225 thoughts on “Cause and Effect”

    1. i don’t get excited about much, but now i’m absolutely giddy.

      …

      time to read the article.

      1. the downside, i suppose, is that no one will know until i’m already asleep. and, at this point i look like a verifiable nutcase talking to myself here.

        1. Hello, this is another of the voices in your head. Don’t mind me, I’m just enjoying your conversation with yourself…

        3. Don’t listen to them, Stevius. They’re just jealous because you were first.

          I raise my glass to you. ๐Ÿ˜‰

          (Don’t get used to it, because I WILL be first again!!!) ๐Ÿ˜‰ ๐Ÿ˜‰ ๐Ÿ˜‰

      2. I used to know a guy who worked first shift. Always went to church, read his bible and prayed. Then he went to third shift, stopped reading his Bible, going to church and praying. Now he just sits around talking to himself and……………..

        3. tlorz is right: Don’t start to work– you can see where it leads!

          By the way, how many hysterectomies DID Mr. Mikell’s aunt have? Five? Ten?
          She never should have gone to those horse races!

        5. It’s true, I’ve heard night shift preached against from the pulpit, it leads to sleeping in on Sunday, which leads to drinking and gambling and pornography. Let’s all pray for Stevius.

  3. “She has had hysterectomies”! how many wombs did the poor lady have?

    Even I as a benighted (sp?) heathen can tell that the theology is not good here.

    2. That was my question. Multiple uteruses? No wonder she has been “in and out of the hospital.” And “parts of her breast removed?” Which parts? Poor ole auntie must really be a freak of nature. Explains all of her drinking and smoking.

      Indeed Theology Student, Why don’t they teach logic at these schools? Check your brain at the door, you have just entered fundyland.

        1. george you meant to say what part of her breasts were removed? Part of the Third Breast.. to go along with her multiple uteruses …maybe a tap for each pod? ๐Ÿ˜ฏ

    3. It was all that beer-drinking and cigarette-smoking–the first hysterectomy didn’t take. She had to have another one. That’s what happens when you aren’t “spiritual enough”–modern medicine will fail you because your sin is MORE POWERFUL THAN MEDICINE!!!!111!!!!! or something

  4. Whoa, you mean Tom Ferrell and his “This person stopped reading their Bible and is now dead” stories aren’t original?? ๐Ÿ˜€

  5. I don’t know how people can go through life so scared of a deck of cards, or not know anyone that plays cards?

      2. Because we all know that you can’t play those “ungodly” card games with UNO cards. Of course, the hall monitor my first year at BJ didn’t notice how much “house rules UNO” resembled poker or how similar “two card UNO” was to blackjack.

    2. OH, for the love of Mary, I don’t get the cards thing either. I like to play poker. IT’S A FRIGGIN CARD GAME!!!

    1. And of course she just happened to be right there when he gave that confession (rolls eyes) seriously, if you make up an illustration at least make it credible! ๐Ÿ˜

      1. When my friends and I want to fudge some statistics, we say, “Evagelistically speaking…..” It cracks us up because it is so true.

    1. Apparently, it’s an indoor sport with a dogtrack-like gambling twist, which would explain the hate it’s drawing from Captain Combover here. The Jai Alai arena here in Tampa reminded me of an old bowling alley that might have been a hip place to be in the 70s and 80s, but it closed probably 10 years ago.

      1. I think it’s a FL thing. The one near me just closed a few years ago. You could gamble on all sorts of things there, I think there was a lot of OTB there.

  8. Joel O’Steen couldn’t do the health & wealth version of the gospel (lower case intentional) than this guy. I can only assume he thinks he has never been and never will be sick.

    1. I’ve experienced some pretty BORING Sunday School teachers in my lifetime, including one who read out of a lesson manual for an hour. . .Don’t know how I survived her for a year. Then again, it was probably better than some of the preaching I was forced to sit through as a child.

      1. In my defense, I’m long winded because we are systematically going through the book of Galatians and the theology, especially in chapters 3 and 4, is rich and deep and wonderful!

        1. OK… I’ll stop haveing a conversation with myself on this 2+ year old and long dead post… ๐Ÿ˜ณ

        3. Galatians must be wonderful to teach! I could easily get long-winded too, but since I am recently teaching children most often, I have to curb my loquaciousness!

