dialogue is part and parcel of the ethical responsibility at the heart of liberation theology. He maintains not only that any liberation theology ought to be pluralistic, but also that any adequate theory of religious pluralism ought to include an ethical dimension oriented toward the goal of resisting injustice and oppression.

"Knitter claims that, if members of diverse religions are interested (as they should be) in encountering each other in dialogue and resolving their conflicts, this can only be done on the basis of some common ground. ..."

Knitter sees suffering as that common ground: "Suffering provides a common cause with which diverse religious traditions are concerned and towards which they can come together to craft a common agenda. Particular instances of suffering will, of course, differ from each other in their causes and effects; likewise, the practical details of work to alleviate suffering will almost necessarily be fleshed out differently by different religions, at different times and in different places. Nevertheless, Knitter maintains that suffering itself is a cross-cultural and universal phenomenon and should thus serve as the reference point for a practical religious pluralism. Confronting suffering will naturally give rise to solidarity, and pluralist respect and understanding can emerge from there."

Knitter also sees the planet as a source of literal common ground for us all: "Earth not only serves as a common physical location for all religious traditions, but it also provides these traditions with what Knitter calls a 'common cosmological story' (1995, p. 119). ...Knitter makes a case that different religious traditions share an ecological responsibility and that awareness of this shared responsibility, as it continues to emerge, can also serve as a basis for mutual understanding."

When Knitter and other liberation theologians speak of suffering or earth care as rallying points for interreligious solidarity, it's important to point out that such solidarity doesn't happen automatically: it is something we have to choose to commit to. We have to be courageous about challenging those who would pin suffering on another religious or cultural group. We have to be courageous about having difficult conversations, again and again. We have to learn how to work together for common goals even while accepting where we differ.

How to end this long ass post?

My hope is that as you read (or skimmed) all this, you were thinking about your own personal beliefs: where, if anywhere, do they fit among all these ideas? where would you like them to fit?

And, in the end, did I really address anon's question about whether it's disrespectful to people of other religions to assert that everyone is loved by God, or gets into heaven? Not really, because I don't know. I think it probably depends on context, and how one puts it, and how certain one acts about their ideas about God and heaven.

For me, it always comes down to humility about my own limited perspective, even while asserting that we all have a right to our personal beliefs, including ideas about what comes after this life.

When I imagine all human beings together in whatever comes next, I hope I do so not out of a desire for assimilation into my religion, but a desire to continue to learn from and alongside all kinds of people and beliefs. I hope I remain open to learning about how other people envision both what comes after death, and more importantly, what they think about life here and now. What can I learn from them about truth, kindness, justice? How can we work together to achieve those things for all creation, despite and in and through our differences?

I'll end with Eboo Patel's description of religious pluralism, which sums up much of how I feel, from his memoir Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim:

"Religious pluralism is neither mere coexistence nor forced consensus. It is a form of proactive cooperation that affirms the identities of the constituent communities while emphasizing that the wellbeing of each and all depends on the health of the whole. It is the belief that the common good is best served when each community has a chance to make its unique contribution."

___

Further resources:

Explore my #religious pluralism tag for more thoughts and quotes

You might also enjoy wandering through my #interfaith tag

Two podcast episodes that draw from Eboo Patel, Barbara Brown Taylor, and other wonderful people: "No One Owns God: Readying yourself for respectful interfaith encounters" and "It's good to have wings, but you have to have roots too: Cultivating your own faith while embracing religious pluralism"

My tag with excerpts from Holy Envy

Post that includes links to various questions about heaven

Here’s a post where I talk about why I don’t believe in hell

My evangelism tag (tl;dr: I’m staunchly against prosletyzing to anyone who doesn’t explicitly request more info about Christianity)

[fallahifag]

sorry if this is too personal, you can ignore if it is. i was just curious. you mentioned your family is multi-faith, and i was wondering what that was like growing up? do you celebrate both eid and christmas? do you have influences from both religions or do you strictly follow one? do people in your fam get to choose which religion they wanna identify with or did you guys just grow up automatically following one?

