We're
celebrating the 12 days of Solstice rather than the 12 days of
Christmas. I'm done writing and editing books. So I'm highlighting each
of my twelve books leading up to the 25th of the month when we party. I'll tell
you something about each of them you probably don't know. [See Tag Below]
I envisioned my first anthology The Christian Delusion to be an extension of my first book, Why I Became an Atheist. I thought it would be great to get experts to write on topics I addressed in my book, which I considered essential background reading. All the themes in it expand on issues raised in my book. I personally think The Christian Delusion delivers a powerful blow to conservative Christianity, especially when combined with its predecessor.
Dawkins: I decided to name the book The Christian Delusion after Dawkins' extremely popular bestseller The God Delusion. If his focus was on God, mine was to be focused on the Christian God. I also thought it might get his attention. It didn't. In fact, none of the bestselling atheist writers--the so-called New Atheists--publicly acknowledged my books.
Christians celebrate Christmas in Mexico not just one day, but twelve days! The 12 days start on December 25th and end with a party on January 5th. Perhaps they adopted the number 12 from the the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas"? The message of that song is overtly Christian in every way. Is there a secular counterpart? Please say there is. There should be.
How about celebrating the 12 days of Solstice rather than the 12 days of Christmas? I'm done writing and editing books. So I'll be highlighting each
of my twelve books leading up to the 25th of the month when we party.Your place or mine? I'll tell
you something about each of them you probably don't know. [See Tag Below]
When I first started teaching philosophy classes in 1985 for the College of Lake County, in Grayslake, Illinois, I lost about half my class because the students could not understand me. Yep, that's right. Being in a Ph.D. program at Marquette University, after earning three masters degrees, I didn't know how to bring the information down to college students. I
thought my teaching career was over before it began. Luckily the chair
of the philosophy department told me this happens more often than not for first time
philosophy instructors. Over time I became an expert teacher, bringing highly complex ideas down to first year students.
I eventually learned how to communicate to the average educated person in the pew! My goal is to keep it as simple as possible without being simplistic. The problem with this goal is that there are some elitist readers who think I'm ignorant, for if I was smarter and better educated it would reflect in my vocabulary. Smart, highly educated people, it's assumed, use the nomenclature requisite with their educational achievements.
The
evidential problem of horrendous suffering is one of the most powerful refutations of the
theistic god as can be found: If there’s a theistic omni-everything god, who is
omnibenelovent (or perfectly good), omniscient (or all-knowing), and omnipotent (or all-powerful), the issue
of why there is horrendous suffering in the world requires an explanation. The
reason is that a perfectly good god would want to eliminate it, an all-knowing god
would know how to eliminate it, and an all-powerful god would be able to eliminate
it. So the extent of horrendous suffering means that either god does not care
enough to eliminate it, or god is not smart enough to to eliminate it,
or god is not powerful enough to eliminate it. The stubborn fact of horrendous
suffering means something is wrong with god’s goodness, his knowledge, or his
ability.
There are topics that aren’t mentioned from the pulpit or in Sunday School. One example: how can—how should—faith claims be tested? How is valid knowledge acquired? Epistemology is not a word commonly used by the laity, but the concept is crucial. “Take it on faith”—take our word for it, is stressed by clergy, based on centuries of tradition. But that is avoidance of epistemology, i.e., arriving at sound methodology to find out what is actually true. Folks are trained not to be curious or skeptical.
There are a lot of excellent speakers on this important subject of suffering. I'll be speaking for this virtual eConference, as will a few authors in my anthology "God and Horrendous Suffering", including Darren Slade, David Kyle Johnson, Taner Edis, Mark Gura, David Eller, and Dale O'Neal. I'll be introducing and discussing the problem of horrendous suffering from my book. Come for a discounted price of only $10. Just use the code #Atheism at checkout! LINK.
Unbelievable! This year Margaret Downey will be adding all twelve of my books to the Tree of Knowledge, co-hosted with Phil Zuckerman! Come join the live Zoom meeting this Sunday, December 5th, at 2:45 PM EST, which starts out with a concert for 25 minutes. This year's performer is (award winning) Gary Stockdale. Afterward she will hang this year's books on the tree and then interview the authors. This is exciting! You can watch last year's event right here.
