I recently enjoyed answering 10 questions for atheists which gave me an idea, why don’t I also write 10 questions for Christians? To add more information, none of these questions are intended to trap you or to disprove God; I only ask the questions because I want to know the answer. This is not intended to be one of those “10 Questions Christian’s can’t Answer” type articles. The questions asked comes from the perspective of someone who used to believe, and was a strong believer for a really long time.
Question 1: Why do so many Christians doubt?
When I was a Christian it would often seem that any random strange question would cause me to spiral into a series of doubts that took a lot of thinking to be resolved. It wasn’t just me, a lot of people had this, with the phrase “I’m going to have to think about that” being extremely common. How can you have a strong personal relationship with someone for a long time, yet doubt their existence? If you have doubts, is the strong personal relationship really that strong?
Question 2: Do you feel most Christians are in a filter bubble?
For those who don’t know, a filter bubble is where all the information around you from friends, social media, and news sources already agrees with you, without challenging or showing you different ideas. To give an example, a filter bubble for a flat earther is being exposed to nothing other than pro flat-earther ideas.
I ask this because I feel I was inside a filter bubble when I was a Christian, and I’m interested if people have the same experience, and if so, if they’re trying to escape the filter bubble.
Part of the issue I’ve seen is that the most popular content against your position is deliberately intended to mock people who hold your beliefs. I understand why nobody would ever really want to watch this, but if you are in a filter bubble, I really recommend trying to find reasonable and honest people on the other side who don’t want to mock others. I try to do the same, so let me know if you have any recommendations.
Question 3: Why has Christianity Not Spread Further?
This question may sound funny to some, as over 2 billion Christians isn’t a small number, but this is still a world minority, why hasn’t an all powerful, all loving God who wants everyone to know the truth and obtain eternal life not spread their message further?
Why in many places is atheism or ‘none’ growing faster than Christianity? Why in many places is church attendance falling?
Is it that you are not showing them the evidence to believe, or is it that the evidence isn’t convincing?
Question 4: What Would Convince you Christianity is False?
It’s often proudly declared that nothing will convince you that Christianity is false, but I’m not sure if that’s true. What if you found yourself in a different afterlife, or if a new religion with undeniable evidence swept the world? I think most people would change their mind if that happened. Is there anything less crazy than this that would convince you that Christianity was false? For example results from experiments in prayer, finding that the case for Christ is weaker than you thought, finding parts of the bible that you morally disagree with etc.
You have the right to ask me this same question for Atheism, so I will answer it in advance. Every time I listen to a new argument for the existence of God or see new evidence for the case for Christ I’m open to changing my world view and considering what the evidence means in terms of my beliefs. If you’re instead asking what would convince me that Christianity was true, that would be the discovery of much more evidence supporting the case for Christ or an undeniable encounter with Jesus. I am still investigating and researching the evidence, so I may actually find something, although it won’t be something that scholars have talked about as their main argument as I’ve listened to a lots of debates already.
Question 5: Why Should Doubting be Punished?
Why are people scared of doubting, and why are some people punished for doubting God? If God is real, then surely exploration of doubt will only allow you to find the answer you need, ensuring you never have that doubt again. If God is not real, then surely exploring the doubt will help you to stop believing something that is incorrect? In both cases, I really don’t see a good reason to not explore doubt. It’s a win-win.
If a Buddhist was doubting their own religion, and interested in researching your brand of Christianity, of course you would encourage their doubts for Buddhism. If you were skating on a frozen lake, which was starting to crack, would you value doubt that the lake was safe? It’s with examples like these, that I only see doubt as a positive force in the world.
Question 6: How do you treat those who stopped believing?
When a believer stops believing, it can be incredibly scary and intimidating because of how you are treated. In my church there was a hostile sigma towards those who were Christians yet stopped believing, as if it meant that you were stupid, proud, arrogant, and just wanted to sin. But people don’t change their personality so quickly, just their beliefs. Isn’t a better approach to still talk to these people, be kind and friendly, honest and open, trying to understand why they changed their mind, and then have a respectful discussion without impeding each others boundaries?
It’s the stigma towards non-believers which has made me not tell Christians I’m an atheist for about 4 years now. If a sincere friend didn’t believe, and felt too scared to tell you, wouldn’t you hate that?
Question 7: What is Hell Like? Will I go there?
Is eternal punishment really necessary for finite crimes? It is really justice? I am what I would call a “non-resistant non-believer”, which means I feel I have honestly searched for God, looking at the evidence and the claims, and am yet still not convinced simply because I do not find the evidence convincing. Most interpretations of heaven consider those who have not had the opportunity to be heard, but what about those who have searched honestly and yet not been convinced?
Question 8: Why are there so many different versions of Christianity?
Is the trinity real? Is the wafer literally the flesh of Jesus? Did Jesus die for all or just for the few? The answer depends on which version of Christianity you believe. It’s obvious to all that in each case, both interpretations can’t be right, so why is there a difference? If God is not the author of confusion (1 Corinthians 14:33) why are there so many alternate interpretations? If Christians are all praying to the same God, why is he telling one thing to some, and another thing to others?
Question 9: Why is there a God rather than nothing?
The big bang was a finite, non-conscious, scientifically understood event, which as many Christians say, demands an explanation. In comparison, God, who is conscious, all-powerful and all-knowing is much more complex, so surely must demand an explanation even more so? Why when science can’t explain the origins of the big bang is it ok to assume that God created it, when we lack an explanation for God in just the same way?
Question 10: What Language did Jesus Speak? What Language were the Gospels written in? Who were the Authors of the Gospels?
First of all, if you don’t know the answers to these questions, I’d rather you didn’t look them up straight away. Instead please leave a comment telling me what your best guess is, and then research, and correct yourself if your answer was wrong. This is a fun experiment I’m doing.
If you don’t know and you are a Christian, then that’s ok because I didn’t know this when I was a Christian either. If you are interested in knowing the answer, and have already written the comment, I’ll answer the question now. Jesus spoke Aramaic, the language of the gospels is Greek (specifically Greco-Roman Greek), and my guess is that the next question is what most people will get wrong, because the gospels were not written by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, instead, they were written at a minimum of 30 years after the death of Jesus, by highly educated Greek speaking writers who were all writing anonymously, meaning the correct answer to “who were the authors of the gospels?” is “I don’t know”.
