The Inconvenient Truth About Death

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I know a friend who lost a loved one and her pastor came over to offer her some comfort, the same one who preaches the unsaved will be condemned to hell. It seems pastors can't get it straight. They condemn to hell the unsaved but comfort people with false hopes when it's convenient. They preach only a few will be saved but turn around and comfort their parishioners by telling them they will see all their loved ones again. Which is it?

Lighting the Fuse

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At a recent atheist meetup, I was talking with a former Muslim, and asked him what had led to his deconversion. He said that he had come to the United States from Pakistan and was working as a taxi driver while attending college. One night, after his shift ended, he asked a fellow driver to give him a ride home. As they were talking, the other driver, in a passing remark, said:

“You know, all religions are man-made.”

There was no discussion on the topic, just that simple statement, but it stuck with him, nagging at his thinking. Approximately two years later, he rejected religion and became an atheist.

Are You An Honest Christian?

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A church member where I preached when I was a believer is trying to convince me to believe again, but will not read any of my books. So I said: "You really should crack open one of my books if you really are an honest person and really want to know the truth. It might not convince you but when shopping for cars don't you want another opinion? That you don't shop for gods like you do for cars is very telling. 95% of Christians will never do this." --Two choices: Am I right or am I right? ;-)

Quote of the Day, by Dr. Victor Reppert, and My Response

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You can't have miracles unless you have an order of nature for them to stand out from. A Presidential pardon is only possible because there is a stable system of laws that require punishments for certain crimes, yet our system of laws allows the President to alter the penalty and release someone from those penalties. There is no inconsistency in a system of laws that permits Presidential discretionary pardons.
My response:

Exactly Vic! That's one of the reasons I do not believe ancient testimony about miracles. It's precisely because they had no understanding that there were natural laws. Without that understanding everything was a miracle. From the rising of the sun to a bumper harvest to the birth of a baby boy it was all miraculous. Since miracles happened everywhere they were seen everywhere and it was quite literally impossible to properly evaluate miracle claims. They were a dime a dozen.

With the advent of scientific understanding that would allow for miracles we've learned how to test miracle claims based on natural law. It raises the bar for what we can accept. So while I have no reason to believe ancient testimony, now I must judge them from the standard of natural law. I no longer can believe the miracles in the ancient world twice-over. LINK.

Humanity Is Becoming Increasingly Less Violent, with One Exception -- Religious Violence

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This is due to recent findings from the Pew Research Center. Check it out.

Victor Reppert Again, On What Would Convince Us God Exists

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Many of the things that it is supposed that God could have done to make his existence perfectly evident could be passed off as the work of powerful (but evolved) aliens. And no matter how much evidence God provides, there is some additional piece of evidence that an atheist could say God didn't provide, and if God really cared for us, he would have provided. The amount of evidence God could have provided has no intrinsic maximum.
Vic made this comment in this discussion. Like other apologists who have an invested stake in being apologists he won't be convinced otherwise, but since there are Christians who want to be honest with their faith I'll respond.

A Serious Question From a New Deconvert

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How does someone know that the Bible is the inspired, inerrant, infallible, absolute truth, perfect word of an omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, omni-benevolent, perfect God?

Stephen Law On Playing the Mystery Card (from his book, Believing Bullshit)

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This seems pertinent from recent discussions with Victor Reppert. Enjoy.

Victor Reppert On What It Would Take To Convince Me Christianity Was True

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Vic links to my original 2007 post so you can see what I said for yourselves. He asks if I'm arguing for the god of the gaps right here: "Isn't [Loftus] just saying here 'Gosh, I wish the gaps were bigger?'" It's an interesting question I'll admit. But we need to see what's going on. In my original post I had said:
But let’s say the Christian faith is true and Jesus did arise from the dead. Let’s say that even though Christianity must punt to mystery and retreat into the realm of mere possibilities to explain itself that it is still true, contrary to what my (God given?) mind leads me to believe. Then what would it take to convince me?

I would need sufficient reasons to overcome my objections, and I would need sufficient evidence to lead me to believe. By “sufficient” here, I mean reasons and evidence that would overcome my skepticism.

What Is So Bad About Christianity?

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I'm getting some of the chapters from contributors for my new anthology Christianity is Not Great as I write. They are really good too. We're writing on the harms of Christianity. Imagine my surprise to find that James McDonald has an excellent website dealing with many of the same issues we're dealing with, seen here. I hadn't noticed it before. From what I read it looks really good. We're told: "Many Christians and non-Christians remain largely unaware of the history of Christianity. This website lays out the facts as clearly as possible," and it looks like he delivers the goods. He has also written a large book, Beyond Belief: Two thousand years of bad faith in the Christian Church.From my investigation I highly recommend it.

