Not long ago, our home was visited by some door-to-door Mormon missionaries. Since I was at work at the time, my wife was the lucky one who got to deal with them.
At one point in their brief conversation, after expressing her lack of interest in hearing what they had to say, they asked about her husband. Would he be interested? So she told them that I was an atheist. Their reaction was typical of those who live in such an insulated world: their eyes bugged out and they said, "You're kidding!" After assuring them that she was totally serious, they said, "Well, deep down in his heart, he knows there's a God."
"No, he really does not," she corrected them. Clearly, this was difficult for them to grasp. So she elaborated a little. "Look," she said, "I know how hard this is for you to accept. I was raised Mormon, too, though I'm not one any longer. So I know what you believe; I know what you're told; I know how it is that you see things. But the truth is that there are many different belief systems out there, and that's okay. It's okay for you to believe what you believe, and for others to believe whatever they believe. Really. It's okay."
For the most part, she was met by blank stares. And to show how little they really got it, they then asked if she wanted them to switch her records for her. Meaning, transfer her Mormon records from her old ward in Utah to a local ward here in California. She assured them that she did not want such a thing done.
I'm told that the whole encounter ended fairly politely, but I think it was yet another clear example to her of how obtuse some religious people can be. Some of them clearly cannot comprehend that an individual could utterly reject the concept of a deity, any more than they could understand how someone raised Mormon could walk away from that religion.
Of course, she's had other bizarre encounters with warped religious views in the people she used to work with. I've written about one example here. But there are two others, both involving employees at the same job, and both involving the same wacko belief…
Her boss, upon being told that we had some friends who were pagan (of the Wiccan/Druid sort), and one co-worker, upon being told that I was an atheist, both said, "You mean, they/he actually worship[s] Satan?"
Now, this was not the result of the old argument, "If you don't worship God, you automatically worship Satan." No, this was just complete ignorance on their parts, a total lack of understanding of what atheism and paganism are or are not. They literally did not understand that Satan does not exist, as far as atheists and pagans are concerned.
To be fair, it's entirely conceivable that these two co-workers were actually told that atheists and pagans worship Satan. I have no idea. I wouldn't be totally surprised if this were true.
So. Brainwashed? Or just totally clueless? You decide.
