Bryan's story is amazing! The power of God shines through his life.

God is a delusion.

You can not prove the existence of god any more than I can prove the existence of the flying spaghetti monster. And by the way, most of the myths about Jesus were taken from other Mediterranean myths floating around the time (e.g. the sun god Ra.)

You also realize there are hundreds or thousands of other religions each also claiming to be just as 100% accurate as you seem to think Christianity is.

Just because you want something to be true, doesn't mean it is. Grow up.

Dear Poo Phantom:

Being told to grow up by someone styling themselves the "poopmonster" is a bit much, but...I knew what I was in for when I responded. :>

Poo Man Wrote: "You cannot prove the existence of god..."

Response: In a technical sense I agree: Can I replicate "god" in a petri dish? No. But, I would ask you in return, you seem certain that God is a delusion. Can you prove your assertion either? How can you be certain that you are right and that I am wrong? By your own assertion that god is unprovable you must accept the possibility that your premise--non-existence, is also, in your use of the word UNPROVABLE.

So, this leaves us both in the same place: We must gather evidence as best we can and decide what theory best describes the evidence.

Example: Your original comments said that Jesus never existed, etc. My response was to give you hard evidence: scholars both L. and C. consistently date the cannon gospels within 30 - 60 years of Christ's supposed (I say that for your benefit) life, Paul's writings are dated even earlier (e.g. Letter to Galatians, C. 50 AD), so the gospel story was being promoted well within the lifetime of eyewitnesses who could have easily argued as you have--that Jesus never existed--but NO such arguments prevail. In fact, NON biblical sources like Tacitus (C. 109) and Celsus (C. 177) who are much closer to the evidence than we, both speak of Jesus as an established person--though they themselves were certainly not believers. So, YOU posited the NON-existence of Jesus, and I responded with multiple source documentation of his existence.

Yet....I am somehow the wide-eyed, gullible one who needs to face the cold reality.

Let me turn the tables on you: Just because you WANT something to be UNTRUE, doesn't make it UNTRUE.

I don't doubt that there was a person named Jesus. There were probably lots of them, actually. Did he go around raising up dead corpses, healing the sick, feeding 5000 people with a loaf of bread and forgiving sins through his martyrdom? ... Absolutely not. I really needn't go into the hundreds or reasons why this is so proposterous, but to point out the completely illogical nature of religion I do have one question...

Either you understand the fact of evolution or you have decided to ignore all scientific evidence and believe that the earth came into existence 5000 years ago and there was some garden with two people in it that started everything. I will give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you aren't insane enough to believe the latter. In that case, most Christians who believe this claim that the story of genesis was just a metaphor or what have you. So if the story regarding original sin was just a metaphor, why did god have to embody himself into human form, get crucified, and resurrect himself as a zombie to forgive a metaphor?

In any case, the onus is not on me to explain why I don't believe there is an invisible man in the sky who created us and then judges his own creation and condemns some of them to eternal suffering. It is always on the believer to prove there is a reason for believing what he/she believes. There are thousands of faiths each with their own claim to certainty about their god, and it always boils down to faith in an ancient text that has been demonstrably altered over the course of thousands of years to suit certain people's motives. If there was a single shred of evidence regarding the existence of a deity, someone would be holding a Nobel Prize for it.

Dear Dr. P:

I find this posting of yours much more reasonable than your original "Jesus never existed.." troll, hence your new honorary title.

But, I am amazed that you can speak of logic without recognizing the assumptions you make in your argument:

(1) Why do you presuppose the miraculous cannot or did not happen? No, I am not letting you off the hook; your entire argument is founded on this pressupostion, so let's have it: What data allows you to know ABSOLUTELY (to borrow your word) that miracles cannot and did not occur, and therefore Jesus did not rise from the dead?

At this point, all you have done is created an argument via definition: I define miracles as prepostrous; since all miracles are prepostrous, the story of Jesus must be prepostrous.

Bah.

I suspoect you will argue, "I do not believe in the miraculous because I have never seen or experienced the miraculous or read credible scientific studies validating miracles, etc." I would respond that this is because your data base is limited to your personal experience, Stephen Hawking, and old episodes of Babylon 5.

How are you any better than a fundamentalist Christian who believes God wrote the Bible because he presuposes the Bible is God's word--and so around and around the circular reasoning goes. Your presupposition is simply a negative version of the same type of circular reasoning.

You might reasonably respond, let's have YOUR data freebird: I can give you my own personal touches with the miraculous and I give you names of close friends and aquantences who have personally experienced inexplicable healings associated with the name of Jesus. They can supply you with the types of medical evidence a cynic might require.

So, your data set is void of the miraculous; I, on the other hand, have data that suggests the supernatural exists. Why do you presuppose YOU are right?

(2) Presupposition two:

(2) You claim that there are BILLIONS and BILLIONS (ok, had to do the Carl Sagan) of religions out there each claiming to be totally correct, and each flimisly resting on ancient texts that have been greatly altered throughout the years....

(A) You are painting with way to broad a brush. E.G. Mormonism makes outlandish claims that white peoples warred with dark skinned peoples in Ancient North America around 200 AD, and that Joseph Smith was shown where to find Golden tablets that described these events that only HE could interpret through magical seeing stones...and, oh SORRY, you can't see the tablets now because the Angel wanted them back.....

I consider the Mormon story roughly the equivalent to the Spaghetti monster you mentioned earlier. Complete bull.

