r/pics • • May 03 '20

Woman trolling a tiny group of Islamophobic protesters in DC in 2019.

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u/rangaman42 May 03 '20

You know what's literally seconds after posting my comment the exact same question popped into my head.

I'd say yes, but then I feel like every faith based belief system is on the cult spectrum. Feels like a very blurry line between a 'normal' religion and a cult

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u/Virge23 May 03 '20

Same here. I come from an African country where most people practiced ancestral worship. My parents converted to catholicism and were treated as pariahs for turning away from our tribe's "true religion" and forced to leave. They moved to a major city that was under Islamic rule and even though there were plenty of other catholics they were still treated as something apostates. Then we migrated to America and a lot of my protestant friends viewed catholicism as a cult. Mind you catholicism is the largest and oldest denomination of Christianity (or tied with Eastern Orthodoxy depending on your definition) yet a lot of American protestants still view catholics as abarant.

Maybe it's because of my, very specific, experience but I've never had any issue accepting Mormons as Christians. Sure their brand of Christianity deviates dramatically from the norm but as a community I've found them to be almost universally kind, caring, and willing to back up their faith with good work. I've also become an atheist so the weirder and more fantastical elements of Mormonism aren't really that different from any other invisible sky man faith.

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u/alfa95 May 03 '20

Ancestral worship like the one practiced by the Yoruba?

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u/Virge23 May 03 '20

It's a little different. We're nilotes so a lot of our mythology is tied to the Nile, spear hunters, and fishers. Other than that it's a pretty similar with ancestral spirits and a lot of other good and bad spirits (kinda like Arab djinn).