Religious Hot Heads

[rc.]

Ever know anyone keeps having conflicts with one person after another after another due to their extreme controlling opinionated personality? I lost a friend I've had over 15 years because of one of his irate temper tantrums over a religious disagreement. I just didn't want to go to services with him and his wife at this time. I thanked him for the offer but I told him I'll go when and where I feel comfortable. He is pushy about his extreme religious views on %%%%ation and he could not handle me telling him "NO". He's complained about lots of people over the years he's had conflicts with often over religion. Sadly his actions don't match up with what he preaches. The polite offer to attend services with him and his wife was welcome but his pushy stubborn angry response when I said "no" was not. He did this to another close friend and his children who won't speak to him. I walked away calmly and ask him to cool down but he chose to end our friendship rather than calmly respect my right to run my own life. Sad!

[tominboise]

Not really much of a friend if he doesn't accept you for who you are. Good luck to you.

[rosscoe]

I have way too much I could say to this!

[David Valdina]

A 15 year friendship is worth saving, if possible. You could speak to his minister about this. Maybe the minister could talk to him and give him some guidance. And you could write a well thought out letter to send him. One that attempts to leave the door open to getting back to being friends. The advantage of a letter is that it is capable of being saved and re-read. And perhaps his wife or others in his family will read it and try and talk some sense into him. He is fortunate he has a caring friend in you.

[greenyonline]

That’s a sad situation. Sometimes people become so focused on bringing others to the Lord that they forget the second commandment: “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself" , or a friend. It sounds like your friend is single minded and perhaps stubborn but try to reconcile with him. You will know very quickly if your attempt is going to be successful. Sometimes it doesn’t work out and we just have to move on. I don’t know what faith or doctrine he follows but one can find peace by seeking the Lord in their own way. Good luck in both endeavors.

[rc.]

I had left the door open to mend the friendship when I walked off to let cooler heads prevail but he ended up escalating to the point that I don't want anything to do with him. He got really petty and dumped some reloading equipment I had semi permanently loaned him at my mom's house the next day and sent me a text demanding $300 for a chronograph we were originally going to split along with other rude comments. He had twisted around our original agreement to split the chronograph. Originally we agree to split it and leave it at my house where we both shot. In reality he never paid me anything. He gave me some of his cast off gun stuff to sell on ebay and I gave him the profit. He said, "Why don't you pay me off and you own it and keep it at your place or I'll pay you off and I'll own it and keep it at my place". That wasn't what we agreed originally but I swallowed my pride and I let myself get stuck paying for the whole thing and I still let him use it. I didn't want to fight over money as I was keeping it at my house anyways. A friendship is more important to me than a few bucks. Now in his befuddled brain he thinks I owe him for half of the new chronograph value based on the original agreement. He accused me of being "greedy" and within 24 hours of the original spat he threatened to "sue" me. He tried to guilt trip me saying what I am doing is a "sin" and there is a "principle" involved. I told him to "go ahead and sue me" I have the receipt from Midway. A judge isnn't going to do anything for him but dismiss the case. If money is all he cares about after 15 years of friendship I'm done with him.. I've helped him out on multiple occasions financially and with my time. I got him out of a financial bind when we first met making a personal loan on his truck when he was struggling financially through a divorce and making high interest payments. I helped him with some moves, typed up his annulment so he could get remarried and helped move his son to college. I fixed a collapsed portion of his fence where he lives now with his wife for a hot meal and friendship. I'm sure there is more I did but I can't remember. I don't keep track of what I do for my friends like that. Some people who claim to be religious, go to church every Sunday and pray all the time but don't know how to live their faith in a way that treats others with dignity and respect. They end up living like hypocrites and don't even know it. That is one of the reason's I've become more agnostic with religion over the years. I've seen way too many people who go to church regularly fake it through services and then treat people horribly. My old friend will never admit he was wrong or apologize for what he's done. I've encouraged him to write to his children regularly and just tell them he loves them, misses them and wants them back in his life, but he feels they should be coming to him, asking for his forgiveness and living like he thinks they should. You learn a lot about people by watching how they treat others. That's exactly how they are going to treat you when they get upset with you. He even screams at his dog pretty often when it doesn't obey.

