I Hope I Get To Meet Christopher Hitchens In Heaven One Day

Every time I listen to Christopher Hitchens, or one of the other four horsemen of the atheist apocalypse (Dawkins, Harris and Dennet), I feel myself taking a deep breath unsure if I'm about to hear some killer argument that will see my faith disappear in puff of logic. After all they are pretty smart people.

This time I was listening to Christopher Hitchens being interviewed by Tony Jones of Late Line fame.

He spoke as if many of the Xn people he spoke to argued that morality was proof of God or that God (via Xy for Xns) is what teaches us morality. I can't believe this kind of argument still persists. Hasn't any of the Xns pushing this line of argument read Matthew 25 or the parable of the Good Samaritan or any of the parables where moral thing being done by the non religious or religiously incorrect person is contrasted with the religious person doing the immoral thing?

His arguments about Martin Luther King I found less convincing mainly because of the way I read scripture. I think Hitchens sees scripture as like a law book where you can pick and choose bits equally with the whole thing needing to be in complete agreement with itself. This is completely understandable as this is exactly what many Xns do. Personally I've always thought of weird given that one of our major figures said things like "you have heard it said but I say..." (Matt 5:38)

I tend to view scripture as an on going revelation rather a law book. Xns who argue against picking a bit out of Leviticus to support a particular idea usually have their arguments reduced to something along the lines of "that's not loving and god is loving so we'll ignore that bit" I would argue that they're simply not taking scripture seriously.

As he spoke it reminded me how important it is to hear the voice of the heretic. Hitchen's may not be a believer but like previous heretics (Martin Luther or even Jesus) his voice needs serious thought.

Hitchens is not only the atheist and critic we deserve to have but are blessed to have. We need to agree with him that religion can be dangerous and open to abuse which under the right and fairly unextraordinary circumstances can be devastating. For example if we were to want exemption to discrimination laws it would not be carte blanche (as some Xns are arguing at the moment) but only for very specific reasons which wider society would be comfortable with.

There has been much post enlightenment theological thought but for the most part of of it seems to still exclusively reside within theological institutions. My hope is that The popular and lucid thoughts of Hitchens might challenge main stream Xy and force us to grow and change.

Questions from a Brand New Atheist

I came across the Brand New Atheist blog via Cameron Rilley's Blog, initially to a great and moving older post about how he became an atheist. More recently he posted a series of questions he wanted his Xn friends to answer since no one he knew was polite enough to answer I thought I’d give it a go. I'm guessing he's hot asking these questions so someone can convince him to become a Xn or so he can bait them but perhaps rather to answer the question "How can someone believe this stuff?"

These are my somewhat condensed answers. I’m happy to expand on any of them if you want.

Here’s a very small list of items that are wrong in the Bible, I would like you to explain how you deal with them.

1. The Bible refers to the Bat as a bird. (science has proven this to be wrong) Leviticus 11:13-19 and .Deuteronomy 14:11-18

2. The Bible refers to the Earth being flat. (science has proven this to be wrong) There’s too many, here’s an article that lists them all. http://www.goatstar.org/the-bibles-flat-earthsolid-sky-dome-universe/

3. The Bible refers to the Earth as being the center of the solar system. (science has proven this to be wrong) 1 Chronicles 16:30, Job 9:7, there are others but these are the easiest to interpret.

4. The Bible refers to the Moon as having it’s own light. (science has proven this to be wrong) Genesis 1:16, Isaiah 13:10

I'll deal with these 4 questions in one hit. You can also add that Pi = 3 and technically that the earth is a dome with waters above and below (kind of like an inverted snow dome). All of these are really the same critique, that is that the Bible is not scientifically correct. I would argue that the Bible is trying to answer why the world has been created rather than how the world is created which is why much of the creation story is a re interpretation of already existing creation myths with an emphasis on the world being ordered rather than a random accidental chaos. I've written a bit about this if you want to read more at http://achurchlessfaith.blogspot.com/2006/06/not-so-intelligent-and-definitely-not.html

5. The Bible condones slavery. (written in the text of the Bible) Too many to list, here’s a link to them all http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/interp/slavery.html

I think how you read these texts depends on how you view the Bible. that is whether you view it like a big law book were you can quote random verses from anywhere or whether you see it as an unfolding story or revelation. if you believe the first option then you have to disagree with Paul that you can be Xn without being Jewish as well. to me arguing that slavery is ok is a bit like arguing that neo is still trapped in the matrix by showing selected clips from the matrix.

