Winners and losers
Jordan writes: "Steve can do better than that, I hope. He will lose by continuing to equate Islam with Christianity when attempting to discredit Christianity."
This is not a debate that anyone should lose. If we are both open-minded and carry on to the end then there can only be winners. At the very least we may both learn something about the richness and diversity of research into the history of Christianity - a fascinating subject, whatever our religious beliefs. The real winner though is the one of us who is wrong and comes to realise it. If I am wrong and realise it then according to Christians I will find Jesus, the greatest prize of all. If Jordan is wrong and realises it, then he will find the real world open up with much amazement in store, as is constantly testified by ex-Christians (see quotes). I can imagine Christians thinking "we all know who Steve thinks is wrong!" Well, of course I think I am right - I can only belive what convinces me, but if I'm not right then I genuinely want to know, just as I did when I was a Christian, which was the opening of the door that led me out. Ex-Christians report much greater mental health and happiness after deconversion and the dust has settled. Despite being told how terrible life without Christianity is, this is not what ex-Christians find, rather quite the opposite. Christians really have nothing to fear if they are wrong, other than the reaction of some of the "loving Christians" around them. The only way to lose is to squander opportunity to learn by being dogmatic and uncharitable. One of us has a profoundly mistaken view of the world and I really hope that whoever it is does not rest on what they have come to think or devalue those who think differently, but rather continues to scrutinise their own world view as well as that of others. Whilst I regard it as unhealthy to jump through hoops for anyone, at the same time it is irresponsible, and hardly charitable, to be quickly dismissive of and sarcastic to other views. Last week a fundamentalist Christian was bellowing at me, red in the face and shaking with anger whilst attempting to persuade me that homosexuality is un-natural. Even then I gave him time and listened to him. I asked him to calm down whilst I went through his arguments, tried to find the root of his ideas and presented my thoughts. I try to be civilised on my site so I hope that any Christians reading will at the very least enjoy the opportunity to stretch some brain-cells with me and not get angry.
When doctrine becomes more important than spirituality, loving behaviour and charitable acts, then Christianity looks pretty hollow and I wonder why anyone even bothers to call it a religion. If the evidence is so good then priests, missionaries and hosts of well-churched Christians would not be deconverting. Also, if evidence was important for convincing ex and non-Christians then a god could obviously convince them very easily. However, Dietrich Bonhoeffer said that "to ask for faith in the way that many people do" (i.e. want evidence) "is to ask for a prouder God than He who became our brother in the cradle and on the cross." As such I think pounding ancient history, desperately trying to find flaws in evolution and all the other behaviour of demanding evangelists are way off even the religious mark. If the Christian god wanted to make us Christians by the weight of evidence then he could easily do it. I fail to see how Christians can be doing "God's work" by taking up the task of trying to convince us when the Christian god himself does not seem too concerned about doing this. Frequently we poor atheists watch in bewilderment as some Christians strenuously try to shore their god up, like abused wives making excuses for their negligent (e.g. the holocaust) and violent (e.g. hell) husbands, all the time convincing themselves that it is they, who are at fault in the relationship - unworthy sinners, estranged from God, deserving of unrelenting torture unless they accept the "damnable syllogism" of the atonement [ref].
Even within the Christian tradition itself, seriously confronting hard questions, even to the extent of loss of belief, has been seen as extremely important spiritual growth, all the way from St. John of the Cross and his "Dark Night of the Soul" to the writings of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and eventually Don Cupitt et al. St. Therese of Lisieux basically lost her belief in God during her last 18 months. She came to "eat at the table of unbelievers" as she put it. She also described how much purer her feeling of love was when unsupported by the promise of future joy and glory. Eckhart famously wrote "Man's last and highest parting occurs when, for God's sake, he takes leave of God." From the reflections of the ex-Christians I have known, it seems to me that there is a crass unspirituality in the literal and somewhat material beliefs about the supernatural that much popular bible-believing Christianity consists of - "God" being another "fact of the world" that we must "face up to!" The religious mystics and geniuses of the past have seen beyond this. Now that atheism is not illegal or punishable by slow torture, what was a great discovery for the ancients going against the overpowering views of their times is a commonplace discovery for many of us who have "fallen from grace" and are able to reflect on this.
Please read my guest essay.
Update *New* 22nd March 2002
What Jordan and Steve are up to now...
We're looking into the common grave hypothesis - see a sneak preview.
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