I am writing this blog in response to a challenge I received in regards to some of the things I believe. I think some of my challengers responses are valid and deserve response. Perhaps some of you have heard similar things from people you know, so I hope that this post will answer some questions, create others, and over all help us all get closer to the truth (if it exists) of reality and religion. I will sum up his points here, ask some questions that need responses, and give my thoughts on the matter.

His points:

1.    My reasoning is based on religion, and religion often drifts from reality. Thus my reasoning is flawed because its foundation is flawed.
2.    Morals are relative and subjective. Why should we believe morals are universal?
3.    The belief that Jesus died is ridiculous.
4.    Religion is full of contradictions.
5.    Bible isn’t a good book to live by.
6.    All religion is wrong in regards to morals.
7.    Moral beliefs are not facts and are never true.

I hope that I have summed up his points accurately because some of them were a little obscure in their wording. Let me first pose some questions and then I will assume some answers. But please answer these questions for me if you can:

First you use religion a lot, and I am not talking about religion in general, but my religion, which is Christianity. I just wanted to start with that, I will address your points, but I am not here to debate religion in general, if I were I would agree with you on many points, but I believe Christianity is a unique religion which is objectively defensible and stands above all others in believability, reliability, and accuracy in explaining how the world works. I.E it is true and no other religion is true. Meaning it describes reality better than any other religion, so much better in that all other religions miss some huge important fact in reality, that they can be considered false, or a false view of reality.

1. My reasoning is based on religion, and religion often drifts from reality. Thus my reasoning is flawed because its foundation is flawed.

This does not prove that my view is false, just stating that religion often goes against reality, doesn’t prove that MY religion goes against reality, or better yet, my views in particular. So this is not a good argument against me. It is a logical fallacy to say that B is sometimes wrong, A is based on B, thus A is wrong. First one must prove that A is truly based on B, and than that B is wrong, and then that the way in which A is based on B makes A wrong out of necessity. It is the same error as saying, men often err, Ryan is a man, thus Ryan errs.

Unless you are claiming that all religion are always wrong, in every way, then your claim is a logical fallacy. If you are claiming such a broad thing, you must have a really good reason to out of hand disregard every religion, and therefore must have a reasonable response to every “evidence” for the truth of Christianity. That would be a very long discussion.

For this point you must prove that my views are wrong in and of themselves, not because they are associated with something you doubt. Even if it was the case that every religion was wrong, it still wouldn’t follow, in this case, that my views themselves were wrong unless they were proven to be exactly the same as the religious ones, which were proven to be wrong. Since you have not proven religion wrong or my views, there is still no doubt that they are correct.

2. Morals are relative and subjective. Why should we believe morals are universal?

First, do you even believe in morals? If so, where do they come from? If macro evolution is true and there is no God, then where did morals come from, and why should anyone give them any heed? Have you ever been upset at a “wrong” committed?

Do you really believe that morals are relative? Do you believe it is ok for me to steal from you? Do you believe it is ok for people to torture babies for fun? Do you believe Hitler wasn’t wrong in murdering Jews? Do you believe it is ok for people to just kill other people for no reason?

My next question is. What do you do with your guilt? Do you just stuff your guilt down, and try to ignore it and hide it? What if there was some way for you to get rid of your guilt, would you want to know what it is? Don’t you see there is a problem of evil in the world? Remember without evil, there also cannot be good, that is if evil doesn’t exist, than morals don’t exist, and thus good doesn’t exist , because they all fit together and cannot be separated.

3. The belief that Jesus died is ridiculous.

Why is the belief that Jesus died ridiculous? Do you just reject miracles out of hand? What proof do you have that they don’t exist? What proof do you have that a person CANNOT ever raise from the dead? What if hundreds of people came up to you and said they saw this person raise from the dead? What if Dozens of them who claimed to personally see this person raise, were all tortured, and killed for believing such a thing? Would you believe then? Would dozens of people knowingly let themselves be tortured, and killed for a known lie when they didn’t gain riches or fame?  Not very likely, we often believe less reasonable things.

