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Like I mentioned in the other topic, my house flooded and I've been helping clean up the basement. Going through some of my dad's books I found this one called "The Devil and the Jews." My mom told me that when my sister and I were little she got into huge arguments with my dad over what religion to raise us. My dad was agnostic, so my mom wanted to take us to Church. She's a Protestant, but only goes to church on holidays and such.

After my mom announced this, apparently, my dad became really angry and started attacking Christianity from a Jewish perspective. He's more a Jew now, though he doesn't argue about religion as much any more. So my sister and I had Hannukah and Christmas and celebrate Passover, but I was never really...I never fully connected with anything. Not even philosophically. I was just an empty void until recently.

Went to Hebrew school, but never fit in with the rich, liberal Reform Jews. Had a really awkward Bar Mitzvah with half my family Chinese Christians. It's just a joke now, the whole culture behind it. Bar Mitzvahs these days they let women have them and its lost all meaning. What did it mean to be a man when the Old Testament was written? You went out and hunted a goat to sacrifice, you were a man per contract law, and you could take a wife and keep the family going. Now they throw these really expensive kids birthday parties, plus. They give you cake, when sugar has estrogens in it. And my sister had a Bat Mitzvah, but she doesn't even want children.

In any case, I was baptized against my understanding. One day when I was really little my babysitter took me to church and had me baptized, but I didn't really know what was going on until much later. Frankly I don't mind it. No one else knows it. She was an older woman, family friend, and was my babysitter from the time I was born until I was nine. This because my dad was a lawyer and my mom was a dirty feminist career woman.

So here's some excerpts from that book I found. It's about how Christians viewed Jews in the medieval era. My dad underlined and highlighted a lot of passages.

"We may interpret it as an effort by one group to stigmatize another, socially inferior, group as being physically inferior as well, a sort of extra prop to bolster up the former's sense of superiority."

"The Jew emits a foul odor as punishment for his crime against Jesus"

"Jew was not quite human"

"Indeed, it was this belief that helped to account for the Jewish need of Christian blood, the sole effective therapeutic available to them."

And on and on. Those were passages my dad highlighted. He was attacking Christianity and my mom for wanting to take us to church. I don't remember them arguing though because I was too young.

I found another book of his, something like "8 Questions About Jews" where one section is all about why you shouldn't marry out. Well I agree with that section after seeing my parents' marriage. I don't have a real family; we don't share the same values. So the best I can do is to create a family.

I don't know why they married in the first place or why they stayed married. They might not considering my dad likely slept with a prostitute and my mom thinks it gave her cancer. But I'm on my dad's side for that; my mom's accusation is just crazy and she was a cold, absent parent.

Sharing the same religion helps to make a relationship, especially a marriage stronger. It's about a common faith and the common morals. Statistically a relationship with people of two different religions is more likely to fail. Religions and adherence to morals is important.

Some religions are very similar that a relationship is more likely to be successful. Similarity can also make converting easier for a willing person.

Catholics and Orthodox are very similar because that split resulted because of politics. Catholics and Protestants are much different because the Protestants disagreed with the doctrine. That is why I would be willing to convert to the Orthodox religion if it meant a stronger relationship with an Eastern European bride.

One quote from the Bible that speaks on the topic of sharing the same religion strengthens a relationship

2 Corinthians 6:14 ESV
Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?

Here's a good article regarding interfaith marriages:
Interfaith marriages are rising fast, but they're failing fast too
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02011.html

It gives an example of a marriage between a Catholic man and Jewish woman. He converted to Judaism but he converted back to Catholicism. The divorce was bitter, his ex-wife filed charges and had a Judge bar him from exposing their daughter to any religion other than the Jewish religion, and he violated that order and faces potential criminal charges with jail-time. The court system violated the constitution and infringed on religious freedom of the man and his child. I guess feminists can also take away a man's right to freedom of religion.

My dad had left the Anglican church after they'd allowed an openly gay clergyman vicar to preach.

For him, that was anti-American, anti-British Empire, and communist. I guess he's now a part of a one man denomination, the Church of himself.

S_Parc wrote:My dad had left the Anglican church after they'd allowed an openly gay clergyman vicar to preach.

For him, that was anti-American, anti-British Empire, and communist. I guess he's now a part of a one man denomination, the Church of himself.

I agree. It's also against Christianity. One of the common denominators among Christian tradition is not condoning and not promoting homosexuality.

It could also be seen as a conflict of interest. If they were not openly gay or they were remaining true to the Christian policies of not acting on their desires it could be tolerable. How can a Church promote morality, support tradition, and adhere to the Bible if they go against it? I don't think the Anglican Church or other Christian groups that promote homosexuality are remaining true to the Bible and Christian tradition.

One question that hasn't been answered is how many of those Catholic Priests that were involved in child abuse were secretly gay?

http://boingboing.net/2013/02/20/papal- ... ys-to.html contains an interesting fact. Why has Africa and some other regions of the world that do not accept and do not promote homosexuality have lesser incidences of priest child abuse? It is easy to infer that the Catholic priests that abused children in North America, Britain, and regions of the liberalized Western and Central Europe are in regions that accept or promote homosexuality (or have legalized same-sex marriage).

"Less than a quarter of the 18- to 23-year-old respondents in the National Study of Youth and Religion think it's important to marry someone of the same faith."

That scares the hell out of me. I'm in that less than a quarter because I've experienced it. I wouldn't wish it on anyone. Not that I'm a self hater or anything.