Why does it seem that so few Christians are aware of basic information highly relevant to their sincerely held beliefs? In a world where a vast mountain of new testament knowledge is freely available at your fingertips, is there any good reason not to know all this relevant information about the important documents that are so relevant to your life? If you are going to live your life following the bible as your teacher, don’t you want to know where it comes from?
My Brain Is Completely Empty 
You have never produced evidence for your claims regarding Yahweh.
The moment you do, we can examine the evidence like adults.
So, once again, feel free to present evidence for your god,Yahweh.
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1. Doubt is a superpower. It helps us filter out the bs and find Truth. I don’t see it as a bad thing at all. See #5
2. Most? Yes. But I would also say that exemplifies”most” human beings, Christians being a subset of human beings.
3. The spread of Christianity is dependant on People, both for people willing and obedient to Go and people willing and obedient to Believe. Faith and belief are very Individual things, not geography or “spread” across the globe territory things.
4. Physical evidence that Jesus did not rise from the dead. Since out Faith is founded on that Belief, if someone absolutely debunked it, dug up “jesus” and you could absolutely verify THAT Jesus was THE Jesus who was said to have risen… done. In a heartbeat.
5. See #1. Doubt should never be punished, only encouraged. Truth can handle the scrutiny. 🙂
6. I see them still as my brothers and sisters. As members of the Family of Man if not still part of the Family of God in Christ. But this also gets complicated theologically too. Many Christians, wrongly I think, would say they “lose” their Sonship or salvation. I don’t believe Jesus and the Father casts family off that easily. For me, I treat them as Family still.
7. Easy. Not all Christians believe in a literal place of eternal torment for unbelievers called “Hell”. I’m one of those. I don’t see it in the ot, nor do I find the concept in the NT, although scriptures can be interpreted to seem that it exists. Doesn’t match with gods love, his mercy, and man’s freedom to accept or not without forced coersion. God doesn’t need the threat to get people to “love” him. He is Love.
8. There are nearly 7 Bill people on the planet. Be happy the “versions” of Christianity are only in the Thousands. Lol
God meets people where they are and in their own cultures and understandings.
9. “Why” questions are as they say Above my Pay grade. Lol. You’ll have to ask God and I suspect… He isn’t all that interested “why” questions from those who presume to Know a better way and assume His way wasn’t the best option. That’s what Faith is for.
10. Is actually three in one… a Trinity of sorts, but I’ll bite.
One..Jesus likely spoke Aramaic, Greek or Hebrew, or perhaps all three. Two..The gospels we still have are copies of copies. They are all in Greek. Although we do not know what the Originals were written in, we can assume, absent other evidence, they too were written in Greek. And three..the four gospels of the NT are all anonymous. We do not know for certain who the authors were, although church history has “given” them the traditionally accepted authors of Mark, Matthew written next, Luke written third using mark and Matthew, and lastly John. This last was the only one that may…stress may… give us a clue as to authorship due to the tradition that John was the “disciple Jesus loved” and that he intentionally obscured his identity as the author in the gospel. But… at the end of the day, who knows for certain.
I’ve tried to answer your 10 honestly amd as candidly as i can. Hope it helps. -Barabbas
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Thanks Barabbas! I really like your responses. What you said resonated in a way that made me think “If I were a Christian, this is probably what I would be like”, especially because I love your answers in response to doubt.
3. Yes, that’s true. I guess missionaries can only accomplish so much, and certainly not as much as moving permanently to other locations.
4. This would definitely disprove a bodily resurrection. The reason why I don’t like this is that it seems impossible to verify that a random skeleton was actually Jesus’. Let’s say in one of the many tombs that is claimed to be where Jesus was buried we discover a body buried or hidden in a place not found. Aren’t people more likely to say “this tomb must be the wrong tomb” than “this disproves Christianity”? Also, there is an interpretation of the gospels that Jesus’ resurrection was spiritual and not physical, wouldn’t this only disprove the physical interpretation and not the spiritual interpretation?
What would you say to these objections? Is there something else that is more easy to test that would convince you God doesn’t exist?
6. That’s awesome!
7. Completely agreed. I only reference the common perception of hell because it’s what so many people believe in. I wish more people would see the same evidence against the place of eternal torment that you see.
8. “Why” questions are also above my paygrade haha, perhaps “how” is a better word. For the record I don’t presume to know, my answer is that I don’t know. Amazing findings from quantum physics have really put a Universe from Nothing in a much better standing as a theory than previously, so although I don’t presume the answer, if you made me guess, it seems more likely to be from nothing.
I could believe that something came from nothing based on faith, and I could also believe that a God came from nothing based on faith. How do we know which person’s faith is better or more likely to be true? Also, why is faith useful if it can be used to justify any position?
10. It definitely seems like you’ve done your research! Could I ask what made you think Jesus possibly spoke Hebrew and Greek? I’d be interested to know if there is any evidence in that direction.
I know the passage in John that you are referring to. It’s true that we just don’t know, but the person who wrote John was writing over 60 years after the death of Jesus, and I just think it’s unlikely for any of Jesus’ disciples to live that long. John accepts responsibility for looking after Mary the mother of Jesus, which makes him seem at least an adult at the time of the death of Jesus, making him 78 as he is writing. When you also factor in that only really rich people could write, most people couldn’t write, he was likely writing in a different language to what he spoke etc I would still be inclined to answer “don’t know”, but happy to hear if there are more reasons why I should give the passage of “the disciple Jesus loved” more serious consideration.
Thank you very much! If you want to have a respectful conversation about these things I’d really appreciate it!
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Gotta cogitate on these a bit. Currently at work, but I’ll check in later and see if i can respond as well. Thx
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Of course, and please never feel like you need to reply quickly, I really appreciate that! Thanks, Ross
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4. The physical resurrection of Christ, not the spiritual or psychological/vision resurrection, is the foundation of Christian belief. See 1 cor 15. Paul was emphatic. And I totally get that proving the negative is prob “more” difficult than us as Christians proving the positive. But… Again it’s a Faith game, not an evidence game. Which is why alot of apologists try to “fudge” at the game. Lol.
8. “How” questions presuppose our ability to trace the physical/natural “means” to the supernatural origins and “ends”. We’d have to be God to do that. And I’m not. (Great question for the room: how would we even do that?) Thus, it is a Faith Question, not an Evidence question.
