In this episode of Drunk Ex-Pastors, Christian opens up and shares with us good saintly folks what it’s like to be a vilified, persecuted agnostic (and if he thinks God’s going to help him out with this problem, he can frickin think again). He then amuses Jason with his slurred speech, which must be contagious since by episode’s end Jason sounds like he is speaking in slow motion. The issue of the Baltimore riots gives way to a discussion of such systemic issues as wage slavery, sweatshop labor, and the crime of Driving-While-Black (geez, some people always find a reason to complain, right?). A listener’s call opens up the matter of marriage equality, causing the DXPs to discuss whether the church or the state should have any say in marriage in the first place. Jason is biebered by mathematically incorrect attempts at voicing one’s agreement, while Christian’s bieber stems from his being way too gentlemanly a spectator at sporting events.
Also, if the Bible condemns idolatry a thousand times more often than it does the practice of two people gay-sexing each other, then why don’t religious conservatives hate Mormons as much as they do Homos?
Links from this Episode:
Ray
Christian,
You and Jason lamented the disadvantages of blacks and the supposed privilege of whites. I acknowledge these things are real in many cases. But the real question is: “why is this the case?” You attributed it to racism. But you did not bring up at all what I believe is probably best answer to this question “why?” It’s the lack of fathers being there for these young men and guiding them.
And you then right away demonstrated the importance of fathers when you talked about how you guided your own son away from a shallow and possibly destructive attitude because he had car problems. You talk about how your son is a good kid. Well, I see why. I think a lot has to do with the fact that you are there to guide him as a father.
Many of these young black men do not have that. THAT is, I believe, 90% or more of the problem.
Lane
On the riots in Baltimore. I wrote this on facebook a few months ago when we were seeing the Ferguson riots and it applies here as well:
Also, one of my friends had this to say that thought was really pithy:
Justice doesn’t bring riots. Full stop.
My 2 year old, like all 2 year olds, gets really upset and maybe starts yelling at his sister over nothing, or just throws a tantrum. These reactions are not acceptable in and of themselves. And when I am being a good parent, I recognize that sometimes he is simply unable to communicate. Maybe it isn’t about the toy or his sister, maybe he is hungry, tired, or isn’t feeling well. I love him enough to try to figure out why there is so much frustration and not just chalk it up to him being “bad”(or a “thug”).
Lane
(Following comments check box)
Kenneth Winsmann
This was a really great podcast guys! I was entertained throughout the whole thing AND for the first time ever, I never once was frustrated or pissed off at either one of you 🙂
Greg (@greghao)
Perhaps you might want to think a little deeper and ponder the question why those young black men _and_ women, don’t have fathers around?
Ta-Nehisi Coates has written a few posts on this issue that provides a relief against all this tired talk about non-violence.
Coates also probes a bit behind the reason why these riots are occurring.
Both are well worth your time and very short.
comradedread
As I’ve said elsewhere, when we Americans see riots in other countries, we wonder what their government did to set them off and we sympathize with the oppressed and call for understanding and reform.
When we see riots in this country, we say minorities just want free stuff and flip the TV to the next channel.
comradedread
Well, the one God gave to Thomas would be a pretty effective one. If the immortal Jesus Christ, God incarnate, still on the Earth, were walking around healing folks or showing up in church periodically to give a pep talk and let folks touch the holy wounds, I don’t think you’d find too many agnostics or atheists.
Or maybe just a weekly Skype chat where He can field a few questions we all have.
“Yeah, I didn’t write that bit in Leviticus there, that was all Moses…”
“No, Hell isn’t only going to last a trillion years. It’ll be two trillion, with time off for good behavior.”
“Well, I could have stopped the Nepal Earthquake, but I try not to intervene too much in your affairs, except when one of your prays for a good parking space at the gym.”
comradedread
One of my favorite Portlandia skits was the one where the couple feels awful about supporting sweatshops, so they resolve to only wear clothes made from America by Americans, so they hire a local woman to make their clothes. Then they give her so many orders that they ask her to just come over to their house and work in their basement. Then they have her invite her friends over to work with her to help. And it just keeps going until their basement is a dank, overpopulated, unsafe sweatshop shipping garments overseas.
Christian
This was a really great podcast guys! I was entertained throughout the whole thing AND for the first time ever, I never once was frustrated or pissed off at either one of you.
Ha ha! Uh oh. That’s not a good sign. 😉
Christian
Well, the one God gave to Thomas would be a pretty effective one. If the immortal Jesus Christ, God incarnate, still on the Earth, were walking around healing folks or showing up in church periodically to give a pep talk and let folks touch the holy wounds, I don’t think you’d find too many agnostics or atheists.
Yeah, I may not know exactly what it would look like, but I know what it wouldn’t look like. It wouldn’t look like a war-mongering tribe of people from 5000 years ago wrote down all their myths and used “God” has an excuse to murder entire nations, kill their rebellious children, rape and pillage, and not eat shellfish. It wouldn’t be a book written 2,000 years ago that is not corroborated by historians that makes claims that can’t be proven. It wouldn’t be a church (God’s mouthpiece on earth) that kills Muslims and people who don’t agree with it and doesn’t allow it’s priests to marry and covers up its heinous acts against children, etc. It wouldn’t contradict itself by telling it’s adherents to love their neighbor and then follow a God that encourages genocide and refuses to condemn slavery when he has the chance.
Instead of hardening men’s hearts and speaking in parables so that people can’t understand, “God” would do everything in his power to make things as clear as possible. Surely, even if God’s ways are higher than ours, he can make things much clearer than they are now. Clearly, he could still do miracles and write on the moon that YHWH is god and talk to us for reals (not just a little voice in some people’s heads).
Do I know exactly that God revealing himself to man would look like? No. I just know it wouldn’t look like anything I’ve seen in any religions I’m familiar with.
Kenneth Winsmann
Haha! Yeah, if God revealed himself it would totally have to be an event that set the entire world on fire. One that would be spoken of in every corner of the earth. He would probably write a book that would become the best seller of all time too. His Church (if He made one) would be like the greatest force for good on the planet. Feeding more hungry, educating more children, and caring for more sick than any other institution on earth. The Church would probably be responsible for things like the advent of hospitals, universities, and the development of the scientific method. It would totally shape a worldview that nurtured a healthy defense of human life and defended the dignity of the human person….. oh, wait…..
Much depends on the seeing eye.
comradedread
Make sure you’re tethered to that cherry picker, mate. I’d hate to see you get hurt if you fell out of it.
