Why is Christian fundamentalism given a bad name?

Question

It seems that nowadays, many people believe that a person's religious views should never completely reflect what is taught in the bible. Instead, they throw all the values and laws from the bible in the same pot as all that we have learned from modern culture, and they see what floats.

For example, I have heard many people call themselves "Christian", but they have edited christianity to fit their own agenda. I've heard some people say: "I'm a Christian - but I believe that everyone will eventually go to heaven, I believe that homosexual acts are not sinful, and I believe that humans evolve from monkeys." What??? You beliefs and values are incompatible with Christianity, yet you call yourself a Christian!!!

I don't understand how people think they have the right to do this. It's as if everything in the bible is conditional, and needs to be changed every once in a while ... NO!! It doesn't!!

Why must people do this. It seems 'real' Christianity is harder to find these days.

Answer 1

Fundamentalist Christians certainly have the right to believe whatever they think the bible teaches unless and until their beliefs infringe on the rights of those who do not hold their beliefs. But you see, that's not good enough for most of you. If others ignore what you tell them they should do, then you rally the troops and attempt to change the laws of society to match your beliefs and thereby force the rest to follow.

Answer 2

You kind of answered your own question. The reason why many don't find Christian fundamentalism to be agreeable is the whole "our way or the highway attitude" couple that with the fact that many fundamentalists actively seek to establish the United States as a fundamentalist theocracy-then you have a recipe for strong disagreement. My theological beliefs are not the same as yours, and I'm hostile to the idea of you sitting in judgement of my beliefs. That's why Christian fundamentalism has a bad name, it's insistence that they're the only "real" Christians and their insistence that our country should be a nation built around their specific theological beliefs.

Answer 3

i think of you're perplexing extremism and fundamentalism. The be conscious fundamentalism has earned a destructive connotation, yet replaced into merely meant as a reaction to non secular liberalism. An extremist could be somebody that shoots an abortionist interior the call of existence, a fundamentalist is somebody who insists on doing Christianity the way the scriptures say.

Answer 4

For starters maybe the way so many "christian fundamentalists" treat people. There is a way to be respectful and kind to others and still hold to your beliefs and not compromise yourself. It seems there is a lot of different sets of beliefs when it comes to christianity. Mentally and psychologically abusing individuals to force them out of fear and emotional distress to convert is also seen quite frequently especially in "bible belt".
I think if more christians follow their own saying, "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." then maybe they will not get such a bad rap.

Answer 5

Homesexuality is OK. God says we have enough people on this planet so please stop reproducing. You can have sex just for fun with whatever sex you prefer now.
We evolved from lower life forms, God said to get over it humans aren't all that.

God says it's OK to vote a woman like Hillary Clinton into the White house.
God Says anyone of any religion or lack of is welcome in the home of the lord.
God Says even though you are a bigot you are a worthwhile human being who has the potential to do real good.
A book can never contain the words of God. Can you understand and communicate with Crickets? We are that simple to the divine. Anything in our language is too simple for Gods expressions.
Christianity has some good, some bad. Worship does not require strict adherence to a Dogma. God is not a legalistic force, that is an invention of simple man. God cannot tell the differnce between one religion and another.
Your prayers are like Crickets Chirping. He knows your there from the sounds but distinguishes none above the other.
God is all of us and more than us.
I hope you learn peace in your way but Neo-Christianity as you know it is less than 300 years old.
Be Divine.

Answer 6

I realize this is an alien concept to you, but it might just be that "their" interpetations might just be right and yours might just be wrong.

That's the Bibles biggest strength and weakness: It can specifically mean just about anything you want to read into it. For you it justifies homophobia and rejection of scientific fact. For others it is a command to make everyone else "cxonvert or die", while still others regard it as a very simple message: "Love one another as one loves oneself."

