In reading Richard Carrier’s excellent chapter in John Loftus’ superb Christianity is not Great in which I have a chapter myself, there is much to glean concerning matters of democracy and the American Constitution in the context of the Bible and religion.download
It is funny how so many libertarians/right-leaners and political commentators in the US are fans of both religion and freedom of speech. Freedom of speech seems to be something which, though actually complex and problematic, is intuitively argued for by many who also favour free market economics and general human liberties.
Tag John Loftus
The Founding Fathers are still on the front line of debate amongst atheists and Christians, secularists and theocrats alike. All these years later there is still confusion abounding. Part of the reason why is that there are many misquotes (and this can happen on both sides). Here, for example, is a quote (A letter from Adams to Jefferson) sometimes used by secularists:
I haven’t done a post like this for ages. Reading, as I mentioned in a previous post, a book sent to me for review, Franz Kiekeben’s The Truth About God, the author takes a whistle-stop tour through inconsistencies in the Bible (not so much to list them all, as he only mentions a few, but to illustrate the types of defences that Christians typically use). He details the inconsistency which starts the Bible off, namely the six day creation story.
The Problem of Evil (why is there so much suffering in the world given an OmniGod?) is sometimes answered by theists that suffering has to exist so that people have a working knowledge of what bad or evil is in order to know what good is, or indeed that pleasure cannot exist without pain.
I love this quote from Valerie Tarico in her chapter “God’s Emotions” in John Loftus’ book The End of Christianity.
To say that the descriptions of God in the Bible are metaphors does not make the situation any better. A metaphor about something as deep as the human relationship to ultimate reality needs to be deeply accurate.
Whilst on holiday I finished reading John Loftus’ The Outsider Test for Faith which I greatly enjoyed and will be reviewing in a short while. There is much to talk about within the pages, not least some of the excellent quotes he has gathered from other writers which he uses to defend his own positions on various topics.
For the purposes of this post, I want to just think a little about the jurisdiction, even the residence, of God.
It comes with some great surprise and sadness that John Loftus has decided to leave the Skeptic Ink Network, a platform which he co-founded with Ed Clint for which we are all exceptionally grateful. As you surely know, John is the author of some superb books, one of which I am due to soon review (The Outsider Test For Faith, which is excellent).
So Randal has responded to my response to Part 1 of his response to my review of his book. But I have not yet had the chance to respond to his Part 2 of his response to my review of his book.
Or something.
Anyway, this will combine responding to his Part 2 and commenting on his further reply.
The other day, I posted my first take on John Loftus’ and Randal Rauser’s debate book God Or Godless? recently. Randal Rauser has now posted two responses to the post:
Part 1
and
Part 2
In this return fire, I will be inter-paragraphically (that might be a new word) commenting on his claims and views. Thanks to Randal for engaging in this debate. For those who don’t know, we have some history in debating the Nativity on radio. Please comment below on what you think.
I am stoked to have received a review copy of John Loftus’ latest offering, “God or Godless?” which he has co-written with Randal Rauser, the apologist with whom I had a radio debate on the subject of the nativity. Let me briefly introduce the authors and the book.