I need to talk to a Christian apologist that is intellectually honest and can prove the faith with evidence with absolute certainty without rejecting science. It has been a horrible experience as many Christians websites I go to refuse to help me. In fact just recent was an “apologist” who refused to answer 2 of my questions, and whose arguments are weak. In fact, I suspect he is a narcissist. There are so many hypocritical Christians, and the fact of the matter is, I am an ex-Christian atheist who has found many problems with the Bible, such as science, historicity, and especially with practically application, I don’t know if it is practical to start discussions on specific topics on here since there are many topics I have problems with. (I am shocked that there are Christians that accept evolution!)
Hi Rafal, Sorry to hear you have had a bad experience. I absolutely believe the Bible is true, does not reject science and also goes into a lot of detail about evolution. To start, here are some of my views that you can peruse (each with multiple replies):
The Creation Days – A Day Age Concordance (currently still open for more replies)
The Flood of Noah – Another Examination of the Flood - #14 by graft2vine
Common Decent through the Patriarchs – Skipped Generations of Genesis - #31 by graft2vine
Remapped Flat Earth Imagery – Why Young Earth Creationism and Flat Earth Theory are false - #19 by graft2vine
Hi,
Well that is a challenging OP.
I think you will find that there is a wide range of beliefs that incorporate Evolution into Christianity that range from just accepting the Scientific view to trying to balance it with a more active God than one wo sets things in motion and let it run amok.
Providing proofs may be more problematic as much of faith is personal and subjective.
Perhaps if you start with where you are and what you need to accommodate we can discuss it further. However , if you ae looking for consensus and a single solution, I am afraid you will be disappointed.
Richard
What were your two questions Rafal?
My journey went from American import fundamentalism to American import emergence, I loved it all at the time. The great majority of my friends and acquaintance, colleagues, are Christian. Apologetics does not work. At all. Ever. Except for the converted. The faithful. But not for the unfaithed likes of you and me. It’s not for us. British and continental Christianity is far more comfortably sophisticated; evolution is just not an issue. Darwin and Dawkins are national icons: Faith can easily accommodate science here. In the tiny minority active Christian population.
There’s only one problem.
Anyone who claims they can “prove the faith with evidence with absolute certainty” isn’t intellectually honest.
So you’re setting yourself up to fail.
Didn’t you notice them when you were here three years ago?
The point of apologetics is to make the converted more comfortable. You have to accept the unstated assumptions that underlie their argument to make it valid.
That’s not what faith is. That sounds more like science (and even in science, there is room for doubt and uncertainty).
I’m curious, since you say you are an atheist, then why is “proving” Christianity important to you?
That’s a great question… From my experience, I grew up in a Christian home but never really owned my own faith, and the church my family attended was “dry” of the Spirit. When I got older I then abandoned the faith and became an atheist, but was never satisfied in that. I still had questions and felt an emptiness with no purpose. I did want to believe in something but also wanted what I believed to be true.
My then future wife was a Christian and she did not want an unbelieving husband. She attended a Spirit filled church, invited me and so I gave it a try. God was not proven to me by logic or facts, but by His Spirit. It was something I felt that I could not explain.
After I had my own faith, I then began my search to prove the faith. It is through the Spirit that understanding is opened up and He teaches all things. The Bible was proven true to me by the Spirit, listening to His voice reconciling all things, and this included evolution.
- Col 1:20 And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say , whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.
I’m glad you were able to experience faith like that! I think that really gets to the crux of the matter, that so often trying to find “proof” becomes more of a mathematical or scientific process, which is profitable in many different areas, but is not exactly the same process one would use to discover faith.
It’s complicated by the fact that some Christian groups (perhaps unintentionally) reduce faith down to a series of propositions and “answers” to questions, which ends up making it feel safer and more comfortable for some people, but can result in a lifeless sense of what faith is.
I guess faith, like everything else is individually nurtured or spawned, but some approaches are more vulnerable than others. The need for proof or confirmation leaves you open to negative proof, or disillusionment. Likewise a faith based purely on an understanding of Scripture will fail if reality does not match the expectations that Scripture might suggest or the understanding demand. I have known many a Christian falter because either life or even God does not live up to their reading of Scripture.
You cannot argue someone into faith, but you can argue someone out of it or away from it. I would say that I use apologetics in my preaching and witness, and would refute that it was any sort of waste of time be the recipient Christian or no, so perhaps it is the use of Apologetics that you misunderstand.
People have many excuses or reasons not to believe, or to believe, and it is those things that Apologetics addresses. The need for tangible proof would be one such issue that apologetics can confront or even overcome.
If you follow the scientific threads I get involved in you will see that the underlying issue is the difference of approach between scientific and intellectual or abstract thinking. It reaches a point where you are unable to communicate effectively because the understanding, even of some words, is poles apart. Not everyone can think scientifically, but conversely a scientist does not always find it easy to understand things outside their scientific methodology. Intelligence is often the enemy of social graces and understanding and abstract thought.
God’s refusal to be empirically proven comes as a mystery to many, and one that is almost impassible.