10. Notice I said Likely. Jesus was a man of his time, nation and circumstance. Judea under Roman, influenced by Hellenistic Grecian culture (his “bible” was likely the LXX), and His Jewish culture was Aramaic speaking. Thus… “likely” he was aramaic speaking, greek conversant and Hebrew knowledgeable in culture. Who knows, but I would assume, as a multilingual myself, he may have been a polyglot.
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1) Because we are human, and imperfect, and there is no such thing as a strong faith that did not first pass through doubt. Some of the most unstable people I have seen are those who refuse to doubt so much, refuse to face them head-on, that their zealotry is actually the result of being consumed by doubt, rather than free of it.
2) Not many, no. We are part of modern society, after all, and most of us live in countries where our internet access is not (yet) censored by the government, such as the atheist regimes of North Korea or China do.
3) There’s a couple things I could mention here, like the age-old fallacy of assuming that one side is right because they won, or the assertion that Christianity is forcing anyone to convert and believe when you yourself mention the growth of atheism instead, but I think those are somewhat beside the point.
For a comparison, a bit over a century ago, the people of the Enlightenment thought that science would solve all of the world’s problems. A century filled with world wars, poison gas, nukes, and more has somewhat disheartened a number of people around the world, and now a number of them are turning back to mysticism and the worship of nature, such as wiccans or the revived worship of Odin. Does that diminish the validity of science, or does it just mean that people got issues to sort out?
As you say, people have doubts. And there are powers in the world that want to fan those doubts, to see Christianity and the Western world crumble in the furtherance of their own agenda. It plays out at many levels, in the chapel, in the classroom, in the home, we are under an assaulting flood of cleverly devised lies and half-truths, designed to draw us away. Of course there are going to be losses in the face of that.
4) What would convince you that the sun does not exist, does not shine, and does not warm the surface of this planet?
5) It shouldn’t be. But, alas, we are imperfect, judgmental humans, easily riled in fits of passion that should have been restrained by Christlike love.
6) A very dear friend of mine left our church, and turned against it. We remained friends for some time. Until she betrayed our friendship in such a way as I could not endure it anymore. Years later, I still miss her, both who she used to be and the friendship we enjoyed. How do we treat those who stop believing? We love them, or at least we should, even long after they turn against us and hurt us.
7) We’ve discussed this at length before, so I’ll just say that everyone will go where they can be as happy as possible.
8) People disagree. And some, as you probably realize, seek for power through the use of religion, as others seek it through money or military might. The Bible did not arrive as-is from Heaven, and between mistranslations and deliberate alterations, there are many confusing questions left unanswered. When the clergy of the Catholic church lost their monopoly on being able to read the Bible, it being translated into languages that commoners actually spoke, people saw inconsistencies and broke away to worship as best they could figure out to.
9) I will admit that some people use the explanation of God as a crutch, and there is something lacking in that. But I think we can agree that either there is a creator or their is not, and until we know everything, the proof of God remains a question of whether we choose to believe it or not.
10) I am uncertain what language Jesus truly spoke. I mean, I would think Hebrew, but, then again, the Jews were under Roman domination at the time, so they might have spoken Latin as well. But I think Hebrew. If I understand and recall correctly, the Gospels were written in Latin as well, written by the people whose names they bear, the Gospel according to Matthew, according to Luke, and according to Mark. I fail to recall the exact history of the Gospel of John, who penned it and whose hands it passed through. But either way, to address your further question.
People don’t learn that much about ancient history these days, or even just history itself. It is saddening to think that we have so much information at our fingertips, and we are letting ourselves be distracted by cat videos on YouTube and likes on social media instead of learning anything and everything about who we are and where we come from and all the lessons that history has to teach us. Very sad indeed.
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Thanks for answering these questions, it was really interesting seeing what you wrote. It may surprise you but I think a lot of them were satisfying answers I don’t really want to dispute because I agree with them. It’s rare to discuss things that aren’t as central to belief/non-belief so there were certainly new things that I saw here.
2. So living in the modern world doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re not in a filter bubble, by that definition nobody is in a filter bubble. Escaping your filter bubble refers to deliberately listening to opinions against your position, not being exposed to things against your position unwillingly. With this definition would you still say the same thing?
4. I don’t think that these questions are really similar, I’ve never once doubted the existence of the sun for example, and you are comparing things with vastly different amounts of evidence supporting their existence. Nevertheless, I’ll answer what would convince me that the sun doesn’t exist.
The most simple thing would be us being mistaken at what the sun actually was, and finding out it was some other kind of invention, like a huge lightbulb made by aliens in order to do experiments of life on planets. Of course if I could be convinced that I was inside a simulation, I would also believe that the sun doesn’t really exist. If the sun suddenly disappeared or went supernova I would also be convinced that the sun didn’t exist, or at the very least, not in the same way as it did previously.
The sun is testable, observable, and very easy to prove exists. Nobody is doubting that the sun exists. If God is real he should be testable (but none of our tests have shown the existence of a God), observable (but no scientifically verifiable observations and just hearsay so far), and very easy to prove, but you can tell me how easy proving God has been for you, I really don’t think it’s that easy, and if it was, why would so many people need faith?
I am still interested in what would convince you that God didn’t exist. If I’m willing to say what would convince me the sun doesn’t exist, could you also write what would convince you that God doesn’t exist?
8) I agree with this. In order to combat the translation mistakes do you try to read the original Greek/Hebrew? Or do you have a specific translation that you prefer? Obviously the book of Mormon is the one you prefer, but when reading from the bible, which bible do you use to try and make sure you’re reading the most accurate version to the original? Have there been times where you have noticed these problems yourself and then adjusted your beliefs?
9) Yes, and I’d extend that to three options which are: there is a creator, there is not a creator, or there are many creators. I think until we know the answer we shouldn’t assume. I don’t think we can choose to believe things, like it’s not very easy to control how convincing something is to you. Would it be fair to adjust this to “until we know everything, the proof of God remains a question of whether we choose to put our faith in it or not.”?
10) Really interesting, thanks for taking part in the experiment and putting your ideas out before researching. Have you looked into this further? I’m really interested to know what you think the correct answers are now.
Great responses, look forward to hearing from you!