  11. I think I shall have to separate from Pastor Dave Mikell. He allowed the expression “Oh my G**” to be put into his book. If my child were to read this, my child might start using minced oaths, then profanity, and eventually end up as a Hollywood writer.

    We can tell that the Sunday School teacher’s heart wasn’t right all along because she said OMG instead of “Oh dear Lord!” or “Oh my word!” Even in highly emotional situations, one must avoid all appearance of evil.

    1. Just remember, whatever you do to hurt Pastor Mikell, make sure you do it out of love.

      There’s nothing quite like an all out emotional assault to convey how much you love someone!

    2. I said, “Oh my God!” on September 11th, when the first tower went down. I still feel slightly guilty thinking about it.

      1. If your first response upon seeing that horrendous tragedy was to call out to God, I think it’s OK!

      2. I remember seeing footage on the news of the second tower being hit, and everyone could hear someone say something slightly stronger than “Oh my God!”. I think it soummed up the reaction of a lot of people, including Christians, including me.

    4. “I think I shall have to separate from Pastor Dave Mikell. He allowed the expression รขโ‚ฌล“Oh my G**รขโ‚ฌย to be put into his book.”

      That is seriously the fist thing I noticed, PW.

  13. More likely they ended up like that because of messed up home situations + their own dumb choices, not because they played a game of cards.

    Goodness. From what I’ve heard the last couple days here, I should be lying in a gutter, beating up a kid, or sitting in jail. I wonder why I’m so healthy and happy.

    1. You’re happy because some fundy “planted a seed”. Your succeeding in life means that there’s an inner fundy just waiting to come out. /sarcasm ๐Ÿ˜›

      1. In the three times this last year I’ve ‘fallen off the wagon’ and gone to a fundy church, it’s made my day miserable. I think the inner fundy is no more.

        1. For me, now that I’ve feasted on the rich meat of the Gospel, I can’t go back to the pathetic cheap hotdogs of man’s tradition offered up as “preaching” at many fundy churches.

        2. PW, +3 to the “pathetic cheap hotdogs.” Says it all about so much of the teaching and preaching I’ve heard over the years. It’s not just the IFBers, but so many others. Fie upon it!

        3. Oh no, well, Emily, if you fall off the wagon again, I’ll be more than happy to go to the fundy church, walk in in my tight jeans and go, “Emily, get in my f&(@in’ car!”

          It would be my pleasure.

        4. Natalie, that would be awesome!

          The times I did ‘fall of the wagon’, I didn’t fall off enough to wear a skirt. I can’t bring myself to put one on more than once in a blue moon because of the memories.

        5. I wonder if the ” I won’t wear another skirt for the rest of my life” thing is common among recovering IFB Women?
          I wore a skirt to the mall a few weeks ago for the first time in a long time and the lady asked if I go to that “Baptist Church”..horrified I went and bought a pair of pants right then and put them on..

        6. I wore a skirt recently for a family funeral, but let’s just say, I had to dig it out of a box in my storage closet.

          It’s the only one I own.

        7. My wife has worn a skirt probably all of 5 times since graduating from a fundie U over 10 years ago And not a single pair of hose since.

        9. HATE hose. I will never wear pantyhose, just tights for the aesthetics (sp?).

          I love dress/pencil skirts, but show me a jean skirt that goes below the knee or is flared and I will fall to the floor writhing.

          I wonder how many things there are that ex-IFBs cannot stand because they were forced to do them.

  14. I remember reading something similar in Norman Vincent Peale’s book “The Power of Positive Thinking”. He would discuss principles, then give specific rules on how to live at the end of each chapter. By the end of the book there were 70+ rules to follow that would give you power and solve all your problems.

    (Don’t ask me what the specific rules were cuz I’ve chucked the book into the garbage.)

  15. He does not go to horse races or jai jai”?

    What’s jai jai? And before anyone has the bright idea to crack a joke I’ll say its not one of Jar Jar Binks relatives.

    1. Jai lai is a very old game played with scoop-like raquets and a ball. I guess people must bet on it. I think I saw jai lai advertised in FL, but no one even THOUGHT of this activity in any of the places I’ve lived. I never heard it preached against either! It jumped out at me too as being rather random, but I guess it just depends on your culture/community.

