Left my local B&M today, just popped in to buy a few things....
When I came out a local street preacher was just starting up.
He had 3 females behind him, (looked like his missus and 2 daughters, could be wrong, obviously)
And he opened his Bible and started to preach from Johns Gospel ''For God so loved the world'' etc...
The fact that he was black and had an ancestry of slavery melted my mind.
The Bible had been used as an excuse for slavery for thousands of years.
The Old Testament endorses it (Exodus)
The Mormon Church excluded Blacks for decades, believing them to be cursed.
Christians held black slaves for centuries for much the same reason.
Ill never understand why Africans/dark skinned people become Christians.
John Newton (Of Amazing Grace fame) only ceased trading African slaves DECADES after his conversion to christianity.
Just dont get it!
Why do people with a history of slavery want to re-enslave themselves?
Nailit; I think the lives of slaves was so bad, and their hope of freedom so remote, that they turned to an imaginary saviour offered by christians to give them some hope (and calm them down a bit). That has led to religion being passed down through the generations.
Nailit, religions hate women too. My conclusion is that those who are religious, ignore the majority of their "books" and make up their own gods that they do appreciate. I doubt any two people in the world actually worship the same God.
They don't actually need to, nailit. The "traditions" continue, because they always have and nobody bothers to think or challenge them.
They may (or not) have come from religion, but as most people see them as normal... nothing changes.
Christians would say that all the terrible things you highlight were perpetrated by man - and since that's true there's no fundamental logic in your argument. The little family are sharing what they regard as good news and God, as always, is off the hook.
Just dont get why black people (who have an unenviable history of been exploited) endorse a belief system that exploits them.
And its just not the Old Testament.
Its the new Testament too.
Nowhere does Jesus condemn the Old Testament slavery laws and actually endorses them as does St Paul in his epistles.
More modern religious movements endorse them too
(Mormons, until recently)
What The Funicular is wrong with people that want to endorse their own slavery?
//Christians would say that all the terrible things you highlight were perpetrated by man//
I know what they say, but dont they read their own Bible?
They are preaching from it...
People who BELIEVE the Bible are Christians.
People who READ the Bible are atheists.