James Finn
1 min readJul 26, 2022

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"If you fail to “share the good news” and bring them into the fold, a) they will go to Hell, and you may be partly to blame, and b) their sinfulness might invite the wrath of your God, who’s been known to destroy a great many in order to punish a few."

It's probably worth mentioning that while your statement absolutely applies to Evangelical Christians, it's far from universal among Christians.

Several mainline Protestant denominations don't center the primacy of sacrificial atonement, and those that do tend to hold out the probability of alternate paths to salvation — recognizing the validity of a variety of religious and spiritual experiences.

Mainline Protestant theologians are highly unlikely to believe in the Hell from the quote I copied over, though the belief may persist somewhat in the pews.

I agree with your main point that progressive Christians need to do a better job speaking up and speaking out and not merely deny someone's Christianity in order to make themselves feel better.

But I don't agree with your point that judgmentalism and condemnation are an inescapable feature of Christianity. Christians outside Evangelical circles are real Christians, and there are an awful lot of them, and your assessment does not fairly describe them.

Your article describes problems within Evangelical Christianity very well, but doesn't capture what's happening in other large parts of Christianity.

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James Finn
James Finn

Written by James Finn

James Finn is an LGBTQ columnist, a former Air Force intelligence analyst, an alumnus of Act Up NY, and an agented but unpublished novelist.

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