All religions have the same faith-based foundation. When faith is a foundation anything can be believed. --John W. Loftus
To which the following comment was added by renolize:
Faith is the foundation and fear is the stick in Christianity. It is true, however, that with faith anything can be believed. One can look forward to any sort of an afterlife. 72 virgins? Streets paved in gold? Life in other dimensions? Gods and goddesses of their own worlds? Xenu will welcome you in person? The list goes on and on.I am convinced that Loftus and those who agree with them are described in Romans 8:5
What will you do for your faith? Murder an abortion doctor? Fly into a building filled with unbelievers? Enslave a population? Torture heretics? Burn the unrighteous at the stake? Go to war for god?Faith is the path to blindness. Reason is a reality check. This world could use more reality checks and a lot less faith.
5 Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6 The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. 7 The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God. - Romans 8:5-8
IF you are unable to reason correctly, and we know for a fact that we are not perfect in that (we all know what it is like to reason incorrectly), why would anyone of us think we can trust our reasoning to know what is right and wrong? WE cannot. None of us is that smart or awesome enough to know the right things and hit it every single time. We need God's help. This brings us up the Loftus misunderstanding of what "faith" is. Loftus is not describing Biblical faith, he is describing a faith that is not commended in the Bible at all. In Greek the word is "Pistas" and Pistas is not the reason why people murder abortion doctors, fly planes into building filled with believers and unbelievers, enslave populations, burn people we think are unrighteous, torture heretics, or start wars. This is why we have the gifs of the Bible. It is the check and balance that tells us objectively if we are living out the faith as we ought. Faith is not found on just anything and everything. Faith isn't something that is true just because you believe it. The Bible was true before I was born and it will true after I die too. Biblical faith can only be a part of your life as a gift from God of his self revelation. It is based in part on this evidence - as well as history, science, archaeology, and as well as many other things. Before Loftus criticizes faith, he should understand what "Faith" is correctly.
6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. - Ephesians 2:6-10
Debunking Christianity: Quote of the Day
The fact is that we are all metaphysicians, from the most fundamentalist YECist to the most self assured atheist.
ReplyDeleteThis is because at the bottom, as the very premise, of all, each and every worldview, religion, philosophy, concept, etc. there are axioms, there are principles, that are un-evidenced and unproven but are rather, assumed, presupposed and/or intuited.
I agree with you, Mariano. Thanks for the astute-as-always comment.
ReplyDelete