Devastating Arguments Against Christianity (Courtesy of the Internet)

I'm re-posting an excellent blog I found HERE

I found it to be a concise response to 3 arguments against Christianity I keep running into on the Web.  The resident skeptic in your life may have throw these your way a time or two, so I thought perhaps it would be good to fact-check them all at once.

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Claim #1: “Religion has been the primary cause of war and oppression throughout the history of mankind.”

The Truth: In their comprehensive Encyclopedia of Wars, Phillips and Axelrod document the recorded history of warfare. Of the 1,763 wars presented, a mere 7% involved a religious cause. When Islam is subtracted from the equation, that number drops to 3.2%.

In terms of casualties, religious wars account for only 2% of all people killed by warfare. This pales in comparison to the number of people who have been killed by secular dictators in the 20th century alone.

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Claim #2: “The dark ages were a time of ignorance and superstition, thanks to religion’s negative influence on scientific progress.”

The Truth: Atheist writer Tim O’Neill responds to this claim eloquently in his excellent review of “God’s Philosophers”:  

“It’s not hard to kick this nonsense to pieces, especially since the people presenting it know next to nothing about history and have simply picked up these strange ideas from websites and popular books. The assertions collapse as soon as you hit them with hard evidence. I love to totally stump these propagators by asking them to present me with the name of one – just one - scientist burned, persecuted, or oppressed for their science in the Middle Ages. They always fail to come up with any. They usually try to crowbar Galileo back into the Middle Ages, which is amusing considering he was a contemporary of Descartes. When asked why they have failed to produce any such scientists given the Church was apparently so busily oppressing them, they often resort to claiming that the Evil Old Church did such a good job of oppression that everyone was too scared to practice science. By the time I produce a laundry list of Medieval scientists – like Albertus Magnus, Robert Grosseteste, Roger Bacon, John Peckham, Duns Scotus, Thomas Bradwardine, Walter Burley, William Heytesbury, Richard Swineshead, John Dumbleton, Richard of Wallingford, Nicholas Oresme, Jean Buridan and Nicholas of Cusa – and ask why these men were happily pursuing science in the Middle Ages without molestation from the Church, my opponents usually scratch their heads in puzzlement at what just went wrong.”

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Claim #3: “Jesus was a mythical figure. The New Testament stole most of its stories from other ancient sources.”

The Truth: These claims gained a lot of popularity thanks to the 2007 propaganda film “Zeitgeist” and its articulation of the Jesus myth hypothesis. It turns out that the “facts” presented in the image above are almost entirely fabricated. I was able to refute most of them in about thirty minutes of searching on academic websites:

Horus

• His mother (Isis) wasn't a virgin. Isis married her brother (Osiris) and conceived Horus with him.
• There’s no historical reference to a “star in the east,” or to Horus “walking on water.” Those are simply made up.
• Horus was never crucified or resurrected. Actually, he never even died! The story is that he “merged” with the sun god, Ra.

Mithra

• By most accounts, Mithra was born in either September or October.
• There’s no historical account of Mithra having twelve disciples. That part is also made up.
• Mithra wasn't said to have been born of a virgin, but rather out of solid rock.
• There’s no known record of a resurrection (or even of him having died).

Krishna

• Krishna was from the royal family Mathura, and was the 8th son of Devaki and her husband Vasudeva.
• There is no mention of a “star in the east” or a resurrection in the literature.
• There are some references to him performing miracles, but that’s about it…

Dionysus

• He wasn't born of a virgin. His mother was Semele (a mortal), and his father was Zeus.
• Dionysus died each winter and was resurrected in the spring. No mention of December 25.
• There are plenty of references to Dionysus turning water into wine…but he was, after all, the Greek god of wine.

The Web is a place for all kinds of "devastating" arguments like these, but often they're put forward with more zeal (or sarcasm) than knowledge.  So remember, "the first to present his case seems right, till another comes forward and questions him." Prov 18:17

Smile, the Universe Loves You

Jim Carrey

Today, saw a viral video that used the musings of a man known for his deep thinking and philosophical insight, Jim Carrey*. It actually contained some real nuggets, like this one:  “Our eyes are not viewers, they are also projectors that are running a second story over the picture we see in front of us all the time.  Fear is usually writing that script.”

But then Jim went on to encourage us to ask the Universe for our dreams and the Universe will come through, if we just ask.  I recognize in his speech, a quasi Christian worldview superimposed onto a neo pantheistic, materialistic, hedonistic one: Ask the loving universe for your outrageous dream and the universe will give it to you, but be patient and trust the universe for the how and the when of dream fulfillment.  He actually sounds like a lot of sermons on prayer I've heard or even delivered (not the first time I’m been compared to Jim Carrey!), just replace the word Universe with God.

That is, the Universe, capital “U”.

This was just the most recent example of how it has become politically correct to expunge every mention of God out of our vocabulary and in pop culture today, but it has not become taboo to use rhetoric about religious devotion, prayer, worship, awe or guidance, purpose and meaning.  If we simply refer to the Universe instead of God using the exact same rhetoric, we can sneak “spirituality” in.