        1. I’ve never seen jai alai played, but it is something like racquetball. In Connecticut, people bet on the winners. It’s a big business there.

        2. The only time I’ve ever seen jai alai was the old Miami Vice intro in the 80’s. Never seen it anywhere else.

        3. HMMMM. Now I’m wondering if fundy preacher man here saw an episode of Miami Vice, and associated everything in the intro with Vice, and assume Jai Alai is a Vice just cause it’s in the intro?

  16. The playing cards story reminds me of a scene in the 1997 version of Little Men where Dan (the rebellious child) “corrupts” the other boys by showing them how to play cards. Do fundies never consider the education value of cards– probabilities, percentages, etc. Picking up a deck of cards does not immediately mean you are gambling… ๐Ÿ˜Ž

    1. Why would you need such worldly knowledge of “probabilities” unless you were gambling? That’s the kind of high-falutin’ talk that’s caused the church to compromise in the first place!

      2. I just got back from my girls valentines day kindergarten party at their Catholic (gasp) school and they played bingo. As I was leaving, I noticed the 8th graders playing Texas Hold ‘Em an having a blast. Didn’t see much sinning going on there, just good old fashioned fun. ๐Ÿ‘ฟ

  17. I find it amazing that the old Sunday school teacher just happened to be in “that” service. I mean what are the odds?

    More importantly what was this lady doing with 7 young men in her house? If that’s not an appearance of evil I don’t know what is. Was her husband at home? Was she alone with these 7 young lads? What was she doing with an evil deck of cards in her house? Were they playing strip poker? Or was it just a game of poke her? What was going on at this home Sunday School?
    Another thing why would she make the second mistake, and call attention to herself like that?

    This is what happens when pulpiteers are drunk with power. They believe their own press, that they are speaking for god and that what they say is just as good as if God himself had said it. Anyone who questions it, is not right with gawd and is, in fact, questioning the almighty.

    1. You, sir, have hit the nail with your head. Right on!

      I LOVE the description, “Drunk with power”. What a completely accurate way to put it.

    2. 7 lads playing strip poker with a female Sunday school teacher?
      Why wasn’t my Sunday school ever like that?

      2. 7 little men and one woman playing strip poker? Sounds like a dirty version of “Snow White” to me. ๐Ÿ˜€

  18. From the “About the Author”:
    “Pastor Mikell stands for everything the Word of God stands for.”

    ๐Ÿ™„ โ“ [twitch]

    2. From the รขโ‚ฌล“About the Authorรขโ‚ฌย:
      รขโ‚ฌล“Pastor Mikell stands for everything the Word of God stands for.รขโ‚ฌย

      Pastor Mikell stands for everything the Word of God stands for… and then some. What the Word doesn’t make a stand on, he will more than amply make up for with his own standards… n’est pas?
      That’s the Fundy way!

      1. You wanna know how to get IFB Converts? They pull a Bible verse, you pull a KJV Cambrige Wide margin. They send one of their’s to visit in the hospital, you send one of your’s to Witness at the ABC store.
        They tell a cute story from the pulpit you fabricate a lie that will scare the hell out of ’em! *That’s* the *Fundie* way! And that’s how you get more numbers than the Catholics and other baptists.

  20. I actually know people that are pretty scared of a pack of cards. We weren’t allowed to bring them to our game nights at church. Ironically, I didn’t know why until some of the uber-righteous explained it to me one day, telling me about the whole “people could end up fortune-telling” thing.

    SFL: introducing you to new genres of sin under the guise of keeping you from sin…lol.

      1. I see a potential business opportunity here. Could we somehow manufacture square-shaped drinking vessels and market them to fundies with the purpose of avoiding all appearance of evil? “No, worldly cups for me! That’s just the slippery slope to drinking beer! Nope, I’m sticking to the Separated Sipsters brand cup.” Or maybe we could shape them in a triangle to illustrate the Trinity for extra-special holiness.

        1. I’m going one step further. Saucers! Drink from saucers. I have seen square tumblers in beer parlours.

        4. What about people who can’t see the white saucer or refuse to acknowledge its existence?

        5. Well, I didn’t identify which colour the saucer had to be. I realize that my inner fundamentalist will insist on one, but I am not giving into that devil.

          So if people can’t see the white ones, we will get them medical treatment.

