Shouldn't Christians hope they are wrong?

There are a bunch of things that Christians believe that I find hard to swallow. Yes, I was once a Christian so I can understand how they HAVE to believe these things in order to maintain their doctrines, but I wish they would consider, as I have, that they may be wrong. Some of these things they believe are so terrible that it should compel them to hope that they may be wrong. For example, if I believed that an ancient people prophesied that in three years the world would be impacted by an alien missile that would send the earth on a collision course with the sun and that subsequently every living thing on the planet would become fried - Shouldn't I spend all my time trying to prove myself wrong? Christians also believe that one day billions of people will fry in the flames of hell, but they take it another step further and make it last forever. What an awful thought. Shouldn't this compel them to hope that they are wrong? Shouldn't they be reading all of the critical books that have been written against their religion? Shouldn't they be researching all of the scientific discoveries that may contradict what is written in their holy book? It may dash their hopes of one day reaching their eternal paradise, but in my opinion that is a small price to pay.

A man may spend his life inventing medical cures that save the lives of millions and prevents much suffering, but in the Christian worldview, if he did not believe and dedicate his life to the god/man Jesus then he will spend an infinite number of years wailing and gnashing his teeth in unquenchable flames. 

According to Christian beliefs, I would have been infinitely better off if I had died in a car accident while I was still a Christian than later abandoning my faith in the religion and one day reaping the consequences. 

I'm sure if you asked most Christians they would say that aborted babies all end up in heaven along with miscarriages and other infants who die young. If this is true then, according to Christian beliefs, all of these babies are better off dead and in heaven then having to live here on earth and possibly not becoming a "real" Christian.

Christians look forward to the day that they can leave this earth for a better home where they can eternally be at the feet of Yahweh, worshiping him forever. Unfortunately they have to do this in spite of being aware of his deeds in the Old Testament. Yahweh was at one time fed up with people so much that he drowned a world full of them including plants, animals, children, elderly and everything that breathed. Yahweh also commanded his chosen people to annihilate the people who lived in Canaan and would not allow them to spare anything that breathed (except a group of virgins once). I'm not sure which was worse: being killed with a blunt sword or having to be the one doing the killing. Why do they want to believe this with all their heart? Because Jesus fixed all of this? 

Jesus had some good ideas, but he was not perfect. He supposedly said things like: "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword", "For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother", and "All these things are done in parables: That seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them." If you think that's not so bad, read about what happens in the book of Revelation and I doubt you'll think the New Testament is a nice book anymore.

In a last attempt modern Christians will re-interpret every passage in the Bible that they have a problem with, they will focus on the social aspects of Jesus' words and Paul's writings, and they will try as much as possible to become relevant for the culture of today. Even this modern version of Christianity should raise some eyebrows. Most modern Christians still believe that the majority of the world is going to hell. Most of them still believe that human sacrifice is a medium for appeasing their god (thankfully it was a one time deal). Most of them still focus on the brutal act of a Roman crucifixion and focus on a broken body and spilled blood. Most of them still believe that any day now the world and everything left in it is going to be destroyed and remade. And most of them still become self-righteous and tend to look down on anyone who does not believe what they believe. All I ask is that they open up about their doubts and become honest with one another. They should be open to other points of view. 

If humanity is going to thrive in the future, things like bigotry and intolerance need to be set aside. Superstitions should be cast off. Apocalyptic and doomsday thinking should be kept in check with reality. Attempts at finding the truth of a matter should begin with evidence and probability and should not be based on dogma and presuppositions. The value of life must be upheld. Suffering should always be avoided. People should be kind and thoughtful to others because they want to, not because they want to gain an eternal reward. I'm not saying anything new. This has all been hashed out many times before. The question is, do Christians deep down really hope they are right about these things? Shouldn't they hope to be wrong?

Thoughts on values, morality

In this post I'd like to comment on the controversial topic of absolute morality vs. moral relativism. From my point of view it seems that all we have available to us is moral relativism. In other words, all we have is everyone's different opinions on what's good for us and what's bad. Christians claim that God sets the standard for us to live by, but if that's the case then he has not made that clear to us. How can we be expected to trust in something written down by ancient people (the Bible)? Especially when it has many things that seem morally wrong, such as stoning disobedient children, killing witches, eternal torment, genocide, human sacrifice, etc. Also, this collection of ancient writings (the Bible) has been interpreted in many, many different ways.

