Tag Archives: Freethought

Podcasts

Jim Wallace reports on his mission trip to UC Berkeley

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Jim Wallace at Please Convince Me has a new podcast up. This is worth listening to if you want to understand atheists.

The MP3 file is here. (75 minutes, 34 Mb)

Normally, I would write a summary of this, but suffice to say that he goes over the thoughts of a few prominent atheists, and what is valuable is that you can see what they think of Christians, and what they really believe. I always enjoy finding out what atheists believe and then taking a look at how well they can ground their “values” based on their view of an accidental, materialist universe.

UPDATE: I just got this in the mail from Jim’s mailing list.

Hello

What a great February! We just got back from a wonderful trip to Berkeley with 30 high school students who spent time studying atheism and philosophical naturalism and talking to students on the campus about the existence of God. It was part of our annual Berkeley Missions Trip and it resulted in 30 young warriors who are now equipped to defend their faith and change their world. We want to help you do the same thing, so here is this month’s “Three Minute Truth Training” responding to yet another objection to the truth of the Christian Worldview:

OBJECTION: Christians believe Christianity is true simply because they were raised in a Christian culture. If they were raised in a Muslim culture, they would believe that Islam is true with the same passion and certainty.

RESPONSE: The answer to this objection lies in Christian history. While it is true that cultural and geographic influences often favor a particular point of view or behavior, our personal experience demonstrates that individuals often make private, independent choices in spite of the accepted beliefs of their culture. As an example, many of us are vegetarians in spite of the fact the culture is predominantly carnivorous. The history of Christianity also confirms that the vast majority of Christian converts concluded that Christianity was true in spite of their geographic location or cultural background. You can demonstrate this by helping the skeptic recognize the facts of history:

The History of the Ancient World
Christianity emerged in a culture that was largely Jewish or Pagan (a polytheistic mix of religious beliefs within the Roman Empire) and completely hostile to the claims of Christianity. History records the hardship that was faced by 1st Century Christians who concluded that Christianity was true and devoted their lives to Jesus. These believers did not become Christians because Christianity was the default religion of the time.

The History of China
China also has a history of religious suppression related to Christianity. The native culture of China has historically embraced some version of Shenism or Taoism. While Christian missionaries labored in China for centuries, their efforts were often suppressed by governmental regimes (like the Communist Party of China). In spite of this suppression and the cultural inclination toward Shenism or Taoism, Christianity has continued to grow as a underground movement, with some reporting as many as 130 million Christians now living in China. These believers did not become Christians because Christianity was the default religion of their region or culture.

The History of Persecution
History has demonstrated the fact that Christianity continues to grow in spite of intense persecution. Christians have historically come to faith in regions where Christianity is NOT the default religion. For this reason, Christians are still the most persecuted religious group in the world, particularly in places like North Korea, Muslim countries, India, China, Vietnam, and the Philippines. These suffering believers did not become Christians because Christianity was the default religion of their region or culture.

The History of Many of Us Here In America
While America is clearly a Christian nation, our principles of freedom have allowed our citizens to embrace a number of competing religious worldviews without restriction. In fact, a recent Pew Forum poll revealed that Muslims and those who do not affiliate themselves with any religious belief system are the two fastest growing groups in America. Many Christians have come to faith in homes that were hostile or benign to theistic beliefs. In spite of their familial “micro-culture”, they converted to Christianity. These believers did not become Christians because Christianity was the default religion of their family.

Millions of Christians have historically demonstrated that they embrace the truth of the Christian worldview because they believe it is true, not because it happens to be the default position of their family, culture, region or era in history.

Polemics

William Lane Craig answers questions from an arrogant atheist

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Mary sent me this question and answer from William Lane Craig’s Question of the Week.

Here are the questions:

Hi there, I’m writting in regards to your “Q&A 170: So many athiests, so little time” answer. First of all, your two simple questions have very simple answers, and an athiest who can’t answer them isn’t a true athiest.

1)
Q. What do you mean by (you don’t believe in God)
A. I mean that I have a lack of belief the the existance of a deity, your christian God or any other.

