Of course everyone now is going to say I'm attacking religion.

If people want to believe, fine. I'm not stopping you.

But I'm sick of it being shoved in my face. & oh boy is it ever.

I'm sick of it, & I just want it to stop.

I hear you, Tristan.

I am sorry.

:(

Trust me Tristan, I feel the same way.

That's because you probably live in this screwed up so-called "Christian Nation" which it never has been, but we still pay the price.

My wife's sister and her husband spend a good deal of their time in France. They claim that they hardly ever hear religion mentioned unless in a derogatory manner and they live here in liberal Silicon Valley where most individuals are too busy trying to get rich to have any time for religion.

I'm sure Utah would be culture shock for them. When my folks were alive and we visited Utah my never-MO wife would always say afterwords that it felt like we were living in a church! She couldn't believe how often religion is discussed - good and bad. She said that after that experience she could better understand why I was so screwed up! She thinks that no one could possibly live in Utah and not be weirdly warped. I agree.

Templar Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> That's because you probably live in this screwed
> up so-called "Christian Nation" which it never has
> been, but we still pay the price.
>
> My wife's sister and her husband spend a good deal
> of their time in France. They claim that they
> hardly ever hear religion mentioned unless in a
> derogatory manner and they live here in liberal
> Silicon Valley where most individuals are too busy
> trying to get rich to have any time for religion.

Silicon Valley is where I graduated high school, and where my well-to-do con artist uncle and aunt live. He grew up Methodist and then Presbyterian in Ogden, Utah. Went away to Berkeley and never moved back to Utah - went straight to Silicon Valley where they've lived since. He and my aunt are atheists. He's invented microchips to go inside computers... and then at some point in his career re-invented himself into a con artist to keep up appearances! They live in a million dollar home, with millionaires for friends and neighbors. He's a shell of the man I used to know as uncle. He's now become a bitter old man, and an alcoholic. That, in addition to his being a con artist on the lam. (And on the University Hall of Fame for California for his contributions to science.) Just more proof of the good, the bad, and the ugly American image.

He ripped off my hometown ten years ago of tens of thousands of dollars, a world away from his home in Los Altos. If not for his being on our Crimestoppers here, my kids and I would never have known. He was never arrested, but the cops have told me to this day he was and has always been their only suspect.

How much the Mormon culture helped to shape my con artist of an uncle, there has to be some correlation. He grew up surrounded by Mormons.

> I'm sure Utah would be culture shock for them.
> When my folks were alive and we visited Utah my
> never-MO wife would always say afterwords that it
> felt like we were living in a church! She couldn't
> believe how often religion is discussed - good and
> bad. She said that after that experience she could
> better understand why I was so screwed up! She
> thinks that no one could possibly live in Utah and
> not be weirdly warped. I agree.

My Hebrew grandmother lived in Utah for most of her life. She kept it together well. But each one of her children had some kind of disorder. From my con artist uncle to each of his three sisters, they each one suffered from something - one was manic depressive, another schizophrenic. My mother, God only knows. She had everything wrong with her, rest her soul. Yet all the sisters and my grandmother shared good values. They'd be rolling around in their graves if they knew what their brother and son has been up to for the past umpteen years of his existence. They're all deceased now, except for Uncle John. He's the last one to go in that family.

I'm fairly certain living among Mormons influenced the girls because they had social anxieties with the boys in Brigham City, where they grew up (the family moved to Ogden right after mom graduated from Box Elder High; she was their oldest.) Their dad would literally drive the boys off their front porch when they'd come to visit the three sisters, and occasionally with a shotgun. That's my granddad, a very strict father, even among Mormons. And he hated Mormons, which did not make for a good mix.

The most shocking thing is that it was a proselytizing billboard from a mainstream Islamic organization. It was a huge billboard on a busy street, in a rough part of town.

It just jarred me because 1) The regular Muslims I know do not preach or proselytize, & 2) People in the lower economic classes do not need more religious crap heaped on them.

I was pissed not because of Islam, but just because it was another huge religious billboard. I have been equally angry about Catholic & Evangelical billboards in the past.

I had a fun time last Saturday when a JW knocked at my door.
I peaked out the window, smiled and told her, "Hi lady, sorry but my father was a scientologist and I'm an ex-Mormon, and unfortunately I don't believe in cults anymore."

Then I smiled some more and said, "But I wish you luck anyway."

She was so confused that she smiled back at me and walked away in a dazed manner.

Wow, thanks for sharing that. Billboards? Come on.

Come to our church …

no OUR’s …

NO COME TO OURS … free sandals for every new member!

Seriously, I live in a major Canadian city, and we just don’t have that sort of thing going on up here. Even the Muslims are getting on board (pun) with this religious furor?

What the hell is going on down there you guys? You’re makin’ us nervous! It’s just so weird. Until this one exception when I moved onto a street with all these Mormon neighbors (which was so unusual it caused me to find this board), but until then, everywhere I’ve lived in Canada, I’ve never had anyone give a hoot about what religion I was or wasn’t. No one asks, no one cares, it's invisible ... your own private business. It just isn’t an issue.

I know. It’s the water. We need to give you some of our water. That’s what it is.

Sorry Tristan. That would be a drag. Like, who cares? Leave me alone! Get out of my face!

Take comfort in the desperation and cheapness of marketing god like a bottle of beer.

"Move over Bud. Nothin' buzzes you good as Jesus."

No thanks. It was a b---- of a hangover last time.

Pickpockets have no shame, no honor.

I would suggest reading "The Voice of Knowledge" by Miguel Ruiz. It is a "Toltec Wisdom" book with the mysticism stripped out. Miguel was raised Christian, so you get his take on that as well. The point? You can only experience Truth and everything else is just a story told to you by the teller. Once you realize that and realize people do things for their own reasons, and it has nothing to do with you it becomes a lot more interesting to watch people and see why they do things the way they do. It becomes quite entertaining rather than infuriating. It is due to this book that I was able to sanely transition out of religion.

Tristan, I couldn't agree with you more. I don't give a flying flip what other people do, just don't push me.
I commute a long way to work. Last week, I stopped midway at a gas station I normally do not go to. I noticed a guy behind me at the pump with a car like mine, and you do not see many of them. We talked and found out that we work for the same district and happen to live within walking distance of each other. The conversation was enjoyable till he "invited" me to attend his church. He and his family attended there, and the "church" had only existed for 3 years. He was the head of some some of praise event committee. So, of course, he suggested that I come to the church because it was in walking distance of where we each live, etc. I asked him waht they believed, and his response was, in God and Jesus, and you can wear anything you want to and anything goes, etc. I said, probably not, because I'm not into organized religion. Then he began to get this crazy-like expression and strange excitement I have seen before on folks who think they can rope you in with enough enthusiasm. He said he thought it was fate that we met up like we did, commuting to the same district from the same area, having the same car, etc. He went on and on about my coming there. I finally had to leave.
Why could there not have been just a pleasant conversation there instead of it turning into a getting you to attend my church thing?
Even if I had put thought into visiting, I wouldn't have even considered it after that pushy, obnoxious BS. At the beginning of the conversation, I was thinking of asking him to carpool. Glad I dodged that bullet.

It would be hell to be stuck in a car with a Jesus freak. Nowhere to run.