I'm pretty sure this review of my book The Case against Miracles got their attention:
In 2008, John W. Loftus launched what would become a definitive series of anti-apologetic works. The Case against Miracles is the capstone volume of this astonishing output, and it's an impressive achievement. Any thoughtful Christian whose conviction rests on the evidence of miracles who reads this book with an open mind will be hard pressed not to abandon--or at least profoundly rethink--his or her beliefs. Of course, true believers seldom approach works critical of their faiths with an open mind, which is why The Case against Miracles will probably be of greater value to secular students of religion and especially to those drawn to the challenges of anti-apologetics. --Tom Flynn, Senior Editor of Free Inquiry magazine.
It’s no longer out-of-bounds to wonder if Jesus existed
In his book, Outgrowing Religion, John Compere wrote: “The myth of Paul Bunyan makes a good story, as does the story of Jesus. But neither tale withstands critical scrutiny or gives us a clue about the meaning of life. For that, we have brains.” It can be noted, by the way, that legions of New Testament scholars have applied plenty of brainpower to analysis of the four gospels—and they know very well that these stories do not withstand critical scrutiny. Of course, to defend the faith at all costs, evangelical scholars hold out against this conclusion. But Jesus studies have been in turmoil for decades because scholars have not succeeded in identifying which parts of the gospels actually qualify as history. No agreed-upon methodology for that has been discovered.
Hypatia Press is currently sending out defective books, ones that did not include a section describing the authors. They have been informed of their mistake and are correcting it. So here is that missing section below:
"The most pressing challenge to belief in God today is undoubtedly the problem of pain. One only needs to read the provocative array of essays in this volume of leading atheists and other non-theists to see why this is such an ongoing problem for those of us who believe that God is real. Whatever one’s beliefs or worldview, and whether one agrees or disagrees, I commend all seekers of truth to read and reflect on this significant work that John Loftus has so skillfully edited. -- Dr. Chad Meister, Professor of Philosophy at Bethel University and co-editor of The Cambridge Companion to the Problem of Evil.
Only a few items survive in the dusty archives! That is, the paper trail from my eleven years of graduate work is meagre. Boston University School of Theology was my academic home, 1964-1975. There is, of course, my 250-page doctoral dissertation (typed on my manual typewriter), but I saved few of my other papers. One that I cherish the most is a 17-page essay titled, The Secrecy Motif in Mark’s Gospel, which received an “A”—and a glowing comment from the professor: “This represents a lot of careful work and thought, and I have learned much from it. An excellent paper.” What a nice boost for 24-year old me!
“You shine with radiant light, in this circle of earthly existence. You shine so finely, it surpasses understanding. God hugs you. You are encircled by the arms of the mystery of God.” St. Hildegard of Birgen, 1098-1179
“If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better you to enter life maimed or lame than to have two hands or feet and be thrown into the eternal fire.”
Jesus, Matthew 18:8
“Religion is all bunk.” Thomas Edison
The New York Times, 17 September 1994, in its Religious Notes column by David Gonzales, reported on the preparations for a college debate that would soon take place between a Hunter College team, and one from England touring the U.S. at the time. The topic: Is the world better off with religion?
I couldn’t resist saving the clipping, because I’m always on the lookout for examples of bad theology innocently stated. Mr. Gonzales introduced his readers to one of the debaters, 28-year old Daniel Mallon Durante, who was preparing to make the case that the world is better with religion. But the young Durante had been a “self-styled rebel, who went from school to pool hall and on to jobs as locksmith, plumber and printer before enrolling in college.” He had returned to his Brooklyn parish to find God, under the tutelage of Father James Zona. The rebel had been tamed: “Talking and praying with him, Father Zona helped him develop a deep and personal faith…”
Our 408 page paperback book, "Varieties of Jesus Mythicism", is now available for order on Amazon, and other online stores! Order it and spread the good news about Jesus at this holiday season!