    2. @Beckyboo, I wasn’t allowed to bring a set of “Bible Daughters” playing cards to my Christian school. The cards were in sets of four naming Biblical women – Esther, Rachel, Sarah, etc. Each card had a fact about that woman. I wonder if my response of “What in the world is wrong with you?” was an early indication that I wasn’t really a fundy.

    3. The other night, I watched “Some Like It Hot.” In an early scene, an undercover cop goes into a speakeasy and orders a whiskey. The waiter says, “We only serve coffee here. Canadian coffee, Scotch coffee, and Irish coffee.” The detective says, “Then I’ll have a Scotch coffee, with seltzer on the side.”

      You shouldn’t allow tea or coffee, either, because people might tell fortunes by reading tea leaves or coffee grounds.
      Remind me to tell you sometime about the time a woman read my coffee grounds in Bosnia.

    4. One church we attended for about seven years had choir practice on Sunday afternoon before the evening service. One of my daughters, who was about eleven or twelve, I think, and her best friend hung out in the church auditorium while we practiced (lots of Ron Hamilton). One afternoon, the friend brought a deck of playing cards to church to play some innocuous child’s game like “Go Fish.” Another girl their age walked in, and they invited her to play with them. The girl took one look at the playing cards, and refused to play. She hot footed it out of the auditorium, and pretty well ignored them forever after.

    2. Jai Alai was featured in the opening credits of Miami Vice. Now we all know tv is of the devil. And any show that has the word “vice” in it cannot be holy. Amen?

      Here’s my testimony….I watched an episode of Miami Vice and within a year I was betting on horse racing and jai alai. Not to mention I started to wear just t-shirts with my suit coat. :mrgreen:

    3. Warning: I’m getting pedantic again.
      Jai alai is actually a Basque game from northern Spain. The only other places I know of where it’s played are south Florida, Cuba, and Mexico City.
      It’s a lot like handball, except that the players wear “cestas” (baskets) on their hands, which give them the leverage to make the ball go much, much faster.

      Probably the reason brother Mikell thinks it’s evil is that gambling goes on among the specatators. You don’t have to gamble to watch the games, though.

      1. I have seen a professional Jai alai match (in Mexico), by the way. The atmosphere there was no different from that at other spectator sports.
        Except for the gambling in the bleachers, there was no obvious vice being practiced.

        1. FYI Jai alai is also played in Rhode Island, I have gone to a few matches there. It is very fast. Exciting to watch. I did not bet on the games although most people there went for that very purpose.

  22. Anyone remember a story that circulated years ago about someone doing something rude to a little boy in church and he grew up to be John Dillinger?

    1. I remember that as a skit or a dramatic reading a church service. The version I heard was that John Dillinger was in Sunday School class with other children. After the kids were dismissed and left the room, one of the moms entered and loudly complained to the Sunday School teacher about disruptive children (i.e. Dillenger). Dillenger, wanting to talk about salvation with the teacher, returned to classroom and overheard this conversation from the hallway. He burst into the room and responded with something to the effect of “I’ll never return to a church again as long as I live.”

      I’m sure there are more fundy myths like this out there…

    1. From the story:

      “Every time the city harasses us in some fashion or other, it doubles our attendance in church and Sunday School. Christianity has always gone forward on the stepping stones of persecutions!”

      Nice.

      1. Wow, he didn’t blame the devil? That’s who always got the blame when our church got called on the carpet for building code violations. Not the lack of permits, or the lack of fire alarms, but the devil.

        1. Wow, I’ve never heard of this devil. He cares about the safety of children. Does he think that lead shouldn’t be put in children’s toys? Does he think that meat should be inspected? Oh, never mind. He is a Democrat.

        2. You gotta admit, when those fundy preacher say they have “NO RESPONSIBILITY” to the community other than to name their sins & decry their wickedness, they aren’t just using a rhetorical flourish. They mean it & practice it!

        3. @RobM, our disagreement with the “no responsibility to our city” was a major step for my husband and I in stepping away from fundamentalism.

        4. @PW I wish it would drive more people away. I don’t get how people can take their kids to a church that willfully flaunts fire codes & other safety regulations.