Does everyone have the same set of values implanted within them by God? If that were true then we would all agree on what's right and wrong. In some cultures women are not given the same rights as men (even driving a car), they think that's right, but I think it's wrong. A few centuries ago there were people in America  who thought slavery was not wrong, but I think it is. Lying, in my opinion, is not always wrong. If you had lived in Nazi Germany and you were hiding Jews in your basement, it would have been good to lie when asked if you knew where any Jews were. If you are a spy that works for the CIA, you may have to lie all the time, and I think that is okay because it is a necessity for that type of job. The most clear example of different  moral standards is the stark contrast between modern people and ancient.

So, where do we get our values from? I think we get them from our parents and our culture. I think down through the years different cultures have been improving values little by little. Judaism and Christianity have given us the value of helping the poor and needy. The enlightenment period gave us the value of science and reason which helped dispose of superstitions. Modern thinking has given us the values of freedom and equality. Modern medicine has instructed us in good values for eating and exercising. And modern science has established the values of recycling and sustainability (to name a few). Having values gives us the ability to make this world a better place to live. Some day we may be able to do away with war and famine and we can try to minimize suffering as much as possible.

What about guilt, where does that come from? I think this uncomfortable feeling comes whenever we do something that other people do not agree with or perhaps we ourselves do not approve of. Since we worry about what other people think about us, we are constantly aware of their possible judgments. Also, if you've been raised in a Christian environment as I have, you will think that God is keeping tabs on you and expects you to do things a certain way. I think all of these things have been the ideas and creations of men, however.

Values help us everyday to make good decisions. Good decisions will result in a happier life and will make those around us happy as well. There may not be a clear standard for everyone to follow, but we try our best and learn from the past.

My challenge to someone who claims absolute morals exist is simple. If they exist, then tell us what they are. Once you've been able to decide on what those are tell us on what authority they are based. No matter what, you will have to rely on your own opinions and biases to make this list. Since they are based on your own opinions and biases they are, by definition, relative to you and not absolute.

The gap of the gods

I've recently been reading some materials by Christian apologists and I'd like to comment on what I see as a gap in their arguments. The standard Christian arguments for the God of the Bible usually begin with the natural world. They usually involve cause and effect, fine tuning and complex design. In my opinion, these are all reasonable arguments that have been put forward. Most Christian apologists realize that these are not absolute proofs, but they can be called "clues" that there may be an intelligent designer. At this point they reach a major gap. First, they avoid giving any explanation for how this designer exists, then, they jump directly from an intelligent designer to the Christian God of the Bible.

Some apologists will seemingly cover all their bases by arguing against the God's of some other religions, but overall they give no good reasons for leaping past the gap. I think they fail to see that there are so many possibilities surrounding the concept of an intelligent designer. I would like to grant for a moment that the intelligent design concept is true (although I do think naturalism has a strong case, but that's for a different post). Here are some possible "what if" scenarios I thought of in just a few minutes. There are probably many other "what ifs" that could be dreamed up as well.

• Naturally, we think that God is much like us in ways of consciousness and the ability to effect changes on things, but what if this is not the case. What if the intelligent designer is something like a network of different minds and is not really a single conscious being? That might sound strange, but it's actually similar to the idea of a three in one God.
• What if the creator of our universe is a grand scientist of sorts and he has created many millions of different universes trying out different settings and parameters with each one?
• What if every galaxy has a different deity in charge of it and each galaxy has several inhabited planets for each deity to watch over?
• What if the intelligent designer died at the moment it created life on planet earth, giving it's last breath to create new life for us?
• What if there is an infinity of deities in existence and they have all lived for eternity past in infinite space creating infinite numbers of universes? 
• What if there is a grand hierarchy of deities, with a father and mother type at the top of the chain? The deity that created our world could be several notches down in this hierarchy.
• The intelligent designer could be more or less like a male or could be more or less like a female or could even be similar to a robot or something.
• Perhaps the big bang was caused by two deities smashing into each other in some other dimension in a  sort of galactic jousting match.
• Or perhaps the world was created by small fairies who watch us all the time, but are invisible to us.
• If I take any of these scenarios and add more and more specifics to them, they will gradually sound more and more bogus.

