you live in a christian country, you can’t hold grudges. it’s in their nature. it’s practically their job. you can’t control what they say to you. all you can control is how you respond. or don’t respond.

i used to get all worked up at seeing evangelicals talking to people in parks or at the library and stuff. you know the types they target: alone, maybe a little sad-looking. as if they can smell a wavering belief system a mile away. i thought, why can’t they pick on someone with a working brain? someone who can match them point for point, who asks more questions than they themselves do.

but that’s not the point, is it? if you’ve already got a concrete belief, then you don’t need what they’re selling. so they offer it to someone who does. and you can’t blame them.

i have had my fair share of being preached to and prayed for and prophecied at. it comes with the territory of not clasping-your-hands-and-closing-your-eyes in a country where this is done at every social gathering. it’s more awkward when it comes from people you know.  because then you have to worry about somehow offending their beliefs while you try and tactfully explain that you think their beliefs are basically bull.

to add insult to their injury, i don’t even have a religion. for christians (and i imagine most religious groups) this is like your spouse not only leaving you, but leaving you and becoming homosexual. actually it’s more like leaving you and then never having sex again. they think i’m missing out on something, and they try to fill that gap with christianity. they cannot fathom not needing to believe in something. but that’s cool. i can understand you, even if you can’t understand me. we can still be friends. i still love you.

but i don’t want to hear about how much jesus loves me because, no offense but, that’s your delusion. and it’s okay. because it’s a cultural thing. i get it. and i don’t want you to preach about the benefits and “truths” of christianity and then call it objectivity because you know about judaism and islam too. that you have chosen only one religion to follow makes you biased in the same way that the man with a favourite son is biased. blindly.

but mostly i’d rather you were a little less intolerant of my tolerance. choosing not to conform to the herd of society is difficult, but not devious.  i’m not here to sabotage your religion. and despite what you may think, i don’t pick on christianity. it’s just always in my face, and i can only comment on what i see. if a jewish/muslim/buddhist/whatever person was getting on my nerves, i’d go off on them too.

evangelists just keep asking for trouble.