RESPECTFUL DIALOGUE: Atheists / Theists / Agnostics / Etc - Facebook Group

I have created a new group for those interested. Join the group, add members and participate in the dialogue. https://www.facebook.com/groups/respectful.dialogue/

RESPECTFUL DIALOGUE is a safe haven for respectful dialogue between atheists, theists, agnostics etc.

RULES:
1. No personal insult of members or individuals.
2. No insult of deities / prophets / spokespeople
3. No flooding threads with off topic posts.
4. No posting threads irrelevant to the aim of the group.

Not adhering to the rules will result in a permanent ban.

THE FOUR W's OF CHURCH - WIN, WET, WORK, WASTE

"Sadly many churches practice the four W’s: win them, wet them, work them, waste them." - Bruce Gerencser

Once upon a time ..........

WIN THEM

You get sold a sales pitch full of lies and offers too good to be true.

"They told me a fairy story,
'Til I believed in the Israelite." - Greg Lake "I Believe In Father Christmas"

"Just believe" all your problems will be solved. Believe us. We know Jesus personally. (How? Through reading a man-made bible, that's how.)

"Jesus is the answer." (But he never answers your questions.)

You are suckered in without using your rational faculties.

You are brainwashed with repetitive Jesus Jingles and mantras. Free mass hypnotism for the people.

You are love bombed with smiley faces. "See, we really love you ... because you're a new convert."

WET THEM

In evangelical / pentecostal churches the next step is adult baptism to prove that you are really serious. Nothing really changes except that you are held under water for a few seconds. It does provide a badge of honour as you are not "sprinkled" like those heathen Christians down the road (Bloody Catholics, Anglicans and Liberals!). You are a "trew kristyun" who has been dunked. You are one of us. Welcome to the club ... now obey all the rules or we'll kick you out of heaven. Attend your weekly indoctrination classes. Don't ask questions.

WORK THEM

You get put in a "ministry". Everyone must have a ministry. Your "ministry" will be validated by the pastor who has the final say. Your ministry might begin by mowing the church lawns or cleaning the toilets. If you are a teacher ( like myself) you get a ministry of helping in children's church even though you have worked the last five days at a school and have preparation for those classes to do as well. If you are a musician (like myself) you get put in the "praise and worship ministry team" where you have to play Jesus Jingles for free though your fans pay money to see you elsewhere. You never get an explanation of the difference between praise and worship. Yours is not to question why. Yours is to do and .... Every Jesus Jingle is exactly like the previous and next ones. You never get paid for your ministry even if it is something that takes many hours. Any expertise you may have in any area is now available for free to any church member. You are doing it "for the Lord" though you are never told who the Lord is exactly.

WASTE THEM

You never get a break from this routine except over the Christmas holidays when the Lord is not so busy and there is no ministry available. Wait till February if you want ministry. You do the same thing every week for years. You get a mention in the church bulletin and a thank you from the pulpit. That's your pay. Nothing ever changes unless a better new convert comes along and then you are relegated to the sidelines. You are especially relegated to the sidelines and menial work if you are not a personal friend of the pastor. If you don't like the pastor then you are removed from "public ministry" where people can see you, perhaps back to cleaning toilets and mowing lawns. If a curvaceous young female comes into the church she is placed ahead of you as having a better ministry. One can only guess what that ministry is as she gets on so well with the pastor.

You read in your bible where slavery is advocated in both the Old and New Testaments and you begin to think that it is a viable option and a better "work for the Lord".

THE END

And they all live unhappily ever after if they remain in church.

The Strata of Christian Belief - Possible Ways Forward Part 2

Stages of Faith, by James W. Fowler (published in paperback by Harper Collins, 1995.)

Stage 1--Magical World

ages 2-6, perceives the world through lens of imagination and intuition unrestrained by logic e.g., lives in a magical world in which anything is possible

Stage 2--Concrete Family

ages 6-12, sees the world as a story - concrete, literal, narrative family of ritual and myth e.g., "In the beginning, God created the . . ."

