Let me give you a little tip…

The Boy had a first-time experience yesterday while working at the farmer’s market. An older couple wandered by, pretended to look over his wares, and handed him this as a “tip”:

Apologies for the orientation. With the advent of the $^#*$(#~! “beep beep boop” version of post writing, I can’t find the way to re-orient photos that get screwed up in downloading. **Fuming**

You’ll probably have to zoom in to read the incredibly inspiring text here.

Of course, they couldn’t just leave it at handing over their pain-in-the-ass “religious” tract. They had to ask him whether he’d been “saved.” That led to an interesting conversation, considering the fact that our son declared over Christmas break that he’s an atheist. Doesn’t bother me, but I think the “bash you over the head with Jesus” couple were taken aback – mainly because our son was polite, pleasant, and reasonable when talking with them about his lack of interest in their “religion.”

My take – and I say this as someone who has worked full-time in church ministry for 11 years – is that my son had the moral high ground in this situation. To my way of thinking, the worst possible way to represent your faith is to ambush people in a public setting and try to talk them into submission. Well, I guess the Crusades were worse than that, but I’m talking about the kind of proselytizing that I’ve witnessed personally.

Our son may profess that he has no belief in a Higher Power. But he lives every moment of his life authentically, kindly, and thoughtfully. I’d rather spend time with him than with this type of God-botherer any day.