Tim
I enjoy the podcast despite disagreeing with you politically. I appreciate the discussions about religion, especially that you consider a variety of philosophical/theological positions when talking about religion, but not sure why you guys don’t apply that to your political discussions?
I couldn’t disagree with you more regarding the Baltimore riots and the premise that “Institutional Racism” has caused oppression in the Black community and thus the protests and the rioting are a result of pent up frustration.
First of all, cities like Baltimore, Philadelphia etc., have been controlled by one-party Democratic rule for over 60 years. The same party that is supposed to champion the cause of minorities etc. but not only have Democrats run the city for that long, but Mayors, Police Chiefs, School superintendents have been all minority led for decades. Secondly, what exactly is “Institutionalized Racism”? Are cops being ordered by “the system” to target minorities?
So it begs the question, what is to be done? If the pre-supposition is that all cops are racist, and are looking to beat and murder blacks, how do we make these cops stop being racist and beating minorities?
Racism, IMO has nothing to do with the prevalent use of force by cops in these situations. And painting an entire group of people as victims is not going to solve the problem. What is wrong with the position/argument that poor people in bad situations as individuals need to look in the mirror and perhaps only change what they themselves have control over…which is themselves? Statistically two parent families that focus on education is the recipe for increasing the chances of moving upward socio-economically speaking.
I look at the Ferguson situation and the Baltimore situation as this analogy, “The coach doesn’t like me that’s why I am sitting on the bench, my teacher doesn’t like me that why he or she failed me, my boss doesn’t like me that’s why he fired me etc.”
“The police don’t like us because we’re black, that’s why they are shooting us” It’s a very juvenile mentality.
Secondly, you mention that the “media” has only portrayed the violence and not the peaceful protests, yet you cite John Stewart several times about points being made…by someone in the media.
We need to change this mentality of blaming everyone but ourselves. If your coach doesn’t like you, run extra laps and stay late after practice, if your boss doesn’t like you, work harder, show up early, stay late do extra work. Then as a result, the coach, teacher, boss, will have no other choice but to like you. If the police don’t like us, let’s double-down on being polite when confronting a police officer, change the perception of what police officers have of you.
We need to apply this mentality to our society. If its known that statistically, that young black males weren’t prone to criminal behavior (and this starts at home with mom and dad), then perhaps society, police etc. will change their perception of young black males as well. How is making excuses for an entire race of people going to help them? Ok so the entire United States, its people, and its system is fundamentally racist? So now what? Its a very flawed and anti-productive mentality IMO
Anyhow, Cheers, enjoy the podcast. and stop being liberal pusses
Lane
Tim,
I think it is very nearsighted (to the point of blindness) to reject the presence of racism. The frustration is also obvious – riots. As for pointing out that these areas are controlled by Democrats, that does not counter the claim that there is racism and frustration. However, Democratic policies may or may not have helped the situation is another thing to discuss. There is definitely a problem, and racism is definitely a component.
This isn’t an either/or problem, it is a both/and. The Right tends to put all the emphasis on individual sins. On the other hand, the Left tends to put all the emphasis on the society. Both are right. The individuals are to blame for their sins AND the society made by those individuals are also to blame.
Greg (@greghao)
Kenneth, I take it by implication that you believe such a force exists already on Earth? If so, then honestly, God’s track record ain’t pretty. Especially since his own supposed adherents rail against much of what you write about.
I accept that God is never going to manifest in front of my eyes, or even appear in a believable dream, but even absent that level of miracle, the hypocrisy that I see from so many of his supposed follower (and honestly, this applies to pretty much all religions for me) leads me to wonder if even supposed followers believe that they’re hearing.
Kenneth Winsmann
Christian Kingery,
If you have some time I would be curious to see what your response would be to this critique of agnosticism.
https://youtu.be/dqnq_DnuW6w
Kenneth Winsmann
https://youtu.be/dqnq_DnuW6w
Kenneth Winsmann
I can’t tell if the link is posting lol
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&ei=TOtHVfbzAZDGogTywoHoAg&url=http://m.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3Ddqnq_DnuW6w&ved=0CBwQtwIwAA&usg=AFQjCNHvS5b6lZTQQ4Ve2szdRNnmNoF4ag
Christopher Lake
Many agnostics and atheists say that *if* the God of the Bible would just clearly show Himself *today* and do obvious miracles *now*, then they would believe. The Bible claims that God did just that, in human form, in the Incarnation, and what happened? Some people believed for a while and then walked away from Him, other people believed but still doubted even after seeing His miracles (Thomas), and other people called for Him to be crucified.
Of course, agnostics and atheists don’t believe that the Bible is telling us about a real God who actually exists anyway, and *some* agnostics and atheists think that even *if* this God exists, the accounts of His ways in the Bible show that He isn’t worth worshiping. For the latter group, even if the Biblical God *were* to clearly show Himself today and do obvious miracles, it wouldn’t seem to matter, because the latter group just doesn’t find this God to be *worth worshiping*.
I used to think that the Biblical God was both mythical *and* contemptible, so really, I can understand the former *and* the latter views described above. I don’t think of myself as holier than thou. I can’t think of myself in that way, logically, because over the years, God has showed me *some* of my sinfulness, and I’m sure that there are much deeper depths of it that I have yet to see. However, God has showed Himself to me in ways that have led me to continue to want to follow Him. That’s not the empirical evidence for God that many people want, but it has been enough to move me from being a vehement atheist (and anti-theist) to a Christian and to stay there for most of the last twenty years.
I still have doubts. I’m strongly tempted, sometimes, to think that God is either not there, or that He doesn’t care, but ultimately, to me, the Christian narrative (and especially, the Catholic Christian narrative) makes more sense of life (not just *my* life but life itself) than agnosticism or atheism (or other world religions that I’ve studied). People can say that Christianity is mythical, illogical, ridiculous, etc. For years, I said the same things about Christianity– and I said *incredibly* negative things about Christians as a whole. There are a lot of professing Christians who can be jerks. Sometimes, I’m one of them. I try not to be. When I fail, I go to confession and seek God’s help to change. All of this may seem delusional even to most people who listen to this podcast– I don’t know. It’s more real to me, though, than the supposed meaninglessness that I used to think was *objectively* at the heart of human existence.
