Christians, This is Why You Shouldn't Evangelize to Us

Christians, This is Why You Shouldn't Evangelize to Us


Hemant Mehta (http://www.friendlyatheist.com,   / hemant   ,   / friendlyatheist  )

I know it's your duty to fix me. But don't. Not to me, not to any atheist. Because you do it so badly.

You wrongly assume you're telling us new information.

Do you honestly think we could live in the United States and not know Christian mythology? You will never heard someone say, "I've never heard of this "Jesus"... tell me more."

We know about Jesus. We know about God. We know about the crucifixion. And we just think it's childish and silly.

Hell, we probably know more about your religion than you do. Maybe we should be the ones teaching you about it.

Actually, why don't you sit there and listen while I convince you Hogwarts and Voldemort are real... and then we'll chat about how annoying it is when someone tries to convince you of a fairy tale.

You wrongly think you have Good News to share.

Telling me I'm bad and sinful and in need of saving doesn't work when I know I'm a decent human being.

Telling me I'm going to be tortured for eternity if I don't agree with you isn't love. That's a threat.

No one needs to rescue me.

The only way that talking point is effective is if I have really low self-esteem. Which I don't.

You're kind of like telemarketers: Interrupting my life, uninvited, to try and sell me something I have no use for. I just want to put all of you on my Do Not Call List.

And when I tell you my problems, you don't listen. You're worse than Comcast.

You wrongly think anecdotes are convincing to us.

We're atheists. We know better than to be swayed by emotion. So your personal story of finding God -- as touching as it may be -- does nothing for us. I'm immune to your sob story of finding Jesus. Sorry!

Same goes for the stories in the Bible. Telling me about the life of Jesus or Adam and Eve isn't gonna make me think, "Wow! That makes perfect sense!" Instead, I'm just thinking "I can't believe you fell for this shit."

It's never a two way conversation.

I don't know what the formal definition of evangelism is... but it tends to mean that you talk while I just have to shut up and listen. Which is the worst way to convince anybody of anything.

In that way, you're no different from those annoying preachers who show up on college campuses and yell at students about sodomy and jezebels and fornication. Those guys are only interested in conversion, not conversation.

If you disrespect me so much that my opinion and my rebuttals mean nothing to you, then why should I have to listen to you?

You would never be okay with evangelism if it went in the other direction.

If atheists sat you down to explain the life of Charles Darwin and why only we can give ourselves meaning, you'd be royally pissed off. And annoyed. And you'd feel like I'm talking down to you. And you'd probably be bored.

Now imagine us knocking on your door when you're busy doing something else.

Welcome to my life.

I don't really think you care about whether or not I convert.

I think a lot of Christians evangelize for themselves. It makes them feel good. They think they're getting brownie points with God. They could care less if I change my mind because they're too busy getting off on the sound of their own voices.

It just doesn't work.

...

So, after all this, how should you evangelize?

Here's how. Make your contact information publicly available. And that's it. Don't call us. We'll call you.

Or, how's this? You ask me if I want to discuss religion with you? And if I say yes, we have that discussion. If I say no, respect my time and my wishes and stop bothering me.

That's how you do it. That's the only way you should do it.




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