The stupid, it burns!!!

[gridlore]

I just had door-to-door Christians come by.

Nice couple of zombies, repeating what they learned by rote and obviously puzzled when I failed to immediately drop to my knees and scream "praise Jesus!"

One of them mentioned that the hurricane currently swamping New Orleans was God's punishment for Mardi Gras.

"OK, but why would God punish people for holding a Christian festival?"

"Mardi Gras has nothing to do with Christ!"

"Au contraire! Mardi Gras is a traditional week of excess leading up to Lent. It has Papal sanction which is what mattered when the tradition began."

I then had to explain Lent. And that for more than half of its history, there were only two major churches following Jesus, the Roman Catholic Church, and the Eastern Orthodox.

They had no idea who Martin Luther was.

I was growing tired of them, and politely said it had been interesting chatting, but I am an atheist and really not interested. That evidently was a keyword in their little 64k brains, for it triggered another speech.

"Can you prove God doesn't exist?"

"Nope, can you prove he does?"

That stopped them for a second. So I went in for the kill.

"How about Santa Claus, is he real too?"

"Of course not!"

"Prove it."

More silence and troubled looks between them. Here they were fucking up my Sunday trying to save me, and I was shaking them up.

"I mean, I've seen Santa Claus, spoken too him, sat on his lap.. either of you ever see Jesus?"

"Well, noo.."

"And when I was eight I got the Guns of Navaronne play set! No way would my parents buy that for me, so it had to be Santa, right? So how can you say God and Jesus, who nobody sees, hears from, or gets cool presents from, is real, while Santa, who is in the bloody Macy's parade every year, isn't?"

"Well, those are people dressed as Santa, not the real thing."

"Prove it. Prove that every single person with a jolly beard and a red suit is not Santa."

It was obvious that their training in door-to-door annoying had included the lesson "never walk away when you have a conversation going". I decided to show mercy.

"Look, you seem like a nice couple of kids. But I have a burrito to feed and a cat to throw in the microwave, so i have to cut this short. Just remember that at one time you believed with all your heart in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy and for all I know the monster under the bed. These were cultural lies you were told, and you got over learning the truth. Now you still believe in another being you can't actually see. I ask you to consider this: what is the difference between the stories you were told about Santa Claus and the ones you were told about God? Have a good day!"

Last I looked they were out on the sidewalk arguing.


Crossposted to gridlore and mock_the_stupid

Comments

[isomeme.livejournal.com]

It never ceases to astonish me that people are willing to practice religions without studying them. I would have started laughing uncontrollably as soon as I discovered they didn't know who Martin Luther was. Amazing.

[kengr]

Reminds me of the time I got into a conversation with some teen "born-again" types. I was in my twenties at the time so it wasn't as weird as it sounds.

It was sparked by a t-sirt a friend was selling. "Give me that Old Time Religion" with a pentagram and various religious symbols in and between the points.

I actually got them down to "I know because God tells me so". But I lost them at "So how do you know that the voice in your head isn't Satan?"

[nolly.livejournal.com]

Wow. The ignorance astounds me. I'm pretty sure we studied Martin Luther in world history, even if I hadn't grown up in a scholarly Christian tradition. I could almost for give them Mardi Gras, if they aren't from a strongly Catholic area, but...wow.

[bunyip.livejournal.com]

Nice work, mate

[collie13.livejournal.com]

ROFL!! Oh, man, that was definitely a "good thing I wasn't drinking!" moment. You can have my baby, if you want! ;)

[dandelion-diva.livejournal.com]

If I haven't mentioned exactly how much you rock, well, I'm mentioning it now.:)

Gessi

[riverheart.livejournal.com]

Here via my husband, charlesks. I love the above. That's terrific!

There is now a million dollar challenge - a million dollars to anyone who can prove that Jesus was not the son of a Flying Spaghetti Monster.

[chriso.livejournal.com]

Thank you for giving these two idiots the chance to think about their faith rather than following blindly what they have been told to believe.

And this is from someone who considers themselves a follower of the Christian faith. I think every person who believes in any faith should think for themselves, read their religion's sacred writings for themselves and make up their own minds about what they believe or do not believe. I agree with many things my church teaches, and I also disagree with many of its teachings.

[benkenobigal.livejournal.com]

You have a burrito to feed and a cat to throw in the microwave??? Confusion upon confusion. I'm surprised their heads didn't explode.

Point-and-Smite Interface?

[aurictech.livejournal.com]

Let me leave aside, for the moment, the question of whether the above-referenced deity exists. I would prefer to address the contention that Hurricane Katrina (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Katrina) is a smite-fest* intended to punish New Orleans for hosting Mardi Gras (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Orleans_Mardi_Gras).

1. Why would an omniscient, omnipotent deity smite a city a full six months after the offending event? Wouldn't smiting New Orleans during Mardi Gras provide a more effective punishment?

2. Even if one stipulates that New Orleans is smiteworthy, isn't it rather clumsy for an omniscient, omnipotent deity to smite the neighboring state of Mississippi? Presumably, the transgressions of Mississippians are less iniquitous than those of New Orleanians; otherwise, the missionaries in question should have cited Mississippi's sins as the reason for Katrina's unwelcome arrival.

Or, just perhaps, the two missionaries have juxtaposed their fourth and sixth points of contact....

*I would link to the online game Smite, but I'm away from my home computer.