~Stage 2 collapses when teenagers use newfound power of abstract thought to deconstruct previous understanding of the world e.g., risk of rejecting religious beliefs of parents, and identifying with surrounding secular culture

Stage 3--Faith Community *

teenager to early adulthood or beyond, sees the world through the lens of the peer community e.g., unconsciously "catches" faith, values, and way of thinking from peer group or subculture tends not to question the accepted ways of thinking e.g., "if the Bible says . . . it must be true" or "if some group says . . . it's the Truth" difficult dealing calmly and rationally with issues that touches on one's identity

Stage 4--Rational Constructs *

adulthood (if) traditional answers stop making sense e.g., beliefs previously unquestioned are called into account; develops the capacity to step back (usually for the first time) and examine beliefs with reason universe is reconstructed with self-chosen concepts might experience deep disappointment/anger on finding some beliefs did not stand up to investigation

Stage 5--Numinous (Supernatural/Mysterious) Universe

mid-life or latter (if) it seems we have run up against the limits of rational thought e.g., the search for certainty can end in feelings of failure/despair; we come to live in a spiritual universe of mystery, wonder, and paradox e.g., we might return to sacred symbol, story, tradition, liturgy, spiritual
community, but no longer captured in a theological box

Stage 6--Selfless Service **

rare stage for many; identifies deeply with all humanity, and spends themselves in service of worldwide issues of love, and justice e.g., Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Theresa, etc.

________________

(*) To those in stage 3 or higher, the next stage looks like a loss of faith, and the previous stage is repulsive. This can be seen when stage 3 engages in witch hunting, and stage 4 baits and taunts stage 3.

###################################

I have entered stage 5 and am interested in sacred symbol. There are many metaphors used for the mystery that is God such as light and wind.  I would like to explore the metaphor of music being life and God.

Suppose that all the music that had ever been composed was played one after the other. The melodies, harmonies, chords, scales, tone, timbre, rhythm, time signatures - everything that has to to do with melodic music is the physical universe that can be explored by empirical science. It is a grand art form. You are a short melodic phrase somewhere amongst the billions of melodic phrases - da-da da dum. That's you and your life. It is different form other melodic phrases because it is played at a different time and on a different instrument. Even if it is quite similar it is not exactly the same as to placement.  You melodic phrase finishes but the song cycle continues.

Suppose that all the percussion elements are God. God is the drums, triangle, tambourine, etc that give the melody its backbeat. Except for timpani they are usually not tuned to a specific note. They are about striking an object and about silence. Some music pieces have no percussive elements at all yet they do have a time signature and a rhythm. Scores for percussion are different to scores for melodies and harmonies. percussion instruments vary as much as melodic instruments and each has its own specific tone and timbre. 

This is about everything to do with God that is completely different to melodic elements of music.  Exploring melodic elements may give you some hints as to the percussive elements but it is quite vague and unsubstantial.  In the same manner exploring God through empirical science does not give understanding of a God who is completely different to anything physical and measurable. Nor can one only examine one elments of the percussive elemnts, say cymbals in a drum kit, and think that one knows all about the drums.  Cymbals by themselves may sound completely strange and chaotic compared to say a regular snare drum beat.  There is also the element of silence. Silence is as important as the striking in percussive elements.  Experience of the silence might lead you to believe that percussion does not exist.  Thus the percussive elements demonstrate a transcendence of silence but at other times an immanence of the striking.

If God is the Ground of all being then being is the melodic elements and the Ground is the perscussive elements. There are completely different and need to be explored in different ways.  One does not explore music by abandoning all melodic elements. They are importnat. However, equally important are the percussive elements. One does abandon all percussive elements in order to explore music.  Both melodic and percussive elements make up music. Music is the grand theory of everything. The explantion of all that is - both Ground and being.

The very big question is HOW we explore this percussive element when we mainly have tools only for exploring the melodic elements. We cannot explore percussion in the ame way as melody. New tools are required. WHAT are those tools?

My guess is that we explore the mystery of God through the tools of mysticism.  However, this tool is  a primitive tool much like we would now view a stone age axe.  It is not particularly precise.  It may be misused.  There are many inferior copies.  I have no answer. All I have is a possibility that may or may not work. It is a tentative step forward. Explore the mystery of God through possibilities.

The Strata of Christian Belief - Possible Ways Forward

The way to know God is life and living life. "In him we live and move and have our being."  Acts 17:28. However there is a massive problem that there is no empirical evidence for God's existence and no philosophical proof of God's existence works.  Many theologians have stated that there is also a paradox - God is utterly transcendent and thus unknowable to human minds (like the Hindu Brahman) but at the same time utterly immanent and closer than one's own thought.  God is the great mystery of life.

