What Evidence Would Make You Believe Again?

[Adam5]

Hi Folks, just wondering what sort of evidence do you think would make you be a Christian again.

 

For you personally.

 

Would a personal "sign" be enough, or would you want raise the bar higher than this?

 

I am not de-deconverting, just interested in your opinion. Cheers

[RankStranger]

I think I'd require that Gawd personally appear to me - explain all the christian bullshit we're all so aware of, and PROVE to me in a repeatable and verifiable manner that he's real.

 

Now most Christians probably think that's too much to ask. But are we not talking about an all-powerful being not constrained even by space, time, or thermodynamics? Does he not supposedly love me as his child? An all-powerful being could make that happen for every single human in the blink of an eye - and with no more effort than scratching his ass. I'd be willing to scratch my ass in order to save most of humanity from eternal torture... why isn't Gawd?

[Ravenstar]

We've been asked this before..

 

For me, if the actual scientific evidence backed the claim up... you know EVIDENCE showed the supernatural to be possible, much less correspond to reality. It doesn't. As a matter of fact the scientific evidence points in the opposite direction.

 

Logic points in the opposite direction.

 

History

 

Nature

 

Reason

 

etc...

 

 

Now, that would just be me actually being able to entertain the notion of the supernatural, to believe in the Christian God, well first there would have to be the whole identification thing... Yahweh started out as El..father/creator god amongst a host of gods, a pantheon.. then El Shaddai, etc..etc.. until a war god named Yahweh seemed to creep in and take over (funny, during the time that Judah came into power in the Hebrew people, during/after the Babylonian exile - and the rest of Israel's tribes were lost to history, including the LEVITES - their priestly caste). There would have to be an explanation as to why the Hebrews borrowed so heavily from the Canaanites, the Persians (Zoroaster) and the Babylonians, as well as the Egyptians in their theology. So.. 'gods' identity is in question.

 

Then there is the morality question, because the 'god' of the bible is a moral disgrace, a monster bloated with the blood of millions.. an entity who regularly breaks it's own commandments. It would take a LOT to explain that... to my satisfaction.

 

Then there is the history of the christian church... another horrendous and inexcusable 2000 years of hatred, war, torture, ignorance, bigotry, destruction, intolerance and division continuing to this very day.

 

Then there is the LACK of EVIDENCE that christians are any more 'blessed' or morally upright than any other kinds of people.

 

So, basically a medically impossible feat like oh.. an amputee regrowing a limb and scientific evidence that it was a miracle that could be attributed to the deity Yahweh. That might do it. I still don't know if I would worship that deity...

[florduh]

It wouldn't take a burning bush or booming voice from the sky. Evidence would be that the Bible makes sense and is scientifically and historically accurate. Believers would have their prayers answered, as promised. Additional sources would cite the incredible events from the Bible stories. Believers would agree with each other.

[Vigile]

This question comes up periodically, but the truth is, there isn't any evidence that would convince me at this point.  The world would have to be very different than the world we now live in because an all powerful, all knowing, all benevolent god could not possibly exist in this world. 

[buffettphan]

I've become so convinced that biblegod cannot possibly exist, that if I suddenly "heard something/received a sign", I'd doubt my own sanity and check myself into a mental hospital pronto.

 

But I do have a secret thought in my head.  If biblegod can tell me what it is, I'll be convinced he exists.  I'd still think he was an incompetent, cruel asshole though.

[mymistake]

A personal sign wouldn't work for me.  I might have gone insane or be hallucinating.  I require a sign that can be recorded by many sources and seen by many witnesses.  Everybody has a camera in their pocket so if God was real He could arrange for hundreds to catch him in pics.

 

Now that would only get me back to theism.  If God wants me to become a Christian again then God is going to have to straiten out this whole mess with the flawed Bible and flawed Christian theology.  Also, I believe God owes humanity an apology.

[Karhoof]

If, by some strange quirk of the universe, god really did exist, he could display it to me in a lot of different ways,

 

Off the top of my head...

 

Have an alien race arrive here on earth with their own copy of god's "Magic Instructions". Other than peoples names and places, all of the rules of worship, sacrifices to him and names he is called by should be identical.

Anything other than that would clearly be fraud.

 

Alternatively...

He could very easily raise people from the dead. No other person, prophet, or messiah would even be needed. 

Virtually everyone has lost someone who was much loved. Just simply raise them from the dead. Millions of them. All over the world.One from every family should do it. Then have them all report on their absence.

Everyone would certainly know their own family members who have passed. Most of us have seen them all the way to their final 6 foot vertical ride.

