Are you talkin' to me?

I have pet peeves, you have pet peeves- we all have them. For some people it's bad grammar. They'll correct you every chance they get. For others it's people who drive and talk on their cell phones. Still others have favorite razors that get misplaced :)

I recently had a conversation with my wife, and she told me that people occasionally come up to her and ask if I know this or that about the Catholic Church, with the insinuation being that if I had that one piece of secret information, I would know the real story. Some of them question whether I'm really a Christian. The common denominator here is that none of these people ever come to me and tell me these things. It's easier to talk behind my back.

Some will tell my wife, "Oh, he's just too argumentative and only wants to debate." I won't deny that I am occasionally argumentative :) But they confuse my desire to discuss the issues with a desire to debate. There's a difference. To debate means that I want to be the winner and want to see you as the loser. Not true. I do like to discuss things, which means that we have some give and take and try to understand each other's sides better.

For some people, just that fact that I question something they're telling me means that I'm picking a fight. To me it means that I'm not willing to blindly accept something just because you said it. At the same time, wisdom will sometimes tell me that it is better to let a subject go. If I know that an argument is the inevitable result then I'll wave a subject off.

So if you ever have an issue with something I've wrote, the comment section always follows the post, and I have my e-mail link at the top.