But let’s examine this trend.  At first glance, this is a less offensive way to appeal to universal religious sentiment in people by being less sectarian, and less overtly religious.  Who can be offended by outsourcing our universal religious feelings onto something that everyone, regardless of religious belief, can feel and see and “know” – like the Universe?  How uncontroversial!  At once it seems to include believers and non-believers alike.  Even the atheist/agnostic eggheads on “Big Bang Theory” will invoke the “Universe” from time to time in reference to personal purpose or guidance.  It’s not uncommon for irreligious characters of all kinds to now say, “I wonder if this is the Universe’s way of telling me I should…”

However, after short examination you can see how this trend is disingenuous at best, and utterly illogical at worst.  For what exactly do we mean by the Universe?  If it’s what we typically mean, all the atoms and space and heat and energy and particles that make up the observable universe, then how can that stuff DO anything for me, personally?  How can I trust this material stuff?  How can it hear me, it has no ears?  How can it answer me, it has no power except to follow relentlessly and obsequiously, its own predetermined path, set by its own immutable laws?  How can it guide me, when it itself is just flowing along a perfectly unchallengeable script?  Why would “it” suggest options for me to follow, to uncover my secret fate or purpose, when inside the closed system of the Universe there are, in reality, NO OPTIONS;  No option for the movement and actions of atoms, therefore, no real options for the movement or actions of people, who are simply a collection of atoms, bound by Universal laws.

Now, I get humans personify things all the time.  Things like mountains, or wind or trees.  So it’s not a surprise that we might personify the Universe.  But when we say, “the mountain forbade us to ascend that morning…” our personification is simply a metaphor and we know it.  We mean, “the weather was bad.”  But truly, in the case of the new usage of “Universe”, no metaphor is being used or implied.  Jim Carrey really means that the Universe will guide him, answer him, bless him, love him.

But this is just logically ridiculous.  We are, without saying it, attributing personality to something completely and totally impersonal.  Of course, this trend would make some sense if when we are talking about the “Universe” we really mean something MORE than the atoms and energy and space of the universe as we know it and speak about it, in the proper sense.  I imagine the sage Jim Carrey himself might respond that he means something more than the physical universe when he invokes the “Universe”.  He means “all of its energy together, synergistically making up more than the sum of its parts, creating a Universal Soul.”  But then whatever it is he’s referring to, is something OUTSIDE of space, time and matter.  And that something, whatever it is, is properly described as spiritual or extra dimensional, because it is by definition beyond the space time matter dimensions.  So why call it the Universe?  It seems by every other thing Jim Carrey says about it, that what he means is in fact the OPPOSITE of the universe.  When he says universe, he means the NOT-universe.  It’s the grossest mislabeling you could imagine.  To talk about “height” and mean depth.  To talk about heat and mean cold.  To invoke the Universe and mean, “God”. 

This is why the Theistic worldview alone makes sense of the data.  It rejects the No-God solution of Atheism, which cannot seem to expunge or account for our religious urge (the “Universe Loves Me” pop trend only the latest evidence of this), and it rejects the All-God solution of Pantheism, which illogically foists personhood onto the impersonal, spirituality onto matter, morality onto relativism.  Only Theism accepts the material world without rejecting a spiritual Source for everything and vice-versa.  So go ahead Jim Carrey and all pop icons, invoke “the Universe”.  We know what you really mean.

Is Christmas OK to celebrate or does the "No Christmas" stance border on legalism?

These days, you'll get two groups of people telling you that Christmas is a sham Christian holiday, because it's origins are pagan.  The first group are the irreligious agnostics you might know who seem to take some Grinchy delight in exploding your sense of Christmas specialness.  The second group are the very religious, very rigid Christians who condemn anything that is directly or even remotely associated with paganism, witchcraft and spiritualism.  Also, the second group is often having a hyper-protestant overreaction to Catholicism.  The effect is like that of the militant ex-addict we all know, who no longer sees any difference between a beer and a binge. Ironically these two groups share arguments for completely opposite reasons, and yet the result is the same:  make everyone feel lousy about celebrating Christmas.

So is December 25th Jesus' actual birthday?  No one knows for sure when Jesus was born.  Some very creative biblical study can be done to make a case for December 25th. But after reading all the arguments for why Jesus was possibly born in December or September or even the Spring, you find all of them lack this one thing:  explicit biblical support.  They are all cases built on circumstantial evidence and Scriptural inferences.  Which doesn't mean these theories have no merit, it just means we DON'T KNOW for sure.  And that means it doesn't matter, for sure.  

Clearly, Jesus was really born.  Anyone who celebrates that event, is going to be doing so on a somewhat arbitrary date.   We celebrate the births of presidents on days that do not correspond to their actual birthday's.  It doesn't mean they weren't born (Mr Agnostic), and it doesn't mean we're being sacrilegious (Mr No-Christmas Christian).