        5. @RobM, it wasn’t fire codes for us. Our church actually took good care of the building. Our problem was that people in our circles proclaimed NO responsibility to helping anyone outside their own church family (except of course giving the salvation plan). I’d never thought of that attitude extending even to “we don’t care what you think; we’re not going to even keep our buildings up to code.” It makes them look like they think they’re superior to anyone else. Not an endearing way to show yourself part of your community.

      2. I love how in the article he says he has no axe to grind with the city, but he is suing them for 1 million dollars.

        I am sure his church growth is directly related to the city harassing him over fire code violations. I know I always look for sub-standard, potentially dangerous facilities before I choose to attend.

      1. Maybe insulating those bare wires and moving the kerosene away from the stove would show a lack of faith in divine Providence?

  25. This is the kind of guy you meets in the foyer of the church with a greeting card and 50 of the most intimate questions, except how’s your sex life?

    2. He sounds to me more like the kind of guy who panhandles for change outside the city library.

      Whoops, I just admitted I hang out at dens of iniquity like public libraries. ๐Ÿ˜ณ

      1. If you are not a fundamentalist anymore, then it is den of iniquity, even if there is no causal relationship between the antecedent and the consequent.

      3. Wow! My parents didn’t have a TV or a Christmas tree, and we were KJV only and we girls had to wear skirts, but my parents took us to the library faithfully every other Saturday. My parents were the most separated people I had ever met (more so than our church), but I guess there are deeper depths still. No library? How depressing!

  28. Knowledge of probabilities was actually what taught me not to gamble. Every time I feel tempted to buy a lottery ticket, I remind myself what the odds of winning are (practically non-existent).

    1. Some people say they love gambling so much that the money they lose makes it worth the entertainment. If I ever find myself enjoying losing money that much, I can throw it out the window and save myself a trip to the casino.

      Other people say they win, and don’t lose. These people fall into two categories: liars, and the severely deluded.

      1. These comments made me laugh out loud. If you go to Pogo.com and play their free casino games you can gamble with tokens, instead of real money. And after playing those games several times I have to wonder why anyone would gamble with real money.

    2. Eh, this was supposed to go under Tyler Flynn’s and Green Monkey’s comments about card-playing. I don’t know why things don’t post in the right place.

      1. “…I donรขโ‚ฌโ„ขt know why things donรขโ‚ฌโ„ขt post in the right place.”

        Perhaps unconfessed sin in your life?

        1. You know, you might find an empty parking spot at Walmart every time you go, if you would just live right.

  29. “Harold:
    Well, either you’re closing your eyes
    To a situation you do now wish to acknowledge
    Or you are not aware of the caliber of disaster indicated
    By the presence of a pool table in your community.
    Ya got trouble, my friend, right here,
    I say, trouble right here in River City.
    Why sure I’m a billiard player,
    Certainly mighty proud I say
    I’m always mighty proud to say it.
    I consider that the hours I spend
    With a cue in my hand are golden.
    Help you cultivate horse sense
    And a cool head and a keen eye.
    Never take and try to give
    An iron-clad leave to yourself
    From a three-reail billiard shot?
    But just as I say,
    It takes judgement, brains, and maturity to score
    In a balkline game,
    I say that any boob kin take
    And shove a ball in a pocket.
    And they call that sloth.
    The first big step on the road
    To the depths of deg-ra-Day–
    I say, first, medicinal wine from a teaspoon,
    Then beer from a bottle.
    An’ the next thing ya know,
    Your son is playin’ for money
    In a pinch-back suit.
    And list’nin to some big out-a-town Jasper
    Hearin’ him tell about horse-race gamblin’.
    Not a wholesome trottin’ race, no!
    But a race where they set down right on the horse!
    Like to see some stuck-up jockey’boy
    Sittin’ on Dan Patch? Make your blood boil?
    Well, I should say.
    Friends, lemme tell you what I mean.
    Ya got one, two, three, four, five, six pockets in a table.
    Pockets that mark the diff’rence
    Between a gentlemen and a bum,
    With a capital “B,”
    And that rhymes with “P” and that stands for pool!
    And all week long your River City
    Youth’ll be frittern away,
    I say your young men’ll be frittern!
    Frittern away their noontime, suppertime, choretime too!
    Get the ball in the pocket,
    Never mind gittin’ Dandelions pulled
    Or the screen door patched or the beefsteak pounded.
    Never mind pumpin’ any water
    ‘Til your parents are caught with the Cistern empty
    On a Saturday night and that’s trouble,
    Oh, yes we got lots and lots a’ trouble.
    I’m thinkin’ of the kids in the knickerbockers,
    Shirt-tail young ones, peekin’ in the pool
    Hall window after school, look, folks!
    Right here in River City.
    Trouble with a capital “T”
    And that rhymes with “P” and that stands for pool!
    Now, I know all you folks are the right kinda parents.
    I’m gonna be perfectly frank.
    Would ya like to know what kinda conversation goes
    On while they’re loafin’ around that Hall?
    They’re tryin’ out Bevo, tryin’ out cubebs,
    Tryin’ out Tailor Mades like Cigarette Feends!
    And braggin’ all about
    How they’re gonna cover up a tell-tale breath with Sen-Sen.
    One fine night, they leave the pool hall,
    Headin’ for the dance at the Arm’ry!
    Libertine men and Scarlet women!
    And Rag-time, shameless music
    That’ll grab your son and your daughter
    With the arms of a jungle animal instink!
    Mass-staria!
    Friends, the idle brain is the devil’s playground!