"Why this is madness!" says the apologist, "You are just speculating all of this." Indeed. But think about how much time you have spent speculating about your deity. Don't think you're special because you have piggy-backed on other's theories passed down for a few millennium. The Israelite's concept of Yahweh is not much different than the concept of Ahura Mazda as conceived by the ancient Iranians. Is Christianity special because it has lasted so long and has so many followers? No, for this can also be claimed by other religions.

So we are left with this gap in their argument. Yes, we could be designed. But I think you should stop there. Everything else you can imagine about this designer or designers is speculation. It may be fun to speculate, but things can get ugly if you start assuming too much. If you're not careful, you may end up using your concepts to control other people and even worse begin speaking on the designer's behalf or writing in his name.

Mind shift

This post is about the fantastic shift I have experienced in my thinking as a result of changing my worldview. Things that used to be meaningless now have meaning and vice verse. For example, I used to think that space exploration was a huge waste of time and taxpayer money and now I think it is very important. As a Christian there is no point in exploring other planets because Jesus is going to return to this one, so we should just stay put. Even recycling was somewhat pointless. Why should Christians take care of the planet when God has plans to destroy it and make a "New Heaven and New Earth"? This all changed with my new worldview and I have had to re-think everything.

I was pretty much raised in a Christian incubator. I was home-schooled from Kindergarten through 12th grade and went to church every Sunday. I was never taught evolution. All of my text books were A Beka books from Pensacola Christian College. I was a descendant of Adam, the first man, who lived around 6,000 years ago. I was indoctrinated with Christian Facts that cannot be questioned: The Bible is God's Word, I was born a sinner and Jesus died on the cross to save me from sin and hell. I say all this so you can see how steeped I was in my first worldview.

Now imagine how radically that has all changed. I've already discussed some of the realizations that led me here along with some reasons for my deconversion. This ultimately leads to my mind shift and having to come to grips with this new reality. The reality is that not a single person on this planet knows with certainty why we're here and how we got here. We may all have our own opinions, but that's all they are, opinions. All we can do is examine the evidence available to us and make an educated guess. This is why I've embraced science rather than religion to understand our universe. Science says, "I don't know, but let's work towards figuring it out using what's available to us." Religion says, "I've got it all figured out, just put your trust in me." When a new discovery comes along that challenges our accepted viewpoints science and religion show their true colors. Science says, "I have to change my views because of this new evidence." Religion says, "The evidence is wrong, keep trusting in me." Now which of these seems like a more honest approach?

Since we don't know how we got here (evolved, created or something in-between) what should we do now? If we are created then whoever created us might expect something of us or might not. Since we don't know I think it's best to listen to our own reasoning. My reason tells me that smoking tobacco or doing drugs will destroy my organs so I don't do those things. I love my wife and my family so I am fully dedicated to them and their welfare. I will never kill another person because I have a high regard for life and liberty. If we have evolved through natural processes that doesn't change anything I just wrote. Either way we are very fortunate to experience life and should do our best to ensure that future generations can experience it as well. Things like world peace, equality, sustainability, and fighting hunger and disease are all fantastic goals and should be sought after. This sums up my agnostic viewpoint and I am glad that my mind has shifted to this new way of thinking.

Far-fetched claims

Christians need to ask themselves why they accept some far-fetched claims and not others. What yard-stick do they use when arriving at conclusions and how do they know that it's reliable? I think we like to assume that our beliefs are based on sound evidence and reasons, but is that really the case? Do we consider what other influences may be steering our beliefs? For example, what have we been taught by our parents? How has our culture influenced our beliefs? What do the people that are closest to us believe in? What about our personal desires? When you start to realize how much all of these factors influence your decisions and beliefs it can be a real eye-opener. I've even wondered if it's actually possible to make a truly objective decision without all of these factors weighing in.

