For many fundamentalists the entirety of their spiritual life is comprised of a series of moments in time in which they have made BIG DECISIONS. If you’re a fundy nine-year-old who has just decided in the throes of religious fervor that he’s going to become a preacher boy, never kiss a girl until he’s married, and never buy alcohol at any place where they sell gas (the details are often confusing for a nine-year old) then you had better plan on never, ever changing your mind. For he who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is not fit for fundystand.
What’s that you say, John? You want to go to a state school and be an engineer? Don’t you remember surrendering to missions during our Patch the Pirate Club back in the summer of ’91? And a missionary doesn’t need a state school, he needs training at our basement bible college…
Esther, do you really think you’re going to marry that guy you met at work? Didn’t you promise when you were but a wee girl to let your parents pick someone for you to helpmeet? I’m sure God doesn’t want you going back on your word.
Bill, didn’t you swear as a teenager that you were going to give half your income to missions for the rest of your life? Need I remind you where liars go?
There’s a reason that minors are not allowed to enter into a legal contract. If only there were the same prohibition on them entering into a life-altering spiritual one as well.
Whether they like it or not, fundamentalism does change. The changes, however, happen slowly and quietly all while fundamentalists insist that nothing is changing and that they’ve always done/said/believed/smoked this.
In my corner of fundyland, comic books were eyed with deep suspicion of being a gateway to the occult, pornography, and Communism. You might think I’m kidding about that last one but I’m dead serious. But apparently, this prohibition on the costumed heroes has been abandoned in some fundamentalist camps as evidenced by the Shawnee Baptist Youth Conference website where the speakers are portrayed at least in superhero costume masks if not (thankfully) in tights.
Of course, other fundamentalists like David Cloud aren’t happy about this. Then again, when is David Cloud ever happy? I think the last recorded time was one brief moment in 1984…
Fundamentalists are huge fans of original sin and never hesitate to point out that everyone from newborns to octogenarians are prone to spiritual corruption and gross wickedness. Even a child (of unspecified age and ability) is known by his doings.
One might be inclined to wonder how it is that an infant who possesses neither speech or nor rational thought could be guilty of willful sin but apparently the little critters are just rife with it. You see, sometimes they cry when there’s (and here’s the important bit) nothing wrong. Indeed this is deception of the most base kind involving fooling another human being into paying them attention when they simply don’t deserve it. That such evil should exist in the heart of a baby is breathtaking.
Indeed, the go-to illustration for most fundy pastors when addressing the topic of the heart’s corruption generally involves some infraction of their baby or toddler. Now godless, secular, atheist psychologists might have some theory or another on things like developmental stages and cognitive ability but fundamentalists have never been much bothered by psychology…or anything else. No, the simple reality is that your little smiling cherub is a willful and premeditated liar and the truth is not him.
Heed this warning well and watch for the telltale signs of corruption.
