Round Three
This exchange has brought to mind the saying of Thomas Paine, "Reasoning with one who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead." If through technology we could someday revive the dead to health, what might this suggest about Paine's assertion? I'm not sure where this metaphorical connection is going to lead. But here is the continuation, and probably the finale, of the correspondence with a radio preacher.
This is Mr. Thomas' third reply.
Matt,
Please give me the evidence that you were "betrayed", or that by raising my children according to Biblical truth is I'm betraying them. Show me the evidence that God does not exist. Show me the evidence that God has not created this world, me or you. OK, it is probably unfair of me to ask you to prove the negative. Show me the evidence that technology will eventually cause people to cease to die.
What is evidence, anyway. In a court of law, evidence is that which substantiates or contradicts the charge. People far more intelligent than I...C.S. Lewis and Lee Strobel come to mind...charged that there is no God, that the Bible is a fairytale, and, similar to your charge, that believers simply play mind games with themselves or, worse, are mindless followers of a hoax. So convinced were they, and thousands of others, that they set out to, once and for all, debunk the Bible and, in turn, this pesky thing called Christianity. The results of their putting the Bible on trial? "Mere Christianity" and "The Case for Christ"...two of the many definitive sources for evidence, empirical and circumstantial, that validates our "mind games"...our faith.
I don't know which person(s) in your life disappointed you so much as to have caused you to reject God because of their failings. I've seen it often, and it saddens me every time. "My father was a pastor and he left my mom for another woman", "I put my faith in my Priest and he took advantage
of me", "I see those hypocrites who are 'Christians' in church and crooks during the week". Pick your reason, but I'm guessing someone, some human being that you looked to for spiritual leadership, at some point let you down. They failed you, so God must be a joke. Their failings are the evidence that God either does not exist or doesn't care.
I allow for the possibility I could be totally wrong in the above supposition, but I've seen it too often to not consider in a discussion where you appear to get angry, or at least resentful, when you harken back to your days as a young believer. If I'm wrong, I apologize for the supposition. But, if I'm right, I can only offer that you can not judge God by man.
As for why God allows things that seem to make him look "incompetent" (apparently your favorite critical word...one that could easily be turned on you, as in being spiritually incompetent), it's simple. God gives us the freedom to follow or not. We are both exercising that freedom. Just know that either direction has eternal consequences. You are right. Technology is not going to develop in time to significantly extend your life here on earth. Your spirit will live on. The question is, where's it gonna live?
And, you're right. How can we measure the onset, or existence, of spirit? You imply we can't. I emphatically agree. We can't. And, that's my point with regard to human life. Since we can not state, with certainty, the exact moment when spirit, or sentience, or reason begin or end, then we risk killing an actual human being (by anyone's definition...even if those definitions differ), regardless of whether the killing procedure is abortion, euthanasia or stem cell harvesting. I don't know of any worldview, religious or secular, that condones killing of innocent human beings.
Show me the evidence of exactly when whatever measure you use to define human life begins, to the second, and I'll reconsider my position. Without the evidence, your argument falls far short of convincing.
ST
This was my response.
Mr. Thomas,
Your supposition is understandable based on the large number who leave their roots for such reasons. But it's not correct in this case. Leading and teaching people to practice faith as a means of deciding what is true, especially innocent children, is the only betrayal I'm talking about. I'm very forgiving of faith in hapless followers but not in authority figures who have a responsibility. There has been no adultery, no hypocrisy in the pews, or any abuse of the types you describe. There was the abuse of faith.
Let me illustrate. I was once an avid reader of Christian apologetics including Lee Strobel, Francis Schaefer, C.S. Lewis and Hank Hanegraaf. I read a scene in a book by Charles Colson titled "How Now Shall We Live?" In this scene a daughter asks her father, "If you are wrong, and what we beleve isn't true... would you want to know?" That question struck the father to the heart, as it did to me. He told his daughter that he had the honesty and courage to follow the evidence wherever it led, even if it was uncomfortable or difficult to cope with at first. Needless to say, in a book by Chuck Colson they went on together to be convinced of proof for the truth of Christianity, or the story would not have made it into the book. Nevertheless, through apologetics I began to see reason as an ally, not an enemy. It was from them I first learned the attitude that the truth, whatever it might be, had nothing to fear from a fair fight.
I started spouting about how those secularists need to become objective and see the evidence. But shouting "bias" is a double-edged sword because the bible teaches faith. If I could pull the faith card, then I couldn't complain about anybody from other religions pulling it too. If my feelings of peace, joy and salvation had been given to me by God, what are those of other religions? Just brain activity with no outside source? Or is the source satanic? Why theirs and not mine? If it is intrinsically virtuous to accept faith claims without question, why is it wrong for those with faith claims other than my own?
This shamed me. I had exploited reason only far enough to let me discard it. Since then I've investigated without the help of apologists, and the results were devastating to their arguments. I could provide all the evidence that I have, volume after volume of point-by-point refutations for books by Strobel and Lewis. But you and I would be dodging the point: Why should I waste my time offering it to you when you can call it off, say "nevermind" and deny it all by faith? This is the abuse of faith I was referring to. The fact that your bible tells you to do this is all the evidence anyone should need to reject the notion that it's divine. You would play the game of debating evidence as long as you feel it gives the upper hand, then switch to faith when you start losing. But we have seen through you now, as I hope your children will someday do with our help. There is a growing recognition in the post-911 America that pulling the faith card is cheating in exactly that way.
