Osler's Razor

Yesterday morning, I was flying out of Jackson Hole on the little plane pictured above. As I sat down, a young woman took the window seat behind me. She edged in past an older lady in her 60's as she moved to her seat, and once they were buckled in they fell into conversation.

Almost immediately, the young woman started asking the older one if she "knew Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior," and whether she "was interested in eternal truth."

The older woman explained that she wasn't a Christian (I got the idea from her answers that she was Jewish). She politely parried each of the points the earnest young woman made... for example, when the younger woman asked "But can I ask you why you don't want to know about eternal life?" the older one explained that she was wary of easy truths about things we can't see.

Frustrated, the younger woman began to just argue with the older one, and insisting that she read either the Book of John or a tract that she had with her. The older woman, though, was clearly better-educated, smarter, and well-read (at one point she quoted Dostoevsky). The younger woman just started to talk over her. It took an unpleasant turn.

The older woman was remarkably patient, but eventually said she just wanted to read her book. The younger one did not accept that, and kept on making statements like "I know that many people don't want to know the truth. I'm going to pray for you."

It was excruciating to witness. As a Christian, I was horrified by what she was doing. Seen plainly, she was de-evangelizing, making a terrible impression for the faith on all around her (and I was not the only one listening in).  She was living the stereotype of Christians as pushy, arrogant, and insulting. I suspect that her performance will become a cautionary story told by some of the people who heard her, when they talked about why they weren't Christian, or what was wrong with the church..

As we left the plane, I asked the young woman if I could talk to her, and we talked about advocacy for a while. More than anything, I tried to tell her the same thing I tell my students: that people don't get argued into anything important; rather, we are transformed by stories. Jesus knew that. When he talked to people who weren't religious "experts" (the Pharisees, for example), he told stories, parables.  There is a deep truth in that.