There is a fundamental difference between religion, which is based on authority, and science, which is based on observation and reason. Science will win because it works. – Stephen Hawking Religion is a culture of faith, science is a culture of doubt. – Richard Feynman The apparent conflict between science and religion […]
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In a Nutshell… The issue of origins is knotty topic. In order to address it properly, there are several important distinctions to keep in mind. First, the age of the universe vs evolution – the old earth does not have any bearing on the diversity of life. Second, the scientific data vs […]
Whether infants who die are redeemed or condemned is certainly a knotty problem and one that deserves to be treated soberly. Here, I will not attempt to tease out the various issues and reach a conclusion. Rather, I am going to examine a particular objection to a particular view and […]
There is an interesting objection to the reliability of the Gospels centered on the problem of private conversations. There are several interactions, the objection goes, wherein the details of the events are privy only to the participants of those events. The writers of the Gospels neither participated themselves in these events […]
One common challenge posed by skeptics is to impugn the goodness of God using difficult passages from the Old Testament. Some of these challenges are trivial; for example, the challenge of 2 Samuel 12:31. In the KJV, this verse reads, “And he [David] brought forth the people that were therein and put them […]
Before we jump into the discussion of the existence of miracles, we need to determine what a miracle is. Many different definitions could be proposed, but lets look at a few possibilities: Miracle: a violation of natural law (David Hume) Miracle: an event that cannot be explained by only natural causes […]
In the United States, for a reason that is incomprehensible to me, Evangelical Christianity has become associated with strong political stances on a number of issues. Some of these stances, like abortion, make sense, but others, notably environmental issues and the perception that Christians are out to exploit and destroy nature, […]
Introduction The sin of racism runs deep, especially in modern day American culture. Sadly, racism has stained the history of the Church and is even harbored by some denominations today. However, there is simply no excuse for a consistent, Biblical Christian to be racist. From a general perspective, Christians are called to […]
First, we ought not disregard the historical value of the New Testament. Within the New Testament we have at least eight independent authors confirming the outline of the life of Jesus. However, there are also many sources that tell us about the life of Jesus of Nazareth and the beliefs […]
The Argument If an all-powerful and perfectly good God exists, then evil does not exist. There is evil in the world. Therefore, an all-powerful and perfectly good God does not exist. Or: God exists. God is omnipotent, omniscient, and perfectly good. A perfectly good being would want to prevent all […]
One of the most misunderstood doctrines of Christianity is that of the Trinity, and not only by non-believers; most Christians have difficulty explaining the doctrine. We will not here undergo a complete explanation and defense of the Trinity. Instead we will tackle the simpler question: Is the trinity a contradiction? […]
One of the often heard criticisms of the existence of God is that it somehow produced irreconcilable contradictions. These arguments range from the very simple to the very sophisticated, but most of them can be dealt with in a very straightforward manner. We will list a few: 1) Can God […]
Does the Bible support slavery? Some would claim that it does, and that this contradicts the view of an all loving God presented by Christians. Before we dive in to the issue, let us ask a more basic question, “how does God change the world?” This question is important, because […]
Two Problems There is perhaps no stronger argument leveled against the existence of God than the existence of evil and suffering in the world. How could a good God allow suffering? Perhaps the strongest factor in the argument is not any logical problem, not any actual argument, but the pure […]