Evidence God Exists: Part II

[Jaysyn]

... the negative moral & ethical influence of the Christian religion.

The actual teachings of Christianity or how some abuse such teachings? There is a difference. I would be interested in hearing how Christian morals and ethics, particularly as presented in the New Testament, would be negative.

Feel free to read "The God Delusion" then.

Start with a society in which a majority of that society determines that it is ok to kill a minority member of the society. Let's even say that a law is passed that says a member of the majority is obligated to kill a member of the minority if they come into contact with one. Is it then ok (right) for a member of the majority to go around killing members of the minority?

Beautiful example of a strawman argument / appeal to pity. The answer, of course, is no. Now give me a reason you have to have religion to tell you that killing another human, another member of your tribal group so to speak, is wrong.

How is that a strawman argument? A strawman argument is one that a person sets up and portrays as another person's position and then rebuts that, instead of rebutting what the other person's position really is. Mine is merely a hypothetical scenario that I ask people to answer to see how consistently they apply their view of morals. It seems to me that if one believes that morals are manmade and based on the majority of the members of a society, to be consistent, the answer should be "yes", not "no". Nobody has yet explained how a "no" answer is consistent with an initial position of morals being manmade and based on the majority. As to your last sentence, I really did not understand what you want me to explain. If you restate, I will try to answer.

Maybe not a strawman, I thought you were inferring the made up society would be an atheist society. However your argument remains an appeal to pity (they are killing each other!) as well as an argument from personal incredulity (I can't believe a non-religious society can have mores & ethics, so it must not be possible).

My question at the end, put in simpler terms is: Why do we need religion to tell us that killing another human being is wrong?