Tag Archives: Christianity

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How to defend Christian exclusivism from the challenge of religious pluralism

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Recently, I had posted a debate from the Unbelievable radio show, which is broadcast in the UK. The topic of the debate was whether India should pass an anti-conversion law to prevent Christians from trying to convert people to Christianity. Basically, many Hindus in India want Christians to adopt the Hindu notions of polytheism and religious pluralism. They want Christians to accept that Jesus is one incarnation of the divine among many, and they want to outlaw the Christian practice of using speech to convince people to become Christians.

You can listen to the debate here in my original post.

But I wanted to highlight another debate that occurred in the comments of this blog, between me and a Hindu reader, who challenged me for being intolerant because I said that Hinduism was false.

His initial comment is here.

Guys, all religions teach the same things. Its how each religion is interpreted that makes it different. If you follow any religion persistently, it will lead you to a peaceful and happy life.

[…]If one feels happy following Christian rituals, he may follow Christianity; if he feels happy following Hindu rituals, he is good to a Hindu. It all depends on what makes sense to the person. Enforcing or luring someone to another religion is wrong…It should be a personal choice. And no one should oppose a conversion made by personal choice.

[…]To say that someone’s God or method of worship is false or not real is absolute rubbish according to me.

[…]If one says that other’s God or religion is false, he/she is not tolerating the other’s beliefs. And its immoral. Such things lead to religious conflicts.

[…]I believe in Jesus and so in my religion which is Hinduism.

[…]Why convert when a human being’s main aim is to be happy? Every religion has scriptures that tell how to become happy and attain heaven/liberation.

[…]Everyone loves his/her religion. They would not want to hear anything bad about it.

And I replied:

Our view as Christians is that the purpose of religion is not to live a happy life and to be “good”. Our view is that we want to believe what is true and to know God as God really is. We believe that God is a person, with a real personality – likes and dislikes.

What you’re proposing is a Hindu approach to religion, except with Christian symbols and rituals. But Christians don’t care about symbols and rituals much. We are more interested in history, science and propositional logic. We treat religion like… any other area of knowledge. First we discover the truth, then we act on it.

Additionally, you have a Hindu approach to conversion, and you are trying to force that on Christians. You can keep your Hindu approach to yourself, and tolerate the fact that we have a different approach to conversion.

[…]You’re not in a position to know what Christianity teaches, or what Jesus believes, since you haven’t looked into these things at all. You know Hinduism. And you are projecting Hinduism onto other religions. But Hinduism is totally different than Christianity. They conflict in many areas, like cosmology and history. We believe that the universe had a beginning, you think it’s eternal. And science can arbitrate that claim. We are willing to change our beliefs to be in line with what we can test in the external world, using the laws of logic, and the study of science and history.

[…]You write “To say that someone’s God or method of worship is false or not real is absolute rubbish according to me.”, yet you think that Christianity is false, and not real. But I am actually not offended by that at all. You are welcome to think I am wrong. I don’t mind, this is the way that the game plays. Only one of us can be right, and if you were right, I would have to switch over to your view and that would be fine with me.

[…]You write “Everyone loves his/her religion. They would not want to hear anything bad about it.” No that’s your view. You identify Hindusim with India and patriotism and your people and culture. I don’t identify Christianity with anything except truth. I like it because it’s true. And that the only reason I like it.

[…]When I say that Hinduism is false, I am not “talking bad about your religion” any more than I am talking bad about the view that 2 + 2 = 5, when I say that 2 + 2 = 4. It’s not talking bad about an idea to say it is false.

And then he replied:

Do you believe that people who worship idols are devilish or all religions except Christianity are false? If yes then explain me with proper scientific reasoning and provide me a proof in the recent decades that logically explains the above two statements. You need to prove me that what you believe is experimented by scientists and proven by technology.

[…]I believe in all Gods no matter what religion because God is One. For me and this generation of educated Indians, we believe in tolerance and respect for all religions. We believe in co-operating with each other and not pointing flaws in others beliefs until its proven scientifically and attested by scientific authority. And we believe that people’s belief be respected!

