Jack Chick started writing those in the early 70s. That’s when I saw my first one, I think.
Some of them are just vile.
Lol, you probably have family members who won’t speak to you. “Here comes drunk Uncle Annoyed again with his crazy Old White Guy bullshit.”
More like “here comes nephew Annoyed again - when will he give up the emo-goth phase bullshit and get a real job?”
I absolutely love talking to these people:
So you believe women should sit down and shut the fuck up in church?
So why aren’t you out killing witches?
Do you eat pork? Shellfish?
One of them offered to buy me a meal at Chick-Fil-A. Never mind that I’m a vegetarian. As I shot back: I’d pee my pants before I’d go in there to use the bathroom.
A tract given to small children, telling them they and their families are going to hell?
No, not fine at all.
(If instead you mean a note saying ‘please tell your parents/caretakers we’d be happy to talk with them about our religion’, that would be fine. I’ve got my doubts that’s what’s being handed out, though.)
– if you don’t want your door knocked on at Halloween, turn out the outside lights. If trick or treaters knock anyway, don’t answer the door. It’s not required.
I don’t believe you . You are a good old Evangelical god botherer, and if a Musilm were to knock on your door your first instinct would be to call ICE on him, and get him arrested as a terrorist.
I’m a Christian, but I don’t believe in evangelizing, and it irritates me no end. When a guy came up to me on the street and asked if he could talk to me about Jesus, I said eagerly, “Sure, right after I talk to you about our Needle Beach time shares in Florida!” He rolled his eyes and turned away.
This is important to note. I too am a Christian but that doesn’t make us immune to evangelists. We get pestered same as anyone else. Either we’re not the right denomination, or we don’t go to their church, or whatever. Even if you answer, yes I believe in Christ and have been saved, you’ll get the same spiel as a non-Christian.
I had it happen to me a few years ago when my car was in the shop and I needed a ride from a coworker, I was waiting in a parking lot where we’d agreed to meet up and some guy comes up and starts preaching. I am stuck and he knows it and I am enduring his crap for a good 10 minutes or so. I’m trying to politely fend him off but it’s doing no good.
To me that’s evidence that these people aren’t even doing it for the reason they claim. They’re not “saving souls”, they’re salesmen for whatever church they’re representing. I’m guessing the real goal is to get donation money from people who they can add to their congregation. Like I’d join a church that pesters strangers on the street.
<Annoyed>
“Everyone is talking about me! I’m special! I am somebody important”
It’s actually quite sad and pathetic when you think about it.
And this is A FACT.
It is one thing to think you are an influence when you are only a mosquito, but it is quite another to know that you are a mosquito and take pride in the fact.
*"<Annoyed>
“Everyone is talking about me! I’m special! I am somebody important”
It’s actually quite sad and pathetic when you think about it."*
More pathetic than sad, almost funny, but absolutely contemptible. Asshole had to drag his shit into the games forum. Got reported immediately. Waiting for her/him/it to do it again so it gets its ass banned… again.
One of the benefits of attending a Catholic school upbringing, is that I am familiar enough with the bible to shoot down any BS people try to tell me it says. If I’m feeling particularly sporting, I usually tell them how their “services are no longer needed as God speaks directly through me, although I am but a lowly minor prophet.” No one has continued past that point. I haven’t used it on Jahova’s Witnesses yet, but they have been hanging around my front lawn lately…
Can I see your methodology? (I’m assuming you ran a double blind experiment, and published your results in a peer-reviewed journal?)
Going back to the OP, for really persistent “missionaries” who block my way, I’d consider giving them an offering of pepper spray.
Do they get extra points or what for making a convert?
For some, they get “martyr points” if they are abused.
Personally, I stick with a variant of thorny locust’s approach: a polite “Sorry, I don’t discuss my personal religious beliefs.”
After saying that phrase verbatim in response to three successive attempts to proselytize me, I consider myself entitled to go back to my book or whatever it was I was doing and ignore the proselytizer. If the proselytizer continues to try to engage, every now and again I’ll look up, smile vaguely, and repeat “Sorry, I don’t discuss my personal religious beliefs.”
Courteous, non-confrontational, and maximally effective in making it clear who’s the asshole in this situation. Sometimes a random co-religionist of the proselytizer will even join in to shut down the proselytizer with an exasperated “Brother/sister/whatever, didn’t you hear her, she said she doesn’t discuss her religious beliefs!” 
There are plenty of religious believers who are deeply embarrassed by asshole proselytizers of their faith, and if you don’t piss them off with insults they will often help you out in fending off the assholes.
I have found some success in saying “I am comfortable with my current relationship with God, thank you.” and walking off. The bonus is that anyone can say this, including an atheist - who would, of course, be comfortable with having a non-existent relationship with an non-existent being. Almost invariably it seems the pest projects their own faith relationship onto that statement and walks off in search of someone else to score karma points off of.
I will admit, I have anger issues, and probably could not pull it off that simply. I was polite in the beginning, I said not interested. They persisted, I said I’m an atheist. When they persisted, that’s when I told them their beliefs were stupid, the bible bullshit, all in response to direct questions that I did not want to answer, but if they persisted, goddamn it, I wasn’t going to give them any answers they wanted.
I can sympathize with somebody losing their temper on being repeatedly pestered by an annoying religious proselytizer with unsolicited attempts at conversion. (And I would likewise sympathize with a religious believer losing their temper on being repeatedly pestered by an annoying atheist proselytizer with unsolicited rational-materialist critiques of religion.) Just noting that if you want to make it crystal clear to all observers that it’s the annoying proselytizer who’s the asshole, keeping your temper works best.