An Evangelical preacher recently said:
Evidence for the Bible is everywhere, including outer space. We just have to be willing to look for it in a credible manner that brings glory to God. He does not lie, and the presence of water in Space shows us that God does not lie about biblical events. We know God did it because he told us he did it, and the evidence comes to shore up Christian faith when the time is right. As Christians, we do not need physical evidence. We just need to believe God because he does not lie.
And this is why having a discussion or debate with an Evangelical Christian is usually a waste of time. Discuss and debate if you must, but you won’t win. Why? When shown their beliefs and practices are false, what do Evangelicals do? Do they admit they are wrong? Do they admit you are right? Do they deconvert? Do they admit to having serious questions and doubts about their faith? Of course not, silly boy. When cornered, Evangelicals run to the safety of the house of faith and the inerrancy/infallibility of the Bible. Within the house of faith, all is ordered and well, and the Bible is true. Everything is right in this house. Of course, toking marijuana gives the same result — in my professional opinion. 🙂 It is only when Evangelicals venture outside the house of faith that change is possible. For it is in the world that they will find their beliefs and practices questioned, challenged, and overcome. Over the years, many devout Evangelicals and IFB Christians have stumbled upon this site, only to crawl away beaten and bruised, with more questions than answers.
Is my goal to evangelize for atheism? Nope. I don’t do it — ever. I am just one man with a story to tell. If my writing troubles someone or causes them to question or doubt, that’s on them. If they contact me, I will help them any way I can. I’m content to answer sincere questions and suggest books for people to read. Whatever they do with what they learn is up to them. Do some of them deconvert or move on to what I call “kinder, gentler Christianity?” You bet, and I am glad they did. Some sects of Christianity are more harmful than others. Evangelicalism, the IFB church movement, Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Catholicism come to mind. These sects might be “right” about religion, but they sure cause a lot of harm, both physically and psychologically.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen 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 think the main reason that Christianity and other religions flourish is that life is so fundamentally meaningless that for a human to be right or wrong has absolutely no significance, so being wrong on everything has no consequence in any arena that matters. Hence, religions. You honestly think your life is more privileged than a spider’s or a fly’s? It comforts people to think that their lives have meaning, and that an avuncular artificer is at work on their behalf in the universe. But where do you ever see morality at work in the natural world? Where do you even see it positively mattering among humans? Look at the horror that now rules the U.S., proof that moral and existential truth have no meaningful roles in life. It’s all about power, it’s all nature writ in tooth and claw. That any Christian would support Trump is just more evidence that life has no independent meaning.
ETB—I admit that my understanding of biology is limited, as I took my last course in the subject when Jimmy Carter was President. But, given what I know, I would think that in the rest of the animal world, Donnie Boy would be seen as the predator he is and other animals would avoid him. Yet 77 million humans voted for him, And the notion that our lives are more meaningful than those of other species) is predicated on our “intelligence,” which is a God-like quality and expressed through language, which animals supposedly don’t have.
(What does Caliban say to Prospero in “The Tempest?” “You have given me language/ And the profit on,t is. I can curse.”)
I have to ask because I do not know. Are Jehovah Witnesses considered Christian or are they more of a restorationist cult? It is not hard to correlate Evangelicalism, the IFB church movement, Mormonism, and Catholicism falling into the span of Christianity with some of these having significant elements that are authoritarian cults.
I am open to hearing folks enlighten me about the perspective of Jehovah Witness and how they could be considered Christian. I also appreciate the atheist/agnostic perspective here because many are smarter than the folks within these religions who are the so called experts (looking straight at the uneducated IFB and Evangelicals).
Yes, they fall under the “Christian” banner, generally speaking. The thing is, for an example, the IFB and Evangelicals label them a cult and do no include them under the Christian umbrella. Likewise, the JW’s don’t consider anyone outside their belief-system as Christian.
As someone, who once as an IFB/Evangelical engaged JW’s in conversation (in an effort to “save” them), they were and are very unaware of their own history. If you start to tell them their history they freak out and leave. They are like deer caught in headlights. In hindsight, that is quite true to most religions and cults. People follow, but rarely know the historical roots of their belief-system.
JW’s have a long history of spiritual abuse, other abuses, and you should be able to find all sorts of information about them.
When i was an evangelical Christian, people did try to talk with me about some of the dogmas I carried. One conversation I really recall was when I was a teen working in a university science lab. I don’t remember the entire conversation, but I do remember saying that communism is bad. The post-doc with whom I was conversing asked me why I thought communism was bad. 16-year-old OC really didn’t have a good answer. I realized I had been told it was bad to pool all one’s resources and redistribute them based on individual need. But what happened as a result of this conversation was that OC (1) realized that one needs reasons for their declarations and (2) asking questions can be uncomfortable but can lead to finding out more information. So while the conversation itself was impossible, there were important seeds planted.
OC when I was a teenager attending the Assembly of God church I had a similar discussion with a distant cousin who was raised in a very liberal secular family. It was nice enough but neither of us changed our opinions. He started by telling me how great the Castro regime was because the literacy rate had went way up. I responded that of course it had because all the illiterate people had either fled, been put in prison or executed. That didn’t go over very well, and we went back and forth for a little while. I never really talked with him after that.
I was immersed in conservative Christianity, the Rambo movies and talk radio when I was a teenager. I had a financially comfortable childhood in the suburbs and attended a large but decent public school that was well funded. I got a new Toyota pickup when I turned 16. I was involved in Royal Rangers (similar to Bou Scouts). I thought Reagan should use the military more than he did. I thought everyone on welfare were frauds, and I made sure everyone knew my opinion. Looking back, I was just an unpleasant, stupid little boy.
As I’ve gotten older I think about the conversation I had with my distant cousin. We both had valid points, neither of us was wrong about the good and bad aspects of the Castro revolution, but the situation in Cuba was (and still is) complicated, just like America and its history. Many arguments you can make against oppressive Communist countries has some parallel in America at some point in our history, maybe just not to the same degree. I also think more now on why a population would embrace a communist Revolution. It’s not because they are evil or deceived, it’s because they are oppressed and desperate. The issue arises with who gets to determine the system of distribution of collected goods, and how do you do the collection in a society that has been based off private property and individual freedoms? Inevitably oppression results. But the idea of a fairer distribution of wealth, a good public education system, the maximum on individual civil rights, and a higher basic standard of living is a worthy goal for any nation. For example, the fact that we in the USA do not have a world class universal health insurance model is ludicrous. I personally would have no issue confiscating the wealth of United Health Care and Aetna to begin this. The share holders and CEO would get some money to go away, the rest would be seed money for a socialist style national medical system. I’m sure I’m missing a-lot in all my arguments. This is a topic I ponder a lot which is why my post is so wordy. These are just my thoughts and I apologize if it is coming across negatively.
In my opinion (which along with $3 gets you coffee at Speedway) the issue usually becomes what role does a government play in this, and when does a government with good intentions go too far in its zeal to make everyone “equal”? And what freedoms will you allow the populace to have, like freedom of religion or sexual orientation, when those freedoms are contrary to the ideology of the new government? This historically have been the areas where communist governments don’t always do so well, but neither have we in the good ole US of A either.
I would hope that in an imagined re-discussion with my cousin we both would be more willing to listen to each other, and maybe be closer in our opinions.