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2) Oh, I would very much say the same thing! Heh, if we were, I wonder if any of us would still be leaving the faith, as you have pointed out. Instead, it seems we cannot be part of the modern world without being bombarded with every possible perspective that disagrees with us. It’s on the News, it’s everywhere on the internet, we can’t even watch a Disney or Marvel movie without coming face to face with it. It actually gets tiring at times.
4) Well, my point was to illustrate the difficulty of disproving God to me, LOL. But to answer more fully, I have to say that God *is* testable and observable, though, much like any other science or person, it can take time to get to know Him and build a personal relationship with Him. I’m not so arrogant anymore to say that *nothing* could prove to me that God does not exist, as I have seen people fall away despite everything, and I have learned that I am not so different from them as to be immune to whatever went through them. But, that said, I cannot conceive of what it would take for me, personally, to deny the existence of God.
So, basically… I dunno! 😉
8) Heh, if I could read Greek or Hebrew, or really any language besides English, that would be quite an accomplishment for me! My brain seems stuck on one language, despite my best efforts.
I read the King James version of the Bible simply because that’s the one we have. Though it is a little tweaked in my religion as our Prophet Joseph Smith Jr. was tasked with restoring, by divine revelation, much of what was once lost due to all the mistakes and interference of ages past. Unfortunately, after his death, there was a splintering over the question of leadership, and the splinter group took most of the Joseph Smith version of the Bible and did not treat it very well, if I recall my history accurately. We still have notable bits and pieces, included among the footnotes of our version of the King James Bible, but not the whole thing. (a number of our people also took pains to create a topical guide and a dictionary for our version)
Basically, we treat the Bible as the word of God, insofar as we can rely on an accurate translation. We seek to understand it better, as well as all of our other scriptures, through regular study and discussion. We know we don’t know everything, and we often do find reason to adjust points of out belief here and there. The core of it, however, is that God is real, that we are His children, that we have a purpose in this life, and we strive to serve Him to the best of our ability. So long as the core remains, we can patiently wait and work to illuminate the rest.
9) Heh, I suppose I would put the notion of many creators as an extension of their being one creator. Like, say, an entire crew that works together to build something. That’s another point which is mentioned in the texts of my religion, that at least some of us were actually involved in the creation of this world when we were only spirits.
But to answer your question: yes, I believe that would be fair. 🙂
10) I have not yet looked into this further, but you’ve got me thinking about it now, so I probably will at some point. 😉
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2) I never thought about Disney or Marvel films challenging beliefs! In the most recent Thor movie Gods are not portrayed as very nice. At least they made the wise decision to not include Yahweh as one of the Gods, or to make him a superhero haha.I’ll just take your word for it here. I think particularly in evangelical groups you are deliberately seeking people who disagree with you. LDS like to do this a lot, so I get where you’re coming from.
4) Yeah, I thought that might be the case! At any rate, racking my brain to try and find things which would disprove the sun to me gave me a better idea of how strong your belief is. That’s fair, and I struggle to know what would convince me either. Luckily, if I am wrong and there is a God that exists, he would know what it would take to convince me. If God is testable and observable, I look forward to the results from experiments in this area!
8) I know Greek is really difficult. I didn’t necessarily mean learning it, but rather trying to work your way through it with a dictionary, both of course are not easy.
The King James bible has a really interesting history! It was intended to take from many different translations available, but it ended up using 90% William Tyndalle’s translation. There’s a really interesting lecture on this I can share with you if you’re interested. I have heard that this translation was great for the time, however with it being written in 1611, we have found a lot more old copies of different bible passages which make other translations more reliable in my opinion.
If I was really trying to find exact meaning I would try going to the Greek (or other language for books not in the new testament) but I generally like the English Standard Version which not many (as far as I can tell) seem to have problems with.
I get that the core idea of the bible being central means that you are willing to accept the overall message, without necessarily being absorbed in the details at the Greek level haha.
9) Awesome, I’m glad we can agree on that. The question then becomes should we choose to put our faith in God? I’ve been thinking about this question recently more than normal, and it will probably manifest itself in a blog post, so only respond to this if you really want to, but I’m not so sure that faith is a useful way to find truth.
10) Amazing! If you do look into it more I’d love to hear your thoughts. It doesn’t even have to be here, you could just send me a link or find me on Twitter instead.
Great to hear back from you, thanks for continuing the discussion.
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Refutation #2 Whether Christians live in a filter bubble.
This is false. Jesus’ final command was to “make disciples of all nations.” The Church calls this the “great commission.” Therefore, mixing it up with non-Christians is in the DNA of Christianity. Further, in our present barbarian Philistine culture, it is impossible for Christians to live in a filter bubble unless they lock themselves in a dark room with no access to the outside world. The media, public education, government, entertainment, corporate America routinely confront Christians as they go about their daily lives.
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I never claimed that all Christians did live in a filter bubble. It seems very obvious to me that you’re not in a filter bubble, as you’re here talking to me.
Yes there is absolutely scripture telling people not to stay in a filter bubble (although not in those words), completely agreed with that point there.
I didn’t realise people confronted Christians about their beliefs in their daily life in America. That’s so interesting because it’s not really a thing here in the UK.
Maybe I didn’t define a filter bubble as clearly as I should have done, as you can be in a filter bubble and still hear about atheist beliefs, the main distinction is the source you hear it from. For example hearing about atheism from an anti-atheism source e.g. biased news network is still inside a filter bubble, whereas hearing atheism from a pro-atheism news source isn’t.
So within the media, it just depends where you get your information from. Of course entertainment can contain pro-atheist material, but people can choose to avoid all kinds of entertainment which may be against their views.
I still largely agree with you, it is completely false that all Christians live in a filter bubble, and filter bubbles can be broken naturally just through daily life.
When I was a Christian, I didn’t really care about this passage from the bible, nor did I get any exposure to atheist ideas really from within the UK, and only heard from pro-Christian sources. Like I might hear a quote from Richard Dawkins followed by a 45 minute sermon discrediting him, this is still in a filter bubble as there’s no chance for Dawkins to defend himself, or give his 45 minutes in support of the statement. It wouldn’t surprise me if there are others who are like I was. You can dispute the other things I said, but you do not know more about me than I do. I promise I was in a filter bubble as a Christian. Maybe I was the only Christian in the world inside a filter bubble, but the fact that I was in a filter bubble made me interested enough to ask people the question. And I actually I do have another Christian friend who said he was in a filter bubble, and is really trying hard to get out of it.