6. Adam didn’t die the day he ate from the tree of knowledge. (written in the text of the Bible) Genesis 2:17, Genesis 3:6, Genesis 5:5

Personally I think this is very much intentional rather than an overlooked flaw. it is part of an ongoing pattern of God promising to do one thing but then relenting and not doing it, or doing something less severe. This was exactly Jonah's problem with God and why he goes off to sulk in the last chapter of Jonah (the chapter usually left out by Sunday school teachers)

7. The Book of Judas and Book of Jasher are missing. (written about in the text of the Bible) Book stores already have the Gospels of Judas on the shelves http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5327692, Joshua 10:13

Also the book of Jude quotes Enoch (a non canonical book) as well. quoting texts outside the cannon will disturb you depending on your view of the cannon of scripture. If you view it as divine instructions handed down from God kind of 10 commandments style and the only source of any truth then this is going to be a problem (and you'll still be arguing that the world is flat and 6000yrs old). however if you view it as something that people chewed over for a while before they decided what was in and what was out (which is historically what happened) then it might not be so much of a problem. Also, if you are happy to accept that there is wisdom to be found outside of the cannon then it's not so much of a problem either.

8. The virgin Mary was a mistranslation of the maiden Mary. (written in the text of the Bible http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8m8ntlyrXnY

Yep, the passage in the old testament that Luke quotes (Isaiah 7:14) is best translated as a young girl and was interpreted as virgin in Luke (from the slightly off Greek Septuagint rather than original Hebrew). some people might argue that the intent of "young girl" was virgin, it is also possible that Mary was a virgin even if the passage was mistranslated. I know that people make a big thing about the virgin birth but to honest for me it's just one small passage in just one gospel and personally I don't think it makes a big difference to the overall narrative either way.

9. The Bible speaks of the unicorn which has never been proven to have existed. (written about in the text of the Bible) http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v14/i2/unicorn.asp

Hey what about the Leviathan (Job 41)? Or has someone found that ;) . See answers to question 1-4.

10. Atheists can’t get into heaven. Does that also mean Jesus didn’t let Peter into Heaven? (written about in the text of the Bible) Matthew 10:33, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzzORZhnCao

Sure atheists can get into heaven. Any Xn who doesn't believe that hasn't read Matt 25:31-46. in this passage those who didn't describe themselves as Jesus followers (no reason why they couldn't be atheists as well) get into heaven, and those who do don't get in.

I hope these answers explain how at least one person is able to believe even though they know this stuff.

Peace.

Why I'd like to be an Athiest

A while ago I wrote about why I’m not an atheist today I’d like to balance up the ledger with a short post about why I’d like to be an atheist.

1. It's the default position. As much as some Xns say Atheism is as much a leap of faith as belief in God I beg to differ. I think atheism is the default position and it's me who has had the leap of faith to believe in God rather than an atheist.

2. I wouldn't have to hang out / be associated with Xns. Xns do some stupid and embarrassing things in the name of their faith. There wouldn’t be a Xn anywhere who couldn’t find another Xn who has said, done or believes something contrary to their own beliefs.

3. It's clean. There are bits of Xy that are grey and unknowable. I could ignore or at least pay little anything that isn’t provable.

I’m still a Xn but sometimes I think life would be easier if I wasn’t. Narrow path and all that.

An inspiring atheist's call to appreciate how lucky we are

Cameron Reilly's a hardcore atheist and a great thinker with a big heart.

Reply on Seesmic.

This is a mantra that we all need to be saying to ourselves everyday, people sometimes shriek at the idea that I support a family on less than 50k a year and live in arguably Perth’s most bogan suburb. It’s so easy to start thinking I need a new car rather than one that’s 10 years old, I need to live in a nicer suburb, I need to regular go on interstate or even overseas holidays. This is all a meaningless chasing of the wind. The reality is I’m living the high life it’s just that I spend my time comparing myself to the people richer than me.