You can order my anthology on god & horrendous suffering now! It's not available on any other site that I know other than from the publisher! Click on the link, then on the Preview, to get the pdf. There you'll read the Abstract, Advanced Endorsements, Table of Contents, Foreword by Dr, Stephen Law, the 5th chapter on Childhood Torture by Dr. Darren Slade, andAbout the Contributors. It's coming out as a hardback book. Get it!
“Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me, I once was lost, but now I'm found, was blind, but now I see…” These words were written by Anglican clergyman John Newton in 1772. About the same time these words were also written: “There is balm in Gilead, to make the wounded whole; there's power enough in heaven, to cure a sin-sick soul.” To be saved and cured: one of the most common claims about religion is that it brings comfort. Atheists are sometimes accused of insensitivity: why are we trying to destroy this source of comfort? People count on their religion to get them through the day, but they’ve been prompted in this hope by bad theology: The church has pushed the idea that, in our natural state, we are wretched and sin-sick.
I hadn't shared these pics before. I've already shared my transcripts. People wonder why I've gained the respect of many people both believers and non-believers. I attribute it to my education under Drs. James D. Strauss and William Lane Craig both of whom I majored under, along with my passion for truth.
The Fallibility of First Principles, by Gunther Laird (gunther.laird@gmail.com)
The late Norman Geisler was one of the most popular
proponents of Evangelical Christianity, wedding Calvinistic argumentation with
technical concepts drawn from the Catholic philosopher Thomas Aquinas.[1]
His son David Geisler continues his work, and recently contacted John W. Loftus
with a syllogism for God’s existence Norman had made in the Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics.
David asked my editor if he had “any atheistic friends that would be willing to
critique this more comprehensive argument for God’s existence and explain what’s wrong with it,” and I was one such friend, so John contacted me.
What follows is a brief critique of the entry “First
Principles” in the Encyclopedia,
which David copied verbatim in his email to John. The entry is quite
substantive, as Norman Geisler provided very detailed descriptions of a variety
of first principles, such as the Principle of Noncontradiction, the Principle
of Causality, and the Principle of Contingency, and explains why they cannot be
coherently denied under any circumstances.
We are so used to easy access to the Bible it’s easy to forget that for most of Christian history the laity did not have the Bible. That became possible in the wake of the invention of the printing press in 1450, and the move in the following century to translate the Bible into the languages spoken by the laity. So for well over a thousand years the church got people to believe what it wanted them to believe about Jesus. Itsold an idealized Jesus based primarily on Paul’s hallucinations of a resurrected Jesus who ruled in heavenly realms. During this long dark age of Bible ignorance, the laity learned the story of their lord through great works of art, stunning stained-glass renderings, and the word spoken from pulpits.
Christian philosopher of religion Dr. Win Corduan shows why I focus on concrete examples like a virgin birthed son of a god, and have such a low view of the philosophy of religion by philosophers who want to rationally discuss the probabilities of these kinds of ancient myths. He wrote a brief summary essay answering the question, What is the difference between objective and subjective claims? He argues there's a point at which subjective and objective claims are the same: "Clearly, the fact that I am making a subjective claim about feeling pain is an objective claim. And that matter can be tested pretty easily; just ask me. But whether I actually have the feelings that I’m telling you about, only I can know."
This isn't the real issue though, even if he's right. For the real issue concerns concrete claims like a virgin birthed son of a god. Those kinds of claims require objective evidence for them, since they're extraordinary claims of the highest order concerning events that are impossible to occur on their own within the natural world, based on everything we know about how the world works. So it doesn't matter if there's a point at which objective and subjective claims converge, even though I doubt that they do. Sure, I would see no reason to doubt Win's claim of pain since it's not an extraordinary one. But I cannot objectively feel his pain either. So I would have no way to conclusively test whether he's lying, without some objective evidence coming from a heart monitor or brain scan.
The real reason Win is addressing such a question is because there's no objective evidence for any of the miracle assertions in the Bible. Sorry if that's the case Win, but that's the case. Sorry if it ends your philosophical discussion Win, but it ends it. It could have turned out differently if there was a god who had the foresight to provide objective evidence for biblical miracles, Win. But your god didn't do that.