On the other hand, the Gospels are written close to the events they describe within the lifetime of eyewitnesses, describe real, testable places; can be attested to outside of the text itself (e.g. Tacitus, AD 109 writes, "The originator of the name [Christian] Christ, was executed as a criminal by the procurator Pontius Pilate during the reign of Tiberius");

I am not sure WHY you believe the cannon Gospels (first four books of the New Testamentt) have been greatly atlered. I told you in a recent post, the earliest existing Bible shard comes from C. 125 AD (you will excuse the fact that papyrus doesn't hold up especially well), that you can actually see very early copies of Paul's writings down the road in Ann Arbor (Michigan U. library) dated C. 200 AD or so). In other words, there is quite a difference between golden tablets that can only be read by magic seeing stones (Mormonism), a story dilievered to ONE MAN (Mohammud) via the angel Gabriel; and the collection of multiple witnesses that comprise the New Testament and that can be attested to via very old existing texts.

I challenge you: Name ONE alteration in the New Testament that significantly impacts the story of Jesus or orthodox Christian doctrine? You can't. What you have are a multitude of petty scribal errors and a couple small contested stories.

(3) You display your ignorance in two areas of Christian doctrine: God does not condemn his creation. He offers salvation freely to those who trust his remedy for sin, His very person crucified for you c. 33AD, named Jesus Christ.

One aspect of Christianity I find particularly compelling is it seems to accurately desccribe the human condition: We certainly seemed predisposed to sin and to actively enjoy finding ways to screw each other over. Some may be waiting for some sort of social evolution: I would say the only thing that has changed about human society in its brief history is the size of the club we've invented to bash each other.

No, I find experiences of the miraculous to be credible; I find a reasonable argument can be made that the NT Gospels represent reliable information; and I find the logic of Christianity to be satisfying: God loves us; we all have sinned; God is just and must judge sin, but God is also merciful and sent his "son" to die in our place.

As for evolution, you must understand the Bible is not a monolithic book, but a collection of stories written for different purposes over a long period of time. I am not sure Genesis is meant to be history as you and I understand it; but, I am quite sure the Gospels are meant to be taken quite literally. As Paul himself said, if Christ did not die and was not risen, then our religion is worthless.

This is a pretty ridiculous argument, but at least it keeps me laughing.

1) What about all the "miracles" that happen in Mohammad's name? or in the Flying Spaghetti Monster's? Do those validate those deities?

I think it is much more likely that people are just attributing experiences that are unlikely, or coincidental, or part of sleight of hand, to the name of Jesus in order to validate their belief in their religion. Not one single "miracle" in the history of mankind can be validated.

2) The gospels contradict themselves and each other. If they are taken quite literally, I think you are in trouble. I'll do you the favor of not listing the hundreds of contradictions here.

Dear Mr. P:

As someone else has said, if you smell poop, check your own shoes first... :>

(1) Your argument is based on the presupposition that miracles are prepostrous...

Your response, "what about miracles in the name of...." Come now, any miracle in any name of any deity would invalidate your premise--I am not aware of miracles in the "name" of other deities--but, here you show your ignorance: A muslim would be horrified if you called Mohammud a diety--The fact Christians call Christ a deity is one of the main objections Muslims have to Christianity. They would rather say it was a miracle done in the name of Allah--And, I say, well, sure; Allah is just Arabic for God, after all.

My main point, any miracle in any name would invalidate your argument, so I am not sure why you take this tack.

(2) "Not one single miracle in the history of mankind has ever been validated..."

Now YOU are the DIETY!!! to claim such omniscience over the entire scope of history. PLEASE!!! Control the scope of your claims. Poopman, how could you possibly validate such a claim given your limited data base? Good grief, man, has postmodernism taught you nothing? Wouldn't you be more honest and logically better off to say, "I have never seen or read a credible account of a miracle"? Show some humility and openmindedness....

And you think I am the closeminded brainwashed one!!!

What do you mean by "validated"? Let me give you an example of a credible miracle I have encountered: I was praying for some friends who were touring on a bus; while praying I had the picture of smoking tires pop in my head. Strange. So, I prayed that tires would remain functional for my friends. Weeks later, I found out that their tour bus tires were constantly overheating and had to be inspected every three hours.

Yes, yes, a modest encounter, I admit.

Could it be coincidence?

Sure.

But, here's the rub: Why are you CERTAIN that it is coincidence? It could also be that a God who calls me to participate in His good works through prayer was communicating to me.

I think so, and such a conclusion is validated in my mind because such experiences have been replicated consistently in my life and the lives of other credible people I know.

That's the nature of quantitative research, by the way. Social research (that which involves social issues and people, etc.) involves interviewing people, gathering multiple perspectives and looking for patterns, and then making an inductive leap concerning the best theory to fit the pattern.

You and I have made leaps in different directions, but I wonder if you have truly given the data I have a fighting chance before now.

I challenge you to talk to real people, real Christians across a spectrum of cultures. See if you see a pattern.

(3) If you have bothered to read this far: I do allow for one correction on my part: My use of the word "literally" was unfortunate. You say the Gospels have many contradictions. In that sense, I agree that they cannot be taken literally: Did Christ make one speech using Mark's words or Luke's? Likely neither is word for word correct. Rather, I would say it is remarkable that four different writers collected stories that seem in keeping with each other in spirit (and often word), and certainly agree on the vast majority of major points. I would argue that these writers did their best to write in keeping with all the accuracy someone remembering events and gathering data from either eyewitnesses could gather. I argue they are reliable, and were meant to be read as such and not as a metaphor which may be true of something like Genesis 1.

Before you POO-POO (as you are want to do) such writing remember this: All historical research relies on gathering data on that which already has happened.

Anyway, this has been fun. I mean that honestly. Thanks for the dialogue if you ever read this, though, likely this conversation will is already buried in cyberwaste.

The next best thing to a worthy friend is a worthy opponent. You have been the latter.

Appreciated.