It’s hard to be in the middle. The mud comes from both sides. I am a follower of Jesus—I use the word Christian sparingly these days—and ordained clergy. For many years now I have studied and worked with people damaged with religious abuse, that can come from a fundamentalist perspective of any religion, and curiously enough, by atheists.
Throughout my life, I have often found more commonality with agnostics and atheists than I have found with the religious right. But from the hard ends of both, I have had fairly equal treatment, just a different vocabulary, I suspect fueled by anger and fear.
To fundamentalist Christians, I am a heretic and going to hell. To the fundamentalist atheist, I am stupid, naive, and a supporter of abhorrent behavior. Attempted discussion with either pole generally results in increasing virulent abuse.
Few seem to understand that I can disagree but still care, be respectful, faithful and/or have a brain,
Perhaps this is a moment to address abusive behavior and language from both ends of the spectrum. If one wishes to be heard, one turns down the volume and detoxifies the language. I am bewildered in my inability to share excellent articles and information, because the language would guarantee that a questioning person would be so offended that their ears would close. That seems to suggest that we all like to preach to the choir, which only seems to make people more inflamed than to listen and grow together.
I wish I were not sensitive—but I am, which I have been told is a requirement to be sensitive to other people and people in pain, which I am. I wonder how things might change if we left the attack strategy behind.