Anne Rice is quitting Christianity

[Tom Wetmore]

Quite apropos a friend posted this on Facebook:

Two lions were resting in the shade in their cages under the Roman coliseum. One said to the other:"You say Christians give you heartburn? Let me tell you: they give everyone heartburn!"

[GreatLakesGramma]

Hmm. I just realized that the most judgmental Adventists I've known have not been conservatives.

[Bravus]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-rowe/why-anne-rice-has-never-b_b_664576.html

[Dr. Shane]

Well that is sad. It sounds like she could not reconcile what the Bible says about homosexuality with events and relationships in her personal life. I read once where Ellen White said there were believers that died in the Flood because they loved someone too much to get on the ark and leave the other outside. That is too sad. Jesus said that he who loves his father or mother more than He is not worthy of Him. Too often we make gods out of people that we love. Been there, done that. Always sad to see.

[Bravus]

Bit of a narrow analysis I think, Shane: it seems pretty clear it was not one issue but many that turned the tide.

[Dr. Shane]

Well, I cannot say. From reading the article, it seemed like her son's homosexuality pulled her away. Of course, the fact that she was in a Babylonian church that may have been very political may have just made the issue too terribly much. It is hard to say. The Adventist church is very well balanced on such things although there are some congregations that lack such balance.

[Neil D]

Well that is sad. It sounds like she could not reconcile what the Bible says about homosexuality with events and relationships in her personal life. I read once where Ellen White said there were believers that died in the Flood because they loved someone too much to get on the ark and leave the other outside. That is too sad. Jesus said that he who loves his father or mother more than He is not worthy of Him. Too often we make gods out of people that we love. Been there, done that. Always sad to see.

Ooooooouuuuch!....

OOOh, that those who profess to be followers of Christ were to exhibit the principles of Love...Oh, that words which seem christian were seen for what they really were, and the Spirit of Christ with HIs principles of loving interaction replaced....Hatred, hatred hatred was the in the mind of man before the flood. His whole being was like bread in gravy, covered in violance...

If you could see what violence, and hatred that comes forth, you would see yourself a wretch that seemed undone....

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

OOOh, that those who profess to be followers of Christ were to exhibit the principles of Love...Oh, that words which seem christian were seen for what they really were, and the Spirit of Christ with HIs principles of loving interaction replaced....Hatred, hatred hatred was the in the mind of man before the flood. His whole being was like bread in gravy, covered in violance...

If you could see what violence, and hatred that comes forth, you would see yourself a wretch that seemed undone....

Forsooth...I have no idea what you wrote is trying to convey!

[Neil D]

Forsooth...I have no idea what you wrote is trying to convey!

Yeah...kinda goes in one ear and out the other, doesn't it....and only darkness inbetween the openings...

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

That hurts. I never did anything mean to you...why are you slamming me?

[GreatLakesGramma]

Because that's the way he is, Pam. You just got in the line of fire.

[Bravus]

Your comment could have been read as just quizzical, Pam, or it could have been read as quite sarcastic and an attack. Have a second read.

And Neil, clearly she meant it the first way, so IMO an apology might be in order.

[olger]

Apparently Anne prefers to be thought of as:

pro-gay

pro-feminist

Pro-liberal (politically)

pro-secular

Pro-humanist

pro-evolution

pro-vampire (whatever that is)

She's correct. Jesus does not support such things.

rejoice always,

g

[SivartM]

I could be wrong, but I don't remember Jesus himself ever mentioning any of those things. Actually, I think the only one of those things that the entire Bible even mentions specifically is "gay", and that's different from "gay rights", which is what Anne Rice seems to be thinking of.

[Neil D]

That hurts. I never did anything mean to you...why are you slamming me?

[Dr. Shane]

"For everything there is a season... a time to love and a time to hate..." Eccl. 3:1, 8.

The problem with us sinners is we tend to love things we should hate and hate things we should love. It sounds like Anne Rice got mixed up in an odd group of so-called Christians. I am not sure how mainstream Christianity is anti-feminist although there are certain pockets of Christianity that most certainly are. Adventists, of course, have no problem with women voting, going to school, becoming doctors, teachers, administrators, etc. There is a congresswoman in the United States House of Representatives who is an Adventist. If Anne Rice had been hanging around Shelia Jackson Lee she might have had a different prospective on Christianity.

