Atheists love this thing. I don't get it.



I mean I get it, but I don't understand how this is the trump Christianity card.

Bertrand Russell was a smart guy, most of the time. Not that time though.

I don't see any flaws in the argument? That doesn't trump Christianity, but it does convict Christians to provide better arguments than "you can't prove God wrong; therefore, he must be real."

Very True Last Firstborn!

My problem is with dealing with the atheists, there is a lack of evidence for Christianity.

The Christians are at a disadvantage outside of the Bible, and even non-biblical sources we have such as Josephus, give differing accounts of Biblical characters.

If I am incorrect here, please let me know.

The biggest thing for them, faith is not valid proof, and outside of the Bible, everything about Christ is 2nd hand information, as there is nobody who was actually around Him, so they call it all hearsay.

If there weren't a lack of evidence, Christianity would be called Truth instead of Faith.

I did make a fun joke post about how Jesus Christ actually returned and was an ex-guitarist for Ancient! I'm not sure if they took it seriously or not, but it was a fun post to make imo.

There's a good number of extra-biblical sources other than Josephus. But even the fact that there are differing accounts of biblical characters doesn't weaken Christianity, at least in my mind. How many differing accounts of Abraham Lincoln are there? Or, to level the field a little, anyone from the same time period as Jesus? Why does Christianity need so much more evidence to be taken seriously (especially considering the numerous written eyewitness accounts that all confirm each other, the fact that Jesus talked and proclaimed Divine Revelation with THOUSANDS of people) than say, Buddhism, which was the product of one man claiming he found enlightenment, with no witnesses or credible accounts other than himself? If anything, that should make the Buddha a madman. I honestly think Christianity is the most well documented religion in the world, and seeing as how our culture so often demands documentation, I'd think it would be more accepted. Why is Islam not questioned as much as Christianity, when the entire ideology is based off one guy, who claimed to have a vision while he was alone in the desert, wrote a bunch of stuff, proclaimed it as the perfect, absolutely inerrant word of Allah(which, when considering the Doctrine of Abrogation, which allows the Koran to be amended and other passages voided, is interesting), and then kill anyone who disagreed with him? I make my case that Christianity, going by the numbers, is the most reliable religion. The Bible, strictly as a historical record, has been proven to be 99.6% accurate; no other ancient text is anywhere close to that. So my question would be, why is the Bible seen so often as not enough of a source?

It's not like in math, where one different value throws off the whole equation. There's plenty of evidence for Christianity, and yes, some of it is not visible. I'm thinking of the great minds like Aquinas and Anselm, who were both able to prove God existed without using the Bible or physical evidence. Their arguments aren't 100000% watertight, but then, what argument coming from our flawed human minds has ever been? And for those who would make the claim that reason and rationality is the the only way to go, reason in and of itself when not grounded in God is ultimately impossible to justify in the philosophical sense and ends up being one of the most circular arguments there is.

There's certainly proof for Christianity. One just has to have an open mind and heart to be able to find it.

Walter Kovacs wrote:

There's a good number of extra-biblical sources other than Josephus. But even the fact that there are differing accounts of biblical characters doesn't weaken Christianity, at least in my mind.

It’s not so much the accounts, but the fact that if you put them together, some things will not add up. Jesus’ birth is currently being discussed as well. They claimed that King Herod died before 1 A.D. so Jesus had to be born before 1, according to the Gospel of Matthew, but according to John, Jesus was born during the census so it should be between 6-7 A.D. That is what they do.

From their eyes, are the accounts from somebody who actually met Jesus, or are they simply stories passed down?

Walter Kovacs wrote:

How many differing accounts of Abraham Lincoln are there? Or, to level the field a little, anyone from the same time period as Jesus? Why does Christianity need so much more evidence to be taken seriously (especially considering the numerous written eyewitness accounts that all confirm each other, the fact that Jesus talked and proclaimed Divine Revelation with THOUSANDS of people) than say, Buddhism, which was the product of one man claiming he found enlightenment, with no witnesses or credible accounts other than himself? If anything, that should make the Buddha a madman.

