There was a poll just before covid that actually separated stats by right-leaning traditionalist churches, and left-leaning modernist churches. They found that the left churches were the ones bleeding members and right-leaning traditionalists were actually gaining members.
So the whole thing about "declining Christianity in America" is almost exclusive to the left wing modernist ones. The actual Bible following Christians were gaining numbers, it's just that America had/has a whole lot of fake Christians who's colors are showing.
I'd suggest that this is a regional thing. In my area the opposite is true; the woke feminist churches are doing really well, and the traditional churches are struggling to survive. And I live in a midwestern red state.
Matthew 19:17(NKJV) So He said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one [is] good but One, [that is,] God. But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments.”
If only more people knew and spoke the scriptures, they’d find themselves thrown out the ‘churches’ instead of the other way round.
No they're not. Also, the Eastern Orthodox churches tolerate a good deal of globohomo-adjacent shit like Femen demonstrators and the massive amounts of porn generated in eastern europe. As much as certain people try to paint them as a more authentic christianity, they are in fact just as corrupt.
Remember: Jesus did not say 'follow my church', he said 'follow me'.
Matthew 6:24(KJV) No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.
We have a lot of house churches here, some of the best services I've been to have been with 2-3 families worshiping God together in someone's home.
No church building to fund, no full-time employees to pay.
Study the Bible, pray for each other, and sing hymns.
Often God is to be found in the humble places like that, not giant corporate churches who make it all like a business model where money has to be coming in to keep it running.
We have a few farm churches here also, meet out in a barn, kids play with the animals after.
I've heard a lot of those stories in CA, it's as if they thought gay would bring more people, instead existing membership left. What the heck were those elders thinking?
Church attendance has been in complete freefall since the 70s, so they're getting desperate. Still, this isn't the right way. We need to attract the youth, but we cannot do so by abandoning core Christian principles. It seems like Christianity is destined to become a small minority religion in America.
That gets covered in the bible.... it goes something like this.... people get fucked = they remember why god is good and go to church, life gets too good = they abandon church to pleasure seek. When shit gets bad, churches will regain membership. It's human nature.
At this point I worship in my yard on Sundays doing landscaping than sitting in a pew because of such moves the church had made.
You know, back in the day, I would have thought that this was a cop out, that you just didn't want to go to church, just getting your landscaping done. Holy Moses! I can totally identify, now! Sheesh! I've been trying to find a church that preaches the Gospel...most of them just preach "love your family', 'don't kill lgmft, because they need love' and 'don't be a racist." Still looking, but, I'm not optimistic.
Try American Anglican churches. The Episcopal church split in the early 2000s over gay marriage. American Anglicanism still follows scripture as written. I have yet to be disappointed in Anglican services, traditional hymns, liturgical worship, and values that remain unchanged in the face of a secular world.
Please join a Bible believing church. You can't worship corporately in the backyard, nor have appropriate church discipline, sacraments, corporate prayer, etc. There are lots of Bible believing churches in the USA. Jesus established the church for a reason. Holding yourself away is wrong.
Let's not even start on the Mormon Church, who have tacked on a bunch of fantasy novels to the Bible and call it "the word of God". We live in a time of apostasy and rebellion against Jesus.
This is absolutely God punishing us. You can see it all through the Bible. Check out Hosea 4.
Hosea 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.
We are at the "Repent or Perish" part of the story.
Seek how the earliest Christians worshipped, what their faith was, how the Church was actually assembled and functioned. Don't just use Scriptural content to paint a picture, dig into writings of the early Church fathers to learn what the apostles built on Christ.
There are good churches out there, but you have to look for them. The traditional churches seem to have drifted away from the Bible, if they ever followed it at all. I sometimes watch Cornerstone church from San Antonio online, they seem pretty based.
They just booted out Saddleback Church for having a woman pastor, and ordaining 3 women as pastors. 4 other churches were expelled also. The SBC is hopefully finally defeating the liberal views that have gained popularity in the last 2 decades.
IIRC, the Southern Baptist convention is now pretty woke. Hard to think, because, I used to be SB, and, when I can't find a good Pentecostal church to go to, I revert and go to SB. Now, tho, it's just a headache.
