Pascal's Wager Archives

My Response to an IFB Missionary

Bruce Gerencser November 12, 2023 Evangelicalism 9 Comments

Over the past sixteen years, I have received countless emails and social media messages from Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) pastors, evangelists, missionaries, and everyday church members. These emails and messages are typically hateful, judgmental, mean-spirited, and unkind. Some IFB adherents have threatened me with physical harm, including murder. They have also threatened my partner, our daughter with Down syndrome, and our other children. With no decency, no respect, and no regard for how their words might be perceived, these so-called lovers of Jesus ignore their Savior’s commands about how to treat their enemies. The Sermon on the Mount is nowhere to be found in their Bibles.

This behavior is not new, nor is it atypical. Abused people tend to abuse others. When you spend your life being berated and judged — hard, foot-stomping, pulpit-pounding, hellfire and brimstone preaching, brother! — by their pastors, is it any wonder that when they get older, they repeat the same behavior? The late Jack Hyles turned out thousands of preachers just like him, men filled with certainty and arrogance who Sunday after Sunday abuse their congregants with the pure words of God straight from the King James Bible. The late Cecil Hodges, a notable IFB preacher, said one time at a conference I was attending, “We hit our people over the head with the sin stick so often that they duck when we begin to preach.” Boy, ain’t that the truth. When you are psychologically abused and assaulted this way year after year, you begin to think the abuse is “normal.”

Some IFB preachers are nice people with winsome, kind, helpful personalities. By all accounts, they are respected by people both inside and outside of the church. Recently, Republican Mike Johnson was chosen to be the speaker of the House. Johnson is an all-round nice guy. However, when you look at his Fundamentalist Baptist beliefs and practices, you find a very different kind of man — beliefs that are physically and psychologically harmful. Johnson is a true blue believer, as was I. By all accounts I was a winsome, kind, helpful preacher, but my beliefs were anything but.

Does this mean IFB Christians are bad people? Well, certainly some of them are. More than a few IFB preachers are sociopaths, and some are even psychopaths. Narcissism is common. The question is, why this is so?

Yesterday, I received an email from Sam Hodges, an IFB missionary to Honduras. Hodges’s son, Joseph, and their daughter-in-law Abbi, are also missionaries in Honduras. Their sending organization is Prayer Baptist Missions International in Boiling Springs, South Carolina.

Hodges’ email was respectful and polite, so I shall respond to it in like manner:

Hello there Mr. Gerencser,

My wife and I have been IFB missionaries in Honduras for 26 years now. I would hate to think that I left my home in the USA and all that is dear to proclaim a gospel that is a figment of someone’s imagination. It would be sad to waste my life in such a way. But of course we do believe it is real and many precious souls have come to experience God’s grace as well.

People commit themselves to all sorts of beliefs that are false, beliefs they are willing to die for. Hodges likely thinks Mormonism is a cult, but millions of people believe Mormonism is true. Mormon missionaries go two-by-two across the earth, preaching the gospel and evangelizing sinners. They are devoted to the teachings of the Bible and the Book of Mormon. If the level of devotion and commitment is evidence for the truthfulness of a belief system, then Mormonism is definitely true. Of course, Hodges thinks Mormonism is false.

How is the IFB church movement any different? Just because people are committed to a peculiar belief system doesn’t mean it’s true. People can and do commit themselves to all sorts of beliefs that are false. None of us is exempt from delusion. All any of us can do is rationally and skeptically examine our beliefs. Hodges believes his peculiar brand of faith is True Christianity®. How does he know his flavor of Christianity is true and all others are wrong? Forty percent of Hondurans are Roman Catholics — Christians in every sense of the word. I suspect that Hodges rejects the claim that Catholics are Christians. How do we determine who is right? Every sect appeals to the Bible as evidence for their beliefs, yet no two of them agree on what the Bible teaches, They can’t even agree on the basics: salvation, baptism, and communion. Why, then, is Hodges certain he is right?

I grew up in IFB Christianity in the 70s and 80s.

Hodges was born into and grew up in the IFB church movement. The only religion he has experienced is IFB Christianity. Thanks to lifelong conditioning and indoctrination, Hodges is certain that IFB Christianity is right. I understand where Hodges is coming from, having spent the first forty years of my life in Fundamentalist Christianity. Even though I left the IFB church movement in the late 1980s, I continued to pastor churches that were Fundamentalist. It was only when I pondered whether I could be wrong that I began to reexamine my beliefs. I wonder if Hodges has ever taken a hard look at his beliefs? How many books outside of his IFB rut has Hodges read? (Assuming he reads books. Some IFB preachers don’t read anything except the Bible and the terms and conditions on porn sites.) 🙂 Best I can tell, Hodges is King James Only — an untenable position if there ever was one. I wonder if Hodges has ever read any of New Testament scholar Dr. Bart Ehrman’s books on the nature and history of the Bible? Until I was willing to read authors who were not IFB/Evangelical, my beliefs remained safe and secure. However, once I started wandering outside of the Evangelical box, I found that many of my sincerely held beliefs were untenable. I tried to hang on to some sort of faith, but eventually came to the conclusion that the central claims of Christianity were false.

Most IFB church members are cradle believers. Born into the church, it is all they know. They have what is called a borrowed faith. While they can point to a time when they got saved, they can’t point to a time when they weren’t surrounded by IFB beliefs and practices. Unlike many mainline sects, IFB Christianity is all-encompassing: multiple church services each week, Sunday school, revivals, conferences, youth rallies, and the like daily reinforce the one true faith (IFB Christianity). When people ask me why it took me fifty years to deconvert, I point them to my childhood, the conditioning and indoctrination. How could I have become anything other than an IFB preacher? My path was paved with thousands of hours of preaching and teaching that reinforced my IFB beliefs. I had no reason to think I could be wrong. The Bible says . . . end of discussion, right?

That seemed to be the tail end of the big church growth movement of the Fundamental Baptists in America. I realize that not all of the pastors of that time were faithful but many of them were. Some people were embittered over bad experiences they had with a particular church or pastor.

The bigger question is why the IFB church growth movement died on the vine. Why did so many of these churches close their doors or become shells of what they once were? If these churches preached the faith once delivered to the saints, why are they in numeric decline? Hodges would have me think that some people were “embittered over bad experiences they had with a particular church or pastor.” Is he suggesting that I am bitter? Scores of people have left IFB churches. Did they all leave because they were bitter or because they had bad experiences? Maybe we should take a closer look at these “bad experiences.” If I could, I would love to share with Hodges the emails I have received from hurting IFB believers. They were misused and abused, and, at times, raped, assaulted, and sexually molested. Bullies abound in the IFB church movement.

Regardless, the IFB church movement is dying because of its unwillingness to adapt to the times. Their rigid beliefs keep them from adapting to the twenty-first century. Instead, they continue to operate using 1950s methodologies. Of course, they take great pride in being anti-cultural.

I would love to know who Hodges thinks were “faithful” pastors. I suspect he and I have different definitions of the word “faithful.”

While I am no longer a Christian, I pay close attention to the IFB church movement. We have family members who are IFB pastors, evangelists, and missionaries. I daily read IFB websites and blogs, and occasionally listen to IFB sermons. I am a member of my alma mater’s (Midwestern Baptist College in Pontiac, Michigan) Facebook group. As someone who is considered an expert on the IFB church movement, I believe it is important for me to keep in touch with the machinations of the movement. While there is a peripheral movement towards more progressive practices, the beliefs of the 1970s and 1980s are pretty much the same as those held by more “enlightened” IFB preachers today. Sure, some IFB churches use drums and guitars in worship now, women are permitted to wear pants, and men can have mustaches, beards, and longer hair, but the core beliefs and practices are still harmful.

In my case I happen to believe to this day that the position of the IFB churches was and is the right position to take although some perhaps executed those positions poorly. It’s sort of like former President Trump I guess. Great policies but many hated his attitude and demeanor.

I certainly take issue with disgraced former president Trump having “great policies.” Many of his policies are contrary to the teachings of Christ. Worse, he is a vile, disgusting human being. Yet, countless IFB Christians voted for him twice and will do so again if he is on the ballot in 2024. I will never understand how any Christian could vote for the man.

Anyway I’m not the smartest guy in the world and my IQ is not the highest.

I can make no judgment here because I don’t know Hodges.

But the whole Christianity thing makes perfect sense to me.

Has Hodges seriously examined and studied any other religion but his own? I doubt it. I would love to know how many religious books he has read that were NOT IFB or Evangelical. Since such reading is widely condemned or forbidden, I suspect Hodges doesn’t wander too far from his IFB roots. I would be glad to make some reading suggestions if Hodges is interested in challenging his beliefs. 🙂

If it’s not real I don’t know why we are here on earth. Not much to live or die for if there is no eternal life.

We are here on earth because a woman and a man had sex, the woman became pregnant, and nine months later gave birth to all the Bruces, Sams, and Pollys of the world. I don’t need a deity to understand and comprehend why I exist. My existence is self-evident.

Does Hodges really believe there is “not much to live or die for if there is no eternal life”? Has he really thought about the implications of a meaningless life without Jesus/eternal life? I don’t know about Hodges, but my life is filled with meaning and purpose — all without God, Jesus, the Bible, or Christianity. Since this life is the only one I will ever have, I want to make the most of every moment of every day. Even in my sickest days, I still try to make the most of the day before me. I am in a tough spot physically with little to no hope in sight, but I still try to do what I can to make the most of my life. Does Hodges really believe life would be meaningless without eternal life; that the only reason he is a good person is that a religious book told him that a mythical deity promises him a home in Heaven IF he believes the right things? Is the promise of eternal life the only reason Hodges isn’t a rapist or a serial killer? If so, by all means, keep on believing. If Hodges needs religion to be a good person, fine. I just wish he’d realize that MOST humans do not need his brand of Christianity to live good and prosperous lives. In fact, I can make a compelling case for the fact that Fundamentalist Christian beliefs keep many believers from being good people; that their beliefs require them to hate, marginalize, and condemn anyone who thinks differently from them.