For them, because they say the Bible is lies, and contradicts reality, as Hguols has shown, a teapot they love to use for this. They also believe Jesus Christ was a myth, a made up character, or like Santa Claus, an mythological character who was based off of somebody in real life. They believe Paul was a madman with His’ conversion to Christianity, because they don’t believe people can get visions. Because of this, they say Paul never met Christ once, and His’ views of Christ contradict the claims of the Gospels, who are based off of Christ’s story.

Walter Kovacs wrote:

I honestly think Christianity is the most well documented religion in the world, and seeing as how our culture so often demands documentation, I'd think it would be more accepted. Why is Islam not questioned as much as Christianity, when the entire ideology is based off one guy, who claimed to have a vision while he was alone in the desert, wrote a bunch of stuff, proclaimed it as the perfect, absolutely inerrant word of Allah(which, when considering the Doctrine of Abrogation, which allows the Koran to be amended and other passages voided, is interesting), and then kill anyone who disagreed with him? I make my case that Christianity, going by the numbers, is the most reliable religion. The Bible, strictly as a historical record, has been proven to be 99.6% accurate; no other ancient text is anywhere close to that. So my question would be, why is the Bible seen so often as not enough of a source?

They are just as anti-Islam/anti-theism as they are anti-Christianity. The thing is, Christianity and Islam are what over ½ the entire planet proclaim, so of course they will be going against the popular society.

The reasons they say it isn’t a reliable source, is because we can’t prove anything with it. The flood story and the tower of Babel can not be proven according to them, and in fact, they believe that these stories are false because the evidence they do have, contradict the stories. They also claim that Nephilim don’t exist, because if there were, there would be evidence within fossils.

Walter Kovacs wrote:

It's not like in math, where one different value throws off the whole equation. There's plenty of evidence for Christianity, and yes, some of it is not visible. I'm thinking of the great minds like Aquinas and Anselm, who were both able to prove God existed without using the Bible or physical evidence. Their arguments aren't 100000% watertight, but then, what argument coming from our flawed human minds has ever been? And for those who would make the claim that reason and rationality is the the only way to go, reason in and of itself when not grounded in God is ultimately impossible to justify in the philosophical sense and ends up being one of the most circular arguments there is.

There's certainly proof for Christianity. One just has to have an open mind and heart to be able to find it.

From WWGHA, they have a prove the claim attitude. They did it to Hguols, and they will do it to me. The fact that they refuse anything that isn’t physical, to be proof, means that they will only want physical proof that God exists.

Apologize for playing devil’s advocate, because I am actually getting ready to debate with an atheist on there about Jesus Christ, and all the info I can get to help support Christ being real will be great!

One claim that was started was Jesus is a myth based off of other Pagan Gods, I posted to him that zeitgeist part 1 debunk and Stupid Evil *******: Debunking the Myth of Horus links for starters.

The last kick btw, which makes me think Hguols and I are wasting time on there: They admit, even if we prove beyond the shout of a doubt that the Christian God is the True God, they still refuse to bow down because of God destroying Sodom/Gomorrah/ the Entire Planet with a flood, all the wars, all the murdering God demanded, the fact that a negative afterlife was created, etc.

All in all, double-standards they have!

Death over Life wrote:

Very True Last Firstborn!
My problem is with dealing with the atheists, there is a lack of evidence for Christianity.

The Christians are at a disadvantage outside of the Bible, and even non-biblical sources we have such as Josephus, give differing accounts of Biblical characters.

If I am incorrect here, please let me know.

The biggest thing for them, faith is not valid proof, and outside of the Bible, everything about Christ is 2nd hand information, as there is nobody who was actually around Him, so they call it all hearsay.

If there weren't a lack of evidence, Christianity would be called Truth instead of Faith.

I did make a fun joke post about how Jesus Christ actually returned and was an ex-guitarist for Ancient! I'm not sure if they took it seriously or not, but it was a fun post to make imo.

[/quote]

You're absolutely right. Atheists want empirical evidence of God. That's impossible. We can't provide that sort of evidence that God exists. (and that evidence would defeat the purpose of faith anyway)

Likewise, Atheists like to dodge the "burden of proof" by saying they don't have a belief, it's a disbelief. (much like bald is not a hair color, or not collecting stamps is not a hobby)

I've been arguing Belief and religion with them. They seem to be dancing around some of the points I've made.... I'll make a separate post about this.


