Substantial evidence in favor of a belief in God incudes: Evidence from science – that the universe had a beginning (AKA “the big bang”). So He knows the pain we go through. This evidence is consistent with the story of creation as given in Genesis Chapter 1. Atheism. Richard Dawkins wrote a book entitled “The God Delusion”. Agnosticism literally means “no knowledge” or “without knowledge”. The universe had a beginning according to science. Weigh the evidence, and make your choice carefully. Humans created a belief in God. r/atheism: Welcome to r/atheism, the web's largest atheist forum. The Messiah, the Son of God? 20:20. I don’t have the evidence to prove that God doesn’t exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn’t that I don’t want to waste my time.”. How are they able to judge one thing evil, and another thing good? You live once, and then when your body dies, “you” (if there is a you) die with it. Objection: If there is a God, why isn’t His existence more overtly clear to people? This further supports the notion that when the body and brain cease functioning, the mind – that which comprises the “you” or your personality – may indeed continue to exist. Celebrity atheists such as Richard Dawkins appear to claim the moral high ground when it comes to violence. ... which to me seem worse than Hinduism. At its extreme, he contends that “Muslims pose a special problem for nuclear deterrence” because theologically they don’t fear death. I am a “materialist”, and deny the existence of an immortal soul. Atheism. Atheism vs Agnosticism? A new heaven and a new earth will also one day replace the fallen and corrupt reality we now inhabit, and natural evil will be banished. Bottom line – to try to explain everything by sensory impressions alone, or naturalistic processes, is a limiting world view that precludes the supernatural. For more on Genesis 1, see https://evidencetobelieve.net/genesis-days-or-ages/. And there is much more reasons to believe in a Creator God. We also see our own “broken” nature and inherent flaws – how we know “the right” that ought to be done, yet we continually choose the wrong. It was a New-Age cult. It is a growing movement that is becoming more aggressive, more demanding, and less tolerant of anything other than itself. The moral argument – we are all endowed with a conscience, a sense of right and wrong. Rot, for example, only exists as long as there is a tree that is still left to be rotten. Their success at writing bestselling books, giving engaging public talks and cultivating a global following through social media, has made them minor celebrities. Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. People in this group are sometimes called anti-theists. Gen 1:31 explains that “God saw all the He had made, and it was very good.” There was no evil – moral evil, or naturalistic evil. Christians believe that something dreadful happened between then and now to cause this change. The atheist either denies or disbelieves that there is God or any supreme being for that matter. But Christians believe there is a coherent response to the problem of evil in the world. It actually requires it. And in specific reference to the Afghan war, Harris adds (p.53): There is in fact no talking to some people. Answer: If God were to stamp out evil today, He would do a “complete” job of it. The word atheist is attaching an “a” to the word theist. Examples are Moses and Joshua, Daniel, and the miracles performed through Christ and His apostles. There is significant evidence of design in nature. Perhaps the most vexing question one can ask is, “How did we get here?” The question of origins, both of the universe and of life on Earth, is a question of great importance. The New Atheism has rather faded from prominence, partly because, as its proponents acknowledged, it was not very different from the old atheism. Answer: Empirical observation is a necessity for scientific endeavors. Objection: If there is a God, and He is all-good, and all- powerful, why doesn’t He get rid of the evil right now? More to the point – there has been an invasion of sin into the world. There was no corruption of that which was good. Go further back and you arrive at a definite beginning of the universe in space and time. And God has intervened, or used “miracles” to attest to His existence. So that we could be made right with God once again. “Everything” was good. Answer: First of all, there are two kinds of evil in the world: Because there is evil in the world, atheist try to use this fact to dispose of a belief and trust in an Almighty God altogether. Could it be true that Jesus – Yeshua in Hebrew – is who He says He is? He has been through it. While Christians maintain that God’s existence is apparent by the things which are made, I view the evidence for God as not obvious – why has he not made himself more plainly known? Christianity affirms that the natural evil, and personal evil, is the result of “sin” – of rebelling against God’s way, and His standard for right and wrong, and choosing to set up our own standards or morality. Answer: Logically, this position is indefensible. But really, who is truly deluded? Christianity and atheism are two sides of the same coin. So, in sum, the Christian world view provides a compelling explanation for what we see and experience in our daily lives. We are in a story, and only the end of the story explains the rest of it, just as the conclusion of an argument explains why the premises are selected as they are. This is evidence, when turning back the clock, that the stars and galaxies were previously closer together. Answer: Evolutionary theory consists of adaptation of species to their changing environment, microevolution (changes within species), and macroevolution (one species over time evolving into another species). That is His current model – working through the church to reach all of humanity for Christ – and then then end shall come, as the Bible says. