What follows is not a personal attack on the member of this forum called Missionary. I'm certain that he's an intelligent man who firmly holds to his beliefs and earnestly engages in debate about his passionately-held faith.
Rather, I'm puzzled by what he says in reply to Brian37 on page three of the, "Let there be light" thread. To my mind there are contradictions in his statements and I choose to point these out, hoping that he will respond and clarify what he means.
You could go to that thread and read all of it for the sake of context but the part that perplexes me I now reproduce here.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Missionary Replies to Brian37.
"However, the proof was given to me. I didn't ask for it and I wasn't expecting it. I was a non-believer too. The only one that can prove anything to you or anyone else is god himself.
Brian37 wrote:
Your "intense" feelings are not evidence.
Tradition is not evidence.
Popularity is not evidence.
Holy books of any religion are not evidence. They are self-serving
and circular. "My deity is real because my book says so."
Your holy book is not the only one out there.
Missionary continues...
Actually, all that is true... Except the bible actually becomes evidence after the fact: it's secondary in a sense. It becomes truth after you receive god. Until then it's essentially nonsensical and meaningless.
"The only one who can prove anything to you or anyone else is god himself."
...he is making a grave error.
This statement is clearly and obviously false and can be easily proven so.
I do not need the hand of god to prove to me that the city of Newark is in the state of New Jersey. I already know that, having been there - twice.
Another proof.
Divine intervention is not needed for any literate and numerate person to prove to themselves that there are more pages in the old testament than in the new testament. Just count them up and see.
In the same way god need not demonstrate his power for it to be proven that ice is colder than fire, that Canada is larger than Mexico and that George Dubya will soon become an ex-president.
Yet Missionary's sentence clearly states that only god can prove the things (or anything) to be true.
What he might have meant to say was...
"The only one who can prove
[god's existence]
to you or anyone else is god himself."
Of course I'm only speculating here. How could I possibly know what he was thinking at that moment?
So, returning to what Missionary did say, I find his behavior in this forum to be at odds with his own words, or, putting it another way - contradictory.
Why does he quote the bible to try and prove anything when only god can do that?
If Missionary is not trying to prove anything why does he continue to try and refute the arguments of other members?
If he were not trying to prove anything why does he respond to others using phrases like...
"Your logic is stuck." Free Will thread, Page 3, replying to Kmisho.
"This is false." and...
"This is a flawed conclusion..." Free Will, P.4, to Seekah.
These examples use the language of debate - which is fine for this forum.
But if Missionary is presenting and defending arguments to prove his views isn't he doing a job that he says only god can do?
Moving on we arrive at another contradiction.
"Actually, all that is true... except the bible actually becomes evidence after the fact; it's secondary in a sense. It
becomes
truth after you receive god. Until then it's essentially nonsensical and meaningless."
Here he describes an order or sequence of events concerning the bible and unbelievers. The bible BECOMES the truth after you receive god.
Do you see it?
Before an unbeliever receives god the bible is not the truth - once they receive him it becomes the truth. In fact, "Until then it's essentially nonsensical and meaningless."
So where does that leave the thousands of millions of unbelievers who might open the bible looking for answers?
Well, according to Missionary, nowhere. No matter how much they read, it'll remain meaningless nonsense to them. Of course, that's assuming they have the ability to read. Most of the human race throughout history was illiterate, but even if they'd been able to read the bible it would have done them no good at all.
Now when I was a born-again christian the pastor of our church taught me that god's holy spirit works thru scripture to guide men's heart's and mind's to him. This, I believe, is standard evangelical theology.
However, Missionary's position on this is that god's holy book won't make any sense until after you've given your life to Jesus.
Once again this leads to a contradiction between what Missionary has said and how he's behaved in this forum.
If the bible is nonsensical and meaningless to unbelievers why quote it to unbelievers? They can't understand it - he said so himself.
These contradictions need resolving and I look forward to Missionary making his position clear on them.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.
BornAgainAthiest.
Cygnus Graduate Thinker
Joined: Mar 26, 2008
Posts: 515
Posted:
Sat Jul 12, 2008 1:10 am
Good luck with that, BornAgainAtheist. Missionary hasn't been on the forums for a while. Even if he did respond, I do not doubt his response would require further untangling.
_________________ К чёрту вечность, какой в ней прок?
BornAgainAthiest Confident Learner
Joined: Jun 16, 2008
Posts: 75
Posted:
Mon Jul 14, 2008 8:15 pm
Hello Cygnus!
What you say is entirely possible. I'm also maintaining a holding pattern on Missionary's reply to my last post in the, "Free Will" thread.
There, I asked him where he obtained knowledge that is "above and beyond" human understanding and how he intended sharing that knowledge with us humans. So far, nothing.
If he were to say that every time he quotes the bible here he's doing just that (because it's god's word) he's tangling himself up again. Why? Because he's already said that it's nonsensical and meaningless UNTIL you've received god into your life. Assuming that a lot of the folks here haven't made that move, whatever Missionary does quote isn't going to mean much.
Simple logic!