Then I replied:

The current best theory of the origin of the universe is called the big bang theory. It states that all the matter, energy, as well as time and space and time, came into being from nothing. It is backed by experimental data from red-shift measurements, cosmic microwave background radiation measurements, and light element abundance measurements, etc. The theory states that the universe began 14.7 billion years ago. Additionally, the universe will not recollapse because measurements of mass density from Maxima and Boomerang show that the universe will expand forever.

The big 3 monotheistic religions agree with the universe coming into being from nothing. Unfortunately, other religions think that the universe is eternal, such as Mormonism and Hinduism. On that basis, I reject Hinduism, which requires that the universe be eternal.

“I believe in all Gods no matter what religion because God is One.” That view (pantheism/polytheism) is called Hinduism. You are a Hindu. Christianity (monotheism) is mutually exclusive with Hinduism, because the teachings are in conflict, (as with the example of cosmology). As a Hindu, you therefore think that Christianity is false. On your definition, you don’t “tolerate” Christianity – you think it’s false. You don’t “respect” Christianity, because you want to force your view (Hinduism) and your view of conversion (don’t tell other people their religion is false) on Christians.

[…]Note: I am ok with you saying that I am wrong and that Christianity is false.

And then we sort of wound things down from there.

Anyway, the point of this exchange is most people in most religions think that the point of religion is to be happy, to have a sense of community and to get along with everyone by never talking about whether religious claims about the external world are true or false. But that view of the purpose of religion is not the Christian view. On the Christian view, the goal is to seek the truth. And part of Christian practice is to defend Christianity in public, and trying to convince other people that Christianity is true.

So, I think that Christians need to be a bit tougher, and recognize when someone who is not a Christian is trying to get them to accept that the purpose of religion is not to seek the truth. That’s their view. That’s not our view. It doesn’t make any sense for someone to say that I am evil for thinking they are wrong, when they are thinking that I am wrong. I think a better way forward is to allow other people to disagree with you, but to keep the disagreement focused on arguments and evidence.

And just because you disagree with someone else, it doesn’t mean you have to be mean to them. In my office, I am friends with Hindus, Muslims, atheists and Jews. We try to outdo one another in good deeds to make our religions look good! And when we debate which religion is true, we use arguments and evidence to attack and defend. What I’ve found is that you get a much stronger friendship when you are comfortable being yourself. I keep telling my co-workers – it’s OK to disagree.

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Doug Groothuis explains the correspondence theory of truth

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Check out this short paper on truth and postmodernism by Christian philosopher Douglas Groothuis.

Excerpt:

The correspondence view of truth, held by the vast majority of philosophers and theologians throughout history, holds that any declarative statement is true if and only if it corresponds to or agrees with factual reality, with the way things are. The statement, “The desk in my study is brown,” is true only if there is, in fact, a brown desk in my study. If indeed there is a brown desk in my study, then the statement, “there is no brown desk in my study,” is false because it fails to correspond to any objective state of affairs.

The titanic statement, “Jesus is Lord of the universe,” is either true or false. It is not both true and false; it is not neither true nor false. This statement either honors reality or it does not; it mirrors the facts or it does not. The Christian claims that this statement is true apart from anyone’s opinion (see Romans 3:4). In other words, it has a mind-independent reality. Minds may recognize this truth, but minds do not create this truth. This is because truth is a quality of some statements and not of others. It is not a matter of subjective feeling, majority vote or cultural fashion. The statement, “The world is spherical,” was true even when the vast majority of earthlings took their habitat to be flat.

