It’s always been a business. Even in biblical times. The only time Jesus got violent in the Bible, was when he beat the shit out of the money lenders doing business in the temple.
HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club 1 day ago
Read up on The Great Awakening in the USA.
You had large parts of the USA without an established church and a lot of religious freedom. So, you had pastors able to preach whatever they wanted without government intervention. This free market Jesus produced a lot of religious diversity. Some pastors used this as an opportunity to turn religion into a business.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 day ago
VerilyFemme@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 day ago
Crazy how the only thing to cause the son of God to fly into a violent rage was unfettered capitalism
Agent641@lemmy.world 3 hours ago
He also killed a fig tree for not having any figs on it.
This is also perfectly understandable.
HobbitFoot@thelemmy.club 1 day ago
The question was kind of vague in terms of what part of Christianity he was questioning, but it seems to be focused on how churches currently function. At that point, I figured I’d focus on prosperity gospel for some US churches, which is a uniquely American phenomenon.
To just say “religion has always been like that” may bury understanding on how the current form came into being.
andros_rex@lemmy.world 3 hours ago
The documentary Marjoe is a really good exploration of this. Former child preacher who stopped believing, and invites a documentary crew as he does a tour.
It’s in the public domain - they forget to register it, so you should be able to find the full movie online.