Christopher Lake
I live in Maryland, not too far from Baltimore. It’s interesting how peoples’ perspectives can change over time. in 1989, I considered myself a Marxist revolutionary (I’m not even kidding– I and my Communist friends wanted to see worldwide capitalism overthrown), and in 1992, I thought that the L.A. riots were, basically, justified. Let’s just say that I saw them as a good *start.* I admitted that Reginald Denny didn’t deserve to be beaten within an inch of his life, but overall, I saw the riots as, at worse, an understandable thing, and, at best, a quite justifiable response against a racist, capitalist, white supremacist system, manifested in the beating of Rodney KIng, in this case, and the beatings and murders of countless other people. At that time, I would have been quite sympathetic to the worldviews of Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky, but I would have said that they don’t go nearly *far enough* in their leftism.
From the early-to-mid-90s, I had some life-changing encounters (some of them long before I became a Christian) that led me to slowly begin reconsidering my views. I moved from revolutionary Communism to Democratic liberalism. After I had been a Christian for about a year, my view on abortion radically changed, and I became pro-life. After this happened, I was not able to remain a Democrat, and thus began my move into the Republican Party and generally conservative economic and social views.
Now, as a Catholic, I’m still “conservative” on some issues but definitely less of a down-the-line Republican than I once was. I know that police brutality is a reality in America, and I strongly believe that it affects minorities disproportionately. I also strongly believe that most of it goes unpunished. These views seemingly put me far from many of my conservative brethren. I don’t really care. I’m not interested in being a “Party line” guy. I just care about following the truth wherever it leads. This effectively means that I’m *almost* equally alienated, now (or at least, I feel that I am) from most Republican *and* Democratic pundits. If you want to find a comfortable home in America, politically speaking, Catholicism is not the way to go. Such has been my experience anyway– and I don’t regret a thing.
The riots in Baltimore saddened and angered me. A CVS was burned down, and now, some elderly people (and younger people) in the area probably have a much harder time getting their medications. Freddie Gray’s death saddens and angers me. I think that such things happen more often than many of my fellow white people imagine.
I don’t want to see the violent overthrow of the U.S. government anymore. I also no longer think, as Noam Chomsky does, that a “capitalist democracy is a contradiction in terms.” I don’t think that America is nearly as much of a “racist system” as I once did. However, racism is real in this country, and I suspect and fear that many violent racist acts go unpunished. We should work to see this happens as little as possible.
In a world where sin is a reality though, some horrible crimes against humanity *will* still go unpunished by man though. This is one of many reasons that I believe in the existence of at least a Hell that has *some* population. I don’t *want* to see people go there. It’s just hard for me to believe that it will be utterly empty though, when I consider both Jesus’s teachings on it, *and* the likelihood that many unspeakable crimes against humanity *do* go unpunished in this life.
Lane
Christopher,
This is also my current situation.
Lane
Christian,
As for miracles, are you familiar at all with some of the Mary apparitions, such as Fatima? In 1917 Portugal, tens of thousands of people witnessed the sun dancing as predicted by children who were visited by Mary. You can find news stories sbout it at the time.
Greg (@greghao)
You don’t need to believe or not believe. It’s a reality. But I suppose you are following the classic trajectory, “a young man who isn’t a Democrat has no soul, an old man who isn’t a Republican has no brains.”
Yes, precisely. It’s pretty annoying to sit here and read about a bunch of white people pontificating about what minorities should and shouldn’t do. To be very honest, real life for minorities is way worse than you could ever imagine and I speak as a “model” minority.
Christopher Lake
One of the reasons that I am perhaps quicker to listen to claims of racism in the U.S. than many of my fellow white people (especially, many my fellow *politically conservative* white people) is that I’m a member of a minority group– not a *racial or ethnic* minority group but a minority group nonetheless. I have a disability– Cerebral Palsy. Guess what *our* unemployment rate is in the U.S.? For over 20 years, it has ranged from approximately 60-65%. (For blind people, it’s closer to 70-75%.
Think about that. Really think about it, and allow it to sink into your mind, heart, and soul (if you believe in the existence of souls). If any group, other than the disabled, in this country had had 60-65% unemployment for more than 20 years, could you even *imagine* the social outcry? The protests? The promises of action, with at least *some* real follow-through, from Presidential candidates and other politicians? Yet for the disabled, there is relative silence from most politicians. Heck, here in Maryland, wheelchair lifts did not even *begin* to be installed on public buses until *1989*. (This was after disabled people actually began to physically chain themselves to buses in protest.) Until then, we weren’t even allowed a seat *anywhere* on the bus, so to speak– and it was not until many years *later* that all of the buses had wheelchair lifts that actually regularly worked!
In light of all of the above, I am quite wiling to believe that racism against minorities and police brutality are still very much alive in America. I’ve never been beaten by a cop, but as a person with a visible disability, I’m treated as either invisible, or subhuman, or as a person but one to be dismissed or avoided, basically, by other human beings, more regularly than many non-disabled people could probably bear.
Speaking of dehumanization of the disabled– quite a few of “us” (especially those with Down Syndrome) are killed while we are still in our mother’s wombs. America in 2015, so “free,” so “enlightened.”
Christian
Kenneth,
If you have some time I would be curious to see what your response would be to this critique of agnosticism.
This is the first time I’ve heard William Lane Craig and, frankly, I’m disappointed. I’m not sure if he’s intentionally being intellectually dishonest, or if he’s just ignorant, or (as may be the case) if he’s just so much more intelligent than me that everything he says is over my head.
His whole premise is based on a definition of Agnostism that is incorrect. He says that Agnosticism says that “it’s impossible to know whether God exists.” The definition, according to Wikipedia (and perhaps WLC doesn’t have internet access) is “Agnosticism is the view that the truth values of certain claims – especially metaphysical and religious claims such as whether or not God, the divine or the supernatural exist – are unknown and perhaps unknowable.” “…are unknown and perhaps unknowable” is quite different than “it’s impossible to know.”
His points are that Agnosticism is philosophically untenable, practically untenable, and existentially untenable. He makes the point that “like an egg on a roof” you will eventually fall to one side. Why can’t the egg be in a bowl? And so what? You tend more towards agnostic theism or you tend more towards agnostic atheism, so what? Why can’t you believe that knowledge of god is unknown because that’s how god intended it? Why can’t you believe that knowledge of god is unknown because there probably isn’t a god? Why can’t you simply believe that we aren’t meant to have an answer this side of death, if there is one? Seems completely “tenable” to me. Perhaps when you sit around all day contemplating philosophy and religion instead of living your life, you work yourself into these conundrums that no one else sees or cares about.
Then he hauls out these tired tropes of atheists. No meaning to life. No morals. Might as well die. Etc. It’s like listening to Chuck Smith talk about amillennialism. Not only does he mischaracterize it and present it in a reductionistic view, but he probably doesn’t even really understand it because of the paradigm he indoctrinated himself with.
