Posted on 02/10/2018 7:10:14 AM PST by tiredofallofit
When I tell people about my childhood church, they will usually insist that I was in a cult. While I strongly suspect that they are correct, I never thought of myself as a cult member. Sure, my church may have shunned the outside world and taught that it alone possessed “the truth” but we never had to swear our undying loyalty to the leaders or live in a compound or drink poison. Should you wish to stop attending the church, you were free to do so, but you had to accept that the members who remained were no longer your brothers in the Lord or even friends; you were automatically disfellowshipped and labeled an apostate.
Most who hear my story (and there is much more to it) shake their heads and tell me how unlucky I was to end up in such an “extremist” church. That is not normal they tell me. Why would your parents go to a church like that?
Frankly, I believe that these types of churches are far more “normal” then people think. Thousands of small independent fundamentalist churches dot the American landscape; you probably drive past a couple every week on your way to church. I know that I do. You don’t know about them because you don’t attend them; you have your own place of worship. But yet, these churches do exist and each one has a story. Granted, not every one has a story like mine – but many do.
“There are churches like that?” I remember a close friend of mine asking me a few months ago after hearing my story. “I’ve never heard of such a thing”. Well of course not. He grew up in a well-structured denominational church that had little contact with these smaller churches.
(Excerpt) Read more at runningawayfrommychurch.com ...
Religions = organizations. Groups of people and group think. Why you need to learn it for yourself.
Why do you want to know the name of the author’s church? How will it change his point? If it’s a home church, it might not even have a name.
I think you missed my point by a wide margin. I was talking about a type of church, not the name of a church.
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