Everyone Sins, So Shut the Hell Up About It
Christians are Not Supposed to Be Judging Other People
Last Sunday, I was driving my daughter back to her mother’s house before I headed to my writing office. I noticed we left a bit before 10 am, and it made me think of all the times I left home on a Sunday around that time to attend church.
Then I smiled to myself because I’d much rather be driving to my favorite place to write than to some fanatical religious institution. A church where I’m being judged and told that I am going to burn in Hell for my sins. Fuck that noise.
I don’t believe any of that for a second. Just as I once realized that the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, and even Santa Claus were fraudulent fairy tales, I now have known this about Christianity and religion for over 25 years. I am happy not to be shackled by the constraints of fear and ignorance.
If your religion brings you peace and makes you a better human being who treats others with kindness, respect, and equality, I’m all about it. I’m happy for you. I am glad you have something to guide you in pursuing a moral, fulfilling lifestyle.
But to those who judge people, call non-believers “sinners”, and weaponize their beliefs, you all can go to Hell. Figuratively, of course. There’s not an actual Hell. Or Heaven. Not if you have an analytical, logic-based mind that stands behind the principles of science over a 2000+-year-old book that has been modified to fit evil, greedy agendas over time.
Call me a sinner and I’ll tell you about hypocrisy. Cast the first stone at me, then prepare to break your bathroom mirror when looking at yourself. As it says in the Bible, “Judge not, lest ye be judged yourself. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”
The whole idea about sin is flawed, anyway. I remember getting into trouble as a young child, being spanked with a belt. And my dad programming into my head that it was not only ok but the right thing to do, hitting us with a belt on the bare ass.
He’d ask us why we got spanked, and instead of saying what I wanted to (“Because you’re a 220 lb, impatient, child-abusing prick who’s swinging a belt at my 8-year-old bare ass!”), I’d tearfully regurgitate the biblical programming that had been drilled into our young minds:
“Because it says, “Children obey your parents, in the Lord, for this is right…” I’d say in my tearful, hurt voice.
Have you ever had a large adult grab you, yank your pants down, and hit you with a belt? It’s fucking embarrassing, hurtful, demoralizing, and made me hate my father in those moments. I didn’t give a damn what the bible said when I was being strapped. I’m sure it made him feel better, that he wasn’t going to raise a son destined to burn in Hell, one day.
Surprise, Motherfucker. If there really IS a Hell, and it’s your version of it, I’m going, anyway. You didn’t need to hit me with a belt. It did nothing to save me.
Fortunately, I don’t believe for a second that people who treat others with kindness, love, and respect are going to Hell. Logically, I am much safer from an afterlife of Hell, fire, and brimstone than some MAGA follower who sits in church every Sunday morning. The same person who affiliates with racist and bigoted people, and organizations, and supports a disgusting person like Donald Trump.
You can’t have it both ways. Either you do all of the good things Jesus taught or you’re not a real Christian.
Hearing about how we are all sinners who are saved by grace in church as a kid was depressing. The way my father preached, it sounded like everyone on the planet was running around sinning and being terrible deviant types of people. But by proclaiming to be a believer and “saved”, we would all be just fine.
Never mind that so many people in the churches I attended were blatant, obvious sinners. We had those who were cheating on their spouses, abusing children, drinking, and doing drugs. So these are the people I’m going to spend eternity with in Heaven?
I’ll pass. I’ve been around enough of that already here on Earth.
And honestly, the things that many Christians consider to be “sin” are just laughable. My father never let us listen to rock music, that was a sin. We couldn’t take sex ed classes in junior high and 9th grade, because having premarital sex was a sin. We couldn’t watch R-rated movies because, God forbid, we hear the word “fuck” or see a pair of boobs.
The human body is a sin, remember? We weren’t even supposed to touch our own body, let alone another willing participant’s. At least until we got married. Assuming, of course, that it was someone of the opposite sex. Don’t even THINK about touching another man, if you’re a man. Many Christians really get hung up on that whole homosexuality thing and it’s nonsense.
But that’s my whole point. If you believe in the bible and what you’re taught in church, you’re going to believe in ALL the sins. The Devil is everywhere, at least in your mind. So how are you going to judge others’ sins when you know damn well you sin, too? Just in different ways.
The hypocrisy that pervades society is astounding, and one of the main turn-offs for the majority of people regarding organized religion. I refuse to subject myself to being judged and insulted by some pasty old man who may be a self-proclaimed leader or prophet of a church. I may have been born at night, but it wasn’t last fucking night.
And who is he to judge? Only God can judge us. If ALL have sinned and come short of the glory of God, I don’t need some asshole telling me that I’m a sinner and I’m going to burn in Hell. Especially when so many of these so-called “church leaders” are often caught doing the same or worse things than most average, non-believing citizens.
I am no longer that impressionable, grade-school child I once was. I outgrew religion and saw it as the farce it was: A greed-motivated way to attempt to control others and justify discrimination and hatred toward non-believers, marginalized groups, and those who practice other faiths.
I’ll always be happy to have escaped the clutches of flawed, hypocritical religious figureheads. I’m secure in who I am, how I treat others, and why I work hard to be a good human being.
I don’t behave because I fear a fairytale Hell someday. I do it because it’s the right fucking thing to do.
© 2024 Jason Provencio. All rights reserved.
If Christ were here there is one thing he would not be—a Christian.”
― Mark Twain
“You believe in a book that has talking animals, wizards, witches, demons, sticks turning into snakes, burning bushes, food falling from the sky, people walking on water, and all sorts of magical, absurd and primitive stories, and you say that we are the ones that need help?”
― Mark Twain
“Heaven goes by favor. If it went by merit, you would stay out and your dog would go in.”
― Mark Twain
What bothers me most about the Evangelical Christian Nationalists are two things: the constant recruiting/grooming of children by interfering in secular education in order to keep kids dumb, complicit and compliant; the strident, aggressive and escalating Holy War against everyone that doesn't fit their twisted world view. My soul belongs to me, not some ginned up crusade against people who have never done me any harm.