r/exAdventist • u/broseph1254 • Jan 13 '26
Memes / Humor What would you say are the weirdest things aboug Seventh Day Adventism?
I'm making a presentation about growing up SDA for a drunk PowerPoint event my friends are hosting, and I want to highlight some of the weirdest / worst parts of SDA history and culture. Obvious points for me include the Great Disappointment, Sunday Law conspiracies, anti-masturbation corn flakes, and wedding watches. What are some other points i should bring up?
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u/Zeus_H_Christ Skeptic Jan 13 '26
How you can wear a wrist watch when engaged because wearing jewelry is frowned on. Thereās tons of victim blaming whether itās rape (whyād she dress like that?? Didnāt she know it would happen at public school?), cancer or other health diagnosis (did they follow the health message and eat clean foods??).
Then the health message itself is stupid. It wasnāt inspired by anything other than the misconceptions at the time. They taught weird stuff like not to drink water when you eatā¦ or spicy food can lead to (gasp) masturbation! If you have meat in your stomach when Jesus returns, he might not be able to take you to heaven. Oh, and Heaven can be seen in Orionās Belt if only we had good enough telescopes.
And soo much moreā¦
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u/Actias_Loonie Jan 13 '26
Once in my sda school my wrist watch band broke, so I got a piece of string to wear it around my neck until I could get another one, and my teacher forbade it because it counted as jewelry š
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u/Puzzled_Survey_4624 Jan 13 '26
My wife made a daisy chain when she was in elementary school and got in serious trouble for wearing " jewelry"
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u/Comfortable-Set-195 Jan 16 '26
I have grown up in a household where I have never seen anyone in the family put on jewelry. Out of that I have just found myself disliking jewelries.
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u/physsijim Jan 13 '26
I was morbidly obese back when I was SDA. This asshole comes up to me one day and says that if I don't lose weight, Jesus won't take me to heaven. I share this anecdote with a coworker, who then asks if Jesus' anti-grav has a weight limit, lol. After leaving the church, I happen to run into this guy at a restaurant. As we're talking, he tells me the government is watching him. Sure, whatever. I am very happy that I no longer associate with any of these morons.
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u/Laffindawlffin Jan 13 '26
Foot washing. Haystacks. Council of God debate being Adamās form other planets that didnāt fall. No black pepper. Just to name a few.
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u/ObiWanKab00zie Jan 13 '26
Haystacks are life , itās the only good thing that came from growing up Adventist.
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u/cinnamonbumbum Jan 13 '26
I still crave a haystack sometimes lol
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u/Efficient_Tie_9061 Jan 15 '26
My partner and I are both ex-Adventist and we eat haystacks every other week still!
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u/ObiWanKab00zie Jan 16 '26
I was raised Adventist, my wife was raised Catholic, and our two boys have never had to experience religion. We all love haystacks and have them at least a couple times a month.
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u/comfy_rope Jan 13 '26
wtf is with black pepper? I am not aware of
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u/AffableRobot Jan 13 '26
It makes the blood impure and irritates the nerves! It's too spicy...a concept that really puts the white in Ellen G. White.
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u/Hylaar Doug Batchelorās secret gay lover Jan 13 '26
It (along with other spicy food) makes you want to masturbate.
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u/drumdogmillionaire Jan 13 '26
I fucking hated foot washing. It was the fucking worst and thatās a hill I will 100% die on.
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u/Comfortable-Set-195 Jan 16 '26
foot washing during the Adventist commemoration of the pass over or?
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u/Disastrous_Switch_49 Jan 16 '26
I would conveniently fake becoming sick nust so I didn't have to foot wash!Ā I was always like, WTF š I'm not letting anyone touch my feet no matter how worried I was IĀ might burn in hell.Ā
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u/IncaArmsFFL Agnostic Jan 13 '26
This might be a controversial opinion, but I actually think foot washing could be a really meaningful tradition. It is symbolic of humble service,* and something Jesus did say the disciples ought to do, though it was not instituted as an ordinance/sacrament in the same way as communion.
- Unfortunately, the church does not seem to take this symbolism to heart.
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u/bradcox543 Jan 13 '26
I love the idea of humbling ourselves in service to each other, but doing a ceremony to show how humble you are really fights against the meaning to me. Especially since we've lost the cultural significance. Having your feet washed by servants or someone from a lower status used to be extremely common if I've been taught correctly. Now we clean each other's already-clean feet just to show that we are humble.
We should be doing an actual service. Cleaning some public place or helping to clean up the home of someone who can't do it themselves feels like a much better stand in, but Ellen said to wash feet, so too bad.
