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First off, hope you are well and continue to be so.
Second, you are not wrong.
I personally don't get offended or upset by people offering blessings or prayers, etc. I don't believe in their efficacy of course, but I generally feel as if they are offered in a sincere bid to help or give comfort; a nice gesture.
So, unless someone gets terribly pedantic or pushy I tend to just think they are attempting to be kind.
If you feel you must say something (and it is certainly not out of bounds to say something) you might just preface it with something like
"Well, I appreciate that, but I am not religious"
or
"Thank you, but I don't believe in these things. Perhaps you should save your energy for someone else"
or something. I dunno.
I am not happy about it, but I do feel we have to coddle The Believers if we are interested in avoiding head-butting contests.
It makes no sense to argue with someone who has abdicated reason, after all.
Thank you so much for your well wishes. Those are pretty much exactly the two sorts of things I do, actually say or write, and which are considered by many to be "rude" or,at best,counterproductive. <<sigh>;
May the gods forbid if you should be in a hospital and some well meaning chaplin wants to give you comfort.
Am I (a Christian) offended if some secular person wishes me his or her positive thoughts regarding my "cancer"? Nope. Are any of my theist friends offended? Nope.
Get over it, smile, and be gracious.
I sus pect people get angry with you, because you are hostile. People are people and no one gets angry with another person with out cause. If indeed you politly say no thanks 99% of people are cool with that and will go away. Either you attract fanatics or....
No one gets angry with another person without cause? What follows from that is that no one ever gets angry unless their anger is justified. But a lot of anger is not justified because the anger is based on misperception; if someone challenges your most cherished beliefs you have the choice of staying at the level of ideas (the rational, scientific model) or revert to attacks and counter-attacks on the person.
The first choice is productive; the second is useless.
I can completely empathize with the OP, actually. My mom was in the hospital for 28 days due to complications with chemo. She coded once and was alerted once during two separate visits. It was a nightmare. I was alone with her because my father suffers from mental and physical conditions that kept him from staying at the hospital or helping more. My sister decided it wasn't necessary to come help (despite going to Jamaica for vacay 10 days after my mom was discharged). My mom walked into the hospital for chemo and was wheeled out unable to walk or stand without immense assistance. I had to clean her, feed her, and brush her teeth. She reverted to infancy and stayed that way for nearly a month. She acquired a wound that became infected, and I tended it everyday for a month. I was completely alone. It was awful.
Everyday I was bombarded with empty religious nonsense. My mom laid in her bed despondent, and nurses and chaplains would talk to me about "her heart being right with God". Once going back to her room after getting food in the cafeteria, a Southern Baptist preacher entered the elevator and began to preach to us. On my mom's second admission, I had taken her to the ER (the hospital was 2 hours away) because her lungs were filling with fluid. The ER doc looked her dead in the face and asked her, "Is your heart right with God?" I have never felt so enraged. My mom could not walk. She could not breathe. She was literally dying in front of us, and this doctor found it more important to play pastor than to do his job and transfer her to permanent room and stabilize her. I was angry. I am still angry. I am ecstatic that my parents moved 900 miles out of the Deep South and my mom's not at a cancer research hospital where the BS is omitted. Her hem/onc is probably a Hindu, his fellow is probably a Muslim, and the nurse practitioner's faith is unknown. No religious BS included.
I think, esp. as a cancer patient whose life is dangling, you have a right to omit the crap. Your primary focus is survival, is fighting to live. I don't believe you should have to tolerate anything. You are tolerating enough - cancer, chemo, nausea, hair loss, emotional and physical torture.
This is just my opinion, as the daughter of a cancer patient who endured endless religious comments and questioning. I wish you the best.
I also side with the other posters who would not get upset assuming they weren't overly pushy or proselytizing about it. I mean at it's practical worst a prayer is a completely benign act, and if the person doing it really does mean well. So if they mean well, and aren't negatively influencing you in any direct way (apart from your emotional frustration), what's the point in getting upset.
