Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the opposite - an undercover Christian. The environment I work in is almost all atheists and they make very clear their feelings and negatives attitudes about Christians, so I just stay quiet. Sometimes I feel very guilty about doing so but I have seen a couple other people 'come out' and it has been really ugly. So I just nod and smile. I just walk away from conversations where people are trashing Christianity or mocking a specific person because of their faith. Not very Christian of me to not stand up for them but I am not prepared to handle the consequences of speaking up.

First reaction: doubtful, unless you work for the American atheist association. SOunds more like a Christian taking an opportunity to make atheists look bad

FruminousBandersnatch wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the opposite - an undercover Christian. The environment I work in is almost all atheists and they make very clear their feelings and negatives attitudes about Christians, so I just stay quiet. Sometimes I feel very guilty about doing so but I have seen a couple other people 'come out' and it has been really ugly. So I just nod and smile. I just walk away from conversations where people are trashing Christianity or mocking a specific person because of their faith. Not very Christian of me to not stand up for them but I am not prepared to handle the consequences of speaking up.

First reaction: doubtful, unless you work for the American atheist association. SOunds more like a Christian taking an opportunity to make atheists look bad

As a fellow atheist, I disagree with you. I think once people in a workplace discovered that most everyone who was there shared their lack of belief there would be much more open conversation about feelings about what various religions/religious leaders are up to, because, let's face it, there are plenty of reasons to make fun of certain religious leaders and their respected hypocrisies.

Conflicts over freedom from religion are in the news a lot more these days, the group building the Satanist sculpture to sit alongside the 10 Commandments and the supposed "black mass" to name just a couple, and I could see those being topics of conversation in a workplace where atheists felt more comfortable (they are in our house, where both DW and I are atheists).

Religion has so infected a lot of our politics, and politics has so infected our daily lives, that I have no trouble imagining those conversations that make the religious OP keep quiet.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the opposite - an undercover Christian. The environment I work in is almost all atheists and they make very clear their feelings and negatives attitudes about Christians, so I just stay quiet. Sometimes I feel very guilty about doing so but I have seen a couple other people 'come out' and it has been really ugly. So I just nod and smile. I just walk away from conversations where people are trashing Christianity or mocking a specific person because of their faith. Not very Christian of me to not stand up for them but I am not prepared to handle the consequences of speaking up.

+1 This is me.

Anonymous wrote:

I agree with what you say. What I think is unlikely, is that there would be an office environment here DC where most people happened to be atheists and happened to talk openly about it, so that they realized they were all atheists. I doubt that would occur except in an organization that was itself atheist -- like the American Atheist association -- which is not in DC.

Thus my guess that it was a Christian trying out a reverse discrimination story.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the opposite - an undercover Christian. The environment I work in is almost all atheists and they make very clear their feelings and negatives attitudes about Christians, so I just stay quiet. Sometimes I feel very guilty about doing so but I have seen a couple other people 'come out' and it has been really ugly. So I just nod and smile. I just walk away from conversations where people are trashing Christianity or mocking a specific person because of their faith. Not very Christian of me to not stand up for them but I am not prepared to handle the consequences of speaking up.

+1 This is me.

What do you think the consequences would be?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the opposite - an undercover Christian. The environment I work in is almost all atheists and they make very clear their feelings and negatives attitudes about Christians, so I just stay quiet. Sometimes I feel very guilty about doing so but I have seen a couple other people 'come out' and it has been really ugly. So I just nod and smile. I just walk away from conversations where people are trashing Christianity or mocking a specific person because of their faith. Not very Christian of me to not stand up for them but I am not prepared to handle the consequences of speaking up.

+1 This is me.

What do you think the consequences would be?

In certain circles that I run in (not all), an insufferable amount of condescension.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I agree with what you say. What I think is unlikely, is that there would be an office environment here DC where most people happened to be atheists and happened to talk openly about it, so that they realized they were all atheists. I doubt that would occur except in an organization that was itself atheist -- like the American Atheist association -- which is not in DC.