    People:
    Trouble, oh we got trouble,
    Right here in River City!
    With a capital “T”
    That rhymes with “P”
    And that stands for Pool,
    That stands for pool.
    We’ve surely got trouble!
    Right here in River City,
    Right here!
    Gotta figger out a way
    To keep the young ones moral after school!
    Trouble, trouble, trouble, trouble, trouble…

    Harold:
    Mothers of River City!
    Heed the warning before it’s too late!
    Watch for the tell-tale sign of corruption!
    The moment your son leaves the house,
    Does he rebuckle his knickerbockers below the knee?
    Is there a nicotine stain on his index finger?
    A dime novel hidden in the corn crib?
    Is he starting to memorize jokes from Capt.
    Billy’s Whiz Bang?
    Are certain words creeping into his conversation?
    Words like ‘swell?”
    And ‘so’s your old man?”
    Well, if so my friends,
    Ya got trouble,
    Right here in River city!
    With a capital “T”
    And that rhymes with “P”
    And that stands for Pool.
    We’ve surely got trouble!
    Right here in River City!
    Remember the Maine, Plymouth Rock and the Golden Rule!
    Oh, we’ve got trouble.
    We’re in terrible, terrible trouble.
    That game with the fifteen numbered balls is a devil’s tool!
    Oh yes we got trouble, trouble, trouble!
    With a “T”! Gotta rhyme it with “P”!
    And that stands for Pool!!!”

      1. After the line, “Words like ‘Swell'” I always want to yell, “Shit, yeah!” :mrgreen:
        My mother remembers being lectured not to use “swell”, or “lousy”. ๐Ÿ™„

  30. My parents were saved in a revival in a small fundy church (not I or B, but definitely F). I was two years old at the time. The thing that got them was the evangelist’s story of how he was preaching a revival in a similar church where a similar young family was in attendance, and refused to respond to the invitation. They drove home that night, and their little boy was jumping on the bed. He fell off, hit his head, and died. My father was the first to go forward.

    One of the truths of evangelical Christianity: what you save them with, you save them to. My life has pretty much played that out.

    1. I remember someone saying, “How you get them, that’s how you have to keep them”. Get them with cookies and that’s how you have to keep them. Get them with fear and that’s how you keep them. Get them with guilt and that’s how you keep them. That’s why many preachers jump all over. They have a lot of bases to cover.

  31. “The way a man parts his hair gives one to know whether you can immediately trust whatever this man says”.

    Wonder if that applies to men wearing hairpieces.

      1. I think comb-overs are a duty for the non-hirsute. Otherwise, a couple of she-bears might tear up three and a half dozen of the local youngsters. Just check out 2 Kings 2:23-24.

  32. What about my son, whose hair is a mass of curls? He couldn’t part it to save his soul. (Maybe literally?)

  33. My dad taught in a baptist school. There, the issue with cards was their association with gambling. In his contract, he had to agree, among other things, not to go to the movies (this was before video rentals, but watching “good” movies on TV was perfectly OK) or own playing cards. (I guess it was OK to play cards, as long as you didn’t gamble, and the cards belonged to someone else.) Although it was frowned on, students weren’t forbidden to own playing cards. Games with playing cards were generally not allowed at school or school functionsรขโ‚ฌโ€not that that stopped anyone. I learned to play poker (not for money) in the back of a church bus on the way to / from school activities. Rook cards were perfectly acceptable. We owned a set, but didn’t play that often. Then Uno came out, and we made up for lost time. ๐Ÿ™„

  34. Oddly enough, I know many people who play cards (I might even have played myself), including my very pious grandmother, and so far, none of them have been sentenced to death.