I'm amazed Joseph Smith's cult didn't collapse after Kirtland Bank.He basically told all his followers that the end was coming and only God's money would be good after the world ended. So, he encouraged his followers to turn over their United States currency in exchange for this new currency he invented and his community was using that within their community. It was fine, because it could be exchanged at the bank for U.S. Dollars when dealing with the outsiders.
Then the guys Joseph Smith had running the bank loaded up all the U.S. Dollars in the bank and fled to South America. Thus rendering Joseph Smith's bank insolvent and the currency worth less than the paper it was printed on.
After Obama came in office, it became criminal to be a Christian, esp if you were a homeschooling Christian. Popular preachers were suddenly dying in unusual circumstances. They went after Freedom of Religion first, and no one noticed.
J. Gresham Machen's Christianity and Liberalism, published in 1923 is entirely prophetic on this matter.
Here are some quotes:
The greatest menace to the Christian Church today comes not from the enemies outside, but from the enemies within; it comes from the presence within the Church of a type of faith and practice that is anti-Christian to the core.
The chief modern rival of Christianity is “liberalism.” An examination of the teachings of liberalism in comparison with those of Christianity will show that at every point the two movements are in direct opposition.
Liberalism is totally different from Christianity, for the foundation is different. Christianity is founded upon the Bible. It bases upon the Bible both its thinking and its life. Liberalism on the other hand is founded upon the shifting emotions of sinful men.
The Christian movement at its inception was not just a way of life in the modern sense, but a way of life founded upon a message. It was based, not upon mere feeling, not upon a mere program of work, but upon an account of facts. In other words, it was based upon doctrine.
Modern liberalism, placing Jesus alongside other benefactors of mankind, is perfectly inoffensive in the modern world. All men speak well of it. It is entirely inoffensive. But it is also entirely futile.
The grace of God is rejected by modern liberalism. And the result is slavery—the slavery of the law, the wretched bondage by which man undertakes the impossible task of establishing his own righteousness as a ground of acceptance with God. It may seem strange at first sight that “liberalism,” of which the very name means freedom, should in reality be wretched slavery. But the phenomenon is not really so strange. Emancipation from the blessed will of God always involves bondage to some worse taskmaster.
I was raised catholic. I have some serious issues with the Catholic Church, and for a long time considered myself an atheist. I’ve had some life experiences that have made me realize I was wrong, but now I’m not sure what to do since it seems like churches care more about being woke than having a relationship with God. I’m not really sure what to do.
And know that once you find a church that unabashedly preaches the Bible, be prepared to accept that you've been lied to for all of your life. It's the same awakening as when you realize the government has lied to you all of your life. Sometimes, the truth can be a difficult pill to swallow.
find your local Catholic Church and go there. you will appreciate the structured Sundays and focus on the readings and the message they send to you. you are not obligated to agree with, or even listen to the priest's preachings if you do not want, especially if they are woke preachings (fighting that in my own church currently)
Churches are (or should be) small enough entities that we'll see a pendulum swing pretty soon. Back to basics: Divine Service 1-3 straight out of the hymnal, organ only, Sunday school for children and adults the hour after.
Already seeing it in the churches around. Those that are going woke are going broke.
Well many are guilty of this. Jesus comes back he's not flipping tables. He's going to lay the smackdown on them. You think he's going to be nice to all those Catholic priest raping kids? Hes not walking un their door tossing tables. Chasing them out hitting them with a whip maybe.
Christians believe in loving the sinner not the sin. But God has rules. This accept gays and accept trans, chop up your kids, etc not going to go over with him. We all know we sin. They think is a beautiful and they say and believe now they are gods. Listen to them rant they say that now. I'm waiting for the space rock to end us.
Out here I have encountered so many "churches" where Bro Pastor Braxton drives an overpriced lifted Jeep, they have massive TVs, "staged" happenings (such as the "pastor" recording himself going for a random mountain climbing adventure and somehow realizing at the top of the mountain that, oh hey, he had a rucksack absolutely loaded with Bible Study books and a Sony Alpha 9 camera to record his "sermon"). The band has all custom shop instruments. They preach things directly contrary to the Bible.
