Arella Prest’s posts about the Christian media she had access to as a kid are like a deep dark rabbit hole that does not lead to Wonderland… Having grown up in a household where we never ever talked about religion, no prayers, no church going, no baptism, all this talk of religion and Jesus used to be incomprehensible to me. Bad people doing bad stuff to other people. But reading about it in terms of TV and radio allows me to relate.
#Life
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Sounds interesting... I come from a culture that does tend to raise kids in a conservative religious fashion. It’s been a long and fascinating journey unpacking all the influences I recognise in hindsight. 🙂
– Hugo van der Merwe 2016-10-28
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I remember visiting Hawaii and on a parking lot, a guy asked me about Jesus and I told him I did not believe. He asked whether he could pray for me and I said I didn’t mind. He walked over to me, held my hand and started praying right then and there, on the parking lot. I was speechless. Random people touching me and praying in public? This is madness!
Later that year in Palm Springs my wife and I were walking through some sort of market and noticed a Humanist stand. We laughed. Look! Atheists! Haha! The two old guys smiled and started talking. Apparently we were the only ones to have stopped and they were astonished that we didn’t mind Atheism at all. America and religion was bewildering. And we didn’t even go to any of the places known for their religiousness.
– Alex Schroeder 2016-10-28
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I will just leave this here: Belief in Belief
– Radomir Dopieralski 2016-10-28
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I have aunts, uncles and cousins who are extremely religious. Some of them have preached that “doubt is the biggest sin”, i.e. their beliefs prescribe belief in belief. You have to believe. Self-reinforcement.
To some degree, I appreciate psychological benefits too: if you’ve grown up with one way of coping with the world, one way of relating to it, *losing* that and having to reconstruct a worldview can be psychologically very traumatic. Which is partly me saying I believe change needs to mostly happen across generations, or basically at self-guided pace for people that do choose to extricate themselves from an older worldview and find a new one.
– Hugo van der Merwe 2016-10-28
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I have to admit that I was lucky enough to associate with trained professional theologicians and ethicists (of several faiths and sects) when growing up. Which made it interesting when the fundies came visiting school.
[One of the big differences is that the first group tend to believe that an unquestioned faith is worthless, whilst the second group tends to feel that questioning your faith is something that is blasphemous/wrong.]
– Ian Borchardt 2016-10-28
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I have to admit I find theology/Church history much more compelling post-apostasy.
– Jeremy Duncan 2016-10-28
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The politics of the Nicean Conventions are always interesting reading.
– Ian Borchardt 2016-10-28
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One of these days I have to sit down with some theology nerds and play *Credo!* (maybe once the new edition is out).
– Jeremy Duncan 2016-10-28
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It’s really fun when you can pull out a weird creed as the official creed of the Empire. Something like Apollonian Aryan, for example.
– Ian Borchardt 2016-10-28
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My biggest sources are Gibbons (hah!) and currently I’m listening to the History of Byzantium podcast, so there’s more theological discussions. At one point I tried to explain the Arrian heresy to my wife and she was all “wtf people went to war over this!?” It also drives home the point that phrases such as “in the name of the father, the son, and the Holy Spirit” are actually tests – are you a Monophysite!?
– Alex Schroeder 2016-10-28
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One thing I really liked was the *Avoirdupois* sourcebook for *Legacy Ironclaw* as the original edition in now being referred to.
These sourcebooks each detailed one of the five Great Houses (in this case House Avoirdupois [Horses]), some rules that specifically apply to that House, and an adventure (that was semi-connected to the other sourcebook’s adventures).
In the case of this book it is the S’Allumer Church, which is the great church of that continent. One of the really nice things about this is that it isn’t a monolithic entity, and it goes into detail on the various sects of the Church (including some heresies and heterodoxies), and how they interpret things differently (it is a very Christian style of church).
It’s the sort of in depth treatment that immediately presents ideas. Much like the old *Cults of Prax* did for *Runequest*.
[This information is also in the current *Ironclaw* (including expansions) except that these books are not the paragon of organisation and the information is scattered piecemeal through several books. Whereas in this supplement it is solidly presented in a single entry.]
– Ian Borchardt 2016-10-28
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I’m glad you’re finding them insightful! My goal when writing them is two sided: expose people to the reality of millions of individuals who live in this whole other world, and provide a safe haven for ex-religious kids to say “OH SOMEONE ELSE GETS IT”.
No one can stop these people from doing this. You can’t make them stop believing, putting their kids through it, but you can be educated in their world, and provide them emotional support if they manage to leave the pit.
– Arella Prest 2016-10-28