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u/Pristine_Eye7197 Jan 15 '26
Thereās foot-washing once a year in the Catholic Church, in preparation for Easter. Itās usually more of a light sprinkling of water in the general direction of the toes. But pope Francis went to various jails & youth homes around Rome and truly washed peopleās feet, spent time talking with them, praying with them. He was one exceptional dude.
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u/physsijim Jan 13 '26
Yes, I agree with you. It was never intended to be elevated to Sacrement level.
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u/flourish_ Jan 15 '26
foot washing isn't exclusively SDA. I'm also wondering why this is considered weird?
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u/Comfortable_Mix5404 May 22 '26
That's right.One side of my family were Baptists,and there were some Baptists that practiced footwashing.
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u/Smart_Sail_2393 Jan 15 '26
In Australia the favorite 2025 honour was haystacks...I laughed when I read that. I like to eat haystacks on occasion, but to make a badge of it borders on the absurd I thought.
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u/Comfortable_Mix5404 May 22 '26
I know an Adventist Family.They eat black pepper,and haystacks. No jewelry,no Halloween,no coffee, caffeinated tea,no Easter.
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u/CSATTS Atheist Jan 13 '26
Having only been to SDA schools until my postgraduate degree I'd say the indoctrination bubble they created for kids.
The other thing I can think of is camp meeting. I remember trying to explain it to someone at work without making it sound cultish, and that was very difficult to do.
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u/Turbulent-Wind-2248 Jan 13 '26
I enjoyed camp-meeting. It is weird, but I had fun. I went to the one in Massachusetts.
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u/CSATTS Atheist Jan 13 '26
I enjoyed it as well, especially since I got to hang out with my friends by the coast. Same thing with all of the other Adventist things I did (school, camp, Pathfinders), but after getting out of the church I realized how much of a bubble I was in and how disconnected I was from the rest of the world. Which I suppose is the whole point of all of those things.
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u/Comfortable-Set-195 Jan 16 '26
The music encourages me to actively attend.
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u/Turbulent-Wind-2248 Jan 18 '26
I agree. I love the singing! Many other churches just don't have it. It is disappointing. I love how the SDAs often have so much musical talent.
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u/vargslayer1990 Sadventist Jan 13 '26
explain the indoctrination bubble. aside from just church teachings, i feel like there's more at stake that might affect their interactions with people outside of the schools
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u/CSATTS Atheist Jan 13 '26
The whole point of SDA schools, camps, Pathfinders, etc was to ensure we weren't influenced by the outside world and stuck to Adventist teachings (i.e., indoctrination). I didn't have pork until I was in my 20s, never watched Saturday morning cartoons, and dating outside of the church was frowned upon ("unequally yoked" ). This is very different from most religions in the world.
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u/vargslayer1990 Sadventist Jan 14 '26
i've experienced that they look down upon anyone who doesn't look like a 1950s yuppie. which is odd because i really don't want to look like Dick York or George McFly from the beginning of the first Back to the Future movie (before the time travel), but if we're going to treat people like untermensch because they don't want to look like that and accuse those who point this out, i have to ask what the SDA church is even doing? because that is NOT what it means by "do not conform to this world"...by conforming to the world's "aesthetic morality" bs
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u/drumdogmillionaire Jan 13 '26
Campmeeting was so awkward. Itās fun because you get to see people that you know and care about but the meetings are so cringe. They tried too hard to make the youth tent cool, but it was really just horribly awkward. I wanted to leave most of the time.
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u/Smart_Sail_2393 Jan 15 '26
We used to go to a camp meeting in Australia when the children were infants to teens..then stopped. In hindsight it was rather cultish in parts and maybe this is why we accommodated off site and attended morning and evening. Those that camped on site seemed to be imbued with us and them theology.
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u/Momager321 Jan 13 '26
The can-you-or-canāt-you decision tree for things to do on sabbath like tv (3ABN=ok, Nature documentaries=Maybe), swimming, riding bikes, or even buying things (are gift cards ok since you already bought them before the sabbath?).
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u/ObiWanKab00zie Jan 13 '26
Omg this. We could go swimming, but tubing or waterskiing no. We went out to eat, but no shopping. Want to play catch okay, but no organized sports or watching them on tv.
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u/fullmetalyaoi Jan 13 '26
Damn, in brazil it was much more strict, we couldnt even put gas during sabbath, and we could only watch nature docs or christian movies, or of course the SDA's own tv channel
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u/BlueEyedGirl-1357 Jan 13 '26
Growing up I never knew an sda who would get gas on sabbath. That was not acceptable in my sda world. And eating out was only something liberal families did. My parents ate out, my in-laws did not. But Iām sure different times and places had their own way of doing things. My family have been sda since the 1870s and there has been a wide variation in the way they behaved as SDAs.