Polly and I have been married for forty-five years. We have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. We own our own home, drive a nice late-model car, and have two indoor and two outside cats. Our children and grandchildren all live within thirty minutes of our home. Are not these things (people) enough to make life worth living? If all I had was my family, it would be enough.

I hope Hodges will really rethink the notion that he has nothing to live for without the promise of eternal life. Is not this life enough, to live it fully and without reservation?

I give the following advice to readers on my About page:

You have one life. There is no heaven or hell. There is no afterlife. You have one life, it’s yours, and what you do with it is what matters most. Love and forgive those who matter to you and ignore those who add nothing to your life. Life is too short to spend time trying to make nice with those who will never make nice with you. Determine who are the people in your life that matter and give your time and devotion to them. Live each and every day to its fullest. You never know when death might come calling. Don’t waste time trying to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Find one or two things you like to do and do them well. Too many people spend way too much time doing things they will never be good at.

Here’s the conclusion of the matter. It’s your life and you best get to living it. Someday, sooner than you think, it will be over. Don’t let your dying days be ones of regret over what might have been.

This approach to life has served me well, as it has countless other unwashed, uncircumcised Philistines.

And just imagine if hell is real after all(and I believe it is) then all those who scoffed at that are in real trouble.

Sadly, Hodges ends his email with an appeal to Pascal’s Wager and a reminder that HELL is real. The good news is that as an IFB teenager, I was gloriously, wonderfully saved, so, according to once saved always saved, I am still headed for Heaven when I die. Nothing can separate me from the love of God, right? Hodges could argue that I never was a Christian, but I am confident he can’t provide any evidence to justify such a claim.

As far as Pascal’s Wager is concerned, I wonder if Hodges has applied it to all the other religions of the world. Shouldn’t I also become a Muslim just in case the Muslim version of Hell is true? Shouldn’t I cover all my bases just in case the true God of the universe is Allah or any other deities humans worship are God? Instead, Hodges applies Pascal’s Wager and the threat of eternal damnation only to the tenets of Christianity.

But everybody is going to believe like they want to. Thanks for taking my comments.

My beliefs, for the most part, are based on evidence. I will become a Christian the moment someone provides me with sufficient reasons to believe. I am open to believing in God, but so far the evidence that has been provided to me is lacking or false. Hodges seems to be asking me to believe regardless of what I know to be true. I can’t do that. If there is a God, he knows exactly what it would take for me to come to faith in Christ. Instead, God hides or sends people to evangelize me who seem capable of only spouting Evangelical talking points or cliches. I am more than willing to have honest, open discussions about Christianity, but Bible quotes, sermonettes, or cheap evangelism methods ain’t going to cut it.

Saved by Reason,

Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

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I May Burn in Hell Someday, But Until That Day Comes . . .

Bruce Gerencser December 14, 2022 Religion 23 Comments

I am often contacted by Evangelical zealots who purportedly are concerned over my lack of belief and my indifference towards their threats of judgment and Hell. Bruce, aren’t you worried that you might be wrong? Evangelicals ask. And right after they ask this question, they follow it up with an appeal to Pascal’s Wager (the number one apologetical argument used by defenders of Christianity). Evangelicals use Pascal’s Wager to attack the agnostic aspect of atheism. Since no one can be absolutely certain that God doesn’t exist, it is better to be safe than sorry. Of course, GOD in this equation is the Christian God, their peculiar version of God. Evangelicals have deemed all other Gods false, even though they themselves can’t be certain these Gods do not exist. If Evangelicals were honest with themselves, they would do what they ask of atheists: embrace ALL other Gods just in case one of them might be the one true God. Better to be safe than sorry, right?

As an agnostic atheist, I can’t be certain a deity of some sort doesn’t exist. Of course, I can’t be certain that life on planet earth isn’t some sort of alien experiment or game. Perhaps, life on planet earth is more Westworld-like than we think. How would we know otherwise? Assuming that we are not AIs in a multilevel game, how, then, should rational beings deal with the God question? All any of us can do is look at the extant evidence and decide accordingly. I am confident that the Christian God of the Bible is no God at all. I don’t worry one bit over being wrong. Now, there’s a .000000000000000000001 percent chance that I might be wrong, but do I really want to spend my life chasing after a deity that is infinitesimally unlikely to be real? I think not. Now, if I am asked whether I think a deistic God of some sort exists, that’s a different question. Not one, by the way, that changes how I live my life. The deistic God is the divine creator, a being who set everything into motion and said, there ya go, do with it what you will. This deity wants nothing from us, and is quite indifferent to the plight of the human race. Whether this God exists really doesn’t matter. She is little more than a thought exercise, an attempt to answer the “first cause” question.

Is it possible that I am wrong about the God question, and that after I die I am going to land in Hell? Life is all about probabilities, so yes anything is possible. However, when governing one’s life, our focus should be on what is likely, not on what might be possible. And what is likely is that there is no God, and it is up to us to make the world a better place to live. Evangelicals look to the Eastern Sky, hoping that Jesus soon returns to earth — thus validating their beliefs. This other-worldliness makes Evangelicals indifferent towards things such as suffering, war, and global climate change. Jesus is Coming Soon, Evangelicals say. Fuck everything else! As an atheist, I live in the present, doing what I can to make a better tomorrow. I dare not ignore war and global warming because the future of my children and grandchildren is at stake. I want them to have a better tomorrow, knowing that all of us have only one shot at what we call “life.” It is irresponsible to spend time pining for a mythical God to come and rescue you. First-century Christians believed Jesus was returning to earth in their lifetime. They all died believing that the second coming of Jesus was nigh. And for two thousand years, the followers of Jesus Christ have continued to believe that their Savior will come in their lifetimes to rescue them from pain, suffering, and death. Listen up, Christians. Jesus is dead, and he ain’t coming back.

I may land in Hell someday, but until I do I plan to enjoy life. I plan to love those that matter to me and do what I can make this world a better place to live. I have no time for mythical religions and judgmental deities. I am sure some readers are wondering how I can live this way without knowing for certain that nothing lies beyond the grave. None of us knows everything. Those who say they are certain about this or that or know the absolute “truth” are arrogant fools. What any of us actually “knows” is quite small when compared to the vast expanse of inquiry and knowledge that lies before us. I know more today than I did yesterday, but that only means I learned that McDonald’s has added new menu items and the Cincinnati Bengals are really good this year. Life is winding down for me, so my focus is on family and friends. One day, death will come for us, one and all, and what we will find out on that day is that most of what we thought mattered, didn’t. Perhaps, we should ponder this truth while we are among the living, allowing us to then focus on the few things that really matter. For me personally, God and the afterlife don’t make the list.

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My Response to Evangelical Pastor David Langley — Part Two

Bruce Gerencser September 27, 2022 Evangelicalism 10 Comments

David Langley, an Evangelical pastor in Owosso, Oklahoma, sent me the following email after reading the post titled My Response to Evangelical Pastor David Langley:

Thank you for your speedy reply. Not expected but grateful. A wise man once said; “…electricity is real, but you can’t see it.” This is what you are saying I guess. Albert Einstein stated “I believe in Spinoza’s God “. He did not believe in a personal God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings, a view which he described as naive. He clarified however that, “I am not an atheist”, preferring to call himself an agnostic, or a “religious nonbeliever.”

I replied:

No, what I am saying is this: there is no evidence for the existence of a God, especially the Christian deity. Is it possible that someday a deity of some sort might make itself known to us? Sure. Unlikely, but possible. So that’s why I am an agnostic atheist. Practically speaking, I live my day-to-day life as an atheist. The only time I think about God at all is when writing for this site or doing an interview for other sites or news organizations. Life is too short to spend much time thinking about mythical beings.

Langley then sent me a lengthy response, to which I shall reply below. :

Well then we are both at a conundrum about our communication. You say one thing I say another. That’s fine left as it is you would agree.

All I did is explain my beliefs. What should I have said, instead? In the world I live in, disagreements are common, frequent, and encouraged. Is that not the case for Pastor Langley?

After lengthy reading most of your site, (10 minutes you calculated me).

Based on the server logs, Langley read less than 30 of the 4,588 published posts on this site. This means Langley read .00654307 percent of my posts — definitely not “most of your site.” Nor do the logs suggest he spent a lot of time reading my writing. Granted, he could have multiple IP addresses, but even then, it would take weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks to read “most” of my posts. I will leave it to Langley to explain his words. Perhaps he is “evangelistically speaking” — a method used by preachers to exaggerate church attendance, offerings, salvation decisions numbers.

You are a very prolific writer as seen on your web site. Maybe this web crawler will show a different time that I spent reading.

Yes, I am a prolific writer, much like I was a prolific preacher back in my preaching days (4,000 sermons). This blog is my job. I spend a significant amount of time each week reading Evangelical blogs, websites, and social media accounts. Since this site focuses on three things: my journey from Evangelicalism-to-atheism, critiquing Evangelicalism, and exposing criminal behavior by Evangelical preachers through the Black Collar Crime series, it is important for me to do my homework before writing a post.

I have been blogging for fifteen years. All told, I have written millions of words. I am a writer. This is what I do. The issues I write about matter to me, as they do the thousands of people who read my work. I make no apology for being “prolific.” Because I AM prolific, I am going to call out Evangelicals who say they have read most or all of my writing.

You certainly tore into my small paragraph, taking several paragraphs to break down every statement.