At the same time they beg and beg for money as if they are about to be put out on the street. it's all fucking fake and an absolute joke. The churches have become the new country clubs where your worth is based on which one you go to and who you associate with there. It isn't about the Word of God... No, it's about some stereotypical bro pastor telling made-up stories he came up with to stroke his own ego while grifting off of people who feel the need to donate.
Also, nowadays I guess it's the cool and accepted thing to whip your phone out during service and record what's going on as proof that you were there for your Instagram followers. The pastors have become social media influencers for their followers who also feel they are social media influencers.
I see a lot of Pride, Greed and Gluttony when I look at many of these so-called "churches".
This is what happens when you have a communist Pope who turns a blind eye and gives a wink and a nod to abortion, tranny ideology and tyrannical socialist governance by an incompetent "catholic" imbecile.
This isn't about just the current Pope. Reminder that the last one, who so many consider to be "conservative", was covering up the brutal rape of little boys by Catholic priests. This kind of thing has been going on for who knows how many centuries.
Catholicism has very little to do with Christianity. It is a semi-pagan cult ruled by Satan.
Part of Protestantism is that Jesus died for your sins so you are saved, period. You can do drugs, have gay sex, knock up a chick and abandon the child, etc., and at the end of the day, you're saved.
Even fifty years ago this was not true.
It is now only because "Protestantism" is such a wide net it includes the liberal self help groups like Methodists that hardly even read the Bible anymore, or Unitarians that openly abandoned it.
Speaking so broadly about Protestantism is no different than when an atheist assigns exactly the same flaws to you because that's what "Christianity" has become.
There are still protestants that uphold the need for repentance, and hold with most Orthodox beliefs minus the post first-century traditions.
In America at least, and possibly a lot of western Europe, the problem remains that most protestants know next to nothing about Eastern Orthodox. It's still quite firmly "The Bible vs the Vatican" in most theological circles. They recognize there is no "going back" to accepting Vatican heresy, but their knowledge of Eastern Orthodox remains limited at best.
The churches have been completely infiltrated. It's not the first time. See Ezekiel 22.
25 There is a conspiracy of her prophets in the midst thereof, like a roaring lion ravening the prey; they have devoured souls; they have taken the treasure and precious things; they have made her many widows in the midst thereof.
26 Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned mine holy things: they have put no difference between the holy and profane, neither have they shewed difference between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my sabbaths, and I am profaned among them.
Jeremiah also talks about this in chapter 5. All throughout, he speaks of the decline and it ends with:
29 Shall I not visit for these things? saith the Lord: shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?
30 A wonderful and horrible thing is committed in the land;
31 The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means; and my people love to have it so: and what will ye do in the end thereof?
I think the main reason for Protestantism and its reformation was Martin Luther showing the Vatican was lying about the contents of the Bible. It’s really that simple. They (Germans) were told a series of lies to steal their money, and were forbidden to learn Latin in order to keep the truth from coming out. Now, that doesn’t mean we should accept each tenant of Protestants. But when I see Protestants talked about negatively, I always remember they were basically the first to step up to the Vatican’s bullshit and challenge their stranglehold on the world. I respect that. What it’s become now is atrocious.
As much as the Catholic Church had it coming, the Protestantism that the US was founded on is inherently self-divisive. Christianity could only reliably spread when the foremost church and power in Europe was the RCC.
As long as Protestant infighting continues, Christianity will never again be a dominant force in American life.
The main issue with Protestantism is its lack of coherent religious tradition and defined dogma. It is in essence doomed to split and splinter until it either stabilizes or disappears.
There are also heresies that all church congregations practice, like Modalism. Protestants do this, but so do Catholics.
Unfortunately Modalism is embedded in the Catholic church.
