If you wanted to convert an atheist who wanted to believe....

They managed to do that for about 6 or 7 posts (not for pages). Then they reverted to type and started insulting Christians and Christianity.

Really? I don't believe I've gone out of my way to insult Christians or Christianity.
We're talking about logic and reason, and this girl wants to convert an atheist who is an atheist based on logic and reason to Christianity with, erm, logic and reason. This sounds like an impossible task, and clearly it must be, as I don't see too many Christians stepping up to the bat to lay out a logical and rational explanation for belief in Christianity.

Curiously, I haven't heard you explain to me why my reasoning that I listed to you was not rational or logical for disbelieving in a God. Since you say no one has such a reasoning. It definitely seems easier to skip the parts of a post that are hard for you to confront.

I suggest you go and visit these communities and see these evil manipulative religious folk. They live in Gold castles too.

I wouldn't jump in on this one too fast. While there are definitely a lot of missionaries traveling the world (some are friends of mine) who have the interest of the people at heart, there are plenty who don't. My partner was in Ethiopia a few years ago and the Christian Brothers might as well have been living in gold castles.

Folks, lets try to avoid any personal comments and stay on topic.

Take a deep breath, Biro. If you have specific criticisms please make them. Generalities only serve to stir the ****.

Otaku Girl wrote: »

....what argument/stategy would you use?Bearing in mind the said atheist is atheist soley due to logical reasons not because God did'nt get her/him a pony nor to sound pretentious or pseudo intellectual.

Hello Otaku Girl,

I've given up arguing with atheists. I really believe the only thing that can convert someone to belief is the light of God's grace. Sure we can put people straight about misconceptions about theology and doctrine but at the end of the day only God can move someone's heart.

Atheists, IMO, put too much faith in science. I won't for a second deny that science has made great strides in discovering the "how's" of the universe but it's incompetent when it comes to the "why's" which is the domain of philosophy and especially religion.

There's a certain ostrich-like attitude when it comes to answering questions around matters such as the origin of the universe, why we are here, what's the purpose of life, where do the faculties of reason and self-consciousness originate, why is love so vital to us, why do we have a conscience etc. I really think atheist brush away the "why" questions too readily.

Atheists tell us that we are nothing more than advanced machines and therefore we have no free-will and therefore there is no objective good and evil. What a load of hogwash! If we really had no free will and were driven along deterministically why are the majority of us so shocked by evil? Why do we love the good?

Evolution is about the survival of the fittest and yet time and time again we humans break this mode of operation and perform self-sacrificing acts for those we love and even strangers. We do things out of LOVE! Where does this love come from? Is it nothing more than a chemical reaction? No way! Without love we die and with love we flourish. Seems to me that love is what it's all about at the end of the day. Strange for machines really.

I welcome questions from atheists who are genuiely trying to understand belief in God and Christianity and we Christians should be ready to answer their questions. Again and again I heard people saying that Christianity wasn't appealing because it didn't seem to answer their questions. I was in that boat once and I looked elsewhere. I don't think it's good enough just to say I don't know or worse to make up an answer. Let's take Sts. Peter and Paul as examples.

Years ago people believe things they were told far more readily that we do today and we're more rebellious. Today we need an encyclopedic knowledge of scripture and theology to refute false arguments. We need to be ready when people say thing like "OK, but who created God?" etc.

I hard to know what arguments to use but I can only suggest evidence of God's "finger-prints" e.g.

- Miracles
- Cause of the big-bang
- Private revelations of the Saints
- Christ's Resurrection
- The apparent design in DNA
- The beauty of nature
- The existence of love and our moral conscience
- The fact that the (diminishing) majority of us believe in a Supreme Being.
- The extreme evil we see in the world suggests (to me anyway) that there is a demonic force driving people to commit evil which points to an opposite which is God.
- The origin of consciousness/reason/will/intelligence/creativity.
- So many huge question remaining impenetrable to science.

God bless,
Noel.

P.S. very sad that yet another thread has descended into a slagging match. One of the reasons I rarely post on this forum these days.

MatthewVII wrote: »

What you said about atheist reasons for atheism was pretty low.

Did he say atheists weren't logical? Did he say they were inferior beings? NO! He said he has not come across an atheist who was atheist on 'solely' logical grounds. He didn't say that their atheism was based on soley 'illogical' grounds. It was in response to the OP saying the atheist in question was atheist on 'Soley' logical grounds. Feck sake guys, get yer heads out of yer @rses will ye!

wolfsbane wrote: »

I would appeal to their consciences by reminding them that they are sinners, estranged from God ... I would bring them the good news that the God they have rebelled against now offers them a way back to Himself ... All who repent toward God and believe on His Son will be saved; all who do not will pay for their own sins for all eternity in hell.