Atheism vs Christianity: A Reflection

I've been feeling a little but fatigued by the Atheism vs Xy (or faith of any description) debate. It is something that has struck an unusual chord with me over the last year or so. Mainly because when I listen to these debates I find myself tending to cheer on the side of the atheist rather than the Xn, which is a little disconcerting seeing that I identify as a Xn and have not been persuaded to give up my faith. This is not to say that I haven't been persuaded by any of the arguments of atheists, I think I have, but rather than those arguments demolish my faith I feel like they have sharpened it or trimmed off the woolly bits. I do wonder whether this will eventually whittle my faith into nothing or whether it will only refine it further.

Perhaps one of the unspoken limits of the debate is that the debate is always going to be about someones dentition of God rather than just God. Never the less they are still worthwhile especially given the kind of things people will do in the name of their definition of God. This is why I often find myself cheering on the atheist, thinking "that definition of God is not my idea of God", or cringing at the Xn because I feel like my definition of God or what God is like is very different to theirs.

I wonder if it would be helpful to concede that the big problems with Religion and God believers is not that they believe in God, but what they subsequently believe and what that belief gives them a right to or, instructs them to do. Most people don't have a problem with people who believe that aliens landed in area 51 or that the moon landing was staged because it doesn't actually impact on the way they treat other people. The big problems with religious people, as I see it, is when religous people do evil things because they believe it is what God wants. That evil stretches the spectrum from genocide to indoctrinating children in their own faith with out giving them a choice about it or denying the rights of scientists to do science.

I also think it is worth Xns conceding that science has more to say to faith than faith has to say to science. Faith is about a general whole of life perspective, science is about specific measurable things. Faith is like a big blanket and Science is like a knife, hitting only specific areas of the blanket. It may cut a hole in the creationism part of the blanket, but the blanket is still there, it may cut so many holes that many people consider the blanket is no longer a blanket.

I can remember hearing someone say that Atheism or Faith might be genetically determined. To me, often the debate seems to be trying to work out who is blessed and who is cursed. Are the believers blessed because they can experience something other or are they cursed because they are deluded. Are atheists blessed because they can see the world rationally and clearly with out the distortion of faith or are they cursed because they are missing out on a connection with something other. Too often it has felt like two sides yelling at each other telling the other that they are the blessed ones and the other is cursed. As a Xn I would like to say that I do not know whether I am blessed or cursed by my faith. It has certainly been important to me and it is something that has been shaped not only by other Xns but more recently by atheists too.

Richard Dawkins says that on a scale of 1 to 7, where 1 is absolutely sure that God exists and 7 is absolutely sure God doesn't exists, that he would be a 6. Personally I think I waver between 2 and 3. As much as it is easy to get caught up arguing about what is the "right belief" I'm convinced that what is important is how we live and I will always feel like I have more in common with an atheist who cares for the poor and their fellow human being than an Xn who is protesting against the teaching of science or protesting about someones private sexual ethics.

Atheists can say dumb things too

I've just listened to the podcast of the Sunday nights with John Safran and Father Bob show (I'm a bit behind). On the show they interviewed Ian Bryce, NSW Campaign Manager of the new 'Secular Party'. To see how a secular party might do things differently to a religiously influenced party they asked how he would make a decision about something like abortion. He said they would use the utilitarian principle, the greatest good for the greatest number of people. Given that if both parents don't want the child and say only the child is keen to be alive then that's not going to change whether the child is a 2 day old fetus, 30 weeks into the pregnancy or 2 weeks after they are born.

Surely it would be better say something like we'd measure when the fetus becomes a sentient being and won't allow terminations after that, or some other measurable scientific principle. I'm usually groaning because I hear Xns saying dumb things, so it was nice to hear that atheist are susceptible of falling back onto a dogma too.

Why believe and why I don't mind being confused.

