What atheists fail to understand

[Bobber]

Atheists fail to understand that believers don't become believers because they go to church a lot or listen to very charismatic preachers. They believe because of experiencing highly improbable events that common sense insists can not be attributed to blind coincidence alone.

Much of the time I think very much true. It's things of the Spirit which awakens the reality of spirit or spiritual things.

 

[Bobber]

Unless they can discuss everything on the basis of 2 + 2 = 4, they are floundering ducks.

Problem is they spin off all sorts of crazy sounding rhetoric to make it seems that 2 + 2 = 5. They train their students in universities that their unreasonable position is justified and if others don't tout the line they'll give them a failing grade. Many are deceived for to admit they've spend untold thousands of dollars going into debt to have worthless ideas planted in their heads is unquestionably hard to take. It's not easy to admit you've been duped.

 

[dlamberth]

Of course, they are going to tell you that life is all about 2 + 2 = 4 so I am going to ask them what formula I have to put into practice to be able to love my wife?

Perhaps kiss + kiss = lips.

The formula that's worked for me is Love + Gratitude + Compassion + Listening = 37 years of marriage.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

Let's just reiterate for a second here:

Creationists , your response to the "what's the difference"-question was: "I don't believe in fairies", right?

Well, thank you for demonstrating my point exactly. I am confident you'll figure it out eventually.

 

[MehGuy]

Maybe... then again I am an atheist who was once an extremely spiritual Christian.. so much so I went through horrible chemical withdrawals when I lost my faith. Coming close to killing myself.

As far as coincidences, the mind can easily fall into the bias of only really remembering the hits and not the misses.

 

[mindlight]

And *another* supposedly holy book clearly states that the cosmos was created from a milky ocean stirred by the Hindu gods. Krishna's speech to Arjuna clearly establishes him as the supreme being.

Another tells us that God is from Planet Kolob, and black skin the result of a Divine curse.

Yet another tells us Hailie Selassie is the messiah, hiding until the final battle that will squash "Babylon", that is: the western world.

There is nothing that sets Christianity apart from any other religion or ancient myth, whether people still believe in it or not.

None of those alternate religions have an historical foundation. The evidential supremacy of Christianity is demonstrated in the incarnation

 

[dlamberth]

None of those alternate religions have an historical foundation. The evidential supremacy of Christianity is demonstrated in the incarnation

I would hope that it lies in the drive to help those in need, the homeless, the hungry, those with no medical access, the mentally challenged, the troubled families, social justice...

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

None of those alternate religions have an historical foundation. The evidential supremacy of Christianity is demonstrated in the incarnation

They consider their sacred texts to be as grounded in history as you believe yours. Few of them are thoroughly ahistorical, and many reference or were directly involved with historical events and sites.

There is no disputing the historicity of the Buddha, Mani, Muhammad, Baha'ullah, or even Joseph Smith or L. Ron Hubbard. It's the extraordinary claims made *about* them that can and should be called into question - and the same goes for your religion.

 

[mindlight]

I would hope that it lies in the drive to help those in need, the homeless, the hungry, those with no medical access, the mentally challenged, the troubled families, social justice...

No the supremacy of the Christian faith rests in the life of Christ who healed the sick, made the blind see, taught the ignorant, helped the poor, drove out demons... in human history before a host of witnesses.

 

[mindlight]

They consider their sacred texts to be as grounded in history as you believe yours. Few of them are thoroughly ahistorical, and many reference or were directly involved with historical events and sites.

There is no disputing the historicity of the Buddha, Mani, Muhammad, Baha'ullah, or even Joseph Smith or L. Ron Hubbard. It's the extraordinary claims made *about* them that can and should be called into question - and the same goes for your religion.

You cannot see any difference in the historical credibility of the different claims, as someone who taught all the major religions I know that is not true. Hinduism especially is practically devoid of all historical legitimacy and even Islam is a social construct regarding the actual person of Mohammed. If you want to make a claim for equal credibility for another religion then make it specific and we will take it case by case.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

*you* taught all major religions?
And yet you embrace a thoroughly unfounded claim to Christian exceptionalism?
Let's talk plainly, then.
For the sake of the argument, let's take the historicity of a Jesus of Nazareth who was revered as the messiah and got executed by the Romans for granted. He lived, he preached, he died, and his followers turned his death into the spark of a new faith.