For all his negative character flaws he was mostly a good friend and I believe his intentions were mostly good but his anxiety and anger and ego keep getting him into trouble. Sadly this is like a sudden unexpected divorce or the death of a close friend. I just have to do my best to accept it and move on. The only way that I could repair this friendship is to take all the blame myself, be guilt tripped to go to church and fake through the motions in the name of God. I admire people that are good Christians that don't just practice faith on Sunday but live their faith by example. However, mental abuse is not something I'm willing to take even after 15 years.

[comfisherman]

Screwed up semi narcissistic folks come in all shapes and sizes, religions and creeds.

Harsh reality every faith group has to deal with. For every decent honest Christian in a church, there is a manipulative monster that takes advantage of the system and abuses it and the genuine people. This is probably true of almost every group of people or identity group. For every decent philanthropic new atheist, is another willing to cancel gifts to poor children because he hates the idea of religious giving. Guess the key is, sometimes folks are terrible representatives of themselves and the groups they attach them to.

Makes it more important for all of us to be discerning in friendship as well as group association. Might even be a lesson for the 2a crowd in our teaching and training of this large crop of new gun owners.


Very hard to change anyone by force, read the book "unbroken" if you need proof. Guess we all get to live as best we can, as examples of either what "to do", or what "not to do ".


Sorry to hear about the loss of a friendship, that's no fun any way you slice it.

[BigTimePlinker]

Originally Posted by comfisherman

Screwed up semi narcissistic folks come in all shapes and sizes, religions and creeds.

Harsh reality every faith group has to deal with. For every decent honest Christian in a church, there is a manipulative monster that takes advantage of the system and abuses it and the genuine people. This is probably true of almost every group of people or identity group. For every decent philanthropic new atheist, is another willing to cancel gifts to poor children because he hates the idea of religious giving. Guess the key is, sometimes folks are terrible representatives of themselves and the groups they attach them to.

Preach.

[gmd1950]

One of my Dad's best friends in the Church I grew up in was very pushy witnessing wise, never seemed to be the way to be to me, I'll witness to someone but I'm not going to brow beat them. Plant a seed, try to set an example, be genuine and admit your own flaws (we all have them).

[sigshr]

It probably has nothing to do with religion or anything else, and everything to do with him. I've had several erstwhile "friends" turn on me, my attitude is that if people don't value my friendship theirs is worth even less to me. Sounds like he's mentally unstable and someone to avoid.

[GTS225]

Let's see.....what is the scripture verse? "Pride goeth before the fall"?

And that's coming from a self-described agnostic.

Roger

[Dairyboy]

Originally Posted by gmd1950

One of my Dad's best friends in the Church I grew up in was very pushy witnessing wise, never seemed to be the way to be to me, I'll witness to someone but I'm not going to brow beat them. Plant a seed, try to set an example, be genuine and admit your own flaws (we all have them).

This. Our role is to plant seeds. Being forceful and really pushy to the point of ending a friendship is not the way. Sadly not all "church goer's" show the love of Christ in ways like that.

[RogerKipwell]

I have a friend who is Southern Baptist minister. He's the least pushy religious person that I've ever met.

[rc.]

Sadly had his approach been to simply express concern and leave the door open and give me time I eventually may have accepted the offer to celebrate faith with them in the future as I had in years past. I believe there is a lot of positive things about being part of a faith community but I am not of the mind there is but 1 true church and all the others are trash filled with ignorant people. I am open to consider other points of view and to respect people of all faiths or non faiths for that matter who treat others with kindness, dignity, honesty and respect. I have gone with other friends to their respective services to see what they were like. My former friend does not respect other faiths. He refused to go to his son's wedding because he got married out of the church and this attitude and lack of respect for his son's wife or right to lead his own life led to a permanent rift between them. The son feels he and his siblings was mentally abused as a child. I have maintained casual contact with his son because I respect him as a man who can make his own decisions about faith. I have seen too much scandal in communities of faith to believe being part of a particular group makes you a better human being.

Some people will fall on a sword to make a point. Sometimes, the point however is "look at how self destructive I can be".

[whiplash]

Sorry this happened to the OP and others. Not everything can be reconciled on Earth so move on if needed. IMO next to the miracle of Creation will be God's Reconciliation. Until then it seems like we're being tested through and through.