"And a Jew and a Christian who marry have a greater than 40 percent chance of being divorced in five years."

Well my dad was an agnostic/atheist whatever in college when he met my mom. After college we was in the Navy and had my parents had my sister and I when they were in their thirties. My dad became a lawyer after retiring from the Navy and my mom became a corporate executive for Bell Atlantic/Verizon. So they didn't see each other enough (which caused problems anyway because my dad said she wasn't being a parent for us, which is true) and he doesn't believe in divorce. Plus he'd lose custody of us and he was more the caring parent anyway. So he f***ed up from the start and never should have married her. It's an unresolvable issue. My mom said things could fix between dad and her (and me presumably) with better communication, but she's wrong. No matter how much we understand each other, I'll never consider a Feminist like my sister real family nor a career woman like my mother. If I have a daughter, I wouldn't want my sister influencing her.

My dad is just more religious overall than my mother. He might not spiritually believe like she does, but his values and dedication lie with Judaism. That's why he has all those books and my mother doesn't attend church.

"One parent may agree to raise the children in the other's faith, he says, but then that faith "becomes repellent" to him or her. Coleman doesn't think that people get married with the intention of deceiving their spouse; "they just have no idea how powerfully unconscious religion can be."

"One woman I spoke to who was raised as a Catholic recalled her thoughts on dating when she went off to college a few years ago: "To limit yourself to only people of your own religion seemed bigoted. . . . There is a whole world of people that I don't know." To write them off as potential partners before she even met them "seemed rude," she said."

The effects of political correctness.

S_Parc wrote:My dad had left the Anglican church after they'd allowed an openly gay clergyman vicar to preach.

For him, that was anti-American, anti-British Empire, and communist. I guess he's now a part of a one man denomination, the Church of himself.

Maybe I will join. lol. Isn't that one of the fastest growing ones?

Tsar wrote:

S_Parc wrote:My dad had left the Anglican church after they'd allowed an openly gay clergyman vicar to preach.

For him, that was anti-American, anti-British Empire, and communist. I guess he's now a part of a one man denomination, the Church of himself.

I agree. It's also against Christianity. One of the common denominators among Christian tradition is not condoning and not promoting homosexuality.

I think my dad doesn't believe in forgiveness and Salvation. He believes vehemently that communists (which now includes gay, even if they're capitalists ) need to suffer and be casted into the Lake, even if they accept Christ on their death bed. For him, he sees that as plea bargaining to get a hall pass in the afterlife. I guess he's a type of Calvinist at heart, where people are judged on their intrinsic nature, not their aspirations.

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S_Parc wrote:I think my dad doesn't believe in forgiveness and Salvation. He believes vehemently that communists (which now includes gay, even if they're capitalists ) need to suffer and be casted into the Lake, even if they accept Christ on their death bed. For him, he sees that as plea bargaining to get a hall pass in the afterlife. I guess he's a type of Calvinist at heart, where people are judged on their intrinsic nature, not their aspirations.

That sounds Jewish to me.

Anyway, I don't understand why it matters what religion one's spouse is when all of today's religions are broken anyway.

fschmidt wrote:

S_Parc wrote:I think my dad doesn't believe in forgiveness and Salvation. He believes vehemently that communists (which now includes gay, even if they're capitalists ) need to suffer and be casted into the Lake, even if they accept Christ on their death bed. For him, he sees that as plea bargaining to get a hall pass in the afterlife. I guess he's a type of Calvinist at heart, where people are judged on their intrinsic nature, not their aspirations.

That sounds Jewish to me.

Actually, it's Puritan.

The idea that if your nature's tendency is to be obedient to mother England, America, and church doctrine, that you're predetermined to be saved. Yeah, sometimes I feel like I'd grown up in the 1600s in my household.

Since your mother is not Jewish, you don't owe anything to Judaism (if you do believe in G-d and want to join the Jews, you would have to formally convert). But your story sheds light on how such mixed marriages affect kids. No offense to your father, but where was his Jewishness when he was marrying your mother?

S_Parc wrote:My dad had left the Anglican church after they'd allowed an openly gay clergyman vicar to preach.

For him, that was anti-American, anti-British Empire, and communist. I guess he's now a part of a one man denomination, the Church of himself.

Good thing they didn't try to pin your pops down like the way that pro-Nazi freak in the gun shop tried to do to "D-Fens" Michael Douglas
in the 1993 classic Falling Down:

abcdavid01 wrote:"Less than a quarter of the 18- to 23-year-old respondents in the National Study of Youth and Religion think it's important to marry someone of the same faith."

That scares the hell out of me. I'm in that less than a quarter because I've experienced it. I wouldn't wish it on anyone. Not that I'm a self hater or anything....
snip...


The effects of political correctness.

Well about 2/3rds of the youth who attended church regularly with their parents stop attending when they are in that age group. But all is not lost a woman is much more likely to give birth then to actually get married in that age group also. So religiously mixed marriages breaking up are a smaller part of the real problem of single parenthood in general. As people get older and actually plan on having children they often return to church but by then they came from a religiously mixed background and the question becomes which church do they compromise on, one of the couple's parents church or a neutral third party church.

abcdavid01 wrote:"Less than a quarter of the 18- to 23-year-old respondents in the National Study of Youth and Religion think it's important to marry someone of the same faith."

Since most mainstream religions are effectively political correctness as a religion and therefore part of the same evil death cult, they would seem to have a point. It doesn't really matter how your particular branch of the cult decorates its places of non-worship.