You seem to have come up against some pretty unusual Jesuits, Steve. I certainly wouldn't count them as "your average Jesuit"! That just isn't how any I've met operate. They'd be delighted to start a discussion from a position of no prior assumptions.

I didn't say no prior assumptions. A proper conversation must start with the prior assumption that God does not exist. Saying there must be "no prior assumptions", in a world in which the default position is that God exists is no way to start a fair fight.