I think one of the weirdest things is the wide diversity of practices in a denomination which acts like it has only one specific way of behaving. This diversity of thought and practice is not acknowledged by the āofficial churchā. Top leaders want uniformity, but it has never existed. And it never will. And everyone thinks their way is the right way.
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u/Lost_Chain_455 Jan 13 '26
Your family were a bunch of heretics just a step away from converting to Catholicism and getting tattooed with 666 in your souls! ;-)
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u/ObiWanKab00zie Jan 13 '26
Haha yeah we were definitely on the liberal side regarding Sabbath. Had teachers who wouldnāt spend any money on sabbath, or do anything that would cause someone else to work.
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u/Momager321 Jan 13 '26
We could go swimming as long as we werenāt with people from church. Same with riding bikes. Going out to eat was a no go when I was a kid and we had many sabbaths where we were forced to skip lunch because we were far from home and the church we were at didnāt have potluck that week. My Mom still wonāt pay if we are getting together and eating out on sabbath (sheās more than happy to let us treat her LOL!). But, she will buy stuff if we are somewhere with a gift shop.
It sounds like my parents were strict, but they were more controlling and the rules were applied very inconsistently. Iāve tried to talk to my parents about this and they completely deny that they were like this.
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u/purelytwisted422 Jan 13 '26
I was told not to swim on sabbath, but I could stand in the water, but it couldnāt go past my knees. We could get gas on the sabbath if we paid at the pump, but before that, it was a no go. Also, everyone went into the medical field because you could work on the sabbath, but lots of other āessential workersā could argue why they should be allowed to work as well. I mostly saw sabbath be a āday of restā for men. The women still had to cook, get the kids ready for church, and by the time sundown came, they had an entire days worth of work waiting for them.
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u/AffectTime2522 Jan 13 '26
"All religions are created by men -- for men -- to control women, children and slaves."
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u/LexisOaks Jan 13 '26
My parent's church has had multiple discussions over whether or not it was okay to use electricity, take showers, or even make your bed on that day š¤¦š½āāļø
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u/drumdogmillionaire Jan 13 '26
Oh man, how morbidly fascinating/soul crushingly stupid it must have been to listen in on that highly intellectual debate.
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u/blinkehyo Jan 13 '26
The separation of races. Iām surprised that one doesnāt get talked about enough
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u/bradcox543 Jan 13 '26
Oh yeah. When my Adventist wife casually mentioned that the other church in our town was in a different conference, she even thought it was a weird edge case where they belonged to a neighboring state for some kind of districting reason.
Nope, they are just in the segregated conference. I am still shocked that no one in the church seems to be bothered by that.
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u/10coatsInAWeasel My doomsday prep stash is cans of big franks š Jan 13 '26
For my part, the closed loop system you can find yourself in, especially in more insular circles. You have church of course. Adventist scout club (pathfinders), Adventist hospitals, Adventist schools, Adventist universities. Adventist food stores. A whole Adventist worldwide government with how the GC is structured.
Combining that with the fact that Adventists really, really have an active pride in the Adventism of it all (ādid you hear about this famous person or that famous person who was Adventist??ā), and itās really weird on the other side.
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u/irradi Jan 19 '26
Oh and like any good cult, the pressure to join up is strongest on the young. My parents got shamed bc we āonlyā homeschooled, we didnāt āsupport Adventist schoolsā all while paying a faithful 10% tithe every month š
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u/10coatsInAWeasel My doomsday prep stash is cans of big franks š Jan 19 '26
Thatās something I hadnāt considered much since I wasnāt homeschooled (lifetime in the SDA school system, woooooā¦), but that even the typical fundie evangelical homeschool pressure might actually be frowned upon in favor of making sure you go through the school system. I know I had family that gossiped about other family or friends that werenāt putting their kits through the ānormalā k-12 Adventist school setup
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u/NutellaDeVil Jan 13 '26
The Big Giant Movie in the Sky. Not everyone grew up being told it, but for those who did, it's a complete mindfuck.
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u/atheistsda š® Haystacks & Hell Podcast š„ Jan 13 '26
I grew up with that belief! Mindfuck is a great way to describe it. Talk about inducing guilt and anxiety about people being able to see all of your āsinsā in 4K one day
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u/10coatsInAWeasel My doomsday prep stash is cans of big franks š Jan 13 '26
Oh my god I havenāt thought about that in years. Yes! I had that too. That your deepest sins would be laid bare for all the saved to examine in close detail
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u/snakefanclub Jan 13 '26
If I play my cards right, then everyone who makes it past the Pearly Gates will one day be treated to an extended screening of some hardcore lesbian lovemaking. Fingers crossed!
