Just a thought.

[langwidere]

Why is it that when two people become romantically involved, one of faith and one not of faith, that the "unbeliever" is the one that feels forced to change his beliefs? Why do we, as a society, take for granted that people of faith, whichever faith they may believe, are more correct than those that don't have any religious faith to speak of? Why

Comments

[devrat]

That's a very good question.

I think (and this theory isn't very well thought out or anything, so just bear with me) that from the believer's standpoint, the non-believer has something to lose, but from the non-believer's standpoint, the believer doesn't.

That's really clunky wording. Lemme try again.

The non-believer, if he has gotten into a relationship with a believer, is probably not the type who thinks that religion is actually detrimental. So they would have no reason or inclination to change the other person's beliefs.

Believers on the other hand typically feel that a lack of faith is detrimental to one's life and afterlife, so they would be inclined to want to change the other person's beliefs or at least expect or hope for them to change.

I hope that made sense. I could be wrong of course. What brought this thought on?

[langwidere]

That's a pretty good observation, I think. But why do non-believers try so hard even if faith doesn't come naturally for them? Perhaps it boils down to uncertainty about life and death and being taken care of or something.

I mention it because yesterday it occured to me that not once have I ever asked Kevin to give up his beliefs, but he's subtly asked me to give up mine, namely in taking on his. *shrug* He's not aggressive about it by any means, certainly not as much as his family is, but I wonder if he will be if we have kids and we disagree about how to instruct them spiritually.

[devrat]

Perhaps it boils down to uncertainty about life and death and being taken care of or something.

I think that's definitely it. A Christian, for example knows that there is a God, that Jesus died for our sins and that, if they're saved, they'll go to Heaven when they die. They know this because they have faith, whereas non-believers are either 1)wrong and going to Hell when they die or 2) wormfood. Neither is a fun prospect and it would be nice to have the comfort of just knowing what happens. Which makes it easier to consider the alternatives.

I worry about what will happen when Alex gets to the age where she'll say, "Mommy, why doesn't Aunt Jenny go to church with us?" My sister and brother-in-law don't even know that I'm - well, I don't want to say non-believer, because I'm still very torn on the issue, but I'm no longer a Christian. And they're not really the types who'll accept it easily. Like someone said below, it's okay to say, "Oh, I'm a Taoist, now" or a Buddhist or something, but not okay to have no faith at all.

Hypothetically speaking...

[krud42]

If you take the religious aspect from the equation (no easy feat), I think a more basic, logical explanation can be found. If you'll allow me a moment to hypothesize here. *ahem

[kerndy]

Okay, so I already knew why you asked the question. I think Dev's right, actually. non-believers, or people of a new-agey broad minded thingy usually have a don't care or a live and let live attitude to religion. Mainstream religious people tend to really give a damn.

That being said, when two people of differing faiths have kids...I wonder what happens? In the only case I know of, the kids were raised with dabblings in both, but let to make up their mind about religion. One is new-age confused and the other isn't much of anything, let alone Jewish or Catholic.

[lyspeth]

I think other people have already expressed why this occurs pretty well, but I just wanted to say that it drives me completely insane, although I haven't experienced it in the particular manifestation that you mention. More things like being able to fend off evangelicals by saying that you have a religion, but not by saying that you don't have a religion and don't want one. And the sense that it's offensive to try to convince somebody to stop believing what they believe, but not offensive to try to convince somebody to believe something. It's a huge double standard.

Like most people without religious beliefs, I've been trained to "respect their faith", but in my less diplomatic moods I sometimes do wish that they would stop it with all the nonsense, and especially with pretending that somehow lots of different kinds of nonsense are all better than sense.

[langwidere]

Goodness. I didn't even make the jump from "this is expected in relationships" to "this is expected. period." But you're right. All of a sudden, I'm really disappointed in the rationality of our society. Okay, not all of a sudden. But I certainly have more reasons now.