Why do so many Christians do this?

[.lava]

I'm not saying all Christians are like this at all. I've noticed that there are a lot of great Christians on this forum. It just seems to me that the situation that happened today is more prevalent than understanding for some reason.

Anyone have any comments? Answers?

IMO that is not a "Christian" behavour. that is only human nature, nature of bigotry and ignorance.







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[ayani]

it is ultimately helpful for Christians (and non-Christians) for them to realize that not everyone is Christian, or shares a Biblical worldview.

Christians do this, and outside of the Christian world, so do many people of other faiths. faith can and should be shared, but faith can never be forced. not real faith, at least.

That's true. It's just frustrating. It feels to me that they feel they are better than me or something. I just wish people could be more understanding. I live in the Bible Belt and I feel like I always have to watch what I say because I may offend someone or upset them.

 

[DadBurnett]

I pictgured myself in the same situation, wanting to respond to the tellers's saying kill it, with something like What good would that do? Why, what has the cricket done to deserve death? That would be my attempt to keep the focus on the cricket and avoid the so-called religious issue.

 

[BHSU_Student]

So I'm at work right now and this morning I had a customer come in to pay off his loan. He is a regular with our company and I know him by name. Well there was a cricket in the change tray where the money is slid through to my side of the glass and my regular says to me to go ahead and kill the cricket. I told him no. He asked me why not and I told him that the cricket has done nothing to us and it's not like we feel threaten by it so why kill it. That makes no sense to me. Then he asks me if I'm "one of those vegetarians or something". I told him no I'm not and told him to think about it, what if something bigger than him killed him just because he was annoying to it. I guess it gave him something to ponder because he was real quiet after that.

So, this afternoon he came back in to open a new loan and he asked me where the cricket went. I told him I put it outside in the flower bed so it can live its life. He laughed at me and said to me that crickets don't have long lives. I responded by saying that neither do humans in comparison to other things. He asked me who's fault I thought that was. I looked at him confused and told him no one's. He asked me if I thought it was Adam and Eve's fault and I told him that I do not believe in Adam and Eve. He asked me if I believed in Jesus and I told him no. Then he asked if I'm with a non-denominational Christian church. I told him no and I don't beleive in religion.

First question I have is why is it that so many Christians believe that people who don't believe in Jesus are bad people and that there is no way that we could live moral lives, but quite often they disregard what they preach (sanctity of life thing) and kill things for no reason, send people to wars to die, believe in capital punishment and they think all of that is fine and dandy, but it us who are non-believers are heathen animals that have no morals or conscience.

Second, after I told this guy I don't believe in Adam and Eve and I don't believe in Jesus, why does he still try to ask if I'm Christian? I don't get it. After I told him I don't believe in religion he looked at me like I was some crazy person. I don't know. I try to avoid religious talk with people that I don't know very well and especially customers, but when someone straight out asks me then I will answer. I just really hate the crazy look and the preaching that usually follows and the anger that usually follows when they realize I'm not converting.

I'm not saying all Christians are like this at all. I've noticed that there are a lot of great Christians on this forum. It just seems to me that the situation that happened today is more prevalent than understanding for some reason.

Anyone have any comments? Answers?

I think that several Christians see the world in black and white. There are no grey areas. If you accept Jesus, you are in the good camp. If you are a non-believer, and/or accept a different path of spiritual attainment, their immediate assumption is that you are under the influence of Satan. Having been a conservative Christian for many years, and having suffered the "bible belt," I remember making such assumptions myself. Eventually, as I studied science and the major religions, I learned how ignorant I was.

A year ago, I remember my father telling me that Bhuddism is satanic. When I heard this, I attempted to discuss what Bhuddism is. When I told him that I had studdied Bhuddism, he began to pick up objects, throw them, smash things in a rage, and then tell me how dissapointed he was.

Fortunately, he has become more open-minded since then.

 

[Kathryn]

Hi, Wandering!

It sounds like you work with the public like I do. I am a personal banker at a very busy bank. At any given moment, anyone from a millionaire to a guy working at Burger King may come stumbling into my office and start spouting off God only knows what sort of nonsense!

I am a Christian, but I also know I don't have all the answers, or even most of the answers, about God, eternity, salvation, and life in general. I also believe that God meets people where they are, and relates to each of us according to the personality and gifts that He gave us - so different people have different expressions of faith. The last thing I think I should be doing is trying to judge another person's soul.

So it really, REALLY bugs me when anyone - Christian or not - starts pushing their own set of beliefs on me in a professional environment. I find it just as irritating when a Christian starts trying to convince me that I need to get SPIRIT FILLED and PRAISE GOD SISTER yada yada yada as it does when someone sits down across from me and starts spouting off about what a great guy Ted Kennedy was (well, actually I've never had that happen, but if it did, it would bug me).

It also really gets to me if someone starts saying, "Jesus F-ing Christ, I just can't seem to balance my checking account!" while they're sitting across from me reeking of stale cigarette smoke.

I guess my point is this - gooberism is apparently rampant in today's society. Guess we better get used to it and have our goober antenna up.

 

[Vasilisa Jade]

I am sorry youhad this experience. It seems to me that you accidentally let this person's nasty nature get to you.

As you know I work in retail sales, and we do a lot of customer service too. I also live in a Bible Belt with many nasty christians. There are a lot of nasty people in general, but the majority just happened to get swooped up into the most prevalent religion in the U.S... christianity.

There is the answer to your question of why it seems to occur mostly in christians.

Christianity is also very appealing to the nasty malicious person. They do not have to make ammends the hard way. They can simply ask for forgiveness, and go about thier business being malicious to everyone else and feeling good about themselves cause they are saved.

Of course this is not always the case as you said, there are many christians I love.