If you know what Modalism skip the next paragraph:
Modalism is when the Trinity is portrayed oversimplified that the Father is 1/3 of the Trinity, and so on. This is heresy because God is also the relationships between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. They are inseparable. Modalism is equivalent to polytheism. If Catholics didn't forget this at some point, they wouldn't say prayers like "Saint Michael the archangel, defend us in our day of battle..." etc. Catholic belief is that all saints become one with the Holy Spirit. But to pray to a saint, even in its most charitable representation, is Modalism, because you're praying only to the Holy Spirit, treating it like 1/3 of God.
It sounds radical to talk about heresy in this day and age, until you realize that the reason the Church Fathers rejected it so strongly, is because all heresies are mischaracterizations of Christianity that lead people away from actual understanding and faith.
But this isn't just an issue with Protestantism.
This is an issue with the entirety of American Conservatism. We will literally never conserve anything if our main strategy is to abandon institutions that turn against us. Churchs, schools, universities, clubs, and corporations have been poisoned like this. Mainline churches are dying. Woke pastors drive actual Christians away, who then atomize and divide the faith further by founding their own microchurches.
The problem is unfortunately foundational. The heart of modern US conservatism is nothing more than disgust towards the left. Out distrust and disgust towards the Left can destroy any institution, but it can't actually build anything real. Unfortunately, the label some leftists give us of 'reactionary' is true. Insofar as we DO actually have REAL principles, we seemingly haven't founded any institutions upon them that haven't been subverted.
Each of us needs to return to tradition. Take back the institutions that have been stolen from us, starting with the Mainline churches, preferably the Catholic Church itself. I'd personally love it if the RCC would drop its heretical practices and return to the fundamentals as set out in the Nicene Creed (and Filioque, if only because that's a feature of the RCC at its founding. The Eastern Orthodox church exists because they rejected the Filioque).
We need more to unite us than just 'the left is at it again'. If we could talk to long-dead conservatives or Chrisitans, they'd think we were heathens.
Most "Churches" in America are shilling the religion of this world and it prince, Satan. Wolves in shepherd's clothing praying on the ignorant and unsuspecting, aided and abetted by people too cowardly to call them out.
Follow the money, a lot of cash comes in. Avoid churches owned by the pastor. You can find out on the property appraiser if the church has a building. Also who is the business registered to?
It is a fight against Pure EVIL. The Devil wants to destroy The Church that was instituted by our Lord Jesus Christ. No matter how many men Fail and blaspheme The Church, the devil will Never destroy her. The Catholic Church is the One True Church instituted by Jesus. No man will ever destroy it. Period.
I left the Catholic Church the day they asked parishioners to help pay for the $600M judgment against them because of their pedo priest scandal. Love the religion and teachings, but the devil has infiltrated the church. I'm disgusted to see so many churches abandon the basic tenets of Christianity.
One must remember that organized religion is big business and making money is the number one priority. Like other businesses that have tried, alienating your loyal 'customers' to chase the ones you don't have usually doesn't end well.
I met a streamer who claims to be a witch while her dad is an orients. I did a little doxing and her dad is actually in charged of every Mennonite church whose kids aren’t even saved. They’re there to collect money now
It depends on what you mean by Christianity. If you mean the religion about Jesus, then yes, many churches are abandoning Christianity. But if you mean the religion of Jesus, then no. Most churches never endorsed the religion of Jesus in the first place.
If you submit to evil, you serve it.
If the churches served God, this nonsense would be stopped in it its tracks.
There was a poll just before covid that actually separated stats by right-leaning traditionalist churches, and left-leaning modernist churches. They found that the left churches were the ones bleeding members and right-leaning traditionalists were actually gaining members.
So the whole thing about "declining Christianity in America" is almost exclusive to the left wing modernist ones. The actual Bible following Christians were gaining numbers, it's just that America had/has a whole lot of fake Christians who's colors are showing.
I'd suggest that this is a regional thing. In my area the opposite is true; the woke feminist churches are doing really well, and the traditional churches are struggling to survive. And I live in a midwestern red state.
It wasn't a regional poll, it was national.
There are always regional differences though.
Even Jesus wouldn’t accept being called “good.”
If only more people knew and spoke the scriptures, they’d find themselves thrown out the ‘churches’ instead of the other way round.
