Reading Time: 9 minutes A line’s determined by two points, so I reckon we’ve found a new trend. His end of Christianity might have come to the Satanic Panic too late for the dancing, but they arrived eventually. So today we welcome Benedict Atkins to the Cult of “Before” Stories!
testimony
Posted inReligion
How One Christian Apologist Justifies a Failing Evangelism Strategy
Reading Time: 11 minutes A funny thing happens when Christians learn that their favorite tactics backfire hard when trotted out on actual prospects. One large group of Christians drops the failed strategy with relief. Another group, however, drills down harder on it. I’m going to show you one of the folks in that second group, and we’ll take a close look at his reasons for clinging to the technique he likes best.
Posted inReligion
Miracle Maxin’: The Ongoing Problems With Miracles
Reading Time: 8 minutes Today, almost five years after Miracle Maxin’ debuted, we look back at why miracles are still at once one of evangelists’ most treasured persuasion tools–and yet one of the most damning pieces of evidence contradicting their claims. Today I’ll show you why so many Christians cling to the idea of divine aid and why they can’t look away from the idea of miracles–and even why they get so touchy about people who refuse to buy into their claims.
Posted inReligion
The Cult of Before Stories: Glenn Hobbs, Totally An Ex-Satanist
Reading Time: 10 minutes I want to show you today how Glenn Hobbs’ claims line up with our checklist for the Cult of Before Stories–and what happens to one of these people after their gravy train jumps the rails for good. We’re going to see a lot more of these people as Christianity continues to decline, and I want us prepared for them.
Posted inReligion
The Christian’s Guide to Ex-Christians: Ex-timonies and Deconversion Stories.
Reading Time: 13 minutes As usual, Christians have totally gotten the whole matter wrong about these stories–and they’ve revealed a few very unpleasant aspects of their own tribe in the doing. So here, at last, is the real skinny: here’s what an ex-timony actually is, who tells them and why, and how they differ from Christians’ testimonies.
Posted inReligion
The Weird Alternate Reality That Is Christian Pseudoscience
Reading Time: 9 minutes Pseudoscience has been a serious part of Christianity ever since Christianity was, well, Christianity. And it wasn’t until recently that Christians’ rock pile of alternative facts got so unwieldy that it simply collapsed in on top of them. Today we’ll have an overview of pseudoscience–what it is and why it’s so important–because we’re about to head into that CPC manual again and it’s going to be relevant!
Posted inReligion
The Weird Alternate Reality That Is Christian Pseudoscience.
Reading Time: 9 minutes Pseudoscience has been a serious part of Christianity ever since Christianity was, well, Christianity. And it wasn’t until recently that Christians’ rock pile of alternative facts got so unwieldy that it simply collapsed in on top of them. Today we’ll have an overview of pseudoscience–what it is and why it’s so important–because we’re about to head into that CPC manual again and it’s going to be relevant!
Posted inGaming, Religion
The Cult of “Before” Stories: A Mega-Review of Zachary King’s Testimony
Reading Time: 16 minutes Zachary King gave an extensive XM radio interview a couple of years just after becoming semi-popular. Today I want to show you that interview–and show you how it fits into the narratives we find within the Cult of Before Stories.
Posted inReligion
The Satanic Panic Meets the Anti-Abortion Crusade.
Reading Time: 12 minutes The Satanic Panic trickled to an undignified end years ago. But not long ago we saw a resurgence of it wheezing back to life in a most unexpected way when a Christian conjob figured out a way to join that largely-defunct moral panic with a far more current one. Join me for a tour of one of the most WTF ever conversion stories. Yes, it’s time to induct someone new to the Cult of Before Stories!
Posted inReligion
Dissection of a Soulwinner
Reading Time: 13 minutes One of the funniest Christian screeds I’ve ever seen was one that I ran across randomly earlier this week. It comes to us from an Australian Christian named Grantley Morris. I’ve never heard of him and you probably haven’t either. His vanity site is full of equally wacky stuff, but his Soul-winning Tips: Witnessing Made Easy easily takes the cake for ridiculosity.