Since I haven't much else to do these days, it being summer and all, I shall take a few minutes to answer your points - briefly. Thus I shall not quote you nor re-quote myself at length, merely address the points.

1) If we accept the Bible as more than bunk, astronomy & math etc must lie, because they are mutually excluding. Modern astronomy can not co-exist with the Christian version of the creation of the solar system. QED

2) The gospels are written long after Jesus' death and CLAIM to be eye-witness accounts. Any biblical scholar will be able to tell you that the present 4 gospels were put together over a period of time (indeed the collection of books we call "Bible" was not introduced until the 4th century) and some gospels contain passages that are commonly regarded as later additions written by unknown authors. We know very little about even the four named authors, hence "unknown" and "obscure" are correct terms. QED.

3) In order to accept miracles one must disregard the laws of science, since these miracles by their very nature break said laws - as you point out, it is what makes them miracles. And this was my exact point - not to disprove miracles - nothing, including the existence or non-existence of God can conclusively be disproved by Aristotelan logic, since there can be construed a "what if" theory for anything. I merely pointed out that in Christianity one must accept that known laws of nature are not unbreakable, and one must accept this on the word of a book written in a time of superstition and total ignorance of said laws. My knowledge of nature, based on actual observations and experiences tell me what the laws are - I am not presupposing, merely observing. YOU are the one making presuppositions since you prefer to accept the words of the Bible, which are not backed up by anything other than personal faith - a faith that does not prove anything, seeing as all religions have their different "miracles", and they can not all be true, since they would then cancel each other out. Example: You have lots of "miracles" in the Bible which you believe in, much as a Muslim or a Hindu would have their own, different miracles. Your Bible has as little evidence to back up its claims as have the Muslim Quoran and the Hindu Veda scriptures. They can not all be true, so why should I consider personal faith in any of them as a proof of their truth? The answer is that in lack of hard evidence that these things - be they Christian, Muslim or Hindu miracles - actually occurred, I cannot, as an intelligent being accept any of them.

4) You make no attempt to provide an alternative view of the Trinity, so it's a little bit difficult to elaborate on this point. Let me just remind you that the Trinity is one of the reasons why Jews and Muslims view Christianity as heretic - it is polytheistic to them.

5) I stand by my version regarding sin & redemption. The notion that an almighty creator's only way of finding it possible to forgive people is by having them nail up his son is so laughable as to be blasphemous, were there to really be such a creator. The world's Jews and Muslims, interestingly enough, agree with me on this particular issue.

6) I shall readily admit to my deficiencies in a number of areas. However, I know an absurdity when I see one.

7) The old argument that it is people and not the doctrine that causes suffering is of course false. Two examples: Nazism and communism would still be inherently evil, regardless of how nice their followers might have been. This because the contents are fundamentally flawed. As for the teachings of Jesus, he explicitly condones the persecution of non-believers, by sending them to hell (Matthew 13, 40-42). Furthermore, by his words in Matthew 5, 17-20 he effectively contradicts many of his other teachings and repeats the validity of the Mosaic law. As you should know, the Mosaic law, among other things proscribes the death penalty for adultery, sex during menstruation and for being raped without screaming for help. I could go on and on, but I have already proven that Jesus in his own words supports barbaric murders. That should be sufficient. Furthermore, you should know that in addition to the often contradictory ramblings of Jesus, the Christian religion also leans upon the words of for example Paul. Paul says that the slave shall be obedient to his master, that men are the "heads of women" and he says that women who cut their hair are sinful. Break any of these orders, and you break with Christianity. The main problem with this discussion is how little you and most Christians really know about Christianity.

8) It is interesting that you should point out that some people - hypocrites - claim to be following a set of rules - say Christianity - then contradicting them. May I, for example, ask you how many coats & shirts you have given to beggars lately? How many divorced people have you informed that they are going to hell? Do you give any time someone asks? Do you refrain from asking to get something back if it is taken - indeed if you were not to, how does the concept of theft even arise in a Christian context? Have you sold what you own and given it to the poor? Of course not. You are too smart. Sadly, you're also a hypocrite.

9) Man created in God's image - it does not really matter much how you interpret it - literally or (more conveniently to a Christian) metaphorically. They were running around naked, and since they had not yet eaten of the fruit of knowledge, they did not know wrong from right. Furthermore, if God created man's conscience in his image, that tells us that whatever man's conscience allows him to do, including evil is compatible with the conscience of God. I guess this is proven by the Bible since the God described there is every bit as mean spirited as any Nazi I ever met.

10) Your little piece on death is revealing. Christianity IS death-seeking and anti-life. It does glorify death. But if it was OK for God to be so nice to the little innocent children as to take them straight up to heaven without having to "toil like the rest of us", then I suppose it was really nice of that man in Germany, Adolf Hitler, to kill all those children too? He shouldn't be vilified for THAT little act of charity, should he? Or maybe they didn't go to heaven, cause they were Jewish and had not yet had a chance to be converted by the likes of you? Something to ponder, eh? Your rationale for defending your God is actually a blank excuse for any and every murder ever committed on innocent people. It is sickening and oh how Christian.

11) Your paragraph on the God of the Old testament and the God that went to Hell doesn't really make sense. But I understand that you are proud of the God that murders infants and puts plague on people. Way to go. As for me going to hell, there really wasn't any need for any God or Son of God to die to prevent that. All God had to do was not to invent that particular punishment in the first place. See how simple it is when you're rational?

12) Coming with sword & splitting families: Matthew 10, 34-35. You really SHOULD read the Bible more often, you know? The point on honest merchants was related to his throwing out merchants from the temple courtyard. Their only crime was to compete for attention, I suppose. But better feed the fears of the people than their physical needs, eh?

13) You try to get around the whole concept of eternal damnation. However, you can't get around this: The Bible, (including Jesus personally) states very clearly that if you do not enter into this "personal relationship" you're toast. Literally. You may think this to be very tolerant and nice. I call it a very explicit threat and use of force. You worship or you burn. Anyone giving you such an option is a monster. Again, should there be a conscious creator of this universe, I would regard it as blasphemous to think that he would condemn people to eternal fire for failing to believe in him.

14) As for Jesus contradicting the things I say - sure. You can find Jesus contradicting himself and the God of the Old testament and the God of the letters of Paul, the God of Rush Limbaugh and the God of Joe Sixpack. This merely tells me that the teachings are incoherent, confused and very poorly phrased. Not what you'd expect from an omnipotent God, considering that your eternal blessing or damnation might hinge on guessing the correct interpretation.

15) I wholeheartedly agree with you. People should really understand the Bible, understand it really well. It would be the best way to bury that particular religion swiftly and surely. Also, I have no argument with your conclusion that the Christian mind is not of the 20th century.

16) Lastly, I should point out that there is hardly an industrialized country more Christian than the United States. Your problems, as those of all nations, are created by man and will be solved by man. It will most decidedly NOT be solved by a religion that preaches that poverty is blessed and that when something is taken from you, you should not ask to have it back, or whose reply to the killings of innocents is "oh shush, they're just going up to God anyway".

Your letter and this response to it will naturally be posted on my internet site as soon as I am sufficiently bored to equip the texts with the necessary HTML code.

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