I used to be a hardcore atheist -- to the point that I would outwardly question the practices/faith of my teachers and friends in a catholic highschool, and then life changed me (Still an atheist though, and forever will be as long as evidence comes).
As college came, I've met my then girlfriend who was very religious and in a religious family. I was honest about my non-belief of God and religion, and so was she with regards to her faith. We had arguments here and there, and sometimes it turned sour. But she opened up my perspective regarding faith and how it plays onto other aspects in life.
At first, I really generalized religious people as basic and deluded, closed-minded, and possesses intelligence that is beneath me. She destroyed all of my pre-conceived notions. All of her siblings -- including her, are academic achievers, consistent Dean's Lister, and a graduate of one of the top universities in the country, and she has a great personality too, and she can respectfully disagree even though we have polar opposites of opinions.
Nothing she said was able to convince me God is real, nor anything I said was able to make her faith shaken -- but we both became more sensitive when it comes to other people's beliefs and our actions towards those beliefs. I'm still an atheist, and I am very critical to all of religion's atrocities towards mankind, but no longer a arrogant, cringe, know-it-all who thinks he's smarter and better than anyone else. Since then, I've always tried to be civil with conversations like these.
