Faith Vs. Evidence

The hallmark of Christianity is faith and only faith. Christians must believe that Jesus died and rose from the dead with faith and faith alone. The apologists who try to assert that there is evidence for this event are only fooling themselves. According to many scriptures, god wouldn’t want to give us substantial evidence of the event because our ability to use faith exclusively would be compromised—maybe this is why there are four different stories of the events surrounding Jesus’ death. This may be why there is no contemporaneous or archaeological evidence of the numerous major events that happened in the Bible. The lack of archaeological evidence for the Exodus event comes to mind; This is not mentioning the 400 years of slavery that preceded the escape. The fact that there are no records, or secular eye witness testimony of events like the dead resurrecting after Jesus’ resurrection comes to mind. A parade of zombies wandering about Jerusalem would have been an event worth noting. Faith is SO important that you will end up in Hell if you fail to exercise it and trust in the object of that faith as your god. Evidence gives everything away; things are no longer blurry but focused and clear. We can wholeheartedly trust in whatever we are studying and don’t have to constantly wonder if it’s true or not. Conversely, faith is just the excuse we have to believe in something when there is no evidence to support it. Faith seems to be much more admirable and praiseworthy to god than evidence. He’s not like an earthly parent who wants you to know that they’re always there. He’s like the boogey man in the closet who only exists in your imagination but isn’t there when you turn on the closet light.

Do Not Judge God

These are the words I hear quite often when I point out the atrocities of the Old Testament. Why can't I judge his actions? We judge each other by what we do even more than by what we say, if we're smart. How are we supposed to understand god or decide if he is someone we want to have a relationship with if we can't even judge his character by his actions? He doesn't make any personal appearances these days but he does make quite a splash in the O.T.. I know that some Christians would say that the reasoning for his actions are so far above our understanding, and we are like mere ants compared to him. But, were the stories in the Bible not god's way of communicating his nature to us? When he orders the annihilation of all that breaths, he is revealing a part of his personality and character. It's a part that I can't understand or admire. The answer to my concern usually consists of someone telling me to "not judge god." I can't help but to have an automatic emotional response of disgust regardless of conscious judgment. Humans have an innate desire to protect the young and the helpless. We all hate to hear stories of people abusing children because they are such helpless, innocent creatures. So, why would god order the destruction of these helpless creatures? Furthermore, why do so many Christians find no problem with those actions?

If We All Came from Apes...

than why are there still apes? Checkmate atheists! Or, is it?

Watch the Nova special Becoming Human to stop making such ignorant arguments.

A Few of My Favorite Things

At risk of sounding like Oprah, I wanted to list a few of my favorite things that I go to for more head knowledge as an atheist, and student of science.
1) The A-Unicornist site- This guy has to be the greatest kept secret on the net. Why he isn't more recognized for his blogs is beyond me because they are probably better than just about any blog I've read, and I read a lot of blogs. He is also the one who played a major part in my own de-conversion, and I've known him since 6th grade; We've only recently got reacquainted through Facebook.

2) Atheist Experience Podcast- If you own an iphone or anything similar, you have got to download the podcast. I usually listen to the sunday afternoon show on mondays. They have several different hosts and all of them have great insight and knowledge. Matt Dillahunty is the founder.

3) The Universe series brought to us by the History Channel via Netflix-I've been watching the four year series on The Universe via Netflix and, besides noticing just how ignorant I am, have learned a great deal more about this awesome universe we live in.

4) Skeptic Magazine and The Skeptical Inquirer- I have a subscription to The Skeptical Inquirer and just swing by my local bookstore to purchase the Skeptic magazine that comes out quarterly. The publisher of Skeptic is Michael Shermer.

5) The Local Library- It's great to be able to request a book online and have it transferred to the nearest library for free, nuff said.

6) Dead-Logic.com, John Loftus' blog and any other blogs that I follow are also great resources.

7) As far as Youtube goes, I like to listen to everybody's favorite transexual Zinnia Jones, the always insightful AronRa, the hilarious nonstamp collector, Thunderfoot and the incomparable Edward Current.

Joe Rogan and Noah's Ark

I've always been a bit of a Joe Rogan fan, and we both share a passion for MMA. The story of Noah's Ark is asinine to say the least and easy comedic fodder. For instance, how did Noah get all of the millions of animals on one boat, both male and female gender? How did he also gather all the food supplies and have the capacity to store that on the boat as well? Male lions alone can eat 75 pounds of meat at one sitting!

After the comedy routine, Joe and a documentarian discuss the "evidence" as they take the fight back stage. The documentarian states that they found a 550 foot boat on top of Mount Arafat! Joe remains unconvinced of the findings and points out the absurdity of the whole story.