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning. There is clear evidence that the Bible, supposedly inspired by God, is liberally sprinkled with the type … and we both go to the grave. Is he both able and willing? Bishop John Shelby Spong long ago welcomed "the death of theism" and what it meant for Christianity (see his A New Christianity For A New World), and in that most literal sense, I can finally accept and embrace that I am a Christian atheist. Agnosticism. The argument from design – the world and all of nature displays a marvelous design, which is not explainable by pure Darwinistic evolutionary processes. But we all know that even during these times, there were still people who saw, and yet refused to believe. In the latter half of the 1600s, there was an increase in conflict between atheism and Christianity in the Western World. First, they see religion as essentially violent. We will continue to spill blood in what is, at bottom, a war of ideas. God does not exist in their thinking even though i… Whereas US President George W. Bush insisted that “Islam is a religion of peace”, the New Atheists disagree. By attaching an “a” prefix to a word, the opposite of that word becomes true. A skeptic is a person who is tentative in his/her beliefs, neither denying, nor affirming God’s existence. Such random, chance processes cannot explain the marvelous design of the eye, the design of a bird’s wing, or the amazing micro-biological machines we see under the microscope. Objection: Belief in God ought to be rejected, because it is based on faith, not reason. That there is adaptation, and microevolution within species. Whence then is evil? It ushered in the age of Pisces and the end of the age of Aries, the lamb. We live in a “broken” world that is out of balance, and terribly flawed – natural disasters occur and wipe out thousands of people. God allows the evil due to the corruption of sin. We sought to establish their positions on US and UK foreign policy since the September 2001 attacks. I view the God of the Bible as cruel, ordering His people to murder women and children. The evidence provides some support for evolution (macro evolution) over time within species; but not the slow progression of one species into another. He WILL do away with evil. There simply are no cases of one species evolving by itself into another species. I maintain that there is no mind, apart from the brain. What does the evidence show? What this will mean is not all obvious. I will not accept a belief in God because faith is not a “valid cognitive procedure”. The less evidence one has for a position, the more faith one must muster up to believe it. Objection: The universe is eternal, and creates itself – it always was, is, and always will be (as Carlos Sagan once said). Copyright © 2010–2020, The Conversation US, Inc. because religion is intrinsically violent. Secondly, scientifically the weight of evidence points to an initial beginning al space, time and matter, popularly called the “big bang”. When a human dies, that is the end of him. God is not the creator of the universe. God is a myth, I do not believe God created humans. We are all invited. It is therefore more reasonable to conclude that the existence of such evil disproves that there is a God. This is because they exhibit a simplistic view of the world as being divided between two civilisations – secular and religious – which cannot coexist. Then he is impotent. Newcastle University provides funding as a member of The Conversation UK. I maintain that chance, Darwinistic evolutionary processes alone are all that is required for the This is a problem for the atheist. Atheism is a faith system. With the New Atheism in its twilight years and more fashionable false worldviews taking its place, Christians need to keep apologetically focused. Some Christians subscribe to “theistic evolution” – a view that God initially began creation, but then has been using and directing (at certain times, by intervention) natural evolutionary processes to produce the universe and life as we know it today.). According to Pew Forum: Professor Philip Jenkins at Penn State University projects that by 2100, Muslims will be about 25% of Europe's population. I view the God of the Bible as cruel, ordering His people to murder women and children. The second law of thermodynamics – that the natural tendency of things in a closed system (like the universe), is for things to eventually slow down, wear out. How can he make such a sweeping statement? The irony in this argument, which began with the declaration that religion is uniquely violent, is apparently missed by Harris, who has since qualified his position on torture as this: My argument for the limited use of coercive interrogation (‘torture’ by another name) is essentially this: If you think it is ever justifiable to drop bombs in an attempt to kill a man like Osama bin Laden (and thereby risk killing and maiming innocent men, women, and children), you should think it may sometimes be justifiable to water-board a man like Osama bin Laden (and risk abusing someone who just happens to look like him). Atheism is a lack of belief or a denial of the existence of any god. Although God may still use miracles as a testimony to some, He has also chose to work through human beings – the church- to represent Him, and to bring others into His kingdom. Is there a Creator? Jesus experienced the same types of suffering and evil we all do – and perhaps a lot more than most. In April 2010, Eric Kaufmann indicated concerning the future of Islam in