Apologetics

[mahf]

Last weekend I went to a conference (although I hesitate to call it that since there were only about 20 of us there) in Jacksonville. It was the First Annual Faith and Functionality Conference to be exact. It was a great trip. I had a lot of fun at the conference as well as just shootin’ the bull with my friend Nick

Comments

[mahf]

Well, in most arenas of human thought, philosophy and theology included, people typically put forth ideas, and then other people criticize them. The response is usually called a defense. The point is to arrive at reasonable conclusions. Either way, there have been plenty of attacks on Christianity and most belief systems in general.

People generally prefer to think that they hold beliefs for reasons rather than that they believe arbitrarily or because "they just do." If we're honest, we have to admit that the reasons we believe what we do are complex, and we are only aware of some of them, while others lie below the surface in our subconscious. Even so, we still do our best to come up with good reasons for believing what we do. It seems to be a general assumption that its better to believe something that makes some sort of sense than to believe something nonsensical. So I try both for myself and for others to engage in dialogue over beliefs. I think its better for me and for them.

I find your view very pessimistic as well as contrary to experience if you think nobody changes their mind because of dialogue. I've done it many, many times over the course of my life. Not only so, but I've seen many other people do it to. Certain settings are helpful towards that possibility and certain settings are not.

For example, part of the point of what I wrote here is that we can't expect to communicate things solely by logic when logic isn't the whole story. We have to get down the level of conversation about why we choose the paradigm we do, and what the results are of that paradigm. We have to ask ourselves why we believe what we do, and admit that it can't be communicated via arguments. It can only be communicated in honest and open conversation in which both sides are trying to understand the other and neither is trying to "win" or "attack" or "defend."