WOW. Didn't see it this way at all. Thanks for the eye opening. Things to ponder, certainly. It would take far too long to explain why my husband and I are apart, it really has nothing to do with church going or believing and I'm not here to bad mouth him. (I wasn't a believer when our marriage first went down hill and it's what has kept me strong and happy throughout.)
I agree there are people at all churches who are fake but there are also true Christians who follow their faith, love Jesus and are a blessing to the church. Trust me when I say my husband only sees the surface and from that thinks he knows all. (One church friend made a comment and my husband instantly knew why she said it, what she meant by it and why she goes to church in the first place....) Anyway, I didn't mean to trash my husband or win an argument, just posted what a non believer stated because I know he's not the only one who thinks this about Christians.
Is there any hard evidence that he is either right or wrong on this woman's views?
There are people in the world who are what we call 'empaths', who can decipher tones, objectives, motives and meanings from simple conversations and moments with people. Is your husband the 'unbeliever' you refer to?
You know, sometimes in life, people do perhaps become cynical and a bit blinded, but that's only a one angled view of the situation. Your husband may be tired, he may be stressed, he may be a lot of things and certainly I, being someone who sometimes feels as he does, need understanding in these kind of times rather than pressure being applied or being invalidated. I know it's not intentional on your part, and you just don't think it's merited for him to feel the way he feels, but feelings are very, very powerful, and being told, even in the slightest way, that your feelings are 'wrong', is like being put inside a box of what you 'should feel' instead of being recognized for what you actually feel.
I'm only 23, and I know I might sound very pretentious, perhaps even sanctimonious in what I'm saying, even a bit of a 'know-it-all', but honestly, I'm just trying to explain how my own analytic perception works and how it can sometimes be very useful, and other times it can be a curse. Your husband sounds like someone who tries to pierce through what people portray on the outside and breach the inner shell that keeps the true motives and feelings. This in itself is a really tough kind of perspective to have on the world.
He probably desires the 'real' kind of interaction that today's society rarely promotes. And you know this yourself; the make up, the image, the should-be's and should-not-be's and the parts people play in the world. There are very few people whom I can say portray themselves as what they truly are and perhaps, for all his seeming flaws, your husband has a hard time pretending to play the role that he's 'supposed' to play. Do you know what I mean?
To a certain extent, we all portray something that we aren't. And literally, you could boil this down and go through all this and it's very likely that your husband's desire to know the inner personality so that he can decipher what someone really is, probably comes from something that caused him to be mistrusting of people. I know that's what happened to me. And now I need to understand the motives people have rather than playing along with what they put out. I need to know where their personality and image really comes from. It isn't that I'm unaccepting of people (at least to my own view), it's just that I have a hard time handling deception of any kind and if I know the real person, I can TRULY accept them for what they are and respond to that in the according fashion.
Maybe that can be classed as overthinking, but I like to see it as desiring to know the real truth. The only problem is that I often expect that real truth to be something 'dirty' that someone feels the need to hide. The cure for that is for someone to come along and re-instill my faith in humanity, and when all is said and done, I think that's exactly what your husband needs; to be shown something wonderful and selfless and to know that there really are people in the world who are truly loving. That's not something that can be shown in words, that's something that requires action.
Can I ask you, was your husband once a non-cynical idealist with hopes and dreams, who didn't have this kind of cynicism about things? I suspect so but I can't be sure. You don't actually need to answer obviously, this is all just something to think about. But if it is the case that he used to be that type of person, then all you need to do is find out what crushed him. Because that's all a cynic really is; a crushed romantic.
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