Comments on: Public Prayer and Implications of Agreement http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/ Resources for skeptical, de-converting, or former Christians...... Fri, 25 May 2012 12:39:52 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: Quester http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13837 Wed, 02 Jan 2008 06:16:28 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13837 Taking a different tack on ExEvangel’s original post, I’d like to respond on the assumption of shared paradigm. I don’t think this is really all that rare, nor necessarily manipulative in intent. I know that I am too often caught off guard by the realization that someone sees reality in a different light than I. In the example you state, I know that if I were asked to lead public prayer in thanks for a meal, and the group joined hands, I might easily be surprised that a person in that group would be sitting there, expecting me to note their discomfort, guess the reason for it, and do something about it. I tend to work on the assumption that if someone is bothered by what I do, they would tell me. If they do not, I tend to assume nothing is wrong.

I still do this, sometimes; even after countless examples of people who expect me to assume they are bothered by what I am doing, but for whatever reason refuse to say something to me.

Other things you say reduce the likelihood that this is what your family is doing, but when it comes to assumptions of agreement, I think this problem is widespread, if not universal. Perhaps, though, I’m just assuming a commonness of experience which does not, in fact, exist. *grin*

]]> By: TheDeeZone http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13790 Tue, 01 Jan 2008 05:44:38 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13790 Justcan’t

I agree with you on this one. Their motives for praying are wrong. I am a Christian and that makes me uncomfortable. Praying for 3 more minutes? How long is the mealtime prayer? At out house if someone says a mealtime prayer that is long there might not be any food left when they finish. We pray before meal times. Short and 2 the point.

DH

]]> By: JustCan't http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13788 Tue, 01 Jan 2008 04:23:10 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13788 locomotivebreath1901: “In short: get over it!”

I understand this perspective, and used to abide by it. I didn’t care. But when it is done as a show, or it interrupts other peoples’ meals, or it is done to make the non-believer feel a certain way — well, no I won’t get over it. That is abusive behavior (at least some of it is) and it is also being very antagonistic. And yes, rude too.

When it was done with me at the table, it was done with all eyes on me to see how I’d react. If some particular saying seemed to raise my blood pressure, they’d be sure to repeat it the next time, only in more detail. There’d be little smirks of the “Ha! Look how uncomfortable we’re making him….. Let’s go on for 3 more minutes!” variety. Yes, that’ll bring the atheist into the fold — let’s show him how downright pushy we can be. Let’s make someone who doesn’t think like us feel unimportant and singled out. After awhile, I couldn’t just get over it, but I wished they would.

]]> By: TheDeeZone http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13783 Tue, 01 Jan 2008 03:17:38 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13783 Rob,

You have some interesting plans about God’s will. Reminds me of a story one of my profs told. A devout Christian young lady got on the elvator. She punched all of the buttons & then moved to the side. She rode to the top & then punched all the buttons again. Rode to bottom & punched the buttons. This continued for a long time. Finally, someone asked if she needed help. She replied I waiting for God to tell me which floor to get off & which foot to start with. God has a will for our lives but expects us to use common sense as well.

Karen, guess you know which Christians are actually being “good” Christians & keeping their eyes closed.

DH

]]> By: exevangel http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13782 Tue, 01 Jan 2008 03:02:17 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13782 Well, yes, locomotivebreath1901, dealing with one’s family *is* a personal problem, of course! Dealing with one’s devout Evangelical Christian family when one is de-converted is particularly tough. But the point of this post went far, far beyond the prayer thing.

]]> By: locomotivebreath1901 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13775 Tue, 01 Jan 2008 01:30:49 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13775 “…Praying before meals in public -…This is one thing about dining out with my family that makes me crazy.”

Sounds like a personal problem to me.

I don’t give a hoot one way or another if folks pray or not. It’s a private ritual. A personal preference. Mind your own business!

I would no more be bothered by it or ask they refrain than to ask them not to speak in a foreign language, or not drink alcohol or ban their children from the room.

