NightWriter

i worked from 9 to 5 today but i only just got home half an hour ago because i decided to play scrabble with one of my coworkers and one of my bosses

i won with 240 points

i seriously have to work on how hotheaded i get sometimes 

also idk that was partially prompted by a post I saw that said “don’t feed the church” meaning don’t give them money, in part (although it probably was also referring to the fact that some xian communities are largely money based and that IS a legitimate criticism and a very real thing) 

but like, you see these huge mega churches on tv and in the news all the time, but what you don’t see are the small, failing churches that don’t have enough money to sustain themselves or their faith communities 

and growing up, we didn’t have a lot of money b/c the churches my parents were ministers of couldn’t afford to give them huge paychecks. And even if they could, like, my parents wouldn’t make enough money to support me or my siblings or even themselves. 

We don’t own a house, we never have. The church gives that to us. The church also pays for our heating and electric b/c guess what? Can’t pay that either 

And my parents are partially reimbursed with gas money because of how far they have to drive for meetings all of the time.

Maybe this is specific to the United Methodist Church, but if they just gave my parents a  solid check and asked us to pay for our house, gas/electric, water, our cars, food, school, taxes, bills, etc. etc. we would literally not be able to. 

Some ministers, even with all the aid given by the church, STILL CAN’T afford to live well. Thankfully my parents are good at saving money and budgeting, so we live really well and I am so privileged in that respect (middle class. Not upper middle class, but right on the edge of lower middle class/regular ol’ middle class) 

So yeah, don’t “feed the church” but realise by doing so you’re also not feeding people 

and you’re also not feeding the people who go to those churches for aid and help when they don’t have a place to go or can’t find a good meal or who need spiritual fulfillment from the Christian perspective

but like honestly who is expecting you to give money to Christian communities if you’re not Christian? (If they are, they’re assholes, b/c there is no obligation there. Even if you’re a part of the community there’s technically not any obligation, although it’d be kind of dickish not to give back to your church of choice tbh) Money usually comes from those within, not outside 

Right okay so the Christian Church is fucked up in thousands of ways. Growing up in a church environment pretty much my whole life, and getting to see the “behind the scenes” part of it I can attest to this fact 

But I’ve also had really great experiences within the Christian community, like when my dad participated in interfaith work and worked alongside Sikhs, Buddhists, Jews and Muslims in our local city, raising money for mosquito nets to help prevent malaria in areas that need it, countless groups that have gone to areas in need around the United States and did NOT PREACH the Christian bible, but literally just helped people

Like, I still don’t like the Church, which is one small reason why I don’t affiliate with it anymore, and obviously doing good shit does not forgive all of the awful, awful AWFUL things the “Church” (Catholic + Protestant) has done. 

But I wish that the groups that did all this good would stand up to the groups that are really problematic and that have used Christianity to promote hate and violence and prejudice, and equally, I wish that a lot of groups that DO do good would acknowledge their own problematic behaviour on a large scale. 

As much as I don’t want to be affiliated with the Christian church, it’s still a huge part of my life, for better or worse, and it hurts me to see it being used in such a fucking awful way, and to hurt others. It’s not 100% my community anymore, but as long as my parents are employed by the Church, and I still have a relationship with them, I’m going to still be a part of it