On Being Proselytized

He told me he was a birder.

And I was at the local birding spot, heading out, when he struck up a chat.  This is not uncommon among birders, particularly those entering and exiting at the same time.  Local birders have told me everything from where to find interesting birds to under-the-radar sandwich shops to why they devote their time to birding to where they live to where they vacation.

So we chatted.  About when the birds tend to stir on crisp autumn days, a local hotspot nearby, ruby-crowned kinglets.  He mentioned he was retired, and somehow busier than ever in spite of it.  I laughed and thought of my dad.  When he mentioned he spent a lot of time serving at a local church, I asked which one. When he told me, I recognized the name, vaguely: one of those newer non-denominational evangelical churches, about twenty minutes down the road.

He emphasized to me that his church taught “just Scripture, and none of that other stuff.”  I resisted the urge to ask what he meant by “that other stuff.” He told me about their extensive children’s ministry and multiple campuses.  He told me about the church’s dual pastors, who had spent hours helping him “connect “”connect everything from the Tower of Babel to Revelation.” He shared miracles he’d experienced, his dad’s conversion, and what Jesus meant to him.

About fifteen minutes in, I recognized that I was being evangelized.

This has happened before.  And being from an evangelical context myself, originally, I understand the general goodwill and good intentions behind the act.  When I see it happening, I tend to throw “tells” into the conversation that let the other person know I’m also a believer.  And so, here.  I piped in with a “well, praise the Lord.”  I mentioned my mother’s dedication to children’s ministry.  I agreed with Him about Jesus being the way, the truth, and the life.

“I like to start with birds to make people comfortable,” he told me, “then get into the real stuff to see if they know what I’m talking about, like you do.” He mentioned he frequented the parks quite often.

I assumed that meant he understood me to be a believer.  We talked a bit longer; then I said I’d have to get back to start work.  He asked for my name, which I gave, and I asked for his.  Then he asked me where I went to church.  I told him.

And, much to my surprise, he reached out of his car window to grab my arm tightly.  “Are you a newborn Catholic?”

“What?” I asked.  I didn’t—and still don’t—understand what he meant.  I had not named a Catholic parish. I think I made a joke about the Reformation, despite being deeply freaked out he’d grabbed my arm.  But I hoped maybe he was just confused.  “No, I’m not Catholic.”

“You’re one of those newborn Catholics,” he repeated. He wouldn’t let go of my arm.  He proceeded to tell me about a friend of his, one just like me, who “believed Saint Peter was gonna open the gates.  But we told him, that isn’t Saint Peter you’re going to see.  It’s Jesus.  And when you die—scccchhhhkkk—you’re going to up there facing Him, and having to give an account.  And my friend, he finally understood that and he started coming to our church.”

“Okay,” I said.  I tried to pull my arm back. He didn’t let go.

He told me to visit his church.  He gave me the address.  He was still holding my arm, and I was panicking.  I kept saying okay, sure, yes.  He kept his grip on my arm.  “Promise you’ll go,” he said.  “Promise you’ll go and talk to Pastor _____.”

“Yes, okay, promise,” I said.  He finally let go of my arm and I stumbled back. 

“I’ll know if you don’t,” he said.  “I talk to Pastor ____ and I know your name now, so I’ll know if you did or didn’t and if you’re lying to me.”

I don’t even remember what I said.  Something about my husband and we’ll see and uh huh, God bless you, goodbye, and I fled to my car and pulled out.  He’d been looking at my license plate, and I was so scared he’d follow me I drove to a local grocery store and then sat in the parking lot and cried.

I have been a stew of feelings about it ever since.

I have been astonished because of the sense of distinct threat I experienced, which I have never, ever felt—even while being evangelized, which has happened from time to time (and even from people outside my religion).  Astonished that I lost all wherewithal to say, “please let go of me, I’m leaving.”  Astonished that one of the reasons I didn’t, or couldn’t, was because initially something about him felt so familiar to me: he was like one of the kindly old men I remembered from my home church growing up.  I kept thinking that he was so like people I had grown up knowing. Except the people I grew up knowing wouldn’t have grabbed anyone that way. Astonished because I have never encountered that language—the language of my evangelical childhood, the Romans road—wielded with in such a strange and coercive way.

I’m regretful that I blurted “yes I promise” out of sheer panic and a desire for him to let go of my arm.  It’s not a promise I have any intention of keeping; I had to ask God to forgive me, for that.  I’m disconcerted and saddened to essentially have my own proclamation of faith ignored or denied; to him, not going to his church (or perhaps going to mine) was sufficient evidence of apostasy.  I’m bewildered that having confessed Jesus—in front of a man who spoke for some length, eloquently, about grace by faith—I nevertheless didn’t appear to be Christian “enough.”

And mostly, I’m heartbroken, because I can’t imagine encountering this as a non-believer.

Even as a believer it’s hard.  I texted my husband from the grocery store parking lot that day about how upset I was.  He was furious on my behalf—“there is no reason anyone ought to be grabbing a random woman who is alone in a parking lot anywhere, at any time”—but we both recognize that from a vast and innumerable body of Christ, this man is presumably one member.  I know God well enough to chalk this up as a weird and unsettling experience, and to let it go.  This isn’t about Christ, it isn’t about my faith, I’ll be fine.  But if I was an unbeliever?  If this was my experience of God? 

What would it mean to me, if I didn’t know Jesus, to know that the friendly person who wanted to talk birds with me only did so as a lure to diagnose my spiritual condition?  What would it mean to me, to be pressed and insisted upon by someone I had only ever met today?  To literally be grabbed?  To be cornered into a conversation I did not ask for, intend, and didn’t want?  And if I resisted, if I reacted with anything but enthusiasm and a commitment to attend church, to have that taken as confirmation of my sinfulness and away-from-Godness? 

How on earth, as a non-believer, would I think about God and Jesus and church after that?

I understand that salvation is an urgent matter.  I know that many people who evangelize in a seemingly overzealous or indiscriminate way often do so out of an abundance of concern for the souls of others.  I also don’t think that, in the current evangelical climate, the emphasis on spiritual warfare and “battle” and conquering in the name of God is helping matters either.  I think it is probably helping embolden behaviors like I encountered today.  Sin and hell and eternity matter. But even what comes from good intentions can cause real and lasting harm.

You know what’s strange?

I encountered another guy, before the evangelical man.  He walked behind me to the pond.  As I sat noodling with my camera, he pondered the sunrise.  “It’s beautiful today,” he told me.  “The sunrise all nice like that.”

He went on to tell me that it had been especially beautiful yesterday, all pinks and reds—“just like out West,” he said cheerfully.  I told him the sunrises and sunsets were one of my favorite things about our local area.  We stood, he at his end of the fence and I at mine, marveling at the sunrise together.  I took pictures.  “Don’t miss the heron!” he urged me.  I made sure to get a shot.

At the time, I thought to myself, this is a form of praise.  And God, it’s so nice—to share this sort of joy in the world with another human.  I should come here more often to do that.  It’s a good way to connect and to remember and share who You are.  And I felt, as I often do at such moments, a glimpse of the pleasure of God: the beauty of the world, a sense of peace and possibility.  I thought to myself at the time that I needed to make a habit of this.  To drag myself out of bed early, to get myself here regardless of weather and enjoy the sunrise God made. 

Now, I’m not sure I’ll be able to go back.  And it’s because of the man who called himself the Christian.

Something about that feels so sad and wrong to me.