2)
Q. What reasons do you have to think that (there is no God)
A. The Earth shows no proof of creation, every single thing on this Earth has a natural explanation, simply becasue modern science has not yet solved every problem, does not mean it never will. I’d go in to detail, but no need to bore you with the science of it all.
So, I’ve given my proof and will give far more if you ask it of me, and any wel linformed athiest will be able to answer those questions in a flash and have the burden of proof back in your hands.
In regards to scholarly work, may I point out Charles Darwin’s “The Origins of Species”, the works of Gregor Mendel, father of Genetics, William “Strata” Smith, father of Geology, Alfred Wegener “The Origin of Continents and Oceans”, Issac Newton, Galileo, On and on I go, where I stop, nobody knows!
Now, if I may turn to the real point of this e-mail besides to point out that you havent really told anyone how to argue christianity other than asking easy questions and throwing names at them. Your God is Omnicient so you say, operating on this assumption, here is how morality plays out in the bible…
1) God creates heaven and Earth and then he creates Humans.
2) God KNOWS that humans will sin
3) God puts the tree of knowledge in the garden of Eden KNOWING it will drive Adam to sin.
4) God Determines that Adams sin is transmutable down to every single person that will ever exist. (Moral objection 1: The sins of the father are logically not related to the son in any way shape or form)
5) God decides that to punish people for this one sin they had nothing to do with or anything else he deams bad, they shall be sentenced to an eternity of burning hellfire. Infinite punishment for a finite crime? That sounds like Moral objection #2 to me!
6) When God sees that his creations have really gone bad, he drowns the world, killing millions of innocent people.
7) only 1600 years after the mass murder of his creations(following biblical chronology) they’ve already fallen back in to sin. So God, in his infinite wisdom, determines the best course of action, is to sacrafice his Son, who is part of himself, TO HIMSELF, to make up for the sins of the creations he made knowing they would sin!

How in the world do you rectify this!?

Cheers,

Luke

I think that Bill is doing a great thing to come down to the level of village atheist once in a while and reply, and if you read his answer, he’s actually pretty mean. And it’s a good thing, in this case, because the worldview of village atheists is a lot like the worldview of Islamic terrorists. They are so insulated from outside criticism that you really have to thrash them around a little bit in order to get them to see that they have been involved with a cult their whole lives. That’s not going to be the case with some of the better atheists like Austin Dacey and Paul Draper, but it is going to be the case with many rank and file atheists, and we need to know how to answer them, too.

News

Suicidal Florida school board gunman was a progressive atheist

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You’re not going to hear this reported in the news, because it doesn’t fit the narrative.

Here’s the scoop from Verum Serum. Where else?

Video of a progressive atheist engaging in some secular humanism.

John of Verum Serum writes: (with links)

Did he have “caps” and not real bullets as someone in the video claims? According to the AP, Duke killed himself with his own gun. So it appears the bullets were real and the people on the board were very lucky (or very blessed) to avoid being killed.

We know the media loves stories about right-wing violence, but it’s going to be hard to spin Clay Duke into a Tea Party terrorist. His Facebook page contains a kind of suicide note which references the movie V for Vendetta (a film in which the “hero” blows up Parliament). His religion is listed as “humanist” which means he was an atheist. He also quotes part of Shelley’s poem Masque of Anarchy, not a Tea Party favorite. (click for full size)

Also interesting is the list of favorite websites he provides, including Media Matters and The Progressive Mind along with about a dozen others.

Read the rest of the post to see how the media makes much of some stories where conservatives can be smeared, but how it covers up stories like this one. And it also covers up stories where the victims are conservatives. You’ve probably never heard of Kenneth Gladney.

This reminds me of the last radical leftist environmentalist who shot up the Discovery Channel building. He was inspired by Democrat environmentalist Al Gore. The gunman loved evolution. And he didn’t like “greed” or “religion” either.

The gunman doesn’t like the rich

The gunman’s Facebook page screen shot says this: “I was born in a country where the Wealthy manipulate, use, abuse and economically enslave 95% of the population… Our Masters, the Wealthy, do as they like to us.”

The wealthy? That sounds a lot like “the rich”, doesn’t it?

And who do we know who rants against “the rich”?

Barack Obama doesn’t like the rich

Here he is talking about taxing the rich.

Here is Barack Obama calling in Democrats to “argue with them and get in their face.“.

Not to mention asking Latinos to come out and “punish our enemies“.

Could Obama have incited this gunman to violence with his hate speech?