Roger Penrose On "Before the Big Bang"

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Dr. Matt McCormick On Talking Believers Out of God

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This is good!

"God or Godless" Named Among the Top Ten Religion Books of 2013

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The Dubious Disciple, a self-described "agnostic Christian" (there's such a thing?), named my co-authored book with Randal Rauser as one of the top ten religion books in 2013. Here is his list which isn't a bad one at all for a believer. If you click on the book cover it will take you to his review of it. Someone likes it! Wooooo Hooooo! ;-)

Using the Bible to Prove Jesus Was a Sinner

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I have pointed out over the years here at DC (and elsewhere) that the religious system of reasoning called theology is one of the most flawed and defective so-called logic systems ever devised in human history; bar none! For me, people who are immersed in this pseudo-logic system are similar to an alcoholic or drug addict who, although he or she can’t hold a job, has lost both family and friends, still dogmatically maintains they don’t have any problem at all.

Further Discussion On the Hallquist vs Rauser Debate

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Previously I had argued that Chris Hallquist lost his debate with Randal Rauser. Here is our further discussion, below for learning and comment.

Jesus Behaving Badly: The Smoke of Their Torment

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When it comes to dealing with the violent, angry, bi-polar god of the Old Testament, many Christians use Jesus as their get-out-of-jail-free card.
If we atheists bring up some of the many examples of the despicable actions and character of Yahweh, as described in the Bible, we hear: “But… Jesus… grace… New Covenant...” 
It’s as if sometime during the inter-testamental period, their god attended anger management sessions or got in touch with his kinder, gentler side.  Perhaps an image consultant advised him that all the smiting and killing was starting to give him a bad reputation? God 2.0 (aka Jesus) is supposed to magically override the trail of carnage that the Bible tells us that Yahweh left in his wake.

Christopher Hitchens On Minority Opinions

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“My own opinion is enough for me, and I claim the right to have it defended against any consensus, any majority, anywhere, any place, any time. And anyone who disagrees with this can pick a number, get in line, and kiss my ass.” ― Christopher Hitchens. I quote him in reference to this opinion of mine. Cheers.

What Kind of Atheist Are You?

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Not a Good Year for Dinesh D'Souza

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...writes Jerry Coyne.

We are Nonbelievers, We Don't Believe, Period.

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I used to think the position I now hold to was philosophically naive at best, and I have taught university level philosophy classes. Tell me this, do you know the sun will rise this morning, or do you believe it will rise? I know it will rise. Could I be wrong? Yes, but I don't need certainty in order to know something. If a truth proposition has that degree of probability to it then the fact I could conceivably be wrong means nothing. I know it. What does saying "I believe" the sun will rise do? It allows Christians to claim all knowledge is based on faith. Then they slip their Trinitarian incarnational god into that same crack. If the odds for a truth claim are calculated to be 70% then what does faith add to them? 50%? 15%? If we go exclusively by the probabilities there is no room for faith, no reason to believe anything at all. The problem is that we don't have separate words to describe the various probabilities. We only have one word, the word "belief." It covers the whole range of probabilities when we should be using different words to describe them. Other words better describe what we mean, like hope, trust, accept, think, know, conclude, and so on. The word "belief" is a Christian one supporting the Christian faith in the western world. We need a new nomenclature. We are nonbelievers. We don't believe. Let's use language commensurate with what we know.

"Is Belief in God Irrational?" Chris Hallquist Loses This Debate to Randal Rauser Who Wins a Pyrrhic Victory

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I wouldn't want to debate a professional Christian philosopher on the topic of this debate. But Chris Hallquist did. He made some good arguments against Christianity but in terms of the question itself, debate judges would unanimously proclaim Rauser the winner, by a landslide. For Rauser it is nothing more than a Pyrrhic victory though. He won the battle but suffered serious loses in doing so. I judge Chris to be out of his league here, but he did manage to raise some issues Rauser didn't have good answers for, so Kudos to him. The problem of evil was his best argument. Rauser hammered Hallquist on the word "irrational" and won the debate because of it. However, unbelievably, given someone's ignorance about science then a Flat Earther would be considered rational too. Big crapping deal. What we want to know is if one's belief in God is true and Plantinga, Rauser's guru, never addresses that question. Hallquist did, but we all hold some conclusions that are false and we're not irrational in doing so.