just curious bc i’ve never actually known anyone who was from a multi-faith family that actually practice their religions 😅 sorry again if it’s too much, i hope you’re having as good of a day as you can and that your family is healthy and protected 🧡

yes i celebrate both eid and christmas lol. and i do have influences from both religions because its just how i grew up. as a child, i would do "muslim things" when i spent time around muslim family (like going to the mosque on fridays) and "christian things" when i spent time around christian family (church on sundays).

i grew up automatically following the christian faith but as i got older i started doing readings and seeking knowledge about different religions. for a while i tried practicing as a muslim (would pray 5 times a day, go to mosque every jum'ah, read quran). currently i practice christianity - but i believe in both religions - the muslim and christian faith have a lot in common. i feel more inclined to practice christianity because i have more experience with it; not because i favour it. i was never explicitly discouraged from practicing one religion over the other alhamdullilah, but my family made it very clear that i had to be religious in whatever way. just cause god is really important to my family.

i also have veryyyyy bad religious trauma so i think exploring religion on my own was necessary for me to continue practicing. if i did not take my own path learning about religion, i dont think i would have continued to implement it into my life. i find comfort in religion now more than anything. im not a good christian, and im definitely not a good muslim, and im not good at the in between. but i like it and it brings me comfort and thats all that matters to me. and alhamdullilah i have the best of both worlds

[theconstitutionisgayculture]

I dont see why a christian should even be rooting for Israel. They are not Christians. They are jewish and its a Jewish state. I dont have any reason to support something like that. Also this is just a result of how the religions work. If Jewish people want a holy land then people from other religions are not going to support something like that because they do not believe the Jews are God's chosen people. So they will fight and try to claim territory. The same is true for Muslims who believe that Jesus was real but just a prophet. They aren't going to just change their beliefs and roll over for Jewish people. I'm not going to root for either because as a Christian I think the land should be ruled over by the Church and not either of these groups.

Considering you have a completely empty account I'm going to assume you're someone I've previously blocked who is definitely not a Christian. Most Christians, the vast majority I would say, would easily understand that you don't need to be Christian to deserve compassion and support.

The fact that you seem to think groups can, or should, only support their own kind is a very leftist belief these days, so that's further support for my "oh look it's another left wing idiot pretending to be conservative/Christian/whatever" theory. You guys are the ones who see the world as groups of faceless people all fighting a constant struggle for finite and vaguely defined "power". It's not surprising you can't ditch that mindset even when you're pretending to be Christian or right wing.

[candy8448]

(Also posted to @yourbigendergremlet my bigender community blog)

Ive been meaning to make this post for a while so what better day to do it than on trans visibility day/easter?

I am bigenderfluid, but i can also somewhat consider myself christian.

These two factors weigh heavily in my life.

I am in an extremely orthodox christian, extremely lgbtphobic household and it is tough. Being christian was always tough for me. My mum tried to raise me as a perfect christian but it never worked and only recently did i figure out why. She never actually taught me what anything is for, just that i have to do it. I have to follow these rules, why? Because the Bible said it. And there are so many things in the Bible that contradict eachother and ive never gotten a straight answer, not even from priests at church.

I discovered i was bigender in late 2023, but many years before then i was an ally. This is tough.

Trans and lgbt+ people are always weary of religious people, always making arguments against and fighting back religion, while religion is hateful and they fight against lgbt+ people. At home i cant come out because it isn't safe, at school and with my friends and trans spaces i cant say im christian because of the shame i feel because of the correlations between religion and hating lgbt+ people.

Its tough.

My bigenderness is currently a massive thing that has me struggling with my faith. Ive been hating being a christian for years now but only recently have i discovered that i do believe, and i want God to love me but being bigender, and being christian gets in the way of that.

I can't trust the christian faith specifically anymore and i feel reluctance with religion because being trans means i will go to hell. I feel i can't go to church because i am trans. I dont know if God will love me or condemn me to hell.

Being trans is a big factor to why im struggling so much with being christian right now, even though i desperately want to be, and it sucks. I can't be bigender because i am christian, and it sucks.