Last month I was interviewed on a podcast by Cameron Reilly as a follow up to my What would it take for me to become an Atheist? post. It was a strange experience if only because I felt a bit like Cameron tried to do a bit of a "debunk the Xn" on me, whether he was aiming to do this or not I'm not sure. I think I was kind of hoping to talk more about the things we had in common rather than our differences. None the less it was weird to both walk away from the experience feeling like I had been "Beaten by the arguments" but yet not convinced to give up what I believe. I truly disconcerting place to be in. None the less if only for my own sake I did say I'd post on some of the issues raised that I felt I didn't answer very well (which was pretty much most of the issues)

Cameron started by asking me about the Egyptian God Horus and the similarities with Jesus as outlined in the film Zeitgeist which at the time I hadn't seen and now I have.

Part one of Zeitgeist looks very much like a "loose change" for Christians (loose change being a 911 conspiracy movie), part two is 911 conspiracy and almost a complete knock off of "loose change" which for me doesn't do very much for the films credibility. There were obvious mistakes of the film like the implication that early Xns believed Jesus was born on the 25th (the gospels make Jesus birth look like summer (which is the time time shepherds watched there flocks) and that there were three kings rather than just three gifts. It also implied that the gnostic tradition was the was the earliest Xn tradition who the catholic church who got rid of and then emphasised the historicity of Jesus. For me one of the biggest unanswered questions was why would a Jewish sect who's big story is their escape from Egypt appropriate an Egyptian God. I'm sure that any two people who want to debate this movie can out google themselves to their hearts content and their is plenty of pages supporting both sides.

All of that aside I'm happy to bet that the Jesus Project recently featured on Point of Inquiry does not come to the same conclusion as this documentary. If they do then it's time for me to seriously examine what I believe about Jesus.

After this we got into some deeper how can you believe in Jesus / God questions. I really tried to answer some of these questions way to quickly and most of them I should have said "I'll have to think about that" but I didn't.

The big thrust was why do I believe in God and why the Xn God. The short, not thought up on the spot, answer is that I just have an innate sense that there is something bigger than myself, something transcendent, something other in life. In part this inspired by the incredible beauty and brokenness that I see all around me and the incredible unreached potential of humanity on an individual and collective level. Jesus just happens to be the best representation of that innate sense of what this transcendent thing is.

One of the questions I wasn't sure how to answer at the time was why don't I pray to other gods. This is something I have never tried and probably never will partly because of my belief that all religions and denominations are trying to understand the transcendent in life. They are trying to understand what God is like and what that means to us. Which is why we can learn from each other. I'm not going to go through and test each religion because I do not hold the belief that I (or Xy) is right and everyone else is wrong. I believe that Xy as I understand it at the moment makes sense of my world as I experience it. As I continue to wrestle my ideas will continue to change, whether this causes me to wave outside of Xn orthodoxy or even theistic orthodoxy I don't know. I'm certainly not going to look down upon anyone just because they have a different view than me. These are precisely the people I can learn from.

As much as it may look like, from the above few paragraphs, that I'm not moved by the arguments of atheists and other secular humanists the truth is I am. It would be easy if I wasn't but I am. Unfortunately I often find my self in a space of doubt or confusion rather than a space of confidence either way. CS Lewis famously once said that Jesus was either a "Liar, Lunatic or Lord", and perhaps the same can be said of me or any other Xn. As I continue to wrestle with what I believe. I sometimes worry that I am more likely to booked into a mental asylum than to become an atheist. Dawkins or Harris said something along the lines of if someone said they spoke to an invisible being we'd put them in a mental asylum. Sometimes I wonder if that's where I belong. But it's not all preparing for the padded cells, one of the glorious things about confusion and faith and a lack of confidence is that this produces (in me any way) more love for others. To be a confident atheist i would tend to a destructive nihilism. To be a confident Xn I would tend towards self righteous arrogance and intolerance.

Thank you God for Confusion.

What would it take for me to become an Atheist?

As I mentioned in my previous post Cameron Reilly asked me "What would it take for me to loose my faith and become an atheist?" so hear is the answer...

