A Catholic and an Atheist

I know the title of this post sounds like the beginning of a bad joke... a Catholic and an atheist walk into a bar... but it's actually about something I never thought I'd do in a million years. I'm dating a religious woman. A very religious woman. To protect her identity I'll call her D. She is a pretty strict Catholic and goes to church pretty regularly, though she does miss a day here and there on occasion. Both of her parents are religious. In fact, her father is a deacon. Before I met him she warned me that he can be a “pushy” deacon and likes to try to convert people but D. told me she talked with him about how I'm an atheist and told her father to behave himself. Both of her parents seem very nice and I haven't been subject to any form of proselytization (one exception was a mild attempt it seems by a friend of D's but I'll get to that later).

I knew she was religious before we began dating. I'd seen her post bible verses sometimes on her Facebook page, though I didn't know quite how religious until after we began dating. Regardless of her religious beliefs and my atheism we get along great and have a lot in common and we enjoy spending time together. We enjoy a lot of the same foods, we both have similar tastes in movies (though she also enjoys these “Christian” movies), a similar sense of humor, and we have both had several similar life experiences. We both enjoy going to the gym and working out. We're both personal trainers and we actually met at the personal training certification course we both attended. In many ways I think our largest differences would be our religious and world views.

Despite her being a fairly strict Catholic D. is not one to preach to people. We've only been dating about a month and a half and the subject of religion has hardly come up, though I have agreed to attend mass with her on two occasions, which was interesting. And, no she didn't convince me to go, I was the one who offered to tag along. I had never been to a Catholic mass before and I was curious to see what all went on. I was also curious to see what kind of nonsense D. was being indoctrinated with.

The Catholic church experience was interesting but at the same time very sad. Both times I went they practiced the ritual of the Eucharist and afterward I asked her if many people get sick after drinking from the same cup and she told me that if you're sick you're told not to drink. Well, that's a relief! I am still a little grossed out, though, about the thought of drinking from the same cup as dozens of strangers. The sad part came when they began to sing along to the songs. The lyrics constantly had the same theme: We are all sinners and we need Jesus' salvation. Please forgive our sins! I found it very sad to have someone I care about being told, and worst of all believing, that they were some horrible person all based on some ancient fable. The first time I attended the mass the deacon, or whoever it was leading the mass, mentioned how we're all sinners. Then he said that because of this even our most noble actions are worthless, like dirty old rags. Wow, I thought! That's despicable! What a nice self-esteem booster for everyone here – especially the poor kids who were in attendance! I told D. my thoughts about this and she told me she doesn't accept that belief. I thought to myself...she's ignoring her religious authority!? That's a good sign, but at the same time a little hypocritical to be honest.

While the topic of religion has mostly been avoided for now, we have briefly discussed some of her views, which are a little disturbing to be honest. She appears to believe in creationism and does not accept evolution. I asked her if she knew anything about evolution and she said no. I commented that I wasn't surprised because evolution is rarely taught in schools anymore. After I said this she commented that religion isn't taught in schools any more either.

I asked about some books on her religion because, while I am familiar with the basics of Christianity in general, I'm much less familiar with the beliefs of the various sects. D.'s father loaned me two books. They're called Surprised by Truth: 11 Converts Give the Biblical and Historical Reasons for Becoming Catholic, edited by Patrick Madrid, and Rome Sweet Home: Our Journey to Catholicism, by Scott and Kimberly Hahn. The name Scott Hahn immediately rung a bell since a few years ago I had refuted his 2008 book Answering the New Atheism: Dismantling Dawkins' Case Against God, which was co-authored with Benjamin Wiker.

I found the books interesting but their arguments about how Catholicism is the “original” Christianity is pure nonsense. A talking point also seems to be that Catholicism is the only bible-based Christianity because it supposedly doesn't stray from the teachings of the bible. Again...pure nonsense. From what I can tell, many of D.'s beliefs can be found in the bible, I will grant that, but many beliefs are not. For example, she obviously doesn't accept slavery, or her subjection in relationships, and she accepts homosexuals, which is a clear violation of biblical teachings (Leviticus 20:13-14: If a man has intercourse with a man as with a woman, they both commit an abomination. They shall be put to death; their blood shall be on their own heads. NEB).

Since I was given some books on her views I thought I would ask if she'd like to read a few books about my views. She responded that she is too busy right now, which I don't think is an excuse. She is very busy with two jobs, school, along with her social time with her friends, family and our time. She said once she finishes reading a book for one of her classes she will take up my offer. I plan on holding her to that. I'm curious what she will think and I'm curious if she can be argued out of some of her views and I wonder what her reactions will be to many of the facts about the bible that I doubt she is aware of.

A sort of awkward moment happened, though, when D. and I went to visit her parents one evening. I thought it was going to be a quick visit but I then saw in D.'s hand the movie Christmas with a Capital C. D. gave the movie to her father and I saw the title and I remembered reading something on an atheist website about it and how it was incredibly stupid and biased. I was actually thinking of renting the movie myself to see what it was about so I mentioned, “I've read about that movie; I wanted to see that.” So her parents asked if D. and I wanted to say to watch it.

