 |
 |
 |
encouraging ex-Christians
News of interest to former Christians
By Christopher Hitchens, from the Washington Post blog.
On Sunday the New York Times reported on the recrudescence of "faith-based" teaching in Russian public schools:
This grisly vignette, which almost perfectly summarizes the relationship between sadism and masochism in Christian teaching, probably wouldn't delight all those who think that morality derives from supernatural authority. After all, the Russian Orthodox Church was the patron of Czarist autocracy, helped spread The Protocols of the Elders of Zion to the West, and compromised with the Stalin regime just as it had been allied with earlier serfdom and chauvinism. It is now part of Vladimir Putin's sinister exercise in the restoration of Russian supremacism and dictatorship: an enterprise that got off to a good start when our President admired Mr. Putin's crucifix and "looked into his soul". (Question: has Putin ever been seen wearing that crucifix again, or did his cynical advisers tell him that the Leader of the Free World was such a pushover for the "faith-based" that he would never check?)
So, and as with Salafist madrassas, it's easy to see how wicked it is to lie to children when it's done in the name of the "wrong" faith. But Ms Donshina's nonsensical propaganda is actually a mainstream statement of what the truly religious are bound to believe. Without god, how could we tell right from wrong, or learn how to do the right thing? I have never had a debate with a religious figure of any denomination, however "moderate, where this insulting question has not come up.
Yet is it not positively immoral to argue that our elementary morality and human solidarity derive from an authority that we must simultaneously (and compulsorily) love, and also fear? Does it not degrade us in our deepest integrity to be told that we would not do a right action, or utter a principled truth, were it not for fear of punishment or hope of reward? Moreover, we are told that we begin sinful and must earn our redemption from an authority whose actions and caprices (arranging a human sacrifice in Palestine in which we had no say, for example, and informing us that we are all guilty of it) were best summarized by Fulke Greville when he remarked ruefully that we are "created sick; commanded to be sound". This abject attitude, of sickly love for the Dear Leader combined with dreadful terror of him, is in fact the origin of totalitarianism. And there is nothing ethical about that.
I should like, for the continued vigor of this discussion, to repeat the challenge that I have several times offered the faithful in print and on the air. Can they name a moral statement or action, uttered or performed by a religious person, that could not have been uttered or performed by an unbeliever? I am still waiting, after several months, for a response to this. It carries an incidental corollary: I have also asked large and divergent audiences if they can think of a wicked action or statement that derived directly from religious faith, and you know what? There is no tongue-tied silence at THAT point. Everybody can instantly think of an example.
I don't rest my case but I have stated it as concisely as I can.
Christopher Hitchens is a columnist and author whose latest book is entitled “God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything."
On Sunday the New York Times reported on the recrudescence of "faith-based" teaching in Russian public schools:
"A teacher named Irina Donshina set aside her textbooks, strode before her second-graders and, as if speaking from a pulpit, posed a simple question:
"Whom should we learn to do good from?"
"From God!" the children said.
"Right!" Ms. Donshina said. "Because people he created crucified him. But did he accuse them or curse them or hate them? Of course not? He continued loving and feeling pity for them, though he could have eliminated all of us and the whole world in a fraction of a second."
This grisly vignette, which almost perfectly summarizes the relationship between sadism and masochism in Christian teaching, probably wouldn't delight all those who think that morality derives from supernatural authority. After all, the Russian Orthodox Church was the patron of Czarist autocracy, helped spread The Protocols of the Elders of Zion to the West, and compromised with the Stalin regime just as it had been allied with earlier serfdom and chauvinism. It is now part of Vladimir Putin's sinister exercise in the restoration of Russian supremacism and dictatorship: an enterprise that got off to a good start when our President admired Mr. Putin's crucifix and "looked into his soul". (Question: has Putin ever been seen wearing that crucifix again, or did his cynical advisers tell him that the Leader of the Free World was such a pushover for the "faith-based" that he would never check?)
So, and as with Salafist madrassas, it's easy to see how wicked it is to lie to children when it's done in the name of the "wrong" faith. But Ms Donshina's nonsensical propaganda is actually a mainstream statement of what the truly religious are bound to believe. Without god, how could we tell right from wrong, or learn how to do the right thing? I have never had a debate with a religious figure of any denomination, however "moderate, where this insulting question has not come up.
Yet is it not positively immoral to argue that our elementary morality and human solidarity derive from an authority that we must simultaneously (and compulsorily) love, and also fear? Does it not degrade us in our deepest integrity to be told that we would not do a right action, or utter a principled truth, were it not for fear of punishment or hope of reward? Moreover, we are told that we begin sinful and must earn our redemption from an authority whose actions and caprices (arranging a human sacrifice in Palestine in which we had no say, for example, and informing us that we are all guilty of it) were best summarized by Fulke Greville when he remarked ruefully that we are "created sick; commanded to be sound". This abject attitude, of sickly love for the Dear Leader combined with dreadful terror of him, is in fact the origin of totalitarianism. And there is nothing ethical about that.
I should like, for the continued vigor of this discussion, to repeat the challenge that I have several times offered the faithful in print and on the air. Can they name a moral statement or action, uttered or performed by a religious person, that could not have been uttered or performed by an unbeliever? I am still waiting, after several months, for a response to this. It carries an incidental corollary: I have also asked large and divergent audiences if they can think of a wicked action or statement that derived directly from religious faith, and you know what? There is no tongue-tied silence at THAT point. Everybody can instantly think of an example.
I don't rest my case but I have stated it as concisely as I can.
Christopher Hitchens is a columnist and author whose latest book is entitled “God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything."
I make sure that all atheists and agnostics are treated cordially and respectfully on my (Catholic) blog.
"...my blog, where it is currently near the top. Anyone is welcome to come comment.
"I make sure that all atheists and agnostics are treated cordially and respectfully on my (Catholic) blog."
Just look over your shoulder, honey; I'll Be There.
....and we make sure that all self-righteous theists are treated like people with no more objective evidence to validate their beliefs than any other religionist, on this (EX-Christian) blog.
This goes for all 33,000 some-odd denominations/off-shoots(we don't discriminate)
I'm from Motown, eel! As a funny aside, I happened to be driving by the Motown studios a little while ago, and that very song came on the radio. :-)
...and we make sure that all self-righteous theists are treated like people
Thanks for the warm, charitable welcome, boom.
I took a quick look at your blog. I did not have time to read through the whole thing, but I wanted to offer a few responses.
You start by responding to Dave's comment "None of this proves or disproves Christianity..." with the statement "If such stories give no reason whatsoever to reject Christianity then (not to be insulting), I humbly submit: what good are they at all?"
You erroneously equate lack of "proof" with "no reason whatsoever to reject Christianity". That is a gross misinterpretation. Dave is acknowledging what is manifestly true--that neither side can be PROVEN absolutely. However, proofs are not what we employ when deciding upon empirical matters; we marshal *evidence*. I submit to you (not to be insulting) that the difference is enormous, and that the weight of evidence is not on the side of Christianity.
In response to Dave's story about asking difficult questions as a child, DA responded "I would ask the child back: 'why do you presume to question God's purposes for doing anything, or act as if we would or could or should understand everything that God does, in the first place?'"