Contrary to what he says, you don’t “have to decide between atheism and theism.” Maybe there just isn’t an answer until we die. Live life. It may be all you have and it may not be. Personally, I’m gonna live like it may not be, but that doesn’t mean I have to buy in to one religion or another.
Jason Stellman
For what it’s worth, countering our complaint about institutional racism with “Democrats are no better” only shows how myopically beholden people are to a two-party system (as well as how far to the left we are from the DNC).
There’s little difference between a Bush and a Clinton, is what I’m saying. . . .
Lane
Christian and Kenneth,
To be fair, I also didn’t agree with WLC’s analogy of agnosticism as an egg balanced on a roof. That implies the constant presence of gravity forcing the egg to fall one way or another – forcing one to decide between some form of theism or atheism.
Christian, there are philosophical forms of agnosticism that aren’t just not making up your mind, but are actually an active belief in the unknowableness of God’s existence (they are really atheists, but can’t prove atheism).
Right, one can go about their life not asking the big questions, not living an “examined life” (in the words of Socrates), but I’m not sure how long one can really do this. At some point “gravity” kicks in and the egg will be forced to roll. You will be forced to have to think something about the big questions. For example, someone close to you dies, you become very sick, your house burns down, you have a baby; something will break you out of the daily routine that has been distracting you from the big questions. Asking and thinking about these questions, contemplating the transcendental, is distinctly human, so I believe that eventually they become unavoidable.
I’m reminded of the Kierkegaard’s “Three Stages of Life”:
1. Aestheitc. Where one only cares about enjoyment and the desires of life, not being reflective of life at all.
2. Ethical. A person begins to have direction in life and becomes aware of good/evil and their duties to others. This is where people start to become really mature, and start to scrutinize their own life and actions.
3. Religious. A person realizes their sinfulness and their relationship with the transcendental.
Lane
Christian,
That’s too bad, the video wasn’t that great an example (I only watched the first few minutes of it). He is an incredibly intelligent and talented debater. He has debated so many people from a wide variety of specialties. I’m most impressed when he has debated cosmologists on topics that included cosmology and quantum mechanics. He is not a young Earther, and he doesn’t have too much problem with evolution in general. On a side note, his next debate will be with a German, done in German. He also speaks French and does his Bible devotions in ancient Greek. He is very impressive. Too bad he is a Baptist, although he has adopted a Catholic philosophical view of God’s Providence and human free will (Molinism).
You should watch one of his debates. I believe you have mentioned liking Bart Ehrman’s work? You can watch him debate WLC:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhT4IENSwac
Mike
If you do watch it (I read the transcript instead here: http://academics.holycross.edu/files/crec/resurrection-debate-transcript.pdf) be sure to consider the following “case study” afterwards:
http://atheistexperience.blogspot.com/2009/02/case-study-william-lane-craig-vs-bart.html
I think he’s more dangerous than a young Earther. As Lane pointed out, he’s a very smart dude. His showmanship is on point. At least with the Young Earthers you can immediately tell they are full of it. With Craig, he’ll confuse the shit out of everybody then declare victory before anybody knows what the hell is going on. His disciples cheer. Rinse. Repeat.
Ich bin ein Berliner…
Greg (@greghao)
I think that around the margins they might look similar but even as disenchanted as I am with the Democratic Party, they are still light years better than Republicans on issues of substance like the restriction on equal rights. And don’t forget, presidents get to nominate Supreme Court justices who serve for life. That alone means for the foreseeable future I will be voting Democratic.
Christian
Lane,
He is an incredibly intelligent and talented debater.
I’m sure he is. I’ve heard a lot about him. I wasn’t impressed on this topic though. I’m sure I couldn’t out-debate him on it though. 🙂
I just felt like it was a mischaracterization of Agnosticism so that he could make his points.
Lane
Christian,
Like I said, I also didn’t think the video was a great example from what I watched of it.
I’m sure I couldn’t out-debate him on it though. 🙂
To be sure, there aren’t many people who could out debate him. I will also concede that being good at debating is different than being right. Although, I do believe he is both.
BTW, he also debated Christopher Hitchens. Although Hitchens is a awesome rhetorician, he isn’t much of a philosopher and most of his arguments are appeals to emotion.
I have watched maybe a half dozen of his debates all the way through, the first one I watched was against Frank Zindler (I think it was recorded in the 90’s). What I found interesting was that they did a survey before and after this debate. They had 7778 in attendance, 6168 filled out surveys, 97% said the Christian case was most compelling presented. Of the people in attendance 632 were non-Christians, 82% of which said the presented Christian case was stronger. And of those, 47 became believers that night! (No Christians became atheists.)
comradedread
Debating, in my experience, isn’t a good forum to discuss ideas. It’s a game, usually where one side has a home field advantage and cheerleaders, set to give one side bragging rights if their team ‘wins’.
Lane
Comrade,
“Debating, in my experience, isn’t a good forum to discuss ideas.”
That’s probably true. But it is a good way of surveying arguments and their counter arguments. Not to mention they can be entertaining if you care about what is being discussed.
comradedread
Yes, it can be entertaining, but there are two reasons to argue: you can argue for wisdom, to arrive at truth and be open to new ideas, or you can argue to win, to bask in your own brilliance, validate your beliefs, and crush your ideological opponents.
Debates are a vehicle for the latter.
Greg (@greghao)
Jason –
Couple clarifications…
1. Larry Bird was a power forward, not shooting guard.
2. Not Jason Bibby, it was Mike Bibby (PG of the Kings). Or were you thinking about Jason Kidd?
Jason Stellman
I realized my Bibby error as I was editing, but I just hoped no one would notice!
Christopher Lake
Just thinking out loud here about agnosticism, atheism, meaning, and moral outrage… Having been an agnostic and atheist at different points in my life, I know that both groups can certainly find personal meaning in life. I also know that many people in both groups *can* be much nicer, and more moral, people than many Christians. However, it also seems inherent to the “systems” of agnosticism and atheism that there is no *objective moral meaning* to anything.
My cousin is an agnostic who seems to be strongly leaning toward atheism, and he gets deeply, viscerally outraged about American government intrusions into our privacy, human rights violations, and such. I can see that he finds such things annoying and inconvenient, but I don’t understand his outraged reactions to them as a seeming violation of some *objective moral order*, because by the nature of his agnosticism (or perhaps, near-atheism), I don’t see how he could logically get to, much less explain, the existence of such a moral order in the universe.