Watergate was a huge cover-up, and that leaked out super fast and no one was tortured or died for that lie. Personally I find it pretty powerful evidence that men, who had nothing to gain but misery, all claimed to see Jesus risen from the dead (not heard it second hand, but seen it with their own eyes), were then persecuted, tortured, and killed after many years of claiming Jesus was risen. They had plenty of opportunities to say “ya, it was just a big joke, just kidding” but none of them did, not a single man or woman.

If 12 people said to you they saw a person you never have seen like George Washington and they gave you the names of 500 more who also saw him, and all of there were willing to swear, be tortured, persecuted, lose all their positions, lose their families, and die a painful death for it, wouldn’t that hold some weight, wouldn’t you believe them? Why is it any different in the case of Jesus? What belief are you holding on to, to keep you from being consistent in this regard? If you believe history and that people like George Washington existed, then you have just as much reason and evidence that Jesus existed and was raised from the dead.

4. Religion is full of contradictions .

Which religion is full of contradictions? All of them? I am not here to debate other religions, and surely many are full of contradictions, but what about Christianity? What are some contradictions with Christianity? You have not given any yet. Please in responding to this, note there is a difference between a contradiction and a difficulty. A contradiction is saying things like “God is eternal, God isn’t eternal” or “Jesus died, Jesus never died”, I say no such contradiction exists in the Bible, please prove me wrong. A difficulty is something that may appear like a contradiction, but does have a reasonable explanation. Like: “God loves the world, and God hates sinners” difficult, but able to be reasonably explained.

5. Bible isn’t a good book to live by.

What do you mean the Bible isn’t a good Book to live by? In what way? How so? What do you mean by this, and by what standard are you judging the Bible by? Did you know that Christianity has done more good in this world than any other system of thought? Christianity freed the slaves (William Wilberforce and John Newton = Christians). Christianity gave women rights (New Testament and early Church history- women have been treated better since Jesus than before Him in the world as a Whole). Christianity was one of the main pillars of thought that created this country, which is one of the greatest nations in regards to good and freedom that has ever existed on this earth. Early Science was dominated by Christianity, much of Art and music was influenced by Christianity. Name me another system of thought that has had such a long and wide influence as Christianity?

Yes, it is true many evils have been done in the name of Christianity (again if you call it evil than you are no moral relativist), but those have been disavowed by the Church as evil and not Christian.

Yes, I know I have made some claims here that you might disagree with, or would be hard to prove either way, but I do believe the historical record supports my claims, and if you want we can discuss certain points in greater detail. My over all point is Christianity has done a lot of good too and shouldn’t be dismissed from the evil done in it’s name, nor is it fair to say it is equal with other religions.

*See footnote for a Dilemma to think about.

6. All religion is wrong in regards to morals

Again I am not going to deal with all religions, but only Christianity. First where is Christianity wrong in regards to moral? Second, by what standard are you judging Christianity by? If God doesn’t exist there is no standard of morals, thus Christianity cannot be judged by anyone.

Let me give you a simple truth: Something does not come from nothing. And: Moral law needs a moral law giver. If there are morals, then they had to have come from a moral law giver.

7. Moral beliefs are not facts and are never true.

Again I dealt with this earlier. Another question I have is: Can you believe something true? If you can than just believing in something doesn’t make it false. So what is it about moral beliefs that make them not true? By what standard are you saying that moral beliefs are never true, and are never facts? What are you presupposing here? You are stating something, which requires proof. You must know some standard by which we can judge morality as to being true or not to make this statement, what is it?

Think about this for a second: is truth in general relative or absolute? Well if you say it is relative, then you are saying it is true that it is relative, and thus you are disproving the fact that it is relative. Either it is true that it is relative, which then proves that it in fact isn’t relative, but absolute or else it isn’t true it relative and thus it is true that it is absolute. It is a statement that commits logical suicide.