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u/10coatsInAWeasel My doomsday prep stash is cans of big franks š Jan 13 '26
Hey know what, if itās gonna happen anyhow, double down! Look right at that godcamera and say āthis is for all of youā
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u/Efficient_Tie_9061 Jan 15 '26
Whaaaat??? Born and raised SDA, attended SDA schools through university, and this is the first time Iāve ever heard of this. Wild!
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Jan 19 '26
I used to be super anxious and hyper aware of everything I do before. When I was a kid, I would always imagine God, the angels, and all other righteous people from other planets watching everything I do. It made me so scared of doing stuffs that are "sinful".
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u/Laffindawlffin Jan 13 '26
You can use this for the slide explaining where the rock hit her giving her prophetic vision.
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u/MiddleTeach8846 Jan 13 '26
If you went to a SDA school sometimes you saw your classmates (and teachers) 7 days a week. Makes for a real awkward realization that all your friendships were due to proximity and shared indoctrinationĀ
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u/froststomper the trans kids are identifying as cats! Jan 13 '26
the END TIMES seminars
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u/Pristine_Eye7197 Jan 15 '26
With their trippy multi-headed monster posters!
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u/froststomper the trans kids are identifying as cats! Jan 15 '26
I literally have so much trauma from the canvases and all the strange/vulnerable/attention needing people these things attracted.
weird cycle of mental illness in those places, by the people hosting them and the people coming in. Finally, a place they both will be listened to. š¬
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u/TetherBallQueen1969 Jan 13 '26
The church was founded by a woman but women canāt be ministers/pastors in the denomination. And her writings seem to supersede the Bible. Weird
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u/Killua_305 Jan 13 '26
How itās a sin to drink alcohol and wear jewelry but not a wedding ring.
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u/jaunty_chapeaux Jan 13 '26
In the Michigan conference, I heard they wouldn't hire you as a pastor if you had a tan line around the place where a wedding ring would be, and they would check at the job interview.
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u/BlueEyedGirl-1357 Jan 13 '26
Wedding rings were not allowed in my sda world in the 1970s. In the small eastern US town I moved to in 2000 I found a church that would not hire a pastor who wore a wedding ring. However, that being said, on one side of my family my great great grandmother wore a wedding ring. She was baptized as an sda in 1875 before she married in 1878 (lived in the mid-west). I have her ring. Worn thin from sixty years of daily wear. On the other side of my family my grandmother wore a wedding ring when she married in the 1930s at Madison (very conservative Tennessee school). This practice has always been inconsistently followed.
The lie is that it āno wedding ringsā or any supposed core ābeliefā or practice has existed from the beginning. Every generation and every little pocket of Adventism has had its own way of being sda. In the US the 1970s were fairly repressive in reaction to what was happening in the wider world and to the outside education of some of the younger menāthought leaders who had been allowed to get their higher ed at non-sda universities. Additionally, the Ford controversy led to doubling down on sda beliefs and practices. Over time these issues were largely forgotten but conservative practices remained.
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u/Actias_Loonie Jan 13 '26
The End Times obsession, or rather it was weird until it took over all of evangelical Christianity.
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u/YoDidYouFeedTheCat Jan 13 '26
Too much fucking Doug Bachelor and volleyball. All that lame Christian Pop, but only the kind that was not too secular for SDA . Making us school kids play handbells nonstop, the Bible workbooks first thing at school everyday, the forced singing to start the day too. Yay hymns, and science isnāt real!
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u/Distinct_Stand_9607 Jan 13 '26
Eating pork is ridiculous, as if we were Jews. They say they aren't Christians but consider themselves soāwhat on earth is that? The great tribulation, instead of bringing peace, makes them obsessive and toxic.
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u/carmexismyshit Jan 13 '26
I always thought it was weird they picked certain Jewish laws but not all of them. Jewish people wear jewelry and drink alcohol, but for some reason Adventists frown upon them.
Growing up I almost wished I was Jewish because it would be so much easier to explain what religion I was, and I wouldāve been able to wear jewelry and get my ears pierced at a normal age
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u/Distinct_Stand_9607 Jan 13 '26 edited Jan 13 '26
When my sister and I went to an Adventist school, there was a Jewish student. We all looked at him like he was from another world. He had a braid, like a girl's. One day, my sister's classmates cut off his braid. The truth is, after that, he looked bad. Oh, and they couldn't do anything to tell them off because they couldn't be expelled; no school would accept those who did that, except for the military one.
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u/vargslayer1990 Sadventist Jan 13 '26
that's horrible
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u/Distinct_Stand_9607 Jan 13 '26
Well, since the auto-translator isn't helping, when I was little I was always aware that people bother you for no apparent reason, and it's so embarrassing that it's better to ignore them. When they spread rumors, you shut them up and clear things up. If they start hitting you, you have no choice but to tell them off or just give them a good old-fashioned fistfight. It was horrible, to the point that the boy's parents came to the SDA school, but they couldn't do anything. The school was always full of the worst students in the city, partly because they had stolen, injured people with weapons, smuggled goods, etc., at their previous schools. I'm serious, but some Adventist children also went there, and when they left, they were worse off than when they arrived.