All books (including the bible) are only the thoughts of humans as they try to articulate their experience of this paradoxical transcendent / immanent God. Jews see the holy spirit not as another person in a duality or trinity of the One God Yahweh but as the shekinah glory of God experienced by humans.

Spirit = mind = soul = psyche. They are all the same. One is supposed to use one's mind to know God. The mind experiences rational thought as well as emotion and intuition. Do not despise using all of your mind in the process of finding God.

You may use a book as a reference of how others have found God but they are all fallible and all have errors as well as truth. A short list of possible texts to explore:
- bible
- Qur'an
- Tanakh
- Great Hymn to the Aten
- Egyptian Book of the Dead
- Tibetan Book of the Dead
- Vedas, Sutras and Upanishads
- Tao Te Ching

Or it may be that you explore God through oral tradition such as the Australian Aboriginal Dreamtime.

Find your own path.  Others can share their journey with you but your own authentic journey is the one that counts for you.

Strata of Christian Belief - Strata 1 - Assumptions about being and the whole field of ontology & CONCLUSION.

Strata 1 - Assumptions about being and the whole field of ontology. Ontology is a systematic account of existence.  Sartre correctly stated "existence precedes essence" yet Christians repeatedly value the priority of essence.  They wish to state what we are made of and what our purpose is based solely upon subjectively interpreted bible verses.  Thus in the Westminster Shorter Catechism it states:
" Q. 1. What is the chief end of man?
A. Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever"

The answer is totally reliant on material from the upper strata and not at all self-evident or proven by empirical science.  It subjectively assumes the existence of God, a human relationship with God and communication with God.

In Acts 17:28 a pagan poet is quoted by Paul which states "in him we live and move and have our being". The quote originally referenced Zeus but Paul reinterprets it to mean his God.

In what do we "live and move and have our being"? Part of the answer is given by science. We live and move and have our being" in the laws of science. Some call it Nature.  It includes mathematics and perhaps can be part of knowing the "mind of God" as Paul Davies suggest.  This is not "living and moving and having our being" in dead Jewish peasant - Jesus of Nazareth - for which there is absolutely no empirical evidence.  It has nothing of a "personal relationship" with a supernatural being that communicates in understandable propositions.

Why are we here? What gives us meaning in our existence? Is the meaning part of nature or nurture? Are we born with constructed meaning or do we construct our own meaning? Are there any objective criteria in such a construction and how does that relate to the subjective assumptions of Chrstianity?

Christians say that every human is born with "original sin" and is intrinsically evil as a result of subjective intepretation of bible verses that speak about a "Fall" from God's grace by Adam and Eve who are subjectively assumed to be the parents of all humans. It is also subjectively assumed through interpretation of bible verses that this sin can be passed down and inherited by all their offspring for ever and ever, Amen.  As of the present time no scientist has found the "original sin" strand in any DNA.

CONCLUSION
The strata are evidence of subjective choices from beginnng to end. Thousands of subjective choices. These subjective choices inform or are reliant upon strata above and below. One wrong choice in the chain and the reliant choices are totally invalid and thus the conclusion is invalid. It is precisely that the independently verifiable base is missing from Christianity despite claims to the contrary theologians and clergy. The top strata of dogmas, bible, God, Jesus and the human response to such are all spoken about as though they were objective truths by the vast majority of clergy and Christians yet they are nothing but subjective assumptions. At every step subjective assumptions are made that have no bearing in empirical science or history. The strata are a short history of those subjective assumptions. 

One cannot hold that the subjective assumptions are indeed subjective and in the next breath give a sermon which speaks of the same subjective assumptions as objective truths to be believed and followd. That is hypocrisy.

Christian proselytise on the basis of subjective assumptions about bible verses without grounding in empirical evidence.

"we live and move and have our being" in something. Some call that God.  It is perhaps better to explore that Ground of all being rather than make subjective assumptions about it based upon bible verses.  It is a  "Mysterium Tremendum Et Facinens"- fearful and fascinating mystery - a Latin phrase which Rudolf Otto uses in The Idea of the Holy. An infinite God is beyond  knowing in totality by any finite human or group of finte humans. An infinite God is both utterly transcendent and thus ultimately unknowable yet at the same time immanent and closer than your own thoughts. The human finite Jesus of Nazareth can never be such an infinite God. Any time the infinite reduces itself to the finite it annihilates itself.  It is a mathematical proof.