None of this Namby-Pamby calling coincidences "MIRACLES!" Give the entire world a miracle that couldn't be refuted. There is nothing in the bible that would prevent him from doing so.

There are a number of people who, if I were to see them standing in front of me again, would be proof for me.

 

Publicly prove the "Gift of Prophesy". Christians love to speak in tongues when they know they they won't be caught (or called out for) speaking gibberish, but NONE of them actually prophesy.

The book of Acts says that believers prophesized as often as they spoke in tongues, and further says that WHEN they spoke in tongues, they spoke prophesy.

Prophesizing an even next week or next month and publicly recording it in newspapers - and having those events come true 100% of the time (as often as people speak in tongues - hundreds if not thousands of times per week across the country) would constitute proof for me

 

 

[milesaway]

None. I left due to moral problems, then that's when I realized either god doesn't care, or god isn't real, leaning heavily toward the latter at that point in time. Any evidence of gods is neither here or there as far as I'm concerned, since that evidence will be too little, too late.

[3DollarBill]

Proof.  Something controlled and repeatable.  "Personal revelation" wouldn't come close to cutting it.

[CDFree]

Christ-like behaviour from Pastors and Preachers!

[pawn]

If all prayer was answered instantly and obviously.  You know like the thing that Jesus promised, but just doesn't happen in reality.

You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.

 

 

John 14:14

[midniterider]

Hi Folks, just wondering what sort of evidence do you think would make you be a Christian again.

 

For you personally.

 

Would a personal "sign" be enough, or would you want raise the bar higher than this?

 

I am not de-deconverting, just interested in your opinion. Cheers

 

I didnt deconvert due to lack of evidence. I deconverted because I was tired of guilt and fear. If Jesus exists he needs to rework the culture of guilt and fear. But really I don't think I will be kissing the ass of any more imaginary beings.

 

Ok, maybe if he let me screw Jennifer Aniston twice a week I might put in a good word for Jesus.

[RaLeah]

Nothing would ever make me a Christian again -- the Bible has too many contradictions and out-right inaccuracies. I know the Bible too well now, and nothing can explain away all that. 

 

I'd believe in GOD again only if GOD came down and EVERYONE on earth saw God and God explained very clearly to every single human being the reason we're here, what's going on, answered everyone's questions, and fixed up the big mess of suffering going on here on this planet. 

 

Like others have said, if God just appeared to me personally, I would chalk it up to a hallucination. 

 

So... I'm not ever re-converting to Christianity. Nor am I ever again believing in God. 

[amateur]

There would have to be a personal visit from the real God, not biblegod, that would explain how much bigger the real God is than anything we ever made up with our biblegod stories.  And the personal visit would have to go on long enough over time (weeks?  months?) so I wouldn't just think it was a hallucination or dream or someone shitting me.  And not just a personal visit to me, but a visit that lots of people would see and hear, and God could hand us a definitive text we could all understand readily, and God would hang around long enough (months?  years?) to make sure we all understood things correctly so we wouldn't end up with another 30,000 denominations.

 

I'm not holding my breath.

[R. S. Martin]

It wouldn't take a burning bush or booming voice from the sky. Evidence would be that the Bible makes sense and is scientifically and historically accurate. Believers would have their prayers answered, as promised. Additional sources would cite the incredible events from the Bible stories. Believers would agree with each other.

 

YES!!!! It would all just make sense without anyone having to twist brains or arms or truth or what-have-you. No twisting should be necessary. The straight and narrow should be straight at the very least. No twists and turns and convoluted explanations and explaining-away. Etc. There'd still be room for faith. Given all the clarity possibly, when it comes to the future, faith is always required. We'd still have to have faith that there really is an afterlife, since nobody ever comes back to tell us about it. But we shouldn't have to twist our brains to believe the rest of the doctrines. The mental gymnastics should be off-limits as a faith requirement.

[Mutantmoose]

All the clouds in the sky spell out "thou shalt not kill" while all the guns and ballistic weapons in the world disintegrate.

 

Amputees around the world start growing their limbs back.

 

Long-dead relatives show up in front of a large gathering of us, and this event is clearly caught on a variety of mediums that are readily accessible and not tampered with.

[seeker001]

Personal revelation wouldn't cut it for me, because I would assume I have finally gone batshit crazy. Hearing and seeing "God" is not usually a sign of good mental health.

 

I need something much more public for me to believe and verified by respected scientists. Not to mention the philosophical debate about what makes a God, but I digress. Just because I can acknowledge a God does not mean I would worship the entity. However, I would still show respect to such a powerful entity.

,

[Bhim]

As others have stated, some sort of obvious proof that Jesus is God, such as an audible voice or substantial number of public miracles would convince me.

