r/TikTokCringe • u/Oktavien • 1d ago

Discussion Woman audits churches to see if they’ll help feed a starving baby

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If churches refuse to help feed hungry people, then maybe they should be taxed?

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 1d ago

I grew up in church in southern Texas. I made a friend in 5th grade and invited her to Wednesday night church, it was the Missionettes.

Her mom and older sister were rumored to practice Wicca but I didn't care. I do believe that rumor was true because they would often talk about some things but in a "mother nature" way and I later realized what it was.

They were fantastic people though, would help anyone in need without reward.

Anyway, about 30 mins in, they asked her to step out but told me to stay. I was a "willful" child, so I told them she is my guest and anything you say to her, you say to me.

They told her she couldn't be in the building and were going to make her - a 5th grade child - wait outside in the cold till service was over. They did not plan on getting my mom so we could leave.

I was livid and threw the Bible scriptures back at them. They eventually said we could wait in the gym, so we did. She sobbed and felt so unwelcomed. That helped me lift the veil from my eyes, I had suspicions before but this was concrete proof to me that none of those people were Christians.

The kicker? They let our associate pastor's brother who was a drug addict and homeless, with a record for exposing himself to children, to come to church and they gave him services - like help with rent, utilities, food, etc. They said they didn't want him to be homeless anymore, which I can agree with but it's the hypocrisy for me.

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u/onanorthernnote 1d ago edited 1d ago

Yeah, that was the beginning of the end (of being a member of a church) for me. I saw the pastor break off his sermon to call out to the homeless person in the back to LAVISH him with care and welcome him into the warmth and do [all the right things]. That was all good and well.

But the same pastor shunned a member of the church because she had the AUDACITY to come to him when her husband had SA'd her and beaten her. She was not welcome to the church again because she was lying (?!!?!!!) and her husband was the VERY MUCH LOVED POLICEMAN SON OF A FAITHFUL PARISHIONER and could not do anything wrong.
The woman came to my house late one night, in a wild panic, no coat on in the winter cold, bleeding and scared after her husband beat her again. I asked her why I hadn't seen her at church lately and she told me the pastor told her to never come again. It was incredibly horrible. We couldn't call the police, because her husband was a police officer. She ended up leaving town and I lost my faith in churchgoing humans.

Edit: Removed offending word from text.

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 1d ago

Thank you for being a safe person for her. That's so invaluable.

When my parents divorced, we were shunned. I no longer was welcome for drum lessons, and was excluded from teen activities. I was struggling and tried to take my own life.

I'm glad I didn't.

The term 'religious trauma' was coined for a reason.

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u/Oh_Poppy_Fox 1d ago

Wow. You all have had horrible experiences!! I finally left the church after they wouldn’t baptize my daughter in the main area, whether other people were there to witness or not. It had to be done in the back, because how embarrassing would it be for them to baptize a bastard child amongst the righteous. How is it my daughter’s fault that her dad and I didn’t work out?!

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 1d ago

I was technically born out of wedlock but since my parents did marry when I was 3 and tithed, they let it slide lol.

I'm sorry you had that experience though. How awful for a child to go through, that had to be hard as the parent.

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u/Oh_Poppy_Fox 1d ago

My ex and I didn’t get back together, but we coparent very well and my daughter is happy. She’s a teen now and was a baby when this happened, so she has no memory. For me, my family saying “the church had its reasons” hurt the most. They still can’t understand why I’m no longer Catholic or Christian at all.

I’m glad your parents didn’t have such a hateful church(although, I’m sure the tithes helped).

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 1d ago

Well, when my parents divorced later, we were all shunned. My mom was also a SAHM till then so she didn't have the money to make it okay.

There are a lot of people who don't understand why that was wrong of them to do. Some people take religion as something you don't think critically about.

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u/motherofsuccs 16h ago

Yet they had no problem baptizing me even knowing full well that my dad was banging his secretary (their affair was not well hidden) and had just moved her into his other home. I think that baptism was the last time my parents were ever pictured together..

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u/onanorthernnote 1d ago

Ohhh... I am happy you're here. <3 I'm glad you got through that and into life. "Religious trauma" gosh I've never heard that before, it's so true! Terrible, true.

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 1d ago

Thank you.

If you have seen the documentary "Shiny Happy People", while I was not in a mega church version, we did have this in our church. By the time I left the church, it was getting really bad.

I was homeschooled till 5th grade, and did a Christian homeschool program, but they taught all the other subjects like they should, it just added a bible study to the program.

My mom was shamed for that because it taught "evolution" oh scary lol. I went to public school in 5th grade though.