The Back Story

I've been a reader of Cameron Reilly's website and started listening to all his podcasts after I heard him on the Father Bob podcast. One major thing he has been talking about for the last couple of years has been Atheism and struggles with religion and often particularly Christianity (being the dominant religion in Australia) He has even been called "ignorant”, a “troll”, “dishonest” and “sneaky" by Christians. On a recent podcast either he or his guest (I can't remember which) mentioned that none of the Xn people he had talked to had been able to the answer the question "What would it take for you to loose your faith and become an atheist?" A simple enough question on one level and one that I wanted to be able to give and honest a personal answer to.

Now I'd like to say a few things at the outset

• I don't see myself as a spokesperson for Christianity or any sought of authoritative spokesperson for any group except.
• I'm not the kind of person interested getting into the kind of heated debates that some Xns and atheists seem to enjoy.
• I'm not listening to the Cameron's podcast or the Point of Inquiry podcasts or follow blogs like the excellent five public opinions so that I can understand atheists in order to convert them.

Instead by engaging in this which 99% of the time just involves listening and reading I'm trying to do three things

• Understand views different from my own
• Learn from people who hold different view to me
• Challenge my own views particularly by listening to people who's views differ to mine

It's also worth mentioning at the start that at least 10% of anything I say I will disagree with by next year. The only problem is I don't know which 10% (cheers to Tom Wright for that phrase). I am not a theologian and I have not really read widely on this topic. I have never actually got into a debate with someone about the existence of God where one of us has tried to persuade the other otherwise. So, as far as being the kind of representative that a group of Xns would choose to represent them in an argument between Xns and Atheists am pretty much equivalent to the really fat kid at school when it game to picking teams for sport.

None the less I am interested in challenging my own belief systems and learning from others. So hear goes

How I think Xy appears to atheists

The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree...

This above picture I took from Cameron's website. This picture, and the one below, neatly illustrate how I think many people (not just atheists) view Xy. I know that the atheist blogs I follow often have digs at fundamentalist end of Xy and while I'd claim that my worldview is very different a fundamentalist Xn. I need to acknowledge that my own brand of Xy probably sounds only slightly less ridiculous.

I think it's important to acknowledge straight up that Xns are the one who believe in something that we cannot see or test scientifically and that we believe that God has acted in the world through Jesus. Whether this is true is irrelevant in as much as I think it is important to admit that Xns believe things which can be hard to accept and we should not look down on those who do not share all or some of these beliefs. On the contrary I am often suspicious of those who just accept these beliefs at face value.

How Xns Respond to Atheists

In a word badly.

Sometimes it's hard to imagine in a Post modern world where truth is seen as relative for many people why some of us would bother arguing one persons truth against another persons truth when it comes to religion. I think the reason that these arguments have become so heated and passionate is that these claims are not just about belief but they are ultimately claims about power. The power to have intelligent design taught in schools or the power to have Xn chaplains in state schools or the power to stop people wearing a crucifix around their neck. (you can probably Google all of these to find the original stories). It saddens me that for a religion that worships a servant king that we are so often sucked into trying take power.

I had hoped that since the early Christians were often labeled atheists by those around them because of their disbelief in pagan gods (the dominant way of viewing the world), that even if Xns disagreed with atheists we would at least have compassion towards atheists. Finally and most importantly, since having freewill and free choice is such a major tenant of Xy would should at least give atheists the dignity to disagree with us. Now I realise that what I am saying does not apply to all Christians. And for every Xn who protests (in what ever form) about the beliefs or actions of an atheists I am confident that there are others who have no problem with those beliefs. None the less as someone who doesn't believe in bagging out others for having different opinions to my own I'd like to apologise for not defending people's right to think differently than me, especially when they are being hassled by people who are calling themselves Xn

How my brain works

Before I answer the "What would it take for you to loose your faith and become an atheist?" question I though it might be worth explaining a little about how my brain works or and how that assesses my world view. This is a quick summary so apologies if I gloss over stuff. My brain has two aspects to it kind of like the two left and right channels on a stereo. The two channels don't play exactly the same thing but do inform each other, heavily influence and often change each other but are none the less in some kind of harmony. I know that when Father Bob has spoken to Cameron he has often said something like "your talking the wrong language!" And he'll say something like "I have no idea what you are talking about". For me the "other language" is my left channel as opposed to my right channel.

