Sorry for the generalization, but why is it always that people that always claim to be God’s servants turn out to be the people with the most horrible takes?
As if our social media hasn’t had enough of personalities suddenly revealing themselves as problematic, another one seemed to spurn the ire of Filipinos online after her questionable statement on “non-believers”. Yes, we’re specifically talking about Joyce Pring.
In her October 5, 2022 episode of her Spotify podcast titled, “Adulting with Joyce Pring”, the latter part of the episode featured featured her talking to Wil Dasovich about “Unpacking Christianity. For context–and as many people may have already known about her–Pring considers herself a devout Christian and says that she is a “sinner saved by Christ.”
The episode, according to Joyce herself, aims to tackle “in-depth questions about God, how Christianity is as her belief-system, and whether she should recommend Wil to date her Christian friends”. While nothing seems to be out of sorts from all these, there was one specific clip from the episode that went viral, which was Wil asking Joyce on her take on whether or not a “non-believer can go to heaven”.
And boy, were people so heavily divided on this topic on social media. Twitter and Reddit went ablaze after seeing that clip.
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People were also quick to call Joyce Pring out on her hypocrisy, especially clapping back on some of her Tweets and on the kinds of people she follows.
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However, there are those Christians that also had their fair share of sentiments over the matter.
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Say what you want, but religious extremism in all of its forms is dangerous. While it’s an undeniable fact that what she said is written in the Scriptures and established in doctrine, how she perceives it is definitely wrong. Her point-of-view is practically medieval, and she’s not alone in this. There are countless other people who think in the same way about being a non-believer, and that’s not okay.
Being close-minded and uncompromising in this time and age is not a proof of how strong one’s belief is, but how they understood it wrong. Let’s not forget that the Bible and all of its teachings are a product of their time—the ideologies considered to be right during the time of the Pharisees, Sadducees, and of Jesus Christ aren’t the same in 2022.
Being a non-believer doesn’t send you to hell, by the way. Stop putting morals and religion on the same pedestal; they are in no way related to one another. A person could be following a certain religion that has love and forgiveness as the main pillars of their teachings, and yet be supportive of a person that has backed unjust killings and crimes.
One’s morals shouldn’t even be based solely on one’s religion, as religion is just a belief-system set by people in history to ease man while they’re alive. What is correct in the theological doctrines may not be morally right, as well.
Also, is there even evidence of a “Heaven” and a “Hell”? Sure, the Bible does say that there will be a Judgement Day and that Jesus will be the only one responsible on deciding who gets to go to Heaven, stay in Purgatory, and burn in Hell, but why are there those Christians who are adamant on judging others as if they’re Jesus themselves?
Who are we to say that every non-believer goes to hell, when there are other religions to consider as well? Such is the problem with religion—every single one of them tries to assert themselves on being the one that’s right.
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