If it is the consensus of a party I joined for dinner, and I objected, I would politely refuse then let the majority perform their little ritual. Or be more aware of the company I keep and make alternative plans accordingly.

In short: get over it!

]]> By: Rob http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13772 Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:53:11 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13772 Hi Exevangel,

During my time in the church and when I went to Bible College (!), there was a significant amount of hand-wringing over the idea of ‘God’s will’. It went to extremes of course, with some people espousing that when we pray, we shouldn’t ask for things that we want – like a safe journey on an icy road for a friend coming to visit – as it may be God’s will for that person to die on the road. In my mind, even then, it made prayer a rather tricky undertaking as we were meant to “pray in God’s will”. How to do this was less defined then expressing the idea of it.

Getting back on the topic at hand (sorry for all of my ramblings, guys!), I always found it uncomfortable to pray in a restaurant under the guise of saying grace. I find it interesting that Jesus’ statement that Christians shouldn’t pray in the streets like the hypocrites isn’t acknowledged in this context. Maybe Jesus didn’t mean Denny’s? Where’s the verse in the Bible about Denny’s, again?

]]> By: karen http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13768 Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:17:08 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13768 A gang of us used to head to Denny’s after every Thursday night church service. We would all bring our bibles in, pray loudly, and I know looking back that it was all for public display. It was all for show.

Yeah, I hate to admit this, but I did this too and I think we were all suffering with a “look at us and see how holy we are” complex. It’s embarrassing to think of now. At least we didn’t sing, like the chaplain did. ;-)

Now, when we have “grace” at someone’s house or we have Christian guests and my husband wants to say a prayer, I stop what I’m doing but I don’t close my eyes or bow my head, or say “amen.” My own small conscientious objector status, I guess.

Happy new year, all!

]]> By: exevangel http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13767 Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:09:52 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13767 Rob,
your comment about “God’s plan for my life” really resonates with me; I’m always amazed by people that express such certainty about these things. I had a very long, very passionate arguement with a Quaker once, about how anyone could know what God was leading them to do. It had to fit in with a set of rules (i.e. be good and Godly) and the more uncomfortable it was the more likely you could convince someone that it was God’s will and not your own idea. But I have never been able to come around to a view where communications with any deity were actually sufficiently 2-way that you could ascertain truely any information about God’s plan for your life or God’s will for what you do.

]]> By: Rob http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13765 Mon, 31 Dec 2007 23:25:06 +0000 http://de-conversion.com/2007/12/30/public-prayer-and-implications-of-agreement/#comment-13765 Hi DZ,

One of the main burdens lifted off of me when I finally cut my ties to Evangelical Christianity was not having to worry about ‘God’s plan for my life’. Taking any kind of action, expressing certain thoughts, or even reading certain books caused me great anxiety. Most of this came out of what other people were going to think of me and my ‘walk’, as if I were involved in some sort of beauty contest. To be fair, I put the pressure on myself, driven as I was to please others, and to adhere to my idea of the person of God. But this was in reaction to the underlying, and unwritten, social norms that dictated that I was not to go my own way, but ‘God’s Way’. The flaw in that was that “God’s Way’ or ‘His Plan For My Life’ was never really fleshed out by anything I could access, and was never really explained as something I could really know, unless I prayed a lot (but … what should I pray for?). It was only when I realised that God’s plan should only be about using the resources given to me to make the best decision I could. It is surprising, within the context of the subculture (to which I now commonly refer to it as) how long and hard a journey this was.

The reason it was hard is simple, I guess. Independent thought is dangerous to collective thinking, and therefore dangerous to everyone within that collective who is bound together by common ideas, good or bad. Social norms used to minimize or even eliminate this tendency is usually based on fear of loss – security, power, and a sense of greater meaning outside of one’s self, even if it’s imagined. A lot of people I know, and myself to a certain extent, have been sacrificed on that particular alter enough for me to know its true nature. And after a while, you begin to realise that anything spiritual or meaningful cannot be so rooted in insecurity as that.

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