religion: church

I thought when my pastor said the tithes and offerings were 'given for God's use', he actually took it to the church parking lot, threw up the money, and God would take as much as he could from the tossed cash. The rest that fell to the ground belonged to the humans. Safe to say, it's no wonder we moved to a bigger building in record time.

A neighbor girl and I were convinced that leprosy was a very common thing. Started in Bible class, I'm certain. The lepers were dealt with by throwing them through a hole in the roof of a specal house without doors or windows, piling up inside and eventually dying. We identified several of these places in our neighborhood. Mean enough, but our greatest concern was that we could be easily infected with leprosity by being touched by older people, say 60+. Our understanding was that church was above all an institution that dealt with this threat by healing lepers. Apparently our teacher wasn't a good communicator.

I used to think that going for a ski holiday to Austria shortly after chrismas was a religious command, because the stable that Jesus was born in was located in that particular village. Also, people in in that Village practcally all had names like "Joseph" and "Maria".

When I was little, I lived in a mostly Hispanic neighborhood where passion plays were held during Holy Week. On Good Friday 1967 or '68, there was a big procession that went right under our apartment window with a guy portraying Jesus carrying the cross, Roman soldiers, etc. I got the idea that Jesus came back to Earth every year to be crucified all over again.

I used to believe that if you wore jeans to church, God would strike you down with lightening (I still get a little nervous and pause for a second when I walk through the chuch door wearing jeans...)

I always wondered why we made donations in church. If god was the creator of everything and had the power to create more why were we sending him our money. I had no idea that the donations actually paid for the church itself. I thought that the money was given to god by the priests.

My Mother once told me when I was a little kid while we were in Church that it was God's house.
Our church had a back room for the choir and I always thought that was were God lived. I always wondered why He would never come out...

I was raised Catholic, and at Easter we'd always hear the stories about the women encountering Jesus after his resurrection. I somehow twisted this into thinking that Jesus came back to life EVERY Easter, and that there was some secret place grown-up women knew about where you could go to meet with him face-to-face.

I used to think that If I did something bad then God would punish me by making my bang by leg or hurt myself in some way, or not get something that I wanted. I used to hate myself for committing 'sins'.

I used to think that my dad was jesus, because he looked like the traditional brown bearded, blue eyed illustration of him. but I also kind of though that he was the devil because he didn't come to church with me and my mum. It was ver confusing.

When we went to Catholic mass when I was about 8 or 9 years old we always used to sit on the front bench. At that time we weren't 'confirmed' and so didn't go up for holy communion but we listened in on those who were. The priest at our church was an old Irish guy who'd obviously said the words so often that they merged together so for years I thought that when he put the 'host' on your tongue he said 'puddy-pram' to you. A couple of years later I learned that he actuallly said 'body of christ'.

Growing up in a very religious home, once in a while, we'd have "devotions". I always liked them because we had to listen to the other person so that way no one would interrupt me. (I liked to talk, still do!) So every night after dinner, which was usually the time we would have them, i'd ask my mom, "Mommy, when are we going to have divorcen?"

I currently live around the corner from a church with a very large cross in the front of it. When I was much younger, my brother, Travis, thought that it was a shrine welcoming him home from wherever he was, so until he was about four years old, the only way he knew how to get to our house was "Turn right at the house with the big T

when i was a kid and we went to church, the priest would always tell us to offer each other a sign of peace. (shake hands and say "peace"). but i always used to say, "Peas!" instead of "Peace." OOps

i used to think that when people would tell me at church or something that "god is all around you" that there was little invisible men who i considered god literally ALL around me, syanding next to me all the time

When I was a child attending Catholic Mass, we had certain responses we had to say after the priest spoke. At the end of Mass, we were supposed to say "Thanks be to GOD"....................For the longest time I thought we were saying "Thanks, Speedy GOD" as if he sped the Mass up so that we wouldn't be bored.