Thus my guess that it was a Christian trying out a reverse discrimination story.

You want to believe your own mythology, evidently, and the facts (and three different posters) be damned!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I agree with what you say. What I think is unlikely, is that there would be an office environment here DC where most people happened to be atheists and happened to talk openly about it, so that they realized they were all atheists. I doubt that would occur except in an organization that was itself atheist -- like the American Atheist association -- which is not in DC.

Thus my guess that it was a Christian trying out a reverse discrimination story.

You want to believe your own mythology, evidently, and the facts (and three different posters) be damned!

FruminousBandersnatch wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I agree with what you say. What I think is unlikely, is that there would be an office environment here DC where most people happened to be atheists and happened to talk openly about it, so that they realized they were all atheists. I doubt that would occur except in an organization that was itself atheist -- like the American Atheist association -- which is not in DC.

Thus my guess that it was a Christian trying out a reverse discrimination story.

You want to believe your own mythology, evidently, and the facts (and three different posters) be damned!

This might've been a little more ironic than you intended.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the opposite - an undercover Christian. The environment I work in is almost all atheists and they make very clear their feelings and negatives attitudes about Christians, so I just stay quiet. Sometimes I feel very guilty about doing so but I have seen a couple other people 'come out' and it has been really ugly. So I just nod and smile. I just walk away from conversations where people are trashing Christianity or mocking a specific person because of their faith. Not very Christian of me to not stand up for them but I am not prepared to handle the consequences of speaking up.

+1 This is me.

What do you think the consequences would be?

In certain circles that I run in (not all), an insufferable amount of condescension.

Like if you said you believed in ghosts?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the opposite - an undercover Christian. The environment I work in is almost all atheists and they make very clear their feelings and negatives attitudes about Christians, so I just stay quiet. Sometimes I feel very guilty about doing so but I have seen a couple other people 'come out' and it has been really ugly. So I just nod and smile. I just walk away from conversations where people are trashing Christianity or mocking a specific person because of their faith. Not very Christian of me to not stand up for them but I am not prepared to handle the consequences of speaking up.

+1 This is me.

What do you think the consequences would be?

In certain circles that I run in (not all), an insufferable amount of condescension.

Like if you said you believed in ghosts?

Worse, actually. The irony is, it appears to be perfectly fine to believe in ghosts, Wican lore, etc. It's Christianity specifically that hits a nerve with people.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the opposite - an undercover Christian. The environment I work in is almost all atheists and they make very clear their feelings and negatives attitudes about Christians, so I just stay quiet. Sometimes I feel very guilty about doing so but I have seen a couple other people 'come out' and it has been really ugly. So I just nod and smile. I just walk away from conversations where people are trashing Christianity or mocking a specific person because of their faith. Not very Christian of me to not stand up for them but I am not prepared to handle the consequences of speaking up.

+1 This is me.

What do you think the consequences would be?

In certain circles that I run in (not all), an insufferable amount of condescension.

Like if you said you believed in ghosts?

Worse, actually. The irony is, it appears to be perfectly fine to believe in ghosts, Wican lore, etc. It's Christianity specifically that hits a nerve with people.

Doesn't sound like the washington I know. Perhaps you're trying to convert people and they don't like it? or you're a fundamentalist who talks about Jesus all the time.

PS -- God is a ghost.

Anonymous wrote:^ By this I mean a ghost that says "boo," as in Caspar the Friendly Ghost... most people's concept!

Anonymous wrote:I am the opposite - an undercover Christian. The environment I work in is almost all atheists and they make very clear their feelings and negatives attitudes about Christians, so I just stay quiet. Sometimes I feel very guilty about doing so but I have seen a couple other people 'come out' and it has been really ugly. So I just nod and smile. I just walk away from conversations where people are trashing Christianity or mocking a specific person because of their faith. Not very Christian of me to not stand up for them but I am not prepared to handle the consequences of speaking up.