Since we are usually very biased when considering whether we should believe something or not how do we overcome this? I think we should constantly ask ourselves what is motivating us to believe. Is it one of the factors I mentioned above or is it because there is sufficient evidence to believe? Do you believe the earth is a sphere? Yes, because there is sufficient evidence. It was hard for men to believe at first when it seemed the earth was flat, but eventually the evidence piled high. I think it was good for men to be skeptical at first, but once the evidence is sufficient then it is time to have a change of mind. I think being skeptical of any outrageous claim comes quite naturally to us, but the hard part is being consistent. If someone told you that a UFO landed in their backyard you would be very skeptical. If your neighbor told you that they had a vision from an angel you would also be skeptical. How come Christians are not skeptical when this same claim of an angel visitation is made in the Bible? I think it's because Christians put the Bible in a special category within their minds and they will believe what it says no matter what. However, if you are going to be consistent you should be just as skeptical of claims in the Bible as you are of claims from any other source. But what are Christians repeatedly told? Keep reading the Bible, don't question it's authority and any doubts you may have are directly from Satan.

Now, if you're ready to take an objective look at some far-fetched claims from the Bible continue reading. Christians, please be honest with yourselves and ask yourself if you really think these claims are true. I am going to word them a little differently then you would hear them in church because I think this helps us look at them differently.

According to the Bible...

• A man named Ezekial was sitting by the river one day and had a vision of God / Yahweh. God had the appearance of a man sitting on a throne wrapped in fiery clothes and surrounded by a rainbow glow. His throne sits on an expanse that is moved around with four wheels and four creatures that each have four wings and four faces (Ezekiel 1).
• There was once a time when the sons of God / Elohim would come down and impregnate humans which caused a race of people called the Nephilim who were giants (Genesis 6). The book of Enoch actually names some of these angels who came down and married the daughters of men, but Enoch is not in the canon (even though the book of Jude quotes from it).
• A man named Moses spoke with God and sent ten awful plagues on the Egyptians because the Egyptian pharaoh refused to release them from slavery. Somehow the Egyptians forgot to record any of these events in their records, probably from embarrassment. Somehow all of these plagues only affected the Egyptians, but not the Israelite people, even the plague of darkness which made it pitch black everywhere except in the Israelite homes. Maybe they had lamps, but no one else did? The darkness was so thick that none of the Egyptians moved for three days (Exodus 10).
• A talking snake tricked the first woman and in turn her husband into eating a magical fruit that would give them knowledge of good and evil. For this sin they were exiled from the garden of Eden whose entrance is guarded by a flaming sword to prevent anyone from eating from the tree of life (Genesis 3).
• A man named John was on an island and received a vision of events that will happen in the future. Great wars will be fought on horseback. Angels will use a sickle to "reap" mankind like grapes and fill up a huge wine-press with blood. Other angels will turn all of the rivers and oceans to blood and great hailstones one hundred pounds each will fall from the sky (Revelation 16).
• A woman named Mary was artificially inseminated from God to give birth to a son named Jesus who later traveled around Galilee doing miracles. Once he sent a legion of demons out from a man and into a herd of 2,000 swine who all dove off a cliff and drowned in the sea (Mark 5). When Jesus was later crucified the earth became dark and there was a huge earthquake and many tombs around Jerusalem were opened and the dead were raised and walked into the city (Matthew 27).
• A man named Noah built a huge boat at Yahweh's request and used it to escape a flood that somehow covered the entire earth up past the mountain peaks. The boat held Noah's family and every species of land animal and also enough food to keep everyone fed for a year, even the carnivores (Genesis 7).
• Prior to creating everything God's Spirit / Elohim used to hover around over the water (Genesis 1).
• One day some children were teasing the prophet Elisha calling him "bald-head". Elisha cursed them in the name of Yahweh and two she-bears came along and tore up forty-two kids (2 Kings 2).
• A man named Korah felt that he should be allowed to be a priest like Aaron and his sons were. This was a bad idea and he ended up being sucked into the earth along with the rest of his family. Another 250 men that had agreed with Korah were burned alive with fire from the sky (Numbers 16).
• Noticing that men were building a huge tower up to heaven, God was concerned that mankind would work together and become unstoppable. So he went down to them and programmed their brains to speak in different languages which caused them to disband (Genesis 11). 

Now if someone told you a story like these in modern times you would probably think they were crazy. What would you say to me if I told you that a glowing blueberry bush in my backyard talked to me last night? I stopped believing stuff like this because it is just plain dishonest. If you won't stop and question your beliefs will you at least stop forcing them on other people? And if you do believe these stories then to be consistent you should also believe in many other ancient folk stories as well.

