this post was submitted on 01 Aug 2024
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I don't at all understand churches advertising.. Maybe because of my European ass? To my knowledge churches are not about profit? I get that you want to announce your service times and such, but put that in a small column in a newspaper for the ones interested or something lol
In America, all things are about profit.
In Europe we are sadly switching to that attitude too.
USA gotta export its worse ideas abroad, after all. For-profit churches, flat earth, antivaxx
More like someone in Europe realizing that they could import something from America and it'd catch on like an invasive plant species with no local ecological resistance.
America didn't invent any of that.
AFAIK, they did invent the modern flat-Earthism. Europe designed a straw-men to use as racist propaganda to say the people on their colonies are stupid, but it was a group at the US that said "yes, that's us, and we are proud of it!"
Antivax was invented everywhere, again and again, so,maybe they get a half point for it too.
Where do you think we got the idea from?
That's an ad for Mormons. The Mormons are a corporation disguised as a church that has gained extreme wealth. They own a huge real estate empire, universities, and farms plus over a hundred billion in one investment fund.
Thy have been caught numerous times breaking all sorts of financial laws but because of their status as a church it's hidden.
For the Mormons it's all about profit and hoarding wealth.
A religion of hoarding money. It doesn't get any more American than that.
In NZ, churches don't have to pay tax. This makes them extremely attractive to people with no skills who want to obtain wealth
American megachurches are for-profit multimedia empires, doomsday cults, illegal political influence organizations, human trafficking rings, and shields for those who commit sex crimes, in an expensive, tailored trenchcoat.
The church in the ad is particularly harmful. I had to fight to get out of it, and only after they took 10% of my income for years and trafficked me. They want money, power, and control, not increased numbers at their services.
There's a serious "wait, what?!?" here. The church sells slaves?
I was threatened by local leaders and family if I didn't go on a 2 year mission in another country, then when I got there, they:
I didn't want to call it trafficking for a long time. I figured maybe God just had a weird way of doing things. But my spouse works at a recovery center for survivors of violence (including trafficking) and helped me realize that's what it was.
A pretty big misconception is that trafficking has to look like selling slaves, and I agree that's an egregious thing, but it can be a lot more broad than that.
There are a lot of resources at https://humantraffickinghotline.org/en if you're curious. My mission experience checked just about every box for labor trafficking, and I've heard very similar stories from a lot of other people who have been missionaries.
Yep, sounds like slavery. Taking your passport away would already be enough.
Were you mormon? Or is this more widespread than I thought?
If you are talking about the mormon church, and if what I've heard is correct, you missed an added point that makes it look all the worse. That you had to pay for the right to let them do that to you. Normally in a labour trafficking situation you'd at least be expecting some sort of compensation, even if it's grossly inadequate and ends up largely back in the hands of the traffickers as they charge for accommodation and transport. But from what I've heard, mormons do the labour entirely for free, and pay a large amount for the "honour".
I was mormon. Thankfully my parents paid to traffic me, so I could afford to go to college and cut them off relatively soon after I got home.
They might be talking about a mission? Personally wouldn't call that trafficking, but it can be pretty brutal depending on the mission
What the GP describes looks exactly like trafficking.
It is trafficking. Growing up in that church, I still agree with a lot of the stated philosophical beliefs, the actual behavior of most of the community is incredibly disappointing and leans cult-like. The mission isn't inherently trafficking, the religion isn't inherently a cult, but it's not beating the allegations and more within need to call out the members that commit these illegal organized atrocities and make it into a cult.
The gods demand more believers to increase their mana.
Not everything is so Black & White ;)
They want to convince you to come to their church so you can donate to their church which is totally not profit it is for the lord trust me it’s not sweet delicious tax-exempt profit mmmm
I imagine it’s a form of evangelism. Like, if they can convince someone to attend church from the ad then that is the same as saving their soul and gets them points in God’s book (or so they tell people when in reality money is the goal).
in America everything is about profit
Oh my sweet child...