What a terrible answer. You are, in effect, saying that the child must simply accept the story as given, without testing it against their own experience or their own notion of justice and compassion. While the latter ought not be the ultimate yard stick, it should certainly sound an alarm if a religious teaching proclaims compassion yet appears to lack it in its most basic teaching. I should think it far better to explain why we should accept that god's actions appear less charitable than the child's own would have been, and why the child should continue to seriously question actions that appear unkind or downright devious.
DA: "...many atheists collapse Christianity into know-nothing fundamentalism, so that it can be dismissed as 'anti-intellectual' and 'anti-science'..."
I don't know who the "many" are that you speak of. At exchristian.net there are hundreds of Christian visitors who zealously place themselves into this category by refusing to examine any of their beliefs and by attempting to discredit science in the large with childishly simplistic and fallacious arguments. We, as a rule, do not use such visitors as an excuse to dismiss anything (which is what you are apparently suggesting). However, they do get dismissed because they contribute nothing.
DA: "...what makes him [Dave] think that he knows better than scholars who have studied these things for years? This is a common motif in atheist deconversions. They know better than everyone else."
Tell me, which scholar should we all listen to? You know as well as I that 1) what some scholars have to say is not worthy of the name "scholarship", and 2) there are legitimate scholars on both sides of practically any issue. In the end, each of us must decide which line of reasoning is most coherent and has the greater force of evidence (thanks, in part, to the efforts of legitimate scholars). Having studied the arguments of a great many apologists who purport to dismantle the "so-called contradictions", I can say with little hesitation that I find their arguments to be artificial and filled with special pleading and often circular reasoning. (See below for an example.) Do I know better than everyone else? No, I don't believe so, and I don't claim to. But I have a well-thought-out position--one that is coherent, and has benefited from exposure to nimble minds on both sides (Plantinga, who you mention, is among them).
Bottom line: don't dismiss all atheists as simply thinking they are smarter than anybody else. Instead, I encourage you to address their arguments with the same dedication that they put into forming them.
Regarding how Judas met his demise, DA said "... And so, did Judas hang himself...or did he 'fall headlong'? Both are obviously true."
Obviously?! Why is that obvious? Certainly not by a plain reading of the text. Do you think it improper for someone to point to the two different accounts and suggest that they contradict?
DA: "He hung himself. When did he fall headlong? Did the rope break? Or did his 'entrails gush out' when others came along to cut him down from the tree (assuming he actually hung himself from a tree limb)...and he split open when he hit the ground? There is a lot of data the Bible doesn't tell us."
Right, lots of details will be missing from any story. However, this does not give you license to ADD whatever detail you wish. In this case you are assuming that the missing details will harmonize the two accounts. Why do you assume that? It is also possible that the missing details would make it even more difficult to harmonize the accounts. Missing details are MISSING. We do not know what they are. If you claim that there is no contradiction because facts can be inserted to harmonize them, then you are begging the question--i.e. you claim there is no contradiction because fact X can be inserted to harmonize the accounts. But your reason for assuming X is that it harmonizes the accounts. That is circular.
That's all I have time for at the moment.
Let's get one thing straight, m'kay? To me, you are the equivalent of a Bacardi vendor at an A.A. meeting. This is an EX-christian website; you are a Christian. Duh.
Now, if you feel you've "debunked" the Webmaster's deconversion story?...then fine, we know where to go if we'd care to see it. Otherwise, I feel no obligation to treat you, or any other "alcohol" vendor, with kid-gloves. But don't let my position be indicative of all ex-christians here. After all, we became individuals again.
(Notice too, BTW, that I said "EX-christian" website, not "Atheist", as you charged in your blog)
I'm very happy to be both.
Steve
Thanks for your thoughtful reply.
You start by responding to Dave's comment "None of this proves or disproves Christianity..." with the statement "If such stories give no reason whatsoever to reject Christianity then (not to be insulting), I humbly submit: what good are they at all?"
You erroneously equate lack of "proof" with "no reason whatsoever to reject Christianity". That is a gross misinterpretation. Dave is acknowledging what is manifestly true--that neither side can be PROVEN absolutely. However, proofs are not what we employ when deciding upon empirical matters; we marshal *evidence*. I submit to you (not to be insulting) that the difference is enormous, and that the weight of evidence is not on the side of Christianity.
That's a good point, and it did cross my mind. However, in light of Dave's later comments, I think I was justified in reading it the way I did, and not in the more technical epistemological sense you suggested. E.g., Dave claims in the combox:
"My mind was opened to reality, and is continuing to be opened to reality, as the myths and gods of my youth are abandoned to be replaced by reason."
Also: he describes Christianity as "primitive imaginings" and a "phony cult" that "enslave[s] the mind." It is supposedly anti-science and (most ridiculous of all) allegedly "caused the Dark Ages." To me this implies that somewhere along the line he assumes Christianity has been rationally disproven, or at least so discredited that he has justification to speak in such insulting and derogatory terms.
And that gets back to my point: either he thinks his deconversion story offers some of the reasons why he thinks Christianity is false or it doesn't. If it does, where are they? I saw none as I examined it. If it doesn't (as I interpreted), then what good is it? Frankly, who cares about horror stories of the ignorant, anti-intellectual fundamentalists he mostly associated with? It may tickle the fancy of former Christians who love to hear these things, but it doesn't advance the discussion at all. It is merely anecdotes about fools.
And I would add that if he couldn't extricate himself from such know-nothingism for 30 years, what does that say about his intellectual discernment? Does he mean to imply that he couldn't find a single Christian congregation anywhere for 30 years, that respected the mind and science and philosophy, and had a thought-out view of culture, politics, the arts, etc.? I find that astounding. Catholicism (my group) certainly offers all that. And many Protestant groups and congregations do. I've been in them myself (as a former Protestant evangelical). But it doesn't reflect well on his own judgment as a Christian.
In response to Dave's story about asking difficult questions as a child, DA responded "I would ask the child back: 'why do you presume to question God's purposes for doing anything, or act as if we would or could or should understand everything that God does, in the first place?'"
What a terrible answer. You are, in effect, saying that the child must simply accept the story as given, without testing it against their own experience or their own notion of justice and compassion. While the latter ought not be the ultimate yard stick, it should certainly sound an alarm if a religious teaching proclaims compassion yet appears to lack it in its most basic teaching. I should think it far better to explain why we should accept that god's actions appear less charitable than the child's own would have been, and why the child should continue to seriously question actions that appear unkind or downright devious.
I didn't say all that. You read that into what I said. My point was simply to note that we shouldn't expect to know all about God's deepest purposes, by the very nature of the case (or Being). Later I made analogies to the many deep mysteries of science (origins of life, DNA, why gravity acts as it does, etc.). I'm contending that if we can acknowledge mystery in science, why not also in theology? In that context I was presupposing belief in God. If you grant that, then given the traditional theistic / Jewish / Christian concept of a transcendent, monotheistic, omniscient, omnipotent God, it is foolish to think that we can figure all that out, since clearly such a Being is many magnitudes greater in thinking ability.
