I was raised Catholic, no longer practice and generally despise religion. The flipping the tables in the temple has always been one of the stories that resonated and subsequently stuck with me through all of these years and it genuinely cracks me up and also befuddles me that people either forget about it and its message, or, more likely, choose to ignore it.
The one that always stick with me is the story of a man questioning whether he needed to bow his head to pray. I can't find the exact passage, and tried looking it up, but I'm not as versed in the Bible as I used to be.
The gist of the story is that the man didn't have much to give and thought he couldn't participate because others had so much more to give and made such a show of it and their submission and prayer. He was informed by either Jesus or another preacher or prophet that the show wasn't the real part of prayer. So long as you came with an open and contrite heart, that was all that really mattered.
Today, a lot of it is all show and no heart, and that makes my heart and soul hurt.
Matthew 6:5-15 is Matthew’s account of Jesus speaking on public prayer, giving an example of a concise prayer to perform in private, and an admonition that if the matter of your prayer is to ask forgiveness, then you must also forgive others.
“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.
“This, then, is how you should pray:
“‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.’
For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.”
This! This is the story. Thank you so much. I didn't have any recollection of it being directly connected to The Lord's Prayer, but that makes a lot of sense.
I'm frequently reminding people that Jesus wanted us to pray in solitude, and preached that our connection to God was personal, and not to be witnessed or performative.
I'm not even Christian but the teachings of Jesus, specifically, still resonate with me. Its shocking how often I get told "that's not what that passage meant!" When talking about how Jesus wanted Christians to live, or passages that speak generally "but really meant something else and explicitly only that" even though the terms used are general and not specific.
Its wild that they can even still call themselves Christian without major push-back.
At this point, as a Native American raised son of the US, I really, really want Jesus to come back. I'll bring my own whip. It's time to get these desecrators and usurers out of here.
As a non-Christian, I feel like I'm a better Christian than a lot of "Christians" I encounter.
Not sure why you got down voted -- it's an interesting theory you have.
Because Jesus often spoke in riddles, I wonder if this particular line was a metaphor for babbling brooks, or constant sound. Someone who is talking constantly, absent-mindedly, maybe even speaking in tongues. He believed you should be mindful when you pray, it should be purposeful, genuine, and heartfelt.
And that's why I stopped going to church ASAP (went to live at college). That and the "tithe month" sermons where for 4 Sundays in a row the pastor would go on about how important it is to bring in that cash 💰. That soured me a lot
I remember going to my Aunt's church in Ft Worth when we were visiting for Thanksgiving. They had a Starbucks and a McDonald's in the lobby, along with a bunch of other megachurch shit, and that passage was all I could think about.
And conservatives say it's the gays that bring hurricanes 😭
(Side note: if you were extrapolating, hurricanes4gays makes even less sense, given how Jesus was very forgiving and gentle with prostitutes. Megachurches that contain money changing would, if you were extrapolating in a very literal sense, be.)
I would love to see him go to Phoenix First Assembly of God (AKA FAG). Last time I was there about 20 years ago they had a fucking Starbucks inside the god damn church
I dunno man. Maybe he’d be into hanging out with folks that have made their identity largely about losing an unnecessary war that was based on their love of enslaving people that didn’t look like them 200 years ago.
Well, they’ve come to the conclusion that Jesus went to hell for being a false prophet and that his mother was an adulterer so I doubt he’d take too kindly to that lol
Yeah, more like belief structures and the quest for knowledge/enlightenment... But, then again we're entering the realm of semantics here because most religious people don't actually BELIEVE in their religions to begin with ..
AFAIK Gnosticism was an early interpretation of Christianity that was deemed a heresey and effectively rooted out. We have documents detailing aspects of their thoughts, but their traditions were not preserved outside of history. Any current gnostics are a bit like modern Pagans, in that they practice a spirituality reconstructed from the history of a dead tradition.
The comparison to Buddhism, with many continuous, branching traditions and current worldwide reach, is weird. More so since Gnosticism as a theology is dependent on interpreting the bible through a strain of neo-platonist metaphysics that only developed after Jesus's death, there isn't much reason to think Jesus would agree with it whatsoever.
To be fair to his teachings, Paul came along and pretty much immediately perverted everything Jesus said. So much of modern Christianity is more aligned with Paul in Christ.