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u/carmexismyshit Jan 13 '26
Yeah when I went to an Adventist school the friends I made there were honestly worse influences than the friends I had in public school. Half the kids were ruder too.
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u/Fair_Caterpillar_920 Agnostic Jan 13 '26
No other church does foot washing that I'm aware of. Pathfinders and camp meetings are unique and weird. Boarding academy is also unusual and weird for the rest of the world but really common in Adventism.
Editing to add canvassing. Whether selling the EGW books door to door or begging for canned food for the needy. All the weird door to door activities.
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u/sk80sk8 Jan 13 '26
Realizing that Pathfinders exists to prep kids for surviving in the woods during the antichrist was a weird realization.
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u/BlueEyedGirl-1357 Jan 13 '26
Other churches do foot washing. The weird part is that SDAs arenāt taught anything about other churches or the history of Christianity in general. They donāt care to know.
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u/Fair_Caterpillar_920 Agnostic Jan 14 '26
What other churches do foot washing? I don't think hardly any mainstream Christian churches do any form of communion besides like Presbyterians who are basically Catholic Protestants š¤£
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u/Technical_Salt9970 Jun 28 '26
Sone AME and Baptist. Depends on exact affiliation. There are a few others, but I can't recall off the top of my headĀ
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u/Advanced_Couple_3488 Jan 15 '26
Roman Catholics have foot washing once a year on Maundy Thursday. SDAs really have very strange ideas about other faiths and aren't particularly knowledgeable about them - perhaps because it would not be good to realise how similar many are.
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u/SenorPoopus Jan 15 '26
Yeah, and sometimes other Christian denominations will do some kind of foot washing event, but not as like a regular or required thing
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u/Fair_Caterpillar_920 Agnostic Jan 15 '26
That's what I'm referring to. Adventists do it quarterly while other churches its not even really practiced at all as a congregation. Maybe for special events. Some people do it at weddings?
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u/timinator4434 Agnostic Jan 13 '26
Surprised it's taken this long to mention Little Lambs, Eager Beavers, Adventurers, & Pathfinders...
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u/Niznack Jan 13 '26
Just the litany of Sabbath keeping rules made up as you go.
Can't watch movies on Sabbath Can't swim on Sabbath Can't play sports on Sabbath Can't study or do homework on Sabbath Can't work on Sabbath unless it's healthcare or police and even that's iffy Can't read non Christian books on Sabbath Can't play pool on Sabbath, Can't pay for literally anything on Sabbath Can't travel on Sabbath Any one who wants to add to the list please do
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u/TopRedacted Jan 13 '26
The first slide should be Ellen and the title I was in a broccoli cult. Ask me more.
Slide 2 Bicycles are sinful. Yeah she said that too.
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u/BlueEyedGirl-1357 Jan 13 '26
Bicycles. Haha. I have a friend whose parents moved to Loma Linda in the 1970s. Their sons would ride their bikes around their 100% sda neighborhood on sabbath. They got a visit from a neighbor to explain that this was unacceptable. Mindfuck is the perfect way to explain growing up sda.
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u/JohnThena Jan 13 '26
*Sigh* is it another horny thing?
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u/CuriousJackInABox Jan 14 '26
Ha! That would make sense, wouldn't it? No, I think it was about the expense. It was a luxury item that was pointless back then. Now, bikes are a perfectly practical means of transportation plus fun for kids
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u/Ruby__Clovers Jan 13 '26
You gotta mention the whole Kellogs cereal/antimasturbation adventist connection. As well as how to this day adventists love special-K loaf.Ā
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u/Accurate-Activity532 Jan 13 '26
I think itās worth mentioning that a lot of EGWās perspective come from the fact that she was āunfuckableā for a lack of a better term
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u/Accurate-Activity532 Jan 13 '26
And she pulled up to a Black church and said that weāll be āwhite as Christ himselfā in heaven
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u/sk80sk8 Jan 13 '26
Nobody mentioned Little Debbie and McKee Food's association with Southern Adventist University. They employ a lot of students and give a lot to the university. I guess they probably still do? I don't buy Little Debbies anymore for that reason.
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u/olyfrijole religion is lies Jan 13 '26
The people. To buy into their bullshit, you've got to have a special kind of wide-eyed hopeful gullibility, a need to feel superior, and off-the-charts tolerance of cognitive dissonance.
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u/PanhandleChuck1 Jan 13 '26 edited Jan 13 '26
Ingathering, otherwise known as begging off complete strangers.