    In fact, I didn’t even know that playing cards was a capital offense.

  35. My former mog used to LOVE this type of thing. Newton’s Third Law of Fundametalism. The IF/THEN equation. Usually he would try to wrap it around tithing (i.e. IF you don’t give it THEN god will get it)but he was a master at making it fit whatever he needed it to fit. IF you have a drink THEN you will become a drunk and have an affair and leave your family and end up in the gutter sitting in your own vomit. IF you take your kid out of AWANA to play soccer, THEN your child will go to Marilyn Manson concerts and smoke dope and wind up a loser in life. I could go on forever with these….

    1. Haha my dad actually tried this one time.

      My and my brother were going to a Newsboys concert (LOVE the Newsboys). His explanation was he didn’t want it to lead to us going to wild parties and smoking pot in our bedrooms. I don’t even think he knew who the Newsboys are lol

      The whole tithing thing bugs me to death. Especially “tithing off the gross not the net income” and the “if you won’t give it, God will take it.” Where are either of those in the Bible, pray tell??

      1. Well, he did major in music at a (gasp!) State University before he got into (briefly) Baptist preaching, then running the Gold Coast Christian Academy in Florida. Ain’t Google wonderful? Can’t find him after the 70’s, though.

  37. When Baptist ministers tell implausible stories but do not provide specific names and places, I just assume they are either lying or repeating an urban legend. It would not be difficult to track down five inmates.
    Letรขโ‚ฌโ„ขs survey tour death row and ask the inmates how playing rummy was a gateway into a life on crime.

    1. Many inmates will tell you whatever you want if you give them a few bucks or a pack of cigs.
      They have a lot of time on their hands, and not much money.

      1. I was thinking the same thing. Also people love to blame something ELSE for their bad behavior. “Why am I in jail? It wasn’t because I mugged someone. Of course not! It’s because my Sunday School teacher let me play cards.”

        Of course, to be scrupulously honest, I’ll have to keep from saying this: “It’s not MY fault the house isn’t clean. It’s all those interesting posts on SFL. THEY kept me from doing my work.”

  38. If I were still teaching logic (which I did, years ago), I would present this as an example of the “Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc” fallacy.
    “I played cards as a teen, and now …”

  39. I’d bet they make sure the school kids have opportunities to suffer and face persecution. I’ve seen those kinds of so-called christian schools.

    1. I noticed that too. I thought that was a strange way to advertise their Christian school: “We’re going to help your kid learn how to suffer.” Ummmm, think I’ll pass on that.

  40. We had a great revival once, and after the evangelist left, our SS Superintendent, still enthused over the message of revival decided to take “Something evil and turn it into something Good” So she requested that we bring in all of our playing cards from home to the church, it was sorta hinted at to bring them even if our parents objected, because we were doing something “for the Lord” Anyway we had probably over 100 decks of cards. What we did was white out all the numbers on the cards, and then put scripture verses on them to memorize. It took us over 6 months of Wednesday nights working at this to finally finish.

    The above “tale” is as full of bull as the original post was. Gotcha ๐Ÿ˜€

    1. My first time on an airplane, I received a few small mementos: one, a pin of the Delta wings, another, a set of playing cards with a cool picture on the back. My mom wanted me to throw them out, but I begged her to keep them. I glued the whole pack together two by two so the numbers could no longer be seen. Now I had a pack full of two-sided pictures of a Paul Revere statue, but I managed to keep my souvenir! And that story WAS the absolute truth! I probably would have whited out the numbers and written Bible verses on them if that would have convinced my mom to let me keep them.

      1. pw, I am assuming you were a child when this happened? That is pretty lousy. Flying for the 1st time should be all about the memory and not a continuation of rules that don’t apply to the real world. I cannot wait to take my granchildren on their 1st plane rides. Their parents won’t because they are afraid to fly. But anyway, whatever trinket the airlines give to little ones nowadays will be kept.

