I've started, I dunno, believing in god more recently; but there's like a meme that says "You're religion does not prohibit me from anything, it prohibits you, learn the difference"
And underlying all of my beliefs, I think is this fundamental liberalism, that no matter how conservative I may personally get as I age, that's about me, not anyone else, and the thing that bothers me about some of these turns towards Christianity like Thiel and Vance or other masters of the world, is it really feels like an excuse to say something like "My behavior no matter how bad is ok because I have an objective truth behind me". And this idea is really disturbing to me.
It feels a lot like a rehash of things like the prosperity gospel which serve as a post hoc justification for what they wanted to do anyway. It’s conspicuous that everyone cited seems to be involved in right-wing politics, ignoring the long tradition of other views which didn’t get pushback, and the views which tended to get the most social friction were things like demonizing gay people or immigrants (about whom Christ said nothing and implored his followers to help, respectively). It’s quite hard to reconcile many of the names listed with Luke 16, 18, etc. when several of them could individually make transformative changes in millions of lives with no impact on their lifestyle or comfort.
And underlying all of my beliefs, I think is this fundamental liberalism, that no matter how conservative I may personally get as I age, that's about me, not anyone else, and the thing that bothers me about some of these turns towards Christianity like Thiel and Vance or other masters of the world, is it really feels like an excuse to say something like "My behavior no matter how bad is ok because I have an objective truth behind me". And this idea is really disturbing to me.