"MERE" CHRISTIANITY

Oh My God.

And when I say that, I do mean MY God. Not yours, not anyone else's, just mine. Male or Female, singular or plural, it doesn't matter to anyone but me. Oh. MY. God.

And I take ownership of that because my beliefs are my beliefs. I don't try to preach, proselytize or convert others.

Which is why, of course, I am utterly offended when others attempt to do the same to me.

I just got off the phone with a telephone solicitor calling me about an exciting new book series I should take advantage of. It's called "The Christians." It's by Ted Byfield.

For those of you that are unaware, Ted Byfield was an editor with Alberta Report, which ended over 30 years of publication in June of this year. It was billed as "Christian Conservative" journalism-- which is putting it mildly.

I always had the impression that Byfield's Report was just on the quiet side of a near-cultish devotion to Christ that reflected poorly on Alberta and Albertan Christians by making them all seem like, not to put too fine a point on it, Old Testament thunderers who viewed everything outside the family farmstead as a Sodom and Gomorrah-- and deserving of the same conflagratory fate as those cities.

The Report would use "facts" from the Bible for politics, disasters, anything-- it could all be rationalized the that Same Old Belief That We ALL Share, Because All Right-Thinking People Are The Same.

And now this guy has written a book series.

Good for him. Except his MOONIES are calling me and I can FEEL the light shining in their zealous eyes over the PHONE as they tell me that they consider themselves "Educated" but that these books "really opened their eyes."

Screeeeeeam.

It's not that I have anything against Christianity or those who practice those beliefs. But let's face it; that religion is the majority in North America. And when it starts SELLING ITSELF over the telephone, I feel a little threatened.

No, I don't think like you do. No, your facts are incorrect. But gee, the majority is going to believe you because you've slapped a Christian label on it and all Right-Thinking people should agree with you-- and if they don't, suddenly they're the MINORITY, right? And we all know how the Human Mob deals with minorities.

Yeah, I know. I'm WAY wigging out here. But this scared me. Scared me because this woman on the other end of my phone BELIEVED everything she was saying. Believed, and was SURPRISED that I didn't. Because, of course, we ALL think the same, don't we? We all KNOW the truth-- those of us that don't know it just haven't been introduced to it yet; and we'll be fascinated and overjoyed when we are finally shown the error of our ways.

Thanks, but I'm not interested in joining your gleefully smiling Rapture Recruits today.

VERY freaked out right now.

Posted by Agent M at October 08, 2003 10:28 PM