This one will probably get very little sympathy...
...because religious people are a very common pet peeve. Funnily enough, religious people can annoy religious people too. It's just...complicated. Here therefore, is a not ranty rant about a non-specific pet peeve to do with being a stupid religious sod like I am.

Prosletytes - please don't go out and try to 'get' people so that you can increase your fold. Even if you're doing this with the best intentions (ie, to save someone from the eternal damnation you are sure they will experience if they do not join you NOW) it's annoying, offensive and really incredibly insensitive. I keep kosher, but this doesn't mean I stand infront of the seafood counter at Tescos telling people it's bad for their souls if they eat shellfish. For a start, that's bollocks as most religious practice that isn't "be nice to people" is fairly arbitrary and is to make your religion different to the other ones. In any case, anybody who is suddenly converted and finds God from your little speech is likely to turn into:

The Newly Religious Freak - people who have a 'road to Damascus' scales falling from eyes overnight revelation are generally not all there. They may well be very nice. Usually, they are very zealous - this is enhanced if they were completely secular and living a hedonistic drug-fuelled lifestyle. Essentially, they originally felt there was something missing in their lives - they tried to fill the hole with drugs, sex, rock and roll etc, and when that failed they figured the hole might be God-shaped. This also happens with people who had a passing religious identity who suddenly turn the dial up to full volume overnight. The main thing you have to ask is 'why? WHY??!!' And please stop ending every phrase with 'blessed be', it's sickening.

Non-Religious People Who - still identify fully with your faith group without keeping any of the practices. This usually applies far more to ethnic minorities than to mainstream atheists/non-practicing CofE people. What's the problem? Guilt. You're there living your life not bothering anyone, just being weird and irrational to yourself, and suddenly you get approached by an irate looking person who then berates you for thinking you're so much better than they are, for having such ridiculous antiquated ways of living, for being repressed/oppressive. I'm sorry, do I know you? Have we met or even ever spoken? Am I really that convenient a person to bludgeon over the head with your personal issues? Would you even have noticed me had I been having a beret wearing day instead of a headscarf wearing day?

Rationalisers - please stop distorting scientific fact to try to prove God exists. It is wrong, it is dishonest, and it's really embarrassing. You don't know anything about the science you're trying to talk about! In any case, true belief cannot, and should not be based on proof. Belief is about faith which is not a rational proof based thing. As we discover more about the world we live in, scientific fact changes. This is ok, because we don't 'believe' in science. It doesn't makes science 'stupid' or 'wrong' and scientists aren't lying to you to try to get you to join the church of science. Science is the search for truth, not for Truth. As Douglas Adams said:

"I refuse to prove that I exist" says God,"For proof denies faith and without faith I am nothing!"

*exit pursued by Babel Fish*
( Hampster Squared has stuff at www.tilla.co.uk, Sun 4 May 2008, 1:29, 1 reply)

"The Newly Religious Freak"
I used to work in a company run by born agains and there were a high number of NRFs, many of whom tried to convert me at every opportunity. Funnily enough, the most fervent ones were just as you mentioned above, reformed drug addicts, alcoholics etc. Says a lot for your conversion if it only happened when you were at a very low point in your life and unlikely to be able to resist brow beating/brain washing by fervent prosletysers.

There was one person in that company who was perhaps the most ardent believer, yet would never dream of trying to convert anyone. He just lived his life in a very calm, kind and spiritual way. He was the most likely to be able to convert anyone purely by example. No chance with me though, I'm a dyed in the wool atheist.
( SteamedCleaner, Sun 4 May 2008, 5:25, closed)