This is a beginning of a journey. Continue the journey. There is no endpoint in this lifetime.

Strata of Christian Belief - Strata 2 - Assumptions about the human psyche /soul / spirit and its nature and function tying in both philosophy and psychology.

Strata of Christian Belief - Strata 2 -  Assumptions about the human psyche /soul / spirit and its nature and function tying in both philosophy and psychology.

The interaction of mind and body is a huge problem in fields such as philosophy, pyschology and neuro-science.  Basically it is stated as "What is the basic relationship between the mental and the physical?"  The many varied (and sometimes contradictory) answers are too many to list here. I am concentrating only on the Christian views.

Christianity takes a dualist approach.  Body is the physical attributes that can be seen and includes brain. The unseen attributes are the mind. In philosophy and many religions including sections of Christianity mind = psyche = spirit = soul.  However, many Christians have a "tripartite man" model made popular by Watchman Nee in his "The Spiritual Man".  Justification for a tripartite being comes from the notion that God is a tripartite unity (Father, Son & Holy Spirit) and humans are made in God's image therefore humans must also have a tripartite being. It is backed up, as usual by bible vereses such as 1 Thessalonians 5:23 "may your whole spirit, soul and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." & Hebrews 4:12 " the word of God ... penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit."

The unseen elements of humans in the tripartite view are therefore broken up into:
SOUL: conscious and subconscious minds, intellect, reason, emotion, will; extinguished at death.
SPIRIT: "God's Worship and Contact Centre", waffly goo feelings about God, intuitions about God; eternal part of the person.

It thus views spirit as pure and untainted once one is "born again" but the soul as instrinsically evil, corrupt and suspect and not to be used for investigating the things of God.  The outcome is a profound anti-intellectualism evident in many strands of Christianity today.  This anti-intellectualism is reliant upon bible verses subjectively interpreted by "God's Worship and Contact Centre", the spirit.  Bible verses and prayer are the food of the spirit and how problems affecting people's minds are "healed'. Psychology is suspect as it only helps the soul and the soul is unimportant.  Only the spirit matters.

One's view of the mind affects notions about death, emotions, perception, memory, personal identity and freewill. Thus psycholgy, psychiatry, medicine and neuro-science can help those with mental illness in ways that can be measured and are peer-reviewed. They are also falsifiable. However, the efficacy of  Christian methods which exclude psycholgy, psychiatry, medicine and neuro-science is completely unproven. In one study those prayed for healing faired worse than those who had no prayer at all.  There is also no empirical evidence for a "tripartite man" or the definition of spirit in a "tripartite man' other than subjectively interpreted bible verses.

Strata of Christian Belief - Strata 3 - Assumptions made about God and philosophic investigations of God

Strata 3 - Assumptions made about God and philosophic investigations of God

Most Christians believe in a theistic God who is an existing being and with whom they can have a "personal relationship". They also believe that the human Jesus of Nazareth is part of this same God. (There are liberal Christians who believe differently and I am not addressing their concepts at this stage.  They posit a better argument that God is the Ground of all being as described by Paul Tillich. This is not a personal God.)  A major problem is that there is absolutely no scientific empirical evidence nor philosophical proof of God's existence.  As Christians believe that Jesus of Nazareth is God and all humans such as Jesus have existence as part of their being then God must exist in the same way that humans exist - including God the Father and the Holy Spirit.  Christians have spent considerable time trying to prove God's existence but all the so called "proofs" fail dismally. As there are so many attempts (because God's existence is so central and essential to Christianity) then it is impossible for me to answer all the objections in a short article. However the main basic proofs and the reasons that they fail are briefy stated as:

1. The Ontological Argument

Form: We have the idea of a completely perfect Being. Existence is necessary to complete perfection. Anything that did not exist would be less than perfect that if it did exist.  Since God is completely perfect then he must exist. If God did not exist then he would lack perfection.

Objections:
- The idea of perfection adds nothing to the concept of a thing.
- The perfect thing that we imagine may not exist.

2. The Cosmological Argument (or Causal Argument)

Form: Look at the universe. It came from somewhere. Some great cause produced it. That Cause is God.