One year later

Today marks one year since I left Christianity. It's always amazing how quickly a year goes by isn't it? I was hoping that by this time I would have done enough research such that I would be able to make a firm decision to either be an Atheist, a Liberal Christian or a Deist. This is not the case. I still have a lot of research to do. I've decided to call myself Agnostic for the time being. I consider Agnostic the default position for someone not making a positive or negative claim for the existence of a god. I may very well remain Agnostic for a long period of time because it really strikes me as the most honest position anyone can take. Do I know how we all got here? Nope. So the honest thing to say is "I don't know". I don't know if there is a God. The existence of a super, all-knowing intelligence seems unlikely, but then, the existence of space, matter and life arriving by pure chance also seems unlikely. It is quite a puzzle we all are left with.

I am currently reading "Why I became an Atheist" by J. Loftus and "Reasonable Faith" by W. Craig. Also, while commuting to and from work, I am listening to an audio reading of "The Grand Design" by Hawking and Mlodinow. All of these give me plenty of things to think about. Sometimes it feels like a curse to have to worry about things that most people hardly give much thought to. For those of you who are like me and wrestle with the big questions a lot, I have a challenge for you and for myself. Let's not forget to make the most of the time we have with the ones we love most. And don't forget to enjoy life as puzzling as it may be.

Deconversion Realizations

I haven't posted in a while. Life gets busy and I think my deconversion from Evangelical Christianity will slowly become less and less important to me which means I'll blog less and less. I'd like to write down some of the realizations that I had both prior to and during my deconversion from Christianity. I have a feeling that some day I'll want to come back and read through these blog posts to recall some of these things (I have a poor memory, just ask my wife). Some of these realizations are things that nagged me in the back of my mind for quite some time with which I finally confronted myself and some are things that I discovered upon doing research. These are going to be a bit of a ramble because my intention is to preserve my thoughts; not to create something that is organized and easy to read (kind of fits the name of my blog too).

Let's start with the realization that kick-started my deconversion process. There is not a single, good reason for calling the Bible "God's Word". Even though I was indoctrinated from infancy on up through high school that the Bible was inspired by God I was never given a good reason for it. Many religions want to claim that they have scriptures that were sent down from heaven. The only way to know if they are or not is to examine them critically. If you study how the Bible was formed you'll see that it was put together over a long period of time and that several books were added or removed at different times. The New Testament epistles started out as regular letters, then they got passed around, and then as time goes on they were regarded as sacred. Centuries after they are written the orthodox church selects a canon of books which would eventually be known as the Bible. It was the same for the Old Testament. The Old Testament canon was made centuries after the books were actually written. Rather than having divine instructions to create the Bible, it all happens rather haphazardly for various reasons. Even today there are still different versions of the canon because some books (the apocrypha) could not be agreed upon. Why couldn't they agree? Because God was not telling them what to do. Men have done this all on their own (and it's been done many other times in other cultures / religions). We are left with an "orthodox" canon because the minority "un-orthodox" groups (such as the Gnostics or Ebionites) were wiped out and only some of their writings have survived. We are left with a book that contains supposed scientific insights (read and decide for yourself), but also contains scientific errors (which, conveniently, we should read as non-literal). To this day we don't know who some of the books authors are and there is also continuous debate on whether some books are written by who they say they are. We are left with an assortment of various writings which should not be called a Bible, but should be called a collection of religious texts.

Another realization I had was that Christianity has no more claims to evidence than other religions do. When I was a Christian I assumed that Christianity was profoundly superior to other religions. Reading through apologetic material by Muslims, I found that they make claims about the Koran that are just like what Christians claim about the Bible. They claim it contains prophecy and scientific facts. They even have a consistent author. Muslims, like Christians, can also claim to have explosive growth and vast numbers of followers. And Muslims don't have the problem of trying to explain something illogical like a three-in-one god. Even Judaism makes more logical sense than Christianity. What about the prophetic claims of Christianity? They may seem like pretty good evidence if you are a Christian, but what happens when you examine them critically? Again, you should read and decide for yourself. To me the prophecies are just not clear enough. They seem like they are taken and used out of context. Another toted evidence for Christianity involves life transformation which I wrote about in a previous post and this is also mirrored in other religions. I don't think it's asking too much to see some concrete proof that is superior to what any other religion has to offer. I have not seen this in Christianity.

