The power of Belief 2

So the Westboro Baptist C(ult)urch.
What can we say?

Not much, so I'll just go straight into the negativity of their beliefs.
While a lot (roughly 103%) of what they do is negative, there is only one facet that I want to cover here.

A large portion of their reasoning goes somewhat like this.
"We are followers of Christ. Followers of Christ are called to be of one heart and mind. Therefore anyone who disagrees with us can not be called a follower of Christ."

The next part of their reasoning goes something like this.
"Christ said that his followers (us) would be hated for following him. We are hated for doing his work. Therefore we must be followers of Christ. Since everyone hates us, no one else can be legitimately called followers of Christ"

The next part of their reasoning goes something like this.
"Since God hates sinners, being everyone that doesn't follow Christ, which is everyone that isn't us, God hates everyone that isn't us. Since God isn't subtle about his methods (Look at the Old Testament where he would kill nations for the sin of one man) and he calls us to tell all about him, we must tell everyone that they are going to go to hell."

The final part of their reasoning goes a little something like this.
"People don't like us because we're telling them the truth that they are going to hell. Therefore they are going to hell"

In an interview with one of the members of this small group, it came out that she didn't actually want people to listen to their message in case people repented because if they did that, they wouldn't be punished for their sins. While this may not be the view shared by all of the members, it shows the type of hatred that is a definite part of the teachings.

Any hoo, back to the point. The reasoning is circular and lead the thoughts essentially in this way.
"People who dislike or hate us are going to hell and we should tell them that. People don't like us for telling them that they are going to hell, therefore they are going to hell and we should let them know."

So what is the negative power of belief in this case?
Here they refuse to take accepted belief over dogma. This is one that is especially good in small doses - it leads to questioning the accepted order, which may yet be wrong.

But why is this bad when it leads to questioning? Because in its extreme case (which we see with the WBC) it doesn't allow questioning. Everything becomes black or white, and there is no way that any shade of grey can be anything other than the darkest of blacks. It once again prohibits growth, but it also disallows anything else to be even considered. In this case, they refuse to believe that there are more than 15 or 20 actual followers of Christ in the world because, in their words "They'd be doing the same as we do and we'd have heard about it"


The real problem in this case is that they've warped their views so much that every time they do anything that someone dislikes they re-validate everything that they do once again.