Special revelation and natural revelation

[cmaried]

How do you deal with the apparent rationality of atheists? Consider the following little dialogue:

Christian: Why don't you believe in God?

Atheist: Why don't you believe in the Flying Spaghetti Monster?

My personal reasoning is to point to the prophecies of Christ. The Prophets told the truth, and the Messiah came, was crucified for our sin, and

Comments

[becoming_rachel]

"For those who believe, no explanation is necessary. For those who do not believe, no explanation is possible.."
-Joseph Dunninger.

It may sound over-simplified, but that's really the only way to put it. Some believe, some don't, and to those that don't, there is really no point getting into a discussion about it. The information is out there if they choose to seek it. I used to get upset over this, too, but I think the best we can do is live our lives as a good example, and then people will (hopefully) see Christ through our actions and want to know more about Christianity that way. Telling an atheist or agnostic that they should believe in a Creator just ticks them off and reinforces their point that we are all just out to push our own agenda. Let them come to God through their own understanding, or not. Our actions should speak for themselves.

[cmaried]

I really need to reread C.S. Lewis' conversion story in Mere Christianity. Aside from the prompting of the Holy Spirit, I think love and reason were his reasons for converting from lifelong atheism, though I'm not sure.

[becoming_rachel]

I can't recall Lewis' exact reasons for becoming a Christian, but I do know that he also had a personal encounter with Christ.

[alyoshas_world]

Honestly if someone is attempting to throw out such an obviously ridiculous comparison then there's no point in engaging anyway. The irony is that it would be they who demonstrate the very thing they believe you to be guilty of, a deficiency of reason.

[cmaried]

There are some characteristics that I find some Christians and atheists share: profession to strive for and have the objective truth and rejection of the philosophy that, "if it feels good it must be true". The FSM is terrible logic though, because it is portraying the Christian concept of God as some cartoon-like, absurd anthropomorphism.

[alyoshas_world]

The objective truth aspect depends on the atheist. There are many who believe that no such thing exists.

[karcy]

You're right.

[elainastone]

I would point to the stories of the missionaries who go out into far, far back, isolated regions -- Some of them go and work and toil, work and toil and hardly have anything to show for it. Some of them go and there are people there eager and waiting, because they have seen what we have all seen and known there wasn't just a god, or a chain of gods or whatever, but there had to be THE God. God is just and merciful to call people to witness to those who genuinely believe He is there, but just don't know Who He is

[cmaried]

Yes, I agree. My thought is, If God didn't exist, we wouldn't even be debating his existence. There wouldn't even be any question of "who created the Earth?" and "where did we come from?". It just wouldn't exist in our thinking. Originally, the Trinity had no physical essence, and therefore there would be no good reason for us to anthropomorphize it into created objects that had beginnings.(although I think man took the innate concept of God and anthropomorphized it into all sorts of creatures and different personalities) The Incarnation makes this reasoning a bit complicated, admittedly, but at least we know that Christ was begotten and not made.

Many hard-nosed atheists were raised in very strict religious homes.They were brought up in a sort of anti-intellectual, legalistic environment that told them to never question why they believe what they believe. Then they were hit with secular, higher education and their world fell apart.