Why Christianity?

[Randy Carson]

A question I always ask Christians is, "What arguments do you have to support your beliefs that a Hindu, Jewish, or Muslim does not? 

The argument which is unique to Christianity is that Jesus prophesied that he would die and rise from the dead and that this resurrection gives us a reason to believe his claims of divinity. Scholars who have studied the dying and rising gods genre have determined that Jesus is not the copy-cat god; it is the other gods of the middle east that began to claim bodily resurrection in the first and second century AFTER Jesus. IOW, they are the copy-cats - not Jesus.

Jews and Muslims do not make similar claims for the major figures of their respective faiths.

In other words, if I accept your notion that the universe must have had a creator, why couldn't it have been Thor or Ba'al?

It could have been one of them; therefore, it would be reasonable for you to examine what can be known about Thor, Ba'al and others to determine which God is the most likely candidate. Since it is also reasonable to assume that others have made a similar examination throughout the course of human history, starting with the largest religions - Christianity, Islam and Hinduism - would be most efficient. Further, you might ask yourself whether monotheism is more plausible than polytheism; if so, you could put Hinduism on the back burner.

Even if I accept that prayer works, why must it be Yahweh answering them and not Allah or The Flying Spaghetti Monster?"

Yahweh and Allah are the same God. The Flying Spaghetti Monster does not seem to qualify as an all-powerful God since it has been argued by its followers that the reason people are taller today on average than they were in the past is that as the population of the planet has grown over the past few centuries, the FSM's noodly appendages have not been able to push people down as much as before. IOW, the FSM does not appear to be omnipotent, and the idea that a god who is not omnipotent created EVERYTHING from nothing fails to persuade.  

Every time I ask any version of these questions I get either radio silence or a quick, sudden change of the topic. Because of my many failed attempts at asking these questions in real life, I decided to ask these questions here.

If you are interested in a lot of interaction with your questions, you will get more and better responses to them at the Catholic Answers Forum.