I’ve never been to church with my parents. Not once, ever. This isn’t a bad thing, in my opinion, but whenever I say this people find it strange. Even those that don’t consistently practice religion surely go at least on Easter and Christmas? Nope, not our family. And I never had a problem with it until I started going to church with my friends’ families in elementary school. It would be the morning after a sleep over, and I’d be invited to come with. Sure, I’d say, why not. But the concept is still foreign to me to this day. I don’t know how all of these people gather in this room, and believe these things, and listen to these speeches. But if everybody else’s family did it, why didn’t mine? My parents simply said it was because they weren’t religious, but I could choose whatever religion I wanted to practice. Wow, now I had options.
Besides a brief stint of following Christianity due to my young mind still being molded, I’ve never fallen under any religious category. I don’t have a problem with anybody of any religion though, and I feel as if that should remain clear. I respect every individual’s choice of religion or spirituality, or, lack thereof. My issue with the whole situation is that I’m having people’s religions forced on me out of the blue. A girl stopped me on campus the other day and grilled me for ten minutes about what church I went to, and why on Earth didn’t I go to church, and had I really ever given Jesus a chance? Or people knocking on my front door and not leaving just because I declined Mormonism, even when I was polite as I could be about it. Not all religious people are like this of course, but the ones who are need to learn to respect the rest of us who don’t share their beliefs.
The sad fact is, some people take advantage of the power and connections religion gives you. Parents are teaching their children religion before they can think for themselves, and this causes the child to automatically believe that this is the only way. Not only are they forcing it on other their children, but forcing it on others. People who don’t know that there’s any other option are going to take whatever you give them. Eternal salvation? Sounds good! I don’t want to mock or blame fingers. I just ask that those of you with religious groups have the same respect for those around you that you do of each other. We’re all human beings and were given different minds for different reasons, and we should all be given the chance to explore that on our own.
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