This is why people are turning to Orthodox
No they're not. Also, the Eastern Orthodox churches tolerate a good deal of globohomo-adjacent shit like Femen demonstrators and the massive amounts of porn generated in eastern europe. As much as certain people try to paint them as a more authentic christianity, they are in fact just as corrupt.
Remember: Jesus did not say 'follow my church', he said 'follow me'.
Agreed
Thank you very much for this. Do you listen to any other 'based' preachers? I haven't found too many :/
Pastor Pete Peters, Scriptures for America. He’s passed on but he was fantastic.
Exactly. Leftists hate Christianity and Christians, yet most Christian churches respond by embracing leftist ideology.
My church recenly decided, "hey, let's take the chance to allow homosexuality in" people left in droves.
Church asks "why don't people attend church anymore?"
Me: "because the institution abandon the tenants it claimed to uphold."
At this point I worship in my yard on Sundays doing landscaping than sitting in a pew because of such moves the church had made.
We have a lot of house churches here, some of the best services I've been to have been with 2-3 families worshiping God together in someone's home.
No church building to fund, no full-time employees to pay.
Study the Bible, pray for each other, and sing hymns.
Often God is to be found in the humble places like that, not giant corporate churches who make it all like a business model where money has to be coming in to keep it running.
We have a few farm churches here also, meet out in a barn, kids play with the animals after.
Read your scripture. Sabbath is on the 7th day, not the 1st.
I've heard a lot of those stories in CA, it's as if they thought gay would bring more people, instead existing membership left. What the heck were those elders thinking?
Church attendance has been in complete freefall since the 70s, so they're getting desperate. Still, this isn't the right way. We need to attract the youth, but we cannot do so by abandoning core Christian principles. It seems like Christianity is destined to become a small minority religion in America.
That gets covered in the bible.... it goes something like this.... people get fucked = they remember why god is good and go to church, life gets too good = they abandon church to pleasure seek. When shit gets bad, churches will regain membership. It's human nature.
You know, back in the day, I would have thought that this was a cop out, that you just didn't want to go to church, just getting your landscaping done. Holy Moses! I can totally identify, now! Sheesh! I've been trying to find a church that preaches the Gospel...most of them just preach "love your family', 'don't kill lgmft, because they need love' and 'don't be a racist." Still looking, but, I'm not optimistic.
Try American Anglican churches. The Episcopal church split in the early 2000s over gay marriage. American Anglicanism still follows scripture as written. I have yet to be disappointed in Anglican services, traditional hymns, liturgical worship, and values that remain unchanged in the face of a secular world.
Please join a Bible believing church. You can't worship corporately in the backyard, nor have appropriate church discipline, sacraments, corporate prayer, etc. There are lots of Bible believing churches in the USA. Jesus established the church for a reason. Holding yourself away is wrong.
Church is a suuuuper loose term for the Unitarians. It’s more of a social club.
Let's not even start on the Mormon Church, who have tacked on a bunch of fantasy novels to the Bible and call it "the word of God". We live in a time of apostasy and rebellion against Jesus.
Maybe you shouldn't judge something you don't know anything about.
Having been married to a Lutheran woman, I can tell you that so called 'church' is nothing but a social club that doesn't even pay attention to God.
Romans 1:28
This is absolutely God punishing us. You can see it all through the Bible. Check out Hosea 4.
Hosea 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.
We are at the "Repent or Perish" part of the story.
It's interesting how people on this site can acknowledge how far the infrastructure of Christianity has drifted away from God's laws and God's truths.
But then they'll turn around and blame everything on Commie Atheists with Jewish last names.
As a practicing Jew, all I can say is nice double standards ya got there......Globohomo Jews? Blame Judaism. Globohomo churches? Blame Globohomo Jews.
Torah or Talmud?
Seek how the earliest Christians worshipped, what their faith was, how the Church was actually assembled and functioned. Don't just use Scriptural content to paint a picture, dig into writings of the early Church fathers to learn what the apostles built on Christ.
There are good churches out there, but you have to look for them. The traditional churches seem to have drifted away from the Bible, if they ever followed it at all. I sometimes watch Cornerstone church from San Antonio online, they seem pretty based.