THAT was my point: not that one should render blind faith, or be a fideist. I have always opposed that. I would never urge that on anyone. Now, if people in your past or Dave's taught that they were wrong, and I fully agree with your general critique of their mentality.
More tomorrow. Gotta go catch the movie about John Lennon on VH-1.
Hi Steve. Yeah, me too. Actually, I'm an Agnostic Atheist who's a former christian. In any event, the point of the distinction I made was to point out that Exchristian.net is not exclusively comprised of "Atheists", as our Christian guest erroneously implied on his blog..e.g.."a flourishing Atheist website." And boy, if he can't even get the simple stuff accurate, I surely wouldn't count on him being accurate when it comes to the larger, more complex issues----for instance, like claims of knowing the creator of the Universe.
Take care.
If it is foolish to think that we as humans living today cannot fully know the mind of a God, wouldn't it also be foolish to think that the people who lived 2000 years ago, could have correctly wrote a book that was inspired by the same God that no one can fully understand? Yet for your own intense desire to believe in the supernatural, you are willing to overlook your own supposition. Isn't that what the total fallacy of religions is anyway?
Your longing for a belief in the after life that you are willing to deny the obvious? The obvious truth being, that it's all a lie.
Anytime you need faith in order to believe something, you are expected to go beyond your own intellectual honesty and accentually lie to yourself knowing full well deep down inside it could not possibly be true.
Kill the old self and lie to the new self, step beyond reality into mental delusions of psuedo grandeur.
This is what Dave Va did, he analized that what he was trying to force himself to believe by 'faith' all those years to believe, he finally decided it was time to quit fooling himself into believing such incredable imbecilic nonsense, which I believe most atheists have come to the same conclusion.
I stopped by your site and read your article about me. I will have to say, you are prolific.
You are undoubtedly correct that my thinking and my reasoning in places is faulty. I've never claimed to be the brightest candle in the box, and I am painfully aware of my limitations in that department as well as many other areas. I am, at best, an average guy. Regardless, I wrote my little testimonial in 2001 more as a cathartic exercise and to "come out" to my family and friends. I never intended it as a full-scale refutation of Christianity, anymore than a Christian testimonial is intended to be an detailed apologetic explaining how Christianity is the truth. My testimonial, such as it is, became the first published page of this website. With literally no one to talk to about de-converting from Christianity, I was reaching out to anyone. Somehow, people stumbled on to the testimonial, responded to it, and this website took on a life of its own.
Again, that article is a testimonial, and only meant to give a snapshot into my life, how I became a Christian, and some of what I went through before my agonizing decision to give up the holy ghost. Leaving Christianity made a major disruption in my life and the life of my children, even though it was a slow, gradual process. My comments and articles in the years since 2001 merely reflect my opinions as they've continued to develop. Hopefully I'm a better thinker and a better writer, but I'm still just an average guy. I have a long way to go before I would dare consider myself an authority on much of anything.
Just FYI: I never read a single book or article that refuted Christianity prior to my de-conversion. I didn't know much about critical thinking, logic, or philosophy. I was a fully committed believer, though, and in my 30s wanted to really know the "real truth." It was by studying the Bible itself, the formation of the Bible, the history and development of the Church, ever changing theology, etc., all as explained by respected theologians from across the spectrum of Christianity that helped me come to the conclusion that Christianity is bunk. It wasn't one or two contradictions in the Bible that gave me doubts. It wasn't that respected scholars from different eras have been and today are in complete disagreement with each other over many thousands of doctrinal and theological points. It wasn't that the history of the church is filled with horrific bloodshed, cruelty, and ignorance. It wasn't that real live Christians seemed more interested in feeling the Spirit and less interested in actually learning anything. It wasn't any of those things. It was all of those things. My de-conversion was a holistic experience. To be simplistic, the pieces of the puzzle went together and I saw a picture I hadn't expected.
Anyway, you seem to be accusing of having no valid reasons to leave Christianity. Well, if someone could offer me some valid reasons to re-join Christianity, then I'd have to reconsider my position. Can you show me any evidence outside your book of myths for the existence of a mysterious, maniacal, meglomanic, Jewish deity living somewhere in the sky that has promised everlasting retributive horror to be reigned down on all those who have the wrong thoughts in their heads about his existence?
Of course, there is more to Christianity than threats of damnation for doubting HE even exists, but that certainly is a big part of it. I mean, what in the world have any of us "average Joe's" ever done in our lives that justice would demand our everlasting torture? I'm no saint, as the expression goes, but I've never been to jail for anything. My life is mundane. Most people would find me dull and boring, and more than a few, perhaps, even ugly (Hence the sunglasses). What I'm trying to say is that just because I've masturbated, or had an impure thought, or been angry, or said "F*** you!" or been unkind on occasion... Do those accumulated "sins" really warrant everlasting torture? Are you serious? Really?
I had a car accident a couple of years ago and totaled the vehicle. I took out a telephone pole, which smashed down on the roof of the car. It was a mess. It was 5 a.m. in winter and I simply lost control of the car. However, I was cited for the accident, because there was property damage.
Now, if when I appeared before the judge to pay my debt to society, a friend stood with me, and paid the debt for me, was the debt still paid, or should I still seek forgiveness from the judge? Say the friend paid the debt and then the judge said, "I forgive you your debt!" How could the judge forgive me my debt, since my friend had already paid the bill? Forgiving a debt means there is no longer a need for payment or forgiveness of the debt, right?
That was probably a terrible analogy, but the point is this: Christianity claims that God sent the propitiation for our sins in the form of Jesus Christ. The debt for sin was paid. If the debt is paid, why are we still encouraged to seek forgiveness? Forgiveness for what? How can we be forgiven for a debt that is paid? If I am forgiven a debt, that means someone is out some money. A forgiven debt is a debt that is NEVER paid. If someone pays the debt, then the scales are equal. No debt means no need of forgiveness for the debt.
Christianity is loaded with logical inconsistencies, and because of my long indoctrination in the cult, I wake up to more and more on a regular basis.
"I'm contending that if we can acknowledge mystery in science, why not also in theology? In that context I was presupposing belief in God. If you grant that, then given the traditional theistic / Jewish / Christian concept of a transcendent, monotheistic, omniscient, omnipotent God, it is foolish to think that we can figure all that out, since clearly such a Being is many magnitudes greater in thinking ability."
To a child asking a difficult question about scientific processes (i.e. anything), I wouldn't tell a kid to just be quiet and take in the mystery of it all, but instead, I would commend him/her on the great question and simply say that we don't know yet, but that maybe when he grows up, he can find evidence and answer that question.
I agree that, yes, considering the unfathomability of God's omniscience - His raw thinking ability infinitely greater than ours - it's really haughty of us to think that we really know what is in His mind...well, other than the fact that He hates fags, which is a given.
Well shit, how much sense does it make to postulate a god who is unknowable, and then turn around and say god is unknowable? How much sense does it make to dream up a god who is all-knowing and all-powerful, and then turn around and say we can't question him?
About this business of supplying missing details, like for the Judas story. My favorite is the one about the stars. Some christians still think that the earth is 6000 years old, but we can see stars that are a lot farther away than 6000 light years. Explaination: when god made the stars, he also made the light between the stars and the earth.