Objections:
- It establishes nothing about the deity's characteristics and cannot be used to establish any particular deity.
- It leads to an infinite regress where the question it asks in terms of God can be asked of God in turn.
- We only know that everything has a cause from experience. Experience tells us nothing about causality in any non-empirical world.

3. Argument from Miracles

Form: Miracles exist and are God intervening in the natural course of events.

Objections:
- Miracles are not empirically proven to exist.
- The meaning of the term "miracle" must be defined as it may be the instance of an unknown natural law.
- It does not prove a particular deity or the deity's characteristics.

4. Utility Argument

Form: Belief in God is a great and indispensable moral influence.  Without it human beings would not live good lives. Therefore, it must be true and God exists.

Objections:
1. It is not proven that religion is indispensable to good conduct. The opposite is also shown in the Crusades, Inquisitions and Witch Hunts caused by religion.
2. Even if the premise "Belief in God is a great and indispensable moral influence" is true it does not prove that God exists." Would belief in ghosts that produced good conduct likewise prove that ghosts were true?

5. Argument From Religious Experience

Form: I (and other people) have experiences of a particular nature, which are so profound, so meaningful, so valuable, that they cannot be explained on any natural hypothesis. They must be due to a Supernatural being, God who inspires such experiences.

Objections:
- If  a religious experience of the Christian God proves the existence of a Christian God then a religious experience of a Hindu likewise proves the existence of a Hindu God.
- It cannot be used for any particular God and works equally well for Woden, Thor and Zeus.

6. Teleological Argument (Argument from Design)

Form: The universe shows evidence of order and design. A master architect has been at work. Purpose and not blind chance governs the universe.  The Purposer is God.

Objections:
- Epicurus problem of evil negates it. "Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then is he impotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then is he malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Whence then is evil?" (David Hume)
- It is an argument from analogy which is always invalid.
- It cannot establish any of the hypotheses.

It is assumed that God is personal. Many critique this by finding many similarities between the God and the person who worships the God surmising that humans have made God in their own image and not vice versa. It is not at all apparent or proven that God must be personal.

An even greater problem exists with the claim by Christians that the finite human Jesus of Nazareth is God with both a pre-existence and a current existence as God. This again cannot be proven by empirical science and rests solely upon the subjective interpretations of bible verses.

It is assumed by Christians that God communicates with humans.  See my previous article "How does God communicate to humans?" http://marktindall.blogspot.com/2011/07/how-does-god-communicate-to-humans.html  for the many problems with this belief.

Many Christians say that God's "dialogue" (including current dialogue with Jesus) consists of Yes / No / Maybe demonstrated in life experience. That doesn't seem like much of a dialogue and works equally well for the pagan gods who answer exactly in the same manner. Others say that they speak for God / Jesus but God / Jesus always sounds remarkably like the person and has the same prejudices. Others say that God / Jesus speaks through the bible. How does God / Jesus speak through a book with multiple editors, contradictions, errors, forgeries, fictions and man-made dogmas? Some say that God / Jesus speaks to their heart / spirit though both mean mind in the Hebrew and Greek. Is this through ideas? How do we know which idea is from God / Jesus which is from self, Satan, Thor or Woden or some other god?

It would seem to me that if God / Jesus can speak to humans then he would do so in an unambigious clear way that could be easily detected and investigated by all people. That is not the case. It would also seem to me that God / Jesus would answer questions of utmost importance (like a cure for cancer) and not dwell on minor unimportant details. That also is not the case. If something is true then it must be internally coherent and externally verifiable with facts. God / Jesus's speaking to humans is not like that at all. Whatever God / Jesus's communication is, it is not very clear and unambiguous.

How does one learn about Jesus without reading a bible or hearing an evangelist? It should be possible to find out about Jesus solely and only thorough Jesus speaking to you. That again is not proven by empirical science.

Strata of Christian Belief - Strata 4 - Assumptions about need for God and the so called " God-shaped hole in one's heart".

Strata 4 - Assumptions about need for God and the so called " God-shaped hole in one's heart".

This is based upon existential angst - fear / dread - which is common to all people as a deep-seated insecurity and fear of one's own freedom. One becomes aware of being finite in a world that is infinite. One realises that one has an undetermined future. One is constantly confronted with possibility and the need for decision and the resultant burden of responsibility.

