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I believe my grandmother grew up Unitarian, and that was where she got her quiet atheism and staunch belief in never discussing religion from. She was a good lady, including those attributes, and I'm not trying to make fun of her.
People say it as though they are being sarcastic, but Woke America is literally what agnostic Christians are. I tried going to my neighborhood Presbyterian church once, and the main song was about the singer's friend dying from Aids in 90s New York. Then I stayed for coffee, and the music director was trying to talk about his genderqueer daughter as delicately as possible -- he was clearly a bit distressed that she doesn't consider herself a daughter anymore and he's not supposed to use gendered language, but was struggling.
My father kept trying to go to an Episcopalian church that didn't particularly believe in Christ, because they had a nice choir, and nice architecture, and candles during the appropriate seasons. But the sermons were terrible, like the middle aged women getting up on their social media soapboxes, and he couldn't manage.
I don't get it on a visceral level, but it is what it is. There seems to be something important about actually believing in Christ, without which Christianity becomes horrifically cringe, more than even fake paganism which at least has nice bonfires and solstice celebrations and whatnot.
As others have said, there are churches that aren't like that. Usually they aren't that upset if someone shows up, and they don't necessarily believe in God, but are polite about it. If they're one of the livelier churches, they might try to convert you, but even if they're all Hellfire about it, it's still probably a richer cultural experience than the Unitarians.
If you don't believe there's a One True Religion, it might actually be worth thinking in terms of rich cultural experiences, rather than intellectualism or not believing weird things. I like visiting Sufis, for instance -- I once was in a screened off female balcony while some Sufi congregants chanted themselves into a trance and stuck skewers through their faces. It was super interesting! I was glad I went! If someone invites you to go sacrifice a cow of something, consider going. Humans don't seem capable of making religions that are deep and lively without also being kind of weird, and risking snake handlers or whirling dervishes or some such thing.
You know, I have a couple of Gen X friends (women) who I'm quite sure voted for Harris express and then agree on the statement "so this is why our parents' generation had a rule against discussing politics or religion in polite company." I've always mostly abided by that myself, but it felt interesting to hear the sentiment voiced aloud.
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Indeed, and this isn't a new observation either. In his first letter to the Corinthians, Saint Paul writes:
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