Clever, huh?
DA: "...many atheists collapse Christianity into know-nothing fundamentalism, so that it can be dismissed as 'anti-intellectual' and 'anti-science'..."
I don't know who the "many" are that you speak of.
Isn't it obvious even in this combox? E.g.:
rd:
"the total fallacy of religions is anyway? Your longing for a belief in the after life that you are willing to deny the obvious? The obvious truth being, that it's all a lie."
"Anytime you need faith in order to believe something, you are expected to go beyond your own intellectual honesty and accentually lie to yourself knowing full well deep down inside it could not possibly be true.
"Kill the old self and lie to the new self, step beyond reality into mental delusions of psuedo [sic]grandeur.
". . . incredable [sic] imbecilic nonsense . . ."
It was clear in Dave's deconversion as well. Such rhetoric is very common among atheists / agnostics / skeptics / "freethinkers". Look at Dawkins and Hitchens, for heaven's sake. There are exceptions (you seem to be one of them and I know others personally from the Internet and in "real life") but I stand by my generalization, based on many years of experience of debates and discussions. I used the word "many"; not "most" or "almost all."
At exchristian.net there are hundreds of Christian visitors who zealously place themselves into this category by refusing to examine any of their beliefs and by attempting to discredit science in the large with childishly simplistic and fallacious arguments. We, as a rule, do not use such visitors as an excuse to dismiss anything (which is what you are apparently suggesting).
Why deal with them at all? If thinking Christians and ex-Christians agree that they shouldn't be dealt with seriously, then why the obsession with them? It's because (IMHO) that is the easiest way for an ex-Christian to live with his or her decision to leave Christianity. It's in their interest to caricature Christianity into the silly anti-intellectual wing of it, so it can be rejected (because even a Christian like myself would readily reject the same things insofar as they are stupid and mindless). You take the very worst, fringe aspects of something in order to reject it.
In fact, some sites, like Debunking Christianity, state right out that they are interested mainly if not solely, in dealing with fundamentalist Christianity. 95% or so of the remaining sectors of Christianity are ignored (Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Lutheranism, more sophisticated brands of Presbyterianism and Calvinism in general: folks like Alvin Plantinga, Anglo-Catholicism, Methodism, etc.).
Serious analysis of a competing view will deal with the most respectable form of it, not the dumbest and least respectable.
However, they do get dismissed because they contribute nothing.
And then a serious Christian who comes along gets to deal with all their baggage and the latent hostile attitudes, as if they represented the sum of Christianity . . .
DA: "...what makes him [Dave] think that he knows better than scholars who have studied these things for years? This is a common motif in atheist deconversions. They know better than everyone else."
Tell me, which scholar should we all listen to?
I wasn't talking about any particular one, but all of them as a class. Again, if one is to rationally dismiss a point of view, shouldn't he at least seek out some of the better representatives of it? That was my point. I kept wondering if Dave had even tried to do that, or if he would ask a question of some pastor who wouldn't have a clue, and then just give up, as if no Christian on the face of the earth could offer the slightest reply to his probing questions.
You know as well as I that 1) what some scholars have to say is not worthy of the name "scholarship", and 2) there are legitimate scholars on both sides of practically any issue.
Sure, but that was irrelevant to my point, clarified above.
In the end, each of us must decide which line of reasoning is most coherent and has the greater force of evidence (thanks, in part, to the efforts of legitimate scholars).
Indeed. That's what I'm saying: read the best of both sides, in any given debate, not the best of one and worst of the other, or only one side.
Having studied the arguments of a great many apologists who purport to dismantle the "so-called contradictions", I can say with little hesitation that I find their arguments to be artificial and filled with special pleading and often circular reasoning. (See below for an example.)
As I have found the hackneyed, facile skeptical arguments, that are often so silly that they don't even understand that a clear formal contradiction is not present at all, but simply wished upon the texts, as a result of the usual predispositional bias of the textual critic. I have several examples on my site.
I don't deny that there are difficult textual questions. Of course there are (and there are silly Christian arguments to be found), and Christian scholars devote entire careers to them in some cases. But many "difficulties" are in fact, none at all.
Do I know better than everyone else? No, I don't believe so, and I don't claim to. But I have a well-thought-out position--one that is coherent, and has benefited from exposure to nimble minds on both sides (Plantinga, who you mention, is among them).
Good for you. I would say exactly the same about my own view. Looks like you and I, then, may be able to engage in some excellent, fruitful dialogue. It's the love of truth and reason and dialogue that allows that to take place.
Bottom line: don't dismiss all atheists as simply thinking they are smarter than anybody else.
Many clearly do think so. Again, I appeal to the rhetoric commonly seen here and in similar places, about how "imbecilic" and "obviously false" Christianity is. That is the language of condescension and a "know-it-all" mentality. You are an exception, apparently, but exceptions don't disprove the rule, as they say.
Instead, I encourage you to address their arguments with the same dedication that they put into forming them.
I did my best with Dave's anti-testimony, and am doing so presently.
Regarding how Judas met his demise, DA said "... And so, did Judas hang himself...or did he 'fall headlong'? Both are obviously true."
Obviously?! Why is that obvious?
What is obvious is that it is not a formal contradiction. It just isn't. As a professor, surely you can see and acknowledge that. The two passages can easily be synthesized in several different ways. A true contradiction would be something along the lines of:
1) Judas went and hanged himself and died in five minutes, and his dead body had only a mark on his neck.
2) Judas did not hang himself from a tree, but rather, fell headlong onto sharp rocks and his bowels gushed out and he died.
THAT is clearly a contradiction, and no one would deny it. But the biblical texts under consideration are not.
Certainly not by a plain reading of the text. Do you think it improper for someone to point to the two different accounts and suggest that they contradict?
They could possibly, but not necessarily. When one approaches texts with such hostility and animosity coming in, itching to find a contradiction, then they will "see" them where there are none. It seems to me that Christian, though biased in favor of harmonization of biblical texts, at least comes to it with a positive goal of understanding it in a coherent way. But the critic assumes that it is a bundle of contradictions, written by gullible nomadic idiots and shepherds, and so find what they want to find.
DA: "He hung himself. When did he fall headlong? Did the rope break? Or did his 'entrails gush out' when others came along to cut him down from the tree (assuming he actually hung himself from a tree limb)...and he split open when he hit the ground? There is a lot of data the Bible doesn't tell us."
Right, lots of details will be missing from any story. However, this does not give you license to ADD whatever detail you wish. In this case you are assuming that the missing details will harmonize the two accounts. Why do you assume that?
Because I am giving the texts the benefit of the doubt, that both parties were telling the truth according to the information available to them, and that the two can be synthesized and harmonized, just as we would do with two witnesses in a trial, of good character and reputation. We don't assume that their eyewitness accounts clash or that someone is lying because there are some details that don't harmonize at first glance.
It is also possible that the missing details would make it even more difficult to harmonize the accounts.
Of course. But the Christian who harmonizes is basically expanding upon what we know in the texts. Nothing wrong with that, just as historical fiction is considered valid as far as it goes: as speculation building upon what we know.
