John Lennon once sang about how we should imagine a world without religion, implying that it would be way more peaceful this way. Well, we can argue about whether it would be like that or not, but we will never know the answer, as life without religion isn't really realistic.
Today's OP would probably argue that without religion, they would have a much easier time. You see, they were plagued by an overly religious neighbor, and the things between them went so sour that the police ended up having to be involved.
More info: Reddit
Some would argue that if there were no religion in this world, we would have an easier time
Image credits: Drazen Zigic / Freepik (not the actual photo)
Possibly, today's original poster would be one of these people
Image credits: RDNE Stock project / Pexels (not the actual photo)
And it's all due to the fact that they have a neighbor who cannot stop pushing her religious beliefs on them
Image credits: Freepik / Freepik (not the actual photo)
She does that by stealing their newspaper and replacing it with themed pamphlets, claiming it's the "real news"
Image credits: Entire-Magician-7771
Even the police warning for theft didn't stop her from being pushy, as she switched to leaving them on a car windshield instead
Every morning, the OP gets their newspapers delivered to his driveway. Yet, for the last 2 months, instead of the newspapers, they kept getting religious pamphlets from the same church. It was clear that someone was doing that on purpose, and it wasn’t the newspaper company.
So they set up a camera that caught her, and they realized it was their neighbor, a woman in her 60s or so. They went to confront her with the video proof and kind of got the answer to why she was doing this. Apparently, in her eyes, “mainstream media lies,” and she was “saving” them with “real news”. They told her to stop doing so, but she insisted that she would only if they agreed to come to her church.
They refused to do so – it felt like coercion. Instead, they told her that if she does anything like that ever again, they'll call the police. Seemingly, the woman didn’t take this threat seriously, as she kept doing that. But the OP wasn’t playing – they actually called the cops.
She tried explaining to them how she was “ministering to a lost soul” by doing God’s work, but they still gave her a warning about theft. And still, even this didn’t make her fully stop. She no longer touched the newspapers, but kept leaving the same pamphlets on the car windshield, one time with a note about how they're “going to hell for involving authorities in church matters.”
Well, religious people aren’t a rarity in our society. After all, religion has been a big part of humanity’s history – some of its origins even 100,000 BCE. Granted, most of them didn’t start that in advance, but still, early 2000 BCE or so. In one shape or form, they followed the humans for a long, long time.
Image credits: breizhatao / Freepik (not the actual photo)
Even nowadays, it still holds a tight grip on society. Of course, most of the time, the way it does that depends from country to country. Here, countries like Indonesia, Libya, and Egypt are viewed as the most religious countries, while the Netherlands, Czechia, and Japan are viewed as the least.
Yet, it doesn’t mean that there are no religious people in non-religious countries. In fact, they surely even have religious fanatics, just like the woman from today’s story. Of course, we don’t know her whole deal to be able to fully “diagnose” her like that, but seeing how pushy she is with her beliefs on her neighbor, she might check off quite many needed boxes.
Religious fanaticism typically is described as an extreme and even obsessive devotion to a specific faith, which can lead to intolerant behavior toward others. Sounds similar, doesn’t it? Some religious fanatics tend to go so far as to even believe their religious leaders instead of, let’s say, doctors, just like this woman, who believes that mainstream media is lying and only her church reports on real news.
All of this considered, many people online suggested the OP to do something more to deal with her – whether it’s talking to her pastor or getting a restraining order – anything is good, as long as it makes her leave them alone. After all, her willingness to turn them to religion doesn’t seem to be healthy and feels even kind of dangerous.
Do you agree with netizens? Please share your stance on this whole situation!
So, netizens urged the original poster to do something more about it - her obsession with bringing them to the church seems borderline dangerous
