- Apr 21, 2020
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Very recently I was exchanging in a topic built around doubts and possibly exiting the faith here on CF, and as usual everyone was very pleasant, reserved and indirect, but the objections to the faith (and as a result the reasons one might leave Christianity) were so bad. Perfect inspiration for another topic!
On the record I think there might be compelling reasons to doubt your faith, but none of those reasons seem to be part of the modern conversation around unbelief. The modern conversation often appears to be “this is how I feel, don’t confuse me with the facts,” moving the convo from ideas and arguments (which are part of a healthy conversation) onto feelings (which is a chemical crank that even the unbeliever isn’t in proper control of.)
So I decided this would be an interesting topic, especially for later converts to the Christian faith (although everyone is included.) The topic is have you ever believed in a really poor argument against Christianity, what was the argument, why don’t you believe in the argument anymore and how do you feel about the argument now that you’re of the opposite opinion?
Coming from a non Christian household (or a nominally Christian home) I’ve entertained nearly every bad argument against Christianity, normally during my teen years, \s where the greatest and most knowledgeable atheists are formed and where we do our most clear headed thinking \s
My contribution to the thread is this “If you were born in a non Christian culture you wouldn’t be a Christian.” Mic drop on the Christians.
There are so many reasons that this complaint is a bad one. My culture growing up (British) was pro abortion, pro uncontrolled immigration, pro European Union, pro homosexuality, pro religious pluralism, relativistic and anti Christian.
Yet people still made this argument against obviously conservative leaning Christians. So being a no holds barred practising Christian in a country that’s Christian in name only isn’t an example of Christians being influenced by the culture, it’s an example of going against the grain of societal norms.
What’s more the complaint was always being made by people who already subscribed to the societal norms listed above, yet they considered their unbelief immune from the same charge.
The objection gets even worse when it’s used as some kind of “therefore Christianity isn’t true” argument, I write the objection gets worse because even with the smallest amount of thought we can each see that the way you arrive at a belief doesn’t invalidate the belief itself.
I could think it’s going to be bright, sunny clear skies today because I’m an incurable optimist, does that odd method prove my belief in the bright day ahead is inaccurate? Of course not. The weather man has more to go on than I do, but we can both share the same accurate belief in a clear sunny day incoming.
“If you were born in a non Christian country you wouldn’t be a Christian” can’t account for people who convert to Christianity after having been raised in majority Muslim, Hindu or atheistic countries. For all of these reasons (and many more) the objection absolutely sucks.
So, were there ever any bad reasons to leave Christianity that you were convinced by or sympathetic to in the past? How do you feel about those objections today?
On the record I think there might be compelling reasons to doubt your faith, but none of those reasons seem to be part of the modern conversation around unbelief. The modern conversation often appears to be “this is how I feel, don’t confuse me with the facts,” moving the convo from ideas and arguments (which are part of a healthy conversation) onto feelings (which is a chemical crank that even the unbeliever isn’t in proper control of.)
So I decided this would be an interesting topic, especially for later converts to the Christian faith (although everyone is included.) The topic is have you ever believed in a really poor argument against Christianity, what was the argument, why don’t you believe in the argument anymore and how do you feel about the argument now that you’re of the opposite opinion?
Coming from a non Christian household (or a nominally Christian home) I’ve entertained nearly every bad argument against Christianity, normally during my teen years, \s where the greatest and most knowledgeable atheists are formed and where we do our most clear headed thinking \s
My contribution to the thread is this “If you were born in a non Christian culture you wouldn’t be a Christian.” Mic drop on the Christians.
There are so many reasons that this complaint is a bad one. My culture growing up (British) was pro abortion, pro uncontrolled immigration, pro European Union, pro homosexuality, pro religious pluralism, relativistic and anti Christian.
Yet people still made this argument against obviously conservative leaning Christians. So being a no holds barred practising Christian in a country that’s Christian in name only isn’t an example of Christians being influenced by the culture, it’s an example of going against the grain of societal norms.
What’s more the complaint was always being made by people who already subscribed to the societal norms listed above, yet they considered their unbelief immune from the same charge.
The objection gets even worse when it’s used as some kind of “therefore Christianity isn’t true” argument, I write the objection gets worse because even with the smallest amount of thought we can each see that the way you arrive at a belief doesn’t invalidate the belief itself.
I could think it’s going to be bright, sunny clear skies today because I’m an incurable optimist, does that odd method prove my belief in the bright day ahead is inaccurate? Of course not. The weather man has more to go on than I do, but we can both share the same accurate belief in a clear sunny day incoming.
“If you were born in a non Christian country you wouldn’t be a Christian” can’t account for people who convert to Christianity after having been raised in majority Muslim, Hindu or atheistic countries. For all of these reasons (and many more) the objection absolutely sucks.
So, were there ever any bad reasons to leave Christianity that you were convinced by or sympathetic to in the past? How do you feel about those objections today?