My end message? You can be both. Being trans and being christian can exist at the same time. God loves everyone and God made us the way we are so it should not get in the way of that. It can be tough, really tough to accept that (i am battling with that) and it can seem like a tug of war from both sides when you just want to be in both sides at the same time. We have to accept that the lgbt+ community isn't all that accepting and that christians aren't all that loving and that realisation will tear you apart but as long as you can live how you feel you should live, and find your own faith and/or connection with God or whatever else you may or may not believe, inside or outside of religion, then i hope you can find peace with yourself,

Especially because i need to find that too...

[ppgxrrblove]

Oh Tumblr..your so predictable...sadly...

I am sorry, but tumblr's melt down over Roe V being overturn is pretty darn funny, and something to definitely giggle about.

With that being stated I am super glad Roe got shot down, however,...there is always gonna be a however in this situation, these people decided it was a great idea to give the power to the state...instead of letting the people just end it all, instead we get the demo..the full package will cost people lots of protection, and well...this is uncomfortable to type this down but, there will be dead bodies for the full package to occur. Since tumblr folks are having - well tumblr witches, to feminists that I do believe are just plain witches, don't realize that Roe V..shtick is just limited.. sadly, it's a 'win' but not a win in a sense that you basically well send anybody in jail for killing an infants life, they still will be 'protected' using this loosely cause I know that folks will rightfully stop such vil ugly acts that is being done to an inoccent adorable pure life.

Nonetheless this was interesting to see the reaction of how it went down, because not only does it show how fallen society is in whole, but it really oozes out the real monsters that hide usually under ya bed, now they just ratchet rampant on wanting to murder, riot - all for the sake of killing a life that's not theirs anymore once you open those legs :"). Oh, and yes, I know of the satanic rituals that are gonna occur through out this week, cause these offended vile people -childrenofthedeviltobeexact- are gonna be doing some major nasty, illegal garbage stunt that we will all witness together; people dying because they wanna riot, harm peoples property to the people theirselves, which are, Republicans, Consveratives, to Christians including the 'church'(note; using it loosely because I know they will aim at catholics as well, soo, uhhh..if they burn down a false house of worship be my guest, I am gonna be honest; I don't care, you are practicing pagan acts..- like no, however, i dont wanna see people get harmed, call me a hypocrite if you want to, - makes no sense, because i dont want the people to be killed over this rather just want to see the false churchs go down hill, only in this topic dont try to twist it..forgot to mention, really gotta stop editing posts here, yet, once those false churchs get taken down it can be rebuilt again, but with the people worshipping the real lord not a false one..) - never an edgy moment for these vile things without squaking at the church, because they know as much as us christians know that we're the ones that began the whole thing of protecting babies..just like protecting anybody life out there but that can only extend so much...- meaning if you off hunting people down, and said person defends their self resulting to your death - the church nor anybody else will not defend you on your evil actions. Whatever it maybe, not just abortion but other stuff as well..common sense that everybody knows that if you come knocking to wanting to harm a person they have every right to defend theirself, whether you get offended by this fact or not is up to you.

Laughing aside to giggling from said comment I had made...

Am I gonna be sad, - like my comment on the church if they will be sad about such actions occuring? Heck yeah, that ain't a laughing matter..its serious, and it's depressing stuff. It's bleak, that people wanna go this far..it sucks, it really does but God's in control of everything, so I put my trust - everything on God cause i know the ones that are in that occult will end up turning to christ, not all, but some, and those who do thank you for choosing the light.

[sassymajesty]

may I ask what made you pick judaism, if it's not too personal & you're willing to share? i legit dont know enough about religions so i'm genuinely curious. like why not islam or something else? or why not transfer to protestant or orthodox church? you said you did some wandering, so i'm just curious what made you pick judaism over everything else. like i said i'm not judging or anything, just pure curiosity due to my lack of knowledge! but i'm glad you found something that resonates with you :)

short answer, jewish beliefs resonated the most with me and the more i learn about it, the more at home i feel

long answer, oh boy, i really did do some wandering. i'm putting it under a cut because i wrote a whole essay

i stopped going to the catholic church when i was 15, and the next... ten years? were spent trying to find myself. because i've always known that i believe in something more, but the idea of an old guy in the sky ruling over us with an iron fist felt very odd too me. and that's how i came out of the catholic church

my dad used to say that religion is supposed to bring you comfort and give you the support you need in tough times. that's something that has always stuck with me but then, which religion?