Still , that does not turn the miraculous events attributed to the man retroactively into historical fact. They are just as unsubstantiated as the belief that Mohammed traveled to Jerusalem and the heavens on a miracle steed, that the historical Buddha emerged from the womb capable of speech and sprouting flowers in his footsteps, or that Joseph Smith could translate foreign languages with the help of a seeing stone (just to mention a few).
There is *nothing* substantiating the virgin birth or the risen saints walking the streets of Jerusalem on the day of the crucifixion, earthquake and eclipse included. The case for all of these supposed events is exactly as weak as that of other religions.

Yes, Hinduism's mythology is mostly placed in a remote, mythical "Before" - but the same goes for early books of the Bible, even when they reference some real places. The geological record (along with virtually every other scientific discipline) clearly establishes a global flood and an ark saving all animal species in the middle east as utterly ahistorical. Local natural disasters may have inspired the tale, but whatever happened: it wasn't what we find in Genesis.

 

[mindlight]

*you* taught all major religions?

Yes it is a requirement on the English national curriculum to teach all 6 major religions. So any RE teacher has to do this.

And yet you embrace a thoroughly unfounded claim to Christian exceptionalism?

The uniqueness of Christ is a given for a third of the population of the world.

Let's talk plainly, then.

Please do.

For the sake of the argument, let's take the historicity of a Jesus of Nazareth who was revered as the messiah and got executed by the Romans for granted. He lived, he preached, he died, and his followers turned his death into the spark of a new faith.

Still , that does not turn the miraculous events attributed to the man retroactively into historical fact. They are just as unsubstantiated as the belief that Mohammed traveled to Jerusalem and the heavens on a miracle steed, that the historical Buddha emerged from the womb capable of speech and sprouting flowers in his footsteps, or that Joseph Smith could translate foreign languages with the help of a seeing stone (just to mention a few).
There is *nothing* substantiating the virgin birth or the risen saints walking the streets of Jerusalem on the day of the crucifixion, earthquake and eclipse included. The case for all of these supposed events is exactly as weak as that of other religions.

There were 500 witnesses to the resurrection for example. Their names can also be traced in history. Many of them died professing their witness to what they had seen and heard. Not only do we know from circumstantial evidence that the context described in the bible account is accurate and that the person of Jesus actually existed the circle of witness can also be substantiated. Within about 50 years of the resurrection we have innumerable written records of the events described. This is an incomparable level of proof compared to other religions. More than that we have the accounts of miracles in the early church that substantiated the witnesses testimony, miracles which continue to occur today in Christs name and to which many people in this thread have attested. There is no figure secular or religious who is better substantiated in historical records beyond the range of the last 500 years and in living history today than Jesus Christ. Also much of the world today go beyond your merely secular view of the man suggesting that he was a prophet (in the case of Islam) or in the case of Hinduism (some groups proclaim him an avatar). On both an historical and spiritual level the global testimony to his credibility is unmatched in quantity, quality and global spread across languages and cultures by comparison to any other figure.

Yes, Hinduism's mythology is mostly placed in a remote, mythical "Before"

Absolutely Hinduism has no credibility at all as a matter of historical record.

- but the same goes for early books of the Bible, even when they reference some real places. The geological record (along with virtually every other scientific discipline) clearly establishes a global flood and an ark saving all animal species in the middle east as utterly ahistorical. Local natural disasters may have inspired the tale, but whatever happened: it wasn't what we find in Genesis.

The geological record is of globe wide layers of sedimentary rock that containing fossils that were trapped in the sediment. There is no experiment you can perform that can confirm an audit trail attesting millions of years to their formation so you base your views on the rocks on the explanatory power of the various theories proposed about them. But Inferred science is not fact so you have no grounds for certainty on this point.

But whether or not you accept creationism is not really the point of this OP. There are a very large number of Christians who would agree with you about the rocks and yet think you were misguided about the historicity of Christ and who have had the kinds of experience that leave them in no subjective doubt about his authenticity as Lord and Saviour of their lives.

