Hey everyone I hope your ready for -part 2of the Atheist Debate. Remember for the next 6-7 weeks, every Wednesday, I will be posting portions of the most intense, challenging, edge of your seat atheist debate I have ever heard. Debating on the side of Christianity is Wretched Radio host "Todd Friel" and debating on the side of Atheism is once evangelist/Christian Dan Barker whose website can be found here. I warn you ahead of time, brace yourself. Allow this segment, along with the other segments of this debate, to prepare you for such a conversation in the future. I would pray that it stretches you and takes you outside of your comfort zone.
Way of the Pastor,
Joe Drew
Hello, old friend! I am writing to congratulate you on your courage to post some difficult thoughts. Many of these ideas exactly mirrored my own during my divorce from Christianity in recent years. Though my doubts escalated into some serious intellectual problems with the religion, the catalyst for my departure was the incongruent behavior of Christians themselves, locally and globally. I still believe in a perfect Creator(s), but it's pretentious for me to say that I fully comprehend it/she/he/them. For simplicity's sake, until I discover otherwise, I may refer to this Creator as God. I hope that your efforts to challenge your flock to use their perfect God-given intellect to seek Truth are blessed. :)
ReplyDeleteI mirror the sentiment above and would like to suggest the believer's side could have picked a more intelligent representative, as I was embarrassed for him. I have studied at a seminary (LCMS) to become a pastor and have personally known men with far better reasoning and arguing ability. I did not become a pastor because my "damned reason", as Luther would put it, overtook my emotional need to believe the indefensible in order to explain the unexplainable. We simply do not know and do not have proof of either side’s argument, both are theories. I do not think in dichotomies but rather in continuums, believing there is a high probability of a higher power based on the ontological argument (my favorite as it is the least defensible), but also respect the good chance there is not a God, but rather God/theology is another human abstraction, as is math, devised to alleviate the cognitive dissonance created by mans own existence. If we recognize we exist, we recognize that at some point we will not exist and thus we create "God" as a relief valve for this mental quagmire (thought maybe the previous statement needed repeated). Thanks for posting these Joe.
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