Hi David,

Thank you for sharing your experiences here at OLO. I think I was in my teens when I read or heard that Jesus had given super-powers to the apostles. That made me doubt.

Moreover, I find the particularly Christian position that everyone is especially sinful exagerrated. Most people I have met are decent folk, going about the business of civil living. Axe murders are in a minority in society: Don't think I have ever met one. Likewise, if a human house trains a puppy, usually one perseveres, rather than hashly punishing the pet for little mistakes.

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Dear One under God,

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I am both touched and honoured that you wish to share your spiritual treasures with me and all of us here on OLO.

Thank you for informing me of "A Course in Miracles" (ACIM) and "The Foundation for Inner Peace".

I must confess that I had never heard of them and am surprised to learn of their evident and apparently growing importance.

I am sure you will understand, however, that this is much further downstream than my present quest which is focused on possible sources of the mythical and/or historical Jesus.

If you have anything on this, I would very grateful if you would share it with me.

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<<There are books and books written by various Christians, including those philosophically and/or scientifically qualified, explaining and defending their position.>>

Oh boy are there ever! And every line in every one of them is riddled with fallacies and sophistry. Believe me, I’ve read enough of it.

<<You cannot expect me to do this convincingly for you on this OLO, even if I thought I could.>>

So then, why can I? You like to present theism and atheism as two equally opposing views, so why are they different in this case?

Anyway, George, this dodging and weaving is becoming painful to watch. So I’ll cut the disingenuousness on my behalf and simply state what we both already know: That there is no rational way of going from presupposition to a religious conclusion which is why theists don’t take the “top down” approach you mentioned and those who do, lose their faith.

But it’s easy to understand why theists don’t take the “top down” approach to rationalise their religious beliefs. What motivation would they possibly have when every aspect of religious belief that can be falsified has been?

The only reason some of us manage to escape the dogmatic belief system that is religion, is because we acquire something that is the antithesis of faith: The desire for our beliefs to be as true as they possibly can be.

George,

<<Very few people think the Bible is reliable as a science, or even history, textbook>>

Very few? I think the majority of Christians would disagree with you here (56% last I heard), and such disagreements don’t instil a lot of confidence in me with regards to Christianity. It’s like the personal relationships with Jesus that billions of people apparently have, yet no one can agree on what he wants.

<<...although in order to be comprehensible to our ancestors it had to touch on things that today we consider as belonging to books on science or history.>>

Yeah, I really don’t like this whole, “it was okay in that cultural time and context” argument because god would’ve foreseen modern times, so it leaves this question as to why god only wrote a book for primitive people, making it look more like he didn’t exist to modern people.

For an omnipotent being, he sure was a substandard author. Imagine how a book would read if it really were written by an omnipotent being?!

<<[The Bible] certainly turned out to be “reliable” as an inspiration and source of ideas that (together with ancient Greece) kept, and enabled to further evolve, our Western civilisation. Seen as enabler of science and contemporary technology, this civilisation is/was unique.>>

If you’re referring to the whole “orderly creator” bit, then no, not really. That was more to do with the belief in, well, an orderly creator. The Bible isn’t required for the belief in a god or gods. I also wouldn’t use the word “reliable” in this case; to do so would be to imply that it could be relied upon to inspire scientific inquiry and I that would be a bit of a stretch considering the main character perpetuated superstitious beliefs.

<<And I perceived it as a mixture of rational argument, emotions and wishfull thinking (trying to rationalise your loss of faith).>>

Trying to rationalise my loss of faith? Cute, George, very cute Speaking of tautological though...

Rationalising the rejection of something that couldn’t be rationalised to begin with?

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Incidentally, what on Earth about what I said could possibly be, in any way, interpreted as “wishful thinking”?

<<The question is about one’s basic human orientation, with its emotional, rational, and moral dimensions that cannot be that easily communicated across such fundamentally different orientations.>>

How do you know? You’ve even never tried - not on OLO anyway - and even after inviting you to give it a go, you make every possible attempt to skirt around it.

Why is it, do you think, that I can communicate my “orientation” without any problems?

You see, this is another reason why I said earlier that you argue from the perspective of a Presuppositionalist. Presuppositionalists mistakenly think that we’re trapped in our own presuppositions and are therefore unable to understand opposing views. But I’m walking proof that this is nonsense.

<<The rest of your post repeats your (mis)understanding of the Christian position.>>

No, it’s not that I don’t understand. It’s that I’m viewing it from a more rational perspective. I was a Christian for many years too remember; long enough to be all too familiar with the, “You just don’t understand” argument.

Of course, not everything I say will always apply to every Christian.

<<Saying [religious belief] goes against reason is an affront to legions of Christian - indirectly also religious Jewish and Muslim - thinkers, philosophers, scientists etc.>>

That’s unfortunate, but if you want to claim that religious belief doesn’t go against reason, then presenting a logical fallacy such as the ‘Appeal to Numbers’ probably isn’t the best way of going about it.

<<A more modest (and honest) position would be to find out WHY and HOW they profess things that you see as going against reason...>>

I’m willing to sacrifice modesty for making points that I believe are important, but it’s a bit rich to mention honesty when faith is anything but honest. There is nothing honest about believing the claims of a belief system that requires one to not only believe regardless of the lack of evidence, but in the face of evidence to the contrary as well.

Continued...

Sorry, that first post was supposed to be last.