We've gotten to the heart of it all.
-Matt
This is Mr. Thomas' third reply.
Matt,
Please give me the evidence that you were "betrayed", or that by raising my children according to Biblical truth is I'm betraying them. Show me the evidence that God does not exist. Show me the evidence that God has not created this world, me or you. OK, it is probably unfair of me to ask you to prove the negative. Show me the evidence that technology will eventually cause people to cease to die.
What is evidence, anyway. In a court of law, evidence is that which substantiates or contradicts the charge. People far more intelligent than I...C.S. Lewis and Lee Strobel come to mind...charged that there is no God, that the Bible is a fairytale, and, similar to your charge, that believers simply play mind games with themselves or, worse, are mindless followers of a hoax. So convinced were they, and thousands of others, that they set out to, once and for all, debunk the Bible and, in turn, this pesky thing called Christianity. The results of their putting the Bible on trial? "Mere Christianity" and "The Case for Christ"...two of the many definitive sources for evidence, empirical and circumstantial, that validates our "mind games"...our faith.
I don't know which person(s) in your life disappointed you so much as to have caused you to reject God because of their failings. I've seen it often, and it saddens me every time. "My father was a pastor and he left my mom for another woman", "I put my faith in my Priest and he took advantage
of me", "I see those hypocrites who are 'Christians' in church and crooks during the week". Pick your reason, but I'm guessing someone, some human being that you looked to for spiritual leadership, at some point let you down. They failed you, so God must be a joke. Their failings are the evidence that God either does not exist or doesn't care.
I allow for the possibility I could be totally wrong in the above supposition, but I've seen it too often to not consider in a discussion where you appear to get angry, or at least resentful, when you harken back to your days as a young believer. If I'm wrong, I apologize for the supposition. But, if I'm right, I can only offer that you can not judge God by man.
As for why God allows things that seem to make him look "incompetent" (apparently your favorite critical word...one that could easily be turned on you, as in being spiritually incompetent), it's simple. God gives us the freedom to follow or not. We are both exercising that freedom. Just know that either direction has eternal consequences. You are right. Technology is not going to develop in time to significantly extend your life here on earth. Your spirit will live on. The question is, where's it gonna live?
And, you're right. How can we measure the onset, or existence, of spirit? You imply we can't. I emphatically agree. We can't. And, that's my point with regard to human life. Since we can not state, with certainty, the exact moment when spirit, or sentience, or reason begin or end, then we risk killing an actual human being (by anyone's definition...even if those definitions differ), regardless of whether the killing procedure is abortion, euthanasia or stem cell harvesting. I don't know of any worldview, religious or secular, that condones killing of innocent human beings.
Show me the evidence of exactly when whatever measure you use to define human life begins, to the second, and I'll reconsider my position. Without the evidence, your argument falls far short of convincing.
ST
This was my response.
Mr. Thomas,
Your supposition is understandable based on the large number who leave their roots for such reasons. But it's not correct in this case. Leading and teaching people to practice faith as a means of deciding what is true, especially innocent children, is the only betrayal I'm talking about. I'm very forgiving of faith in hapless followers but not in authority figures who have a responsibility. There has been no adultery, no hypocrisy in the pews, or any abuse of the types you describe. There was the abuse of faith.
Let me illustrate. I was once an avid reader of Christian apologetics including Lee Strobel, Francis Schaefer, C.S. Lewis and Hank Hanegraaf. I read a scene in a book by Charles Colson titled "How Now Shall We Live?" In this scene a daughter asks her father, "If you are wrong, and what we beleve isn't true... would you want to know?" That question struck the father to the heart, as it did to me. He told his daughter that he had the honesty and courage to follow the evidence wherever it led, even if it was uncomfortable or difficult to cope with at first. Needless to say, in a book by Chuck Colson they went on together to be convinced of proof for the truth of Christianity, or the story would not have made it into the book. Nevertheless, through apologetics I began to see reason as an ally, not an enemy. It was from them I first learned the attitude that the truth, whatever it might be, had nothing to fear from a fair fight.
I started spouting about how those secularists need to become objective and see the evidence. But shouting "bias" is a double-edged sword because the bible teaches faith. If I could pull the faith card, then I couldn't complain about anybody from other religions pulling it too. If my feelings of peace, joy and salvation had been given to me by God, what are those of other religions? Just brain activity with no outside source? Or is the source satanic? Why theirs and not mine? If it is intrinsically virtuous to accept faith claims without question, why is it wrong for those with faith claims other than my own?
This shamed me. I had exploited reason only far enough to let me discard it. Since then I've investigated without the help of apologists, and the results were devastating to their arguments. I could provide all the evidence that I have, volume after volume of point-by-point refutations for books by Strobel and Lewis. But you and I would be dodging the point: Why should I waste my time offering it to you when you can call it off, say "nevermind" and deny it all by faith? This is the abuse of faith I was referring to. The fact that your bible tells you to do this is all the evidence anyone should need to reject the notion that it's divine. You would play the game of debating evidence as long as you feel it gives the upper hand, then switch to faith when you start losing. But we have seen through you now, as I hope your children will someday do with our help. There is a growing recognition in the post-911 America that pulling the faith card is cheating in exactly that way.
We've gotten to the heart of it all.
-Matt