What irks me is that athiests, agnostics and other non-religious people such as myself get lumped in as Christian by default.  People assume that if you're a white anglo-saxon, you must be a Christian.  Non-Christianity is considered a by-product of being born in the wrong country, or multi-culturalism gone wrong. 

I've been told more than once that regardless of my views or beliefs, I am a Christian on account that my parents were nominaly Christian.  This might not seem like a big deal to some, but I'm sick and tired of some Christian saying hatefull things about muslim, jewish or hindu beliefs, and then getting offended when I don't agree with them.

I demolished an evolution/creation thread on another message board a few months back. Aside from a couple of nutjobs who insist that the Bible is the only real truth and anything outside of it that disagrees with it must be false, everyone at least agreed that evolution does happen. From there, some guys pointed out some of the 'we don't know's as proof not only against evolution but that the Christian God exists. People are looking for any excuse to keep believing whatever they are comfortable with, regardless of whether or not it makes any sense.

 heike6,  Just check christian? I think not.

Yup, Jesus and Buddha would frown

Thankfully, precious few.  However, it always astonishes me that it's so easy for them to rationalize the brutality and sadism of the depicted "metaphors" against the fuzzy Jesus they believe in.

No shit, I know a hermaphrodite whose parents chose poorly when they decided they wanted a girl.  Turns out, she really should have been a guy.  (The good part of it is that I've never seen a lesbian who can pick up straight women the way she can.  It's truly awe inspiring.)  So, she's been ostracized by her family for being lesbian, even though her family were the ones who did it to her.  

She is a Christian, and don't you dare try to sway her opinion.  The funny thing is, she hates god.  She believes in him so strongly, I think, because it gives her someplace to focus the hate, other than her parents, who were the real assholes.

At least in my family, one or two people read C.S. Lewis, and then told everybody else that he proved the link existed.  Everyone took it for granted, I think.

I don't think it's a majority.  Anecdotally, I think that maybe 15-20% of people who identify as Christian either 1) Go along with it to keep the family peace, or 2) Don't believe it, but think it's good to believe in something, or 3) Don't believe, but know what a cash cow religion can be.

I think that (primarily because of a lack of critical thinking skills) most of the moderate Christians in the U.S. simply don't understand how incredibly ridiculous their beliefs are.  They've just never been exposed to any other way of thinking.

Yesterday, I saw a car with tons of bumper stickers, all advocating peace and harmony (Yes.  It was a Volkswagon.)  One had the word "Coexist" spelled with a bunch of religious symbols.  It makes me sad that such great intentions are wasted on the false belief that religions can coexist.  That's why religion is so horrible!  Each one claims to know the truth -- how can they possibly coexist?

Many people are starting to distance themselves from Christianity.  It is my hope that organizations like RRS can give them a viable alternative to "spiritual but not religious" -- one that will encourage people to answer questions honestly, not just in a way that will make them feel warm and fuzzy.

She was ostracized by her christian family, but she's still christian? That is an interesting kind of defense mechanism... She must be one of those christians who ignore the stuff about homosexuality being a sin.

Did I say majority? Wishful thinking, I guess. I left out a word. It should read: My hypothesis is that the majority of *these* so called "christians" are actually deists.

Oh, but we're the evil atheists for saying such things! Of course they can coexist... in the moderate christian fantasyland where they accept and reject whichever parts of the religion they want.

RRS = awesome! Eventually, the religion question will come off of surveys because the assumption will be that there is no religion, and anyone who thinks so is delusional.