10 Questions Every Intelligent Christian Must Answer

[PandaPirate]

A very intelligent little video that raises very important and valid questions.

 

Enjoy!

 

[Evolution_beyond]

I've seen it before. I think it's already been posted by someone.

 

I find it a bit patronising in tone.

 

It does raise some valid and interesting points. I think it is right in everything it says.

 

But I think the patronising and arrogant tone will just get people's backs up. I don't think it helps the atheist cause if people slip into a patronising tone like this.

 

Religious folks are mistaken - and appeals to reason and education are good - but don't make them feel like they're stupid. They're people first and foremost and they believe they have valid reasons for their beliefs. They are mistaken - but careful communication is essential to teaching anyone that they are in error.

 

It just annoys me slightly when my fellow atheists display as much arrogance as the christians they are criticising. Surely we can be bigger than that.

[PandaPirate]

I see your point. A condescending attitude helps no one

[LtJayson]

Religious folks are mistaken - and appeals to reason and education are good - but don't make them feel like they're stupid. They're people first and foremost and they believe they have valid reasons for their beliefs. They are mistaken - but careful communication is essential to teaching anyone that they are in error.

 

Wonderful point! I spent many years teaching and preaching this stuff...I sure felt stupid enough when the realization hit me! Arrogance and the like only fuels people to remain in the dark longer, as they feel that anything outside of their "box" is scary enough, but when people are making FUN of them, it really makes them want to stay where they are. Very good point!

[R. S. Martin]

Religious folks are mistaken - and appeals to reason and education are good - but don't make them feel like they're stupid. They're people first and foremost and they believe they have valid reasons for their beliefs. They are mistaken - but careful communication is essential to teaching anyone that they are in error.

 

Wonderful point! I spent many years teaching and preaching this stuff...I sure felt stupid enough when the realization hit me! Arrogance and the like only fuels people to remain in the dark longer, as they feel that anything outside of their "box" is scary enough, but when people are making FUN of them, it really makes them want to stay where they are. Very good point!

 

It's difficult to listen to vids with my slow internet connection but maybe I can build on the discussion that's posted here. As I posted elsewhere, I did my oral exam in theology today. I got a decent grade. Everybody knew about my deconversion and we had the agreement that it would be handled in the context of my experience. I made an argument for atheism and logic from various perspectives. I had written on a fundamentalist theologian Charles Hodge and compared him with Charles Darwin in that Hodge built on the word of authority when it came to accepting the story of creation, and Darwin critiqued his own work--used self-critique. I was supposed to explain how the average person could decide whether to accept Darwin's evolution theory or Hodge's theology.

 

First of all, that is way too big a topic to address in fifteen minutes. Secondly, that is nowhere near enough information for me to decide how a person can know. Finally, I did attempt to explain about the use of logic, and inquiry to find out what is behind the authority. I could not tell whether anyone at the table identified at all with what I was saying. Nor could I think whether I was contradicting their own beliefs. Surely these learned men can separate a definition of logic and how it works from its application to theology.

 

I'm still trying to figure out exactly what was going on there. Why was this man whom I've been defending all this time and whom I have thought was so brilliant--why did it feel like he was attacking me and making fun of me in front of everyone at a formal exam? Finally he went off on what to me was another tangent and when he stopped I asked again what his question was. He informed me that it wasn't a question and that he thought I might learn something.

 

It was a really weird moment. I said, "I already knew that." I felt like I was having a one-on-one with Dad at the supper table. At that point the moderator indicated that the next person should ask a question and the moment passed. But I'm thinking Jayson and EB may have the answer. Possibly my arguments made sense and perhaps it made somebody feel somewhat foolish. Yet the stakes were too high for him to admit it. Possibly this was his moment of revenge to get back at me for all the times he felt I had made fun of Christians.

 

I never did it except for fundamentalists; it was all in his head and he never explained to me what I did or said that he found offensive. But he certainly had a crazy expression on his face; wasn't his normal jolly happy-go-lucky look. Kinda like the demons had taken over. I've seen it once before in the privacy of his office and that time we talked our way through the issue.

 

The bottom line is the moment passed, I got a decent grade, and I don't have to go back.