Look into the Apparition of Our Lady of Akita. The Blessed Virgin warned that all of this would happen.
They just booted out Saddleback Church for having a woman pastor, and ordaining 3 women as pastors. 4 other churches were expelled also. The SBC is hopefully finally defeating the liberal views that have gained popularity in the last 2 decades.
IIRC, the Southern Baptist convention is now pretty woke. Hard to think, because, I used to be SB, and, when I can't find a good Pentecostal church to go to, I revert and go to SB. Now, tho, it's just a headache.
I'm amazed Joseph Smith's cult didn't collapse after Kirtland Bank.He basically told all his followers that the end was coming and only God's money would be good after the world ended. So, he encouraged his followers to turn over their United States currency in exchange for this new currency he invented and his community was using that within their community. It was fine, because it could be exchanged at the bank for U.S. Dollars when dealing with the outsiders.
Then the guys Joseph Smith had running the bank loaded up all the U.S. Dollars in the bank and fled to South America. Thus rendering Joseph Smith's bank insolvent and the currency worth less than the paper it was printed on.
The Modernists at the southern border are not Catholic, they are Marxists in frocks.
The USSCCB are cowards for not censuring them and putting a stop to their disgrace.
The parable of the ten virgins comes to mind.
After Obama came in office, it became criminal to be a Christian, esp if you were a homeschooling Christian. Popular preachers were suddenly dying in unusual circumstances. They went after Freedom of Religion first, and no one noticed.
There was also some Catholic priest during world war II who was anti-war. They created an entire organization to get him off the air waves.
Omg YES! I am utterly convinced they murdered Pastor Peters!
J. Gresham Machen's Christianity and Liberalism, published in 1923 is entirely prophetic on this matter.
Here are some quotes:
I was raised catholic. I have some serious issues with the Catholic Church, and for a long time considered myself an atheist. I’ve had some life experiences that have made me realize I was wrong, but now I’m not sure what to do since it seems like churches care more about being woke than having a relationship with God. I’m not really sure what to do.
And know that once you find a church that unabashedly preaches the Bible, be prepared to accept that you've been lied to for all of your life. It's the same awakening as when you realize the government has lied to you all of your life. Sometimes, the truth can be a difficult pill to swallow.
find your local Catholic Church and go there. you will appreciate the structured Sundays and focus on the readings and the message they send to you. you are not obligated to agree with, or even listen to the priest's preachings if you do not want, especially if they are woke preachings (fighting that in my own church currently)
Not just any Catholic Church, but a Traditional Latin one.
Novus ordo parishes are a mixed bag, but TLM is almost universally based.
Cornerstone church in San Antonio is pretty based. They broadcast their Sunday services on Youtube.
Watching sermons from Pastor Murray of Shepherd's Chapel church have always been a calming delight.
Churches are (or should be) small enough entities that we'll see a pendulum swing pretty soon. Back to basics: Divine Service 1-3 straight out of the hymnal, organ only, Sunday school for children and adults the hour after.
Already seeing it in the churches around. Those that are going woke are going broke.
Lutheran church was waving gay pride flags trying to invite fags in for Easter... Despite the building having 0 visible crosses on it from the street.
Not WELS Lutheran churches I can guarantee you that.
Well many are guilty of this. Jesus comes back he's not flipping tables. He's going to lay the smackdown on them. You think he's going to be nice to all those Catholic priest raping kids? Hes not walking un their door tossing tables. Chasing them out hitting them with a whip maybe.
Christians believe in loving the sinner not the sin. But God has rules. This accept gays and accept trans, chop up your kids, etc not going to go over with him. We all know we sin. They think is a beautiful and they say and believe now they are gods. Listen to them rant they say that now. I'm waiting for the space rock to end us.
Because they have.
Out here I have encountered so many "churches" where Bro Pastor Braxton drives an overpriced lifted Jeep, they have massive TVs, "staged" happenings (such as the "pastor" recording himself going for a random mountain climbing adventure and somehow realizing at the top of the mountain that, oh hey, he had a rucksack absolutely loaded with Bible Study books and a Sony Alpha 9 camera to record his "sermon"). The band has all custom shop instruments. They preach things directly contrary to the Bible.
