So I was talking to a Christian mother whose daughter is an atheist and sure to go to hell. I asked her if she's praying for Jesus to return to earth soon. She says yes, every day, and she thinks he'll come back soon too.
Duh. Where is the compassion when it comes to faith? Wouldn't the reasonable thing to do is pray that Jesus does NOT return soon so her daughter might come to repentance and be saved? Are believers brain dead or something?
For two years I worshipped with and studied the Baha'is. They are a group who believe that they originated from direct revelation by god. However their guardian, Shogghi Effendi, acknowledges, "A handful of students, belonging to the Shaykhi school, sprung from the Ithna-'Ashariyyih sect of Shi`ah Islam."
This is a weak argument concerning theodicy that is meant to address the premises of an ontological argument for god. It requires one to look at the attributes of god before they are assumed for the ontological argument itself. It focuses on "capability" rather than omnipotence:
I sadly learned that a team member here at DC has died. I feel a great sorrow for this since Tommy G. Baker had so much more to share. There are six posts of his that I have yet to release and will do so one at a time this week. So he will speak from the grave. But first I'll share what he told me when I asked him to join DC and also link to his previous posts:
I'm doing the copy-edits for the revised book, Why I Became an Atheist, and also co-writing the book with Dr. Randal Rauser. Use the comments section below to provide some interesting links. Cheers.
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I have extensively read both atheist and Christian literature, their blogs, journals and books, along with listening to their videos and podcasts. What I have discovered is that most people are preaching to the choir. They do not step inside each others shoes to understand where they are coming from. They do not meet on common ground, assume common assumptions, and common understandings. They are talking past one another like ships that proverbially pass each other in the night. Instead, they are speaking to people on their own side more than anything else, who seek to confirm what they have already come to accept. There is a time and a place for this, I admit. But I see it almost everywhere I look. More often than not each side speaks from a position without trying to really understand the position of the people they are trying to reach. I’ve thought a lot about this, so in the interest of starting up this conversation let me offer ten ways how to resist preaching to the choir, with specific reference to how skeptics/atheists can do this.
I doubt it, not the way it's going. Evangelical Christians are being forced to retreat from our culture. Many of them prefer home-schooling. And given the entertainment industry I doubt they can watch many TV programs that make the rest of us laugh. I have mixed feelings about this since some of the stuff is getting pretty raunchy, like the CBS sitcom "Two and a Half Men" (linked below). But if pop culture continues headed in this direction then evangelicals might as well become Amish in their way of life to maintain their moral purity. Or, if they are watching, then their morals will continue changing and with it so will their theology.
I've liked this quote by GK Chesterton from the day I read it. Doing something badly is at least doing something productive, if what you're doing is the right thing to do. It's better than not attempting something at all. At least you will learn from your efforts. All of the most important things we learned to do we started out doing them badly, like walking, talking, singing, dancing and riding a bicycle. You improve as you go. You cannot improve until you start. You begin by starting out badly. You have to be willing to fail, sometimes often, to achieve what you want to. So if you decide to do something, anything, be prepared to start out by doing it badly. If you wait until you can do something perfectly you'll do nothing at all.
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