Subject:
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Re: Atheism (was: Santorum Fails In His Effort To Pervert The Constitution)
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Sat, 14 Aug 2004 17:07:46 GMT
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Viewed:
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1930 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, David Laswell wrote:
> In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Christopher L. Weeks wrote:
> > And this "difference between belief and fact" is what you're claiming
> > underpins the difference between agnosticism and atheism? But a Christian
> > only has the belief too, so are they agnostic?
>
> Agnostics generally fall into one of two camps: 1) true agnostics who believe
> it's impossible to know if any god exists in the absence of material proof, and
> 2) modern faux-agnostics who believe that some god probably exists, but they're
> not sure which one. There are Christians who lean towards Type 1 agnosticism by
> questioning the existence of god in general, but in the end they will generally
> either end up strengthening their beliefs or abandoning them altogether in favor
> of atheism. Christians, like any other organized religion, may have certain
> questions about their faith, but ultimately they do have faith in their
> religion.
I would question whether you mean "religion" or "God" here. Faith in religion
is what I call "Churchianity". It's no better than superstition, like athletes
who always go through the same routine before the race starts.
As a Christian, I have many questions about faith and about the God in whom I
have faith. This is quite healthy as otherwise my mind would not be involved.
A Christian has relationship with God. This is based on faith, but acting on
faith brings experience. With experience, faith gains vision and is no longer
blind. It is a virtuous circle.
Incidentally, I count myself as a Christian, not a [denomination]ist, since I
believe it's about relationship, not religion. The only things that could be
called 'religion' for me are the deeds of faith: "show me your faith without
deeds and I'll show you my faith by what I do" (James 2:18 NIV).
It takes more faith to be an atheist than it does to believe that there is a god
of some sort. People have not yet managed to grow a tree from a jar of
chemicals, so there is still a big gap in science. If science is not
all-powerful then something else must be. Call it 'god', since that's what
others use to explain things that science can't explain. This argument is not
what I actually believe, but how well do you think the logic works?
The chinese word for 'agnostic' is composed of 3 characters, meaning "not can
know". I wonder if there's any correlation between people who have trouble
trusting others and those who subscribe to type 1 agnosticism?
Mark
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