My right channel could be loosely described as my scientific and mathematical channel. This is where I do my finances, fix my car and all the other things that are helpful to measure.

The other left channel is where I process things like Beauty, Mercy, Harmony or Love. The kind of things that I can't or it is often not helpful to measure. So, for example, if I give my wife a dozen roses and she feels loved I'm not going to give her 11 next time to see if I can be more economical, I'm more likely to give her two dozen instead. There are other things that happen in this channel as well like enjoying music and movies or the decision to continue supporting the Hawthorn football team, no matter how bad they play. These things may not be measurable but they do have an internal logic. Of course each different aspect of my life doesn't fall into one channel or the other they often sit in both so things need to sit in harmony with each other as they are processed by both sides. Since God is not provable or disprovable my concept of God sits in the left channel. But I'm going to use logic, so if my concept of God says that God controls everything and that God is all loving and that atrocities happen then my right channels is going to tell me that that is just not logical. See the God changes her mind post for more information on this idea.

I realise this is a bit of a quick overview but hopefully you get the picture

Listening to some of Cameron's atheist guests on his podcasts, those who had grown up in a Xn environment and then one day started thinking about God and chucked the idea out with the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus, I often felt like I was listening to a mirror image of myself. I grew up in a house where I cannot remember God ever being mention except when we went to church at Easter and Christmas (which we stopped going to when my younger sister had stopped believing in the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus) I started thinking about God and it just seemed to sit right. After hearing the story of Jesus through a few scripture lessons at school I asked for a Bible for Christmas and then started taking myself to Sunday school. I think I was the only kid there who wasn't dragged by the ear by their parents.

Since those early days dragging myself along to Sunday school I've got to see and hear about some great things and some terrible things done in the name of Christianity. However I'm not sure that I'd say religion is the root of all evil. In some ways I'd like to take a step back and say that any ideology that over rides the principals of Justice, Mercy, Beauty, Harmony, Freedom and Love is the root of all evil. It is certainly possible for religious people to act this way and it is also possible to have a non religious version of that as well. This is something I'll come back to later.

So back to the question "What would it take for you to loose your faith and become an atheist?"

Before getting the answer I think it's worth saying that since I am a Xn, any proof that Jesus did not exist, which includes a coherent explanation of why the early Xn Church started, both the Pauline gentile side and Peter etc... Jewish side, particularly explaining why these people were prepared to die for these myths, would certainly rock the current foundations of my faith. If this happened I'm not sure what exactly would happen. I am a fan of the Jesus that I find in the gospels and would remain so even if I was certain that he didn't exist (perhaps in a similar way that I am a fan of Yoda). I might become an atheist or I might become a Xn with a similar world view to John Spong. So although Xy and belief in God are connected they are in some ways two separate issues.

The Answer

So, back to the "What would it take for you to loose your faith and become an atheist?"

I would become an atheist when I understand an atheist world view that makes more sense than my current world view of all that I experience.

This means that there is not going to be some rational scientific test to prove if God exists or not. There is however an internal logic to what I believe that makes sense of all that I experience. What is most likely to convince me of another world view other than the one I currently hold is simply hearing someone else's story which is why I try to do more listening than arguing.

Now in his original question Cameron was keen to interview me. I'm not sure what he'll think of this answer. Hopefully it at least explains why I like to listen to the show but don't tend to argue with others.

So what next?

Personally I'm going to keep listening to atheist podcasts and blogs particularly because I think they have a lot of good things to say. Xy like any ideology has the potential to over ride the principals of Justice, Mercy, Beauty, Harmony, Freedom and Love. It is often those outside of that ideology who will point this out.

Also, I'm going to try and speak out a little more when I hear Xns slipping into this trap. A classic sign of this that to argue a point some Xns will use expressions like "we should do this because we are a Xn country" or "we should do this because the Bible says so". If a Xn believes that Jesus is loving, merciful and just and that they follow Jesus then they should be able to justify any idea by arguing it on terms of it being just, loving or merciful. If a Xn cannot do this it is an admission that they don't know why something is worth fighting for and they are just following an ideology without questioning it.