The term is used best by Sartre and explained as "The reflective apprehension of the Self as freedom, the realisation that nothingness slips inbetween my Self and my past and future so that nothing relives me from the necessity of continually choosing myself and nothing guarantees the validity of the values which I choose. Fear is of something in the world, anguish [angst] is anguish before myself (as in "Kiekegaard)." Jean-Paul Sartre "Being and Nothingness" (Washington Square Press: 1956) pp. 799-800

( "nothing guarantees the validity of the values which I choose" is particularly telling. What is the criteria for choice?)

It is assumed by Christians that this angst is a condition created by God in order for people to find God and eliminate the angst. The angst is the "God shape hole in the heart" and it is filled by God thus eliminating all angst. Christians talk about the the potency of God and Christian fellowship at church in reducing angst and anxiety caused by death, isolation, freedom and meaninglessness.

Kierkegaard speaks of a leap of faith into God in order to quench the angst. How is this leap of faith informed? Kierkegaard says that this is "by the absurd" because the criteria of rationality is left behind.

This Christian cure through a leap of faith (absurd and without rationality) may be so but the same is also possible through any other religion and also through agnosticism and atheism. For example, Buddhist meditation is currently being advocated by psychologists as a means of reducing stress and depression. If Kierkegaard's "leap of faith "by the absurd" lacks the criteria of rationality it is also an equally valid leap of faith to jump into Woden, Thor, Zeus, Shive , Vishnu, etc. The leap of faith works for all religions and not only Christianity.

Then there is the empirical fact that atheists and agnostics can have the same level of angst as Christians. It is also a fact that many atheists and agnostcs find no "God shaped hole in the heart" but live quite well without ever bothering about God and are not compelled to seek God at all.

Becoming a Christian does not necessarily eliminate all angst. The only true cure of existential angst is one's death as all humans experience angst of some sort.

Strata of Christian Belief - Strata 5 - Assumptions about the human need for holy books and why such things are central to religions

Strata 5. Assumptions about the human need for holy books and why such things are central to religions.

Why are holy books so central to religions? They help to suppress any variation of thought and codify the rules of the community that believes them. One can judge an outsider by whether they conform to the ideas within the book or not. It is way of dividing between Us and Them and negating the Other.

What is written is supposed be a closed canon which the author does not intend to be added to by another. However this is not what actually happens. For example, texts were added to original Hindu Vedas which modified previous beliefs such as the Bhagavad Gita.

The same has happened in the development of Christianity. We have a graduation of new books added as new ideas develop:
A - 10 commandments
add
B - The Law
which is modified and / or explained by
C- The Prophets
which is again modified and / or explained by
D - Paul's lettters
which is again modified and / or explained by
E - Mark's gospel
which is again modified and / or explained by
F - Matthew and Luke's gospels
which is again modified and / or explained by
G - John's gospel
which is again modified and / or explained by
H - The NT forgeries
which is again modified and / or explained by
H - Revelation (new idea about Jesus)
which is again modified and / or explained by
I - The Book of Mormon and / or the Qu'ran

There is another problem that every step above has also been edited and changed by others. The editors have also helped to modify and explain and have left their footprints in the texts. Some books are also forgeries written by people pretending to be famous bible characters. Others are anonymous works. Therefore every verse and or phrase in these books must be looked at on its own merit as the demarcation between the original author and / or the editors and/ or the forgers is not always clear.

At each step the previous written document is seen as replaced or better explained by the new one written or the new edited version.
At each step value judgements are made as to the whether the documents, phrases, sentences and ideas are true or false and authentic or inauthentic.
Readers who are evangelical Christians you probably already made a value judgement with the Book of Mormon, yet there are those people who call themselves Christian and Mormons who value it.  They have have probably likewise already made a value judgement with the Qu'ran but there are Muslims that value it. If all claims are subjective and of equal value then their claim to the value of the Book of Mormon and / or Qu'ran must be accepted as equal to any Christian claim to the contrary. That is, of course, unless there is some objective criteria that is used to negate either as a book to be valued. However, the same objective criteria must also be used on every other step in the progession.

Christians like to think that their "new" testament has replaced the "old" testament. However Jews don't view it that way at all and see no need for a new testament as there was nothing wrong witgh the old testament that Jesus followed. They have made a value judgement on the New Testamemt scriptures. As Jesus was a Jew who followed Judaism and all his friends and apostles were likewise Jews who followed Judaism, why have Jews rejected Jesus' Judaism ? Or is it not Jesus' Judaism that they have rejected but the Gentile misinterpretation of Jesus' Judaism that has become modern Christainity that differs completely with Jesus' Judaism?