The correspondence view of truth entails that declarative statements are subject to various kinds of verification and falsification. This concerns the area of epistemology, or the study of how we acquire and defend knowledge claims. [2] A statement can be proven false if it can be shown to disagree with objective reality. The photographs from outer space depicting the earth as a blue orb (along with prior evidence) falsified flat-earth claims. Certainly, not all falsification is as straightforward as this; but if statements are true or false by virtue of their relationship to what they attempt to describe, this makes possible the marshaling of evidence for their veracity or falsity. [3]

Therefore, Christians — who historically have affirmed the correspondence view of truth — hold that there are good historical reasons to believe that Jesus Christ rose from the dead in space-time history, thus vindicating His divine authority (see Romans 1:4; 1 Corinthians 15:1-11). [4] The Apostle Paul adamantly affirms this view: “And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead” (1 Corinthians 15:14-15). Without the correspondence view of truth, these resounding affirmations ring hollow. Christianity cannot live and thrive without it.

This is a great article from a very smart guy who has written extensively about truth and postmodernism. Doug also has a blog, in case you want to pay him a visit.

News

MUST-READ: Supreme Court refuses to hear case of silenced Christian valedictorian

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Brittany McComb

Story and video here at LifeSiteNews.

Excerpt:

The United States Supreme Court has refused to hear the case of a high school valedictorian whose microphone was turned off by school officials after she began speaking about the part her Christian beliefs played in her success in life.

Attorneys for The Rutherford Institute asked the Supreme Court to hear the case of Brittany McComb, charging that school officials violated McComb’s free speech rights and engaged in viewpoint discrimination when they censored her speech because of its Christian content.

[…]McComb is a Christian and a top student, who graduated with a 4.7 grade point average from Foothill High in Henderson, Nevada. She knew that her valedictorian address would probably be cut short, but was determined to go ahead and mention her faith anyway.

School officials had previously edited her speech to remove Biblical references and one mention of the name of Jesus Christ, warning her she would be interrupted if she deviated from the approved text.

“I went through four years of school at Foothill and they taught me logic and they taught me freedom of speech,” McComb stated. “God’s the biggest part of my life. Just like other valedictorians thank their parents, I wanted to thank my lord and savior.”

The 400 plus graduates and guests who had gathered at a Las Vegas casino for the commencement ceremony, booed and jeered after McComb’s speech was cut short, chanting “Let her speak!”

If this young lady were gay or a Muslim or anything else, she would have been allowed to speak about that, and Christians would have remained silent and respectful. Only Christians are suppressed, and that should tell you something about our government-run, unionized public schools today.

Video of her speech:

Video of her on Fox News:

Props to Alan Colmes for taking her side against the anti-Christian school administrators.

A lot of non-Christians and fake “Christians” on the secular left think that they are doing a good thing by silencing authentic Christians in the public square. They have decided that it is better to hurt the feelings of Christians by forcing them to keep silent and act like non-Christians, than to hurt the feelings of non-Christians. The problem with this is that ultimately, if Christianity is true, it only matters how each of us makes Jesus Christ feel. And if you hurt the feelings of Christians who are busy following Christ, then you are really hurting Christ.

The Bible says this in Matthew 18:1-10:

1At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”

2He called a little child and had him stand among them.

3And he said: “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

4Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

5“And whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me.

6But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

7“Woe to the world because of the things that cause people to sin! Such things must come, but woe to the man through whom they come!

8If your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire.

9And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.

10“See that you do not look down on one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.

This story is in Mark, Matthew and Luke: it’s early and multiply attested, and is therefore authentic.

This cannot be any more clear. If you discourage people from following Christ then you are in big trouble. I think  that this suppression of Christians is worse than murder. Jesus is threatening people who discourage Christians with the eternal fires of Hell. Christians are morally obligated to talk about Jesus in public, and particularly to give thanks to him in public. When you tell Christians not to act like like Christians, then you are really forcing your religion onto them, and expecting them to act as if you are more authoritative than Jesus Christ.

The purpose of life, on Christianity, is not to hide your commitment to Christ in order to make non-Christians feel comfortable about their rejection of Christianity. The purpose of life, on Christianity, is to publicly acknowledge God in everything that you do and to have a relationship with God, as revealed by Christ’s life and teachings. The most important relationship is the vertical relationship – with God, not the horizontal relationship – with people. It is a non-Christian viewpoint that faith should be kept private and hidden.

