I've had three conversations in the last three or four days with people who would claim varying degrees of spirituality, but who reject Christianity.
The first conversation was with a girl whose main problems with Christianity are seeming contradictions, some within scripture itself and some with other fields of thought, mostly related to science.
The second conversation was with a girl who could not come to terms with education and Christianity. She believes that the more educated you become, the less you are able to rationally believe Christian theology. She argued that faith is the antithesis of education.
The third conversation was with an older man who came in to where I work for some coffee. He was buying a book called "I Ching," about eastern spirituality. He told me that he rejected orthodox Christianity, and gave me reasons ranging from hypocrisy to inconsistencies from within and outside the text.
Here is a break down of each of the individual arguments:
1.-The creation account in Genesis conflicts with modern scientific understanding of the world
2.-There are contradictions within scripture
3.-Christianity is not compatible with an educated understanding of the world
4.-Many within the church, especially preachers, are hypocrites
5.-History shows contradictions within scripture, such as Josephus not reporting the mass murder of babies that the Gospels claim that Herod ordered
6.-Many of the so-called miracles within scripture could actually be associated with Satan himself, parading as an angel of light
7.-Jesus was not the Son of God, simply a good teacher who at times had his own share of doubts ("Father, why have you forsaken me")
Three people, from three totally different walks of life and stations in life, and yet all but two of their arguments can be split into two basic categories: contradictions and mistakes within scripture and the relation of Christianity and science. Only arguments 4 and 6 would not fit here. But the important thing is that I believe that a correct understanding of scripture can answer every one of these arguments. That's why I'm going to really try to deepen my grasp of what scripture is over the next few weeks.
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7 comments:
Good Stuff Chet - Please share as you learn - perhaps addressing these 'Issues' with what you find through study. As I read your list it sounds like you spoke to my brother.
what steps are you going to take in order to do this?
Thanks for the encouragement matt. I'm definitely going to be concentrating on this area of thought for the next however long until i feel satisfied (haha, a relative term).
Fil, i've been thinking a whole lot about it and writing down some thoughts that I hope to organize a little better in the next couple of days. But i sort of wonder if the inerrancy lens of scripture alters our reading and potential meaning, so I'm thinking a lot about that right now. I'll flesh that out more for what it means to me in the next couple of days.
Look forward to it man!
Since we are in discussion mode - a friend of mine sent me to this blog - kinda interesting thoughts... Beware the title:
http://poserorprophet.livejournal.com/130382.html
Thoughts?
chet...i don't know if this will help at all, but i've been digesting Bruce Felier's "walking the bible" and have appreciated the options presented about inspiration and inerrancy from an ancient and current jewish perspective...enlightening to say the least (the thought i love most from it is it's emphasis on using the bible for what it was always meant to be used for...enlightenment, as opposed to textbook)
matt, i agree with him to some extent, even though i think he might have overextended some of those definitions a bit (i'm thinking mainly of his version of paul's word).
eric, it's funny because i've picked that book up twice, only to get bogged down in the details and put it down. maybe i'll give it another shot. i'm going to try to spend several hours in the library next week tracing down some history of 'plain readings of the text' if i can.
I would agree with you on his loose interpretation of Paul's word - that must be in the yet to be released "Message 3.0"
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