> I met her a few years later, and we started dating, not knowing any of this back story — she was remarkably normal, all considering — and at some point, she told me the story of going off into the woods, and I laughed and just sort of assumed she was as cynical about that as she was about everything else — but her eyes flashed with anger and I realized I had stepped on a land mine.
My guess, that it is nothing to do with her cynism or beliefs. You can be sceptical about Christian God, and at the same time you may be angry with people who make fun of sacred items and rituals. It was a real emotional experience for her and for others, it is something that you seem to miss, and your laugh offended all of that. The land mine was not a belief system, but a narrative, while you thought of that as of funny adventure of stupid people, she thought about people whom she knew empathically.
My guess, that it is nothing to do with her cynism or beliefs. You can be sceptical about Christian God, and at the same time you may be angry with people who make fun of sacred items and rituals. It was a real emotional experience for her and for others, it is something that you seem to miss, and your laugh offended all of that. The land mine was not a belief system, but a narrative, while you thought of that as of funny adventure of stupid people, she thought about people whom she knew empathically.