At the same time they beg and beg for money as if they are about to be put out on the street. it's all fucking fake and an absolute joke. The churches have become the new country clubs where your worth is based on which one you go to and who you associate with there. It isn't about the Word of God... No, it's about some stereotypical bro pastor telling made-up stories he came up with to stroke his own ego while grifting off of people who feel the need to donate.
Also, nowadays I guess it's the cool and accepted thing to whip your phone out during service and record what's going on as proof that you were there for your Instagram followers. The pastors have become social media influencers for their followers who also feel they are social media influencers.
I see a lot of Pride, Greed and Gluttony when I look at many of these so-called "churches".
Upvoted. This describes the big evangelical churches in my town to a "T"
This is what happens when you have a communist Pope who turns a blind eye and gives a wink and a nod to abortion, tranny ideology and tyrannical socialist governance by an incompetent "catholic" imbecile.
This isn't about just the current Pope. Reminder that the last one, who so many consider to be "conservative", was covering up the brutal rape of little boys by Catholic priests. This kind of thing has been going on for who knows how many centuries.
Catholicism has very little to do with Christianity. It is a semi-pagan cult ruled by Satan.
This is not the first time. Jesus predicted the corruption of the churches. The people are the church, not the priests and ministers.
Same shit is happening in Sweden too. Female pastors celebrating diversity, faggotry and muslims.
No one asked me.
That may be what modern protestantism says, but it's not truthful. Sin is sin.
Even fifty years ago this was not true.
It is now only because "Protestantism" is such a wide net it includes the liberal self help groups like Methodists that hardly even read the Bible anymore, or Unitarians that openly abandoned it.
Speaking so broadly about Protestantism is no different than when an atheist assigns exactly the same flaws to you because that's what "Christianity" has become.
There are still protestants that uphold the need for repentance, and hold with most Orthodox beliefs minus the post first-century traditions.
In America at least, and possibly a lot of western Europe, the problem remains that most protestants know next to nothing about Eastern Orthodox. It's still quite firmly "The Bible vs the Vatican" in most theological circles. They recognize there is no "going back" to accepting Vatican heresy, but their knowledge of Eastern Orthodox remains limited at best.
The churches have been completely infiltrated. It's not the first time. See Ezekiel 22.
25 There is a conspiracy of her prophets in the midst thereof, like a roaring lion ravening the prey; they have devoured souls; they have taken the treasure and precious things; they have made her many widows in the midst thereof.
26 Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned mine holy things: they have put no difference between the holy and profane, neither have they shewed difference between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my sabbaths, and I am profaned among them.
Jeremiah also talks about this in chapter 5. All throughout, he speaks of the decline and it ends with:
29 Shall I not visit for these things? saith the Lord: shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?
30 A wonderful and horrible thing is committed in the land;
31 The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means; and my people love to have it so: and what will ye do in the end thereof?
Also see Maccebees I and II, where a corrupt faction of Jews who wanted to adopt pagan customs stole the high priesthood through fraud.
I think the main reason for Protestantism and its reformation was Martin Luther showing the Vatican was lying about the contents of the Bible. It’s really that simple. They (Germans) were told a series of lies to steal their money, and were forbidden to learn Latin in order to keep the truth from coming out. Now, that doesn’t mean we should accept each tenant of Protestants. But when I see Protestants talked about negatively, I always remember they were basically the first to step up to the Vatican’s bullshit and challenge their stranglehold on the world. I respect that. What it’s become now is atrocious.
I need neither a church nor a Bible to maintain my belief in God.
Would have loved to go to church today but all that is present in my city are Papists and United Communists.
Hot take:
As much as the Catholic Church had it coming, the Protestantism that the US was founded on is inherently self-divisive. Christianity could only reliably spread when the foremost church and power in Europe was the RCC.
As long as Protestant infighting continues, Christianity will never again be a dominant force in American life.