Well, the website was right about the movie. It's a whole bunch of atheist bashing; making atheists appear to be mean-spirited and hateful, misinterpreting the first amendment, and historical revisionism, when one Christian complained about how Daniel Baldwin's character has the gall to challenge the founders of this country and their vision by taking down Merry Christmas banners and whatnot, when this is a “Christian nation.” I chuckled softly at that. Not only did it present atheists in a bad light, at least in the parts I saw (we only stayed to watch about half of it. D. asked if I wanted to leave and I said yes), but the acting was horrible.

I was also a little offended by one scene with Baldwin, who played the atheist lawyer; Brad Stine, who played the part of an asshole Christian and is the one who made the comments about a “Christian nation;” and a young girl who dressed up in an angel costume and went out to a street corner to begin singing Christmas songs that contained a lot of religious content. Baldwin's character came up to the girl and Stine and asked the girl to step down from where she was singing because he believed she was violating the establishment clause. Stine then began getting very violent and yelling, making a scene, and eventually shoved Baldwin's character.

I believe that this scene was very inaccurate. I don't think it's against the establishment clause for a private citizen to sing religious songs; only a member of the government. My feeling about this scene was that it was either done by someone who hasn't got a damn clue about what the establishment clause is supposed to regulate (government employees, not private citizens making use of their freedom of speech) or they just wanted to paint atheists as heartless jerks because he was attempting to stop a young girl from singing.

It was actually Baldwin's hateful antagonist, played by Brad Stine, who was acting like an asshole, yelling and at one point pushing Baldwin's character, when he was talking to the singing girl in the angel costume. During this scene I was appalled when D.'s father made a comment that Stine is finally playing a “good guy” in a movie role, when usually he'd seen him take “bad guy” roles. When I heard this, I thought to myself, “Yikes...he actually thinks he is a “good” guy?! Look how he is acting! He's entirely irate and he assaulted a guy!”

D. and I only stayed to watch about half of the movie. We both wanted to leave so we could spend some time together. Needless to say I was relieved. Sitting there watching that movie was like torture, but on the other hand I'm glad I got to see what the fuss was all about.

That next morning when D. and I met up at the gym and I brought up the movie and told her I was a little offended by it she said she had a feeling that was the case, and that's why she asked if I wanted to leave. To my relief D. told me later not to worry about seeing Stine's character act that way. Not all Christians are like Stine's character, she said. I then mentioned how the movie had several historical and legal inaccuracies but then we got side tracked talking about her workout because I was leading her through a workout at the gym.

Whenever I'm spending time with D's parents her father often mentions religion and I'm constantly rolling my eyes. A family member's doctors were able to take out all the cancer in their bladder and D's father said how prayer really does work. Huh?! It wasn't prayer that saved them, it was science! Oh well. Even though I honestly think her father is nuts on the religious issues (I've also heard him say stuff about “those atheists” who try to take down nativity scenes, etc.) he is a nice, and even pretty funny guy; endearing even.

A very difficult time for me was Christmas. I spent almost the entirety with D. and her family on Christmas eve and Christmas Day. When I say difficult I don't mean to imply that I didn't have a good time, quite the contrary. I had agreed to go to mass with her on Christmas eve and this was the third or forth time I'd been to church with her. After being around all of this religious Jesus nonsense at Christmas time about the “birth of our savior,” and how no one would let baby Jesus into this nice inn to be born and how he had to be born amongst animals in a barn, I was feeling like I was being constantly bombarded with idiocy. After two days of this nonsense I was about to lose my mind. I kept thinking to myself, “These stories are all myths! The likelihood of this happening is slim to none! What is wrong with you people?!” I've noticed I can only take so much religious nonsense since I've never been around it much. Now that I know the faulty basis of these beliefs I find them even more ridiculous and I wonder how people can believe this stuff.

Despite having to put up with the religious nonsense everything else was a lot of fun. D.'s parents and I exchanged gifts and a friend of D's who is also very religious bought me two books, along with a Barnes and Noble gift card. D. had told her I love to read. One of the books was by none other than Ray Comfort called World Religions in a Nutshell and another book about getting into heaven called Since Nobody's Perfect How Good is Good Enough?, by Andy Stanley. I honestly didn't appreciate the books that much since I felt it was a bit of an attempt to proselytize on her part but at the same time I very much appreciated the fact that she thought of me. For those new to my blog I'm very familiar with Ray Comfort. He was the very first Christian apologist I ever engaged with and his Evidence Bible was my first attempt at one my of extensive book reviews.

I didn't know D's friend had planned on getting me anything so I felt bad that I hadn't gotten anything for her. The following day I went and bought her a scented candle that D. told me she liked to return the favor.

With the enormous differences in beliefs about the world I'm not sure how much we will clash the further we get into the relationship, but so far things are going well. I'm just unsure what the future will hold for this relationship and if our religious differences will eventually be too much. I know there are many couples who have differences of beliefs and have good relationships so I think it's possible. At this point I just plan on going with the flow and seeing what happens.