Muffinstuffer

Really? Thanks for pointing it out.

Starboy

Exactly Rhea, Christians live in their own Christian world, oblivious to the rest of the world. I guarantee, if we atheists were as aggressive pushing atheism as the Christians are at pushing their faith, there would be serious social repercussions. We try to give the government back to everybody including us but taking exclusionary and divisive religious sentiments out of our pledge and you see what kind of uproar that caused!

Starboy

Rhea

I hope you recognize that it is NOT EVEN ABOUT those who screw it up.

I would be interested in your comments about Adam and Snikta. Adam is a "good" wealthy person. It is STILL insulting for him to try to tell Snikta she would be happier if she just took her kids to daycare and got a job.

Please tell me you see that.

wildernesse

Where the heck do you people live that get door-to-door's more than once a year (or two)? I supposedly live in the Bible Belt, and I can remember only twice in my entire life that anyone has come to the door of my home (or my parents).

Never since I have been an adult on my own has anyone knocked on my door to witness. (I'm not saying that this is the only way you are solicited, just this way is uncommon in my experience. Yes, I am a Christian, but the people who visit door to door are usually pretty indiscriminate in their visiting.)

--tibac

Rhea

My pleasure. Doing so was additional humor. Glad you found it amusing as you were intended to.

scrumpy

Let’s say 90% of your countrypeople love gardening. Many of them love to share their love of their hobby with anyone in earshot. They think they are helping you; they have an honest desire to share with you the happiness that gardening brings them. They somehow think that you haven’t heard this from many others, or that if you have heard it, you haven’t heard it in quite this wonderful way before. They think that they have the key to unlock your love of gardening, and darned if they aren’t going to be the ones to put it in the lock.

You, on the other hand, already know that you live in a world where 90% of the people you speak to are gardeners. You have repeatedly heard their message about gardening happiness. You don’t buy it (even though you may have already tried it for yourself or may have been an avid gardener for years prior). Gardener after gardener has tried to engage you in conversations about how much happiness gardening brings into their lives and could bring into yours. There isn’t a message about gardening that you haven’t heard, repeatedly. It’s all around you – individual gardeners and gardeners on the T.V., in the newspapers, on the radio. Yet somehow every gardener who tries to engage you in a joys of gardening conversation thinks they are the first, or the best. Frankly, you’re sick of the gardening message. You can’t understand that gardeners can’t get it through their heads that the message is not new to you or anyone else like you, because it is very clear to you that you live in a country that is garden saturated - with gardeners and the message of the joys of gardening. Sometimes you get a little testy with those gardeners. It’s hard not to lose your patience when you’ve been gardened at once too often. Mostly, you just wish they’d realize that when it comes to the love of gardening, you’ve heard it about a million times before, and you’re frustrated to know that you will for at least a million more time to come. You try to be patient, but sometimes it wears thin.

Walross

Hello Muffinstuffer,

welcome to IIDB. I hope you stick around for some discussion. I can understand that you and many of your fellow christians may feel a little perplexed by the hostility they may recieve for trying to witness at atheists, especially when you are honestly convinced that you are trying to help them. But that's where I think the problem lies (at least for me). Look at your own words:

Can you see how this would seem exceedingly condescending to someone who, not only doesn't believe the same things as you, but has also (in many cases) put many years of thought into the conclusions that they have come to? Add to that the facts that:

A) many of these christians use tired old arguments that we can see through a mile away, yet still continue to act as though they somehow know better than us "poor atheists"

and

B) this witnessing often takes the form of an unwelcome intrusion into our personal lives, from being approached in public to having strangers come to our doors.

...and you have a sure-fire recipe for a little griping. Keep in mind, I can only speak for myself here, but personally, I'm not witnessed at often, and when I am I try to pleasantly but firmly make the person aware that I am not interested - kind of like how I try to act when a telemarketer calls. In fact, I believe that is a very good analogy. Do you ever get annoyed at telemarketers? If so, I bet you are getting annoyed for many of the same reasons atheists get annoyed at christians who try to witness at them. I hope this helps you understand where this particular atheist is coming from. Regards,

Walross

(edited to add): wow this thread has taken off in the last half hour or so. I see others have beat me to the telemarketer analogy - I guess great minds do think alike )

Rhea

Anytown USA. (North East). Mostly suburban - to - rural.

I've lived in a variety of places. Been solicited all over. Sometimes at home, sometimes in public. Sometimes at work.

Perhaps their solicitation is not that random after all?

Starboy

scrumpy, if only it were just that. The gardeners put gardening sentiments on the currency, on public buildings, state seals and so forth. The elected officials go on about gardening incessantly. It drives foreign and domestic policy. The gardeners start saying things like, we have to restrict the activities of dog owners because dogs tear up our gardens and care nothing for gardens. They start saying that you can't live a proper life if you do not garden. That the foundation of our country is gardening and that our founding fathers were gardeners and so this is a gardening country and those who don’t like gardening can leave.... and so forth and so on. It is has gone way, way, way past anything remotely resembling something sensible.

Starboy

Muffinstuffer

Somehow I KNEW that you would chime in on this one. That's cool. In response....I think you are making the whole 'witnessing' thing a bit simplistic. Sure, if you want to view all of this from the standpoint that Christians are ALWAYS going to be lacking possession of the full knowledge of the universe (including the mind of God, knowledge of whether or not our religion is going to help others, etc.), then sure, we're always going to be wrong. But sometimes (from our point of view) we happen to be 'right,' or happen to have a clue about a certain situation. I have 'helped' people out before who have suffered from child abuse, because I was abused, and it happens that it was my faith that brought me through it. Does that mean it would have defiintely helped others? No, of course not. But it did help SOME, and for those who wanted none of it, I gave them exactly that after the first attempt - none of it.

Agreed. It may be. Of course, as I said above (I think it was in this thread), whether or not the desire is misguided - and this goes for ANY religion, not just Christianity - has a lot to do with the person's standpoint, and knowledge (or lack thereof) of the other person's point of view and religion.

Well, I can give the nice PC answer, or the Christian answer. Seriously, we can't. But we (and by 'we' I mean those who are religious and reaching out to those who are not) can at least give it one shot (or 3954 shots in a lot of cases ), and if it doesn't work, oh well.

First.....I think you misread my post. I did NOT say that it pertained ONLY to this board. I used to work with a VERY intelligent guy on the USS Enterprise (I'm a sailor) who would ask me questions, wait for my answer (and I'm ALWAYS kind and civil when answering) and would THEN launch into a huge tirade about how I'm screwed up, replete with plenty of profanity and the like. True, not all do this, and maybe it's been my misfortune to have met a lot of the 'abnormal' ones, but it has happened.

Second, the 'Christian' in me would say "You should say you're sorry you feel this way." But I myself would probably let loose with a BUNCH of biting retorts. *L*

Again, I did say above that I may have had the misfortune of meeting a lot of the 'abnormal' atheists/agnostics who are bitter/unhappy/rude/blah blah blah. But I think that stereotyping abounds on both sides.

Probably not. And I for one say that if you are happy with your life, then good for you. Of course as a Christian, I always desire 'better' for others, and from my point of view, you know what that means. But I respect others' points of view and lifestyles, and I will not shove my beliefs down anyone's throat.

One example is the example I gave above. And as I said two times, it's been my misfortune possibly to be with those I've been with, who have given me those stereotypes to go by. But then again, I've been in the Navy for 9 years....not exactly the best place to foster Christian OR intellectual lifestyles and debates.