Okay? I am going to do the same with Langley’s latest email to me. What? Doesn’t he want me to respond? Maybe not. Rarely does a week go by when I don’t publicly respond to Evangelicals who email me or message me on social media. Again, doing so is my job. As far as “tearing” into Langley, he really should read more of my writing. I definitely didn’t give him the full “Bruce Gerencser Treatment®.” 🙂

From your side of the fence you did a great job too. You are not the only person that I have come in contact with as I am 68 years old. I have been preaching/pastoring for 35 years.

I assume there are a few words missing in the “you are not the only person that I have come in contact with” sentence. I assume he means “atheist” or “Evangelical-turned-atheist.”

I cannot say that I will continue in our correspondence. Couple reasons. If I were to be out Soul Winning and ran into to you there would be no argument, attack, preaching, etc. as you have stated many have come after you on the web site. Thus you set some rules and guidelines.

By the way our childhood’s are not so far apart. We all have a past. We don’t choose our parents they say. The other reason is that you would do the same thing as we are doing through this communication, and I would respect you and move on. There would be no attack, no preaching, no disrespect at all. So do not look for much more than you have been given. You obviously do not want to take up all your precious time with this type exchange.

I am more than happy to continue interacting with Langley, as I am every person who contacts me. As far as this site having contact and commenting guidelines, I have these things in place because of the nasty, hateful emails, comments, and messages I receive from Evangelicals — especially Independent Fundamentalist Baptists (IFB). Preachers, by the way, are the worst. They alone would be reason enough for me to reject Christianity,

It is just so odd to me when people say that they can know there is no God! Really.

Here’s the thing, I never said this. I made it clear to Langley that I am an agnostic atheist (as most atheists are).

Now, if the question is whether I believe the Bible God exists, I can confidently say “no.” I cannot, however, say with certainty that no deity of any sort exists. Doubtful? Yes. Probable? No. And that’s why I live my day-to-day life as an atheist (as does my wife). God is not part of my life in any way outside of my writing and speaking engagements.

That’s like taking a gamble on your life and everyone you win over to this thinking. I am sure you hae heard it all before; “What if you are wrong?” and the other one goes like; “To live the Christian life is not a bad way to live.”

Sigh. (Please see Why I Use the Word “Sigh”.)Here comes Pascal’s Wager, a terrible apologetic if there ever was one. Besides, Langley, doesn’t practice what he preaches. If he did, he would also be a Muslim, Jew, Mormon, and Hindu. Langley never asks himself, “what if I am wrong”? If he did, he would cover all his bases. Instead, he presupposes Christianity to be true.

As far as the “Christian life” not being a bad way to live, I couldn’t disagree more. As an atheist and a humanist, I am free to love, respect, and befriend everyone — I mean REALLY love and respect them — including LGBTQ people. Evangelicals are known for what? “Othering” people; neatly putting people into two categories: saved-lost, saint-sinner, Heaven-Hell, in-out. I prefer a world where freedom and choice are paramount; where the humanistic ideal reigns supreme.

As an unwashed, uncircumcised Philistine, my life is better in every way post-Jesus. Why in the world would I ever want to return to the garlic and leeks of Egypt? Since there is no Hell (or Heaven) I can’t think of one good reason to get up on Sunday and go to church. Besides, I already go to church, three services of the week: Church of the NFL.

So far I have seen the Bible proven wrong. In fact there seems to be many Historians that has proven much of it. Along with many great Scientists, whether they were believers or not there is proof from both sides in that field.

I will make Langley the same offer I have made to other people who tell me “the Bible has never been proven wrong.” The inerrancy and infallibility of the Protestant Christian Bible cannot be rationally, historically, or scientifically sustained. Langley has spent most of his sixty-eight years of life in the Evangelical bubble. His understanding of the Bible has been shaped and molded within the safe confines of the bubble. (Please see The Danger of Being in a Box and Why it Makes Sense When You Are In It and What I Found When I Left the Box.)

If Langley happens to read this post, I would like to offer him a free copy of one of Dr. Bart Ehrman’s books on the history and nature of the Bible. Ehrman is a New Testament scholar at the University of North Carolina. I will gladly buy the book for Langley and have it shipped to his home in Oklahoma. I have made this offer numerous times over the years. Not one Evangelical preacher has accepted my offer. Some Evangelicals have read Ehrman’s books after I recommended them. Some of them later deconverted. (Jim Elliff says, Avoid Bart Ehrman, He Could Cause You To Lose Your Faith!)

So with that said I will wait for your response and not sure if it will warrant mine. You have said in this second answer already something that makes me believe that you do not know for sure about something.

Quote: “Is it possible that some day a deity of some sort might make itself known to us? Sure. Unlikely, but possible.”

I lack certainty on most things in life. I have confidence based on knowledge, probabilities, and lived experiences, but “certainty”? That is the realm of Evangelicals who are certain about all sorts of things, even though knowledge, probabilities, and lived experiences suggest they shouldn’t be.

As far as God and the central claims of Christianity are concerned, I am confident that my beliefs are correct. Langley hasn’t said anything that would cause me to change my mind or doubt my present beliefs. I have interacted with thousands of Evangelicals over the years. It’s been years since I have heard a novel argument, proving that Solomon was right when he said “there’s nothing new under the sun.”

You will have to read your email to me to understand. Of course you were correcting me so it may appear that you do not want to learn from anyone but Teach what you either believe, feel, or just aren’t sure of so you reject it.

I am always open to learning new things. However, Christianity is founded on the Bible. I spent thousands and thousands of hours reading and studying the Bible. It’s not a magical book, as Evangelicals claim, providing new information every time you read it. I have done my homework. Do I know “everything”? Of course not. But, I am confident that I understand the Bible, complete with its errors and contradictions. Langley is free to enlighten me, but I suspect, as readers shall see below, that he has no new light to offer.

Moral lives do not make an Eternity difference they just make a Moral life. When life ends then the question and subject you and have had will be up to you, but BEFORE DEATH you cannot do anything AFTER DEATH, which you are stating yourself. I say there are two, Hell or Heaven. To go to Hell do nothing. To go to Heaven one must Trust in the Lord Jesus Christ by Confessing our Sin asking God to Forgive us and believing that Jesus alone saved us by His death on the cross, his shed blood.

Ah, here comes the sermon, the soulwinning appeal. Does Langley think I have never heard these things before? Or did he feel led by the Holy Spirit to say them? Or, perhaps his words are for the lurkers and doubters who read my writing?

Besides, Langley is a Baptist. Once saved, always saved, right? If that’s the case, I am still a born-again Christian, and when I die, I will go to Heaven. Or, will Langley say I never was a “real Christian”? I will have to wait to see how he responds.

I certainly understand all of what you said about Christian, Church People Hurt the worst in those 35 years. Been there too sir.

Langley actually knows very little about my life. His comment reveals that he has read very little of my autobiographical material. Had he done his homework, he would have learned that “hurt” played almost no part in my deconversion. I have chosen not a be Christian because I weighed the central claims of Christianity in the balance and found them wanting. (Please see The Michael Mock Rule: It Just Doesn’t Make Sense.)

I just have to say “forgive me” Jesus suffered more than anyone at the hands of the human race and he was a human at the time, proven by Historians you well know, He was real just you and I have two points of view on these things it seems.

Yes, Jesus was real, but he was also, according to the Bible, God. We have no idea what he actually felt or experienced. After all, God was able to impregnate a Jewish teenager, so it is possible that Jesus’s death was for show. Regardless, Jesus suffered for all of six or so hours. He most certainly did not “suffer more than anyone.” I have battled chronic illness and unrelenting pain for years. I know suffering. I would gladly trade Jesus’s suffering for mine if it meant I would not suffer afterward. I know scores of people who would do the same.

All Langley and I can say is that Jesus was a Jewish man who lived, died, and is buried in an unknown grave somewhere in Palestine. Just because the Bible says something doesn’t mean it is true. The extant evidence suggests that Jesus was some sort of itinerate preacher who attracted, at most, a couple of hundred followers before he died. There’s no evidence, outside of the Bible, for the resurrection of Jesus or the miracles attributed to him. You would think Jesus would have made the front page of the Jerusalem Press a time or two, but he didn’t. Surely first-century historians would have been raving about his mighty works, yet they said almost nothing. Maybe, just maybe, the claims Christians make for Jesus are false.

Thank you again for the communication.

David Langley

Sinner saved by Grace of God

Unworthy but Grace was given

And as you have stated, trying to live a moral life, love family, love wife of 49 years

Praying that your health improves.

I will skip responding to Langley’s benediction. I do want to address his last sentence: “praying that your health improves.” Had Langley read my autobiographical material, he would have known that my health will not be improving; that I am slowly dying; that I have three kinds of days: less bad, bad, and really, really, really bad. I am sure Langley meant well, but offering up empty platitudes to people with incurable diseases is not helpful. Even more so when they are unbelievers.

I state on my contact page:

If you are an Evangelical Christian, please read Dear Evangelical before sending me an email. If you have a pathological need to evangelize, spread the love of Jesus, or put a good word in for the man, the myth, the legend named Jesus, please don’t. The same goes for telling me your church/pastor/Jesus is awesome. I am also not interested in reading sermonettes, testimonials, Bible verses, or your deconstruction/psychological evaluation of my life. By all means, if you feel the need to set me straight, start your own blog.

Two words: please don’t.

A Sinner Saved by Reason,

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Evangelical-Turned-Atheist Bruce Gerencser Responds to a God-Fearing, Bible-Believing Christian From Michigan

Bruce Gerencser September 1, 2022 Evangelicalism 12 Comments

Earlier today, an Evangelical Christian named Richard left the following comment on the post titled Is it Possible to Reform the IFB Church Movement? Richard’s words are emboldened. All spelling and grammar are in the original.

Bruce, as a God fearing bible believing Christian in Michigan in the same areas you left… I want to thank you for your honesty and for being instructional to me.

