Stupid Shit Heard In Church

By: Chris Kratzer

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

Length: 4 hrs and 30 mins

Publisher's summary

Countless people are losing their faith in God, Jesus, Church, and Christianity. Many feel deeply damaged and led astray by their experiences within church and the Christian faith. The duplicity, the judgementalism, the allegiance to politics, and the bullying of the vulnerable and the different have isolated many. Every Sunday, it seems, there is a new chorus of condemnation, shame, and religious elitism. God is portrayed as a hating, violent, temperamental, murderous, codependent, and exclusive deity. The Christian faith is pimped as a performance-driven, privileged-laden, fear-focused, and conditional faith. In the hearts and minds of many, the religious-right has hijacked Jesus and made him into the mascot of their bigotry, discrimination, power, and greed. In his book, “Stupid Shit Heard In Church,” pastor and author Chris Kratzer boldly confronts the evils of much of modern Christianity and charts a new path of faith that rescues Jesus out of the claws of conservative Evangelicalism. Within essays of artistically crafted words wrapped in deep, revolutionary meaning, Chris gives powerful voice to the religiously oppressed; affirming and encouraging their value, inclusion, and worth. He unveils incredible, fresh new ways of understanding, believing, and living as a person of faith. As one reader declares, “This book is going to change the world!”

Pretty angry rant at conservative Christianity.

Narrated by AI… why? This was spoiled so many times by the narration that couldn’t correctly identify what the word actually was because of letters mixed with other characters like F&@k.. which happened A LOT. I did laugh a few times at the absolute stripping down of modern evangelicals. There were so many important, spot on observations that were just shrouded in so much anger that they’d never fly outside of appealing to an already angry group who’ve experienced church trauma. Sure be angry. You should be… but if you want people to consider that they’re actually “tickling the nipples of Satan” then you’d need to tone it down some. Theologically, and also logically there were quite a few inconsistencies within the ‘be who you are, don’t let anyone tell you that you need to change’ language. I liked a lot about the book but sadly disliked just as much. For someone looking to salvage my own faith this book was no help. It was just the left version of the right… which in essence is still fundamentalism of a different name.

OH WOW.......

Absolutely amazing. Especially if you're someone who A. Knows that something about "church" isn't right and you can't stand church people but you still believe in God. B. You are someone who has totally deconstructed your Christian faith and no longer believe in God at all.

Just another form of guilt

The book feels like just another way to push the idea of Jesus and Christianity. I thought it would validate my choice to leave it behind as I develop my own ideas and put together the hypocrisy of the catholic faith which was forced upon me until my departure from the church at age 18. Instead I was met with just another form of guilt. The author may present it in more loving and accepting terms, but leaves no room for any belief other than Christianity. I couldn't listen to more than half of it. What the author states we "may not hear in church" are simply things we "may hear in a different church ". I do not recommend this book to anyone with larger ideas on faith than those pushed upon us by society.

Powerful

This book pretty much goes on every rant against the Evangelical White Nationalist Homophobic Racist MAGA Fascist Right that I could ever dream of. Thank you Chris Kratzer for finally saying it all out loud! I love that the AI voice chosen was female. I'm sorry the choice was for AI, it did screw a few things up.