Missing details are MISSING. We do not know what they are. If you claim that there is no contradiction because facts can be inserted to harmonize them, then you are begging the question--i.e. you claim there is no contradiction because fact X can be inserted to harmonize the accounts. But if your reason for assuming X is that it harmonizes the accounts, that is circular.
Not quite. :-) I am saying that there was no contradiction in the first place. A formal contradiction has not been established; as in most atheist arguments of this sort, it is assumed with insufficient warrant. You have to first prove that a formal contradiction is present IN THE TEXT. When the Christian speculates on unknown details, it is an argument from plausibility or possibility, not strict logic. That is permissible, but claiming contradictions when they cannot be proven is what is out of line, and lousy thinking.
I grant that the aspect of the texts having to do with purchase of the land is more likely to be a contradiction, and the explanations we offer less plausible and strong. But I don't think they are bad arguments or outright implausible.
But one's attitude coming to the text will highly color such judgments. I am biased in favor; y'all are biased against. I approach the writer as an intelligent person (and Luke certainly was that). You guys usually regard them as primitive gullible simpletons (part of that is "chronological snobbery", as C.S. Lewis calls it), and so expect to find massive error and contradiction.
The point being that there may be other legitimate reasons for adding some missing detail--I don't discount that. But I don't see any indication of such an argument in what you've written.
Yet you have not dealt with my arguments themselves. You've only nipped around the edges and engaged in "meta-analysis." That is usually a clue that a person doesn't want to deal with the argument and wants to shift the discussion to extraneous or presuppositional factors. Sometimes that is good, but in the present case, I think it is obfuscation.
Thanks again for your thoughts. I am enjoying the discussion.
Hey Dave,
Have you seen this site?
http://loltheist.com/
DA: "...read the best of both sides, in any given debate, not the best of one and worst of the other, or only one side."
That's what I've done for close to thirty years. Do you claim to have read the best on both sides?
DA: "What is obvious is that it is not a formal contradiction. It just isn't. .... The two passages can easily be synthesized in several different ways. A true contradiction would be something along the lines of..." [emphasis added]
Of course it's not a "formal" contradiction! You are unlikely to find many formal contradictions in prose! If I said I had been sick with the flu, and had a 110 fever all day on Wednesday, and I later claimed to have run a marathon in under three hours that same day, there is no formal contradiction. It's conceivable that both were true. However, without some explication, it would be quite fair to think something was amiss in my claims--that not both are true.
As for the Judas accounts, both appear to offer an explanation as to HOW Judas died; that is, they both convey the fact that Judas died, and they give details of a life-ending event. One is quite explicit in asserting that the death was by hanging. The other mentions a bizarre event of disembowelment. The natural reading of the second is that this bizarre event was the CAUSE of death. Without further explication, there is an apparent contradiction.
DA: "...When one approaches texts with such hostility and animosity..."
That's ad hominem. I'm not interested in such appeals.
DA: "..I am giving the texts the benefit of the doubt, that both parties were telling the truth according to the information available to them,..."
Why do you assume that? Then, even if that is so, why do you assume that the information is accurate? Certainly it's possible that the stories are honest and accurate information written by those who were in a position to actually know what happened. But that is one possibility among many. Stories can and do get passed on inaccurately, paraphrased, and embellished. They can also be synthesized from older texts, through midrash. At the other extreme we have total unfounded fabricated, although I see no reason to think the latter is likely in this case.
DA: "We don't assume that their eyewitness accounts clash or that someone is lying because there are some details that don't harmonize at first glance."
No, of course not. Neither do we simply assume that things took place exactly as described. Particularly when it's unclear how the writer came to know what is in the story. One needn't jump to the extreme of "lying" in order to legitimately doubt a report, as per my comments above.
DA: "You have to first prove that a formal contradiction is present IN THE TEXT..."
No, that's a specious claim. The word "formal" is completely out of place in this discussion. If we were discussing mathematical proofs, then we would seek formal contradictions. What we have before us are written accounts by people we cannot question. If the obvious surface meaning of the text leads to an improbable scenario (i.e. a person dying in two different ways), then there is sufficient warrant to doubt that they are both true.
DA: "When the Christian speculates on unknown details, it is an argument from plausibility or possibility, not strict logic. That is permissible, but claiming contradictions when they cannot be proven is what is out of line, and lousy thinking."
When a Christian speculates, it's not automatically "plausible"; it's still speculation. If there is something to substantiate it, it may or may not then be deemed "plausible". And again, your claim about "proving" contradictions is specious. One cannot "prove" that something is a contradiction in a formal sense in most prose. These are not formal arguments. In general, they cannot be. There is always an element of likelihood involved. And, no, it's not "lousy thinking". You can do better than a quip like that.
DA: "You guys usually regard them as primitive gullible simpletons..."
That's a crass generalization. Let me give you my assessment, so you needn't speculate. I'll use the author of "Mark" as an example. I suspect that the author truly believed what he wrote, and was rather well educated. I do not detect any outright fabrications in his account--not by the standards of the day. However, it appears that the author held a common belief of the time: that scripture was a vehicle though which god *speaks* (in the present tense) to believers. He, and his contemporaries, routinely sought to answer *historical* questions by looking to scripture. If something was "foreshadowed" in scripture, then it must have come to pass. This is not forgery. This is not dishonesty. Yet it is not a reliable way to conduct historical research either (at least not by today's standards). The Judas story, by the way, may have been invented in this way as well. That is a possibility I always consider when reading the Bible.
DA: "Yet you have not dealt with my arguments themselves. You've only nipped around the edges and engaged in 'meta-analysis.' That is usually a clue that a person doesn't want to deal with the argument and wants to shift the discussion to extraneous or presuppositional factors. Sometimes that is good, but in the present case, I think it is obfuscation."
Okay, now you have become quite rude. That's usually a give-away too. It usually indicates fear of being upstaged. I was quite clear that I read only part of your writings, and only responded to part of them. If you actually have something of substance to offer, then please direct me to it, or recap it here. I honestly don't have the time to sift through all you've written looking for something that may make sense to me.
By the way, I pointed out a very clear circularity in your argument; unless you can substantiate the details you wish to add to the Judas story in some independent way, your argument is fallacious. Please don't nip around the edges. Address that directly if you would. Thanks.
"To a child asking a difficult question about scientific processes (i.e. anything), I wouldn't tell a kid to just be quiet and take in the mystery of it all, but instead, I would commend him/her on the great question and simply say that we don't know yet, but that maybe when he grows up, he can find evidence and answer that question"
I agree. The mysteries in science are discernable and testable and, ultimately knowable. There is nothing in religion, contrary to the claims, that is. Dave A states: "we can acknowledge mystery in science, why not also in theology?", as though the two were comparable. Given the fact that the theories of science can be proven with observation and testing and the theories of religion cannot be, the two are not the same, that is, they are not comparable.
Dave A started this with the statement: “why do you presume to question God's purposes for doing anything, or act as if we would or could or should understand everything that God does, in the first place?" and then when Jim Arvo calls him on it, claims that he meant something else all together. This is a tactic that I have seen xtians use frequently.