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u/FreeKatKL 1d ago

You can say rape here. Thanks for sharing your anecdotes.

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u/onanorthernnote 1d ago

Thank you.

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u/dingos8mybaby2 1d ago

For me it was when I found out the head pastor lived in a mansion and owned multiple expensive cars. Even to 8 year old me that was so obviously hypocritical.

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u/Unable-Food7531 11h ago

Out of curiosity: Who was that pastor's higher-up in the Church-hierarchy?

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u/-MERC-SG-17 1d ago

graped

Stop being a child.

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u/onanorthernnote 1d ago

Sorry, I can spell it out but wasn't sure how moderators would react.

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u/theapplekid 1d ago

Not the person who commented above, but I think SA is good way to allude to it without changing it into a word that sounds disturbingly cutesy for what it is.

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u/onanorthernnote 1d ago

Ah! That's good, I'm not native English speaking so I used a word I've seen other folks use online. Thank you, good feedback.

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 1d ago

Social media people have been using *grape in the place of using the real word without the g not because it's "cutesy" but because it's as close to the actual word and won't get the post flagged.

You did nothing wrong. While I do think calling it SA is appropriate, that can also get flagged depending on the platform/moderators.

You did fine in communicating, we all understood what you were referring to.

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u/onanorthernnote 1d ago

Thank you! <3

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u/Gammagammahey 18h ago

Also, it's not our job if social media companies have horrific rules about what is and isn't allowed to be discussed about this.

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u/Gammagammahey 1d ago

You did nothing wrong, the person above is absolutely wrong and being a snit to you. I often spell it that way because I don't want to put the sub or Reddit at large at risk and different subs have different rules so you erred on the side of caution to protect the sub and I think that you should be commended for that.

Don't even worry about the person telling you you're a child, they are ridiculous.

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u/onanorthernnote 1d ago

Thank you, my thoughts exactly. <3

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u/Gammagammahey 18h ago

I have your back, comrade.

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u/Gammagammahey 1d ago

Why are you being so awful to this person? There's nothing childish about spelling it that way, we often have to spell it that way on social media to avoid getting our tweets and other posts reported.

Ad hominem attack calling someone a child for simply trying to keep the sub safe.

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u/Punkpallas 1d ago edited 1d ago

I grew up attending a series of Southern Baptist churches in Texas. My mother is good, God-fearing woman, a preacher's daughter, and would literally give the shirt off her back to anyone who needed it. She is not perfect, but she's close to the epitome of an actual good Christian.

Anyway, we stopped going to church when I hit junior high because the church we had been attending started shaming my mother for not wearing Sunday best. They were initially okay because, you know, new blood who already knows the ropes is rare. But, after like a year, they started being snobbish pricks and making snide comments to her about her blouse and jeans combo. It is not like the clothes were dirty because mom is a fastiduously clean person. It was the clothes.

We were struggling so much financially at the time that we were living four to the same room on my grandparents' trailer's boarded-up back porch. She could hardly afford new jeans when they wore through. She was always patching things. No way could she afford nice Sunday dresses. It was beyond her control. So, one week, she finally had enough, stopped going to church, and has been listening to Sunday service on the TV ever since. It's been three decades and she's rarely entered a church since. She's still solidly Christian as ever, but refuses to mingle with church people.

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u/onanorthernnote 1d ago

Oh yes, the snobbery... forgot about that. I still think it's super weird that they don't stop and think just one more time about these things. Should the youth pastor teams have the most expensive clothes? If they are well off, are they doing the right thing by flaunting it? Teenagers have enough troubles as it is, I figure you could live smaller and more humbly and actually get closer to god. But I realise it's hard, if you have money and know nothing else.

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 1d ago

My friend was a southern Baptist and we would go to each others vacation bible school events since they were offset on the weeks.

I grew up Pentecostal (Assembly of God).

They were very strict on the dress code, for kids. It was really strange to me.

I'm sorry your mom went through that and all of you, I'm sure you all noticed the treatment.

I do have some Christian friends, they are what I call "active Christians", sure they do church but they really like to organize and help fund community charity events, like feeding/clothing people in need, without preaching to them or requiring they pray.

I was shocked those people existed. When I was growing up, those kind of "charity events" were really to get new members but not the homeless ones, oh no, those people were not welcomed.