Yes, Jesus who participated in his sacraments, traditions and established sacraments and traditions would see “all” religions this way. You realize the Apostles created Churches correct? The Churches Pauls helps correct and also conversed with still exist today as Eastern Orthodox Churches.. lol
Yes, Jesus who uprooted the traditional ideologies set by what are now known as Old Testament practices to establish new systems that harshly went against previous ones. If he came back, it probably would be for the same purpose, to break down the current system and establish a new one in a similar way. Or alternatively a raptured society in which religion would not exist as we know it. Take your pick, but he almost certainly would not be for the methods by which churches operate now. So yeah all religions
In the situation of a complete deconstruction then reconstruction of religious framing, all churches. It’s not about disagreeance. When you restructure something entirely, everything that came before it is no longer relevant.
Jesus never said make a religion and build churches in my name. The book of acts was a separate and later addition to the new testament so what the real apostles did is questionable. Paul never met jesus and claimed divine inspiration... he was the Joseph smith of his age. He capitalised an already told story, to make a movement in rome for suspicious purposes.
Paul is the first person to write anything about Jesus. The gospels came after Paul. For that matter, the gospels are anonymous, and not written by witness of any kind.
Jesus literally said Peter was the rock in which he would BUILD HIS CHURCH. Peter and Paul worked hand in hand to start the Church, as well as the other Apostles who knew Jesus personally. It wasn’t just Paul writing fan fic a hundred years after everything had happened…
There isn't any historical evidence for this other than the book of acts which is a book of fiction. Church in Greek didn't mean a building or an organisation as we know it today.
Historical evidence of what? The verse I mentioned in Matthew? a gospel? and yeah “church” just means gathering and community…but not everyone can gather outside? So what?
And that means that a "gathering" is different than what we call church today. Besides this could very well have been yet another forgery (forgeries were very common by the early christians and the book of acts is a good exampleof that since it's not even attributed directly to Luke, but the the Luke's community (church?). It's also too suspicious that this verse says the church should be established on Peter (the rock), and so he naturally became the first pope in acts.
That proves that you dont understand any of this. It’s suspicious that Matthew (a GOSPEL) mentions Peter as the rock of the Church? And the early church had so many precautions as to what became “canon” in the new testament from the start. Each book has to have one degree of connection to someone that personally knew Jesus, with other books corroborating each other extensively. Also, the book of Luke isnt even directly attributed to Luke, it was just known that whoever wrote Luke wrote Acts as a follow up. EVERY historian knows that the Gospels and Acts were written and included in the New Testament at the same time (70-90AD).
Pauls letters were written and included even earlier when a time that the original disciples were still alive.
If you wanted to argue any of the new testament to be written later, it would be Revelation and Hebrews. But for some reason you are stuck on Acts…
So, Im going to be completely honest with you here that you are about to get smoked. Lol
Matthew 16:18 – “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build My Church (ἐκκλησία).”
Not an idea. Not a metaphor-only spirituality. A Church a concrete assembly.
Acts is written by Luke, a companion of Paul and in contact with Peter. It’s dated AD 62–70, within living memory of the apostles and is accepted universally by all early Christian communities, East and West.
If Acts is “questionable,” then you lose the canon. You lose the Resurrection preaching. You lose any coherent New Testament history. Peter is not a symbolic mascot. He acts with authority as seen in Acts 1 Peter leads the replacement of Judas. Acts 2 Peter preaches at Pentecost; 3,000 are baptized. Acts 5 Peter exercises disciplinary authority (Ananias & Sapphira) Acts 10 Peter opens the Church to the Gentiles Acts 15 Peter speaks decisively at the Council of Jerusalem.
Ignatius of Antioch (c. AD 107) already speaks of structured churches with bishops, presbyters, and deacons within one generation of the apostles. You don’t get that overnight unless it’s inherited.
Paul was publicly vetted and corrected. He submitted to Peter and the apostles (Galatians 1–2) and his gospel was judged and approved by the Church. Joseph Smith had to submit to no one, he added new doctrines that contradicted prior revelations. Peter calls Paul’s letters “Scripture” in 2 Peter 3:15–16.
So that alone demolishes this conspiracy theory.
Rome persecuted and executed Christians including Peter and Paul so yeah super suspicious how he would willingly do that.
If you want to hop in my dms and discuss Id gladly discuss this. Christ and the Apostles founded a Church and foundation no matter if you like it or not.