But as I have said before, malicious nasty people can take the most beautiful thing and turn it into something detrimental to everyone around them... turn roses to ****.

A co-worker of mine is atheist and once he accidentally let it slip to the wrong customer. He lost the sale, it caused a huge huge scene (all customer), and the customer actually even tried to get him fired! We are all much more careful now.

My advice?

Energy shielding seems to work wonders! I was amazed. My moldevite necklace also seemed to work wonders. In addition, sometimes you have to shut those idiots down in mid-sentence. That takes practice. The conversation should have been shut down right after you told him you were taking it outside.

You will have plenty of practice though if he is a regular. He will try and torment you about the topic every time he comes in from now on I bet. Impersonate those people that are like poisoned honey and shut him down before he opens his mouth about it.

Much Love! Hope that never happens to ya agian. :rainbow1:

 

[Humanistheart]

So I'm at work right now and this morning I had a customer come in to pay off his loan. He is a regular with our company and I know him by name. Well there was a cricket in the change tray where the money is slid through to my side of the glass and my regular says to me to go ahead and kill the cricket. I told him no. He asked me why not and I told him that the cricket has done nothing to us and it's not like we feel threaten by it so why kill it. That makes no sense to me. Then he asks me if I'm "one of those vegetarians or something". I told him no I'm not and told him to think about it, what if something bigger than him killed him just because he was annoying to it. I guess it gave him something to ponder because he was real quiet after that.

So, this afternoon he came back in to open a new loan and he asked me where the cricket went. I told him I put it outside in the flower bed so it can live its life. He laughed at me and said to me that crickets don't have long lives. I responded by saying that neither do humans in comparison to other things. He asked me who's fault I thought that was. I looked at him confused and told him no one's. He asked me if I thought it was Adam and Eve's fault and I told him that I do not believe in Adam and Eve. He asked me if I believed in Jesus and I told him no. Then he asked if I'm with a non-denominational Christian church. I told him no and I don't beleive in religion.

First question I have is why is it that so many Christians believe that people who don't believe in Jesus are bad people and that there is no way that we could live moral lives, but quite often they disregard what they preach (sanctity of life thing) and kill things for no reason, send people to wars to die, believe in capital punishment and they think all of that is fine and dandy, but it us who are non-believers are heathen animals that have no morals or conscience.

Second, after I told this guy I don't believe in Adam and Eve and I don't believe in Jesus, why does he still try to ask if I'm Christian? I don't get it. After I told him I don't believe in religion he looked at me like I was some crazy person. I don't know. I try to avoid religious talk with people that I don't know very well and especially customers, but when someone straight out asks me then I will answer. I just really hate the crazy look and the preaching that usually follows and the anger that usually follows when they realize I'm not converting.

I'm not saying all Christians are like this at all. I've noticed that there are a lot of great Christians on this forum. It just seems to me that the situation that happened today is more prevalent than understanding for some reason.

Anyone have any comments? Answers?

I've had random customers invite me to their church before. At me work for crying out loud. Who can say why they do these inconsiderate things.

 

[Humanistheart]

IMO that is not a "Christian" behavour. that is only human nature, nature of bigotry and ignorance.







.

Really? You don't see bhuddists doing this.

 

[Vasilisa Jade]

Really? You don't see bhuddists doing this.

It's cause buddhists and hindus and such don't believe that thier way is the only right way.

You will see any member of any group who believes they are the only ones who have the only truth, feverishly trying to convert and save. It's a justfication to feed thier ego on many levels.

 

[Apion]

You will see any member of any group who believes they are the only ones who have the only truth, feverishly trying to convert and save. It's a justfication to feed thier ego on many levels.

It's an epistemological issue, really. The reason they convert is that, in most people's estimation, knowledge is equivalent to how many people agree on its validity. You will see a religious individual physically tense and getting worked-up when faced with an opposing viewpoint in a debate -- it is a threat to their convictions that is held physically in the body. It boils down to: increasing number of people in agreement = more real. Naive epistemology. Of course it is a really bad way of determining what is true, but most never realize they do it and we all do it.

 

[Humanistheart]

It's cause buddhists and hindus and such don't believe that thier way is the only right way.

You will see any member of any group who believes they are the only ones who have the only truth, feverishly trying to convert and save. It's a justfication to feed thier ego on many levels.

Which means that it's not simply human nature, it's a matter of personal beliefs, unlike what the poster I was responding to was argueing.

 

[Vasilisa Jade]

Which means that it's not simply human nature, it's a matter of personal beliefs, unlike what the poster I was responding to was argueing.

It could be human nature, from the epistomology perspective, cause that does make sense, and also personal beliefs. It seems like a compounded problem. It exists naturally, and then the belief system throws gasoline into the fire. It then gets out of control and cooks the beholder of the flame's mind.

 

[Vasilisa Jade]

It's cause buddhists and hindus and such don't believe that thier way is the only right way.

You will see any member of any group who believes they are the only ones who have the only truth, feverishly trying to convert and save. It's a justfication to feed thier ego on many levels.

I really should clarify that. It's a strange issue really. I shouldn't have said any member of any group who believes they are the only ones...

Katz is an example of that being wrong. The LDS believe they are the only ones with the whole truth, but they do not feverishly try and save. Most of the members, 99% of those I have met, are very laid back and open minded about the whole thing. They believe that the majority of the population will be saved/converted after death if not during life, and that is is very difficult to be casted away.

So I shouldn't have said that. But even those who do not act feverishly... because of the nature of the majority of the teachings... it is natural and with good intent, I think, that they try and "save."

They really think they are saving you from fire and brimstone and eternal suffering.

Of course to those of us who do not believe in that, we see it as imaginary, but they really believe it and use it as justfication to act rashly as if it were physical and under your bed or something.

I'm babbling now...