It's entirely relevant, Trav. Oliver stated that Dawkins is open to being proved wrong on atheism, and, unless I misunderstood, you contradicted that.

Were you not, then, saying that Dawkins considers his atheism infallible?

Sells,

Drawing on revisionist Christian theology, eschatological events need not be merely temporal:

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." (Hebrews 11:1 KJV)

- Faith is in the transcendental future.
- Evidence or non-evidence in the here and now.

Similarly, “Neque tunc ciuitas Christi, quamuis adhuc peregrinaretur in terris et haberet tamen magnorum agmina populorum…" "The city of Christ, which, although as yet a stranger upon earth, had countless hosts of citizens" (Augustine, XXII.VI.66-69, XXII.6.482, trans., Dods).

- God’s Kingdom is both Earthly and Heavenly.

Further,

"The Kingdom is proclaimed by Jesus as imminent in the future, as indeed already dawning but not yet actually present. This imminent future is, however, not to be understood as temporal but as existential; the Kingdom cannot by its very nature come in the course of time, its imminence confronts man with the crisis of decision." (Bultmann). God is transcendent yet "never present as a familiar phenomenon but who is always the coming God". (Perrin)

- Else put, here, above, the Eskhatos/Eschaton is not a fixed temporal event. Christians quest towards a transcendental future, perhaps.

There is a temporal version too. Here, the Eschaton is derived from the Jewish final atonement. In this regard, there have been several dates posited, some relating to Enoch and the fourth Jewish millennium. Herein, the most probable date the world ended was 60 CE!

Liberalism has its roots in the temporal struggle of individuals to free themselves from the yoke of Monarchy and Church control under the Feudal system.

In later centuries, freed from Monarchical and Church domination, we see the raise of the French and American republics. Liberalism predates Cromwell. Liberalism is anti-scriptural to the extent that we need not -like slaves- submit to our masters.

Petr, your posts suggest you feel yourself in the realm of the intellectual eclectos ministering “down to” the ignorant hoi polloi. Liberalism frees the individual away from this rank and tiering and from the need for intermediate interpretation. We need not submit to a Church.

Trav., reply next post.

Bushbasher and Sancho thanks for your clarifications for Trav’s benefit.

"In promising to be with the church to the end of time, Christ, the divine Redeemer, willed this charism of infallibilty for his church. This simply means that Christ, the Way, the Truth, and the Life, through His Holy Spirit, will preserve His church from error in its solemn, definitive teaching of the deposit of faith. This special charism of infallibility is enjoyed by the Roman pontiff, in virtue of his office, when as supreme pastor and teacher of all the faithful, he proclaims by a definitive act, a doctrine of faith or morals. This infallibility promised to the church is also present in the bishops when, as a body together with the successor of Peter, they exercise their supreme teaching office. To such definitive teaching all Catholics are obliged to adhere with the loyal obedient assent of faith. This assent of the church can never be lacking on account of the activity of the same Holy Spirit, whereby the whole flock of Christ is preserved and progresses in unity of faith." Catholic Catechism

Trav, you don’t think the above is relevant? The Catholic Church is saying it is inerrant in all matters of faith. That is an incredible claim. Likewise, Protestants hold the Holy Scriptures as infallible. In the wrong hands such extremism is dangerous.

Dawkins is saying even through all he sees and tests tells him that no god exists, he is not infallible, he might be wrong.

My question is relevant because it is truly remarkable for the (illustrative) Rev Smith to claim he/she knows God does exist and he/she cannot be wrong - infallible.

While to the man in the street, Dawkins walks with atheism, he rationally acknowledges fallibility. On the other hand, Christian theologians seem not so up-front about their cognitive vulnerability.

Can a cleric really know God exists?

My question is relevant, because we have a debate between one party who sees limits to his knowledge and another party whose knowledge is held (by them) inerrant.

O.

