(May 19, 2015 at 12:52 pm)Esquilax Wrote: If you're just going to presuppose a god exists, in order to justify your belief in moral absolutes, in order to justify your belief in the supernatural, in order to justify your belief in god, then we're done here, because that is a perfect circle and you'd do better to just stop wasting our time and use the simplified version: "I believe god exists because I believe god exists."
You need to stop asserting and start demonstrating, because a chain of things you believe is not going to convince anybody. You can't say you believe X thing because you also believe Y thing, when neither of those things has any evidence behind them; you can't cover for one claim with another claim.
Do you believe that there is injustice anywhere? If so, then it follows that justice exists somewhere. Is there darkness somewhere? Then light exists. Are lies ever told? Then truth must exist too. In Romans Chapter one, the apostle Paul says:
18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.
21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.
24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
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Because of our fallen, sinful, dead nature (post fall) the human capacity for self-deception is limitless. But by God's grace, the Holy Spirit gave life to my dead soul and made me receptive to His word. I was beyond prideful. I loved arguing with Christians, insulting their faith, and demonstrating the infinite superiority of reason over faith. But God brought me to a point at which it required more faith to remain atheist than to admit what had always been obvious enough through the kind of world that God has made.
