Mling
Knight of the Woeful Countenance (in training)
- Jun 19, 2006
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I'm taking it in the context of considering the people who are usually targeted by Christian evangelism: children, most heavily, but also people who are reeling from tragedy or major life changes (18 year olds fresh out of home are a major target audience) addicts, people suffering from diseases (sometimes with the promise that their ailment will go away once they convert), members of primitive tribes--who are targetted despite having *no* frame of reference that would allow them to understand Christianity, but are likely to say "yes! Yes!" To anything that the near-godlike people with the fancy machines have.
The list goes on and includes lots of people who Christians claim are targeted because they are most in need of support, but take a look at the negative space. The people least targeted by attempts at conversion (as opposed to attack) are well-educated, emotionally stable, happy, healthy atheists. Interestingly, these are the people who most christians would say are most deceived by Satan or "the world" and most in need of spiritual guidance, and yet they are the people least likely to be offered it and most likely to be attacked.
Why? The number one difference I see between those extremes is that the people least likely to be targeted by conversion attempts are the most able to think clearly and rationally. The most likely to be targeted are the ones who are either incapable of mature, capable, rational thought (children, and people with certain illnesses) and people who are in a life position where they're likely to grab eagerly or desperately at anything they're offered (people reeling from tragedy or life change, ill people and their families, and people with little exposure to the modern world.)
I am fully aware that most Christians really do believe that by targeting vulnerable people, they're being nurturing and supportive. That doesn't make it any less predatory. I've known sexual predators who work on similar mo's: "she's young! Sure, she seems hesitant and she doesn't actually know what decisions I'm making for her, but it's for the best. She'd make bad decisions if I let her control her own life, so I'm just going to present things in ways that...'encourage' her to make the decisions I know are best for.her. she needs my guidance!"
Not *knowing* you're a predator doesn't make you less of one. Targeting people who are vulnerable and trying to coerce them into making decisions based on your own wants instead of their's is what makes a person a predator, and that's also the core of evangelism.
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