Europe: Christianity,Because Atheism is Not Viable Atheism is, essentially, a negative position. Only God can exhaust the meaning of an infinite good. There is no question that adaptation or microevolution takes place – for all the various races have descended from one set of parents – Adam and Eve. Ever since humans have walked the earth, they have been plagued with many and various questions. While Christians maintain that God’s existence is apparent by the things which are made, I view the. To make a way for us back to the Creator? ~ Blaise Pascal Atheism, I began to realize, rested on a less-than-satisfactory evidential basis. The result: a people-less universe! You live once, and then when your body dies, “you” (if there is a you) die with it. His action would include the lies, impurities, and selfishness of every one of us! Without the existence of God, there is not “good” or “evil” in an absolute sense – everything of necessity becomes subjective and relative. Answer: The law of causality dos not demand that everything have a cause – only that whatever had a beginning had a cause. If you have some atheists or agnostic friends, encourage them to watch this! They do not believe an afterlife, whether positive or negative, is at all likely based on available evidence. Ask God if He is real, and Jesus is who He claims to be, that you want Him to come into your heart and be the LORD of your life. That He – the eternal God – became flesh, “dwelt among us”, and went to the cross to pay for the transgressions of all humankind? Question: "What is the New Atheism?" We all evolved from a single celled organism. If there is a God – and He is all good and all powerful – then such atrocities as Hitler’s murder of 6 million Jews should never have happened. Thus the Christian story … The word skepticism comes from the Latin word scepticus, which means “inquiring”, “reflective”, or “doubting”. I am a “materialist”, and deny the existence of an immortal soul. Another example are aesthetic judgements- science cannot tell us why one painting is more beautiful than another. The laws of thermodynamics, the evidence for an expanding universe, the theory of relativity, and other evidence point to an initial singularity, or beginning. Answer: First of all, philosophically it is absurd to claim that the universe is uncaused. Atheists do not believe in god(s) or religious doctrines. Areas such as philosophy and theology seek to answer this question. And so on. What we actually see in geology is the sudden appearance of radically new life forms in the geologic column – for example, the “Cambrian Explosion” that evidently tool place some 300 million years ago. Therefore, the universe had a cause. Atheism cannot explain why there is something rather than nothing. But the early 21st century has witnessed the rise of writers like Dawkins, Harris and Hitchens. You would have to BE an all knowing God to claim such a thing. Objection: There is no God or all powerful Creator. The theologians Jeffrey Robbins and Christopher Rodkey take issue with what they regard as "the evangelical nature of the New Atheism, which assumes that it has a Good News to share, at all cost, for the ultimate future of humanity by the conversion of as many people as possible." Why doesn’t God shower us with hard proof, such a continuous miracles that attest to His reality? At the apex of the French Revolution, the Jacobin government implemented the original “reign of terror” in its murderous effort to impose state atheism. Evil is the absence of something good that ought to be there. Evil is the absence or the corruption of something good. The fundamentalist Christians … “Religion is the most prolific source of violence in our history,” says Harris. Historic Christianity, on the contrary, is well rooted in objective historical facts. While new atheism has undoubtedly been disastrous for Christians, Jews, Muslims, and other religious communities, leading countless men and women into nonbelief, the question of God’s existence was at least considered relevant for the new atheists. evolution of human beings to their present state. ~ C.S. if everything needs a cause, then who caused God? Bottom line: while microevolution and adaptation is an observed fact, evolutionists try to speak about evolution as a single unified process – merging adaptation, microevolution and macroevolution into one process, in effect try to say that evidence for microevolution is evidence for macroevolution. sympathetic to the attack on Afghanistan in 2001, vociferously supported the 2003 Iraq invasion, Religion is the most prolific source of violence in our history, the underlying source of the divisiveness in the Middle East, unmistakable confrontation between everything I loved and everything I hated. A colossal perversion of the good has occurred. I’m sure most religious people have found their selves questioning if the … This analysis obscures the murky role of foreign powers and corrupt rulers in the Middle East and the ability of charismatic leaders to co-opt religion and fuse it with legitimate grievances. Could it be that the bible has revealed Him to humankind through His written word? Hitchens also vociferously supported the 2003 Iraq invasion, while Harris saw Western engagement with Islam and the Muslim world as part of a war that the West must win, or else face “bondage”. The word “atheism” comes from two Greek words: “a”, meaning “no”, or “without”, and “theos”, meaning “God” or “deity”. Carl Sagan, the noted astronomer, is a good illustration. But today this is not so – a great deal of moral evil, and natural evil exists in the world. In point of fact, the problem of evil does not negate the existence of God . 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