Four Reasons Christianity Hasn’t Been Explained Away - Saints and Sceptics

For all the attention that Christian apologists focus on the so called New Atheists the fact is that plenty of doubt has been cast on the believers worldview from the secular direction with little change in the ranks. Of late there have been studies that hint there has been a slow but growing number moving toward the "nones" but that is another blog post entirely.
  I am not sure that these four reasons are any better than the reason that people just want to believe.

Let me know what you think of the article.



Four Reasons Christianity Hasn’t Been Explained Away - Saints and Sceptics

I doubt that we should prevent assisted dying

I understand that there is a finality to helping someone end their life. But it is a safe bet that an individual that reaches the decision to meet the end of their life on their own terms would have spent plenty of heart wrenching moments wrestling with the situation.
  What about the conservative movement gives people the confidence to say that assisted suicide is so wrong? How could you campaign against the possibility of helping a fellow human find as graceful and end as might be afforded them?
There is a very well thought out treatment of the question here. And there is mention of an earlier discussion in the article, well worth a read.

on explanations

Science (or skeptically and carefully looking at he world) can offer some pretty strange explanations. explanations of mysteries. explanations that we can understand.

religion (or believing shit because you want to) and dogma (or believing shit because someone else wants you to)  offer some pretty strange explanations. explanations that we really don't understand.

I doubt that most people really want to walk around operating on ideas that they really don't understand.

Doubt that you know that much about your enemies

  This story about the persecution of Yazidis is a little bit more interesting than your typical article about one group killing members of another group over land or religion.
   In this case the one doing the killing is doing it for what they think the other side thinks.
 While I can grant someone that there are reasons for misunderstanding, ( after half a dozen websites glanced through I cannot figure out if it is Yazidi or Yazidis) to act on such a misunderstanding for a few hundred years seems to be bad form.
 The point that is being misunderstood is ISIS thinks that Yazidis worship the devil. If the character in question is the devil we will leave for a moment. The character has a name , Melek Taus and in the creation story that the Yazidis ( or is Yazidi the plural?) believe he was an angel that was thrown in a hell type place not over pride but because he only loved god and wouldn't bow to man. But this story is older than the creation story that involves a snake that was sometimes called Satan. In the Yazidis story this particular angel was able to redeem himself like most religions command, encourage, or point to.
  So he is not the devil, they don't worship him and they are getting killed for worshipping the devil.

   just think what a little bit of doubt could do.

Is There Proof That God Exists?

"That said, multiple arguments have been advanced as evidence of God’s existence.5 None of them will represent convincing proof to every skeptic. However, when taken together, they merit careful reflection. "







all that sounds quite a bit like the folks on social media that post some quote or statement that says oh... "The school shooting was government plot" and then say "makes ya wonder"


Is There Proof That God Exists?

I doubt that the same way of looking at the Gaza Strip is a good idea

I am not sure that I can put together any helpful thoughts on this situation. I am fairly sure I am not qualified to do so. The fact that I would question what Israel is doing would prove to many that I am ignorant of the fact that God has a plan for the middle east.

   That is the part that bothers me. Folks have decided, or accept that it is decided for them that there is a divine plan for the land and part of that plan is that the world will end based on things that go on in that land.

 Well until the world ends I hope we can find a way to help human beings live better and peacefully in whatever part of the globe they live in.

  Here is somebody's thoughts on this that is more articulate than I.



Brian Eno on the Israel-Gaza crisis: How can you justify images such as this? - Comment - Voices - The Independent

Doubting that the answers matter

Disclaimer* I don't like opening a conversation with a disclaimer, but I am here. The disclaimer is I am not going to dismiss Christian thinkers and apologists in this post. Just the answers they give at times.



 The following link is to an article that discusses the 50 questions posed by RE Pucket, questions that Christians can't answer. Turns out Christians are happy to answer them. But the answers are of the type that beg the question, and various other fallacies.

  While I may not think that all 50 of these questions are worth of a lot of thought, the general theme is something that I think is important. Is there or is there not a god is an important question. The morality of supreme beings if they exist and the morality of humans is an important question. But if the answers that are given spend too much time in another dimension they lose usefulness in this dimension, the dimension where the questions are asked.





Answering "Top 50 Questions Christians Can't Answer" (16 through 20) - Baltimore Christianity | Examiner.com