By what criteria is each modifcation or explanation valued as correct? How can it be verified by primary historical evidence (uncontested first hand material written or, next best, by an uncontested eyewitness) and archeological evidence apart from the bible and / or by scientific evidence?

Strata of Christian Belief - Strata 6 - Assumptions about items such as Jesus and other dogmas

Strata 6. Assumptions about items such as Jesus and other dogmas.

It is enough in this strata to recognise basic facts about the main supposed historic character around which Christianity revolves:
- There is no primary historical evidence (uncontested first hand material written by Jesus or, next best, by an uncontested eyewitness) and archeological evidence apart from the bible that Jesus ever existed.
- There is no scientific or medical evidence that Jesus is alive today.
- There is no scientific evidence that Jesus communicates with anyone today.
- All religious claims have value judgements made about them regarding whether they are true or false. This presupposes some criteria for judgement.

All truth claims are not of equal value - Christians never treat all claims as equal otherwise they would treat the claims of Satanism as equal with that of Christianity and warmly embrace it. One makes a judgement on such claims as true or false. By what crieria is that judgment made? In the the case of Christainity is mainly made upon dubious bible verses subjectively interpreted and unable to be verified or falsified. Empirical refutation / falsification is one of the most effective methods by which theories can be criticised.

Strata of Christian belief - Series - Introduction

This is the beginning of a series about the strata of Christian belief. In the next few posts I will be discussing each strata.

Starting at the top level are assumptions about dogmas to be believed regarding Christianity that are answered primarily by bible verses and views about bible verses.

Below that strata are assumptions about the value and authenticity of bible verses.

This is the deepest that clergy wish you to go. This is what is taught at theological colleges and all that you will learn in church but there is more.

Below that strata there are assumptions about items such as Jesus. It assumes that such a person lived and is still alive although many bible scholars doubt he ever did exist and there is no medical or scientific evidence that he is alive today. Unless you have the assumption that Jesus lived and is still alive then you cannot function in the top two layers with bible verses and dogmas about Jesus. There are many such asumptions made of a historical and scientific nature on thousand of items which lie outside the realm of theology.

Below that strata are assumptions about the human need for holy books and why such things are central to religions.

Below that strata are assumptions about need for God and the so called " God-shaped hole in one's heart".

Below that strata are the primary assumptions made about God and philosophic investigations of God (not tied to dogmas or theology).

Below that strata are assumptions about the human psyche /soul / spirit and its nature and function tying in both philosophy and psychology.

Below that strata are assumptions about being and the whole field of ontology.

These strata are explored through theology, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, history, science, psychology, etc and are not the sole role of theologians or clergy.

REVERSE STRATA - How the dogmas of Christianity are built ....

1st. Assumptions about being and the whole field of ontology.

2nd. Assumptions about the human psyche /soul / spirit and its nature and function tying in both philosophy and psychology.

3rd. Assumptions made about God and philosophic investigations of God (not tied to dogmas or theology).

4th. Assumptions about need for God and the so called " God-shaped hole in one's heart".

5th. Assumptions about the human need for holy books and why such things are central to religions.

6th. Assumptions about items such as Jesus and other dogmas.

For each assumption value judgements are made about whether they are true or false. All claims are not considered equal. It is my assertion that most claims made by Christians, in defending Christianity, are based mainly upon the subjective interpretation of bible verses ( and ultimately neverending circular reasoning based upon bible verses) without external verification and that such claims, by their very nature, are not open to falsification. They must thus be held as suspect for similar claims can also be made of any religion or nonbelief. Christian apologetics is thus, in fact, a type of pseudo-science - a claim, belief, or practice which is presented as scientific, but which does not adhere to a valid scientific method, lacks supporting evidence or plausibility, cannot be reliably tested, or otherwise lacks scientific status. It is often characterised by the use of vague, exaggerated or unprovable claims, an over-reliance on confirmation rather than rigorous attempts at refutation, a lack of openness to evaluation by other experts, and a general absence of systematic processes to rationally develop theories. Christians like to place revelation, theology, and spirituality as beyond empirical enquiry (and not a science) and thus water it down to nothing more than a subjective choice that is equally valid for any other religion or nonbelief.