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wedrifid comments on A Rationalist's Tale - Less Wrong
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I think it has to do with the "leaving the tribe" aspect more than anything. Those of us who became devout in one of the more serious religions (that is, religions that view everyone else as a spectrum from "good but deeply flawed" to "hellbound") had that religion encompass most of our social world, and so in order to leave it we had to face the prospect of ostracism from all the people we cared about. The evolutionary pressures to never get ostracized make for a lot of subconscious bias to fight, and a pretty dramatic tale.
If your conversion was undramatic, therefore, I conjecture that you didn't have lots of friends or family who might have abandoned you if you stopped being religious.
That isn't exactly a spectrum. There are serious and sincere believers who I have met who are forthright with the 'hellbound' prediction while also being far less judgemental than others who say 'good but deeply flawed'. "Hellbound" is a prediction about future consequences not a personal criticism.
I meant 'religions with claims to exclusivity', basically. I don't think anyone today worries that they'll lose their social world if they leave their Unitarian church.
But yes, the relationship between theology and arrogance isn't quite as simple as some might think.
Indeed, I had two close friends in high school who predicted I was definitely going to hell. One academic liberal, one fundamentalist conservative. (It didn't come up much.)