This is a response to FakePlasticStar's comments about dwelling too much over thoughts of 'everything was better in the past' (see 'p.s. i'd also like to stop complaining')
* * *
But everything was better in the past!
Except that we lived at home with little to no control over our lives, at the mercy of 1) parents, 2) elders, 3) extremely conditional forms of love and acceptance.
Hmmm, let's see...
Why The Now is better....
We can stay up late watching horror movies or playing terribly violent video games whenever we want; boys can sleep over at our house anytime without it being assumed that Wrongdoing has been committed; we can eat breakfast for dinner and dessert for breakfast (though that's more a general bonus); we don't have to do Bible reading every day; we don't have to go to church three+ times a week; we'll never have to wear a scarf over our heads because we're a woman praying in the presence of a ten year old male; we can kiss people of the same and/or opposite sex without having to take 'pornea' into consideration (ugh); we can go to university without everyone we know making critical remarks about our decision; we won't die over our refusal to accept a blood transfusion because of a strange interpretation of Acts 15:29*; we don't have to try to convince total strangers of the truth of creationism and the identity of the Wild Beast in Revelation; we don't have to worry that a CD or book we buy might turn out to be "demonized" or "questionable"; we don't have to shun our friends over their religious beliefs (or lack thereof); we can be agnostic and atheists to our hearts content; we'll never be asked how our "spirituality" is doing; we'll never be asked whether we've been praying over the doubts we've been having over the submission & headship issue; we don't have to worry about our Harry Potter or LOTR books ending up in some back alley garbage bin; we can leave our erotica story books lying around the house; we don't have to worry about the length of our skirts or the lowness of our shirts; we won't be pulled aside and cautioned over the color of our hair or the number of ear piercings we have; we don't have to tell gay people that we think they're lifestyle is condemned by god and that they're be destined to eternal nothingness; and lastly, we can question and think and defy and protest and talk to our friends about all of the above without ever having to worry about being turned in or expelled or losing their love or their friendship.
__________________
* Acts 15: 28-29 "For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these essentials: that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from bloodNew American Standard and from things strangled and from fornication; if you keep yourselves free from such things, you will do well. Farewell." ()
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12 comments:
You never had to go to church.
You had to go the Kingdom Hall.
There's a difference.
I'm trying to keep my blog less searchable by not using to many JW terms.
I know that sounds weird but...
:o)
(As well, I see no difference between the terms church and a "Kingdom Hall"... Although I know the JWs do, so what?)
Well, mainstream Christians see a difference too. So if both of the groups whose places of worship you're referring to disagree with your terminology, you're probably misrepresenting them.
Church is a generic term. You could classify a Kingdom Hall as a type.
Misrepresenting them in their own terms, but not in a general sense.
That's what I think too - I would consider a Mormon place of worship as a church but I think they have another name for it as well. Temple, I think?
Consider the definition...
church ( P ) Pronunciation Key (chûrch)
n.
A building for public, especially Christian worship.
Sounds okay to me. :o)
Maybe some Christians don't like the term church being applied to a JW Kingdom Hall because they don't consider JWs to actually *be* Christians. Which is quite stupid, in my opinion. Anyone who calls themself a follower of Christ and endeavors to live in a Christian way can use the term Christian, imho.
[shrugs]
The only problem is that, by that reasoning I can call mosques, ashrams and Buddhist meditation halls, 'churches,' and call Muslims, Unitarians and Bahai's Christians (all of them consider Jesus a prophet worth following). Heck, I could call Gandhi a Christian. He admired Christ and followed some of his teachings. I can claim Kurt Vonnegut as a Christian too, though he's an atheist.
My point is that when both groups of people overwhelmingly disagree with the words you're using about them, it's an indication that you're misusing the vocabulary, which arises in specific contexts. It starts to be rather unclear and high-handed. Remember how us liberals are supposed to refer to people by the names they prefer? like First Nations, transgendered, mentally challenged or disabled, etc, etc. ;-)
Anony's right that in these Philistine and unlettered times 'church' has become a more generic name for any place of worship, in popular American usage at least. I think that's kind of dumb, since the word arises as a specifically Christian creation ('the Lord's House'), so it seems strange to refer to a Buddhist Church. It seems a tad imperialist.
See, if you'd just said you wanted to use 'church' to avoid searchability and left it at that, I wouldn't quibble. But word definitions are life itself! :-)
PS: You can use whatever words you want. But I get to bug you about 'em. :-)
In conclusion, I would call any *Christian* place of worship a church.
I would call any non-Christian place of worship whatever was... culturally appropriate or generally accepted.
I would *not* necessarily call a place of worship by the name the *worshippers* themselves demanded it be called.
Moving along...
Yeah, post about something new already!
I can't! I'm at work and its busy!
But thank you for your devotion. :P~~~
I don't quibble about its being a misrepresentation of the individual religions' use, just that it was syntactically correct, I guess.
The rest, well, context and appropriate, really, agreed.
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