Richard wants me and the readers of this blog to know that he is a God-fearing, Bible-believing Christian who lives near Pontiac, Michigan. Based on the buzz words he used, I think it is safe for me to conclude that he is a Fundamentalist.

You are an unabashed Apostate that has embraced his decision. I had left the Church and on was on the path of becoming an apostate myself when God intervened. One thing that always bothered me since then is WHY I was on the path of becoming an Apostate, and also how someone as yourself could become an apostate. You were an Enigma that contradicted my IFB upbringings of “Once Saved always saved”. It was the Bible and God’s word that showed me my error (or incomplete understanding)… 1John 2:19. and also Tares and Wheat describes your condition.

Richard recognizes that I am an unabashed apostate. Of course, I wear many other labels: agnostic atheist, humanist, socialist, pacifist, liberal, progressive, and circumcised Gentile. Richard, however, wants to focus on my apostasy; my denial of central claims of Christianity.

At one time, Richard considered people such as myself to be enigmas, people who didn’t fit in his narrow, defined theological box. However, God has since shown him the light, and now he’s arrived on this blog to set me straight.

Richard believes that I John 2:19 describes my life:

They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.

The Message puts it this way:

They left us, but they were never really with us. If they had been, they would have stuck it out with us, loyal to the end. In leaving, they showed their true colors, showed they never did belong.

Wow, no Christian has never, never told me this before! OMG, I never was a Christian. Sigh. (Please see Why I Use the Word “Sigh.”) I have no idea how much of my writing Richard has read, but whatever he has read, he has concluded from it that I was never a Christian. Nothing in my story suggests that Richard is right, but why let facts get in the way of a strawman?

Your are (now) no more a mystery to me than is Judas who worked Directly with Jesus. If Judas could be an apostate, certainly someone as yourself who was fed a tainted perspective of Christianity from a dysfunctional family and controlling hypocritical “religious” leaders is possible! But both cases are the same… “They were never with us”.

Notice how Richard frames my life: I was fed a “tainted perspective of Christianity from a dysfunctional family and controlling, hypocritical religious leaders.” Richard provides no evidence for his claims. Using a nit comb, he found a few lice in my story and concluded that I am no different from Judas who betrayed Jesus. Instead of taking the time to comprehensively read my writing and interact with me personally, Richard has judged my life and found it wanting. Nothing I can say at this point will change his mind, so I won’t try, except to say, Richard, go fuck yourself.

You don’t offend me, you only prove God’s word to me to be true. You offer comfort to fellow apostates, but you also offer validation of God’s word to true believers, even if that is not your intent.

I am glad I can be of help. You also provide validation to me and the readers of this blog; that you are a judgmental asshole.

You might not know this, Richard, but many of my readers are Christians. Not your brand of Christian, but Christians nonetheless. I suppose you will consign them to the Lake of Fire too.

Bruce, consider this… If I am wrong and self deluded and you are right, I suffer no damage after I die. If I am self deceived, I still count the Peace I attribute to Jesus and Gods Grace as doing far more good in my life than what I was without it and pass onto oblivion in ignorant bliss. But If the Bible is right, if God is real, it is not the same for you. You will hear those terrible words.. “depart from me, I never knew. you” as you pass on into eternity in outer darkness where the only question left is, will you be a wailer or a gnasher…

Richard attempts to use Pascal’s Wager and miserably fails. Evidently, he wants me to pretend to be a Christian; to fake it until I make it. Richard provides no evidence for his claims, yet he just expects me to believe. Fine, I believe. Praise Jesus, I’m headed for Heaven when I die. Boy, that was easy.

Richard presupposes that his peculiar brand of Christianity is true; that it will be his God that will be on the throne of Heaven when he arrives someday. What if he is wrong? What if he gets to Heaven and finds Allah on the throne or Buddha? Better yet, what if he arrives in Heaven and finds out that atheism was the one true religion; believing in Jesus sends a person straight to Hell (also called Mar-a-Lago)?

As is common with Fundamentalists, Richard lacks curiosity. (Please see Curiosity, A Missing Evangelical Trait.) He fails to consider his own atheism or the fact that his being wrong could have real-world consequences. Richard thinks that living according to his interpretations of the Bible is preferable, even if God doesn’t exist. This is patently untrue. The Bible is inherently anti-human. Richard Dawkins was right when he described the Old Testament God this way:

The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.

This is the God Richard wants me to worship.

The New Testament God is no better. One need only ponder God offering his son as a blood sacrifice for the behavior of others and the violence he will rain down upon the earth as recorded in the book of Revelation to see that this God is unworthy of worship too.

Richard, if you are reading this, you worship an evil God. Even if he was real, and he’s not, I wouldn’t worship him.

That brings me no Joy I don’t want that for you. I believe you were made in God’s image and loved by God so much that he Died for you before you denied him. I don’t want you to end up separated from God for eternity, but it’s not up to me. You can equally find both high profile apologetics that have made arguments defending the bible and also die hard Apostates breaking apart the bible to fit their narrative… But God is the ultimate author of our (your) faith.

And I know every argument. There’s nothing new under the sun, and that includes apologetical arguments. If Richard has read my writing, he knows that I reject the central claims of Christianity. I have weighed them in the balance and found them wanting. If zealots such as Richard want to win me back to Jesus, they are going to have to come up with better evidence and arguments. Until then, I cannot and will not believe. (Please see The Michael Mock Rule: It Just Doesn’t Make Sense.)

Richard says that God is the author of faith; that if I ever receive saving faith, it will come from God. Fine. Why, then, did Richard bother to comment on this site? Why did he bother to judge my life? Surely, God knows where I live. He knows my email address and cellphone number. God can give me faith any time he wants. It’s up to him, so I’m waiting. I won’t, however, hold my breath.

Bruce, I love you and I don’t want you to die in your sin.

No, you don’t love me. You don’t even know me. Stop with the syrupy, cheap Evangelical “love.” My love is reserved for my wife, my children, their spouses, my grandchildren, my friends, and the Cincinnati Reds and Cincinnati Bengals. I love good food, traveling, and writing. I even love many of the people who frequent this blog, including my editor. But you, Richard? I don’t know you. I know nothing about you. You may be a lovable person, but based on your comment above, you are not someone I am interested in loving. Instead, I pity you. You live in a closed-off world, a world walled off from all the wonderful atheists, humanists, pagans, Buddhists, Muslims, Unitarians, liberal Christians, and LGBTQ people, to name a few, in the world. All you see is up or down, in or out, saved or lost, Heaven or Hell. My world is much broader than that; a wild, woolly, wonderful — and yes, dangerous — world.

Let me give you a piece of advice, Richard; advice I have given to thousands and thousands of people over the years:

You have one life. There is no heaven or hell. There is no afterlife. You have one life, it’s yours, and what you do with it is what matters most. Love and forgive those who matter to you and ignore those who add nothing to your life. Life is too short to spend time trying to make nice with those who will never make nice with you. Determine who are the people in your life that matter and give your time and devotion to them. Live each and every day to its fullest. You never know when death might come calling. Don’t waste time trying to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Find one or two things you like to do and do them well. Too many people spend way too much time doing things they will never be good at.
Here’s the conclusion of the matter. It’s your life and you best get to living it. Someday, sooner than you think, it will be over. Don’t let your dying days be ones of regret over what might have been.

Be well, Richard.

Saved by Reason,

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According to Evangelical Pastor Dax Hughes, Life Without Jesus is Disastrous

Bruce Gerencser April 11, 2022 Religion 35 Comments

A common trait of Evangelicals is their insistence that life without Jesus is miserable, meaningless, empty, and void of happiness. Now, thanks to Dax Hughes, current or former pastor of Heartland Worship Center — a Southern Baptist congregation — in Paducah, Kentucky, we have a new word to add to the list: disastrous. Hughes writes:

Life without Christ is disastrous. Check your soul and you will see it is true. We all know this deep down that there is something more for us beyond ourselves and his world.

Hughes asks readers to check their souls. Fine, where is my soul? How can I access it? Is my soul like the check engine light on my car, where, when something is wrong with my automobile, the electronic control module (ECM) trips a code and causes the orange CHECK ENGINE light to appear? If the answer is yes, where is my CHECK SOUL light? Maybe the reason I can’t see it is because my soul is black like my heart.

There is no evidence for the claim that humans have a soul. Evangelicals insist that everyone has some sort of ethereal eternal soul that leaves our body when we die, only to be reunited with our body when our bodies are resurrected so we can stand before God and be judged. According to Hughes, everyone KNOWS deep down — wherever the heaven deep down is — that is there is more for us than the here and now. Sorry Dax, I don’t know any such thing. All I “know” is that life is short and then we die. I have plenty of evidence for this claim of mine. What does Hughes offer up for his claim? Assertion. That’s what Evangelicals do — they assert without proof that their beliefs are infallibly true. Filled with self-righteous certainty, zealots such as Hughes cannot imagine any other truth claim but their own. I know, based on what I can see with my eyes and understand through observation, that humans are born, live, and die. End of story. There is no evidence for the claim that life continues in some other form after death. No one, not even Jesus, has come back from the dead. After thousands of years of people living and dying, it is safe for us to conclude that when people die they stay dead. It is for this reason that I give the following advice on my ABOUT page:

You have one life. There is no heaven or hell. There is no afterlife. You have one life, it’s yours, and what you do with it is what matters most. Love and forgive those who matter to you and ignore those who add nothing to your life. Life is too short to spend time trying to make nice with those who will never make nice with you. Determine who are the people in your life that matter and give your time and devotion to them. Live each and every day to its fullest. You never know when death might come calling. Don’t waste time trying to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Find one or two things you like to do and do them well. Too many people spend way too much time doing things they will never be good at.
Here’s the conclusion of the matter. It’s your life and you’ best get to living it. Someday, sooner than you think, it will be over. Don’t let your dying days be ones of regret over what might have been.