I define a filter bubble much more loosely than I think you do. Imagine someone in every aspect of their lives getting information only from sources that support their view, someone stopping them to tell them they’re wrong on the street doesn’t break the bubble. Attitude towards finding information is also highly relevant to a filter bubble. I would still probably say that someone who only got opinions against their views if it was unwanted and unavoidable is still in a filter bubble.
Thanks for your thoughts. I’m really glad I could clarify my position, and also explain further what I mean by the expression “Filter Bubble”
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The thing to understand about Christians is that we are not only challenged by the outside world but also by our own minds and bodies due to our own fallen human nature. So it is absolutely necessary for us to be engaged with the Gospel as much as possible. This means hanging out with other Christians and reading and studying the Bible as much as possible.
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Hi SOM! Yes, that makes a lot of sense. You could say that doubt is kind of like the word used for internal challenge. Because of how I define a filter bubble, I still wouldn’t say that internal doubt contributes, although this is only really a semantic difference probably not worth talking about.
There is nothing wrong with immersing yourself in the Gospel. I really don’t want Christians to exclusively look at things that disagree with them, that would be ridiculous haha. This may surprise you, but I also try to study the gospels, and read them now more than I ever did when I was a Christian. I guess it goes to show that not all Christians do the same things.
I do wonder though, why specifically the gospels? For example what if a Hindu was to say “It is absolutely necessary for us to be engaged with the Vedas as much as possible, hanging out with other Hindu’s and studying our important texts”
If Christianity is true, the Hindu’s have the correct problem, but not the correct solution. They have begged the question by assuming that the Vedas are the source of truth first, and then immersing themselves in it in order to solve doubt.
Of course you know that I think saying the gospels are truth first is also begging the question. So I really want to know, what is the difference here?
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Ross, I refuse to post the dictionary definition because it would be a waste of time. It has been for all atheist I’ve conversed with. You are no different. I’ll come back later and refute another item in your list.
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Hey, you keep using my name but I’m not sure what I should call you?
I agree that brining it up may be a waste of time; it sounds like you’ve brought it up before with other atheists and there’s probably nothing I could say which they haven’t said already.
If we assume that Christianity is true, can we both agree that nobody should be convinced to believe it based on bad reasons? If someone’s reasons are bad they will always think it’s a waste of time arguing because nobody should be convinced by those reasons.
Can we also agree that a good reason is true and can be argued for adequately against criticism? If so, I would love to hear the arguments against my objections as I don’t want to believe the wrong thing at all.
To this extent I don’t think it’s a waste of time to have conversations like these. First of all it’s just fun for me, and enjoyment is as good a reason as any to do this. I would also encourage you that getting the best out of conversations like these means being open and considerate towards the evidence. It is not you with one unchanging opinion trying to change someone else’s mind, it’s both people being open to change if we are given good reasons.
It’s probably too high expectations to try to fully convert someone, the best I ever hope for really is to plant a seed, or to identify poor arguments which shouldn’t be used anymore. A poor argument doesn’t automatically mean that the position is wrong, just that it shouldn’t be used to defend the position.
I really appreciate you engaging with my questions! I see you’ve already written a response to a different question, so I’ll look at that now.
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Atheists refer to me as SOM here on Word Press.
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I never claimed you used faith to reach your conclusions. It is a fact that since atheism cannot be proven, than by definition it is not fact based but faith based.
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Ah, my bad. I made the mistake because when you said “atheist is a 100% faith-based belief” it felt like you were saying I was using faith to reach my conclusions. If you acknowledge that I didn’t use faith in my reasoning, I’m wondering how a belief can be 100% faith based if those who believe it don’t use it to reach our conclusions?
“It is a fact that since atheism cannot be proven, than by definition it is not fact based but faith based.” If this is how you decide to define “faith based” there’s not much I can do but disagree with the definition. I can only really point out that since Christianity can’t be proven then by definition it is not fact based but faith based.
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I don’t define faith, the dictionary does. You just proved my point about atheists’ limitless skepticism. It is your atheist narrative that counts regardless of facts, reasoning and proof. That is what 100% faith looks like. You are the very thing you criticize in other religions.
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“I don’t define faith, the dictionary does” congrats for just defining it in a way completely different to what it is in the dictionary. If this is true, never say “It is a fact that since atheism cannot be proven, than by definition it is not fact based but faith based.” again.
“It is your atheist narrative that counts regardless of facts, reasoning and proof.” – You do realise that evidence against your pre-existing beliefs is still evidence? Atheism only counts because of facts, reasoning and proof, which is the only thing I’ve been interested in talking to you about. What have I been ignoring? I’ve always tried to make it clear that I’m willing to change my opinion based on facts, reasoning and proof. If I’m wrong, I want to find out. Meanwhile you’ve not discussed a single piece of evidence I’ve brought to you, which is the very definition of ignoring facts, reasoning and proof.
I don’t care about narrative, I care about finding what’s right. It’s not a good look to ignore all the evidence I’ve given you and then accuse me of ignoring the evidence without presenting any of your own.
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Atheism cannot be proven?
SOM my old friend your coattails of indoctrination and disingenuity are once again flapping in the wind.
Atheism:the lack of belief in gods; your god, YHWH and every other man-made deity.
As you assert there is a creator god then the onus is as always in you to provide evidence.
As we all need a smile at least once a day let’s see you if you avoid being a complete Christian Nob and for once provide evidence for YHWH.
The floor is yours, take it away Maestro.
😎
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Ark, the lack of belief in God cannot be proven. It is simple personal opinion which may or may not be true. Therefore, atheism is 100% faith-based. That is simple logic. Were your mind the least bit logical you would not be an atheist.
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A lack of belief in anything does not require proof. Such an assertion is idiotic at the least
The theist makes the positive claim – “There is a god called Yahweh”.
I have no belief in this claim as no evidence has ever been produced.
Again, as always, the onus is on you to provide evidence ( ‘proof’ sic) of your claim.
Away you go….
Evidence please.
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Ark, You must be able to argue the case for your lack of belief in God. There is plenty of evidence and plenty of proof which I have explained to you many times. No evidence is ever good enough for you and you haven’t the ability to understand a scientific proof. Consequently, you are an atheist by faith alone.
