The fact is that missionaries irritate the living hell out of me, there’s few things worse, IMO, than having someone try and tell you that unless you believe like they believe you are wrong.
That includes everyone from the Jehovah’s Witness folks that knock on the door, to the transit evangelicals, to the church of the fire of god people down in the market, to those who feel compelled to go to foreign lands and tell the people there that everything their culture and their ancestors believed was a crock of shite and their great-great-grandparents are even now burning in the hot fires of hell — just how does one justify that sort of arrogance anyway?
I was discussing this with friend crow one day and, while the whole missionary gig irritates him as well, he does have a different take on it than I and he actually thinks I should be a bit nicer to them seeing as how their god specifically commanded them to run out and tell the world - in effect, when looked at in that light, the true christians don’t really have much choice in the matter do they?
My initial thoughts upon reading about the evangelical minister who has been given the big Israeli boot for engaging in missionary work was, “good on them”, what gives this guy any right to go to a foreign country and try and tell the Jews that they’ve only got it 1/2 right anyway? If they’re happy in the synagogue leave them alone, and if they’re not, they’ll find his church soon enough if that’s what they’re interested in…. don’t ‘cha think.
Then again, if we take into consideration friend crow’s thoughts on the matter, this is a society that has contrived legislated that specifically targets the tenets of another religions; and not just any religion either, no, no, no my friends, they have legislated against the tenets of a religion that is one of their primary international backers - and that is not only intolerant, but more than a little shortsighted and stupid as well.
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I’m sort of with Crow on this one. The Mormons or JWs who knock on the door of the Bunker on the days when I’m doing reception duties always get a polite couple of minutes, before I tell them politely that I’m a practicing Scientologist ( I have no idea why, but that seems to make the door to door evangelists scatter like vampires sprayed with holy water. Try it!)
I’m assuming that they believe, deeply and sincerely, that they are offering me the gift of salvation in the face of my own ignorance. It’s annoying, and a bit presumptuous of them (especially the ones who presume to engage in a discussion of human origins without the foggiest notion of what natural selection means): but it’s hard to get mad at folks who willingly give up their time and expose themselves to anger and contempt, purely for the sake of my salvation.
Now, telemarketers…that’s a different story.