In like manner morals are either relative or absolute. If they are absolute they apply to all people in all places, and thus it is wrong for everyone, everywhere to commit certain moral wrongs like murder, rape, stealing etc. If they are relative, they do not exist period. If there is no universal morality, then there is no right or wrong, because that sort of thing requires a universality to it, some standard higher than us of which we cannot escape.

If morality is relative then there is no morality, because you cannot say anything is right or wrong for anyone else, nor yourself for that matter, because they originate in you, are based on your own whims, and thus you are your own judge. If there is nothing higher than you to hold you accountable, then there is nothing higher than me, and thus there is no real morality. For then it is just a fiction based in your own imagination, thus it holds no influence on anyone else. Unless you are God, your “morals” do not mean anything to anyone else, and thus really are not morals at all, but personal preferences. So when someone stabs you and takes your stuff, all you can say is “well I prefer to not live that way, but he can do whatever he wants and I cannot complain”. But you do complain when these things happen, and thus I submit that you really believe in moral absolutes, you just do not want to believe in God who gives them. You are being intellectually dishonest with yourself, and the sad thing is, you are the only one who will suffer for it, it is no skin off my back if you are not honest or consistent with yourself in these regards.

Footnote:
************************************************************************************

I give you a dilemma: lets suppose atheism is correct. There is no God, no afterlife. What happens to you? Nothing. What happens to me? Nothing. Perhaps you lived a more sexual, and “Free” life indulging yourself in more temporal pleasure than I, but in the end we all end up the same. So what is the loss to me? A little pleasure, and freedom from being told what to do or be.

Now lets suppose that Christianity is true. Then there is a good, just, and Holy God, who cannot dwell with evil, and must punish evil committed against Him. Do you believe that crimes should be judged? That thieves, murders, and rapists should stand trial before a judge and be sentenced? Well so does God. Where does that leave us? Have you ever lied? Have you ever stolen? Have you ever been angry without cause? Have you ever cheated someone? Have you ever lusted after something that wasn’t yours? I have, thousands of times, I assume that you have too. What does that make us? Well liars, thieves, cheaters, adulterers, and haters, basically evil people or criminals. Well if we have committed these crimes, ought not we be judged for them? Isn’t that justice?

Lets say that you worked for this law firm. Every day you would take an extra long lunch but clock in a shorter one. You would take pens and paper home. You copied software, and would drive your car on private time but bill the company. You even were having an affair with your bosses (the county judge and owner of the company) wife. One day while having a passionate affair with her you killed her because she suddenly threw you off and said she never wanted to see you again and was going to tell the judge everything. Well you couldn’t have that because you made a great living working at that office.

So the judge found out, and through detective work found out everything, and in this state your crimes require a death penalty if found guilty. Well at trial you were found guilty.

What if the Judge read you the sentence, and you were taken off to die. Then while you are at the place of execution a man, scared and broken, walks up to you and tells the executioner to wait a second. In his hand he hold a paper signed with his own blood saying that if you accept this pardon you are free from your crimes. If you accept you are free to go, if you don’t you will pay for the crimes yourself. What would you do?

Well that is just what Christianity teaches. We are all criminals guilty before God, we all deserve His justice, to die, for our crimes against Him. Jesus is the man who offers us a pardon signed in His own blood, we can either accept it and go free, or reject it and pay for our own crimes.

I accepted Jesus’s pardon paid for me, my crimes have been forgiven. But you, haven’t. Thus if Christianity is true, I am ok, and my life of restraint isn’t a bad thing, but your life is a bad thing, for every crime you have committed against God you will have to pay for yourself because you refuse to accept the pardon.

So if Atheism is true, neither of us win. If Christianity is true, you pay for your sins, Jesus pays for mine. So on the face of it, you have a 50% chance of being right. Is that the kind of odds you want to risk your life on? At least that should make you want to make sure you are right and Christianity is not true and not just brush of its claims so half-heartedly. Something to think about. Oh and yes, it really is as simple as accepting a gift.