A religion one here -aibu to find my work colleagues comments offensive

[bagpuss90]

Hope this is allowed - a work colleague and I were discussing the dreadful case in the news this week about the crossbow killer who killed three people . She’s a committed Christian which I respect. I said how much my heart broke for the poor husband and father and his surviving daughter and how I could never ever forgive the guy who carried out the murders. She said that you can hate the sins but forgive the sinner. She also said that we don’t know the full story - wtf??? We don’t know what the killers girlfriend did?!?! It got quite heated- her saying that if the father didn’t forgive the killer - he couldn’t be forgiven by god . I get that this is what she believes and I have to respect that . I told her I thought we would have to agree to disagree . But despite respecting a persons religion- please tell me aibu to find her comments offensive ?

Give her a wide berth. Anyone who thinks there is a reason to do what the killer did - basically torture and kill, is not right in the head, regardless of religious belief.

It’s so weird to me, all these posters feeling offended by the utterings of a random woman. How is that even possible? I k ow that there are people in the world who believe that public lashings, or execution by lethal injection, or open-ended detention without charge are reasonable and legal. Do I find all these things unconscionable and contrary to basic human rights? Yes. Am I offended by these things? No! How can I be? They’re not happening to me, nobody is putting them on me. They’re just people believing different things to me.

I really don’t get this “offended” thing. Moreover, what does it matter if someone is offended by something? What difference does that feeling (of being offended) make to anything?

So this woman’s (mistaken, I think) view of Christian theology is that god might ‘forgive’ this foul murderer for the murder, but damn the victims’ father if he couldn’t forgive?

It's possibly that you didn't read the full post - but I could be wrong. The OP is not offended because the colleague holds Christian views of forgiveness. She is offended because the colleague suggested the murder victims may have deserved or in some way courted their horrific fate. She apparently said "We don’t know the full story. We don’t know what the killer's girlfriend did". This implies that the murderer had some justification for raping, torturing and finally killing his victims (women aged 25, 28 and 61). They were all bound with wire with the younger women shot by crossbow and the 61 year old subjected to a frenzied knife attack. Now, I don't know about you but I can see no justification this side of hell for such an atrocity. For what it's worth there is no implication that any of these women did anything even remotely "wrong" other than falling prey to a sadistic, cowardly and psychopathic man with a history of violence. So in short I would think any right minded person would find her comments off the scale offensive.

I voted YANBU but it was finely balanced.

YANBU because offence is personal and you can’t really be said to be unreasonable for having your reaction. Her religiously-grounded viewpoint doesn’t become reasonable (or not) just because it’s religiously well-grounded (or not).

But I almost went for YABU because it sounds to me like she is saying ‘judge not’ and ‘forgive’. These are foundational Christian beliefs and presumably you’ve heard them a lot. What did you think it meant, vibes? I’m an atheist, but the teaching isn’t “judge not, unless they’re really bad. Forgive when it’s an easy case”.

She’s entitled to her opinion and forgiveness is a very personal thing. I feel the same way as you- I couldn’t forgive someone who murdered 3 of the people I love most in the world. And brutally raped one of them.

I would be so done with anyone who uttered the words “we don’t know what the girlfriend did“. We do know. She dumped his abusive arse and then he raped her and murdered her and her mum and her sister I believe. But there is virtually nothing she could have done to deserve what happened to those 3 women.

How dare who?

I think he should have got the death penalty and I would have told her that.

@WTFFML

Anyone who speaks about religion as fact, talks about the judgement of their ‘god figure’ as if it’s a real thing which affects everyone, is really offensive.

Wouldn’t you have to extend this to all belief, to be consistent?

If you speak of your ethics as fact (“child abuse is wrong”) as if it affects everyone (“always”), isn’t that also really offensive?

If not, what’s the difference? (It can’t be that you just know your ethics are right. That’s a claim many religious people would also sincerely claim).

Such lazy rhetoric 💤 😴

So she can forgive the unrepentant murderer but can't forgive the bereaved father and widower for hating? Weird. CoI: Christian.

I think it is ok for her to have an opinion and for you to disagree with that opinion. We don’t all think the same way and that’s fine. It’s not like you were personally impacted by the case and she wasn’t even telling you how to feel.

I love true crime podcasts and quite a few people forgive their family members killers. It’s healing for them to let go of the hate. I don’t know what sta meant by we don’t know the full story - maybe she is suggesting that he had a mental health problem rather than victim blaming.

Thou shall not kill is basic. Breach that and your going to hell regardless of how much you repent. Personally not a believer, but I do think prison should be made to be like hell on earth for these people.

Completely disagree. The shared values of a community are not beliefs. To extend your logic if child abuse is objectively wrong for "God" why for the first 1900 years post Jesus were girls allowed to marry at 12? Did everyone who did this end up in hell for abusing the children, how do we know that "God" is happy with 16 being the age of consent maybe "God" thinks it should be 25 and in the future we will collectively agree that is better just like we collectively agreed that 12 was too young to marry. Shared values set out in law are very different to religious beliefs.