I occasionally see this meme on Facebook, with attribution to Mark Twain: “Religion was invented when the first con man met the first fool.” But this is probably wrong on three counts: (1) I have never been able to verify it as a Twain quote; (2) the first priests—those who stood out from the rest of their clans as possessing connections to the gods—probably were not con artists; (3) and the people who believed them sensed that the connection was genuine. Of course the time would come when con men took over—these days televangelists come to mind especially.
If this continues they will lose their political influence in America! I welcome this even as I hate what Trump has done to our country. LINK. Thanks to Robert Conner.
When did God stop caring about the Bible? No, it’s not a silly question. Many Christians are so sure that God guided the thoughts—and the pens—of the Bible authors, especially those who wrote the gospels and epistles: they got God’s truth right. But what an embarrassment: we don’t have what they wrote. All of the original manuscripts of the New Testament books were lost. The earliest scrap of a gospel—a few verses of John 18—dates early-to-mid second century. There are scholars who devote their careers to comparing ancient manuscripts, trying to figure out the wording of the original texts. The sloppy, haphazard coping process—by hand—went on for centuries. The scribes made thousands of errors. God couldn’t be bothered to protect and preserve the original documents? That wasn’t within his power? Fundamentalist theologians insist that the original manuscripts were without error: God’s perfect word. Even for them there’s just no denying that so many mistakes were made in the copying process. But their claim that the originals were perfect cannot be sustained.
Looks like it's a race to see which book of mine will be my very last one!
GCRR is set to release "God and Horrendous Suffering" early in November.
Hypatia Press says they're releasing "Varieties of Jesus Mythicism" early in December.
They can both lay claim to the title of last book, if this plays itself out. That's because "God and Horrendous Suffering" was the very last book I submitted for publication, no matter which one is released last!
I actually like that the mythicist book is to come out near Xmas, since people looking for books at that time might be drawn to its cover of an empty manger!
I also like it since the question of Jesus mythicism was one I avoided in order not to offend Christian believers in my early years. So it's good if it comes out last.
In my books I've said all I need to say on every important topic related to Christianity. That's all I can do. It should be enough for one person, even though the debate will continue. I must now live life to its fullest, love, laugh, sing, and dance.
Justin Brierley, producer of the Unbelievable? program, just solved the problem of evil. Not really, but he tries unsuccessfully to make a point about it and free will:
My comments to Justin Brierley:
Justin, anyone can turn a bullet into something good, and anyone can imagine on hindsight that some kind of suffering turns out for good. But an omniscient god is apparently incapable of imagining a world without suffering of the horrendous kind, when even a child can do so. What about a god who never allows humankind to discover gunpowder? What was so important to god that we needed it at all?
Additionally:
Yes, gunpowder has been extremely helpful to modernized society. But was the bloodshed and mayhem worth it when all god wants is for us to believe in him? Think of the murders, the bombs, and the wars, especially the noncombatants like children. The carnage is massive!
If for some indefensible notion god wanted us to discover gunpower, he could have made it discoverable to people who would only use it constructively in building roads, bridges, buildings and the like. He could also keep it away from evil people intent on evil purposes.
A perfectly loving god would do this. Does an omniscient all-powerful god not know how to do it?
Come on now, be honest, if your neighbor announced that he is heading off on a business trip “because I had a revelation from God that I have to go”: would you be impressed by his direct line to God—or would you be tempted to ask if he’d skipped his meds? Maybe the pope receives these kinds of messages—so the faithful hope—but your neighbor? Sometimes noisy televangelists boast that they’re passing on orders from God, but aside from their gullible followers, who believes them? Recently Lauren Boebert shouted to an enthusiastic crowd that God had told her to run for congress. We are alarmed by delusions in high places.
Why is my anthology about horrendous suffering? Because this is the category of suffering every reasonable person agrees is needless, the kind of suffering that a perfectly good, all powerful, all knowing god worthy of worship would eliminate if s/he existed.
