In the Land of Believers

"In the Land of Believers: An Outsider's Extraordinary Journey into the Heart of the Evangelical Church" this is the title of a book that I came across in an article from Christianity Today. The premise of the book is that an atheist went "undercover" for two years at Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.

I have not read the book, but I may. I find it intriguing that an atheist would feel the need to "go undercover" in order to find out about Christians. If I wanted to find out about atheist I would go to a meeting of the Free Thinkers Society or some such group as that and just set in. I do not believe that I would need to hide who I am or what I believe. I also think that if I was not honest about myself then I would never be able to understand them. I would not be able to accurately question them if I was pretending to be one of them. I do, however understand that she may have thought that they would have put on a "religious show" for her had she told them that she was an atheist. She was there for two years, though and any show would have fallen flat rather quickly.

The most interesting question though is this: Are Christians so out of touch with the rest of the world that we have no impact?