Remember that the first commandment is not “Thou shalt avoid offending people who are in rebellion against God” nor is it “Thou shalt hide your faith from non-Christians so that they don’t feel badly about rejecting God”. There’s a temptation to pick moral rules like “don’t murder” and “don’t commit adultery” – things we don’t do, and then to say that those things are the really bad things. And since we don’t do those bad things, that makes us good. But what does God consider to be the really bad thing?

The first commandment, according to Jesus, is found in Matthew 22:34-38:

34Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together.

35One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question:

36“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

37Jesus replied: ” ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’

38This is the first and greatest commandment.

This story is in Mark, Matthew and Luke: it’s early and multiply attested, and is therefore authentic.

And consider Matthew 5:13-16:

13“You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.

14“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden.

15Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house.

16In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.

This story is in Mark, Matthew and Luke: it’s early and multiply attested, and is therefore authentic.

(This is one of my favorite verses in the Bible. I always feel sad when I think of it because I think of it when dealing with laziness, ignorance and cowardice from fake Christians – which is often!)

And consider Matthew 10:26-33:

26“So do not be afraid of them. There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known.

27What I tell you in the dark, speak in the daylight; what is whispered in your ear, proclaim from the roofs.

28Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

29Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father.

30And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.

31So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

32“Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven.

33But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven.

This story is also in Luke, so it is part of the Q source shared by Matthew and Luke, which is very early and likely to be authentic.

One has to remember that for this young woman, her relationship with Christ is as real to her as her relationship with her parents – and she wants to honor him in her moment of celebration. It is striking that school administrators encourage other politically correct groups to express themselves in public. Only Christians are singled out for persecution and suppression. Christians can’t speak freely, but non-Christian school officials can call all pro-lifers murderers and Democrats can force Christians to pay for abortions.

People today seem to think that God, if he exists, would be loving. And what they mean by love is “making people feel happy regardless of what they believe about God’s existence and character”. People imagine what God is like for them using emotions and intuitions, instead of looking at the life of Jesus historically, and asking whether God really stepped into history to show us what he is really like. Biblical Christians don’t comport with this intuitive/emotional understanding of love, so that is why they are persecuted by non-Christians and fake Christians.

This bias against Christians sharing their faith is common in most non-Christian religions who would prefer to silence Christians rather than debate them with arguments and evidence. Countries like the UK and Canada punish Christians for speaking about Christianity, India and Israel consider passing anti-conversion laws, and in the atheistic North Korea or Muslim Iran they just imprison or kill Christians outright. When non-Christians persecute Christians for behaving like Christians, they really are aggrieving Christ himself.

My advice for non-Christians

If you are a non-Christian or an emotional/intuitive “Christian”, you want to avoid denying authentic Christians the rights of free speech and freedom of religious expression. Feel free to spend your lives on Earth seeking pleasure and avoiding a relationship with the God who is there. Even God won’t reveal himself overtly to you to compel you into a love relationship with him. But don’t make it harder on yourself in the after-life by persecuting Christians here and now for behaving like authentic Christians.

Some people think that by suppressing Christians, they actually are doing what God wants because God’s goal for us is to have happy feelings. But if your method of discovering God’s existence and character is by using your emotions and intuitions, then you should be careful about inventing a God in your own image. My advice is to conduct a genuine investigation of whether God exists, and what he is like, using arguments and evidence, not emotions and intuitions. If God is real, then he already has a personality. He isn’t YOU.

Related posts

Here is a series of posts I did on why people go to Hell.

And this debate in which Hindus argue that Christians should not be allowed to speak about Christ in public.

And this debate in which secular humanists argue that Christians should not be allowed to speak about Christ in public.

Here are some stories from the UK:

Here are some stories from Canada:

Here are some stories from the United States.

And of course in atheistic and Muslim countries they imprison or murder you for being a Christian:

You can read more about Brittany here.