....as I think its an interesting read....

Death over Life wrote:

From WWGHA, they have a prove the claim attitude. They did it to Hguols, and they will do it to me. The fact that they refuse anything that isn’t physical, to be proof, means that they will only want physical proof that God exists.

Apologize for playing devil’s advocate, because I am actually getting ready to debate with an atheist on there about Jesus Christ, and all the info I can get to help support Christ being real will be great!

One claim that was started was Jesus is a myth based off of other Pagan Gods, I posted to him that zeitgeist part 1 debunk and Stupid Evil *******: Debunking the Myth of Horus links for starters.

The last kick btw, which makes me think Hguols and I are wasting time on there: They admit, even if we prove beyond the shout of a doubt that the Christian God is the True God, they still refuse to bow down because of God destroying Sodom/Gomorrah/ the Entire Planet with a flood, all the wars, all the murdering God demanded, the fact that a negative afterlife was created, etc.All in all, double-standards they have!

Took me forever to figure out what WWGHA meant.

Honestly, if the points you gave are their genuine arguments (which are honestly pretty weak), you'll be wasting your time there. I once read a great article in one of my astronomy magazines about conspiracy theories where it said that the strength of someone like that is in the details. No matter what argument you give, 10 different people will pick ten minute little details and rip them apart. That's why I don't usually debate online with atheists/nontheists, save for very rare occassions when I sense an open heart and mind. But hey, if you need some help, let me know, I'm cheerin you on.

The main reason why the arguements seem so strong is because I haven't delved into philosophy or science or anything of the sort.

The one I'm debating with, is one of the very few individuals who are friendly to me.

We have been talking about it via pm, and He's much more open than the atheists there, but He did give a claim about why He isn't a fan of Christianity.

Yeah, Hguols and them are going around like a merry-go-round.

They say that we can't claim that there is a God without proving it, yet they are allowed to say there is no God without proving it. They say it's all up to us to prove it, and if we can't prove it, there is no God.

WWGHA is where Hguols got the May 2011 end time prophecy and the Teapot ideals from.

Death over Life wrote:

We have been talking about it via pm, and He's much more open than the atheists there, but He did give a claim about why He isn't a fan of Christianity.

What's his reason?

http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/forums/index.php/topic,17104.msg380208.html#msg380208

ParkingPlaces wrote:

Death over Life wrote:

And this is what I don’t understand from atheists. We theists know you don’t believe in what we say, otherwise you wouldn’t be called atheists.

However, this is my wtf moment. I am a very open minded individual. Perhaps I may not be showing it here, but that is because I have next to no knowledge and information with all of existence. I see this kind of viewpoint from some atheists here, where we transfer them to a world, where beyond the shout of a doubt, this God is real, and yet you will still reject it.

Many are saying that if there was a God that was shown proof, they would believe it, but I’ve only seen the statements above from the Christian God. I just don’t understand and don’t know how to properly write this, but why should we convince you that this God is real, if you even admit if he were real, you would still reject and hate Him? To me, that kind of destroys the whole point of discussing from the Christian standpoint. From the atheist view, you are trying to destroy our way of thinking to help us realize that it is within us, and not some sort of magical fairy that is guiding us, and it is up to us within ourselves to make this place a better place. The magical fairy to the atheist, is the ultimate scapegoat and allows for such evil fellow theists to commence, and are sick and tired of it.

So, from the atheistic view, there is still point, but why should the Christians continue to bother you if this is the ultimate result whether we actually do prove it or not: rejection?

I don't know if I can properly write this, DoL, but I'm going to try.

I happen to be a pretty moral person. I don't steal, I don't hurt others, I don't go after married women. Etc. etc.