On the subject of unfinished business, I see that the, "Hate is the New Religion" thread he began sorta petered out in an unsatisfactory way. I'm waiting to see a good answer to WrathJW's point about the possibility of finding christians somewhere in the world who know god but who've never read a bible and never met any other christians.
Anyways...
As of 18th July I'll be taking a two-week vacation and travelling about a lot. I'll probably keep an eye on this forum via Internet cafes, but that's all.
Returning to holding pattern...
BornAgainAthiest.
gnosis Just Arrived
Joined: Jun 30, 2008
Posts: 7
Posted:
Tue Jul 15, 2008 4:51 am
Dammit, I thought this thread was about the sexual position!
False advertising!!
ApostateLois Grand Poster
Joined: Feb 02, 2006
Posts: 1237
Location: Prescott, Arizona, USA
Posted:
Tue Jul 15, 2008 12:59 pm
Sorry, man, no pics.
_________________ “When you're born you get a ticket to the freak show. When you're born in America, you get a front row seat.” ~ George Carlin
BornAgainAthiest Confident Learner
Joined: Jun 16, 2008
Posts: 75
Posted:
Tue Jul 15, 2008 6:37 pm
gnosis wrote:
Dammit, I thought this thread was about the sexual position!
False advertising!!
Nope! Sorry.
BornAgainAthiest.
BornAgainAthiest Confident Learner
Joined: Jun 16, 2008
Posts: 75
Posted:
Mon Aug 04, 2008 9:47 pm
BornAgainAthiest wrote:
As of 18th July I'll be taking a two-week vacation and travelling about a lot. I'll probably keep an eye on this forum via Internet cafes, but that's all.
Returning to holding pattern...
BornAgainAthiest.
O.k., I'm back and I didn't even bother to use the Internet at all.
I'm disappointed to see that Missionary hasn't replied to this thread.
So I guess I'll just have to bide my time.
BornAgainAthiest.
slicea1a The Learned
Joined: Jun 06, 2005
Posts: 105
Location: Lincoln, NE
Posted:
Tue Aug 05, 2008 7:16 am
BornAgainAthiest wrote:
BornAgainAthiest wrote:
As of 18th July I'll be taking a two-week vacation and travelling about a lot. I'll probably keep an eye on this forum via Internet cafes, but that's all.
Returning to holding pattern...
BornAgainAthiest.
O.k., I'm back and I didn't even bother to use the Internet at all.
I'm disappointed to see that Missionary hasn't replied to this thread.
So I guess I'll just have to bide my time.
BornAgainAthiest.
He probably won't be back. I'm still waiting for him to respond to my comments in a different thread. Guess he couldn't handle the logic of an all-loving god to be impossible.
_________________ Sata Andagi!
BornAgainAthiest Confident Learner
Joined: Jun 16, 2008
Posts: 75
Posted:
Wed Aug 06, 2008 2:30 am
Hi slicea1a!
Yes, there's some loose threads left dangling in this forum.
Missionary did reply (once only) to a posting of mine in the Free Will thread, but that was it.
I see two possibilities here - going out on a limb and speculating a little.
1. Born-again christians usually don't have anything to do with those who have turned away from the true faith. Perhaps he decided to have his say and then follow Pontius Pilate's example and wash his hands of me?
2. Christians consider doubts to be sinful things that must responded to by prayer, fasting and reading the scriptures. Rational, impartial inquiry and reasoned investigation play no part in this.
So if Missionary is absent due to a crisis of faith (resulting from the postings in this Forum?) then he'll probably be back when he's ready.
It's only fair to give him the benefit of the doubt I suppose!
Ooops! Sorry about the bad pun (not) !
BornAgainAthiest
slicea1a The Learned
Joined: Jun 06, 2005
Posts: 105
Location: Lincoln, NE
Posted:
Wed Aug 06, 2008 7:26 am
BornAgainAthiest wrote:
Hi slicea1a!
Yes, there's some loose threads left dangling in this forum.
Missionary did reply (once only) to a posting of mine in the Free Will thread, but that was it.
I see two possibilities here - going out on a limb and speculating a little.
1. Born-again christians usually don't have anything to do with those who have turned away from the true faith. Perhaps he decided to have his say and then follow Pontius Pilate's example and wash his hands of me?
2. Christians consider doubts to be sinful things that must responded to by prayer, fasting and reading the scriptures. Rational, impartial inquiry and reasoned investigation play no part in this.
So if Missionary is absent due to a crisis of faith (resulting from the postings in this Forum?) then he'll probably be back when he's ready.
It's only fair to give him the benefit of the doubt I suppose!
Ooops! Sorry about the bad pun (not) !
BornAgainAthiest
Well I think he's not coming back. I did have an exchange with him and I gave him biblical verses to read concerning God's "Eternal Love", perhaps he is living in denial.
I'm actually disappointed in him. I wanted to hear his input about those verses.
_________________ Sata Andagi!
Cygnus Graduate Thinker
Joined: Mar 26, 2008
Posts: 515
Posted:
Wed Aug 06, 2008 8:37 am
He's been gone a while. He might try to get back in and find that he's forgotten his password or something.
_________________ К чёрту вечность, какой в ней прок?
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