One thing that really annoys me about religion -

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It's astounding how common it is to find members of the myriad denominations of a single religion in disagreement with one another over the correct interpretation of scripture.

This is how my mind automatically reviews such discussions:

"You dun did gawd wraawng."
"Nope, you dun did gawd wraaaaaaawng!"

Take from that what you will.

It seems some are so Bible Blind, they cannot connect on that mystical level and that's too bad because if you can't do that, it's not really spiritual. That is what is meant by let those without sin cast the first stone and judge not lest ye be judged.

In deference to an earlier post, literalism is a relatively modern phenomena. Much of the older scriptures were either a part of, or heavily influenced by "truth through mythology," which was a tribalistic way of seeing spiritual truths through story. Back then, myth didn't mean what it means today. In ancient times, myth was both story and performance, enacted around the fires at night as part of oral tradition, of passing on spiritual truths and keeping the night demons away. Perhaps that's why the compiler, hundreds of years later, put two different creation stories right at the start of Genesis.

During the long evolution of writing, historicity eventually became important, which is why (in part) we go from parting the sea with a stick and living for days in the belly of a whale, to less questionable "miracles" in the new testament.

In the empiricism of modern times, everything must be "literally" accurate, and people wrongly apply that empirical mindset to scripture. Ancient scriptures had a different mindset and different agenda, which is one reason why it causes so many conflicting opinions today.

People just want to recite what's in the Bible and pretty much zonk others over the head with Bible verses but very few want to do the necessary work to go within and create that mystical bond that only comes from the Holy Spirit, not any book. And, these same people are alienating others by telling them they will go to hell. When people hear that, they put up a defensive wall and aren't so receptive.

Speaking in tongues is probably the second most UN anal retentive thing you can do.

Dont conflate Pentecostals with Fundamentalists. Not only are they not the same thing-they are polar opposites in worship style. The Fundies are the quiet anal retentives who are obsessed with the written word of scripture.

The Pentecostals are the ones who prefer to let the Holy Spirit speak directly through them, and speak in tongues, and writhe on the floor, handle snakes, clap and shout, and turn church into a rock festival. The more illiterate you are the better! All of that cerebral hair splitting stuff would...just interfere with the Holy Spirit taking you over! Jeeze!

It just depends on how evangelical they are. Pentecostal can still be Evangelicals and if they are Evangelical, they will pretty much be obsessed with scripture and will tell people they will go to hell if they sin, kind of like what Catholics used to do.

I think naturalplastic was being a tad tongue-in-cheek

He did make several good points about Holy Roller churches because they are known to do that kind of thing - speak and tongues and some do handle snakes.