So here I am, this nice guy, and I am being asked by christians to get all excited about an unprovable, all-powerful dude whose track record on human rights and just plain kindness is absolutely horrific. I mean, it would no more occur to me to drown all but eight people on this planet that it would occur to me to slice my legs off in .1 mm increments. And do you know what that means? That means I am incredibly more moral a being than this god that you say Eve irked in the garden. I would never trash an entire race of peoples because an early model disobeyed my casually mentioned rules. I would ever scatter people to the four corners of the earth with new languages that disallowed communication between different groups just because they were trying to aspire to something more than dirt hovels. I would never send my word of semi-love and semi-peace to just one small group of people in one small part of the world while leaving millions more around the globe in the dark. I would never 'test' a follower by scaring the bejesus out of them because they think they are going to have to kill their kid to keep me happy. I would never make a world inhabited by biting insects, disease carrying bacteria, parasites, earthquakes and tornados. I would never ask anyone to revere me or else. I would never punish those that don't pick the exact belief system I want them to pick to spend the rest of eternity being tortured in hell.

If I actually had the power to prevent or cure it, not a single person on this planet would be sick, confined to a wheelchair, missing a limb or mentally ill. Not a single person would die because other people were angry or greedy or selfish. Nobody would be without clean water. Nobody would be ignorant. Nobody would be suffering. Because that's the only thing omnipotence is good for. Kindness.

All of this means that a)I am immeasurably more moral than this god of yours, but by your definition b) I am born a sinner. That does not compute.

What is my inspiration to pay attention to people who a) believe old stories that are patently false, b) condemn me as a sinner when they don't know me in any way, and c) who insist they are right when the evidence overwhelmingly says otherwise?

If I were a god in need of sending a kid to planet earth and enlighten, I would have sent lots of kids to lots of places and told people to be nice to each other and appreciate cultural and racial and language differences. I would have provided written documentation that was neither full of bombastic language and metaphors or meaningless family trees and impossible tales. All of my people would speak the same language because I wouldn't be an ass about every little thing they did wrong and my book would be a heck of a lot bigger and more useful than that of your god. And my kid wouldn't have had to do that sacrifice thing. I would have made a world worthy of a omnicient, omnipotent and omnigood guy and eliminated the need for theatrics from the get-go.

I am not a god. Nor is anyone else, human or otherwise. Our world is the way it is because of naturally explainable events and evolution. Our imperfection as humans, our "sinful nature" as you call it, is a byproduct of being a bit less civilized than we'd like because being civilized isn't yet a natural act.

If there were a real christian god, I would hate him because he has that deadly combination of infinite power and miniscule wisdom.

To defend yourself, I assume, (if you are similar to other christians who come here), you are going to say "We can't know the mind of god". And that's true. Your forebearers in the religion didn't bother making up enough about that part, so you're constantly flummoxed by a lack of answers. Christians used to handle questions like mine by burning me at the stake. Sadly, current EPA clean air laws made that option go away, so you're stuck with me. And as long as you guys insist that you or your god are more moral than me and the flood and other dastardly deeds really happened, you don't have a leg to stand on.

Mainly, of course, because your god can't heal amputees.

And a couple more atheists chimed in and said they feel the exact same about God like He does. I know it may seem a little rough, but he was in no way trying to offend, just expressing what He feels.

That's one bitter dude. But he sure thinks highly of himself...do you have any reply for him?

Yes, it is currently in the process, but here is something you should know.

Why there is such bitterness, is because there is a recently new Christian on the forum who is acting like an extreme fundamentalist towards them.

In addition, the atheists have to put up with things like this everyday they claim, which will of course lead to bitternes:

http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/forums/index.php/topic,17151.0.html

http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/3379447-atheism-is-a-mental-illness-a-cry-for-attention

The guy also told me from the outside looking in, how can they take us seriously when we have well over 10,000 different interpretations (denominations) of the Bible that we Christians ourselves can't really agree over (sans the 3 essentials) anything.

A perfect example here, from what I've read recently would be the Deicide thread.

Heh. Atheism is a mental illness...that'll show em! I'd be interested in your reply though whenever you decide to send it, if you're okay with that.

Yeah. I'm not sure if it'll get any replies though.

If you wish to see what they traditionally do to justify their views, I would read that entire thread.

I won't lie, they did stump me a few times, so they did for the most part have the upper hand.