Hughes goes on to list his top ten reasons life without Jesus is a disaster. My response in indented and italicized.

You need to be perfect to meet God’s standard and you can’t even get close by your own efforts.

There is no God so we need not worry about meeting “God’s standard” — Greek for Hughes’s personal interpretation of the Christian Bible. Humans are infallibly flawed. The best any of us can do is to love others and treat people with kindness, decency, and respect. When we behave badly, we need not seek out a mythical God’s forgiveness. Instead, we should seek out the forgiveness of those we have offended. God and religion are middlemen that complicate relationships.

You waste your whole life pursuing stuff and people that never brings you real joy and peace.

Remember, Hughes thinks life is disastrous without Jesus. Would he listen if I told him that atheists and other non-Christians have joy and peace, along with meaning and purpose? Probably not. Evangelicals are walled off from any worldview but their own. For Evangelicals, life begins and ends with Jesus, the Bible, and faith. Think for a moment about how much of life Evangelicals miss when they narrow their living down to only Jesus matters. Think of all the stuff and people they miss out on because they are busy brown-nosing Jesus. It is Evangelicals who have shallow lives, lives un-lived because of what this or that Bible verse says. In what other realm of life do we think it is okay for a bronze-age religious text to dictate the terms of life? The world would be much better off if the Bible was put on the shelf with other ancient, outdated, irrelevant books. At the very least, Christians should update the Bible so that it is applicable to the 21st century. Evangelicals need to stop trying to convince themselves that the Bible is a timeless book filled with unsearchable riches. I know that this claim is not true because I, unlike many Christians, actually took the time to read and reread the Bible numerous times. I don’t need to read it again to know what it says.

You are trying to find purpose in life without ever connecting with the only one who can give you real purpose. (It is like playing chess without the king on the board.)

*Sigh.* Hughes cannot imagine any other way of looking at the world but his own. If he could, he would notice that the majority of the human race finds meaning and purpose in life without “connecting” with the Christian God. I have no problem with people such as Hughes “connecting” with their God, but it is offensive for them to suggest that the lives of others have no purpose without becoming followers of Jesus and Hughes’ flavor of Christianity. Billions of people are a living testimony to the fact that what Hughes says here is not true. It might be true for him, but most people have no need for Jesus or Christianity. Life is good without God.

Being religious in order to clean up is about as beneficial as putting perfume and nice clothes on a corpse and calling it full of life.

Hughes is attempting to advance the claim that what true Christians have is a relationship not a religion. I hate to break it to Hughes, but Christianity is a religion made up of thousands of sects. Suggesting that Christianity is not a religion is as absurd as playing chess without a king (see Hughes’ illustration above).

Your enemy is stronger than you and can beat you down every time without divine intervention.

Who is this enemy Hughes speaks of? Satan? Carbohydrates? I assume Hughes is speaking of the Devil, another mythical being in Christianity’s panoply of myths. As with the existence of God, there is no evidence for the existence of the Devil. Saying THE BIBLE SAYS is not evidence. If Hughes has evidence for the existence of Lucifer, by all means he should share it. The existence of evil is not proof of Satan’s existence. All its existence proves is that humans are capable of doing bad things — no devil needed.

You were made to bring glory to God and you are trying to give it to someone or something else and it’s making you miserable inside.

I was made through my father and mother having intercourse. An egg united with a sperm and nine months later Bruce was born. If anyone deserves credit for my existence, they do. Mom and Dad are dead, so I can’t thank them for bringing me into this world, but I can spend the rest of life giving credit to whom credit is due. As a humanist, I believe that I should praise, compliment, and thank people who do well. When a server at a restaurant takes care of our dining needs, should we dial up the restaurant’s corporate office and thank them for the great service? Of course not. It is the cook who made our food and the server who brought it to our table who deserve credit for the quality of our dining experience.
Hughes wrongly thinks that non-Christians spend their lives being unhappy and miserable. Perhaps Hughes should spend some time talking with atheists, agnostics, and other non-Christians. I think he will find that we are, for the most part, a happy lot. Yes, chronic pain and illness make my body feel miserable, but I choose to embrace and enjoy life despite my pain.

You place all your emphasis on living it up for the 70 years or so on earth and give no emphasis or preparation for the eternity you will have left after this life.

Hughes is correct on this point. I plan on living it up until I die, knowing that this is the only opportunity I will have to do so. If not today, when? I feel sad for Evangelicals who choose to refuse themselves the pleasures of this world in the hope that they will get some sort a divine payoff after they die and enter God’s Trump Tower — Heaven Location®. Of course, dead Evangelicals will not know what they have missed out on. They will, like all of us, die, and that will be the end of the matter. They will have no chance to reflect on an un-lived life. Henry David Thoreau was right when he said, “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” I fear that many Christians will come to the end of life only to find, as Thoreau says, that they have not lived.

You are blind, unaware, ignorant, and deceived and you think you can figure out your meaning on this earth on your own.

To this point, all I can say is that the grand project of humanity is to find meaning and purpose. We need no God or religion to guide us. All that is necessary is that we open our eyes wide and walk forward, embracing the tests and challenges that come our way. If we live long enough, we will most likely learn something about ourselves, others, and this planet we share. My grandchildren marvel over Grandpa knowing so much stuff. Well, I have been walking the path now for almost sixty-five years. I would hope, by now, that I have learned a thing or three. There is much that I do not know, and I will likely run out of life before I figure out the ways of women, but I can humbly say that through hard work and diligence and hell of a lot of reading, I know a bit about this life.
I find it offensive that Hughes suggests that I and my fellow heathens are blind, unaware, ignorant and deceived, all because we reject his anti-human religious beliefs (and we reject Christianity because we have weighed it in the balance and found it wanting).

You will face a terrible judgment by the most powerful judge of all time who has overwhelming proof against you and can give the most devastating punishment and you are willing to take a chance that it will all go in your favor without any real reason to believe so except that you want it to be ok.

Hughes attempts to uses the well-worn trope Pascal’s Wager. Memo to Dax: Never, ever use Pascal’s Wager. It is a lame, dumb, stupid, ignorant, silly, and asinine argument. How can anyone know that Hughes’ deity is the right one? To be safe, shouldn’t we embrace all the religions of the world? Shouldn’t Hughes become a Buddhist, Muslim, and a Catholic just in case the one true God is NOT the Evangelical God? Better safe than sorry, right?

You think you are pretty good compared to most of the world when your wickedness just looks different than yours [sic].

I have no idea what Hughes is saying here. Do I think I am better than some people? Absolutely. Do I think I am better than everyone? Of course not. Believing so would be arrogant, especially since I know quite a few wonderful people — starting with my wife, children, grandchildren, and many of the people I have met through this blog, to name a few. The world is filled is with godless people who just so happen to be kind, loving, and compassionate. Their wonderfulness needs no deity or divine instruction. I would argue that Evangelical belief often makes Christians unkind and unloving, lacking compassion for anyone who is not like them. One need only look at the culture wars and the recent presidential election to see that many Evangelicals are mean, nasty, arrogant, self-righteous, hateful, and vile. What religious group is at the forefront of the war against LGBTQ people and same-sex marriage? What religious group is behind the anti-immigrant hatred that currently permeates our culture? Everywhere I look, I see a religion that is all about power, wealth, and control. If Evangelicalism is all about Jesus, Evangelicals might want to figure out where they left him. Evangelical behavior suggests that Evangelicals practice a do as I say, not as I do religion. As long as Evangelicals continue to wage war on those the Bible calls “the least of these,” it has nothing to offer the American people.

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For the Thousandth Time: Bruce, What if You Are Wrong?

Bruce Gerencser February 11, 2022 Religion 49 Comments

Recently, a commenter asked me three questions (slightly edited for grammar):

What if you die and find out you were wrong?
What if you find that Jesus (the true Jesus of course, not the religious/perverted Jesus) is the true God and you simply refused to accept his offer of eternal life?
What will you do?

For the seemingly thousandth time, let me answer these questions.

What if you die and find out you were wrong?

Well, this is most certainly a possibility. I am not infallible, nor do possess all the knowledge that can be known. As I continue to read, study, and understand, I add to my cumulative knowledge. Unfortunately, advanced age and cognitive loss fights against me increasing my knowledge. I do what I can to better my understanding of all that it means to be human. The questioner, of course, is only concerned about me being wrong about her version of Christianity.

As an atheist, I believe life ends the moment my heart stops beating and my brain ceases to function. That’s it, end of story. As such, there is no right-beliefs test after death, no did I believe in the true Jesus, not the religious, perverted Jesus? All I can do while I am among the living is attempt to intellectually, rationally, and honestly understand the world in which I live. For example, I know that most people are to some degree or another religious. Having spent fifty years in the Christian church, twenty-five years in the pastorate, and eight years studying why people are religious, I have come to several reasoned conclusions.

First, all religious belief can be explained from a sociological perspective. Find out where a person was born, who their parents and grandparents are, and what culture they are a part of, and you can determine, for the most part, which religious cult they embrace as the one true faith.

Second, the central tenets of Christianity are irrational. As Michael Mock often says, Christianity doesn’t make sense. Having spent thousands of hours reading and studying the Bible, theology, and church history, I can confidently say that Christianity (in all its forms) is false. Simply put, Jesus died, end of story. Without a miraculous birth, atoning death, and resurrection of Jesus, the God-man from the dead, Christianity is little more than a social club. I see no evidence for Christianity being the one true faith.