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I lack belief not because “no evidence is ever good enough” but rather no evidence has ever been presented.
Claims, whether written or otherwise remain claims unless they can be supported.
To date you and nobody else has ever presented evidence.
So, once again if you claim to have evidence of the veracity of the existence of your god, Yahweh, then please, I urge you to present it and we can examine it like mature adults.
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Already addressed many times. Ark you are either an imbecile or you don’t bother to read the comments and respond with a preprogrammed list of bilge.
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And once again, you hand wave and deflect,a sure sign of cowardice.
If you had evidence it would be a straightforward exercise and you would present it here, or, at the very least, provide links to these copious articles you claim you have written that provided this evidence.
I call BS on your whining.
You have no evidence and have never provided any.
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Ark, Again with the preprogrammed response. You are like a little atheist bot troll that says the same things as response to every comment.
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As you,the apologist are.
Stop equivocating and simply provide a link…any link…to the evidence you claim to have posted, I will pop over and read it and we can discuss it.
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Already done many times. Providing you links was a waste of time all those times in the past and it is a waste of time now.
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Then you obviously have no evidence,merely apolgetic claims, as I have always maintained.
Ergo, your beliefs are based on faith largely influenced via cultural indoctrination.
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Hi SOM and Ark, thanks for commenting on my post! It seems clear that you disagree on what roles people should have in this debate. SOM says you should justify your non-belief while Ark says you should justify your belief.
SOM, is your position that both belief and non-belief need to be justified? Say if someone came up to you saying that there was a flying teapot orbiting the sun, you would have to justify your non-belief just as much as the other person justifying their belief? Or is this attitude towards debates just limited to religious ones?
I may just be reading too much into it when you said “Ark, you must be able to argue the case for your lack of belief in God” and if so, please let me know.
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There is a fair amount of history between SOM and myself as well as a number of non-believers over the years.
Equivocation is somewhat of a by-word for all these apolgetic types,who have little grasp of why actual evidence is.
The onus is, as always, on the one making the positive claim.
SOM will never present evidence for his claims anymore than a shyster such as McDowell or Craig.
Their evidence(sic) is nothing more than unsubstantiated claims based on presuppostional
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…beliefs.
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Yeah I get what you mean. I’ve said to him several times that these are just assertions, and whatever is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence and I haven’t been shown any convincing follow-up.
The sad thing is that I would really like to see evidence, which is why I’m willing to go so far to have a discussion.
Craig and McDowell seem to have arguments, and I guess Craig’s minimal facts argument would count as evidence too but the key is that the evidence needs to be convincing, instead of just present. For example the observation that the Earth appears flat when you look outside is evidence for a flat Earth, but it is still incredibly unconvincing.
SOM did make an interesting point about reasonableness of the point having the need for the burden of proof. For example a lack of belief in the sun may need to be argued for when it is so reasonable that the sun is real. Of course this is no help at all when nobody can agree on what is reasonable, but in some cases, do you see this as a potentially good way of continuing the discussion?
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Evidence is the only thing I am interested in when discussing with Christians and ultimately it is the one thing they never ever produce.
At that point they will always resort to trying to bring the non believer down to their level labelling atheism as a religion and claiming atheists live by faith.
Most are disingenious and / or blithely ignorant of the history of their religion.
And every deconvert I have ever dialogued with has generally supported these assertions.
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Yeah it’s odd. You can sometimes go through all the motions of explaining why something is mistaken only to have them say the conversation was a waste of time because it didn’t convince you. I really don’t want those kinds of conversations.
I used to blog about something else before religion, so most of my conversations online have been with people I knew before which is a good foundation for discussion, which really does avoid the things you’ve complained about here.
The disingenuous/ignorant/down to their level things come across as very ‘Angry atheist phase’ – I’ve been there myself so I get it. From my experience saying these kinds of things are a fast track to having these shouting matches and awful conversations come up that you’ve mentioned.
Have you heard of Anthony Magnabosco? His videos seriously helped me to have better conversations with believers, I really recommend it if you are interested as I can seriously relate to what you’re talking about.
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Ross, The existence of God is not a flying teapot. Such a comparison is a logical fallacy called comparing apples and oranges. The existence of God can be determined through reason. The teapot argument is nonsense. Comparing the reasonable with nonsense is a logical fallacy that atheists use all the time.
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I’m not asking you to think about the teapot as if it’s the same as God, I’m just asking who has what role in the debate. Are the roles and requirements different when you are talking about religion instead of the teapot?
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Ross, the roles are determined by the reasonableness or absurdity of the proposition being presented. Evidence for God’s existence has been around for thousands of years. I have added to the field by introducing scientific proof of God’s existence. Therefore, Ark’s obstinence is trollish especially since, over many years I have presented him with plenty of evidence that is never good enough for him or with scientific proof that he is intellectually incapable of understanding. He has stock replies for any comment which makes him a waste of time ordinarily. I use him as a foil to demonstrate that atheism turns the normally intelligent human being someone who is deeply irrational.
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That’s interesting. The teapot analogy is often used to show who has the burden of proof, but I see that reasonableness is maybe a better way to define roles. An example we could probably agree with is that a lack of belief in a spherical Earth would need to be justified.
For topics more nuanced where reasonableness one way or another is difficult to justify, how can we establish who needs to play the role of evidence giver? It feels right that in some cases arguments from both side are a requirement.
Needless to say, some people view different ideas at different levels of reasonableness. To non-believers including me, the notion of God is absurd, and would therefore need to be proven by someone else. To you, the opposite is true. When people disagree like this, how can we move forward? Maybe it’s best to just put our ideas forward to try and argue our case instead of giving someone a burden of proof or a role they think don’t think they should have?
It would be interesting to know your thoughts SOM.
I really don’t know Ark well enough to comment on how he acts and argues. But I’ve not seen any of the scientific articles you mentioned. If you send a link maybe I could better understand what you mean when you are talking about Ark always saying the same thing?
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Jesus sent the Holy Spirit according to his promise. After the Ascension, Jesus ministry on earth was finished.
As I stated previously, atheist is a 100% faith-based belief based on skepticism without limit. That means atheism is a failure of reason and thus, atheists will always use excuses like “lack of historicity,” “lack of evidence,” to justify endless skepticism. In fact, Jesus and his Christian religion are historical. Christian Western Civilization is proof of that fact.