I will say, if you have anything to offer, for me to post, feel free.

http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/forums/index.php/topic,16970.0.html

I'll say one thing up front: you have GOT to read more of the Bible, dude. I haven't read through the whole thread and honestly probably won't since I'm deathly sick right now, but if you post up a few points where they stumped you I can see if I can give you any help. I don't have the energy to comb through a 3 page debate thread right now :p

Yeah. As I said there and I'll say it here, a month or 2 before going on to that site, I fell into an I-don't-care attitude about Christianity or the Bible or reading it.

This came about afterwards I had read about 1/2 the NT. Tis my fault, and I should have dug in much deeper, but at least me going there made me care again.

That will be one of the few things I will say positive about the place. Otherwise, most of them are STILL acting like angry teenagers who need their diapers changed.

btw, I didn't say "you need to read more of the Bible," to knock you or anything. That sounded kinda crappy. But the general attitude is pretty lame there, form the skimming I've been doing. You're a braver man that I, that's for sure :p But again, if you get/got stumped, post it here and I'll help out, as there's way too much there for me to try and figure that out. But you're holdin your own good enoughh; I liked how you threw the Codex version of Matthew in there.

Yep. It's the one guaranteed thing Alzael admitted He got stumped on by me. But you do see they skimp out on the meaning of the Scriptures to justify them saying Jesus was calling a woman groveling at His' feet a dog, so that way they can call Him a racist.

I understand your context of I need to read the Bible more. I need to, that's a fact.

And Hguols is the one who got me interested. My bravery came from Him, in addition they were overwhelming him at the time.

Death over Life wrote:

From WWGHA, they have a prove the claim attitude. They did it to Hguols, and they will do it to me. The fact that they refuse anything that isn’t physical, to be proof, means that they will only want physical proof that God exists.

I said in another thread, "no one's going to walk up with the proof of God in a bug jar." ....and their response was:

Quote :

Why not? Are you saying it's impossible for the supposedly omnipotent god to provide proof of itself in a bug jar?

I can walk up with a chair and establish its existence to everyone except
the willfully obtuse. Are you saying a god cannot muster the same
amount and quality of evidence for its existence as a freakin' chair?

An odd analogy when one could argue that the chair is created by God, therefore being the proof they so desire. But then it comes down to a matter of wanting to not believe the chair is created by God because of prior conditions that seem to negate God (someone building the chair, etc).

Romans 1:20

20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

"The heavens declare the glory of God..."

"A religion that does not affrim God is hidden is not true. "
-Pascal

To quote a very wise man: "There is not a burden of proof, but a burden of seeking."

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=7249

If faith alone justifies belief, then if I decided to worship Allah or Brahman or whatever, wouldn't that make my faith also above criticism by the same logic?

I wouldn't recommend worshiping Brahman, as those were the priests of the Hindu caste system. Probably wouldn't get to far with that...

I'm not sure I understand the question though...I'm not arguing for Christianity being above criticism for having the virtue of faith. But faith alone doesn't justify anything, really, unless it's faith in something true.

What I'm saying is that if faith alone is a virtue, what basis is left for a Christian to criticize a faithful person of another religion on? (Soren Kierkegaard used a similar argument, but he believed that his faith wasn't objectively superior to anyone else's.)

The only thing that can be added to faith, is historic authenticity on Christ.

As with what Hguols said, they really believe that an absense of physical/empirical evidence is indeed physical/empirical evidence of absense.

I call it bs, but Christ is how you can work through this.

I've been pming Walter on this debate that I'm having with one of them. With the debate, I'm going to quote C.S. Lewis here with the 3 L's: Lord, Liar, Lunatic.

Most of them abide by the 4th L, Legend.

In the 1st post of the debate, we at least agree that Christ is a historical figure, not a myth, so we've already ruined the Legend view.

So, we go back to the 3 L's. I'll continue whenever I read the Corinthians.


If you want me to summarize, most of what I've seen, the criticism of God boils down to 2 reasons from the atheist perspective:

#1. Because God does not physically puts His' face in front of theirs, He's not real.

#2. The Problem of a Loving God allowing evil and suffering to happen in the world.

Very broad generalization, but that is what it is ultimately.