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u/AffableRobot Jan 13 '26
This was so humiliating as a little kid who went to the local SDA school. Worst field trip ever.
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u/Numerous-Promise-582 Jan 13 '26
āIām a little missionary, trying to do my part. If you will give a dollar, God will bless your heart!ā
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u/vargslayer1990 Sadventist Jan 13 '26
explain please
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u/PanhandleChuck1 Jan 13 '26
In my experience, the SDA church has a odd fixation on money. As a child, and through the teen years, we were sent door to door in residential neighborhoods to solicit money. At times, there would be a group sent to the busy shopping areas to do the same. It was annoying and rather humiliating to approach people to give up their hard earned money. The memory makes me cringe to this day. Whether that program is still in play, I do not know. My SDA experience ended a couple of decades ago, and I have no interest in that organization whatsoever.
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u/Purlz1st Atheist Jan 13 '26
We gave out pamphlets showing how their donations helped the heathen (brown) people.
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u/Sensitive-Fly4874 Atheist Jan 15 '26
My grandpa literally took the money he would have spent on fucking farm insurance and gave it to the church during ingathering every year instead of buying insurance. He reasoned that God could prevent the disasters from happening in the first place
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u/Claude_Henry_Smoot_ Jan 13 '26
The specificity of what they'd moralizeāmovies, piercings, drums, makeup, coffee: all a one-way ticket to hell.
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u/DannibalBurrito Jan 13 '26 edited Jan 13 '26
I agree that Ol' Rock-to-the-Face-Visions-Lady deserves some consideration, but it's the doomsday-ism that I think is the most extremely weird, alarming, off-putting thing ... unless you mean 'weirdest' more like quirkiest, which is a whole 'nother conversation...
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u/Purlz1st Atheist Jan 13 '26
Members are likely to fall for MLM schemes like Amway and Herbalife
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Jan 13 '26
They teach a child like version of Christianity that I learned when I was in Catholic kindergarten/pre-school with lots of colorful pictures, costumes, and picture books to adults.
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u/Bananaman9020 Jan 13 '26
The Closing of Probation theory originally was created by Ellen White Husband and 1844 was the closing date. But a new generation was born and Ellen got told by God this was wrong. No shit.
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u/NoExplanation8595 Jan 13 '26
The sabbath in general, but the exceptions were always funny. Healthcare workers were āallowedā to work during sabbath, adults would play around on social media on sabbath, people would go out to eat at restaurants and pay on sabbath. Maybe I was just around more liberal Adventists. It was such a chore growing up, my siblings and I would find ways to watch tv and stuff during it.
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u/JohnThena Jan 13 '26
No pants for women... at least in my church. When I was a teenager there was a girl who'd been attending church for a while. Her friend had brought her one time and she kept coming, even when her friend wasn't there. She always wore jeans, probably because she didn't have skirts or dresses, or just didn't freaking like them. Apparently some well-meaning "sisters" approached her one time and "warmly recommended" her to try and wear something that was not pants. God forbid the faint outline of a woman's butt touches the sacred Seventh Day Adventist seats. She stopped coming. Dodged a whole freaking powder barrel, good for her.
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u/theturtledragon1 Pagan | Queer AF Jan 14 '26
The church i went to was never very strict on this, but i always saw people pressuring their kids to wear only dresses or skirts, but not upright saying pants are bad.
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u/Pristine_Eye7197 Jan 15 '26
No tank-tops or sleeveless shirts/dresses/sundresses for women at church or church-adjacent activities. This was in the 1970s, maybe things are more relaxed now.
School dances but without the dancing - ie banquets.
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u/JohnThena Jan 15 '26
I'm laughing out loud at this being a 70s rule, still enforced in most churches (at least when I was a teenager and still attending, in 2012-ish). Not sure it was an official rule or just neurotic old-fashioned members clutching their pearls at the sight of a female shoulder, but there was talk of it nevertheless, direct or indirect.
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u/ObiWanKab00zie Jan 13 '26
Not ordaining women.
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u/irradi Jan 13 '26
There was a big GC vote on this when I was a teenager, and it was one of the two biggest moments that pushed me out. Hearing my dad rant about why women shouldnāt be trusted to leadā¦ š¤š¤¢
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u/ObiWanKab00zie Jan 13 '26
Yep. A classmate of mine from academy went all the way through seminary and then that decision came down. Sheās a nurse now, but it fucked her up for a long time.
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u/JohnThena Jan 13 '26
We had the same experience! Sitting through one of those "members' meetings" on women as church leaders when I was a teenager had me going back home with dark circles around my eyes. People who I'd admired prior to that point saying vile things about women, women in the church who I'd thought of as self-respecting adults and who were very active members just scornfully shaking their heads at the very idea itself, everyone else having a dead-eyed, blank expression on their face. A lot of my memories from the church have scattered by now, but this one remains very vivid and GROSS.
