Curiosity  got the better of a friend who said, “I like your blog. You seem to be well-grounded in Scripture (she must mean My Other Other Blog).  But…why do you call yourself a ‘heretic’?”

Off the cuff, “It’s a JOKE.”  Serious answer—it’s really NOT a joke.

I’ve spent my entire life living in the Bible Belt.  A lot of folks here will actually tell you, “You’re going to go to hell if you don’t go to church!” To their mind, it seems, you can have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and be knowledgeable about Scripture, but if you don’t “belong to” or “go to” a “church-as-they-know-it”, you’re going to hell. In the Bible Belt, if you don’t “go to church”—in some cases that means every time the door opens—you risk being branded a “backslider”.  I commit “heresy” by challenging their traditional view of church-as-they-know-it.
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