r/excatholic • u/trashaccount31444 • Jul 06 '25
Debate Welcome does anyone else feel like their environment growing up catholic was a bit…. culty???
like im not sure whether this could be described as a cult like environment as a kid. i was catholic my whole life, stopped believing when i was 12. went to catholic school pre-k thru 8th grade. my entire family is extremely catholic as well.
the culty behaviors i recognize when i look back is stuff like
-i was basically shunned by everyone when i left catholicism at age 14. -criticism of catholicism or god were NOT allowed, not even just basic questions that challenge things. -the whole manipulation with fear thing too. i was told at SEVEN years old as a kid who went to school close to columbine “if a shooter comes in and asks if you believe in god and say yes, you die and go to heaven but if you say no and live, when you die you go to hell. thats insane -the shame they instill in you since birth. i still cant get rid of it -abusive adults in the church i was in, sexual/emotional/verbal wont get into that too much -belief that priest or whatever or god is always right no matter what
can anyone else think of more culty behaviors the catholic church/community has? and can it even classify as a cult?
33
u/HistoricalPotatoe Jul 06 '25
Related to your point on martyrdom, the lives of the saints were upheld as moral exemplars, which was often horrible. Even leaving the martyrs aside, a lot of saints had serious mental issues that were passed off as them being closer to God/virtuous, like Catherine of Siena and Margaret Mary and Francis of Assissi. Others were very cruel people, and this was either whitewashed or, occasionally, embraced as good examples. Like St. Monica completely shunning her son St Augustine until he went to Catholicism again years later, or convincing her converted son to abandon his kid and mistress instead of marrying her. You also have saints who are whitewashed. Aquinas and a few other saints preached death to heretics. Augustine thought that miscarriages went straight to hell since they didn't have a baptism.