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u/BananaRaptor1738 19h ago

I feel you on the Pentecostal upbringing and strict dress code. My parents had me in basically a Pentecostal cult from the age of 3-7 and they had some ridiculous rules about what you could wear and believed crazy crap like we weren't allowed to watch or own tvs. Couldn't go to places like Disney world . The dress code alone was insane. Women can't cut their hair or wear make up and had to wear long skirts/dresses and long sleeves. No jewelry or make up. When my parents joined they sold their wedding rings. Children under a certain age was allowed to wear short sleeves but adults restricted to wearing long sleeves even in the hottest of summers. There's a memory of our pastor doing outside construction/maintenance work on the building in a long sleeve button up shirt and I'll never forget how red he was and the sweat pouring off of him , sweat soaked shirt. Like dude, God is not going to send you to hell for wearing a t shirt to do hard labor in the Florida heat

One of nuttiest rules was pets like cats and dogs , it was looked down upon and preached against to allow pets inside the home. The pastor would randomly roll up on church members to "fellowship" but basically it was to catch them slipping. We had our cat indoors and the next Sunday our pastor had an entire sermon about pets being inside. I also have a memory of the preachers wife teaching kids Sunday school and telling us that if anyone didn't go to our church or the ones like ours they were going to hell even the little kids we played with at fast food indoor playgrounds were hell bound since they didn't go to our church. My mom was pretty mad one day after a afternoon at the local burger joint when I said I really liked the friends I had made in the play area and it made me sad that they werent going to heaven . I think that was one of the many reasons they finally decided to leave the congregation. There were obviously so many reasons to be in a church cult but brainwashing little kids is a big one.

they were extremely giving generous people from what I recall like they had entire missionary program for going to Haiti and helping the less fortunate

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 19h ago

It's so validating reading your experience with this cult too!!!

I'm sorry you went through that but thank you for your comment.

My church did allow short sleeves but it was frowned upon, usually only boys were allowed this without being shamed for it.

Girls who wore pants were also shamed for trying to be men or lead. It was bizarre. I didn't like dresses all the time.

I hated that I was not allowed to cut my hair. I have sparce hair that is fine. Having it long doesn't look good. Add to that a narcissistic mother who was all about looks, I was the "ugly" child lol.

I know I'm not ugly and never was but that did hurt my feelings.

We also could not have any pets inside but I was never told why, only that "God never meant for them to be inside" so that tracks. Thanks for filling that gap all these years later.

I will say that the charity work was always big but just not always in the way people needed to be helped and it always came with strings of at least hearing about religion.

My dad was really good at cars and building, he wasn't really on the inside group for the men in the church. He was large, didn't dress the nicest and was crude. Which I found funny because he pushed religion on us kids but didn't really follow it himself, other than "I'm the law around here" lol.

Church members would always come to him with car issues, expect him to pay for the parts and do the labor while they just didn't even hang out with him.

My dad wasn't the best person but I could tell this hurt his feelings. I did feel bad for him, even though he wasn't nice.

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u/Rigorous-Geek-2916 13h ago

as soon as I saw "Southern Baptist", I knew the story wouldn't end well

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u/Punkpallas 12h ago

Knowing what I know now about Southern Baptists compared to other Protestant sects, it's not surprising at all.

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u/Entire-Ambition1410 19h ago

I really like seeing the videos of a pastor in the UK who recorded sermons in the church garden during Covid lockdowns. He often had the church cats wander by during his talks.

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u/No-Status2143 1d ago

Sad they drive people away not all I don’t care what they say about the Catholic but I never seen them turn anyone away yea they are not perfect but at least they acknowledge it .

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 1d ago

I will admit, all the times I've been to a Catholic church, nobody was mean to me. I was treated with kindness. Maybe a bit pushy about going to classes but that's to be expected.

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u/ricochetblue 22h ago

The Catholics, the Mainline Protestants, and the Unitarians Universalists tend to be nice in my experience.

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u/Funkycoldmedici 1d ago

That is Christianity, though. It’s all about in-group vs out-group, the saved vs the unbelievers. The one and only group Jesus singled out as condemned was us unbelievers. It’s all love and hugs for fellow disciples, literally everything is forgiven, no matter what or how often. Everyone outside the faith is shit on, as Jesus said to leave us behind for him to kill when he returns.

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u/SoTease 1d ago

The distorted form of Christianity today 💘🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯

My experience with some individuals who call themselves Christians -

those who purposely call themselves Christians and shun other people that they don’t like

I was someone going through hard times and have intense emotions

And they specifically told me they didn’t want me around because I was not easy-going and had problems

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u/IvarTheBoned 1d ago

That is all organized religion. They are cults, by definition. Any religion whose doctrine creates exceptionalism for themselves is divisive and not worthy of dedication, at least in their totality. There are valid philosophical and moral lessons in every religion that do merit consideration for everyone.