I also realized that I did not have any good reasons to believe in Christianity. I think that someone should only believe in something if they think there is a good probability that it is true. So I'll just list a bunch of reasons that don't meet this criteria and, yes, I used to hold on to some of these reasons.

• Believing because everyone else does
• Believing because it makes you feel good
• Believing because you trust in the authority of other people
• Believing because you want to live forever
• Believing because that's how you were raised
• Believing because you're afraid of going to hell
• Believing because you're afraid of social rejection
• Believing because you're unwilling to think about other perspectives
• Believing because a large number of other people believe

Now you can believe for these reasons if you want to, but personally I don't find them very good reasons. And when I say believe in Christianity, I'm not talking about believing in a God that created you (Deism), I'm talking about believing the Bible is God's Word, believing in Jesus as a man-God, believing in human sacrifice for the atonement of sin, believing in the trinity, miracles, demons, angels, etc. the whole Christian package. Now it might seem pretty harmless to believe these things, but add to it the fact that Christians believe most of the people on the planet burn for eternity in hell and it suddenly is no longer a harmless belief. Add to it the fact that Christians need to "give up their life" for Christ and proselytize more and more followers using any means necessary and now you have some reasons to make you stop and think.

This next realization took some research. I realized that what I thought were good reasons for being a Christian were not backed up by solid evidence. These include:

• Believing because the disciples were martyred for what they believed in
• Believing because there is overwhelming evidence for the resurrection of Jesus
• Believing because God speaks to people through the Holy Spirit
• Believing because God answers prayers
• Believing because of miracles

I used to think that the first two were a given, but I found that was not the case. Obviously it is hard to imagine someone dying for something they knew was a lie. From all I've read so far here is my understanding: No one knows how any of the disciples died and whether or not they died for their faith. There are three disciples who have traditions of martyrdom one of those being Peter who is said to have been crucified up-side-down. We do know that the Jews did not like the Christians because Paul (Saul) was one of them. I've read that Roman Emperor Nero needed a scapegoat for the Roman fires in AD 64 because he was in danger of being blamed for them. He chose to place the blame on the Christians because no one liked them and they were an isolated group. This gives a natural account for a widespread phase of Christian persecution in the 60s. I don't think Christianity is an outright lie. I think it evolved naturally with natural human tendencies. I think the earliest Christians were the Ebionites and were an offshoot from the Essenes. They were followers of Jesus (a Rabbi) in Galilee and they believed that the apocalypse was close at hand. They believed that a new Kingdom of God would be established within their lifetimes. This led to them living like socialists selling and sharing what they owned since the world would soon end. I think the Jewish authorities (big-wigs) did not like this one bit because they wanted to be in control of all religious movements including the movement of money to the temple. Jesus was probably crucified for inciting a riot when he did the temple clearing (or any other reason involved with being a zealous religious leader) and his closest followers hid themselves, Peter being one of them. The disciples were so distraught over the death of their friend Jesus that they became very likely candidates for having a vision. This is a scientifically documented occurrence called an After Death Communication (ADC) and is more common than I realized. Rather than actually seeing Jesus physically they saw him in a dream or vision and he told them to preach the good news of the kingdom. So in this theory they are not spreading a lie they are sincere believers with a sincere cause. This also explains why the earliest writings we have (Paul's letters) do not mention any physical appearances or an empty tomb story. I think Jesus was buried in a common grave like all the other men whom the Romans crucified. These earliest followers spread the original teachings of Jesus which are now lost to us (possibly the Gospel of the Hebrews). Along comes a zealous Saul of Tarsus who has both a Jewish and Hellenistic background and persecutes the Christians because he was a devout Pharisee. At some point he comes to his senses and has a "brainstorm". I believe that Paul is the real founder of the Christian religion. What he knows about Jesus is from the people he was killing. Jesus was the messiah and was crucified by the Roman / Jewish authorities. Paul invents the idea of Christ being the final atonement for our sins and putting an end to animal sacrifice. Since Paul was from Tarsus he may have been influenced by any number of Hellenistic / pagan beliefs. Paul claims in his letter to the Galations that what he preached he received by divine revelation and had a three year ministry before going to Jerusalem and meeting with Peter (See Galations 1). I think that the followers of Jesus of Nazareth and Paul were all dead by the time the gospels were written. The first one written is Mark and I think it was shortly after the fall of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. There are a lot of theories about where Mark got his information, but it's important to note that whoever wrote Mark did not give his name (this goes for all the gospels). My theory is that Mark is written by a Greek writing Gentile convert and is a mixture of religious propaganda and story telling mixed together with verbal narratives passed down through the decades. Another important thing to note about Mark is that the ending was added at a later date, a fact which you will see mentioned in any copy of the New Testament. About ten years later someone wrote Matthew, which, if he was a first-hand witness, would not have borrowed so much of his story from Mark. Most people realize that there are plenty of discrepancies between the four gospel accounts. Some Christians say that this makes it more realistic as if the eyewitnesses writing the gospels are relaying the facts according to their own recollections. The problem with this idea is that the gospels are not written as if they are an eyewitness account. They are written like stories and there are many instances that could not have been witnessed by the disciples (To name a few: Herod's meeting with the magi, Pilate speaking with Jesus, Satan tempting Jesus, Jesus praying alone, Jesus with the Samaritan woman, the angels and the shepherds, Judas and the chief priests, etc.). One way Christians can answer this problem is by simply claiming that the Holy Spirit told the writers about all of these private events. But once you are committed to the inspiration claim then you have the problem of the discrepancies, and around it goes. In summary, the gospels appear to me to be embellished stores written decades after Jesus died. I do think Jesus was a good teacher and that some of his sayings remain within the gospels, but I think Paul and later Gentile converts put a different spin on it. I don't think the original Jewish followers of Jesus would have approved the new testament. *Disclaimer* The above theory is just a lay-mans attempt at piecing something together, I expect it has some problems since I am not a scholar by any means. In the end it all comes down to possibilities and opinions. The point I'm making is that the evidence I thought was sound turned out to be very poor.