From reading the Huffington Post piece, it sounds like the Christians in Ann Rice's experience led her to believe that she couldn't love her son and yet hate his sin. Given the choice between her son and Jesus Christ, she choose her son. Such a story should demonstrate to us how misrepresenting Jesus can have real consequences for other people. Homosexuality is not part of God's plan. Nor are hundreds of other types of fornication. The heterosexual porn addict isn't getting inside of heaven any faster than the homosexual is. Sin, regardless which form it takes, prevents us from experiencing the love of God that He has planned for us. We must love the sinner and hate the sin. Anne Rice didn't seem to get that message from the group of Christians she was associated with.

[Neil D]

The problem with us sinners is we tend to love things we should hate and hate things we should love.

[Tom Wetmore]

...Given the choice between her son and Jesus Christ, she choose her son.... Anne Rice didn't seem to get that message from the group of Christians she was associated with.

Wrong on the first part - She said, "I remain committed to Christ as always..."

And the point is correct on the second part. That she did not get the message of Christ from his supposed followers has lead her to leave those "Christians" that falsely claim the name of Christ. Sadly there are far too many Christians in that category, even thought there are many true followers of Jesus among Christians.

Why would she have concluded that those false Christians were the most representative of Christianity today? Because they tend to be the most outspoken, loudest and aggressively evangelical for their false Christian ideology. They have virtually drowned out the voices of true Christianity by their actions and words.

And sadly we see an increasingly strong infiltration of those types into the Adventist Church.

[Neil D]

Thank you. Tom....Your communications skill, I deem, are still intact....

[Dr. Shane]

Originally Posted By: Shane

The problem with us sinners is we tend to love things we should hate and hate things we should love.

Here is the problem...Christianity is not about "things"....It's about people, and relationships...

[Dr. Shane]

She said, "I remain committed to Christ as always..."

[Neil D]

If God is a God of love, His children are love relationships or relationships of love walking about as an example of God...Christianity is about His love relationships.

...it's about people.

...And if you want to call people "things", I would ask this forum if that could be considered a correct assessment....

[GreatLakesGramma]

There are good and bad, true Christians and mere professors of Christianity, in every denomination, and probably in most churches as well. And, there are also those who truly want to be Christians, who just have a lot to learn yet. It sounds like Ms Rice was mostly surrounded by professing Christians and ones who did not yet understand.

If I were in a church in which the majority browbeat me about my son, and insisted I had to cut him out of my life because he is gay, I wouldn't stick around either. And if I were relatively new to Christianity, and that was all I had come to know of it, I would probably do exactly what she has done.

My maternal grandmother didn't grow up in a Christian home. As an adult, a young, married mother, she and one of her brothers started attending a church. She didn't have a car back in those days, so she didn't have a lot of choice of where to go to church. There was one church close enough for her to walk to, and that is where she went. The members kept hassling her and her brother to "go up front." I don't really know what that meant, maybe they were supposed to go in front of the congregation and confess all their sins publicly, maybe it was something else. But for some reason, neither Grandma nor her brother had reached the point of being comfortable with doing whatever it was they were supposed to do.

Grandma's brother drowned. The next Sunday, the preacher's sermon was all on how her brother was now burning in Hell because he didn't go up front. Grandma never went back. But years later when one of my kids, as very young children will do, asked her if she knew about Jesus, she told him that she had accepted Jesus as her personal Savior, and was trusting in Him for her salvation. I expect to see Grandma in Heaven. And if Ann Rice is leaving formal Christianity with the same convictions as my grandmother, I'll expect to see her there too.

I expect to see my gay son in Heaven too, not because he is currently actively seeking God, which he isn't, but because I know that God is working in his life and drawing him to Himself, and I have full confidence that God is able to reach, in His own perfect time, that place in his heart that wants to be connected to Him, and teach him how to come to Him and be one with Him.

[Dr. Shane]

From the Huffington Post article:

Quote:

For a woman who has written extensively about her journey from childhood Catholicism to atheism and back again... In 1998, Rice returned to her faith after years of describing herself as an atheist...

Like Rice, our belief in the purity of Christ's teachings has chained us to a body of believers who no longer represent anything of what we believe, and indeed represent the very opposite of what Christ's teachings are. There seems precious little Christ in Christianity as it's understood in America today.

She left Catholism. It is a shame too many (perhaps most) in society today do not even know the difference between Catholism and Christianity. Many Protestant church are following right down the intolerant and political path of Catholism. It is little wonder people like Anne Rice leave "Christianity". Truth be known, they never experienced it in the first place.

[Bravus]

It stuns me how people zero in on the 'gay thing'. How many things did she list? At least half a dozen. But everyone seems to want to boil it down to that one. Why? Not anything she said - their own obsessions.