I can then confidently say that Christianity is false. Thus, I have no fears or concerns about being wrong about Christianity. The same goes for all the other extant religions humans have concocted throughout the annals of history. Could I be wrong? Sure. I try to live my life according to probabilities. It is probable that I will die within the next twenty years. I have carefully examined the available evidence and concluded that sooner, and not later, death is coming my way. I can confidently say that I will likely be dead before 2036. When it comes to Christianity, after carefully looking at the extant evidence, I have concluded that there is a .000001 percent chance that the Christian God exists and that Christianity is the one true religion.

I suppose this commenter could say, but Bruce, are you willing to risk an eternity in hell, even if the probability is .000001? Yes, I am. The greater question is why Christians do the same. I suspect this commenter believes all religions but hers are false. How can she possibly know this? Has she studied these religions? Shouldn’t she play it safe and embrace ALL religions? Better to cover one’s bases than end up in hell because you failed to choose the one true religion, right? Christians are hypocrites, demanding of me what they are unwilling to do themselves. Why is it that Christians continue to use Pascal’s Wager to evangelize me, when they are not willing, for safety’s sake, to embrace Islam, Jainism, Judaism, Hinduism, or any of the other countless human religions?

What if you find that Jesus (the true Jesus of course not the religious/perverted Jesus) is the true God and you simply refused to accept his offer of eternal life?

The previous answer adequately addresses this question. I am certainly willing to believe IF Christians can convincingly show me that their religious claims are true. Quoting the Bible, giving subjective personal testimonies, or making appeals to nature are not proof. Each one of these evidences can be satisfactorily overturned and rejected. Ultimately, Christianity rests on a foundation of faith, not evidence (Hebrews 11). Christians believe because they want or need to do so. By faith, they believe. And that’s fine — for them. However, I don’t have the requisite faith necessary to believe. I am unwilling to surrender my life to a fictitious God who wrote a supposedly divine book that is actually an offense to modern thinking. Filled with discrepancies, mistakes, and errors, the Bible teaches that there are multiple Gods and ways of salvation. Thousands of religious sects appeal to the Bible as THE source of their beliefs. How is possible that each sect’s beliefs differ from that of others? The Bible says that there is one Lord, one faith, one baptism — one Christianity — yet there are, if truth be told, millions of Christianities, with each believer shaping a God and Jesus in his or her own image.

If the commenter’s God is the one true God and the Bible is said God’s divine message to humanity, why did he write such a confusing, contradictory message? I’ve spent eight years poking holes in the Evangelical Christian narrative, coming to the conclusion that all the Christian sects are right. The Campbellites and Baptists are right. The Calvinists and the Arminians are right. The Catholics and the Lutherans are right. Every sect appeals to the Bible as the foundation of their faith. All of them can PROVE they are right, so I just agree with them. The Bible can be used as proof for almost any and every belief. Again, if God wanted his soul-saving message to be clear, he should have written it in such a way that no one could possibly doubt his words. That the Bible is a hodge-podge of nonsense is convincing evidence for Christianity’s sacred text being a human, not divine text.

What will you do?

Just for fun, let’s assume that I am dead wrong about this commenter’s God, and that when I awake in eternity I find myself standing before the Big Kahuna. What would I say?

Shit, I got that one wrong.
Hey God, why did you write such a contradictory and confusing book? Bad day? Too much to drink?
Hey God, did you see all the good works I did? Surely, my good works outweigh my bad works. After all, I was a Jesus Club® member for 50 years. The way I see it, Lord, is that I spent five-sevenths of my life doing good and believing all the right things. And even now, as an atheist, I do a lot of good works. My good works should at least be enough to get me a log cabin on the outskirts of Heaven. Surely Lord, you value good works far more than right beliefs.

I have no worries about what I will do because worrying about fictional things is a waste of time. This would be like me worrying that Daenerys Targaryen (Game of Thrones) might send her dragons to turn me into a roasted wiener. Not going to happen. Life is short. I choose to worry about things that matter, things rooted in reality. I have no interest in wasting my time wondering about whether I am saved or lost or whether my beliefs will land me a room at Trump’s Heavenly Hotel®.

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Bruce, I Want You to Know That I Care, And Jesus Cares MORE!

Bruce Gerencser April 14, 2021 Evangelicalism 15 Comments

Offering plates full of snark and cursing ahead! You have been warned. Not that this warning matters. You are going to read this post anyway, aren’t you? All praise to the one true God, Loki, for your faithful support. May you receive many rewards in Hell.

Today, I received the following comment from an Evangelical man named Terry. My response is indented and italicized.

Bruuuuuce! Dont leave the faaaaaaith! 🙂

Really? Shouldn’t matters of faith and eternal destiny be grave and serious? It hardly seems appropriate to use a smiley face when warning me that I am on the wrong path, and if I continue on this path, I will one day eternally pay for my sins.

God is so much bigger than all of this!!

Which God? And what evidence do you have for the claim that God is bigger than all of “this?” This being, I assume, the internecine wars Christians endlessly fight over who has the right beliefs. The Bible teaches that Christians will be known by their love and unity. How is that working out? Hint . . . not well, as the Facebook group you mention below makes clear.

Don’t let the calvinists win!

Win what, exactly? I took a look at the search logs for this site and found out you read all of one post, Calvinists and Their Love of Theological Porn. You made no effort to read anything else. Had you done so, you would have learned that I was in the Christian church for fifty years; that I was an Evangelical pastor for twenty-five years; that I spent thousands and thousands of hours reading and studying the Bible; that I had a library of over one-thousand theological and biographical books; that I wasn’t a Calvinist when I entered the ministry, and I wasn’t a Calvinist when I left the ministry. Had you bothered to read a bit of my biographical writing, you would have found out that I preached a works-based social gospel towards the end of my time in the ministry. Instead, you sent me a masturbatory email. I am sure doing so made you feel good (as jacking off does), but what, exactly, did it accomplish (no new birth for me)?

And even if NO ONE KNOWS FOR SURE (not u, not me, not Hawking, not Piper, not anyone), i think it would be a good idea to try and have a relationship with FATHER GOD.

I am an atheist, so I don’t believe your Father God exists. I am CERTAIN of this fact. (I am also an agnostic, but I will leave that discussion for another day. You do know the difference, right?) You provide no evidence to the contrary, yet you expect me to bow in fealty to your Daddy all because you said it’s a good idea. Not a chance, dude. Just because your invisible Father abused you doesn’t mean I should let him do the same to me.

THE PERFECT FATHER.

Surely you jest. Terry, take a look around at the world. What do you see? The works of a PERFECT FATHER? I see no evidence for the existence of your Father. And if he does exist, it is clear that your Daddy is a deadbeat, abusive parent. My Gawd, man, open your fucking eyes.

And join with others who are really trying to love God (a god who SEEMS often clueless and downright horrible) and love people. …. There is SO MUCH we do not know.

Had you bothered to read more than one post, you might have learned that I have no interest in God, Jesus, or Christianity. Been there, done that. Now that you know my background, what could you possibly say that I have not heard before? I spent most of my life devotedly following the Lamb of God. I sacrificed everything in pursuit of the kingdom of God. Can you say that you have done the same? If you really want to have a Christian dick measuring contest, I am confident that I would win. I can’t think of one thing you could say that would lead me to drop on my knees, repent of my sins, and say to Jesus, “I am yours, Big Boy!”

There has to be more to all of this than what we see….. There has to be!

Why does there have to be more than what we see? Do you have any evidence that suggests otherwise, outside of the words written in an ancient religious text? Based on the extant evidence, our lives are but a blip on the timeline of existence.
I give the following advice on my ABOUT page:
You have one life. There is no heaven or hell. There is no afterlife. You have one life, it’s yours, and what you do with it is what matters most. Love and forgive those who matter to you and ignore those who add nothing to your life. Life is too short to spend time trying to make nice with those who will never make nice with you. Determine who are the people in your life that matter and give your time and devotion to them. Live each and every day to its fullest. You never know when death might come calling. Don’t waste time trying to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Find one or two things you like to do and do them well. Too many people spend way too much time doing things they will never be good at.
Here’s the conclusion of the matter. It’s your life and you best get to living it. Someday, sooner than you think, it will be over. Don’t let your dying days be ones of regret over what might have been.

(And if there’s not, what harm has been done believing that God loves EVERYONE and has a plan??) What if universalism is true? Or conditional immortality? What if evolution is true and that’s just the way God decided to do it?

This is the second time in your comment that you have appealed to what is commonly called Pascal’s Wager.
Wikipedia explains Pascal’s Wager this way:
“Pascal’s wager is an argument in philosophy presented by the seventeenth-century French philosopher, theologian, mathematician, and physicist, Blaise Pascal (1623–1662). It posits that human beings bet with their lives that God either exists or does not.
Pascal argues that a rational person should live as though (the Christian) God exists and seek to believe in God. If God does not actually exist, such a person will have only a finite loss (some pleasures, luxury, etc.), whereas if God does exist, he stands to receive infinite gains (as represented by eternity in Heaven) and avoid infinite losses (eternity in Hell).”
Let me ask you a question. Are you a Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Jew, and Mormon? Surely, you would want to hedge your bets and put your faith in these Gods, and in fact, every other deity. Shouldn’t you cover all your bases? Of course, you haven’t done this. You have found the “right” God, your peculiar version of the Christian deity. You want me to do what you are unwilling to do. This is the definition of the word hypocrite.
Further, you want me to “fake it until I make it.” You want me to deny reality to myself and others. You want me to ignore what I KNOW about your God and worship it anyway. Not going to happen, Terry. I have more character and integrity than that. Either your God exists, or it doesn’t. I am convinced that it doesn’t. Surely, that fact can’t be too hard to understand.

Life is CRAZY. The idea that we are alive on this planet, living our lives, making amazing decisions every day. SOOOOOOOO unlike animals. Sure, we share some of the characteristics as animals, but we are different mentally. So different!!!

