There are so many things that go through my head on any given day that I sometimes have trouble choosing a topic to go with. Today, I think I will go with one that has been tearing at me for a while. I have several atheist friends on facebook who are rather verbose in there anti-religion stance. One even went so far as to call Christians, "narrow minded, bigoted, hypocrites." It bugs me that this is his opinion. I can see his point of view with some of the posts from some of his other supposed Christian friends though. I just wish people would spend a few minutes and think about what they are saying before they say it. I allow things to go as they will and let my friends lead the conversation for the simple fact that if I attack first, which is what bringing up contentious subjects seems like, then they are less likely to listen. I am waiting on many topics. As I mentioned in previous posts, I have been reading Lee Strobel's series of books. I have finished "A Case for Christ" and "A Case for Faith" and am now reading "A Case for a Creator." They are all wonderful books and use genuine facts and quotes to answer many of the tougher questions about Christianity.
The current book has been a real eye opener as far as evolution goes. All I gotta say is I now admire the faith someone has to believe in evolution. If Christians had that much faith in God, we would be unstoppable. Of the "facts" of evolution discussed in just the first 2 chapters, many have been debunked since before the 60s. The sad part is, many textbooks still tout them as facts. I am not done with the book, in fact the current chapter is about how science and religion are not opposites or even separate, but can lift each other up. I encourage any of my atheist friends who are reading this to actually do some research and look up the truth behind the "facts" of evolution. If you still feel that evolution is a fact, we can discuss it by sharing our facts and what we find. I will not say that I am an expert, but I have my research, which is why I say do your own as it is easy to claim other people's research is tainted when you haven't looked at the subject yourself. I also ask that we concentrate on the evolution discussion first as attacking another theory is not a defense for the original theory.
That being said, I had a wonderful weekend. The Sunday service was awesome and motivating. I know I have areas in my life that I need to improve upon and I will work on it. I was able to cook breakfast and dinner for my wife and mother in law. As I mentioned on my last post, my wife already has her Mother's Day gift. Amazingly enough, we had a wonderful day in spite of the rain. Have a wonderful day and I look forward to any comments.
People who believe in God can still be "narrow minded, bigoted, hypocrites." Paul was "narrow minded" to the point of killing Christians, Peter walked on water, when he began to question his faith" and failed to own his Christianity when confornted multiple times on the day Christ as crucifictied. Some would that being a "bigot" - "one who stubbornly or intolerantly adheres to his or her own opinions and prejudices." Lets just completely acknoledge hypocrisy - it just flat-out existed in the day of Christ, and in the Church today.
ReplyDeleteThe real question is, "When you are faced this these strong options that have foundations amongst the strongest of Christians from the past and present, what do you do?
The greatest answer is to love them (and Joe you in word and action). 1 Peter was made into a song years ago. It mentioned in the song, "What would I say if I said nothing at all." Powerful. Christ entered relationship with individuals, and still does now. It is not a great force of people against another great force of people. It is based on Love, Trust, Consistency, ... those break down the walls.
Having read a case for faith I strongly distrust the author to make any sort of judgement on any subject. The questions asked were generally weak, the "answers" were full of logical fallacies, and obvious follow up questions were never asked. I strongly disagree that a belief in evolution requires any significant amount of faith. While our understanding of the mechanisms involved has changed over time, the basic principle has been tested over and over. Circumstantial evidence supports it. Feel free to present your strongest argument against evolution. Occams razor will most assuredly come down on the side of evolution.
ReplyDeleteI have yet to see any circumstantial evidence that would stand up to scrutiny. This is why I asked that you present your evidence as you may have evidence I have yet to see or hear about as everything I have seen or read has been either disproven, misused, or just not real. As I said, I am no expert and frankly tended to ignore evolutionary claims since discovering that much of what I was taught about evolution in high school was patently wrong. Only recently did I try to follow up on it again and once again, I have found nothing substantial. Thank you for your input.
ReplyDeleteEvolution is a very broad subject. I have no idea what parts you have problems with. The origin of life? Speciation? Adaptive evolution? Genetic expression? Further I' not sure of what problems you have with the circumstantial evidence. Do you need help understanding the dating techniques? Unclear on the interpretation of fossils? Other epistemological problems? Hundreds of thousands of pages have been written about any one of those subjects. Imagine a mechanic trying to explain to someone how a car works. Even the most experienced mechanic out there can't answer every question. What metals went into the frame and in what proportion? What is the chemical composition of the airbags? What was the name of the guy who bolted on the side mirror? Explain the vapor pressure gradient of fuel as it travels from the gas tank to the cylinder. No single person can answer all those questions off the top of their head. But that mechanic has a far better idea of how a car works than some guy whose dad told them cars were invented in 1978 and run on whale juice. That mechanic will also have a really hard time convincing that guy, because that guy thinks his dad is always right. How does he know? His dad told him so.
ReplyDeleteLet's start with the paleontological record. To date, there are no known links between the pre-Cambrian fossils and the fossil record after the Cambrian fossil record which shows a sudden appearance of a large amount of complex creatures. The fact that none of these links have been found, despite the decades of searching and the vast amounts of new fossils, tends to disprove, rather than prove naturalistic evolution. Further, the leap from single cell organisms to complex quadrupeds further disproves the naturalistic evolutionary theory in that the change happens over a relatively short time span. Should naturalistic evolution have been responsible, leaving no evidence in the process, then the Jurassic period, by proxy should have had much more advanced creatures than those that we know occupied it.
ReplyDeleteFollow that with origin of life. Currently, there is no known mechanism or chemical action that can create a living organism out of its base elements. Should it be possible we could take a living cell, kill it without damaging or removing its base elements, place it in an environment that mimics early earth, and reanimate it. We can't. Even though all the elements necessary for life are present, there is no natural action that can reanimate it. If we can't recreate life with all the elements we know are necessary to life in a controlled environment after 50 years of trying using direct intervention, how could it occur naturally?