Why Christianity?

[T.J.]

Um...no. The EARLIEST writings about Buddha, for example, are dated about 600 years AFTER his death. With Jesus, we have a proto-creed (1 Cor. 15) that can be reasonably dated to AD 35 or so. There is NO parallel to the level of information we have about Jesus in any other ancient religion. As for more recent religions such as Mormonism and Islam, they fail to persuade on other grounds.

In another thread, I have presented the Five Minimal Facts argument championed by Habermas and Licona. If you haven't followed that thread, you need to know that while some folks here will CLAIM to have refuted them, the fact of the matter is that professional scholars (and not just theists, mind you) are in general agreement that these five facts are known with reasonable certainty. What hasn't been offered (hence my initiation of the Conspiracy Theory thread) is a reasonable alternate theory with any explanatory scope, depth, etc.

Tori, it wasn't my theory, so I'm not blowing my own horn here; I simply made the case as argued by Habermas and Licona, and the silence was deafening. Since you and I haven't interacted in this forum before, let me just say that there are a lot of people here who talk a lot of smack about me, but the fact is that the Five Minimal Facts argument put an ass-whoopin' on the forum collectively, and the trash talk is largely a result of that. You'll see more of that in response to this post, but what you WON'T see is anyone actually refuting the Five Facts.

First I heard of Habermas and Licona. Might have to track down the thread later out of curiosity.

My suspicion is that these folks DO know some things about God, but their knowledge is incomplete or skewed. For example, it is common for people here to go on and on ad infinitum about God allegedly commanding genocide or rape or what have you in the OT. Curiously, these same people NEVER want to discuss the NT, and when they have the OT explained to them, it's as if they put their fingers in theirs ears and start saying "Lalalalalalalala..." because they don't WANT to hear any reasonable explanations that would render their favorite arguments against Christianity impotent. It's preferable for them to maintain their immoral lifestyles or to remain sitting on the thrones of their own lives rather than acknowledge the inconvenient truths that could be understood by an objective seeker.

OT and NT have been at odds with each others that at times it almost feels like there's a different god between the two, and when Jesus talks about things like "What you eat doesn't make you unclean," and "Man was never meant to leave his wife," but turn around and says, "I'm not here to change the law, but fulfill it." It doesn't help provide much clarity. And when I see things like the image Brakeman posted, I have to wonder if that has something to do with the various contradictions and change of tone between the two.

Am I correct in guessing that he is involved in a Protestant or Pentecostal church and not the Catholic Church?

See, Jesus didn't write a book; he promised to build a church, and he left Peter in charge. When Peter died, another man took the office of head of the Church. That man today is Francis, the Bishop of Rome, or Pope. The Catholic Church does not go by the Bible alone; that is a novelty developed by Martin Luther in the 16th century. Instead, the Catholic Church continues, as it has always done, to maintain that Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition and the Magisterium (or teaching authority of the Church) all work together like a three-legged stool which is stable. Luther ripped off two legs, leaving sola scriptura - the Bible Alone, and your Dad is struggling to understand a book on his own when he ought to have Sacred Tradition and the infallible Church to guide his understanding.

He simply identifies as Christian, but I think Pentecostal may be a fair description. When I was younger we all went to a Pentecostal church and that was my formal introduction into Christianity. Then we went to a Baptist church for a while, and back to Pentecostal. I never been in a Catholic Church in my life, and admittedly know very little about Catholicism. I'm not sure if he ever has.

Though this brings me to another question, if I'm understanding you right you're basically saying the Catholic Church is the one God intended us to follow, so that means the other churches under the Christianity sect are false? I see some people on the flip-side feel the same about Catholics and even spread misinformation. Why is there so much of a divide between people who claim to be God's children?

As for there being no comparisons to Jesus, I've seen comparisons made between him and Horus, as well as Mithras, but I couldn't tell you how well the comparisons hold up. I've seen the Jesus/Horus comparison before when I was still a Christian and can honestly say it was the first time I seriously questioned my faith. I'm curious what everyone's here views on those comparisons are.