Unrealistic or delayed reaction to worldview-altering event?

In one of my current WIPs, my MCs, a trio of college girls, are presented with radically different (and pretty unsettling) religious-based origin of the universe and nature of the afterlife.

One of the girls is pretty superficial and shallow and worldly and has never given much thought to religious matters.

Another is a bit more sophisticated and is kind of generically spiritual but not subscribing to any particular religious view.

The third is a practicing Roman Catholic but isn't hardcore and doesn't take everything so seriously. She's into weird fiction like cosmological horror stories, and she's convinced her city is some sort of weirdness epicenter.

My problem is the characters seem to take this new information remarkably well and even joke around a bit (regarding something unrelated) during the scene. It's only later, when they and a new doctor acquaintance (who was also in on the meeting) are sitting in a restaurant that the Catholic girl looks noticeably worried and starts a conversation about how this new knowledge has affected each of them. I created this restaurant setting as a place where, throughout the series, the girls can meet to relax, unwind, formulate strategies, and discuss other things. This scene will probably be the last scene of this particular story, and I think it'd be appropriate for it to end on a downer like this, but I'm wondering if anyone would wonder why the girls take so long to react emotionally. I didn't want to interrupt the previous scene until stuff that sets up future stories is gone through, but would it be realistic behavior for these girls to not have immediate reactions?

Thanks for the replies, everyone.

Megann said:

I am confused as to how a character can be superficial, shallow and never have given much thought to religious matters be wordly at all. Because from your discription she sounds more naive than someone who has seen and done much in life.

Your second character seems much more nuanced and worldly.

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Okay, I'll try to give a better explanation.

Character #1 (Bernice) is fairly vapid, but she's rich, so she's worldly in the sense of being cosmopolitan. She's into fashion, pop culture, and gossip. She's very talkative (about either herself or others). She likes to bring up how her father "owns" the city. She spends money left and right. She's very here-and-now and not at all hereafter.

Character #2 (Amber) is also rich (richer than Bernice, even), but she's more financially restrained. She's new in the city, and her father has big plans for it. She's usually very quiet and keeps to herself, not out of shyness, but because she's simply uninterested in most people around her and considers them unworthy of her attention. If she does talk, it's to either flirt or put someone down. She's kind of New-Agey and generically spiritual (though she's officially Roman Catholic). She's given at least some thought to the supernatural.

Character #3 (Elizabeth) comes from a working-class family. She's been raised as a Roman Catholic (baptized, confirmed, goes to church every Sunday or Saturday), but she's not super-serious about it. She's even a bit blasphemous, often saying "Holy shit" and wearing a necklace that reads the same (though she undoubtedly hides it while in church). She believes everyone is saved, period. She finds the concept of Hell appalling. She's been lifelong frenemies with Bernice (they even share a boyfriend), but she's finding herself attracted to Amber. She's somewhat outgoing and conversational (though Amber has a way of putting a damper on that), but she mostly sticks to reading horror and keeping records of strange events that have taken place in the city.

The secret knowledge that is presented to them by a professor (with the promise/charge of reading and transcribing the relevant documents) is something that none of them would ever embrace. Without giving away the specifics, let's just say everything seems hopeless (OR MAYBE NOT! <--- sequel bait).

Liz, I think, would be the most deeply effected, Amber less so, and Bernice even less so. Amber would be quietly contemplative, and Bernice would be preoccupied with other stuff. That's why I'm having Liz be the one to initiate a discussion about this.

The problem is...would she wait through the rest of the meeting in the professor's office, the train ride to a restaurant, and the ordering and receiving of food before she says anything?

NDoyle said:

Is this "just" textual (or iconographic) information or is it experiential?

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Just textual and iconographic for now. They will have a religious experience in a later story, but that's going to be a major event for them, and I'd rather hold off on it and, for a while, explore their personalities and relationships as they exist now.

NDoyle said:

If it's textual/iconographic, a blasé reaction wouldn't surprise me. In fact, I'd expect it. There are all kinds of religious texts--ancient, modern--relating to the origin of the universe and to the afterlife that run entirely counter to the beliefs of, well, anybody else.

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Yeah, that's a good point. I might have them be too easily accepting of this information. Actually, they haven't even looked at the texts yet (that's for a later story), just gotten a summary from the professor.