The main issue with Protestantism is its lack of coherent religious tradition and defined dogma. It is in essence doomed to split and splinter until it either stabilizes or disappears.
There are also heresies that all church congregations practice, like Modalism. Protestants do this, but so do Catholics.
Unfortunately Modalism is embedded in the Catholic church.
If you know what Modalism skip the next paragraph:
Modalism is when the Trinity is portrayed oversimplified that the Father is 1/3 of the Trinity, and so on. This is heresy because God is also the relationships between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. They are inseparable. Modalism is equivalent to polytheism. If Catholics didn't forget this at some point, they wouldn't say prayers like "Saint Michael the archangel, defend us in our day of battle..." etc. Catholic belief is that all saints become one with the Holy Spirit. But to pray to a saint, even in its most charitable representation, is Modalism, because you're praying only to the Holy Spirit, treating it like 1/3 of God.
It sounds radical to talk about heresy in this day and age, until you realize that the reason the Church Fathers rejected it so strongly, is because all heresies are mischaracterizations of Christianity that lead people away from actual understanding and faith.
But this isn't just an issue with Protestantism.
This is an issue with the entirety of American Conservatism. We will literally never conserve anything if our main strategy is to abandon institutions that turn against us. Churchs, schools, universities, clubs, and corporations have been poisoned like this. Mainline churches are dying. Woke pastors drive actual Christians away, who then atomize and divide the faith further by founding their own microchurches.
The problem is unfortunately foundational. The heart of modern US conservatism is nothing more than disgust towards the left. Out distrust and disgust towards the Left can destroy any institution, but it can't actually build anything real. Unfortunately, the label some leftists give us of 'reactionary' is true. Insofar as we DO actually have REAL principles, we seemingly haven't founded any institutions upon them that haven't been subverted.
Each of us needs to return to tradition. Take back the institutions that have been stolen from us, starting with the Mainline churches, preferably the Catholic Church itself. I'd personally love it if the RCC would drop its heretical practices and return to the fundamentals as set out in the Nicene Creed (and Filioque, if only because that's a feature of the RCC at its founding. The Eastern Orthodox church exists because they rejected the Filioque).
We need more to unite us than just 'the left is at it again'. If we could talk to long-dead conservatives or Chrisitans, they'd think we were heathens.
It isnt Christianity, its Modernism.
Most "Churches" in America are shilling the religion of this world and it prince, Satan. Wolves in shepherd's clothing praying on the ignorant and unsuspecting, aided and abetted by people too cowardly to call them out.
There was a marian apparition roughly 50 years ago that warned of this sad state of affairs.
They stopped supplying virtuous women to righteous men for wifing.
I’m proud of my church disassociating with the Methodists and going non-denominational
Follow the money, a lot of cash comes in. Avoid churches owned by the pastor. You can find out on the property appraiser if the church has a building. Also who is the business registered to?
Common scam is to milk then move...
It is a fight against Pure EVIL. The Devil wants to destroy The Church that was instituted by our Lord Jesus Christ. No matter how many men Fail and blaspheme The Church, the devil will Never destroy her. The Catholic Church is the One True Church instituted by Jesus. No man will ever destroy it. Period.
The devil will certainly try
This is why churches are dying.
DUH!!!
Many churches have become the man of sin.
I left the Catholic Church the day they asked parishioners to help pay for the $600M judgment against them because of their pedo priest scandal. Love the religion and teachings, but the devil has infiltrated the church. I'm disgusted to see so many churches abandon the basic tenets of Christianity.
One must remember that organized religion is big business and making money is the number one priority. Like other businesses that have tried, alienating your loyal 'customers' to chase the ones you don't have usually doesn't end well.
That tax exempt status has been corrupted.
I met a streamer who claims to be a witch while her dad is an orients. I did a little doxing and her dad is actually in charged of every Mennonite church whose kids aren’t even saved. They’re there to collect money now
It depends on what you mean by Christianity. If you mean the religion about Jesus, then yes, many churches are abandoning Christianity. But if you mean the religion of Jesus, then no. Most churches never endorsed the religion of Jesus in the first place.