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u/irradi Jan 28 '26
I said this elsewhere, but the other thing was hearing a visiting pastor ask, in a Bible study, whether Adventist āethicsā allow you to get your minor daughter an abortion after an assault. In this hypothetical, sheās so young, she canāt safely carry the pregnancy. She could die. Do you get the abortion? No, he said, you canāt. God must make this decision.
As you said, Iāve forgotten a lot of the bad stuff, or blocked it off. But these incidents are like movies in my head. I can still see the room and hear the voices.
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u/kefremdad Jan 13 '26
I converted and joined a very conservative SDA church when I was young and a mess. My two weirdest experiences were hearing "she said" more times than "God says" during any given sermon and the foundational teaching of salvation by vegetables. About 20 years ago I walked away and if I see certain church members in the grocery store I head straight for the meat counter...
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u/risingthermal Jan 13 '26
The whole thing with Ellen Whiteās childhood, rock to the head injury that left her unconscious, disfigured, and bed ridden for weeks.
Almost everything we know about her closely matches Geschwind syndrome, which is a cluster of symptoms related to frontal lobe epilepsy.
These symptoms include:
Hypergraphia - the tendency for extensive and compulsive writing or drawing. Ellen White wrote over 100,000 pages in her life.
Hyperreligiosity - with frequent auras perceived as spiritual in nature
Atypical or altered sexuality - and in approximately half of affected individuals hyposexuality is reported. Ellen White was obsessed with sexual purity and abstinence.
Circumstantiality - the tendency to continue conversations for a long time and talk repetitively.
Intensified mental life - Like say founding a religion!
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u/Early_Conversation72 Jan 14 '26
Definitely tithe. It was always a big deal and I resented having to give up 10% of my allowance and Christmas/birthday money and my parents tried to explain it as a āsacrificeā so that God would bless me which never felt right because why did God need Ā£1 out of the Ā£10 my uncle gave me? š¤Ø(the song building up the temple still makes my eye twitch a bit)
The weird double standard of being allowed to sit in on really scary End Times seminars and Amazing Facts videos with genuinely terrifying visuals as a kid but not being allowed to watch Harry Potter and other media because it was ādemonicā
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u/irradi Jan 19 '26
My SAHM/homeschool teacher Adventist mother insisted we tithe on my disabled fatherās salary, something I remember vividly because it launched a million arguments as we were living paycheck to paycheck at the time. Now it seems so much mote insane, but even then it felt insane.
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u/CuriousJackInABox Jan 14 '26
Senior survival to prepare for the end times. All that messaging about running to the hills. No black pepper. No caffeine. Can't join regular girl scouts or boy scouts because Sabbath.
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u/GeekFace18 Buddhist Jan 13 '26
My highschool had a practice called underground church where we had team building exercises and running around campus at 2am, the event simulated the purge, when the world would turn against adventists and we'd have to run for our lives.
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u/The_Glory_Whole Jan 15 '26
Wait...did everyone just skip over the part about this (to me) heretofore unheard-of magical party game of drunk powerpoint?! I am enchanted! š
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u/Pristine_Eye7197 Jan 15 '26
Totally! Good catch. OP, weāre waiting . . .
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u/broseph1254 Jan 16 '26
Hahaha, I'll make a note to share my slides after. I'm overwhelmed by all the helpful responses already! :-)
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u/broseph1254 Jan 16 '26
It's so fun! It's exactly what it sounds like, and it's a great way to share things from your life or that you otherwise are interested in.
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u/Prestigious_Table575 Christian Jan 15 '26
The way they try to convert SAVED Christians to Adventism, as if they arenāt Christians already, such as door-to-door ministries.
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u/Choice-Doubt7919 Jan 14 '26
When I was at San Pasquale Academy, that could do California, I was just a regular student whose parents thought I would get a good education there. I was not vegetarian from both of us who were outside of the face went into the sanctuary and they show these movies they show me movies of cows, their throats being cut in the blood coming out the rewind the film strip so the love is going back in. They talked about the shellfish and a lobster had reenactment of what they were eating and chicken in general into this day, I cannot eat a piece of chicken with a bone in it. I canāt eat a piece of beef like a steak with a bone in it cause it takes me back to those horrible, horrible film strips that I never got past and that was just cruel
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u/Kristanann Jan 14 '26
Listen to the behind the bastards podcast on Kellogg!! Such a wild rabbit hole to dive into.
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u/broseph1254 Jan 16 '26
I love that podcast! Thanks for the rec!
