In paper, Hombre, your points are excellent, and in an ideal society, we'd all be better off if people were able to learn from each other in such ways.

But we do not live in an ideal, society, and this is not paper. I'll use myself as an example here. I am quite strongly atheist. I actively despise organized religion. This does not mean that I am totally against the idea of god or religion; I recognize the peace, happiness, strength, and sense of purpose/belonging that religion brings to some people, and understand that it is a good thing. But these are all things that I believe can exist without organized religion.

My fiancee is agnostic. Just throwing that out there.

Anyways, getting to the point, I very strongly disagree with many aspects of Christianity. And that would prevent me from ever falling in love with a strong Christian woman. Not because I'm some sort of shallow fool who would reject someone I love based on that, but because it would prevent me from ever falling in love in the first place.

Contrary to what some fairy tales may tell you, there's no such thing as "true love on first sight." That's called infatuation, and it is rarely an enduring, powerful love. I would argue that it CANNOT be an enduring powerful love without spending a lot of time with one another. Thus, spending time with one another is a prerequisite for a true, romantic, long-term love to form.

And long before I spent enough time with a strongly religious woman for something like that to form, our differences would drive us apart. There may be some potential for exceptions here, but the possibility is vanishingly small.

IF, however, my fiancee, a woman whom I already love with every fiber of my being, were to go out and convert to Christianity (god forbid), I would still love her, and strive to understand the change and overcome the tension it would introduce to our relationship. And maybe we would succeed.

In summation... I view differing religions as a barrier to entry into a long-lasting relationship, but not so much once that relationship is formed.

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