>Someone later explained that in Indonesia you legally had to tell the government what religion you followed, and "none" was not an option.

That is correct, furthermore, the government only acknowledges 6 religions, although I heard that they started acknowledging some folks religion recently.

This is true. One of my in-laws' neighbor practice a religion not included in the official list of recognized religions, so he just register himself as a muslim instead. Ultimately, this field doesn't really matter though in day to day life, and might be removed entirely in the future.

> Someone later explained that in Indonesia you legally had to tell the government what religion you followed, and "none" was not an option.

While Indonesia is not a muslim country, believe in God is actually included in its foundational philosophy, and thus hammered into your head as part of your education since primary school. You can believe any god, but not believing any god is definitely strange here and many people would have trouble accepting that.

i would like to say i believe in milton Friedman

When "none" is not an option, you can go for:

> What religion? Pastafarian

> What God do you follow? FSM

It's an interesting contrast to here in the US where you're assumed Christian, and certain sects actively try to force everyone (including other Christians) to live by their specific beliefs. I'd take confusion at not following any god over anger at not following a specific version of one.

That’s really not been my experience. I don’t think I have had a religious conversation or even a question outside my immediate family in the last decade. The US is a huge country and you will experience vastly different things in different areas.

A number of people at my small company refer to their church or make other casual statements that affirm their participation of religion. I have no real problem with this (I'm atheist). However, a guy who does some work for the owner and is remote from somewhere in the center of the country recently posted some very hardcore and, in my opinion, inappropriate statements in our company Slack.

He was responding to someone announcing that their family member tested positive for C19. He came with this, "The Lord blah blah and He will save with His grace yadda yadda." I consider that pretty far over the line of good taste at the workplace, even if well intentioned. Especially given that there are people on staff whose religious beliefs are unknown to me, but who come from parts of the world where Christianity is not dominant.

It doesn't bother me if a person says they'll pray for someone's recovery, for example. But the way he displayed an assumption of the superiority of his religion to others really rubbed me the wrong way. Luckily, there's no overlap in our roles and therefore no need to interact. I can just ignore him and pretend that didn't just happen.

I don't know where you're from, but referencing a prayer in response to hearing that someone was infected with a dangerous disease isn't "far over the line of good taste." To those who are religious, it's core to their identity, and their prayer doesn't affect you at all unless you're religious, then it would be seen as very supportive.

> referencing a prayer in response to hearing that someone was infected with a dangerous disease isn't "far over the line of good taste."

I don't know if you deliberately misconstrued my words or not. I specifically said this:

> It doesn't bother me if a person says they'll pray for someone's recovery, for example.

What I found "over the line of good taste at the workplace" was this sort of statement:

> "The Lord blah blah and He will save with His grace yadda yadda."

"I'll pray," is non-specific. Getting into the details of one's religion ("God is male, in fact He's Jesus") bothers me. Maybe God is female. Maybe God has another name. Getting specific invalidates the beliefs of others.

And, once again, I am atheist. I don't believe in a supernatural creator. I just don't appreciate the assumption that one's superstitions are more correct than others.

I'm sorry, I guess I don't understand. Why does it bother you when people express beliefs different from yours, and how do their beliefs affect you?

It’s not a religious belief being expressed that’s at issue. People don’t want to hear specifics about your beliefs any more than they want to hear about your sex life, personal fetishes, or bowl movements.

I'm truly sorry that hearing a prayer is equal to hearing of someone's shit to you. When you hear it, please understand that it's merely a show of support by them. Their culture probably doesn't think it's unkempt for such a personal display to be made to another person.

I didn’t experience anything like the grandparent post even in places with higher proportions of religious people in the US. I even attended catholic and Lutheran schools as a kid, and no one cared about my religion (or lack of).