How to answer "I know that I know that I know"?

[riaaneloff]

If I were you I'd just leave them alone. I mean it seems that you are mad at them because they decided to be poor. Which is a really shitty reason to be mad at people. Actually it's the one part of the bible I rather like. To not participate in the capitalist system.

If they say God will provide for them, all the better. You don't have to give them anything you don't want to. I'd say let them do what they want to. At least they are actually doing what Jesus told people to, rather than most Christians, who are major hypocrites who don't read the bible except for the parts that fit in with the modern world.

P.S. do they know you are atheists?

Hey there.  He knows, we've discussed this in quite some detail.  I'm not mad at them at all, for anything.  Not mad at them for being poor.  He's my friend, and I see him, his wife, and his son living out of boxes for ONE reason only:  he believes god told him to do ministry instead of the job (at which he is actually amazing!  He is one of the top 10 bassist in our country, and his wife an amazing vocalist.  They were inundated with work, and decided to stop taking gigs, only to minister because god told them).  It's tough to just leave someone alone, with whom you've spent 30 years as friends, and see them making an active choice to do irrational things.

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3) Even though he agrees that he has NO EVIDENCE for god, he holds to the fact that he just knows that he knows that he knows god is real and is part of his daily life.

Welcome to the forum! I think the problem is that he has invested too much in believing that there is a god, that were he to give that up he'd have to accept being a sucker and having thrown away his life for something fake. I've never had to do this, and I don't know how I would.

You said you were a pastor; how did you get beyond the highly convincing sunk cost of your entire career being a waste? Of misleading your family about religion? Of pouring your own money into something not real? Even when it's the right move, I think it takes extraordinary strength to accept that, which is a huge barrier towards moving away from religion for many people.

It's quite a long story, but, essentially, over many, many years, there have been questions in the back of my mind.  Ones that I thought I'd still find answers to, or God will still answer in time.  As life unfolded, some of these questions kept popping up, and at one point I challenged myself therein that I considered whether or not church as an organization was TRULY the way god intended.  As I started finding the facts, I started "daring" to question biblical "facts", and once the bible started crumbling, the logical next step was th questions about god himself that were still unanswered.  But, it is quite a long and winding road :-)  Also, not just my own decisions.   A combination of life events, circumstances etc etc that all piped in this direction.  If I were a believer, I would've said: "god was steering me here"  LOL  ;-)