What about the Holy Spirit, answered prayers and miracles? These would be supernatural reasons for being a Christian and although I've never experienced them I won't say that no one else has. If you have truly experienced one of these supernatural events then I will submit that you have a good reason to be a Christian. For me, I cannot accept third-hand accounts - I need to experience them myself to believe in them. It is well-known that humans are prone to exaggerate and make things up. Telling me about a miracle that happened and was told to you by someone who had it told to them by someone who heard it from an eyewitness who was there does not impress me at all. While deconverting it did not take me long to realize that I had no idea if there was a Holy Spirit inside of me or not. There is no way for me to distinguish between my own thoughts and those of another. It could all very well be my own thoughts. Believing that another mind is feeding thoughts into my mind is not something that I would have thought of on my own.

Answered prayer and a miracle could probably be in the same category. I've never seen a miracle. That does not mean they don't happen, I've just never seen one. Basically it would be something that has never occurred before and defies a natural law, such as gravity or death. I find it interesting that stories of miracles were so prevalent in ancient times and have become more scarce in modern times. How can we be expected to trust ancient miracle accounts when people used to be so superstitious and gullible? (Actually even in modern times people report and believe ridiculous things.) Most of the ex-Christians I've come across have admitted that if they witnessed a genuine miracle they would have to re-think their positions and I would do the same.

Let's squeeze one more realization into this post. It took me a while to grasp this one. Faith is not a good character trait to strive for. Just so we're clear I'm talking about the kind of faith that expects us to believe something against the odds. Let's say I told you that aliens had spoken to me and told me that the earth would be obliterated in three days if we did not all wear green hats. Would you believe me? Would you have faith? I hope not. If something sounds like a tall tale it probably is. I think the writers of the Bible included a lot of tall tales in their writings. Asking me to accept them on faith as if faith were some kind of virtue is preposterous. If faith is a virtue then why not believe in all kinds of things? Why not believe that the angel Gabriel revealed God's will to Muhammad? You must have faith! Why not believe that Joseph Smith discovered God's will? You might as well have faith in Santa while you're at it. I think that reason (using our brains) trumps faith all day long. If you are committed to finding truth one of the best tools you can use is being skeptical. Ask hard questions and weigh the evidence. Remember, it was men that told you faith was important, not a divine being.

To read some of the reasons for why I am no longer a Christian, click here.