Maybe I'm one of those to whom Alex refers, Amos.

If so, Alex, then no, I don't mean to douse other people's joy in their faith. I'm simply expressing myself, the same as everyone else on the Forum does, and has a right to do, in hopes of finding a connection with others who think and feel as I do, and also in hopes of furthering communication and understanding between groups of people who think and feel differently from one another.

It's been a number of years since I slowly weaned myself away from my overbearing fundamentalist-Christian upbringing, and I haven't found very many people in the 3-D world with whom I can discuss that change freely and safely. But I have found quite an accepting atmosphere here, even among people who do not agree with me. Even so, I have tried very hard not to be "evangelistic", as you so adroitly put it, about "testifying" to my beliefs or lack thereof, nor to give in to the temptation to go on ad nauseum about the bitterness I feel toward the "Christian soldiers" in whose camp I was a prisoner of war, so to speak.

However, I agree with the sentiment Blackcatter has expressed in several threads that it is important for people of any particular faith to realize and accept that there are many, many others in the world with whom those people share few, or none, of the articles of their faith (instead of assuming that everyone believes in the same concept of God, or feeling threatened because they don't). I do not say this to try to "convert" any believer into a non-believer. I say this as a plea for tolerance and kindness.

Sharon