(By the way Jim, I read his refutation of the WM testimony as well and read your responses to the same points that I saw. Well posted!)
Dave A said:
“…supposedly anti-science…” and "…allegedly 'caused the Dark Ages.'"
Dave, you use the words ‘supposedly’ and ‘allegedly’ as though there is some question about the statements they are attached to and in examining your website, you do a lot of that. There is no ‘supposedly’ and 'allegedly' about their application in this instance and using language to suggest otherwise is simply a form of dishonesty.
The Catholic Church has a long and well documented history of suppressing science, with the tools brought to bear being censure, torture and murder. (Ask the Aztecs! The church destroyed their ENTIRE collection of written works as well as tortured and murdered them, which the pope recently called “a merging of cultures?!”. I can’t begin to express the depth of my contempt for that!) This is continuing today with the drive by religious factions of different denominations, to discredit evolution and require the teaching of ‘god’s truth’ that of creation, dishonestly labeled as ‘intelligent design’. The more extreme of the pious want to achieve this end and others, with ‘biblical justice’, the subjugation and death of all who oppose them.
The dark ages were brought about by the Catholic Church's control of knowledge. This extended to the confiscation of scientific and engineering texts and their subsequent destruction. It also included, and still does to this day, the censoring of knowledge that their laity may possess. The advancement of enlightenment, both scientifically and socially, was achieved in spite of, not because of the Catholic Church.
In addition, the church has a history of leveraging political systems to their own end and still do so to this day, with their summoning of our Catholic senators and representatives to demand explanations as to why they are not voting the church line.
When knowledge is suppressed to the magnitude that was achieved and is trying to be achieved, then “Dark Ages” ensue.
It's very difficult to come to the conclusion that Christianity doesn't make sense, or any religion for that matter. The hard part is really separating your self from it. Most people identify with their beliefs on a very personal level and are offended if someone questions them. Belief equals identity. Threatening someone’s identity usually puts people in a fight mode.
If there is no way to prove that your prayers are answered, that a god exists or that the claims in religious writings are true, then why defend them. Just leave ex-Christians alone and get on with serving your god. I surmise that the very existence of people claiming to have been where you are today is disconcerting to you and you feel compelled to prove that they are wrong. Or it may be your desire to prove your love for god, or to defeat the forces of darkness and win back the lost or disillusioned, or prove to yourself that you know better and the ex-Christian doesn’t, etc.
Whatever the belief, motivation and emotion behind your actions, you can be sure they are personal and not driven by god or pure rational thought. They are emotional driven. Hopefully you will look beyond whatever belief and emotion you possess about this subject and try and step back and think outside the Christian box. If not, there isn’t any point in these conversations. I have been where you are. I have a college and seminary degree, served as a minister, teacher, pastoral counselor and church leader. I have stepped out of the box and taken a long look at Christianity and recognize the inconsistencies and illogic of it’s beliefs. I can see the disunity in theology, doctrine, and denominations. I can see the dis-connect between science and faith. Maybe one day you will too.
Good luck
Bill J.
I'm looking forward to adding my two cents to the others who've taken issue with some of your material.
Peace.
Here's a short recap of the discussion concerning a response to a child:
DA: "I would ask the child back: 'why do you presume to question God's purposes for doing anything, or act as if we would or could or should understand everything that God does, in the first place?'"
JA: "You are, in effect, saying that the child must simply accept the story as given, without testing it against their own experience or their own notion of justice and compassion...."
DA: "I didn't say all that. You read that into what I said. My point was simply to note that we shouldn't expect to know all about God's deepest purposes..."
What does the phrase "presume to question" convey, if not a rebuke? Why would the child even think to ask why god had set up such a scenario in the Garden of Eden if not for the seeming unfairness of it? (That was the context of this question, after all.) Why would it seem unfair except through the child's own experience and sense of "justice"? So, no, you didn't "say" all that, but I didn't assume anything that wasn't clearly implied. I might add that the child's question did not suggest that they expected to know "all about God's deepest purposes", but rather that there was something incongruous that needed explaining. I say again: Yours was a terrible answer--the kind that thwarts healthy questioning.
DA: "...if one is to rationally dismiss a point of view, shouldn't he at least seek out some of the better representatives of it?"
Yes, of course. Do you imply that people here have not done that? Many made a desperate effort to rescue their waning beliefs by pursuing a wide spectrum of apologetics, looking for something well-founded. The Webmaster himself went though this. It sounds as though you chastise them for not having settled upon your particular brand of Christianity. Each sect could take the same stand (and to a degree, that's what they do). Not everybody thinks Catholicism is the most rational branch of Christianity--I'm sure you are aware of that. (To the regulars here: Please pardon my understatement.)
DA: "...I have found the hackneyed, facile skeptical arguments, that are often so silly that they don't even understand that a clear formal contradiction is not present at all, but simply wished upon the texts, as a result of the usual predispositional [presuppositional?] bias of the textual critic."
That's quite a nasty indictment of "skeptical arguments". May I suggest you stop evading them under cover of that word "formal"? If you cannot bring yourself to admit that the clear surface meaning of the two Judas accounts are problematic, then it seems to me that you cannot even enter into the debate in a meaningful way IMHO.
For those interested in how Dave A has spent the last few years trolling sites similar to this one, click here and here.
To read what other Christians think of Dave A's theology, click here and here and here and here and here and here.
To see that Dave A starts conversations, promises to respond, and then breaks his word, click here.
To learn about Dave A's church, click here
We've had some recent discussions here about Mother Teresa.
A recent Time Magazine article on her, spoke about letters she wrote, where she stated that 'god went dark' on her, and he evidently did so before she started her ministry in those awful cities etc..
As I recall, her reasoning for "god going dark", was that it was just too awful (or painful) for god to go with her into those cities and so forth. Such flawless reasoning, I must say.
Obvsioulsy her god going dark didn't stop her mission (notice I didn't say 'blessed' mission here), nor did she seem to turn her back on her catholic faith.
So that leads to my question.....
Assuming (which us ex-xtians do) that there is NO xtian god to answer prayers or guide us in life, what do you suppose the current Pope is thinking about his god going dark on him?
What do I mean, you ask.
One who is chosen to be the grand pupa to such a mainstream god-sanctioned church, and receives the top honor of being the POPE, would surely expect to be in daily direct contact with this god entity, yes?
Now because the folks here know that any Pope can't be in communication with this god entity, there can be only three possibilities/choices for the current pope.
1. If he's hearing answers or receiving guidance from 'above', then it has to be some little voice in his head generating those answers. What a scary thought it is to think someone with such a little voice talking to them would be making policy for such a huge organization.
2. He has no little voices in his head going on and is still waiting patiently for this god to make contact with him. If this is the case, he has to be wondering why god has shunned him so far, as he did to Mother Teresa. Perhaps he's thinking he wasn't worthy of the post he was elected to, but in time, maybe this god will deem him worth if he just tries harder etc..
3. He's already decided god will never communicate with him during his reign as pope.
What a position to be put in. How can he bow out when he's still healthy and a god sanctioned election committee has chosen him to be in that position.