        1. Yeah, I was 8 or 10. I was SO excited, especially because my dad surprised me. I thought we were traveling by car to bring my grandma to our house for a visit and instead he drove to the airport. It’s a wonderful memory, but I did have to use a lot of persuasion and ingenuity to keep those cards!

      2. I remember as a teenager hiding my playing cards with my stash of ‘wicked’ items (which included the John Denver tapes my mom had tried to throw out after a sermon). I was just getting ready to enter my teen years when my mom was ‘converted’, and getting rid of everything familiar and suddenly having to wear clothes I hated was too much of a shock to my system.

        1. Ah, John Denver. Now that’s a blast from the past.

          Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy…

    2. You had me up until the white-out. Cards are too glossy for the white-out to adhere properly.
      Well I’ve been told cards are glossy :mrgreen:

  41. You know, with illustrations like these in his book, I wish there were a Snopes or FactCheck just for these fundy urban legends. I’m sure the ones he repeats here are not his own…they’re just too cute & convenient to be truthful.

    I guess when something is repeated often enough, it becomes true to people, but some of these are just so off the wall.

      1. I don’t know if you’re kidding or not, AndOrYesMaybe, but in fact many of them are in the Glurge section of Snopes.com.

        2. I just spent the entire evening reading Snopes glurge section. Fortunately, I’m sick, so it was time well spent ๐Ÿ˜†

        3. Hey, thanks for that! I didn’t know to look there either…I mean, “glurge”? Now, I’ve got some readin’ to do!

  42. My Granddad was quite a good magician,well known locally, and to some extent known nationally. He never used playing cards, he used Rook cards, because playing cards had witchcraft or devil’s signs on them. In his day job, he had many clients who would give him christmas gifts. They might get most of their associates a bottle of whiskey or wine, but knowing that he did not drink, they would cast about for other ways to show their appreciation. Some who knew of his interest in slight of hand gave him playing cards. He was not one to throw anything in good away that was in good condition. After he died, we found over one hundred and thirty unopened decks of playing cards in his basement!

    1. Of course he explained that what he did was just an illusion, and that the only real magic comes from god.

    1. You had a banquet honoring some Catholic saint’s day? Ohh, how depraved is that? Turn in your fundy license! Right now!

  44. I also have to wonder what prompted a random hobo to stand up in the middle of a church service and lament the condition of his life. What homeless people do we know that do this regularly? ๐Ÿ˜•

  45. Well, I’m not a beer-drinker (I like martinis), but my doctor says my health is good, I’m blessed with a gorgeous husband, a good job, a roof over my head, and everything I need.

    I wonder if its the martinis, in lieu of beer.

  48. This sounds like the 1950’s version (just guessing from the photo) of the Pharisee of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector fame. If I recall correctly, all the “good” the Pharisee did didn’t get him into heaven.

  49. This grieves my heart. Fundamentalism doesn’t understand the concept of sin. It sees sin as external actions and not a condition of the heart. We are not sinners because we sin, rather we are sinners that sins. To think that they are trapped into believing that by avoiding perceived evil vices that somehow they are better off/preserved. Where is Christ in this? The following diagram shows the error in their theology!

    http://www.pastormattrichard.com/2011/01/whats-wrong-with-new-evangelical.html

  50. Just returned home from a cruise. On our at-sea days between ports the four of us Baptists (I’m the most ex-fundy of the bunch) played Liverpool Rummy all day with two, count ’em, two decks of cards! The ship did not sink and none of us suffered hysterectomies. I did get the ship-board gasto-intestinal ailment and was stuck in my cabin for a couple of days and missed Istanbul. If that was God’s punishment, I sure missed that lesson and wasted a perfectly good case of sick. We retired those two decks of cards and bought new ones from the gift shop that didn’t have germs all over them. Hubby suffered a light case. Maybe it was the cards! Here, I thought it was just because I, uh, shared with him before I knew I had it… I’m devastated now. If we’d only spent our at-sea days holding Bible studies and going door-knocking, I would have seen Istanbul.

    1. …”If weรขโ‚ฌโ„ขd only spent our at-sea days….going door-knocking..”

      That is great. Door-to-door on a cruise ship. You would have a captive audience.
      “Hi. Do you know where you would go if the boat sank tonight?”

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