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Please point out the places where I have used faith to reach my conclusions, I really try to avoid doing this so it would be great to know. I will keep talking about this because I enjoy it, so I would rather know my mistakes now than realise them in a few years time!
Why on Earth is “lack of evidence” and “lack of history” a bad reason to not believe something? I don’t see how it’s an excuse at all. When we are looking at the evidence and historicity, we are trying to piece together the most likely events, not just find a way to dismiss religious claims.
Evidence is how we find truth, so lacking it means there’s a greater chance of it being false. I would describe faith as belief without evidence, since I’ve repeatedly been referring to evidence, I don’t get why my position is 100% faith based either.
“Jesus and his Christian religion are historical” – agreed. I believe Jesus was a real person, and that Christianity has existed since his death – the field of History shows that, you don’t even need to go to modern civilisations – I just don’t think that the miracles are true. You don’t believe in the miracle claims of other religions, so it seems certain that religions can emerge and gain mass following despite originally not being true, which also makes me think it’s possible for Christianity to emerge in this way.
Can you give a more detailed explanation of how Christian Western Civilization proves this? I mainly want to understand why you think this as your reasons aren’t clear to me. If we’re talking about arguments based on numbers, Christianity is in the vast minority, with the majority alive today disagreeing with it (Something like 2.5 billion / 8 billion).
This line of argument has proved unfortunate in the past as well. There used to be 100% consensus that the sun orbited the Earth, yet it turned out everyone was wrong, showing that even if lots of people believe it, it’s not automatically true.
Thanks for your thoughts, it was quite enlightening to see your reasoning, and also where we differed in our approach to finding truth.
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Question 10 is error. At Pentecost the Holy Spirit descended upon the Apostles and gave them the charism of languages. The myriad of witnesses from all over the Mediterranean, North Africa and the Near East remarked how they could understand Aramaic speaking Jews, speaking in all the languages of the Empire. Christian was in fact the answer to what Hellenized Greek culture had been seeking for centuries: Logos, the source of all reality, the intermediary between human physical reality and God the source of all being.
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I’ve never heard this argument put forward, so it’s great to see it! Jesus wasn’t at the Pentecost – he had already ascended by the time, so if this event did happen, I don’t get how Jesus would have gained this ability to speak more languages than Aramaic.
What basis do you have to say that this event is historical? It only appears in one gospel, which is written at least 50 years after the death of Jesus, and there were witnesses at the time who saw it, and laughed, saying they were drunk. If people even at the time of the event didn’t think this miracle happened, how can we establish this event as historical?
Christianity did take off pretty quickly, so I wouldn’t dispute that learning about God was very valuable to the Greeks, and that they believed it was their logos.
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Pentecost is in the New Testament, the Book of Acts. The Pentecost is a major Christian feast day, celebrated every year 49 days after Easter. Jesus promised the Apostles that after he died he would send them the Holy Spirit. This is also in the New Testament, prominently.
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What did you think about the idea of Jesus not being at Pentecost?
I don’t think this is a great basis for establishing historicity. Pentecost being celebrated doesn’t make the original event more reliable, it just shows that more people later believed it, and started celebrating it. It’s also not impressive to predict something in a book written by an author who already knows what the story will be, living after the event took place. That’s like prophesying that you will order Steak at a restaurant, and then ordering Steak – you have control over all aspects of the prophesy.
A lack of agreement on this event between the other gospels is a really strong point against the historicity of this event. This was supposed to be a major event that took place really close to the death of Jesus, meaning that it had already happened by the time Mark was written 30 years after the death of Jesus… and was somehow not included. Why? Isn’t this important?
This event emerging 20 years after our first recorded claims of the resurrection of Jesus just adds value to the legend hypothesis. Luke was written 50 years after the death of Jesus (at a minimum) which is an amount of time smaller than the average life expectancy at the time, meaning that it’s probably not a first hand witness. To further support this, it was written in a completely different language to what the disciples spoke.
You may think that this doesn’t matter as the holy spirit taught them new languages, but actually it does, because the disciples could not even write in their own language, nevermind a different one. Literacy was so poor in ancient times. Most could not read. To be able to write simply meant having the ability to copy someone else’s sentences, not actually writing and composing your own sentences, which required a much higher level of education. Further evidence that the gospel writers had access to information disciples didn’t have is through the work of Dr Dennis MacDonald who traces specific gospel traditions to Homer, which only educated scholars would have had access to.
So we’re talking about an event not reported by witnesses (most likely composed from the oral tradition which is very subject to change) 50 years after the event itself, without collaboration from other sources, from anonymous writers. It’s also about the supernatural, which for all we know may be impossible.
The Pentecost is not historical consensus among scholars, even Christian scholars who have researched the subject more than I have. So although I see why you disagree, I can’t accept that saying the disciples spoke Aramaic is an error, as the Pentecost is far from a historical event.
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Acts is regarded as historically unreliable by almost all modern biblical scholars.
In other words, historical fiction.
Only indoctrinated fundamentalists and shyster apologists still punt it as real history.
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1. Doubt is a failure of reason just as atheism is a failure of reason. Christian doubt however, restrained. Atheist doubt is boundless and unrestrained.
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That’s interesting, in many cases I agree with you. For example there may be a bible passage that someone falsely believes contradict, their doubt is therefore a consequence of a failure to reason. Is your reason for doubt here only intended to apply in the context of religion? I feel the example of doubting if a frozen lake can hold your weight shows that in some contexts doubt is a good thing.
Have you heard of thought control techniques? In case you haven’t I’ll give an example briefly. Scientology often claims that the world is against them, and is willing to lie about them, so they tell Scientology members “Don’t believe anything outsiders say, and don’t research it for yourselves as it can distract you from our cause of making the world a better place” – then as the religion causes more harm, and becomes more crazy, members of the group are prevented from researching the group and accepting evidence against them because they just think they’re lies and don’t want to find out more information, thereby having their thoughts controlled.