Thus, he's stuck between a rock and a hard place and surely by now has totally lost his faith in this god being.
So now he has to fake it and make hard decisions/policy without any guidance from his god, all the while pretending to his mass of followers that it's all coming direct from god almighty.
Can you imagine being promoted into such a high holy position, only to discover it's all MAKE-BELIEVE after all?
ATF
And therefore, under the standard you claim to subscribe to, that makes this a contradiction.
Dave Armstrong: My ACTUAL position is to examine proposed contradictions and see if there is a PLAUSIBLE (NOT "any") explanation that can account for it and defeat the suggestion of contradiction. And not just plausible, but more plausible and believable than the opposing view.
Found Here.
If the explanation (as you claim) is not “more plausible and believable” than the contradiction; this must be a contradiction. If you abide by your own standard.
So…where again was Dave VanAllen incorrect in agreeing with your own conclusion the accounts of Judas’ death are contradictory?
I shot back and said "I want the facts. Does your bible have the facts? Yes or no? How many angels, and where were they?"
The silence was deafening. After about 5 minutes, he wrote, "If you want a real debate, you know where to find me".
I says "Yeah, back at Tekton with your tail between your legs"
Never debated him again.
The problem with many/most of the Xtian and biblical stories generally is that there are too many moving parts. In some of the reading I've done about/by Nisargadatta (an example of "nondualism", a sort of thought-yoga) the practioners of nondualism consider that the big mistake is in not knowing who and what we really are. Most of us spend most of our lives thinking that we are a mind being carried around in a body moving around in the world, when the true state of things is not that we are in the world but that the world is in us. Hence, what we really are will not pass away at the time when the "food-body" drops away at what we think of as our death. This is not that far from the story and message of the Jesus character in the bible, except that in the latter there's a slavish reliance on the putative historicity of said Jesus of Nazareth, who likely never existed.
Same with Zen Buddhism; many of the ultra-compressed Zen koans, the little apparently anti-intellectual riddles the devotees have to sort out "on their way" to self-realisation, can be fluffed up to full-length stories about biblical characters (who also probably never existed). e.g. Maybe the Zen question "Is the flag moving in the wind, or is the wind moving in the flag?" can be matched up with Jesus turning the water into wine, or some other story (don't know, or care, which one) that also never happened.
Whatever. The 3 big Abrahamic religions are all cumbersome, inadequate rickety vehicles for bearing any sort of spiritual payload around to the world's people, and the best that can be said of them is that they might work on the back burner of the minds of people who like a good fable without ever quite perceiving what it was about the fable that they liked. All I know is wherever they go, violence follows. Violence to thought (e.g. the Galileo scenario, or Kent Hovind blocking his videos as quotable sources from YouTube, and other forms of book-burning), and, inevitably, violence to ordinary people.
Initially, I was tempted to post a point-by-point rebuttal to your critique of Dave Van Allen's anti-testimony. However, having read the relevant items on your blog, your own testimony, your tributary material, and related comments, I've reconsidered. Instead, I'd simply like to share some observations.
Your chief complaint with Dave Van Allen's anti-testimony seems to be that it failed to measure up to a certain epistemic standard. Ok, fine. But so what? That was not his goal, and he stated as much in the text. Indeed, I note that, in your conversion story (evangelical to Catholic), you too failed to provide an epistemological survey of the alleged evidence uncovered during your studies. To be sure, you hint at your studies and imply they helped lead you to your conclusions, but you did not discuss specifics. Should we therefore dismiss it too as worthless because it has no probative value as written?
Essentially, your critique reads like an extended ad hominem in which you've set yourself up as judge over his experiences. Dave didn't read the right books, didn't ask the right questions, didn't reach the right conclusions. Dave and those around him were ignorant, lazy, or just too, well, PROTESTANT!
This brings me to another point.
In your opening, you imply that Dave's personal testimony contains "the reasons that atheists give for being an atheist," and set the stage for your subsequent ridicule by alluding to the impression some believers have that atheists are intellectual elitists. In addition to these things, which Jim rightly called "crass generalizations," you mock his intellectual integrity, clearing the way for you to claim that Dave is, in fact, "irrational," "brainwashed," and "anti-intellectual."
In short, you set up and wrestled a straw man. Congratulations. You win.
Others, most notably Jim, have already engaged you on Judas and your suggested answer to a questioning child, so I'll leave it to their good offices to continue if they wish. I've got other fish to fry.
In case you read this, Dave A, I apologize for misjudging you in regards to breaking your word in my one comment above. I misread your exchange on that one particular blog to imply you would be continuing a conversation right there, in that thread -- on that website. It never occurred to me that you would respond to a conversation on a website by posting a response on a completely different website -- your own!. But now that I've observed your method, I realize my error. I would have appreciated it if you had pointed this out to me in person and given me the opportunity to respond, but regardless, I made an assumption which was erroneous, so I stand corrected.
My real intention with putting out those links wasn't to personally attack you, but to apprise others reading and posting here of your online background and thus save a lot of needless questions.
You stated this: "I make sure that all atheists and agnostics are treated cordially and respectfully on my (Catholic) blog."
Your heartwarming courtesy to me and others on your blog, as well as your graceful presentation on behalf of your religion, has certainly added immeasurably toward supporting the premise of the original topic of this page. For that, you have my sincere thanks.
Peace.
"I make sure that all atheists and agnostics are treated cordially and respectfully on my (Catholic) blog."
From his blog:
"Angry, Irrational Atheists and Other Ex-Christians On the Prowl Again"
"I have no hostility towards atheists..." yet "...quite irrational, rude, absurd, and foolish..." and "...condescending, hostile, patronizing..."
"...a dozen or so of his cronies on his (this) blog..." So we are all cronies?
"Twelve or so insulting atheists against one Christian attempting to participate in rational discourse: that sounds fair and right, doesn't it?" Did he honestly belive that we he presented his beliefs here that only ONE of us would respond?
"remarkable and pathetic parade of irrational anger and folly"
These are just some of his statements, granted taken out of context, on his cordial and respectful blob. He goes on to say:
"Hardly any of them dare to come to my blog, where they would be treated with politeness and courtesy, but I am expected to stay there and engage in "discourse." Not a chnace." And this is one of the responses to that particular blog:
"Also, in watching you never shrink from debate with credentialed Phds and the like..." Well he did.
This guy contradicts himself constantly and his "cronies" help him do it.
To Huey and to others who claim that my strong words somehow represent a blatant contradiction of my claim to treat atheists courteously on my blog:
First of all, my words were warranted in light of the crap I have been receiving here in this very thread.
Secondly, a person's ideas are not identical to himself. I was referring to an atheist who showed up on my blog. They are treated politely and courteously, not just by myself, but pretty much everyone. We don't indulge in insult-fests such as went on in this thread.
That doesn't mean I use kid-gloves and walk on pins and needles. I speak my mind, and quite directly, as you can all see. Doesn't mean I am rude and impolite.
John Loftus showed up recently, and he was treated politely. He asked if I would reply to some of his papers, and I did (spending several hours on it). But he insulted me on my blog before he ever saw that I had responded.