Cause that'll work.

People who are athiests are so, because they don't believe in this sort of dogma - and using it in an attempt to convert them is going to backfire each and every time. It's like bringing me to a wall that's painted blue, and trying to convince me it's red.

Even if someone is borderline, that type of debate is only going to frighten them further.

kelly1 wrote: »

I hard to know what arguments to use but I can only suggest evidence of God's "finger-prints" e.g.

- Miracles
- Cause of the big-bang
- Private revelations of the Saints
- Christ's Resurrection
- The apparent design in DNA
- The beauty of nature
- The existence of love and our moral conscience
- The fact that the (diminishing) majority of us believe in a Supreme Being.
- The extreme evil we see in the world suggests (to me anyway) that there is a demonic force driving people to commit evil which points to an opposite which is God.
- The origin of consciousness/reason/will/intelligence/creativity.
- So many huge question remaining impenetrable to science.

But for the purposes of the question that Otaku Girl asked, none of these would provide any reason to a logical, rational Atheist as to believe in a God. Infact many would create more questions one would need answered.

On the grounds of evil, one would ask why does there have to be an evil? If (a) God was the creator, then he would have had to create evil, why would he do such a thing? If he created the heavens, the earth's etc. then he would have had to create evil and thus create all the bad suffering that people have to deal with on a daily basis.

On the reasoning of Miracles, these require a faith/blind belief that they happened and indeed WHERE the work of god. A logical thinking atheist would not believe in such a thing and this would be quite a very long shot to change their beliefs.

"The fact that the (diminishing) majority of us believe in a Supreme Being" is one of the worst reasons in the world to give to someone. It provides no logic or fact to back up the statement (that there is a supreme being) but also says you should be sheep like the rest of us.

Also 'Christ's resurrection' cannot really be used as an example, the 'evidence' supporting this generally comes form the bible which in itself was written only a few hundred years ago and was highly edited and modified. Any atheist would take it as a collection of stories and fables, not a literal accurate historical guide.

[i wont go on detailing possible answers to each and every one of them but for a Christian trying to 'turn' an Atheist, even a mild one, many of these would have no result. A Christian would need to think 'outside of the bible box', to do so. The bible really cannot be used in any logical argument attempt to turn an Atheist as it does not provide actual fats, proof or any substance to its claims.



If free-will was also mentioned then the question brought up by myself would be; If god has plans for when we die, if he guides us along our path of life and tells us what to do when we are in times of need, then would a believer in God actually have true free-will or free-thought?

kelly1

Just a few notes to your response.
The whys-- what whys are these? Why are we here? I don't think there has to be a reason for being here. I don't think there has to be a reason for anything. A lot of cultures don't ask these questions because they don't have the luxury of lounging around asking "why". I suppose, for me, there are few things that science or understanding of the human psyche can't answer for me in regards to the "whys" of life.

I like the argument of intrinsic good and evil. These things are relative culture to culture-- because what is good and evil is dependent on how that society operates. In general, we get along with one another and work together, do good deeds, etc, because you can accomplish more things as a group than as an individual. If we went around pissing everyone off, raping and murdering and lying to people we would have more trouble getting them to cooperate to advance society.

I don't see anything non- survival of the fittest about self-sacrifice. For example, a mother who would risk her life for her child. Dogs can love. Other animals, such a monkeys, show acts of kindness and often times "doing good deeds" can advance an individual among that particular group. Survival of the fittest doesn't mean one person being really big and strong to beat out all the other people. Especially now for humans when we no longer operate on survival of the fittest (and for various reasons its hurtful to us, that is, support for people who continue to perpetuate recessive genes, for example)-- we have intelligence and can use advanced tools to "survive".

"OK, but who created God?" etc. -- I always find it interesting when this comes up. Because the Christian response is that "he always was", but when that's offered up to the question of where the universe came from its not good enough

Outside of things like revelations and miracles and that tingling in your stomach which are easily explained (and I don't exactly know how you prove Christ's resurrection outside of the bible) but hard to refute since they are personal-- the rest I find pretty solid assurance in science. This list used to be a lot longer and science has crossed a lot of those "god did it"'s off.