To some extent this sounds like a thought control technique to me. For the sake of argument, let’s say that all the arguments against Christianity you’ve encountered so far are failures of reason. When looking at arguments you haven’t heard yet, you may have good reasons to think that it will also be a failure of reason based on your previous experience. But think of it like this: all that anyone really needs to disprove their position is one good argument which is correct and not a failure of reason. Starting with the premise of doubt against your own position is all a failure of reason means that you may miss the argument which is correct. Not just that, but no matter how convincing it seems, or how much evidence there seems to be, when you already have the idea that atheism is a failure of reason, and your doubt is a failure of reason, you will spend you’re whole life looking for arguments or evidence against the argument which simply aren’t there, rather than accepting it.
I’m not at all saying that doubt disproves Christianity, I just think the question of how we treat doubt is so important, especially in religions such as Scientology which are often very exploitative towards its members.
“Atheist doubt is boundless and unrestrained.” – I suppose specifically in the context of Religion I don’t disagree with this, fully doubting the concept of religion is what Atheism kind of is haha. I suppose I could also say that in the context of Atheism, Christian doubt is boundless and unrestrained, except when Christians start to doubt Christianity.
Thanks for your thoughts. These questions are really important to me so it’s great you took the time to answer them. Sorry for being so long-winded haha.
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Sadly, because of your Indoctrination, you leave no room for doubt and blindly accept the filth of Christianity.
You could do far worse than watch Seth Andrews’ video:
How Christianity Made Me Talk Like an Idiot.
I guarantee you will relate, SOM.
It’s on YouTube.
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#3 also is a problem since Christians are sure that other Christians aren’t “really” Christian. So, the numbers go way way down. Christianity ceases to be a major world religion.
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I hadn’t thought about that! When differentiating Christians from “True Christians” it’s impossible to know how large the religion actually is.
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Yep, there is no way to know at all. But from observation, it would seem to be quite small since each sect is quite sure that the rest are liars.
The bible does say that we should be able to tell who the TrueChristians(tm) are, by their ability to do miracles and get any prayers answered, but alas for them, they seem to be having a little problem with that. 🙂
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Yeah. I’ve seen a lot of sects say that all other sects are not true Christians. To be honest I’m willing to take someone at their word and trust that they are a true Christian if they say they are. It’s so strange to me that some Christians can’t even do that.
Yeah, what bible passage is that? It would be useful to know – and yes, no conclusive miracles to the best of my knowledge, so maybe there are no true Christians either?
There’s also that idea of “You will know them by their fruits” – so are true Christians those who claim to be Christians, and also have the fruits? It would remove a lot of famous Christians I can think of but at least this definition would make at least some Christians true Christians.
It’s not really for me to define I suppose. Now it just feels ridiculous that a non-believer is defining what a true Christian should be haha. I’m happy to leave this question to those who believe it.
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I also take Christians at their word since there is no other way to know who is a Christian since the promises in the bible are evidently lies. Those bible passages are the following:
“16 The one who believes and is baptized will be saved, but the one who does not believe will be condemned. 17 And these signs will accompany those who believe: by using my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; 18 they will pick up snakes,[e] and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”” Mark 16
“7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 9 Is there anyone among you who, if your child asked for bread, would give a stone? 10 Or if the child asked for a fish, would give a snake? 11 If you, then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” Matthew 7
“19 Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. 20 For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”” Matthew 18
22 Jesus answered them, “Have faith in God. 23 Truly I tell you, if you say to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and if you do not doubt in your heart but believe that what you say will come to pass, it will be done for you. 24 So I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” Mark 11
“12 Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. 13 I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 If in my name you ask me[f] for anything, I will do it.” John 14
“7 If you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.” John 15
“13 Are any among you suffering? They should pray. Are any cheerful? They should sing songs of praise. 14 Are any among you sick? They should call for the elders of the church and have them pray over them, anointing them with oil in the name of the Lord. 15 The prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise them up, and anyone who has committed sins will be forgiven. 16 Therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, so that you may be healed. The prayer of the righteous is powerful and effective. 17 Elijah was a human like us, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. 18 Then he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth yielded its harvest.” James 5
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Awesome, thanks for sharing so many!
A Christian would accept these, but the first one in Mark 16 is actually a forgery added to Mark much later so I wouldn’t accept that.
The one about two people agreeing on something and then praying is an interesting one. But if it’s true it’s quite dangerous, so I could imagine two people praying together asking for this method of prayer to not always be granted, which is technically a valid reason a Christian can say for why this kind of prayer doesn’t work anymore.
But all the others are great, and I see where you’re getting at. Thanks!
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Christians don’t agree if that is a forgery or not.
Yep, the bible doesn’t make a whole lot of sense since it was written by many unknown people at various times for various reasons.
It isn’t a “technically valid reason” at all, Rossiroad. It’s an excuse invented to ignore how this god never answers prayers. You have invented quite a circular firing squad of praying Christians. 🙂
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Agreed.
This wasn’t actually invented by me at all. I don’t know who invented it but it was introduced to me through Matt Dillahunty. It’s not intended to be an excuse for why god never answers prayers, it’s a technically valid reason why there isn’t a 100% success rate when two people pray together, as described in the passage, nothing else. There is no excuse for why God doesn’t answer prayers, well, only bad ones.
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Yep, there is no excuse why promises in the bible fail. I am curious where Matt mentioned this. Do you have a source?
Per the bible, there should be a 100% success rate. One would have to assume that this god would agree with stopping answering prayers, a suggesting by a puny human. 🙂
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You know I was actually looking for this again, and went through an hour or so of videos, but I couldn’t find it. He mentions the passage in the video “Nothing Fails like Prayer” but he doesn’t talk about this argument. So not really sure, I’ll keep on looking and let you know if I find anything!
Haha, it’s kind of funny when you seriously think about the consequences of that bible passage. What if a God did exist, and then two people prayed that a God didn’t exist, he would then have to kill himself. The bible passage literally states “if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you” so there could be so many things that could go wrong here, and completely agreed, being willing to do anything that two people ask regardless of what it is is such an unlikely thing for a God to promise.
To clarify the argument it isn’t to 100% stop answering prayers, but to not answer 100% of prayers with a “yes” just because two people agreed on it. I’m sure you knew this, but I’m just clarifying for anyone else looking back at this comment chain.
100% is promised by a few bible passages, thankfully it seems all Christians have much more realistic expectations than that at least.
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Yep, the promises in the bible are really that stupid. They were written by the ignorant.
So much for the bible being influenced or written by a “perfect” being. Just those contradictions make claims about the bible lies.
Christians have indeed made up all sorts of excuses on why their god fails.
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