Why does America produce so many weird heresies?

  • Thread starter Thread starter yawnernonner
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Y

yawnernonner

Guest
I want some links. If you google “American heresies,” you’ll find stuff on Americanism. This isn’t quite what I want. I want some deeper thoughts on the theological weirdness of America than just “The English dumped their heretics here and heretics heresied from heretics.”
Seriously, American non-Catholic theology is just weird. JW started here. Mormonism started here. United Pentecostalism started here (notice that these three aren’t even Christian because they don’t have Trinitarian baptisms). The Church of Satan started here (Would you count something defined as anti-Christian as a heresy of Christianity?). Seventh-Day Adventism, Pentecostalism, Word-of-Faith, Prosperity Gospel, Zionism, Dispensationalism, Quakers (proto-Pentecostals), Puritans (proto-SJWs)[fine, these came from England. But they thrived here.], snake-handlers, Baptists-who-think-they’re-descended-from-Cathars, and even a semi-explicit revival of Gnosticism: these are all quintessentially American.
 
Last edited:
Do you have enough knowledge of non American cultures to be certain that this is a phenomena unique to America?
 
Name as many strange beliefs as I did from one other country.
 
So I guess your answer is ‘no’, then?
yawnernonner said:
I want some deeper thoughts on the theological weirdness of America than just “The English dumped their heretics here and heretics heresied from heretics.”
Click to expand...
Although one possible explanation is that the First amendment gives government protection to strange little cults and so they prosper here.
 
Last edited:
America has always had Freedom of Religion, the nation was founded by religious refugees for the most part. Further, the number of different ethnic groups that have moved here, each with their own views, America’s rich religious tapestry is what one would expect

But a lot of other nations have a lot plurality in religious beliefs as well. The Anabaptist beliefs thrived in Europe, the concept of orthodoxy among our Hindu friends on the Indian subcontinent.
 
Like, they are everywhere.

Some places it is more esoteric, others are more superstitious, and others like black magic.

America usually communicates in English, so you might not be so prone to hearing messages or reading about the others because they most likely don’t speak English. Spanish America, aka media that is in Spanish catering towards that community in America, talks about faith differently and also produces different faith content.

I mean, have you researched Christmas traditions in the world? You’re in for a shocker.
 
Ah, India. I forgot that Hinduism was essentially Protestant and can splinter into multiple strange beliefs.
 
There’s a difference between a weird practice and a weird doctrine. Weird Pentecostal beliefs tend to be exports of America (such as in Africa and South America).
When I was a Protestant, I once went to a “church” in Guatemala [it was on the top floor of a mall!] that had that Pentecostal “holy laugher” nonsense (another American phenomenon).
 
Last edited:
The problem isn’t that it happened in Europe, the problem is that it got independently revived in the U.S.
 
Then it isn’t an American phenomena so much as it is a human phenomena that was tolerated and allowed to grow in America.

Without an Inquisition to stamp out weird practices, weird practices will arise and thrive.
 
Last edited:
You’re right. I guess a less naïve form of the question is “What is it about America that lets heresies fester?”

Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for this heretical land to come home. May this become a Catholic land.
 
you guys put up with it more then we would. We would laugh them all off the footy field, save for a few stubborners.

perhaps you need more sport or something to do? stop them becoming bored and thinking up weird cults ?
 
yawnernonner said:
You’re right. I guess a less naïve form of the question is “What is it about America that lets heresies fester?”
Click to expand...
The short answer I’d guess is a robust interpretation of the First amendment.

Back in the day, especially in rural areas, local authorities would persecute weirdos or the locals would burn those folks out and send then on their way.

But now what with the idea that religious freedom applies to everyone and not just those who are relatively orthodox, and a legal system that enforces that idea and punishes those who would use violence to enforce orthodoxy, that sort of thing doesn’t happen as much
 
Roseeurekacross said:
perhaps you need more sport or something to do? stop them becoming bored and thinking up weird cults ?
Click to expand...
Problem is that weird cults are often profitable for those who start them.

And then those who don’t do well in sports get sucked into then
 
.we don’t have to do well at sport, we just have to get moving.
What is it in your system that makes cults profitable
 
In the US, anything that calls itself a religion is exempt from taxes and financial inspection.

Scientology is a big example of that
 
Also, and I think this is more of a human condition than American, there is a large number of people willing to pay money for the experience of feeling like they are special snowflakes
 
When you think about it, the implications are pretty obvious. If one person believes something that flies in the face of logic, we call that person a lunatic. When a handful of people believe in such things, we call it a cult. But when a whole lot of people believe the same thing, we call it a religion, and we give them a free pass with regard to logic and common sense that we give to no other category of humans.
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top