Greg (@greghao)
Christopher,
You mentioned that once upon a time you were a communist, were you not outraged by the behaviors of X, Y, or Z? Where did that moral outrage come from? That’s the weirdest thing for me to hear from religious people, that somehow, they own morals.
Your sense of morality isn’t objective — it comes from the Bible. A book that you hold in reverence but it isn’t objective in any real sense of the word. It’s objective because you say that it is.
And this goes back to what Christian mentions in the podcast, why is it that a belief, any belief, is somehow better than no belief? There are millions, if not billions, of people who live perfectly “good” and moral lives every single day who are not religious.
While none of these issues have come up for me I can paint a very real and well thought out world in which I examine these issues without leading me to the question of God or religion. It is only when you view life through the prism of religiosity that everything centers around religion. There isn’t anything wrong with that but it’s just one particular point of view, not the only point of view.
Lane
Greg,
Moral outrage, itself, is an argument for objective morality. The reason we can hold others accountable for our morals, is because they are objective. The reason they can be objective is because of God. Your right, religious people don’t own objective morals, we ALL experience them.
The Bible isn’t the source of the morals, God is, the Bible helps inform them and provides us insights into our human nature and our purpose, and gives us insights into who God is. However, we (anyone) can know objective morals, for the most part, from reasoning.
Of course you can. The answers you may arrive at could be bleak atheistic ones. The answers weren’t the point. The point is that people will eventually be compelled to think about the big questions. I was responding to the idea that people can just go about their life not thinking about these issues, and my answer is: maybe temporarily.
Everyone views life through a worldview. The goal is to have a worldview that accounts for as much of our shared experiences as possible and provides us useful insights. Mine just happens to be the best 😉 (otherwise I would modify or change to a new one) Let the best worldview win!
Kenneth Winsmann
Christian,
Thanks for the response! I’ve never really had a chance to speak very much with an agnostic so I think your viewpoint is interesting.
Its all possible that none of the above is true and you just disagree with him 🙂
Craig was addressing two different kinds of agnostics. The first kind, as he explained in the video, was the wikipedia agnostic. The second was what he named “insolent agnosticism” (the audience laughs at the joke) which he described as a person who thinks it is impossible to know the answer. I find it sort of puzzling that you dont like that definition given that you sort of hop back and forth between both!
If the egg was in a bowl there would be no tension. The rooftop represents two different worldviews, theism vs atheism, the agnostic claims to not choose a side and so is balanced perfectly on the rooftop. Craig (and myself) are incredulous that someone could live out their entire lives and never eventually fall on one side or the other. You do not need to be fully convinced of atheism to be an atheist. You do not need to have proof of Gods existence to be a theist. Most people will have some doubts on their worldview no matter what it is. Yet, most people feel comfortable holding to a position even if there are some doubts.
I’m sure if you thought about it, you would agree that you actually hold many positions that you don’t posses absolute certainty on. That doesn’t make you an “agnostic socialist” or me an “agnostic capitalist”. At some point our life experience and studies move us to one side of the roof or the other. Lets say in college I study both socialism and capitalism and I think that the arguments for both sides are precisely equal. At this point my egg is on the rooftop totally balanced. Is it really reasonable to say, after a lifetime of living in a capitalistic society, hearing about socialist nations on the news, etc. etc., that I could just never prefer one over the other? I can’t PROVE that no one could hold that position, but I am incredulous! That just seems intellectually lazy, and all too convenient. Especially when said person is a constant critic of capitalism! Capitalism is bad, capitalism is evil, capitalists are brain washed and indoctrinated….. but I don’t actually have an opinion. I just think capitalism is wrong. LOL Great, you are critique proof.
Craig explained that one COULD claim all of those things. These claims fall into the category of “insolent agnosticism”, that you said was an incorrect definition and misrepresentation. The problem is that it is impossible to defend such things. How could you possibly defend the idea that “God has intended us to not know?” Or that we are not meant to have an answer? These are ideas that you would need to have *some evidence* or reasons to cling to. I don’t think that you could give us any of those reason. (I dont think ANYONE can. Its a completely unsupported speculation).
There is no objective meaning to life on atheism. Your meaning is just whatever you make it up to be in imaginary land. There are no groundings for objective moral values on atheism. “Good” and “bad” are likewise conjured up in imaginary world. As you said in the “kill your baby” podcast, these are the logical conclusions that follow from atheism. (BTW those conclusions have been reached by many of the greatest atheist thinkers throughout history, so its hardly unfair to quote them)
The point is this: everyday you live your life as if “good” and “bad” ARE NOT imaginary, every day that you wake up and live as if your life (and those around you) ARE meaningful, you are implicitly answering the question. You are picking a side. Ironically, its the side you spend the most time ridiculing.
But it does mean you have left all the biggest questions about life unanswered. And, also, it means you probably spend a little too much time “living your life” and not enough thinking about philosophy or religion 😉
Kenneth Winsmann
Lane,
I disagree with both you and Christian. The “gravity” is life. As we go about living the egg just IS going to roll to one side or the other. To pretend like you think all the arguments are exactly equal is just to be:
1. Intellectually dishonest
or
2. intellectually lazy
Kenneth Winsmann
Why should the existence of God be placed in some special category of “i just cant have an opinion until there is conclusive proof”?!? No one lives their life that way! Think if such a person lived that out consistently. i cant vote for President because im just not certain which candidate is best. I cant pick an economic model because there is just too much uncertainty. I cant decide who to support in the war because I just dont know for sure. I cant decide whether or not the riots are just or not because I dont have definitive proof of what goes on in black society. I cant decide if global warming is real or not because there is no definitive proof. I cant decide if we are overpopulating the planet. i cant decide If i should eat organic veggies or the regular stuff. i cant decide freaking ANYTHING if uncertainty puts me in an agnostic turtle shell.
Greg (@greghao)
lol@if you don’t make a conviction about a creator you’re either lazy or dishonest. As Christian points out, the conflation between atheism and agnosticism is a rather false one. But above and beyond that, it’s also pretty galling to say that just because one has no real thoughts on a matter that doesn’t impact their lives (a line of thinking that all atheists would agree to and agnostics to a large degree) that they are lazy or stupid. To put another way, why have you not given thoughts to the draught situation in Taiwan Kenneth? Are you intellectual lazy or dishonest? Of course not, you’ve not given it any thought because it doesn’t impact your life in any tangible or intangible way.
The problem with your comment above is that in any examples you posed above, there are real and substantive steps anyone can take to educate themselves on the issues in order to make up their minds. Religion offers no such similar steps.
