The Group FAQ

Introduction

Welcome to the Atheism vs. Christianity Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ). The intent of this document is primarily to provide succinct answers to common questions concerning the group, atheism, Christianity, and the debate between the two.

The purpose of the Atheism vs. Christianity group

Atheism vs. Christianity is a forum where people with incompatible views get to share their ideas. The purpose of this group is to exemplify how these two incompatible concepts can be debated. This group differs from other groups in this way: This group is not the home of atheists, nor of Christians, it is merely a sounding board where representatives of both of these groups try to establish the truth of their beliefs before a tough audience, and hopefully eliminate some popular misconceptions and misunderstandings in the process. Others are welcome, too: Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, etc. are welcome to participate, as long as their contributions do not deviate from the general theme. This is a group where you can read a variety of views, ranging from the hyper-religious to the hyper-skeptical. Enjoy!

The authors of the FAQ

• This document is an ongoing collaborative project maintained by members of the group. All group members are encouraged to edit, wiki-style. If you wish to contribute, please find the "Edit this page" at the end of the document. You are asked to attempt to use Neutral Point of View wherever possible. Where there is a lack of consensus, then multiple points of view should be presented. The reader is hopefully in a better position to evaluate different points of view. You are encouraged to describe the changes you make in the Change Log at the bottom of this page. You're encouraged to discuss changes in the discussion pages before making major edits, particularly if deleting content.

Definitions

Atheist

Atheism is the lack of belief in god(s). An atheist is a person who lacks belief in god(s).

The meaning of the label "atheist" is dependent upon the context. Strong atheists, for certain definitions of God at least, maintain that God is non-existent. In contrast, weak atheists are without a belief in God - they maintain that the burden of proof is on the theist to provide supporting evidence for God's existence.

 

For the sake of the uninitiated theist, atheists are encouraged to qualify their position when seeking to minimize confusion.

 

Strong Atheist

A person who maintains that it is impossible that a god or gods exists. Also known as "explicit atheism": The absence of theistic belief due to a conscious rejection of it.

Weak Atheist

A person who concedes the possibility that a god or gods may exist, but maintains that such is improbable. Also known as "implicit atheism": The lack of theistic belief without a conscious rejection of it.

Antireligionist

An Antireligionist is opposed to religious beliefs rather than just the Atheist's non belief in deities . An Antireligionist may have a spiritual or a personal belief in God/s, but oppose organised religion. Most would also oppose all other forms of organised belief or superstition.

Agnostic

A person who considers the existence of god or gods to be unknown or unknowable.

Non theist

A non theist does not consider the question of God and the concept is totally irrelevant to them. Most people are non theist most of the time sleeping and waking, until for whatever reason they considering the question of God, they then instantly stop being a non theist and become either an Atheist, Theist, or Agnostic.

 

Theist Agnostic

Agnostic theism is the philosophical view that encompasses both theism and agnosticism. An agnostic theist is one who views that the truth value of certain claims, in particular the existence of god(s) is unknown or inherently unknowable but chooses to believe in god(s) in spite of this. There are contrasting views of the term.

Theist

Most theists on this forum describe themselves as Christian. This traditionally has included those who believe that Jesus is the Son of the Living God (Matt 16:16, 1 John 5:5). Most Christians believe that the soul of man is immortal. Most Christians consider the Bible to be authoritative.

Weak Theist

A weak theist wants to believe in God, and on occasion, they think they do. On other occasions they simply go through the motions, either intermittently plagued with doubts and questions, or simply ignoring them. The method of dealing with such doubts and questions depends on the nature of the person concerned.

Fundamentalist

Fundamentalist Christians typically believe that the Bible is inerrant in the original manuscripts.

God

An Atheist's definition of God would be that God does not exist in reality, but only as a concept. A concept that is shared by Atheist, Agnostic and Theist, but varies considerably, in detail and God's existence and involvement in reality from person to person.

There are various theist's definitions of God. Classic Christian theism ascribes the following properties to God:

1. God is a personal being.
2. God is uncreated.
3. God is omnipotent (all-powerful).
4. God is omniscient (all-knowing)
5. God is omnibenevolent (all-good)

Personal being: God is capable of love John 3:16, He can think Ps 40:17, Ps 144:3, He can plan Jer 29:11

Uncreated: Heb 13:8, John 8:58, Is 43:10,  Is 43:13, John 1:1-3 & Ps 90:2

All-powerful: Gen 18:14, Jeremiah 32:17, 27 & Daniel 7:13-14

All-knowing: Ps 147:5, 1 Chron 28:9 & 1 John 3:20

All-good: Psalm 86:15, Deuteronomy 32:4,  Exodus 34:6

More scriptures at http://www.dianedew.com/godhead.htm

Needs elaboration: Can someone please justify these from the Bible?

Arguments Against the Existence of the Christian God

The Problem of Evil

Evil is a state of mind usually leading to a "sin" being committed. Both Evil and Sin are religious concepts so are a construct of religious men, and not, as some would allege, God. Evil in isolation is passive without Sin, so Sin is the critical indicator of the existence of Evil. Sin is defined by the religious as disobedience to God, but there is no proof that its condemned by that same God, so in the absence of the "alleged" creator and ultimate judge of "Sin" speaking up and condemning the "sinner" sin does not actually exist. What does exist is secular morality, slightly different from culture to culture but very similar throughout the world. An inbuilt life guide crafted by years of evolution, designed to improve the chances of the human race to survive and prosper. An Atheist would likely argue that we don't need religion and sin, morality and immorality works equally as well. A Theist would most likely argue that without religion and sin, immorality would rule, as man is weak and prone to stray from all that is good. An Agnostic would most likely argue that he does not know, and would wait to find out the answer, should it ever be proven.

