Reruns also pulled now from both TLC.com and video streaming site Hulu.
I have heard the most extreme call the Roman Catholics a cult. But yes, many people can be quite religious and still Biblical in their love, tolerance, acceptance, etc, for others. Same goes for non Christian faiths. My dear Evangelical friend in Texas, btw, is a remarkable woman.
In surprising parts of the country, this stuff is thriving. My experience with the woman who excused her actions toward me was in metro S.Cal. And in a progressive tech field. But I have a friend here in the a northeast whose husband is a fund/evang preacher and again, a warm and wonderful, caring, accepting- and open- person. We can find the good examples, as well as the bad. This is not about Christianity. It’s more what one does with it. Or with whatever faith it is.
Your post makes it sound like she is somehow exceptional. Many evangelical Christians are remarkable people. Again, evangelical is not the same as fundamentalist, although I know of no fundamentalist denominations that aren’t evangelical. Maybe someone else does. Most evangelical denominations are not fundamentalist. .
Surprising to you.
Z, this woman IS truly amazing and I’m no easy pushover. Of course there are many. I’m just citing a dear friend.
And I meant “surprising” to many others who assume it’s only Down South or in vague pockets. Not me.
Ok, I get you now. I’m confident that she is amazing. My pastor is a pretty amazing woman, too. Darling, I could tell you stories!
I respectfully think there is a lot of misinformation about Protestant denominations here on CC and in places with otherwise very educated people who aren’t Protestant.
My hope is that the show has at least given the Duggar children an exposure to a wider world. Hope it helps at least some of them break free.
That’s absolutely true, but a lot of those liberal evangelicals are considered heretics by those who consider themselves “truly saved.” Just look at the nasty stuff written about “red-letter Christians” (http://www.redletterchristians.org/) like Brian McLaren, Jim Wallis, and Tony Campolo.
Many of these “truly saved” consider Roman Catholics to be heretics too, although they’re happy to partner with those conservative Catholics who oppose abortion rights.
I had my two younger sons now rising freshman and rising junior sit and one of the 16 and pregnant shows a couple years ago. They got the message real quick. 
And there are old school Protestants who are still fighting the centuries-old battle against the Catholics, at last rhetorically here in the US. But so what? Religions bring a long history. The point I’m trying to make is that it’s important to have some information before lumping diverse groups of people together.
It is very true that the labels being thrown around are often very simplistic. For example, if you looked at Catholics and judged it by the Bishops in the US, you would think most Catholics are these rabid believers who think birth control is a sin, gays are disordered and deserve to be treated as such and so forth, and the reality is most Catholics look at the Bishops with more than a smirk on their faces, most of the Catholics I know (and I live in a very heavily Catholic area) love their church and the people, and basically ignore the local Bishop.
The evangelical/fundamentalist is a common mashup, and many people assume this. Evangelical Christians mean simply that they tend to promote their faith in many ways, lot of them do mission work, help the poor, as part of this, and talk about their faith,and this is true whether liberal or conservative. The problem is that with the whole religious right becoming a major political force, most of whom are fundamentalist or extremely conservative, this is what we routinely see in the media, it is what we hear about. We don’t hear about the people who quietly live their faith, we see the preacher at a GOP political rally calling for gays and lesbians to be put in concentration camps, we saw the Jerry Falwells, the Joel Osteens, the ones who go around claiming the US is a “Christian” nation and should have laws reflecting that, and these are routinely called “Evangelicals” by the media. I was just reading something about the Iowa caucus, and how candidates are burnishing their social conservative positions, and they said that the GOP voters were heavily dominated by Evangelicals, when the reality is they are typically fundamentalist Christians.
I am going to sound like a member of right wing talk radio, but in this the media is really to blame, in their wanting a simple picture, the Media proclaimed ‘the Evangelical revolution’ in the GOP, and to this day they talk about the political power of Catholic Bishops, when the reality is the Bishops claim to power is way, way overstated. We have been sold about this tremendous revolution, when it really only represents a relatively small portion of the population, but because it tends to be concentrated in certain areas, it seems to have massive power (talking the extremely social conservative, out there type we have been talking about).
My only criticism of many Christians, liberal and otherwise, is that in many ways they have let these types grab the mantle of “Christian”, and then they will complain how their faith has been maligned,how people view them negatively. In large part,this is because many evangelicals (who aren’t the fundamentalist-hater type), or more mainstream or progressive Christians tend not to be out there, loudly talking about their beliefs, they tend to go about their business, their missions, and so forth, but do so quietly, so the loudmouths and the politically connected end up getting the press.There are many Catholic churches in the US who are very supportive of LGBT people, whose priest and members are caring and loving, but they often have to hide (or at least had to hide), because the Bishops in power were very anti LGBT, often viciously so, so they had to hide under the radar, so if you looked at things from the outside, it looks like any Catholic Church would be as friendly to LGBT people as the typical fundamentalist mega church, and that isn’t true. I belonged for a while to a very liberal church, and one of the things that bothered me a lot was the attitude that it wasn’t their place to criticize fellow Christians, how it was our job to show love, etc…yet this was a church that had many people as congregants who had been hurt, badly, by the kind of churches we are talking about, many of them alienated from their families because the family belonged to those kind of churches, you name it, and not speaking up gave them the message they as people weren’t worth it, it was like “okay, you can join our church, we have inclusive language, we talk about the issues, but don’t expect us to defend you or speak out”, and that is half hearted at best. That doesn’t mean there aren’t liberal churches fighting against the religious right on issues like same sex marriage, or on the rights of others, or birth control, oir women’s rights, there are, but there is a common attitude that you don’t fight fire with fire, you don’t speak out against the perversion of the faith, and it is why Christians have been lumped together with the extreme, fundamentalist, anti everything types.