And again, speaking just for my own personal brand of agnosticism, the fact that a creator plays no role in my life (other than having created life) means that I’m _not_ undecided about it. It’s not that I am uncertain about the origins of life but simply that the origins of life mean very little now that I am actually alive.
comradedread
You could, in theory, meet and talk to Hilary Clinton or Marco Rubio (or Ted Cruz or Jeb Bush.)
No one these days, however, claims to have met with God and gotten a verbal response. There are no more burning bushes.
Just personal feelings that someone or something was listening or that you were talking to yourself.
Greg (@greghao)
Lane,
There are cultures, even to this day, where cannibalism is accepted. We in the west might be morally outraged by that because it seems barbaric by our standards but that’s just imposing our worldview upon them. So no, I don’t actually completely that there actually is objective morality but rather culturally or societally accepted morality.
I accept and agree that if you view the world through the lenses of religiosity then the absence of god is clearly a bleak existence. But frankly, that’s just not how the areligious world works and lives. While I may not have been clear above, let me try to restate my response, yes, I agree that at some point we think about these so called big questions but the answer isn’t just god yes or god no.
Yes, and that’s the same kind of thinking that led us to the crusades. Why not live and let live? Seems like that’s much closer to Jesus’ worldview.
Kenneth Winsmann
Greg,
What’s galling is that you would put a drought in Asia on par with the existence of God. Whether or not there is a drought in Taiwan does not affect the way I live my life. Whether or not God exists impacts an individual’s entire view of the world. Does my life have meaning? Am I significant? Do my actions matter? Are moral values fact or fashion? If these questions don’t impact your life in a meaningful way, you have just admitted to being a cultural zombie. One that just lives according to whatever society has determined he should. Hamster meet wheel.
I took a comparitive religion course once. My professor didn’t seem confused on how to educate people on religion. Every religion offers education. I don’t see any difference between learning about Atheism vs theism than learning about anything else.
comradedread
And every religion is convinced that they are right and every other religion is wrong. Except Taoists who would see each religion as an individual’s attempt to grasp and experience the Tao.
Unfortunately, there are no more burning bushes, no more miracle working prophets, no more angels appearing in bright light to tell humanity which religion has all the answers. All we have are documents written by flawed men of their time all of which have some dubious moral stances that seem rather inconsistent with the idea of God. All religions ultimately require one to take the leap of faith and jump over the gaps, contradictions, and inconsistencies.
Kenneth Winsmann
Comrade,
Which means that either
1. They are all wrong
or
2. One is correct
How is this problematic? Its not like you have to survey every single religious system known to man. There are only about 5 to 8 worldviews that are serious competitors in the marketplace of ideas. (agnosticism not being one of those as it doesn’t offer any worldview at all). Great place to start
Happily, we do still see miracles all the time. You could start with Lourdes France or Fatima if you like. The idea that “all we have are writings of flawed men and religions that contain many inconsistencies” is just a bald assertion. It represents a worldview (modernism) that has not been established as being accurate.
Lane
Comrade,
You’ve mentioned Tao a couple times. Have you read C.S. Lewis’ The Abolition of Man before? It is a great introduction to Natural Law thinking and objective values. Lewis talks extensively about Tao. It is an awesome read.
Lane
Greg,
So there is nothing wrong with people eating other people, even if their society says it’s okay? You wouldn’t think that our culture is better than theirs? So no objective standard through which we can say that one set of morals is any better than another.
Crusades were bad? Well above you said their is no objective morality. Stop imposing your worldview on the Crusades!
Live and let live? Are you saying this is a better worldview? Better by what standard? You have rejected the ability to judge better or worse, good of bad! If you have truly rejected objective moral standards you have no right to say anything about mine or anyone else’s morals. In fact, you have no right to talk about rights at all.
But there is such a thing as “better” and “worse” morals. You can hold people accountable for violating your rights. Because there are human rights. Because morals are objective. Because there is a God.
comradedread
It is problematic if all of the religions likewise have problems in the evidence or lack thereof they present. This ultimately reinforces the agnostic position that all of the major religions are simply attempts to explain the unexplainable and should not be trusted.
I stand corrected. Surely the visions of uneducated and isolated girls in deeply religious cultures wandering the country side along with unsubstantiated claims are truly miracles worthy of note.
Perhaps we should petition Mary that the next time she graces us with her presence, she give us a pass on the mass hallucinations and unsubstantiated miracle cures and appear in a children’s’ cancer ward instead, where, in front of medical professionals, she heals the children and sends the kids back to their homes.
I’ve read everything he’s written. He was one of my favorite authors. Still is, I suppose, even if I find some of his arguments not quite as convincing these days.
I’m reading about Taoism these days. Buddhism too. I think American Christianity could learn a few things from the latter.
comradedread
I’m not getting back into the objective morality debate. I think we hashed that out quite thoroughly in the last comment thread to no one’s satisfaction.
Kenneth Winsmann
comrade,
Yes, but the proposition that all religions “have problems in the evidence or lack thereof they present” and also that these problems are intellectually insurmountable.
unsubstantiated claims?!? The miracles of Lourdes France are well documented by a medical bureau and an international medical committee. These are hardly “unsubstantiated” as all of these approved miracles have the testimony of medical professionals to back them up. In other words, the miracles at Lourdes happened in front of medical professionals, and the entire general public. There are literally MRIs of peoples crushed pelvic bones growing back into perfect health. Just look up Louis BOURIETTE. These claims are as substantiated as the possibly can be.
comradedread
Lane
Comrade,
This was my favorite: “So, if you’re thinking of going to Lourdes for a miracle cure, the odds are not very high in your favor.”
Translation: “Miracles are rare, therefore they don’t exist!” lol!
comradedread
Miracles are rare and therefore anomalies which require further study rather than jumping to the unsupported conclusion that a religious child’s supposed vision of a woman 100+ years ago somehow causes a modern day patient to be spontaneously healed.
Which is sort of the point of the quote. You’d think there would be more if the supernatural were real. The gospels report Jesus as spending days upon days healing the sick, yet the best miracles we can come up with are 60 or so over 120 years or so?
Christopher Lake
Greg,
I certainly felt moral outrage at many things when I was a Communist. Moral outrage was all but my perpetual state of being at that time. I would certainly never say that only religious people experience moral outrage. I just had no *objective justification* for my outrage. I didn’t see that at the time, but it was the case.
As I mentioned in my last comment, my cousin is an agnostic (he might actually be an atheist now, from some of his recent writing that I’ve seen), and he experiences deep moral outrage over things which he sees as violations of justice– violations of, seemingly, given his visceral reactions, an *objective moral order*.