How do you know we even have free will — the ability to make “amazing” decisions? Sure, we have higher cognitive skills than other animals. However, we eat, drink, have sex, shit, and sleep, just like all other living creatures. One need only look at how we are destroying our planet to conclude that maybe, just maybe, having bigger brains is not such a good idea.

The bible says (i know, i know) that we are made in the image of God. I think there’s something to that.

Good for you. Why should I base my life on what you think or believe about a contradictory ancient religious text? There are thousands of Christian sects, each with their own interpretations of the Bible, each believing that they have the “faith once delivered to the saints.”
Have you ever read any of Dr. Bart Ehrman’s books about the history and nature of the Bible? Something tells me you haven’t. Bart is a professor of New Testament studies at the University of North Carolina. I encourage you to read several of his books. After you do, get back to me, and we can talk about the Bible. I want to be kind, but you really are out of your element here. So, please read Ehrman’s books, and then we’ll talk.

And i believe in John 3:16. And that perish means perish, not burn forever.

*Sigh* (This is a code word for a certain emotion. Only followers of Satan know what it means.) I know the Bible (and Christian theology) inside and out. But, I’m sure glad that you stopped by to straighten me out. Damn, Skippy, I was wrong for fifty years, but bless Loki, thanks to you, I have seen the light! (That’s sarcasm, by the way.)

You might want to join Soteriology101 on facebook (people more intelligent than I, railing back against calvinism). We don’t have many atheists, but I’m pretty sure there are some. It might give you a different perspective, just to sit back and see what people are saying. (And of course there are some who are callous or judgmental, but also universalists and ones who believe in conditional immortality).

I am not on social media. That said, I did check out the Soteriology 101 Facebook group. Again, you insult my intelligence, ignoring the decades I spent reading and studying the Bible. What possibly am I going to learn about the various soteriological schemes from a fucking Facebook group — one dominated by Fundamentalist Christians? I know every system inside and out. Sorry, Terry, but you really should have investigated my background before sending me this email.
Let me be clear, I don’t believe the Bible is the inspired, inerrant, infallible Word of God. The Bible is an errant, fallible, contradictory book written by mostly unknown men. I reject its claims about God, human nature, Jesus, and the afterlife. In other words, I reject the central claims of Christianity. Jesus was a mere mortal who lived and died, end of story. He wasn’t born of a virgin, he didn’t work miracles, and he didn’t resurrect from the dead. You believe all these things to be true, but what evidence do you have for your bald assertions? As I mentioned above, I am not going to take your word for it. Did you really think emailing me would lead to my renunciation of atheism? Or, is your email more about hearing yourself talk or reinforcing your own doubts? I have received thousands of emails and comments such as yours over the past thirteen years. I have often wondered if Evangelicals who try to evangelize me are more worried about their own souls than mine; that my story is a threat to their beliefs.

Anyway, i hope u get this!

I got it! Aren’t you glad I did? 🙂

Your article was from long ago! I want u to know that i care, and Jesus cares MORE! … Have an amazing day!

Sorry, Terry, but Jesus doesn’t care. He’s d-e-a-d. My parents and grandparents are dead too. And guess what? They don’t care either.
I know that you THINK you care, but I have interacted with thousands of “caring” and “loving” Christians since 2007. Based on my experiences with them, I have concluded that words such as “care” and “love” are just lingo Evangelicals use when they run into people they don’t understand or who believe differently from them.
If you want to show that you “care,” please send me a couple hundred bucks. It IS what Jesus wants you to do. Had you bothered to read my backstory, you would have learned that I am gravely ill, that I have battled chronic illness and pain for twenty-five years; that I was recently diagnosed with an incurable disease called gastroparesis; that I am disabled and walk with a cane (and at times use a wheelchair.) Feel guilty? Send me money, dude! I am still a preacher.
Have a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious day. 🙂

Bruce, a Sinner Saved by Reason

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Bruce, What if Christianity is True?

Bruce Gerencser March 2, 2020 Religion 6 Comments

pascals wager

“It’s just the ocean playing tricks on us. Just because it looks like we’re on land, and it doesn’t seem like we’re moving, doesn’t mean we should risk getting out.” “Our ancestors wouldn’t have sacrificed so much to stay in the boat if it wasn’t really on the water. And I wouldn’t feel such a dark, frightened feeling every time my doubts say we’ve been fooled.” “Absolutely. There’s no other explanation for it.” Source

Countless, Evangelicals have asked me, “Bruce, what if Christianity is true?” Usually, this question is couched in the use of Pascal’s Wager. For those of you unfamiliar with Pascal’s Wager, the RationalWiki explains it this way:

“”Pascal’s wager: Believing in and searching for kryptonite — on the off chance that Superman exists and wants to kill you.

Pascal’s wager is an argument that asserts that one should believe in God, even if God’s existence cannot be proved or disproved through reason.

Blaise Pascal’s original wager was as a fairly short paragraph in Pensées amongst several other notes that could be considered “wagers”. Its argument is rooted in what has subsequently become known as game theory. The wager argues that the best course of action is to believe in God regardless of any lack of evidence, because that option gives the biggest potential gains. Pascal’s original text is long-winded and written in somewhat convoluted philosophy-speak, but it can be distilled more simply:

If you believe in God and God does exist, you will be rewarded with eternal life in heaven: thus an infinite gain.

If you do not believe in God and God does exist, you will be condemned to remain in hell forever: thus an infinite loss.

If you believe in God and God does not exist, you will not be rewarded: thus an insignificant loss.

If you do not believe in God and God does not exist, you will not be rewarded, but you have lived your own life: thus an insignificant gain.

….

Pascal’s wager makes a number of assumptions about reality, and a number of theological assumptions about the god it argues for. If any of these can be shown to either be false or undesirable, then the power of the Wager for determining one’s actions and beliefs is severely weakened — indeed, the argument of the Wager can be reversed in some cases and it can argue for non-belief. These mostly stem from the theological implications of applying the Wager to belief in God, rather than the game theory attributes and decision-making process presented.

People asking me this question genuinely fear what will happen to me if Christianity is true. Well, actually, their version of Christianity, anyway. I have yet to have a progressive or liberal Christian try Pascal’s Wager on me. Either out of not wanting to be impolite or believing in some form of universal salvation, liberals and progressives don’t try to evangelize me. All praise be to Loki for such grace and mercy. Evangelicals, on the other hand, adhere to an exclusionary, separatist version of Christianity. For them, it is all about right beliefs, who is in and who is out. Matters of salvation and eternal destiny are elevated to matters of life and death. If God is who Evangelicals say he is, and judgment and eternal torture await all those who refuse to bow a knee and worship Jesus, then I can, on a theological and personal basis, understand why they might be worried about me. There are those Evangelicals who seem to relish and glory in my soon death and torture in Hell, but most Jesus-lovers are decent human beings who don’t want to people to suffer (though their overwhelming support for the vile, anti-human policies of Donald Trump is cause for me to reconsider my view of Evangelicals as a whole). Thus, the question, WHAT IF CHRISTIANITY IS TRUE?

Such questions are laden with presuppositions. The Bible is the inspired, inerrant, infallible Word of God. The God revealed in the Bible is the one true God. This true God reveals himself to everyone through creation and conscience, rendering every human who has ever walked on the face of the earth without excuse. That’s why Evangelicals say there’s no such thing as an atheist, or that atheists deliberately ignore the evidence for God out of some sort of secret desire to sin and live licentiously. No matter how many times atheists suggest otherwise, Evangelicals know better. Their presuppositions tell them so . . . end of discussion. This is why it almost always a waste of time to argue with Evangelicals who are psychologically tethered to these beliefs. Until they are willing to at least consider they could be wrong, there’s no way to reach them intellectually.

I get it. Fear of being wrong is a powerful motivator. So is fear of Hell and eternal damnation. Remove fear as a motivator, and I suspect many Evangelicals would be sleeping in on Sundays with the unwashed, uncircumcised Philistines of the world. But, as long you worried about what might happen if you believe the wrong things, go to the wrong church, or any of the other “important” matters they clench their sphincter muscles over, you are likely to, at least, do the things that make one a Jesus-loving, Bible-believing, Evangelical Christian. It was only when I no longer believed that the Bible was what Evangelicals claim it is that I was able to break free of a lifetime of Fundamentalist belief and practice. It was the Bible that had a magical, powerful hold on me. Once, however, that hold on me was broken, the jig was up. Once the Bible lost its authority over me, I was free to think and believe whatever I wanted. And, here I am today, an outspoken ex-Evangelical turned atheist; a former card-carrying right-wing extremist who is now a progressive and a liberal. Truly reason and intellectual inquiry have transformed me into a new person. As the good book says, “If any man be in reason, old things are passed away and all things become new.” Okay, the original text says, “if any man be in CHRIST,” not in “reason.” However, I did have a born-again experience of sorts when I deconverted. The difference, of course, is that I have not arrived. I have not bought fire insurance and punched my ticket for glory. I am just a man wandering on the path of reason, knowledge, and understanding. Released from fear of God, judgment, and eternal fire and brimstone, I am free to wander at will across this landscape we call life. This is called FREEDOM.

Bruce, you never did answer the question. “What if Christianity is true?” Fine, here’s my answer. I have weighed Christianity in the balances and found it wanting. I have concluded that the central claims of Christianity are not true. Jesus? A naturally-born Jewish rabbi who got himself killed 2,000 years ago because he ran afoul of Roman (and Jewish) law. Once dead, Jesus stayed that way. No resurrection for Jesus, nor for the rest of us either. But what about all Jesus’ miracles? Works of fiction. That’s what reason and common sense tell me. I refuse to let a largely irrelevant religious text cloud my view of life.

“But, Bruce, what if Christianity is true?”

sigh

About Bruce Gerencser

Bruce Gerencser, 62, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 41 years. He and his wife have six grown children and twelve grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist. For more information about Bruce, please read the About page.