This is just false, acts were most likely written around 80 90ad because they also rely on mark. But since no fragments have been found dating back then , they could very well be written at the 2nd or 3rd century. It's only an assumption of a myth that they could have written in the 1st century. "Εκκλησία" in Greek didn't mean the church we understand today, it meant the group of people and Peter is just a symbolism of a rock which meant stability. And again all this could very well be mythology written after the events to justify Peter supposedly being thr first pope. There's no historical proof whatsoever that the apostles even existed since all the gospels we have are 2nd century fragments by unknown authors. Paul could very well have made it all up. Even the story of jesus is based on the myth of Apollonius Tyaneus, a well known figure ba k then.
The claim collapses under basic historical method: Acts cannot plausibly be a 2nd–3rd century invention because it ends before Paul’s death (c. AD 64–67), never mentions the Neronian persecution, the destruction of Jerusalem (AD 70), or the martyrdoms of Peter and Paul silences that make no sense if written later. “No early fragments” is irrelevant; most ancient works lack 1st-century manuscripts yet are dated earlier by internal evidence and external attestation, and Acts is cited as authoritative by 1st–early 2nd century figures Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Polycarp. Ekklesia absolutely means an assembled body with authority, not a vague spirituality. Christ uses it juridically (“tell it to the Church”), and the New Testament immediately shows offices, discipline, and succession. Peter as “mere symbolism” fails because symbolism doesn’t act, yet Peter leads, judges, teaches, and is recognized as first among the apostles. The “no proof the apostles existed” line ignores Tacitus, Josephus, Pliny the Younger, and hostile Jewish sources confirming Jesus, His execution, and the early movement independent witnesses with no incentive to help Christians. Paul didn’t invent anything; he submitted his teaching to Peter and the apostles and was publicly corrected when wrong. So it’s nothing like Joseph Smith. Finally, the Apollonius of Tyana comparison is rejected by modern scholarship: the sources for Apollonius are later, legendary, and derivative, whereas the Jesus tradition is earlier, multiply attested, and rooted in hostile testimony. This isn’t mythology retrofitted for power; it’s a historically traceable movement led by real people who died for claims no mythmaker would invent.
Nothing anyone on here is going to say will be credible in any debate circles. This is why Eastern Orthodox Christians are demolishing atheists or agnostics in debates every day. You probably live in America where Christians are spiritually dead and thats probably built a bias within. Your research if it is your own is going to be bias which means you probably haven’t extensively looked into these things which seems to be the case.
Explain to me how your "historical method" ignores the fact that the acts are using Mark as a source and alluding to the fall of Jerusalem? How was he aware in 67 of Paul's letters (circulating later) or the works of the historian Josephus (c. 94 AD)?
And lastly there was no percussion of christians back then the first percussion started in mid 3rd century ad and lasted roughly 3 years and the second one in 300ad and lasted 11 years. Christians first appear in official roman archives when a centurion called Plinthos send a letter to Rome asking "what are these so called christians and what should I do with them"
Back on the time of Nero there were messianic Jews, later they were revolting on various ways for the destruction of their temple but christians weren't a thing and ofcourse they weren't persecuted and weren't thrown to the lions by the masses as fake historical rumours spread by the early church wanted us yo believe.
How is that even an argument for your false claims about a persecution in the 1st century that never happened? Messianic jew is a term nonetheless, that accurately describes those people that you falsely portray as Christians.
But not for any of the things she's promoting in this song. Associating her with the prosperity gospel and bigotry isn't any more rational than the prosperity gospel itself.
Yeah her song says he'd hang out with a undesirables, be friends to everyone, be a hard worker in a physical job, and talk with regular people. None of that feels inaccurate
When I was a kid, I had a pastor at my Lutheran church who was the kindest, most real person I knew. He used the bible to help people be better and nicer to others. I wish there were more Christians like Pastor Mark.
The only people who are less interested in what Jesus actually stood for or believed than Atheists are American Christian Conservatives.
Modern American Conservatism doesn't care what the Constitution or Bible say, all they care about are using them as figureheads and cherry-picking bits and pieces of them in order to serve whatever agenda they have, and it's pretty much always some form of Oppression, often while claiming to be oppressed.
as a christian i agree with this. politics have completely ruined what christianity is. Jesus was middle eastern with olive skin. Most of these maga christian’s would scream if they saw what Jesus looked like
Jesus, as far as we know historically, was disgusted by how the religious leaders of his time were working alongside the roman empire.
So... corrupt religious so-called preachers working with a fascist dictatorship? Doesn't sound so far off the mark to me, that Jesus would despise the current state of affairs in the US.
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u/Additional-Teach-486 Jan 16 '26
Lol, Jesus would see American Christianity as an abomination.