Huey has now shown up and he is being treated politely:
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/davearmstrong/7789982106164661449/?a=44453#152484
He asked how I felt I was insulted here, so I documented that. One of the things was, of course, what DVA retracted (which I appreciate):
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/davearmstrong/7789982106164661449/?a=44453#152487
Some may object to my post on angry atheists. Yet Christopher Hitchens is a public person who acted despicably in public to a well-known priest (one who was a hero of 9-11, in fact), calling him a child molester and the like, two inches from his face. If he wants to act like that in public, we have every right to use the example as a counter to the self-promoting atheist image as peaceful, polite, always rational, respectful folks. It's not always true. Any group of people is varied, but atheists are no better or worse than anyone else, and there are many irrationally angry atheists, as I know well from firsthand experience.
I also gave many examples from this blog of the rhetoric of "hate" against Christians and Christianity; the highlight being one person's graphic descriptions of clawing away at the faces of Billy Graham and Jesus and screaming how much he hates them. Yet we Christians are constantly characterized on this blog as haters. I saw many dozens of such statements while I was doing that search.
What's good for the goose is good for the gander. If you want to act as if you are so intellectually superior to Christians and treat one who shows up as if he was an infantile moron, then don't object if said person documents some of the manifestly objectionable behavior of some of your own (in fact, the very person who was the subject of the post under which is this combox).
None of that has anything to do with personal politeness and being willing to dialogue with anyone who can sustain a rational, amiable discussion. I'm all for that. But it clearly wasn't happening here, so I left.
I'm only here now out of my desire to publicly acknowledge a gracious apology and to respond to Huey's feeling that nothing objectionable happened here in this thread.
If any of you are truly interested in a constructive dialogue with a thinking Christian (not the fundamentalist know-nothings you constantly harp about); one who doesn't say you are automatically immoral or will go to hell for sure, or were never a Christian, I'm your man. But it has to be a real dialogue, not the insulting rhetoric that we saw in this thread.
Nope. I was going along with Jim Arvo and then he made these comments:
"If you actually have something of substance to offer, then please direct me to it, or recap it here. I honestly don't have the time to sift through all you've written looking for something that may make sense to me.
". . . If you cannot bring yourself to admit that the clear surface meaning of the two Judas accounts are problematic, then it seems to me that you cannot even enter into the debate in a meaningful way IMHO."
That is not me fleeing for the hills in abject terror. It was his decision to become insulting so that it was perfectly reasonable and sensible (given the time limitations that we all have) for me to conclude that good dialogue had come to an end.
If you are having a good conversation, you don't tell the other person "If you actually have something of substance to offer, then please direct me to it" and make a snide remark like "looking for something [in your writing] that may make sense to me". That, of course, implies that much of your opponent's reply lacks substance, which in turn sabotages mutually-respectful dialogue.
The second thing that killed intelligent dialogue is the arrogant claim that if I didn't admit up front that the two accounts of Judas' death were "problematic" then I "cannot even enter into the debate in a meaningful way." That forces me to presuppose the very position that we are arguing about, in which case, no discussion would be possible or necessary, since I would agree with Jim's position by default, before I dare to criticize it.
That is clearly unacceptable. And so the discussion was over. I was actually enjoying it quite a bit until this non sequitur nonsense came in. I think it is a shame whenever a good discussion gets sidetracked by inanities, like this one did.
Jim had gotten mad because I said I thought he was obfuscating because he was picking around the edges of my point of view but not engaging it directly. Perhaps I was too blunt or insulting myself, yet the gist of my observation was undeniably true. he was not interacting with the actual scenarios that I set forth for my position, but talking only in generalities.
"Angry, Irrational Atheists and Other Ex-Christians On the Prowl Again"
Yes, this looks terrible, doesn't it?, if that is all anyone knows. Yet what I documented was highly objectionable. I started out positively:
----------------
Let me start out with a strong disclaimer: I personally know many atheists who do not (repeat: do NOT) fit into this characterization. I've often defended atheists against individual irrational Christians. One must judge every person individually. Atheists may possibly be saved. Some who state that they are former Christians may very well indeed have been Christians at one time (a non-Calvinist Christian need not deny this, as it is a quite biblical notion). Atheists are not inevitably immoral or amoral or ethically relativistic, or politically liberal, etc. I've stated all this many times. I have nothing against atheists as people. I have no hostility towards atheists as a class, or prejudice whatsoever. I approach anyone and everyone with an unassuming attitude and without cynicism. In fact, I cause myself no end of misery for this reason.
---------------
I also ended positively, citing atheist Jim Lazarus vociferously condemning other atheists whom he thought were most unfair to theists because they called theism a mind disease and so forth.
It's not about attacking all atheists; only one questionable and common manifestation of atheism, just as you bash various Christian beliefs and Christian behaviors while admitting that not all fall into the category. Same difference.
Or are atheists immune to all criticism whatsoever from Christians?
Heavens no, not the fundamentalist "know-nothings", but the polar opposite---the fundamentalist know-everything,'s. Now, am I wrong and overly aggressive in my assessment? Let's see.
Question 1: Is not the Catholic interpretation of the Holy Bible the final Word on everything regarding the Universe, and all of Existence?
Question 2: If your worldview was admittedly wrong as an Evangelical/Protestant, could you be possibly wrong as a Catholic?
Question 3: If "yes" to question 2, what would falsify your beliefs, thus, disproving it as Universal Truth?
* "Trolling for fish" is a form of angling where lines with hook-rigged lures are dragged behind a boat to entice fish to bite. Compare the term "Trawling for fish," which involves dragging a net behind a boat to catch large numbers of fish.
* Internet trolling involves a user making comments intended to provoke an angry response. -- Wikipedia
This site is a sanctuary of sorts for former Christians to rant, rave, and try to heal from the mind crippling lunacy of the cult of Christianity, regardless of which flavor one once preferred.
Those of us who wasted decades faithfully following that insanity sometimes lack patience when an angry fundamentalist fanatic shows up to loudly bang his or her drum.
Dave, you may be telling yourself that you've left the fundamentalist mindset far behind, but your methods of communication seem to indicate otherwise.
Dave, this wasn't a personal attack. This was meant as explanation and constructive criticism.
Peace.
Recapping, clarifying, and somewhat expanding what I said earlier...
One cannot add elements to accounts whose plain surface meaning conflict and thereby conclude that there is no conflict; not without independent justification for the elements added. Without the latter, the argument is circular.
In you discussion of the Judas accounts, whose plain surface meaning imply an improbable scenario (the same person dying in two different ways), you suggest possible elements that would harmonize the accounts (e.g. the rope broke and he fell headlong...). There are also possible elements that make the conflict more indelible (e.g. he died by disembowelment, and he died by strangulation). I asked how you would justify adding one rather than another.
You began to address this when you said that you assumed the accounts were honest reports of what had been told to the writer. I asked 1) Why do you assume they are "honest reports" (as opposed to story telling, midrash, exaggeration, etc.), and 2) why do you assume that the information was accurate? There are a great many reasons that a story may be inaccurate, only one of which is deliberate deception (lying) on the part of the writer.
It appears that