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Quote of the Day: Why Don’t You Just “Believe?”

Bruce Gerencser December 1, 2019 Evangelicalism 10 Comments

bart ehrman

What do you have to lose by having faith and believing that Christ was born supernaturally as a result of a virgin birth to Mary, that Christ performed miracles, that Christ died by crucifixion and came back to life from the dead, and that Christ went back into heaven in a supernatural ascension into heaven? I don’t see any downside.

I get this kind of question on occasion. Usually when someone asks it they tie it to “Pascal’s Wager.”

….

The first question I would ask this person is: Are you able to believe something that you honestly do not think is true?

The question itself raises a much bigger issue: what does it mean to believe? Does anyone really and genuinely think that authentic faith means mouthing certain words that you don’t actually subscribe to in order to be let off the hook? Would God be convinced by that? Wouldn’t he, uh, see through it? I assume so. So what good would it do for me to say that I believe something I don’t actually believe?

And how can I force myself to think something is true when I don’t think it is? Belief isn’t mouthing words or lying to get off the hook.

The second question I would ask is, for me, the real zinger: Can it really be a simple case of either/or? Either you believe or not? In other words, is it really a case that if you choose to believe and you’re right, you may be saved, but if you’re wrong you will be damned? Doesn’t that assume there are only two options: believe in Christ for salvation or don’t and be damned?

That may have made sense for Pascal, who lived in a world where, for all practical purposes, there were TWO options. But what about our own world? We don’t have two options. We have scads of them. And it is literally impossible to take them all.

That is to say: If you want to make sure you cover your bases when it comes to salvation: WHICH religion do you follow? Suppose you decide, OK, I’ll take Pascal’s wager and decide (somehow) to believe in Christ? What if, it turns out, Christ is NOT the right option? Or even, say, the only/best option?

In concrete terms: what if you decide to believe in Christ and then it turns out the Muslims are right? You could be damned forever for choosing the wrong option. So how do you cover the Islamic option as well as the Christianity one? And … well … there are lots of religions to choose from.

Even within Christianity: I know some Christians who have an entire detailed list of what you have to believe to be saved. And I know other Christians who have a different list. It is impossible to believe both at once, since they are at odds with one another. On a most simple level, I know different Christians who believe that if you do not belong to their denomination, you will be damned; and even Christians who say that you have to be baptized in their particular church to be saved. So what’cha gonna do?

On this logic, do you become Mormon to cover your bases? And Catholic? And Southern Baptist? And a Jehovah’s Witness? And an Independent-Bible-Believing-Hell-Fire-and-Brimstone Fundamentalist? And …. ?

— Dr. Bart Ehrman, Why Don’t You Just Believe?, December 1, 2019

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Evangelical Man Says Christopher Hitchens is in Hell and All Atheists Hate God

Bruce Gerencser November 5, 2019 Evangelicalism 5 Comments

Warning! Buckets of snark ahead.

An Evangelical man by the name of Stephen left the following comment on a post titled, Christopher Hitchens is in Hell. It’s the only post Stephen read, so I assume he was searching for a writer who told the “truth” about Hitchens’ eternal destiny. I am sure he was disappointed to find out that I, too, am an atheist. Rather than approve Stephen’s comment, I thought I would turn it into a post. My comments are indented and italicized. All grammar in the original.

Hitchens is short for hell’s kitchen

I just love it when a Christian zealot starts his screed with an attempt to be humorous or cute. Sorry, Stephen — epic fail! That said, I do suppose that Christopher Hitchens would enjoy hanging out in Hell’s Kitchen. I hear the food is awesome.

…and he [Hitchens] put himself there out of sheer desire too since he could not be honest and man enough to admit he just hates God and the concept of Him, just like all atheists do

Evangelicals believe that Hitchens died in his sins and is currently residing in Hell — a place where the Christian God tortures non-Christians for eternity. Hitch didn’t have much good to say about Christianity. My God, he even eviscerated Mother Theresa in his book, The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice.

Wikipedia describes Hitchens this way:

“As an anti-theist, he regarded all religions as false, harmful, and authoritarian. He argued in favour of free expression and scientific discovery, and that it was superior to religion as an ethical code of conduct for human civilization. He also advocated for the separation of church and state. The dictum “What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence” has become known as Hitchens’s razor.”

It’s not enough for Stephen to attack Hitchens’ atheistic beliefs. Stephen goes after his character, saying Hichens is not man enough, not honest enough to admit that the real issue he has with Christianity is that he hates God.

Atheists hate God. Where oh where have I heard that before. *sigh* Instead of thinking about why someone might not believe in the existence of deities, Stephen says ALL atheists hate God. Note that he doesn’t say, atheists hate all deities. For Stephen there is one true God, his, and it is that God Hitchens and all atheists hate.

I wonder if Stephen hates Allah, Buddha, or the plethora of other deities humans worship? I doubt it. He would likely say that hating such deities would be stupid. “Who hates imaginary beings?” Exactly, Stephen. Atheists don’t hate your God any more than they do any of other Gods in the panoply of deities. It’s silly to hate imaginary beings, and that’s why most atheists do not hate God — whatever name he may go by. Now, asking if atheists hate Evangelicalism, Christianity, or other organized religions is another question altogether. Many atheists hate religion in general. However, many atheists do not hate religion as a social, cultural, tribal construct. What they do hate are the harmful behaviors committed in the name of this or that God. As a humanist, my concern is with the effect of religious faith and not religion itself. Many atheists agree with this sentiment.

Of course, Stephen will likely reject what I have written here, saying that atheists, deep in their heart of hearts, hate God. No matter what atheists say to the contrary, for the Stephens of the world, atheists hate God.

– imagine up as many logical fallacies you can think of to justify themselves…the human heart is desperately sick, who can understand it?…,

I am not sure what to make of what Stephen says here. He says “the human heart is desperately sick, who can understand it?” This is a loose rendering of Jeremiah 17:9: The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

Evangelicals believe humans, by nature, have been ruined by the Fall; that everyone is born into this world a sinner; that without the salvation offered through the merit and work of Jesus, all of us will spend eternity in Hell (Lake of Fire). As a Christian, Stephen believes he has a golden ticket. His heavenly reservation is secure. When Stephen dies, he will live on in Heaven with Jesus and his fellow Christians. I wonder if the food in Heaven’s Kitchen is better than that in Hell? I doubt it.

Perhaps Stephen might enlighten readers as to what these “many logical fallacies” are. Most atheists value rationalism, skepticism, and intellectual inquiry. Our goal is to construct a logical, consistent worldview. Evangelicals, on the other hand, are required to follow a God-ordained, Bible-based worldview, regardless of whether it squares with science or history. No Christian comes out a winner when arguing worldviews with an atheist/humanist. There’s too much craziness in the Bible for an Evangelical to hold a logical, consistent view of the world. Viewing the world through Bible-colored glasses will always lead to a warped, anti-human viewpoint.

Most unbelievers as atheists themselves might even forget that at one time they had to have chosen to and that must have been out if a high magnitude of shear ignorance if they knew what they were missing..it’s like refusing to believe Gravity exists then jumping of the Empire State building to prove it but never being able to because at the time you find out you were wrong you’re dead.

Most unbelievers (non-Christians) are not atheists. This is a common misconception. Unbelief is not the same as atheism. Most unbelievers are indifferent towards religion or know nothing about it. An atheist is someone who has made a positive affirmation of his denial of the existence of deities. While an argument can be made for all humans being born atheist, it’s preferable, at least from my perspective, to limit the term “atheist” to those who intellectually, rationally deny the existence of gods.

Stephen says that atheists are ignorant. How else can one explain all that atheists give up by not being Christians? Here’s the thing: eternity in Heaven does not sound that attractive to me. What will Evangelicals be doing in Heaven for all eternity? The inspired, inerrant, infallible Word of God gives us a good idea. The triune God expects Heaven’s inhabitants to spend their days in worship and praise. Imagine how sore your back will get prostrating yourself before Jesus day and night! Compare what’s going on in Heaven to the atmosphere in Hell. Party Time! Sure, Hell will be a bit warm for my liking, but I sure prefer Hitchens and his crowd to Stephen’s group. Who in their right mind wants to spend eternity in church? No thanks!

Stephen tries to use a variation of Pascal’s Wager to warn atheists of the danger of unbelief. As usual, its use is an epic fail. I would ask Stephen, have you applied Pascal’s Wager to all other deities? Surely, that’s the prudent thing to do right? Stephen can deny Allah exists, but when he jumps off the proverbial Empire State Building, he will quickly know — albeit too late — that Allah exists. The only safe thing for Stephen to do is to believe in every God, covering all of his bases. Better safe than sorry, right? “No, no, no,” Stephen says, “there is only one true God — mine!” And there goes Pascal’s Wager up in smoke.

one thing we know, there’s no atheists in hell.

Finally, Stephen says something I agree with. There are no atheists in Hell! Of course, Stephen means something different when he says this. He means every atheist in Hell is now a believer; that burning in Hell f-o-r-e-v-e-r will teach those awful atheists the TRUTH about God. Regardless, the reason there are no atheists in Hell is this: There is no Hell, no Heaven, no afterlife, and no God. Atheists aren’t worried in the least about going to Hell. Hell, with its eternal punishment, is a religious construct cooked up by clerics and theologians to keep congregants in line and keep money flowing into church coffers. Remove the fear of Hell and judgment from the equation and most people will trade sitting on hard pews for sleeping in on Sunday mornings. The salvation game only works when humans are viewed as broken and in need of fixing — or as Stephen said, “desperately sick.” Once humans figure out the concepts of sin, salvation, and eternal life are myths, the game is over.

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Tag: Pascal’s Wager

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Evangelical Man Says Christopher Hitchens is in Hell and All Atheists Hate God

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