Discussing Religion, At My Own Risk, Against My Teacher's Advice

WHEN I WAS IN SIXTH GRADE, in 1967, our teacher told us that we should never discuss religion or politics with anyone. She didn't explain why, and I wondered why. I was afraid to raise my hand and ask, thinking that for some reason maybe children should not discuss those topics, because they were the exclusive domain of adults. The idea that these two topics precipitate conflict never crossed my mind, because as an eleven year old, I hadn't the slightest intention of arguing with anybody. I didn't know enough about either subject to have much of an opinion, other than, I thought religion was kind of strange, I still do, for that matter. I loved my sixth grade teacher; to this day she is my favorite teacher. I remember thinking, but not saying, that she was excluding from our conversations the two most interesting topics in the world, and that it was a shame, and was she really sure she thought that was a good idea? Over the years of my adult life, I have usually ignored her sage advice, and have usually suffered no ill consequences, because most often I discuss the twin taboo topics with people with whom I agree, which is the key to conflict avoidance. But every time I talk with someone on the other side of the fence, namely, Christians, and conservatives, it doesn't go well. So, I can see her point. Maybe Mrs. Stirewalt should have qualified her admonition to exclude from conversation only those with whom we are likely to disagree, and therefore argue. No topics are more explosive, obviously. Writing about them is another matter, however, and I do that all the time, like, right now. I despise political conservatism, and I despise religion, and my hatred of religion began in about the sixth grade. In 1543 Copernicus published his famous, seminal work, "On the Motions of the Heavenly Bodies", but only upon his death. He was afraid to publish in his lifetime, because in the book he demonstrated that the Earth revolves around the sun, rather than the other way around, and the church, firmly convinced that the sun revolves around the earth because Christ lived on the Earth and not the sun, would have killed Copernicus had he published while still living, and he knew it. In 1608, Galileo saw through his newly invented telescope the moons of Jupiter orbiting around Jupiter, and he had the audacity (reckless stupidity?) to say so, and for that, the Pope made him recant, under threat of death, and put him on house arrest for the rest of his life. The official verdict of the church was that his "optick tube" was bewitched, haunted with demons. No, I'm not kidding. Fast forward to today. The church never changed. It fought against Darwin, beginning in 1859, when "The Origin of Species" was published, and still does. All truly educated people understand that evolution is nature, and for the Christian religion, or any part of it, to argue against Darwin in the year 2018, which many Christians do, is sheer, unadulterated stubborn, evil, benighted stupidity, just as it was in 1543 and 1608 on the subject of earth's place in the solar system. The church should have accepted Galileo the moment he proved his work was correct, and the church should have accepted Darwinian evolution long ago. These days, I only talk about how stupid and superstitious and evil christian thought is, with people with whom I agree. Or, I write about it. The evolution deniers are impossible to reason with, as devout Christians always have been. The Christian religion hasn't changed, neither have I, and, I assume, neither has Mrs. Stirewalt, in her wisdom.