It is the Christian Fundamentalists who have given themselves their own bad name...their arrogance to presume that their God's opinions are reflected in their own, that willful ignorance of science is somehow laudable, that anyone even slightly different from you in opinion or act is misguided or "evil", the regular efforts to try to force theri religious dogma into science classrooms and get their specific set of religious beliefs validated by law. Not to mention the overt corruption and greed of the fundamentalists spokesmen: Robertson, Popoff, Gish, Hovind, Falwell, Bakker, Wyatt, and so on. And that's not even mentioning the outright lies spread as truth by such Creationists as Ken Ham, Michael Behe, Ron Wyatt, and William Brown. Or the fanatical, self-righteous rage of the self-proclaimed "Army of God", or the paranoid and hateful revenge-fantasies of Tim LaHaye.

Hating homosexuals is not a criteria for being a Christian. Nor is accepting real-world evidence of real-world facts. Nor is a literal interpetation of your Bible the only possible way to read it. It is your own insistence of superiority and conviction that you and ONLY you are the good ones in the eyes of your patron deity.

Answer 7

These 'real' Christians you speak of shout very loud. And what they shout is hate.

It is the fundamentalists that cause wars and bring suffering by being adament that their way is the right way, and well, anyone who disagrees should be shot.

Why do these fundamentalists care what anyone else thinks anyway? Jesus taught through love, but all you know is hate. No matter how loud you shout, more and more people will tune you out and find their own way.

Answer 8

No one gave fundamentalism anything.

Fundamentalism earned the sorry reputation it enjoys all by itself.

Fundies are the scourge of modern man and are responsible for most of the carnage and destruction recorded in history.

We are experiencing the Moslem version of fundamentalism with the Shi’ia wreaking hate and killing anywhere they can around the globe all in what the stone-ages sumbitches have decided is the will of Allah, whoever the He&& that is supposed to be.

Jim D

Answer 9

"Real Christianity"....?
No such animal, never was.

About 1700 years ago, there were hundreds of competing sects of Christianity, all claiming authority based on a variety of pseudohistorical claims of right of succession stemming from one apostle or another, or one apostle's apostle or another.

One sect had strategically targeted for recruitment the slaves of Roman army officers, knowing that eventually many of the officers themselves would be recruited; and then it was only a matter of time before they were "connected" to the highest levels of Roman government, even Constantine himself.
This sect claimed its right of authority through the apostle Peter.
Once they had enough political clout to make a deal with Constantine to become the official state religion of Rome, they went about systematically wiping out any trace of their former competing sects.....labelling them devil worshippers and traitors.
They burned books, churches, entire libraries, not to mention people.
They held a conference in Nicea to stack the deck to load the official approved record of Christian lore with only their own (politically correct) documents.........The Bible.
Whatever were to be considered the "teachings" of this Bible were theirs alone to decree and enforce.....for about the next 1200 years. It was their propaganda masterpiece.

Now there is a sect (fundamentalists) that, while rejecting the idea of deriving spiritual authority through an apostolic lineage, insists on recognizing their propaganda......retranslated in 1611, as the sole authoritative communication of their Deity to humanity.

Ahhhh religion......just like sausage....wholesome and satisfying...untill you see how it's made.

Answer 10

Is "real" Christianity really all about judging/condemning others? Perhaps this is why many Christians like myself are uncomfortable and at times quite offended by the views of our fundamentalists friends.

Jesus told us to forgive, to fight for justice, to love our neighbor as ourselves. Jesus tells us that God loves us, and that each day we have to make Him the center of our lives. To me these ideas are at the center of what it means to be a Christian.

I respect Christian fundamentalists for their commitment. But if that commitment leads them to feel anger and the desire to judge others harshly, perhaps they are missing some of the verses that deal with compassion and love.

Matthew 14: 13-21

And when he went ashore he saw a great throng; and he had compassion on them, and he healed their sick. And when it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, "This is a lonely place and the day is now over; send the crowds away to go into the villages and buy food for themselves. Jesus said, They need not go away; you give them something to eat".