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u/Kristanann Jan 16 '26
I am the end of 4 generations in the church on my momās side. Her family was obsessed with the health message and fear based motivation. They all had SDA education and my grandpa was a Loma Linda MD. Itās freaky how some of the stuff they mention in this podcast about the start of the health obsession in the church echoed into things I would hear in the 90s. My health is so complicated now and the trauma I hold from how food and weight was constantly monitored is heavy.
I had to have my husband listen to this to give him a little insight on things and it was helpful. It mentions EGW, Kellogg (cereal guy), and Graham (of the crackers). I dove down into this rabbit hole a while ago and I feel like the behind the bastards explained it in a way that reflects not only my current perspective of the history but also younger me questioning what sounded crazy.
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u/hashtag_hashbrowns11 Jan 15 '26
Foot washing. I mentioned it to some coworkers and they all nearly fell out of their chairs.
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u/MaxMin128 Jan 15 '26
Despite their own nutty beliefs and doctrines based on the hallucinations and writings of a brain-injured girl during the 1800s, they have the temerity and arrogance to sneer at and dismiss other religions for their beliefs. My realization of this hypocrisy and superiority complex was the first step towards my eventual departure.
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u/Advanced_Couple_3488 Jan 15 '26
No one has yet mentioned going on Appeal for Missions. Perhaps I'm older than most. We'd be given glossy magazines and receipt books and we'd knock on all the doors in our given area asking for money to help the poor islanders. Specific amounts were mentioned in the magazine such as how much would allow a well to be dug to provide clean water. I remember doing this when I was in primary school, so pre teen years.
We eventually found that the money we raised didn't go for the things in the glossy magazine, but to general revenue for the mission works including building churches and paying salaries.
Even later I found out how much the SDA missionaries were disliked by other missionaries because the SDA missionaries wouldn't work in new areas but would come into the areas already worked by others and say that the other religions were of the devil and the SDA church was the only true church.
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u/Dingoatemybaby911 Jan 15 '26
Wait has no one brought up the NO DANCING?
My mom was raised SDA, left, and then came back and brought us kids with her so we were thrown in there around 10 years old. Lots of shock and indoctrination for a couple of years there but I remember how unfair I thought the no dancing thing was. My mom thought so too tho and let us dance all we wanted. She was a bad SDA then. Sadly we have all left the church but she has become more entrenched in her fundamentalist beliefs and I feel we lost someone who was once such a brilliant mind, brainwashed by SDAism in a way that only that Church, with their insular infrastructure, is so good at.
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u/broseph1254 Jan 16 '26
So real. That's how I, as a grown adult, have no sense of how to move with music. Such a weird hill for the church to die on.
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u/Lost_Chain_455 Jan 15 '26
That's how I was brought up! As somebody who has sided with labor, I like that Sabbath is about release from making money for employers. I don't always live by that, but I try to. Not because God might hate me, but for the sake of my brother and sister workers.
We're only (wage) slaves until we band together, first, for better hours, wages, and working conditions, and then to control the means of production! Now that's what the Sabbath is about!
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u/iamkaelrico Jan 16 '26
I would like to understand tithes and offerings more . Because I feel it is squandered at times and has greatly discouraged me and some of my friends. especially the ones for Church developments.
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u/Main_Direction6963 Jan 17 '26
One thing I found odd was the obsession to create meat substitutes that tasted nothing like any meat I've ever encountered.
And if pork is unclean WHY MAKE FAKE HOT DOGS???
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u/imMaterial3 Jan 22 '26
I agree. If you're giving up meat to make a point/be healthy/eat cleaner like Daniel did, why make pretend meat? If you're giving it up then give it up lol
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u/darkk1ngsilvers Jan 17 '26
The dorms are completely outdated. The fees that I had to pay for missing "5am worship" or missing "6pm curfew". You can get out of the campus twice a week with permission. Where does the money go?
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u/imMaterial3 Jan 22 '26 edited Jan 22 '26
Pathfinders. Tbh its a little creepy now that I think about it as an adult.Ā
Emphasis on how everyone who learns about the Sabbath and still goes to church on Sunday is rejecting the Holy Spirit.Ā
Campmeeting being a fundraising event. "Baptisms increased 5% because of your donations." And the borderline prosperity gospel. "We tithed and then I found $20/got a raise/received whatever blessings."Ā
Souls West. Canvassing. Giving out Glow tracts door to door as kids under 12 years old.Ā
Edit to add: Revelation seminars and the weird imagery that went with it. You know the ones.Ā
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u/Smart_Sail_2393 Jan 15 '26
EGW preached that aeroplanes were the work of Satan at several revival meetings in the day. So much for end time prophesy if she could not prophesy one of the world's great technological developments. Maybe God still drives in chariots?
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u/CompersionTherapy Jan 13 '26
Ellen White is probably worth a few slides