What Major Intellectual Issue Most Keeps You From Accepting The Christian Narrative?

[pocaracas]

Hi Friends 

You're new here... not friend.
But it's alright... we can be friends if you want...

I hope this is the right sub-forum. I'm currently in a Christian apologetics class, and I have been assigned a project.

Christian apologetics class?
There are classes for that?!
Why do you need classes for that?

Ohhh... a project!

I need to find a non or "ex" Christian and ask them what the most significant intellectual issue they find in the Christian narrative. Would anyone be willing to help me out with this? 

I see many in here are willing.
Lucky you!






"the most significant intellectual issue they find in the Christian narrative"?
Wow.... that's a toughie...

Well, it all starts with the existence of a god, doesn't it?
At best, one can get to the god of the philosophers, but even that one runs into trouble, as the philosophers who developed that god (Aquinas) failed to account for many possibilities, instead focusing on their own goals.
They also assumed that the intellect has some component that operates apart from the substrate, the brain... That's a far fetched assumption. Their reasoning goes along the lines of our intellect being able to perceive completely abstract concepts, like perfect circularity, hence it can't be composed of real material thing as real material things are not like the abstract concepts they embody. So, intellect must have an abstract non-material component. From here, they bring forth a soul. Again, failing to account for the fact that yes abstract notions can be represented on a material substrate, even if the material substrate is not itself an abstract construct.


Concerning the Christian narrative in particular, the RCC has managed to build up a coherent whole.... if you accept that the god of the philosophers does exist and that it's the one that Jews ended up believing after leaving the Babylonian polytheism...
Speaking of... useless trivia time:
- In Babylonian theology, one finds several gods, 3 of them being the most important ones. 3! Get it? One of them is called An (or Anu) and is the father of the other gods. God the father, remind you of something?
- An had a consort called Asherath, the goddess of the Earth, or something like that.
- Curiously, Asherath also shows up as consort of another god, Yahweh, also a "god the father".
- Yahweh, then becomes the only god of Israel, where he becomes indistinguishable from El - El meaning God. At the time, the region had many els, but the area around Jerusalem ended up adopting a single one, El, god the father.
- Several groups develop around the cult of this one El, the Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and a fourth group that is unnamed.
- The Essenes were preaching a message very similar to Jesus', some 2 centuries before Jesus is claimed to have been around - helping the poor, shedding your worldly possessions, living in communities of "brothers", peace to the world, that kind of stuff... I'm sure they became popular with the common folk.
[here trivia gives way to speculation...]
- A roaming preacher baptizes a guy who goes on to preach those ideals himself, providing a more human side to the interpretations of the old laws.
- Preacher is silenced by the elites and becomes a martyr
- Tales of wonder develop, borrowing symbolism from many traditions, the Teacher, the God the father, the Three-headed divine governing body

You would simply state the most important issue that discredits Christianity as a rational position, whatever it might be, and then I will prepare a Christian response to whatever objection you raise and send it to you. You would then read it and send me back a short paragraph or so (or more) detailing your response to whatever I've written.

Oooohhh.... you got your work cut out for you!
I don't envy your position.... but you did get yourself involved in that apologetics class... it's your fault!
I'm not sure how you can expect to counter history nor the faults in classical philosophy, but go for it.