I was recently sitting on the grass in the shade of a tree trying to think my way through a task I've been stuck on, when two young men approached me and very politely asked me if I could tell them who I thought Jesus is.
I've noticed the campus has broken out in a rash of young Christian men lately. They're everywhere, sitting in pairs with a Bible casually propped between them as they have their mini-Bible-discussion-cum-mentor-sessions. There's also been a large group of "Christian Students" meeting after classes in one of the lecture rooms, which doesn't appear to be the old Christian Union that has been floating around for God knows how long (pun intended). Although it might be the same group with a spot of rebranding. Christian groups do love to rebrand in the 21st century.
Over the years I've occasionally found myself the target of young Christians on an evangelistic spurt. I remember once, when I was 18 and stressed out of my brain, I was literally sobbing in the street after realising I had forgotten to do something at uni and I had to go back and fix it, and most people completely ignored me except for a young Christian woman near my own age. She didn't ask me if I was okay - she invited me to her Church. I was a deeply committed Christian in a modern Pentecostal denomination myself, at the time, so I didn't think this behaviour was particularly weird or inappropriate. Looking back on it now, I wonder if maybe it was an early contributor to my eventual realisation that Christians aren't as "Christlike" as they like to believe. Jesus wouldn't have invited me to his church. He would have asked me if I needed a cup of tea and offered a hanky.
The "fun" thing about being a Christian who is occasionally targeted by other Christians on the prowl is you know exactly what they are doing and why - and it all seems so terribly forced and mercenary. I have always been polite to them "sorry, but you're preaching to the converted - I won't take up any more of your time", but part of me was always slightly creeped out by it. Especially when they would still try a few follow-up techniques on me. I couldn't figure out if I didn't look Christian enough and they still wanted to try to convert me, or if the point was to win more people over to their specific church, rather than The Church.
It's probably why I was never that evangelical myself - I knew how creepy it felt on the other end.
When these two young men approached me, it was the first time I've been hit-up by Christians for a spot of "winning souls for Christ" for a while. It's also the first time someone has approached me about it since I became a Buddhist.
"We were just wondering," said the lead boy, "Could you tell us who you think Jesus is."
I knew what they were really asking, and why, and that they didn't actually want to hear my answer. I knew they didn't want to hear it because they were just looking for an opening to tell me who they think Jesus is. I looked at them as a woman twice their age who has been "Churched" since she was a child and made her way through more than one Christian denomination before coming to see that it was easier to follow Jesus' ethos by being a Buddhist. I looked at them as someone who has been fed the answers, and who has sought the answers, and who has discovered there are problems and holes in all the answers.
I simply told them, with a polite smile, that I had been a Christian, I was now a Buddhist and they were better off trying to have this conversation with someone else. It threw them for a moment - they weren't prepared for that answer, and clearly had no follow up for it, so they muttered something polite and left.
What I wanted to say, as I watched them walk away probably trying to think of how they could respond if they had a similar reply next time, was:
"Oh, boys, I could give you at least 15 different answers to that question and they'd all be as wrong as your answer - but you are too young and in love to have this conversation right now. Go and be young and in love with your faith. In time, when you're ready to be more critically engaged with your beliefs, you might be in a place to hear the answer to the question you're asking."