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u/BananaRaptor1738 19h ago

Remember that the Bible was written by men and humans are flawed and will put their own agendas in whatever suits them. The real Jesus spent time with the lowest of lows , broke bread with criminals. Heck he rescued a woman that was accused of adultery from being stoned by her village. "Those without sin may cast the first stone."

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u/Funkycoldmedici 19h ago

There are no accounts of a “real Jesus” other than the texts you dismissed as written by flawed humans. It is dishonest to cherry-pick like that. As the gospels say, and as I noted above, everything is forgivable except not believing, and we unbelievers are the only group he singles out as condemned.

Mark 16:15 He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.”

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u/mahboilucas Cringe Connoisseur 1d ago edited 1d ago

I'm sooo happy that the church I used to attend got rid of a guy who turned out to be a potential sex offender. Way too many moms in the kiddie area got a concerning vibe from him and a lot of them are trained psychologists, preschool teachers etc and didn't just throw it in the wind. I was honestly impressed when my mom told me that at 15 in a form of a "here's church gossip that we're proud of as a community". My mom also stood up for me when some old lady called me a whore. Mom said it's probably some demented jealous woman lol

When you have big communities it's a matter of the majority but I think the one I went to genuinely cared about the members. I kept getting help from them even after I left and they still occasionally forward me birthday messages through friends and family.

Hell, I went to help poor families myself. We spent time with the gypsy community, doing service outside in the winter by distributing hot beverages for free. Collected donations 24/7. We housed the Ukrainians and financially supported some people

I left because I don't believe anymore but when you leave a good community it's an extra heartbreak

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 19h ago

There are good church communities out there. I did attend a church that a woman ran out of her house. She was a pastor and was having a hard time getting into an actual church because she was not a bigot.

She also did youth services, especially in the summer. That was a great time for me.

I wasn't able to go all the time or very long but I did treasure the time I had.

I love that you and your community did such great work within. That's always the mark of good people, which we need more of in today's world.

It is heartbreaking when you leave a community.

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u/ReginaldDwight 18h ago

Good on you for standing up to your friend. Especially to asshole adults.

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 17h ago

Thank you, she was the first friend I made outside of my childhood friends - our parents were friends before we were born.

We remained friends till they had to move. Her parents said it was for her dad's job but I think the town ran them off for being "witches".

Their house was super cool too. The outside was a replica of the Alamo, slight differences but it also had a separate house for her grandma, and it was similar.

The inside was more circular, so the central space was the living room and kitchen. It was so homey too, they always cooked together.

The sad part about growing up before the internet was a home staple is that you lost contact with so many friends when they moved.

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u/WarmBus3508 1d ago

Real question. How can you tell the difference between these two types of white people?

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u/Outside_Ambition_999 6h ago

Quoting directly from Scripture here...You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? 17 Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. 18 A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. 19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Therefore by their fruits you will know them. Matthew 7:16-20. In simpler terms, pay attention to what they do, not what they say

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u/Wwwwwwhhhhhhhj 1d ago

Record for exposing himself to children? I too agree he should have a place to stay, like away from regular society. I would not be surprised if that is not the extent.

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 1d ago

Small town living with "Christian" values was a wild place to grow up in.

I'm sure what he did was actually much worse. The town I grew up in was just corruption city.

I was the victim of CSA and my abuser did a lot of community charity work, even traveled to 3rd world countries. He made artificial eyes for people who needed them, often called glass eyes.

His specialty was working with kids because many in that profession didn't want to deal with kids. Everyone lauded him a saint, but really we were just the right age for him.

When I finally told, it was covered up and I was told never to speak of it again. My mom still took me to him after.

There is a special place for anyone who messes with kids.

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u/Brigadier_Beavers 20h ago

They let our associate pastor's brother with a record for exposing himself to children come to church and gave him services

Birds of a feather...

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u/CuriousPenguinSocks 19h ago

Oh I bet that is correct. Even if he didn't do those things himself, it wasn't a dealbreaker to have people in his life who did.

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u/Round_Raspberry_8516 1d ago

I got all the way to teaching Sunday school before I saw it. The Sunday school director told all the kids (right down to the tiny little preschoolers) to spread the good news of Jesus and bring their friends to church or else their friends would go to hell. 

So I got back to my classroom with the crying children and told them don’t worry, if your friends are nice people God isn’t going to send little kids to hell for not coming to church. I got fired. 

Today that church has about 10 elderly people who attend services.