In all my experiences with religious persons (and former religious persons), only a minute percentage ever actually change their perspective (based on entirely anecdotal estimates). The same is true of former secularists who are now religious. The overwhelming multitude of adults are never going to change their perspective of religion, so why get upset about something that you almost certainly can't change?
As I'm getting older and (somewhat) more mature , the easier is for me to accept people (and the universe) as they/it are/is rather than tie myself in mental knots trying to change something I almost certainly can't. All most of us can do is try to manage our own lives as best we can. We have limited influence of how others think, so why expend so much time/energy concerning ourselves with them?
My mom laid in her bed despondent, and nurses and chaplains would talk to me about "her heart being right with God". Once going back to her room after getting food in the cafeteria, a Southern Baptist preacher entered the elevator and began to preach to us. On my mom's second admission, I had taken her to the ER (the hospital was 2 hours away) because her lungs were filling with fluid. The ER doc looked her dead in the face and asked her, "Is your heart right with God?" I have never felt so enraged. My mom could not walk. She could not breathe. She was literally dying in front of us, and this doctor found it more important to play pastor than to do his job and transfer her to permanent room and stabilize her. I was angry. I am still angry.
First off, I am sorry for your troubles and hope the best for your mother.
Second, my wife went through something similar while she was comforting her sister through the end stages of the breat cancer which ultimately claimed her life.
One of my wife's cousins traveled out to see my sister-in-law, ostensibly to help, but it was clear to her and to my wife that she was essentially there to try to "save" her and make sure she was "right with god."
Just seems these kinds of things can get fairly tasteless, but I feel there is a difference between someone offering blessings or prayers for someone who is sick and someone trying to interfere and get involved with the state of osmeone's "soul" and their "rightness with god."
First off, I am sorry for your troubles and hope the best for your mother.
Second, my wife went through something similar while she was comforting her sister through the end stages of the breat cancer which ultimately claimed her life.
One of my wife's cousins traveled out to see my sister-in-law, ostensibly to help, but it was clear to her and to my wife that she was essentially there to try to "save" her and make sure she was "right with god."
Just seems these kinds of things can get fairly tasteless, but I feel there is a difference between someone offering blessings or prayers for someone who is sick and someone trying to interfere and get involved with the state of osmeone's "soul" and their "rightness with god."
During a stable time of life, I tend to agree. I never said anything derogatory to anyone, even the ER doc. My position was: "This is about mom, not me. Keep your mouth shut." I did get annoyed with the "I'll keep you in my prayers" or "God will take care of you" or "If it's God's will, you will be healed" lines. They annoyed me, but I said nothing. If I had been in my mom's place, I'm not sure I could have been quiet. Everything she went through and to have to hear ANYTHING about God? Nope. I probably would have bit a few heads off.
I think we should all be careful of our admonitions to the OP because we can never walk in another's shoes. We don't know about the diagnosis, the family response, the community response, and another person's past or personality. No one who met my mom today would believe what she went through in July and August. Her personality changed this summer. She's a different person. Cancer and chemo can cause that. Cancer patients have enough on their plate without adding "be nice" to strangers or acquaintances to the list. Just my opinion.
Thank you, ikb0714 and peppermint. There is an old Yiddish saying, if one man calls you an a$$ you can ignore him; if ten men call you that, buy a saddle!!! Hostile? On reflection, yes. Was Russell hostile to religion? Is Richard Dawkins? Christopher Hitchens was, without doubt. What's wrong with being hostile to ideas which one perceives to be dangerous to mankind? I'm not hostile to people, just to religion.
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, the easier is for me to accept people (and the universe) as they/it are/is rather than tie myself in mental knots trying to change something I almost certainly can't. All most of us can do is try to manage our own lives as best we can. We have limited influence of how others think, so why expend so much time/energy concerning ourselves with them?