Richard
Rafal, thank you for your honesty in where you are at right now. I am truly sorry you have had a negative experience talking to some of the people you mentioned.
In the spirit of honesty you posted with, I will tell you that no one can prove their faith with absolute [verfiable] certainty. Some on here may disagree with that, but as you will see I think that adds to some of the points I have to say. I add verifiable on to that as many people have personal experiences that prove to them absolutely that God exists, but those experiences cannot be directly proven to someone else as they involve an inherently unknowable thing (at least not fully knowable) - the mind of another human. Just as one human mind cannot be fully known to another (at least with our current technology level, though I doubt even technology can fully overcome this), there are certain other aspects of existence that simply cannot be fully known. The biggest one, and, I think, the centernost question at the bottom of it all, is whether there is or is not a God. You take any question about faith, and it ultimately leads back to the moment everything began - and there there are two options - God is, or God isnt. Neither are completely verifiable, and so each person must look at that question and decide what he thinks. Then, that decision affects how he perceives all future questions and evidence. Is that scientific? No. But it centers around a question that cannot be scientifically answered. What was or was not when the universe wasn’t cannot be scientifically known, as science requires the existence of the Universe to operate. Anything that claims otherwise is at best a mathematical theory or metaphysical guess based on some line of logic.
We could have discussions about various scientific theories, theological ideas, or historical facts, but none of them can be proved beyond doubt. In reality, its very much like a civil case in a courtroom (at least in the U.S.) where decisions are made based on what the jury and judge deem the preponderance of evidence. But not all jury members agree where the preponderance falls. The exact same evidence can give people a different conclusion. But the evidence is exactly the same. Some conclusions about reality are ultimately subjective. Even science itself has some ultimate uncertainty to it.
For me, I never fully deconstructed my faith. I went through a restructuring without the deconstruction. I had a cognitive dissonance between what I had heard about faith from some people, and what I saw in science and certain theological ideas. But I knew the person of Jesus to be real and true (personal experience, non-verifiable), so I found groups like biologos and other theologians who helped me to see there wasn’t a conflict, and who helped me to navigate some difficult theological concepts. It took a long time, but now for me the dissonance is gone, and the faith I had is renewed and enriched in me. But those things that helped me I could not prove to you beyond any doubt.
But some people have different experiences that I did, and that is where interpretations diverge. Does that mean truth is relative? No. I think what I believe is true. But it does mean I can’t prove that to you unequivocally.
@RichardG I think our responses have some overlap. Looks like I was composing mine when you posted yours.
The universe, one of infinite, from eternity, is self tuned, going forward. Not an impossible probability looking down the wrong end of the telescope with an eye to God. And singularity is pass’e. Colliding 5D m-branes in bulk 11-17D hyperspace feel more constant. The half dozen measured constants damp down to what they need to be at the 4D collision points. Or just emerge up out from of the interactions of the ultimate minimal indescribable indeterminable undifferentiable wisps of existence. If null, then not null. And here we are. Again. God would make it infinitely worse.
I’ll admit those theories are a bit beyond me. I wasnt ever very good at calculus and such - I respect your knowledge and understanding of them.
But, to be honest, to me that just punts the question back even further. Why are there branes and such instead of nothing? In the end the same binary question remains - is there a God or is there not? Each answer is a step of faith.
I thought you didn’t believe infinities?
Infinity of nature, from eternity, is the greatest truth of all, bar none. It is the most brutal fact of existence. Bar none. You are not alone in not being able to face it. Very postmodern atheists can’t either.
No proof is necessary.
Just reason. Nothing changes. In God or no.
If there can be existence, then c is constant, everywhere. Everywhen. Just like the charge on the electron. The keys of existence with G and h. As soon as they need to emerge, they do. Constant. The interactions of wisps, of strings of next to nothing make it so.
I admire faith in proportion to how it bows to this.
Anything less… less. Although I understand the desperation that elevates ignorance above knowledge. I have felt it.
God explains nothing of this. Which is inexplicable.
All God would have to have done, is a leave a proper fossil. c isn’t it.
[There was no first. There is no end, no beginning, of beginnings. No change. In God or no.]
Fascinating! Grief turned into cosmology.
They’re beyond everybody. Existence, is. I have the most minimal possible knowledge and even less understanding.
And there is no further back. There is no answer. Why, is human. Mesoscopic. There is no why. No reason. No purpose. There is no God because it explains nothing at all. There is existence. Tautology. [Redundant phraseology.] That’s it. No faith is required in the face of that blank, infinite wall, fact. No faith explains it. Is necessary.
And that would all be overturned in the finding of a single impossible fossil.
It’s either that or theology. I can’t do that any more.
I’d ask, but some prefer to grieve privately. I don’t plan on going anywhere soon; until I do, I’m available.
It seems you and I have a fundamentally differing view of the nature of the Universe. It seems we will have to agree to disagree, but that’s ok by me.
I appreciate you sharing, nonetheless. I respect your views - it is apparent they have been carefully thought out and not come to lightly. Thank you for sharing.