It’s not simply that he finds human rights violations (or government intrusions into our privacy) to be *annoying and inconvenient*. He actually seems to believe that they are *truly, fundamentally wrong*.. At least this seems to be what he believes given his outraged reactions to them.
However, recently, he has told me that he thinks human rights are purely a human idea, and that they don’t originate from any source that transcends ourselves (in other words, they aren’t given to us by God, because in his view, there probably is no God). Which brings me back to my observation in the last comment– I can certainly understand how agnostics and atheists feel moral outrage. I just don’t see a *logical* basis from within agnosticism and atheism for one to be *deeply morally outraged* by human rights violations, as if an *objective moral order* has somehow been transgressed.
In a philosophical worldview in which there is no objective moral order, when someone’s so-called “human rights” are violated, at worst, a purely human social contract has been broken by an individual or individuals. This would seem to call for annoyance, or perhaps, anger, but deep moral outrage? Why, if there is not an objective basis for said outrage outside of ourselves and our relative cultural preferences?
Kenneth Winsmann
First there are no more miracles, then there ARE miracles but just not very many, then out of those they just arent spectacular enough…. I mean l, no amputees grew back limbs and everyone knows that the only miracle that counts.
W
E
A
K
Greg (@greghao)
First, a tip of the hat to Christopher, Lane, and Kenneth for such staunch defenses of your position. But we just seem to be going around in circles and for me, as this latest bit on miracles encapsulates (I believe Jason & Christian actually discussed this miracles thing in a previous podcast), this from Comraderead perfectly sums up my position, “All religions ultimately require one to take the leap of faith” and there isn’t much that can overcome that position and I’ve run out of steam to continue down this path.
Lane
Greg,
Thanks Greg!
As for going around in circles. If you think this is bad, you should see the other conversation I’m been following on one of Jason’s other blogs. Catholics and Calvinists talking in circles about God’s sovereignty and human free will. The current iteration of the conversation has been going on for a couple of weeks and has be around 1-2 thousand comments in length!
Honestly, I’ve enjoyed talking with the non-Calvinists over here. You guys a much less irritating. 🙂
Kenneth Winsmann
Lane,
Right?!? Way better
comradedread
Kenneth Winsmann
Wouldn’t I only need one example? I believe this is called “moving the goal posts”. Thousands of claims of miracles were made at Lourdes, a random spring popped out of nowhere and numerous miracles have been verified by medical professionals. Across the pond at fatima, 100k people saw the sun dance in the sky. That’s 100k people from various towns miles apart from each other at the exact same time…. if you aren’t moved by these examples THERE ARE NO EXAMPLES that could ever satisfy
comradedread
No. Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof.
Written testimony from`120 year ago isn’t entirely reliable. Hell, written testimony from 70 years ago isn’t all that reliable. British soldiers at Dunkirk were ‘miraculously’ rescued by the British Navy when they should have been wiped out/captured by the Germans. It didn’t take that long before a mythology had been built up around the event where it was reported that soldiers reportedly saw angelic beings or angelic wings in the sky covering them from German fighters as they left the beaches.
People see things. People imagine that they saw things. People see one thing and interpret it as another.
People see U.F.O.s dancing in the sky all the time. It doesn’t mean there are little green men on Mars waiting to invade us or alien teens joyriding around Earth giving anal probes to the rubes for fun.
Lane
Kenneth,
Didn’t you know?
1. Everything has a natural explanation.
2. Miracles do not have natural explanation by definition.
3. Miracles do not exist.
See, Ironclad.
All you have to do is assume that miracles are impossible first, then you can reject any presented evidence for miracles out hand. It. Is. Genius.
Kenneth Winsmann
Comrade,
No. Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof.
What an extraordinary claim! Is this a universal principle? If so, that’s quite amazing. Could you offer extraordinary evidence that this principle is true?
Written testimony from`120 year ago isn’t entirely reliable. Hell, written testimony from 70 years ago isn’t all that reliable. British soldiers at Dunkirk were ‘miraculously’ rescued by the British Navy when they should have been wiped out/captured by the Germans. It didn’t take that long before a mythology had been built up around the event where it was reported that soldiers reportedly saw angelic beings or angelic wings in the sky covering them from German fighters as they left the beaches.
Mythologies have to have TIME to DEVELOPE around a certain event. Fatima was reported all at once by 100k people who were too far away from each other to qualify as a group hallucination.
People see things. People imagine that they saw things. People see one thing and interpret it as another.
People see U.F.O.s dancing in the sky all the time. It doesn’t mean there are little green men on Mars waiting to invade us or alien teens joyriding around Earth giving anal probes to the rubes for fun.
If 100k people all unanimously said they saw a UFO in the sky and they all were miles and miles apart from each other in different towns we would all have to take another look at the story wouldn’t we? In Lourdes France I wasn’t just “people seeing things” it was DOCTORS seeing their patients and recording bizaar and miraculous cures.
The point I’m trying to make is this: NOTHING will satisfy the unregenerate skeptic. If they won’t listen to the prophets they won’t believe a sign or miracle. Before, you claimed that all religions required leaps of faith because there were no more miracles. Now confronted with incredible miracles, those require a leap of faith because the event didn’t happen within 5 years, there were no amputees healed, and well you really can’t trust people’s testimony. Not even doctors testimony. You are constantly moving the goal posts so that no matter how great an effort the theist puts forward, it will always fall just short. That’s intellectually dishonest sophistry. Just sayin….
comradedread
Really? That’s the proposition you’re going to attack? You feel that extraordinary claims do NOT require extraordinary proof?
Very well, this morning, as I was going outside to get laundry out of the dryer, St. Peter appeared to me in a flash of light. He told me that the Catholics had gotten it all wrong and that he wanted me to start a New Catholic Church with myself as his papal successor. He also said that if you wanted treasure in heaven, you should give me all of your money and sign over the titles to all of your property.
What? You don’t believe me? Very well, I shall email you written testimony from my family and neighbors. You require more proof? Unregenerate skeptic!!!
We would have to determine the climate of the townspeople, the timing of the reports that came in, whether some of the reports were motivated or inspired by other reports, how drunk some of the people were, and ultimately, it would still be inconclusive with the most likely explanations being a natural or man-made object, not extraterrestrials.
So with that in mind, which is more likely, that in a highly religious climate, a girl tells her townsmen to look at the sun and they experience the natural effects of staring at the sun for too long and as word of this ‘miracle’ gets out to the neighboring religious villages, other people start saying that they too were ‘blessed’ to see the ‘miracle’! Or that a magic lady appeared in a cave and caused the sun to literally dance about the sky?