 

[Robban]

Which gives us around 7 billion images of God.

And 7 billion fingerprints,

 

[Silmarien]

You cannot see any difference in the historical credibility of the different claims, as someone who taught all the major religions I know that is not true. Hinduism especially is practically devoid of all historical legitimacy and even Islam is a social construct regarding the actual person of Mohammed. If you want to make a claim for equal credibility for another religion then make it specific and we will take it case by case.

Whoa, that is a super dangerous claim. The life of Mohammed is definitely on far stronger historical footing than almost anything concerning Jesus of Nazareth. To call one God Incarnate and the other a social construct is engaging in some pretty serious special pleading.

I do think that Christianity as a potential revelation has much more going for it than any other religion, but this doesn't justify taking a conservative approach to Christian tradition and then a hyper-skeptical one to Islamic accounts.

 

[Noxot]

this was neat

 

[Episaw]

I could not generalise like that the atheists I know are a mix of ignoramuses and smart alecs who think they know it all. Some are people who genuinely do not care to ask the right questions in the first place while others have come to sad and hopeless conclusions after much effort. There is a massive difference between a Marxist, Nietzschean and a modern Liberal - Evolutionist.

We are gifted with answers to the major questions. Having accepted Christ it is an easy thing to accept the package of beliefs which he supports. Some Christians have thought this through and others not. An atheist is someone who has rejected something not necessarily found a new centre. Many are broken and incoherent. The predominant atheist view today would be a naturalistic liberalism focused on "scientific evolution" and on "choice". But in practice many atheists are not that consistent.

The smart alec atheists I know will have answers like Big Bang, Abiogenesis and then macro evolution to the basic origins question. But there is no scientific proof for these theories, there is only acceptance on the basis of explanatory power. We believe that the Creation event was a supernatural one and as such it has no analogy and cannot be explained by what we can observe and especially since the world has been broken by flood and by fall. Believing in a God of miracles changes everything. But even within the modern atheists terms of reference there is good reason to doubt their worldview is anything more than a faith position.

Well spoken. In fact, to be an atheist requires more faith than to be a Christian. I just can't believe that out of nothing came everything like POOF and there you are. The creation story where God crafted everything out of next to nothing requires less faith. Especially as there was total order to creation.

I guess when you don't want to know the truth you create your own reality to fit your idealization of mankind as the be all and end all of reality.

 

[Noxot]

I don't think it's that foolish to think that so much of the stuff that is observable seems to be doing things without some kind of life force or personality.

to take it a bit further is to say that the birth of the universe was also the result of the same basic stuffs of lifeless processes of reality that surround us.

 

[Episaw]

I don't think it's that foolish to think that so much of the stuff that is observable seems to be doing things without some kind of life force or personality.

to take it a bit further is to say that the birth of the universe was also the result of the same basic stuffs of lifeless processes of reality that surround us.

Or as George Orwell said, "Some ideas are so stupid only intellectuals believe them."

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

Well spoken. In fact, to be an atheist requires more faith than to be a Christian. I just can't believe that out of nothing came everything like POOF and there you are. The creation story where God crafted everything out of next to nothing requires less faith. Especially as there was total order to creation.

"I cannot wrap my mind around the idea of how lightning might possibly come to exist naturally, so it's CLEARLY a supernatural weapon hurled by a deity." Creationist "logic" in a nutshell.
Attributing phenomena that are not yet understood to a deliberate creative process like the ones our species engages in when building structures or painting works of art misses the fact that 99.9% of the processes around us exhibit order *without* the involvement of human-like agency.
The way our species create is the "odd one out", not vice versa.

 

[bhsmte]

Well spoken. In fact, to be an atheist requires more faith than to be a Christian. I just can't believe that out of nothing came everything like POOF and there you are. The creation story where God crafted everything out of next to nothing requires less faith. Especially as there was total order to creation.

I guess when you don't want to know the truth you create your own reality to fit your idealization of mankind as the be all and end all of reality.

Major league, strawman.