But why on that date, and why with the trappings we do, like trees and holly are yule logs and stars?  A lot of these traditions have unclear beginnings.  It's true the Romans had a mid-winter celebration, and they lit fires and lights to Saturn.  The pagan Germans used evergreen trees at the winter solstice and yule logs and holly.  So should we assume that if these things began as part of idolatrous worship they should be forbidden?

Well, the Bible nowhere forbids people to put a tree with lights in their living room in December.  The principle some Christians imagine forbids this, is that of God's people separating from pagan beliefs and practices - in Jeremiah 10:1 for example.  This is an important Christian principle to honor.  But let us have a complete understanding of how this principle played out before we apply it to Christmas.  Jeremiah 10:2 says, "do not learn their ways".  What were those?  The same Prophet lists these in chapter 7:5-9:  idol worship, murder, infanticide etc.  Idol worship is clearly a huge concern, but are the symbols and trappings of Christmas idols?  No one I know, who puts a tree in their home or holly on their door, is doing so to appeal to a god who is not the Lord.  They don't do so to gain favor with that god and they surely don't support the immoral practices that God detests in Jeremiah 7 - which pagan idolatry did.  So the principles forbidding the occult can't apply to Christmas traditions as MOST people practice them.  

A case might be made that the commercialism we attach to Christmas IS idolatrous, since it elevates acquisition and materialism above God in our heart's affection.  There's plenty of Scriptural principle forbidding that.  And in that area, we might say Christmas gift giving can lead us into real temptation.  But in and of themselves, that, and other traditions are harmless.  As music is harmless, depending on how it's used.

Both Christian and non-Christian Christmas debunkers admit a certain amount of strategic thinking on the part of the church as it accepted and changed pagan rituals and infused them with Christian meaning.  One author claims, "the Church said, 'bring your gods, goddesses, rituals and rites, and we will assign Christian sounding titles and names to them...'".  Well, let's be clear:  the church, even at it's lowest point, never told people to bring their gods into the church to worship along side of Christ!  It did however, accept many pagan rituals.  Rather than the great compromise, this has to be seen as great genius on some level.

Without compromising the truth about Christ, it showed that the Christian message had deep relevance to the spiritual lives of pagan hearers.  It showed (as Paul did with the Athenians in Acts 17) that what they did in ignorance, the Gospel would fully explain/fulfill.

So for example, having Christmas at the winter solstice, might have been done because the Church retained a distant memory of the actual date, or it might have simply been done for strategic reasons.  But if the latter, what shame in that?  Since no one can deny it's a beautiful natural expression of what Jesus birth represents:  Light coming to a dark world.  What a great teaching vehicle!  Same with taking the German's evergreen tree and seeing in it the promise of eternal life, or taking holly and seeing the blood of Jesus and the crown of thorns.  Same with the lights and fires that point to the Light of the World, and same with gift giving showing us how God so loved the world that he GAVE his only Son.
 

In this way, the Church was saying the Gospel didn't repudiate paganism as a whole but rather FULFILLED it.  A more liberal view perhaps, but a better one for making converts, and also a view more attuned to the reality that God is the author of the Nature pagan's worship.

Yes, many perversions about God are in paganism - but it's basic instinct was to see spiritual reality in the cycles of nature the Creator made.  Well, do we think it's for no reason that Resurrection is celebrated in Spring?  The date of that event is known with certainty (unlike Christ's birth) and I see God's perfect touch in the timing.  God is a romantic!  We propose to our girlfriends in the place we first dated, or first kissed or first saw each other.  You can propose anywhere, why do it there?  Because the time and the place and the setting add weight, symbolic significance to the moment - which enhances memory and affection.  That God was raised from the dead in Spring is perfectly consistent with that same God calling for New Moon festivals, the sacrifice of animals, and who had palm trees and flowers carved into his Temple, and who created festivals around the cycles of the harvest.

We follow in His example then, when we freely use symbols, settings, and rituals to add weight to our memory of his work and his love.

Uptight Christians have this lesson to learn:  because a thing is from nature, doesn't automatically make it pagan, or demonic.  And the truth is, just because the devil will use some natural thing, animal worship or a physical ritual to imprison people to himself, or expose his power or dumb down our view of God (Romans 1:23) nature finally doesn't belong to him!!  If he is using it to promote his power or obscure God, then it is the right and privilege of the people of God to relieve him of it!  If it's the devil's rituals, they are stolen goods and we, the children of God, rightly steal them back!  He holds no ground in this world that's rightfully his.  He only perverts what isn't his originally.  Evil is a merely a parasite, as Lewis once said. 

So I would not approach the use of formerly pagan trappings with fear, cowed by their former meaning, former owner, former usage, or former evil associations.  The earth is the Lord's and I am the Lord's and so the earth is mine.  So a Yule log is mine to burn in the fireplace and my redeemed heart remembers the warmth of God's grace coming to a cold world.  A wreath is mine to hang on the door and say to my neighbors, eternal evergreen life is promised!

Yes, I think the no-Christmas stance not only borders on legalism, it marches right on in!