And yes, that type of Christian is not just limited to Texas or the south or the farm belt, there churches like that in very liberal areas, in the northeast, there is one about a half mile from my house in a fairly libertarian suburb of NYC (the church stands out like a sore thumb, they routinely try to pressure the school board to introduce creationism as an alternate scientific view, when the town years ago adopted an official non discrimination policy towards LGBT employees and towards residents, members of the church picketed the town hall where the town council was meeting and spoke out in open meetings (they literally were the only ones speaking out against it), it was pretty pathetic.
And I would say that non-fundamentalist Christians, through bodies such as the National and World Council of Churches and others do speak to their faith, but the media loves a good story because that’s how it turns a profit and the story that is most sexy or outrageous is what they will cover. There is also a portion of the country that chooses to marginalize even mainstream Christianity as extreme for political purposes. Because otherwise respectful discussions might be necessary, and that can’t be allowed. And, also, ignorance. Some of the people here and elsewhere just can’t bother to become informed, just like liking Facebook posts that are simplistic or straight-out wrong, it’s easier to follow along with your crowd and share the same (mis)information because it lets you fit in better with your class. That’s also the reason why Christians are excoriated for holding positions that are ignored when held by members of other religious faiths. It’s really not that hard to get informed before offering an opinion.
The Duggars not keeping their kids safe, isn’t a religious matter.
It was a decision that they made when they chose a lifestyle that limited the oversight and connection they would have over their children, when they chose to house more kids than some classrooms.
Unless they were going to hire adults to take shifts, it was predictable that something would escalate before they even found out about it.
Jimbob also exacerbated his f-up, when he lied to the cop about the extent and number of molestations.
Telling him it was once on the outside of clothing, is much different than what actually happened and what he knew about.
http://defamer.gawker.com/jim-bobs-punishment-for-masturbators-crazy-duggar-tale-1707675683
More Duggary tales…
Regarding the last one about dragons - I think I understand what it relates to (that dinosaurs aren’t real). Once when discussing evolution with an old high school classmate who converted from Catholicism to something fundamental, she explained her belief that the devil put dinosaur fossils on the earth to trick humans into disbelieving the creation story.
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I am appreciating learning about the distinctions made here between evangelicals and fundamentalists. Had not realized they were not synonymous.
Any words can have different practical connotations. But you got me to look at some definitions.
Evangelical: of or relating to a Christian sect or group that stresses the authority of the Bible, the importance of believing that Jesus Christ saved you personally from sin or hell, and the preaching of these beliefs to other people.
Fundamentalism: a movement in 20th century Protestantism emphasizing the literally interpreted Bible as fundamental to Christian life and teaching; the beliefs of this movement; adherence to such beliefs
Otoh, wiki: Independent Baptist [the Duggar claim] churches (some also called Independent Fundamental Baptist, or IFB) are Christian congregations, generally holding to conservative (primarily fundamentalist) Baptist beliefs, and notable for choosing not to join a Baptist denomination.
Not sure we’ll come up with the one right descriptor. But I do think we all understand that when we’re talking about the Duggars, it’s not mainstream. (Another word we could ponder, I suppose.)
I am a member of the Lutheran church. Our national church has the word “evangelical” in its name - the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. In this case the word means we want to share the church.
The ELCA has had female pastors and leadership for decades, is pretty liberal on most social issues and, yes, accepts evolution 
I wish the media would use a different word to describe the independent and (backward, IMHO) churches like the duggars.
I have never watched the show, but I have read that the Duggars do not consider themselves to be part of the quiver full movement, although there are many articles describing them as such, and even Michelle Duggars sister uses that term.
Fundamentalist, means nothing to me, that seems to be a descriptor more relevant to someone describing themselves/their beliefs.
Evangelical, is easier to get, those are the people who go door to door, who feel that they know better than I do, what my values should be. Thankfully, I live in an unchurched part of the country, and most don’t persist with conversation when I let them know that I’m not interested.
Some like the LDS church, have the youth spread the word, but outside of the 19yr olds in white short sleeved shirts & ties, and on bikes, I haven’t noticed any other Mormons interested in whether I believe that God has a physical body and lives on another planet.
I don’t believe they consider themselves evangelical, as that seems to be dependent on the born again concept.
This has a link to the Gothard curriculum the Duggars apparently used as a resource- specifically counseling sexual abuse & how to blame the victims, for not being pure enough.
The Urban Dictionary has turned Duggar into a verb @-)
@surfcity - One of my kids applied to St. Olaf which is ELCA. His college counselor, a preppy New Englander, warned us about it being evangelical. I had to set him straight it wasn’t a super conservative place and what ELCA was all about.