  

• More details available here
  

An Atheist's paraphrasing of Epicurus:-

1. Gratuitous evil exists.
2. Gratuitous evil is incompatible with the existence of an omnipotent omnibenevolent being.
3. God does not exist.

Theodicies for the Problem of Evil

Needs elaboration.

• More details available here
• See here for a rationalistic Christian response.
  

A theodicy is an attempt to reconcile the existence of God and evil. A simple example might be "God allows that which He hates in order to achieve that which he loves".

Free Will Theodicy

Needs elaboration.

Essentially, evil exists because of free will, see Genesis 3. Free will is a greater good.

Objections to the Free Will Theodicy

There are instances of evil which do not appear to be the consequence of an informed choice, such as congenital diseases.

The Problem of Hell

This is a subset of the problem of evil. See also.

1. The God of the Bible exists. (Premise).
2. The Bible is inerrant. (Premise, although supported by 0. and 2 Tim 3:16, Psa 119:151-152, 160)
3. God is all-good and all-powerful. (Premise, although supported by 0.)
4. An all-good God would want to rid the universe of needless suffering. (Definition of good).
5. An all-powerful God will eventually rid the universe of such needless suffering.
6. The Bible tells us that God will not rid the universe of suffering, but rather promises to create a place of torture (Mat 22:13). This suffering is infinite duration (Rev 14:11). The majority are sent there (Mat 7:13-14). These souls were not predestined before the foundation of the world, were not elected (Eph 1, Rom 9, John 6 etc), were given contrary advice on how to avoid Hell (Matthew 13, 25:31ff, Luke 10, Luke 18:18ff), were allowed by God to be deluded, with God creating delusions to damn some of those souls (2 Th 2:11-12), a God who actively blinds some unbelievers so that they would not believe (John 12:38-40), a God who speaks in parables so that fewer would come to repentance and escape hell (Mark 4:12), a God who would (hypothetically) allow Saddam Hussein (for sake of argument) to enjoy the eternal bliss of Heaven as he looks on to see Gandhi being cruelly tortured for insignificant and finite evils, simply for lacking the correct religious beliefs (John 3:18, plus others).
7. The suffering in Hell is unnecessary, since Jesus' death is said to pay for the punishment of the sins of the whole world. (Premise, although supported by 0.)
8. The conclusion is inconsistent with the premises.
9. Therefore, one of the premises is false.
   

Objections to the Problem of Hell

1. Objection to the Definition of Good (point #4):

The Christian bible clearly states that the entire world is eligible for salvation:

John 3:16- For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whomever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life.

 Hence, the suffering in Hell may be necessary. 

2. Another objection is that the suffering in Hell is necessary because those who do not accept God's gift must be ostracized (completely alienated) from God's holy presence. Another objection is that Hell is a metaphor for annihilation, see Annihilationism.

How do Strong Atheists feel about Weak Atheists?

Strong atheists accept the burden of proof in showing that the idea of God is false. Religious activity on the planet continues as it is either profitable from an evolutionary perspective, or religion is simply a meme that out-replicates other memes (see Memes). Parents help maintain the belief in gods, since children generally accept the beliefs of their parents. Conversions are rare. Reference? 

The Apisa Quandry

-Can Atheists make Antitheitical Statements and still be called Atheist?

Needs elaboration...Yes. But you can still judge them any way you want, and wait in line to be judged, yourselves!

Moderators

Moderators on Atheism v Christianity are simply here to kill spam. Spamming is the only basis for banning group members. Most topics posted here are going to make it to the board without problem, but some topics are caught by Google's spam filter. If your topic does not show up, it will show up whenever a moderator gets around to letting it through the filter. Do not take that as an invitation to email a moderator asking to let your topic through, because the message queue is checked at least three times a day. Please be patient. Moderators do not have any special privileges, and we won't do anything except kill spam. If you want to start a flame war with the moderators, go ahead, we won't ban you. Basically we're not here to referee, just kill spam. -Mpoxsx. former moderator

On spam:

There is no hard-and-fast way to tell what spam is, ultimately. However there are a few things that can tip us off

• Repeated posts with no changes in response to multiple threads.
• Threads with nothing but an offsite advertisement in them.
• Threads with incorrect alphanumeric posting syntax. Please be aware that posting in ALL CAPS is considered shouting, and rude. Also do not pad your text with unnecessary characters like >>>>this<<<<<.
• Entirely off-topic points. While we do all occasionally post off-topic points, if you ONLY post off-topic points, that's probably a good indication that you're a spammer.

Please attempt to abide by these guidelines. 

Change Log:

 

2007.07.10 Edited by Bob600  Changed and reduced the definition of Non theist.

2007.07.10 Edited by Bob600 Removed "and improbable" following  "impossible" in the definition of strong atheist

2007.06.19 Edited by Bob600 Added an Atheist's definition of God

2007.05.21 Edited by pianoroy. Added an objection to the Problem of Hell. 

2007.05.15 Edited by Bob600 Added the definition of Antireligionist.

2007.04.18 Edit by rappoccio. Added a spam section and stickied this on the list of discussions. More to follow. 

2007.02.04 Edit by Bob600. Added a some definition on Evil & Sin.

2007.02.03 Edit by Bob600. Changed some of the wording in the nontheist definitions and added a Weak Theist definition.

2007.01.09 Edit by Stephen. Put a little more meat on the problem of evil and free-will theodicy, plus some minor cleaning up.

2007.01.05 Edit by Cormagh. Expanded introduction with justification for the group.

2007.01.05 Edit by Stephen. Added "Argument from Hell", plus did some cleaning up.

2007.01.05 Edit by Cormagh

2007.01.05 Edit by Stephen. FAQ is born!