Thank you for your patience in explaining it to me, and I would jus like to put a couple of points forward, so you can maybe clear your view for me.
With regards to changing people, well I dont think religion teaches that men must change other men but rather just to convey the message, from what I have seen this is represented in the Quran, and in the Holy Bible.
So maybe the poeple are just trying to hard, but in their defence, if they really believed in something to be true then dont you see they would be trying to change you, most likely I hope, out of affection?
If I had a christian friend who didnt try explain his religion to me I would feel abit down, in the sense that, I'd think 'This Christian is a Christian for a reason, he belives it to be true, yet he doesnt try and share that with me, he is witholding somethin he holds dear and he believes will lead to eternal life' see I'd feel as if the person didnt care about me in that sense.
But of course excessive constant harrasment is not nice either.
With regards to saying someone's religion is wrong, well from my view point isnt that also jus said indirectly anyway, when someone says 'im a Christian' or 'im a Muslim' are they not in fact showing that they dont believe Islam or Christianity to be true, else they would have been that.
I hope I have made sense.
Peace be with ya
to me it is like the aesop fable "the blind man and the elephant." in case you're not familiar with it:
"A community of blind men once heard that an extraordinary beast called an elephant had been brought into the country. Since they did not know what it looked like and had never heard its name, they resolved to obtain a picture, and the knowledge they desired, by feeling the beast - the only possibility that was open to them! They went in search of the elephant, and when they had found it, they felt its body. One touched its leg, the other a tusk, the third an ear, and in the belief that they now knew the elephant, they returned home. But when they were questioned by the other blind men, their answers differed. The one who had felt the leg maintained that the elephant was nothing other than a pillar, extremely rough to the touch, and yet strangely soft. The one who had caught hold of the tusk denied this and described the elephant as, hard and smooth, with nothing soft or rough about it, more over the beast was by no means as stout as a pillar, but rather had the shape of a post ['amud]. The third, who had held the ear in his hands, spoke: "By my faith, it is both soft and rough." Thus he agreed with one of the others, but went on to say: Nevertheless, it is neither like a post nor a pillar, but like a broad, thick piece of leather." Each was right in a certain sense, since each of them communicated that part of the elephant he had comprehended, but none was able describe the elephant as it really was; for all three of them were unable to comprehend the entire form of the elephant."
in my view, for the muslim, islam is The Truth, for a hindu, hinduism is The Truth (well, not in the same way as in islam or christianity!), to the christian, christianity is The Truth, etc. none of them are wrong.
to try to convert someone shows that you think they are wrong and need correcting. to me this is arrogant and disrespectful. this is why i have a problem with the 2 proselytizing religions.
but i understand what you're saying, from your standpoint.