Perhaps it wasn’t a magic lady at all, but a sign from Tonatiuh demanding that human sacrifices be reinstituted at his temple in Tenochtitlan. Surely you wouldn’t reject that explanation, would you?
Did they too in their journals and records write down the cause of the cure as ‘magic lady’ or did they write ‘yeah, he seems to be okay now and we’re not sure medically why?” And if they chose the former explanation, were they too Catholic?
I’m confronted with fantastical tales of miracles. I’ve read plenty of other fantastical tales too, and yet no one really goes into a wardrobe expected to find a winter wonderland full of talking animals.
Once again, did the doctors actually write down “a magic lady cured them’ or did they say ‘yes, they appear to be cured, we’re not sure how it happened?”
There are many things in this universe that we don’t have explanations for yet. Should we stop trying to find a rational, natural explanation for them and settle on “God did it”?
Perhaps one of these ‘miracle’ cures is something in our genes or environment that could provide a general treatment for the malady?
How exactly have I moved the goal posts? I still don’t think you’ve given me genuine miracles. I think, at best, you’ve given me a few preternatural events to consider.
comradedread
You’re talking with someone several thousand miles away via the manipulation of electrons. Seems pretty mundane to you. Imagine bringing someone forward from the 1700’s and showing them the internet. Or your cell phone. Or your car. Or an airplane. Or vaccines. Or antibiotics.
We are surrounded by a world of miracles that have become mundane.
So how about we say:
1. It has been our experience that everything has had a natural explanation and magic does not exist.
2. So-called ‘miracles’ very likely have an explanation we cannot explain yet.
3. Therefore we should study these events in the hopes of finding the next advancement of human understanding and well-being.
Christopher Lake
Greg,
Thanks for the discussion! It’s true that faith is certainly required to believe in any religion. If our conversation must end here (and I respect that that seems to be your desire), I would only ask you to at least continue to consider the possibility that some forms of religious faith *are* compatible with reason. I have a naturally skeptical temperament, and I could never subscribe to any religious faith that did not hold faith and reason to be friends rather than enemies.
Lane
Well of course technology itself isn’t a miracle, we made those. BTW, I’m an electrical engineer and nothing you listed seems particularly magical to me anyway. You seem to want to dismiss anything that didn’t just happen. ~”Oh those rubes from the 1700/1800/1900’s, they aren’t as smart and sophisticated as we are today.” Seems a little classist… well… temporal-ist? I don’t know what “-ist” we should call it, but definitely seems like it should be some sort of “-ist” to me.
No one, I believe, thinks we should advocate not looking into to phenomena we don’t understand to gain as much understanding as possible. So I agree with there. I just don’t want to dismiss the possibility of miracles out of hand. But again, one of your premises is that miracles don’t exist. In a conversation about whether or not they exist, that is begging the question.
Christopher Lake
Comrade,
Perhaps the appearance of Mary’s apparition to a Native American peasant named Juan Diego, and the appearance of her image on his tilma, would be things to chuckle at for you, rather than potential miracles. However, these events led to the conversion of over eight million people to Christianity in seven years. They also led to the end of the Aztec practice of child sacrifice. I used to mock Marian apparitions myself, but I’ve come to see the wisdom of Hamlet’s statement: “There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/12/feast-of-our-lady-of-guadalupe/
comradedread
And we’re back to ultimately the question coming down to a leap of faith.
One must decide if they will accept the supernatural explanation of events or the naturalistic one (which would include ‘we don’t know, yet.’)
Perhaps you would count it a spiritual or character flaw, but after diving into the deep end of the fundamentalist evangelical Christian pool and finding it to be little more than a mix of conservative politics and pious hokum, I am loathe to make the leap to assigning supernatural explanations to any event, including those that we do not yet understand.
I trust that if Catholicism turns out to be correct, that your version of God will understand that reluctance and I will end up in the cooler regions of hell.
Lane
Comrade,
Maybe it is true that there is some “leap of faith” involved, a very warranted and rational one. Probably a leap of the sort involved when you love anyone. When I took my vows to my wife, that was a leap of faith – a reasonably well informed one. If you are looking for proof of the mathematical sort, that just compels your acknowledgement, you will not find that anywhere. Life involves risks.
However, mere belief in God is not the ultimate goal, love for God is. If God were anymore obvious I can’t say whether or not there would be more people loving God or not. It seems God respects people enough to allow them the space not to love Him.
I did not grow up within a fundamentalist context, so I can’t relate to your experiences. However, God knows all of your experiences and will take the entirety of you into account. I do not know exactly what will happen, but I do know that if God is truly Just and Good, whatever happens will be Just. I have Faith in that.
Greg (@greghao)
@all –
I’m not going anywhere but merely pointing out that the exchanges, such as they are, have (maybe was always) reached an impasse. It’s not that I am trying to change anybody’s mind, especially since I’m an agnostic anyway, but digging into the minutiae has, to me, made it seem like we’re missing the forest to focus on the tree.
Christopher Lake
Comrade,
About your possibly ending up in the “cooler regions of Hell,” I don’t know if you were joking, but as Jason and others have pointed out, the Catholic Church does not have any official teaching on exactly who is in Hell. The Church teaches that *if and when* we are saved, it is Christ who saves us, and conscious faith in Him is certainly the best, and most obvious (in Church teaching), way to be saved, but the Church doesn’t offer statistics on the population of Hell.
About your experiences in evangelical fundamentalism, finding it to be a mix of “conservative politics and pious hokum,” the Catholic Church doesn’t confuse the Republican Party with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. See a subject called “Catholic Social Teaching.” It critiques aspects of both “conservative” and “liberal” thinking. Jesus basically did the same, though one will not hear that truth from many evangelical fundamentalist pulpits!
On the “pious hokum”– there is certainly plenty of that in Protestant fundamentalism, and some Catholics can resemble it, but the Church teaches the goodness of reason and has many priests who are actually credentialed scientists. The formulator of the Big Bang theory was a Catholic priest. Caring about hard, empirical, scientific evidence and believing in the existence of miracles are attributes which are *not* at odds in the Catholic Church.
Christopher Lake
Greg,
Thanks for sticking around. What, in your view, is “the forest” that we’re missing?
scot overholser
wow! that Rhino shell is amazing! I’m going to get one. thru your Amazon page. And I never watched The wire before, saw some snips on YOUTUBE and I’m already hooked. Thanks!
from houston hell
Christian Kingery
Nice. I still have mine on. The only down side to it is that I drop my phone all the time now because I just don’t care and know it won’t get damaged. 🙂