i tried the agnostic route for a while, but that didn't bring me any comfort. then i went to a buddhist temple a couple times, because the logic was sound to me, and i was at a time in my life where acceptance and kindness was what i needed. but still, i felt like there was something lacking

i googled a lot

being gay, i didn't quite vibe with most christian denominations in my town. but my cousin invited me to the presbyterian church and i went there for a few months. it kinda worked for a bit, because i was sure i didn't believe in saints and they talked about jesus with so much love, and tried to spread the love he taught the world. i used to leave the church service feeling very loved, and it was better to read from the bible than it was to just listen to the priest read it and being told that i'd never understand it myself

i just... didn't feel the same love as everyone else. i felt like a fraud even when i was annotating my bible as everyone else. theirs were full of devotion and mine felt flat, i didn't know how to pray without, you know, scripted prayers, i felt like an impostor. then, well. then it got to a point where i couldn't simply ignore being gay for the sake of being accepted there, and i stopped going

at the time, i was working at a health clinic and i worked with pious people from other christian denominations and they were so judgemental of everyone that came in, forgetting their own past and still claiming to be a good christian. which only pushed me away from any other christian denominations, the fanon interpretation of jesus bothered me too. it all felt too restrictive

that's around the time i started wondering whether or not i believed in jesus. it's always been complicated for me to make sense that god, jesus and the holy spirit are separate but still one. i could kinda figure out the holy spirit and god working together, but for me, jesus was a man, a human man who had been kind and drastically radical for his time, but still a man

honestly, at this time i was pretty lost and finding comfort in bits and pieces here and there. christian music actually helped me a lot during this time, go figure

it took me actually meeting a jewish person (that's how small judaism is in here, i had no contact of anyone jewish for 26 years of my life) for me to learn that you could even convert to judaism

i had the catholic thinking of "oh, judaism is an old religion that doesn't really exist anymore" and "the old testament god was barbaric", but getting to learn more about it with fresh eyes was a really breathtaking experience

i like that the rules make sense. there's no "because the church says so" or "because god will be sad if you do it". whatever argument you can think of, someone has gone over it at least a thousand years ago and have had people arguing for or against it ever since. i love it that you get to ask questions!!! you're encouraged to!! oh that's my favorite part, i can have doubts about whatever and no one will talk behind my back that i'm not a good catholic girl. and i get to learn about this practice that goes back thousands of years, and not to be a nerd, but i love how much incentive there is to read and learn and discuss and talk through things and question everything and think critically about every passage, every tradition, every book ever written on judaism

i'm reading "here all along" by sarah hurwitz and there's a chapter called "freeing god from "his" human-shaped cage in the sky" and in it, she talks about different conceptions about god that jewish people believe in. and that is when i realized oh yes, this is home. because god stopped being an old guy in the sky and became this force that no human being could ever describe or understand. god can be all knowing and all powerful, but they can also be all knowing and not all powerful. they can be everything — a shadow the tree casts, the good in humanity, resting on shabbat. god can be the "process of being" or the force that pushes you to be the best you can be. i haven't explored a fraction of those but i love it that i don't have to choose just one, and i don't have to believe in one version that's dictated to me

all my experiences with judaism have been incredible so far. i used to slog through an hour long mass, now two hours every friday feel like not enough. the community i found (both in the synagogue i go to and online) is very welcoming and there's so much strength in them. the more i learn about the practices, the why behind them, the more at home i feel

we had an event for people who want to convert and we talked about being gay and judaism and everyone was pretty much you just gotta find a rabbi that you're comfortable with but even the most conservative ones are mostly chill with it, and the conversation moved on to another question. and that? being accepted fully by who i am, that's incredible for me. i don't have to change, i don't have to force myself to believe in anything

i'm gonna end this here, otherwise i'll be talking about judaism until next week