Sancho
[It's entirely relevant, Trav. Oliver stated that Dawkins is open to being proved wrong on atheism, and, unless I misunderstood, you contradicted that.]

Actually, Oliver said this:

[Neither, Dawkins nor I are atheists.] and [May be you should not call yourself a Christian]

I replied:

"So, Richard Dawkins is not an atheist....and I am not a Christian?

I think it's time I stopped taking your posts seriously."

So when I said Oliver's comment wasn't relevant, I meant it wasn't relevant to anything I was discussing with him. I was simply pointing out the absurdity of claiming that Dawkins isn't an atheist and that I'm not a christian.

Oliver,

[My question is relevant, because we have a debate between one party who sees limits to his knowledge and another party whose knowledge is held (by them) inerrant.]

Thankyou for clarifying. Although this is not relevant to anything I've said, and you've simply introduced it for your benefit, I'll discuss anyway.

Now, this’s simply a red herring.

Firstly, it's absurd to claim that most Christians think they "can't be wrong".

Secondly, it's not relevant to a debate between a Christian and an Atheist, because debates exist primarily for the benefit of the audience. If one side is clearly more correct than the other, the audience will decide that.

Thirdly, it's been shown beyond much reasonable doubt by research on Sam Harris's website, that atheists are more close minded than Christians. It’s atheists who are close minded and dogmatic, regardless of the false pretences they may or may not put on about "being open to being proven wrong" on their ridiculous standards of "evidence".

Fourthly, and most importantly, we need to keep this in perspective. All you're really doing here is playing with semantics on the differences between belief and knowledge, and the ways in which people can claim to hold objective knowledge.

Finally, I repeat that you need to tease out the relevance further. Exactly what point are you even trying to make here, Oliver? If it is relevant, what is it relevant to? And why is it relevant?

trav, i pretty much agree with you that whether dawkins is an atheist or not is pretty much a matter of semantics. and i don't really want to get involved here: it distracts from ridiculing sellick. (though i guess he doesn't actually need much assistance).

but there is a non-semantic angle. my question for you is:

trav, how open are you (or, if you want to venture an opinion, christians in general) to disbelieving a christian god?

i'm not even sure what that means, since i have no real idea what a christian god is meant to be. (no thanks to sellick ...). but you presumably believe in *something*. so my question is, is that belief challengeable? if so, how?

the point is, of course, that scientific beliefs are challengeable, and it is clear how. it doesn't follow that all beliefs need be challengeable in the same way. but clearly non-challengeable beliefs, and not-clearly-challengeable beliefs, have a different status.

i'm not presuming to know your answers to these questions. i'm genuinely curious.

also, if you could point to the evidence, on harris's site or elsewhere, that "atheists are more closed-minded than christans", i'd like to look at it.

Sells ended this article by admonishing us all to 'join a church' in order to 'make a difference'. This would have to be the worst advice Ive seen in any of Sell's writing. The Church is already full of people pushing barrows in all different directions trying to make their own particular difference. If you join the Church in order to 'make a difference' then you are joining for the wrong reason and are bound to be deeply disappointed and hurt by the experience.

Churches demand conformity, are implacably resistant to change and deeply intolerant of diversity. If you think Sells is intolerant then think again, there are worse. When you join a Church you will be 'bullied' in all sorts of subtle ways to conform to the local religious culture: sing mindless choruses, pay lip service to someone's quirky theology, attend silly meetings or whatever. Many of the Churches activities have more to do with imposing cultural conformity and protecting sacred cows than with proclaiming the Gospel.

So here is my advice. Join a Church ONLY when you know that it is your appropriate response to Gods calling and resist it for as long as you can. Choose carefully because you are inevitably going to have to make some compromises and you are really going to have to love the people in that Church to survive. Never forget that the business of the Church is to proclaim a Gospel that threatens the dominant forces of our society. Its a calling, not a social club. If you are looking for a social club then consider the footy club or just go to the local