If you scan the popular literature covering the topic of belief in God, you’ll find the Christian viewpoint presented in many well thought out and sincere perspectives.
Each of these works, while they may have some merit, ultimately winds up presenting the same “pitch” for Jesus. A case in point is the book “I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist”.
This essay is not intended to be a review of this book. It’s offered up here as a fine example of the circular logic Christians are doomed to employ; whether they admit it or not is irrelevant.
Norm Geissler starts off to whet the reader’s appetite with common skeptics’ questions which he promises to answer. He does his best to answer each one but winds up back in the same ‘ole boat of “The Bible is true and is the Word of God”.
The arduous path he hikes to get there is admirable but makes the conclusion no more credible. The shortcoming of all Christian apologetic works, no matter the level of scholarship, is they can offer no defense for the monstrosity of God’s behavior.
So they are either forced to make tired excuses such as “we cannot question God”, or else they must claim the Bible is not literally true.
Both of these positions are indefensible: if God really did wipe out the whole world except for 8 people and a boatload of animals then we must conclude this god is insane or pure evil. Since God cannot be mentally ill, then the literal Bible God cannot exist. An evil god is not a very attractive Deity to worship so enough said there.
What’s worse is the situation a metaphorical Bible believer is in. For, without the literal Hell and specific salvation required to get to Heaven (through Jesus the Messiah), the whole rest of the Bible has no purpose. Christian theology is clear the ENTIRE purpose for all of the suffering and death both of the past and now is the result of sin, with the only cure being Christ.
No way proves God is real
There are many educated people who believe in God; scientists such as Frances Collins who heads up the human genome project, and Michael Behe who is a biologist. This in no way proves God is real. Intellectuals of a bygone era offered up prayers to Ra, and Zeus, and Jupiter, and we know these are dead idols with no power whatsoever.
One reason to not believe in God is that our world today and our Earth history look just like they would if there was no God. Natural disasters arbitrarily kill thousands or even millions. The disease strikes believers and unbelievers in similar numbers. There’s no credible evidence that prayers work; only the intense HOPE that they might. While optimism has been shown to have a healthy effect, it does not justify the incredible investment in time, talent, and treasure a sincere believer is told to “give to the cause”.
An even more damning reason to not believe is the supposed “written word of God” (The Bible). These words tell us that God is just like humans: he is loving and merciful, but also vengeful, angry, spiteful, and totally happy with killing millions of people and animals. He likes their blood too; the Old Testament is filled with passages to the effect that various animal sacrifices are a “sweet savor” to the Lord. How horrible!
Why does this supposed God of love like death so much?
Even in the New Testament, slaves were fine with God and that’s one reason the Civil War had to be fought. Southern preachers were using the clear words of Paul in the New Testament to support slavery even as Union troops divided and conquered the Confederacy, and of course well before that.
The Bible trumpets how Christ will triumph over sin; yet the entire history of our world is filled with wars, wars, and more wars. When there are not wars, there are rapes and murders and all sorts of victims being killed every day. Yet God promises it will all be a part of his “plan”.
The only logical conclusion is that either his plan cares not at all about human suffering, or far more likely: it is a claim made up by men to encourage and control others.
One can be positive and grasp a hold of all that life and love has to offer without surrendering to a system of religion that doesn’t make any sense. It’s not about proof: Surely the God that claimed to give us reason would then have to make sense to the minds he created. Since what he is and what claims to do does not make sense, that’s the final reason to not believe.