 

However, I didn't believe in Jesus based on substantial evidence, and it wasn't evidence that convinced me that he is a false god either.  I don't consider myself actively atheistic (maybe passively so, but that's another story), and I have no objection to belief in the supernatural.  That is to say, I do not believe that the idea of a God is either absurd nor do I think it's incumbent on me to reject such a belief.  Now, I begin with the premise that my personal conscience is given by God; this is something even the Bible agrees with.  Given that this personal conscience can be confirmed by the general conscience of others, there is a clear basis for objective morality outside of the Bible.  I cannot conform this objective morality to the claim that there is an eternal hell where people go for failure to believe in Jesus.  Thus I utterly reject Jesus as God.

 

To convince me that Christianity is true, one would have to first demonstrate that Jesus did not in fact teach the doctrine of eternal hell (note that this is a necessary condition, not a sufficient one).  This would of course preclude the truth of the New Testament as it stands; one would have to introduce additional books which are purported as reliable transmission of Jesus' teaching, and then reject quite a few current New Testament books.  Interestingly, I'll point out that for all the grief Paul gets, some of his epistles may survive this pruning, whereas all four Gospels would have to be eliminated.  The New Testament mentions hell 13 times, 12 of which are from the lips of Christ, and the thirteenth of which is from James (and he probably isn't referring to eternal torment of any kind).  In short, to convince me of Christianity one would have to eliminate Christ as we currently understand him.

 

As I've said before, the fundamental problem with Christianity isn't Christians, it's Jesus.  Jesus is not some misunderstood religious figure who proclaimed moral teachings.  He is a villain who introduced the world to eternal hell, and it is his teachings which have fueled destructive missionary activities throughout the Christian era.

[duderonomy]

Hi Folks, just wondering what sort of evidence do you think would make you be a Christian again.

 

For you personally.

 

Would a personal "sign" be enough, or would you want raise the bar higher than this?

 

I am not de-deconverting, just interested in your opinion. Cheers

 

 

Any evidence would be a place to start.

[Adam5]

Thanks everyone for their answers, made interesting reading.

 

I agree with Vigile that the world would have to be different to the one we live in now, if there was an all-powerful, all-loving God, and therefore the question is theoretical.

[Adam5]

 

 

Any evidence would be a place to start.

 

 

The evidence usually given is the books of the Bible.  And for Catholics and some others also the writings of the early church fathers.

 

But as we all know contradictions, errors and absurdities abound in these texts.

 

Apart from that, the arguments given by Christians usually fall into the category of "I have some warm fuzzy feelings" or "the universe exists therefore God exists".

 

Which as we know on this forum, does not prove a great deal, if anything.

[Adam5]

I'd believe in GOD again only if GOD came down and EVERYONE on earth saw God and God explained very clearly to every single human being the reason we're here, what's going on, answered everyone's questions, and fixed up the big mess of suffering going on here on this planet. 

 

I agree, if a Deity existed and wanted everyone to be saved, he/she would be better to give everyone the exact same revelation, to speak to everyone simultaneously, without the need to bother with men in frocks on a sunday. 

[◊ crazyguy123 ◊]

Apart from that, the arguments given by Christians usually fall into the category of "I have some warm fuzzy feelings" or "the universe exists therefore God exists".

 

 

What aggravates me more than anything is when Christians use arguments that fall into this category here. We know that feelings are not always reliable as they can be easily tampered with and manipulated by other people and/or certain kinds of disorders. Who's to say that a powerful entity posing as a god couldn't do the same to believers and hasn't been doing it all along for centuries or longer?

 

What irritates me even more is when a Christians says, "The universe exists, therefore God exists" you know that when they say "God" they always mean Yahweh/Jebus/Invisible Spirit that watches you masturbate. They say, "The universe exists, therefore my version of God exists and not yours or any other, so there!" How can anyone reach that conclusion?

 

It's like Christians have all gone blind, but pretend that they can see. "I don't need my cane or service dog, I can see just fine!" *walks into pole* "How did that get there? It sure wasn't there a second ago!"

 

 

As for what would convince me, I don't really know if there is anything that could convince me. A powerful entity coming to the Earth and claiming in front of everyone that it's the shady deity known as Yahweh is going to be difficult to trust. Just because it can do a few magic tricks and make people happy on live TV and can be verified to be real by scientists, doesn't mean that it created the universe.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

I'm a committed apatheist, so even if god showed up to me personally, miraculously resurrected my favorite childhood pet, turned my tap water into whiskey, and placed a hundred million dollars in my bank account, I still wouldn't give a damn.