Column: Evangelists' devotion in doubt

By Elizabeth Eberlin
March 14, 2008

Springtime is (hopefully) here. People are wearing sandals again, the temperature occasionally hits 60 degrees, and the most important sign of spring has finally arrived. As long as the weather is warm and it’s not raining, religious folks of all stripes are once again trying to evangelize me.

I don’t have an aversion to matters of faith. Neither do I have a set of religious beliefs one way or another. I’m honestly still trying to figure out where I fit in my world of Christian family, religiously diverse friends and personal beliefs. Right now, the closest universal truth I believe in is the First Amendment, which gives all those people now emerging on Speaker’s Circle the right to offer me pamphlets about their certain brand of Christianity, sing to me a cappella about Jesus or call me a Sodomite (all of which have happened). If a guy in a white shirt brandishing a water bottle wants to tell me to “throw off my cloak of sin” while I’m walking to the bus, I am happy to hear him out in the spirit of freedom of speech and personal curiosity.

However, there is one question that I’ve always wanted to put to the Speaker’s Circle preachers and proselytizers if I weren’t afraid of getting called a Biblical expletive again. That is, why don’t the students of Mizzou need help to repent and accept Jesus over the winter? Is it that we’re only sinners from August-October and March-May but just fine in all the winter months, when it’s raining and when the wind blows? Or is it not so important that the “lost sheep” are saved when it’s 30 degrees? Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t I hear somewhere that the big guy upstairs frowned on fair-weather friends?

If I had to pick an affiliation at Mizzou based on how dedicated its members were, I would go for Add Sheet-ism. Those people have been delivering their message of discounted Shakespeare’s Pizza and El Maguey every single Wednesday since I’ve started school here, and no type of weather has ever deterred them. Sure, they get paid, but like many other preachers, it’s probably not enough to live comfortably on.

Unlike other messengers at Mizzou, through rain and snow and bitter cold, I know that I can always count on the Add Sheet people to be at every corner on campus once a week, persistently offering those yellow pieces of paper. There’s no condemnation or hypocrisy. They don’t need to seek attention. They don’t bluster about how our eternal souls need new Firestone tires or spray-on tans.

Their dedication and their product speak for them.

Though it’s a shame that self-appointed saviors of our campus get beat out for hardiness, manners and devotion by a bunch of workers hawking coupons, the fact remains: If the people on Speaker’s Circle could show me every Wednesday for a school year that they could be there for me, ready to deliver me from evil like Add Sheet delivers me from expensive consumer products, I might have found a religion a long time ago.

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Column: Evangelists' devotion in doubt

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