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Something called "Rez Week" is happening at my university; Rez Week is short for 'Resurrection Week', and it's where a bunch of tents are set up at a specific area, around a stage where a christian band occasionally plays, free coffee and stuff is given, some signs for public responses to a handfull of questions are put up, and people mill around
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Your point about them referring to near-strangers as "friends" actually makes me wince. If it were me I'd be incredibly uncomfortable, not at ease at all. I consider friendship to be a mutual relationship of give and take, responsibilities and trust. It's not a thing I'd throw at another person I'd just meet, and using that term, for me at least, implies some sort of obligation now that I am their "friend".
And I'm familiar with that kind of behavior as a tactic called "love-bombing", and been both on the receiving end and had it taken away when it was soon clear that I would not be a convert. So while I'm sure that they are nice people, from experience, not just my own, but from my parents' experience as well, Christian "love and friendship" is often, sadly, conditional. So be careful I guess.
Just the last thing: "filthy rags" makes me twitch in so many ways I can't even begin to talk about it. Phrases like these are probably one of the many myriad of reasons I avoid the Abrahamic religions, heh.
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It was interesting... They have beaten around the bush more than once around the very specific topic of my doubting my own religion, or wanting to become Christian. Monday's conversation even ended with the guy requesting that I spend the next few days thinking over the question of 'When I go to the next world, what will I say to God?', stated in a way that I think was urging me to reconsider my current religious ideas. Today the subject came up again, in a sort of veiled manner of whether I was at all considering anything beyond Christianity. Sort of like, 'What does the Baha'i Faith do for me?' I told her on no uncertain terms that I was extremely into the Baha'i Faith, and it was everything I needed. There's also the fact that as a Baha'i, I already consider myself a Christian, making the entire thing moot point, in my perspective. I think she might've been disappointed, but I also think that she's still trying whatever she's doing, so I hope to talk with her again.
I'm actually not entirely sure whether to be amused or not; like I said, they're trying to convert someone who already feels is converted. From here on out, their only possible goals are to try and convert my ways of thinking to theirs, which I'm definitely not going to do--but I am going to figure out arguments and other ways to debate things. This is either a situation where an unstoppable force meets an unmovable object, or when two close-minded people refuse to see eye to eye. XD XD
I actually avoided asking some questions... I don't personally think they believe I've accepted Jesus in the way that a true believer should, since I believe in prophets after Jesus. By proxy, this means I'm not going into heaven; I don't want to drag that into the conversation, though, since that might not only end it, but I already know that's probably what their thinking, and I kind of would rather convince them that it's possible for people to not be Christian and go to Heaven, and forcing them to explicitly state something like that would not help with that.
... Uuugh, yeah. I kind of didn't really like that quote much, either--out of all the things the writings could have used, it used that. :\ We also discussed certain passages from the story of Adam and Eve--we didn't stay all that long on it, and we reached some agreements, but at the time and in hindsight, there are still some things I would quietly disagree with... Oh well.
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I'm part of a dominionist watch community called dark_christianJesus camp, you'll see their philosophy applied to young, impressionable children. Sarah Palin has tons of connections to their groups, as does the Tea Party.
If you were anyone else I would worry about getting too close to them.
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Hmm. I haven't seen anything like this--it's all been specifically towards Christianity, not towards the State, or a Christian world. In fact, the girl I was talking with said in the second conversation that a world unity seemed kind of worldy to her. That was one of those things I was reminding myself to talk with her about, next time.
Also, the subject of the End of Times did come up, largely because the Baha'i Faith believes they're already upon us, that that's why the world is so turbulent right now, and that everyone should be putting forth their greatest efforts to be a part of the simultaneous reconstructive effort going on. The girl seemed uncomfortable, I think because it didn't seem like the end of the world to her, and she didn't really persue the subject very far.
In conclusion: I don't think these people are with that, but I'll start keeping an eye out. It's entirely possible that I'll notice other people and other things if I'm looking.
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The way you describe all this is actually somewhat unsettling. I hadn't been aware of this movement until now.
Third Fourth Edit: In hindsight, everyone coming together under a world religion did come up. I can't remember the context, or the preceding conversation. All I remember is that I casually but honestly said that in a way, yes, the Baha'is someday wanted there to be at least as many Baha'is as there are Christians, in a way that it could be everywhere. (For the sake of honesty, this was said in the context of the Baha'i Faith being a common religion to everyone someday. Just so I'm not giving the wrong context to that girl.)
As I said, I can't remember how it was brought up, beyond that I think she was probably talking about the Baha'i Faith--the fact that that term came up at all makes me wonder, though; either she's heard about people like that in conversation, and now thinks me creepy, or she's simply discussed it in passing, or it's a secret agenda.
One way or another, I'll actually start keeping an eye out, now. XD'
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I was eleven when I experienced my first conversion attempt, and it left me so shaken and terrified that I'd burst into tears when I'd gotten home and told mom that I didn't want to go to hell. It was the first time I'd ever heard her say something negative about another religion. She told me in no uncertain terms that it was completely stupid, and that a good god wouldn't do that kind of thing anyway. Oh, the traumas of an eleven year old, haha.
Protestant Christians can be fairly bigoted and narrow-minded in their stance, since they tend to be formed from exclusive, small groups, with a large sense of the "other". For example, most denominations don't consider Catholics Christian, which is just... well. On the other hand, Catholics have had a long time to work on converting others, and have learned what works and what doesn't, so ironically enough, they are far more accepting of religious differences. My godmother is Catholic, and she's a dear, I love her to bits. My aunt on my father's side is Catholic too, and she's pretty accepting.
Of course, it may just be that they're also Asian, and Asians tend to have a more fluid view of religion. The idea of believing in more than one religion is pretty much antithetical to western religions, but it's an accepted and often embraced idea in the east.
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Personally, I grew up in Panama (aka 73%-of-population-is-Roman-Catholic-land), and while no one has ever actually told me to my face that by their standards I might be going to hell, I've always had a sense of leaning against the current. I mean--our very school had a Catholic religion class, whose teacher was a Priest; they were kind and treated me like any other student, but I think I was practicing going against flows from the first time I refused to stand up during Mass, because I thought that was a Catholic thing, and I clearly wasn't Catholic. (I later stood up, but that was out of respect and parent's orders, not deference.)
Maybe they were more accepting, maybe religion was just something different down there. Fortunately, these people here at this thing were okay to talk to; I haven't met anyone who's steered me towards the 'False Prophets' section of the Bible, yet, anyway, and after that one frustrating guy after one of my junior youth sessions, I'd say this is a plus.
I like the Asian views most of all, probably... They show an openness to believe that there's more than one way of being right, that I heartily approve of. Maybe the more people I talk to and show how similar my thoughts can be with theirs, and yet still be friendly but different, then the more people will be more willing to toy with that idea.... IT SOUNDS HOPELESSLY IDEALISTIC AND NAIVE I KNOW, but dammit I can't think of any other way to change society, or impact it in any way. XD;
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