It's almost impossible to look at our world and all that's happening to and or in it, and then conceive of a divine entity, that loves us one and all, more than his very own sacrificed and crucified son!?

Yet every year at this time, this same message is shoved in our faces, or should that read, have our faces shoved in it, and based on seriously plagiarized reports emanating from the Middle East some 50-100 years after the alleged events.

I've always thought the greatest story ever told/mass manipulation mantra, was just a horse's arse, or the stuff dropping from it; only to find out it's double; and just as impersonal as those endlessly ringing Xmas cash registers?

And no that doesn't mean I don't believe in a creative force, or life after death or divine intelligence; just this particularly fanciful/highly embellished (adjust the facts to fit the requisite messianic mold) story!
Rhrosty

Craig,
Thank you for a great article. Do not be put of by the rather sour trolls that haunt this site.

The word of *who*? countersigned by *who*? Carbon dated to * when*?

what you mean is the indoctrinated * opinion* of early "christians", a generation or two removed from the alleged events. A far cry from anything other than literature, at best.

Do call again.

Rusty

I seem to remember reading that the unexamined life is not worth living; nor indeed, I contend, is the unexamined ideology or belief system!

But particularly for the initiated unsophisticated young tribesperson, having the which doctors bone (slow acting death ray) pointed at them!

I'm a troll foldy roll, I'm a troll foldy roll, I'm a troll foldy roll and I will eat you for supper.

Well that's what under bridge dwelling trolls, in far off story land do!
Rhrosty.

Given some of the recorded intimacy with a whale by a former gospel (a whale of a tale or two) writer; it's a pity they couldn't have been guided by the size a fully extended sperm whale male appendage, which would have resulted in tunnels/chariots/railway lines/carriage axles etc, at least as twice as wide!

An consequently, much earlier examples of rapid rail and rockets standing twice as tall and wide i.e.

And given relevant measurements, a havey wall banger wouldn't have sent you straight to the hospital, but directly to the morgue/into permanent orbit, or reserved solely as rocket fuel!
Rhrosty.

What's Thor got to do with Christmas ?

I guess, maybe, Sells would dismiss me as a "troll", but this essay by Craig was pure make believe fantasy.
Once again for what it is worth the essays available on these sites thoroughly de-construct the childishly naive mommy-daddy nursery book fantasy that Craig promotes. The nursery time comic-book fantasy figure "Jesus" being no more real than the easter rabbit, the tooth fairy, and santa claus.
1. http://www.aboutadidam.org/articles/secret_identity
2. http://www.aboutadidam.org/readings/birthday_message/index.html
3. http://www.dabase.org/up-5-1.htm

Good grief!

yes the 'carbon dating ' that Rusty prefers is where you can send rocks to many different labs and end up with huge variations in results. Any lie though in Rusty's mind is ok as long as the truth does not need facing up to.

No, Runner. "rocks" get different techniques to written pages, and " thousands of years" differences represent tiny percentages of the ages of rocks. Errors in carbon dating of organics are similarly accurate and precise within their ranges.

Done any?

Rusty.

Actually the story of the 4 ft 81/2 inches is a little incorrect.
The size of the rocket boosters is determined by the US railway
loading gauge which is somewhat larger than the UK loading gauge.
The loading gauge is the maximum size of any flat car load.

Now Runner, let me guess. Any lab that reports the age of a rock as greater than 600 years is wrong. Right?

Whoops! 6000.

Done any?

no Rusty but know a few geologist who have confirmed the fact that your results must fit your narrative.

MADNESS
"The contemporary attacks on Christianity, moral and political, are redolent of the Decian persecutions, and yet an instinct of much of the secularist media is reluctance to report, let alone condemn beyond formulaic protocols, the beheading of Christian infants, the crucifixion of Christian teenagers, the practical genocide of Christian communities almost as old as Pentecost, and the destruction to date of 168 churches in the Middle East. Very simply, this rhetorical paralysis betrays a disdain for Judaeo-Christian civilization and its exaltation of man in the image of God with the moral demands which accrue to that. Their operative philosophy, characteristic of those who are empirically bright but morally dim, is that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” There is, for instance, the alliance of the inimical Pharisees and Herodians to entrap Jesus (Matt. 22:15-16). That is the logic of the asylum where very smart people are also very mad. For Christ the Living Truth, it is worse than clinical insanity: it is, using his dread word, hypocrisy."

Sentimental gibberish--and the source of the track gauge story unacknowledged. Altogether worthy of Christmas as it's evolved.
Humbug!

It's hard to see what the fuss is about. The theme
is philosphically obvious and not limited to
debate about christianity. But for this christian
it is a welcome widening which i find very
helpful