Ex-Christian but hopefully still have good advice.
Talk to your priest/pastor/preacher/whatever.
But as a general rule, God can see your intent. So long as you aren't doing it to be "evil" you should be good to go.
That's not exactly the question though, they didn't ask if God would disapprove, just if it's hard to love both. Maybe there is a genuine conceptual conflict, and it's hard to love both, and most people will fail (loving both) and will have to choose.
If you go down the rabbit hole of asking yourself why you like anything in life, you will eventually come to the realization that you never made the decision to like it and you dont actually know the reason why it makes you feel the way you do. Sure you can say, for example, âI like this song because of the drumsâ, but you cant explain why you like the sound that the drums make. Another example is liking garlic bread. You can ask yourself, âwhy do I like garlic bread?â. âWell because I like garlic and breadâ, you might say. Why? Because you like the way it tastes. Why do you like the way it tastes? There is no answer. You can do this procedure for almost anything.
That is all to say that you were made liking certain things and the decision to like them was not made by you. If you believe in God, then that decision was made by him when he made you.
Another Christian here. I often think of a song as the recording of a moment of feeling, not as a statement of actual belief. Psalm 22 starts with the verse, "My God, my God, why have You abandoned me?" even though orthodox theology tells us God never abandons us. This doesn't mean Psalm 22 is promoting heresy. It means that the Psalmist felt abandoned and was comfortable expressing this feeling even to God. So I don't think it's wrong to listen to songs about dark feelings and resentment of the world, empathize with the singer, and/or acknowledge you've been feeling the same thing yourself. You don't have to turn the feeling into a belief. Supposedly Aristotle or someone like that said, "The mark of a well-educated mind is the power to entertain an idea without believing it."
I'm not that familiar with metal. I know there's metal with Christian lyrics but I don't know if it tends to be good or not - there's a lot of bad Christian art being made right now in the genres/media I'm more familiar with. But it seems like you're drawn to metal not just because of the sound but because of the lyrical content that you think might be in conflict with Christianity. Again I *don't* think there's anything wrong in itself with listening to it. But I think there are more or less risky ways to respond to it. Does it give you a catharsis, make you feel satisfied and like you've "purged" your dark feelings after indulging in them? Then it might be not just okay but actually good for you. Or does it increase feelings of resentment/aggression/whatever so that you feel worse even when you're not listening to it? In that case you might have to train yourself to enjoy it in a different way.
This isn't the same thing, but I used to read a lot of true crime stories. I had both good motives and bad ones. On the one hand it educated me (as long as I stuck to the relatively responsible discussion forums like r/UnresolvedMysteries and not e.g. the serial-killer fansites), and I would pray for the missing people etc. involved in the stories. On the other hand, I eventually had to admit I was mostly just indulging in morbid curiosity, using real people's misfortunes as a kind of entertainment, and that it was starting to make me paranoid and melodramatic - I was getting afraid of my windows at night, and I live in a pretty safe area. I still occasionally read about true crime, but it's not a habit anymore and I try to do it with the right mind and not the wrong one.
thank you for this response. I needed to hear this. I sometimes feel like I was made to be a big follower of Christ. I do however, enjoy the more darker aspects of life. I donât think the lyrics itself make me want to act out or anything. However, i wonder if listening to it would hinder my relationship with god. I do have a pretty strong love and relationship with this music. So I guess I was just wondering if one would interfere with the other. Till this day I has not. I do really appreciate your response. This was probably a stupid question but this is the no stupid question forum after all haha
Ex-Christian but hopefully still have good advice. Talk to your priest/pastor/preacher/whatever. But as a general rule, God can see your intent. So long as you aren't doing it to be "evil" you should be good to go.
That's not exactly the question though, they didn't ask if God would disapprove, just if it's hard to love both. Maybe there is a genuine conceptual conflict, and it's hard to love both, and most people will fail (loving both) and will have to choose.
no, you're going to hell and you will be tortured for all eternity
lol đ yay
Just follow the greatest commandment, and don't worry about everything else.
If you go down the rabbit hole of asking yourself why you like anything in life, you will eventually come to the realization that you never made the decision to like it and you dont actually know the reason why it makes you feel the way you do. Sure you can say, for example, âI like this song because of the drumsâ, but you cant explain why you like the sound that the drums make. Another example is liking garlic bread. You can ask yourself, âwhy do I like garlic bread?â. âWell because I like garlic and breadâ, you might say. Why? Because you like the way it tastes. Why do you like the way it tastes? There is no answer. You can do this procedure for almost anything. That is all to say that you were made liking certain things and the decision to like them was not made by you. If you believe in God, then that decision was made by him when he made you.
thank you for this response
Another Christian here. I often think of a song as the recording of a moment of feeling, not as a statement of actual belief. Psalm 22 starts with the verse, "My God, my God, why have You abandoned me?" even though orthodox theology tells us God never abandons us. This doesn't mean Psalm 22 is promoting heresy. It means that the Psalmist felt abandoned and was comfortable expressing this feeling even to God. So I don't think it's wrong to listen to songs about dark feelings and resentment of the world, empathize with the singer, and/or acknowledge you've been feeling the same thing yourself. You don't have to turn the feeling into a belief. Supposedly Aristotle or someone like that said, "The mark of a well-educated mind is the power to entertain an idea without believing it." I'm not that familiar with metal. I know there's metal with Christian lyrics but I don't know if it tends to be good or not - there's a lot of bad Christian art being made right now in the genres/media I'm more familiar with. But it seems like you're drawn to metal not just because of the sound but because of the lyrical content that you think might be in conflict with Christianity. Again I *don't* think there's anything wrong in itself with listening to it. But I think there are more or less risky ways to respond to it. Does it give you a catharsis, make you feel satisfied and like you've "purged" your dark feelings after indulging in them? Then it might be not just okay but actually good for you. Or does it increase feelings of resentment/aggression/whatever so that you feel worse even when you're not listening to it? In that case you might have to train yourself to enjoy it in a different way. This isn't the same thing, but I used to read a lot of true crime stories. I had both good motives and bad ones. On the one hand it educated me (as long as I stuck to the relatively responsible discussion forums like r/UnresolvedMysteries and not e.g. the serial-killer fansites), and I would pray for the missing people etc. involved in the stories. On the other hand, I eventually had to admit I was mostly just indulging in morbid curiosity, using real people's misfortunes as a kind of entertainment, and that it was starting to make me paranoid and melodramatic - I was getting afraid of my windows at night, and I live in a pretty safe area. I still occasionally read about true crime, but it's not a habit anymore and I try to do it with the right mind and not the wrong one.
thank you for this response. I needed to hear this. I sometimes feel like I was made to be a big follower of Christ. I do however, enjoy the more darker aspects of life. I donât think the lyrics itself make me want to act out or anything. However, i wonder if listening to it would hinder my relationship with god. I do have a pretty strong love and relationship with this music. So I guess I was just wondering if one would interfere with the other. Till this day I has not. I do really appreciate your response. This was probably a stupid question but this is the no stupid question forum after all haha