If I were to debate Rauser on this question I would focus on the word "belief." Belief is always irrational. We should think exclusively in terms of the probabilities when it comes to the nature of the universe and it's workings. Hallquist didn't even do this. He thought if he could just show that believing in God was improbable then this is all he had to do. For anyone who continues believing despite Hallquist's arguments is irrational. Yet based on this standard of Hallquist's it is only irrational to continue believing in God once someone grants the arguments to God's existence fail, and these types of judgments are person related. Rauser thinks Hallquist's arguments fail instead. So until Rauser thinks those arguments succeed and continues believing anyway, his belief in God is not irrational. Check the debate out and see for yourselves.

Hallquist's position is just too extreme to be taken seriously. He thinks the arguments against the existence of God are so devastating that when it comes to William Lane Craig, and some other Christian apologists, they are intellectually dishonest. What Hallquist simply fails to understand is that there are many cognitive biases that keep honest people believing despite the strongest evidence to the contrary. There are many Christian apologists who think the opposite, that the arguments for God's existence are so strong that non-believers are being intellectually dishonest. If I were a Christian apologist I would hold up Hallquist as exhibit "A" in showing non-believers are intellectually dishonest, for surely he isn't ignorant about the effects of these cognitive biases. So they could conclude he is being intellectually dishonest when claiming William Lane Craig and others are intellectually dishonest. Because of this I must distance myself from him, even though I wish him well.

Neil deGrasse Tyson on Science, Religion and the Universe

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Since the multiverse is mentioned here is the evidence for it.

Sodom and Gomorrah

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Jesus Christ visits Sarah Silverman to discuss women's reproductive rights.

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Open Thread for Comment

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Yes, I've been silent lately. I'm working on a new book and dealing with other exciting things in my life. So give it to me. What's up? Anything new?

If Religious Faith Isn't The Problem Then What Is It?

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A Screwed Up Book From the Beginning: Does the Bible Ever Know What It’s Talking About?

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Left: The Jarvik 7 Artificial Heart (Could Jesus Live Here?)
Over a decade ago I debated a Christian apologist over the fact that the Biblical writers had no idea of what the human brain was.

My point was that, if the Bible was literally correct, than both the first artificial heart recipients Barney Clark and Robert Schrader (who died while on these machines) would have been totally  "unable to have asked Jesus into their hearts" since they had in fact had no hearts for Jesus to live in and thus ended up in Hell. This Christian apologist said this was "ridiculous" and was very adamant that the term "heart" in the Bible was used as a purely symbolic term being that the Biblical authors knew full well that the muscle we call the heart was not really the place emotions and thought.  By contrast, I strongly disagreed and reaffirmed the fact that what the Bible said about the heart (Greek: Kardia, from which we get Cardiac) is exactly what is meant. (You see, we atheists are basically Bible Believers!)


Why Didn't Jesus Tell Us About Germs?

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This is a nice little argument from Richard Carrier. His debate with David Marshall can be seen here.

What's the Difference Between Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism?

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[First published on October 2, 2013, now updated]: Fundamentalist Christianity represents yesterday's conservative faith whereas Evangelical Christianity represents today's conservative faith...and the goal posts keep being moved. Evangelical Christianity therefore is the liberal faith that conservatives of yesterday rejected, while the Evangelical Christianity of the future will reject the theology of today's Evangelicals. Liberalism is the trend into the future. It's palpably obvious too.

Evangelicals in the eighties rejected Karl Barth, inclusivism, Hell as annihilation, the mythical interpretation of the Genesis creation stories, the late dating of 2nd Isaiah and Daniel, and they especially rejected evolution. These former Evangelical views are now being rejected by today's Evangelicals. The goal posts have simply been moved! For more read these posts of mine:

1) The New Evangelical Orthodoxy, Relativism, and the Amnesia of It All

2) The More Conservative The Church, The Less Likely It's True

Two New Bible Movies Hit the Theaters for 2014

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Tonight I decided to see Lone Survivor which is an excellent movie about an ill-fated mission by Navy SEALs in Afghanistan (Highly Violent). As usual before the main movie, our sold out theater watched about six movie trailers for forth coming titles in 2014. Among the secular titles; I was intrigued to see two trailers for upcoming Biblical movies.

It's Okay That Bill Nye Debates Ken Ham

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The Science Guy Bill Nye is going to debate Ken Ham at the Creation Museum in Kentucky on February 4th. Ham believes the universe is not more than 6,000 years old and that there was a world-wide flood that took place about 4,500 years ago. He believes the animals saved by a guy named Noah in his ark can explain biological diversity. Ham also believes dinosaurs co-existed with humans. Ham, in other words, is a crack pot. He represents the absolute worst kind of creationist there is, although they are all wrong. Scientists from Richard Dawkins, Jerry Coyne, PZ Myers, and a whole host of atheist bloggers are saying Bill Nye shouldn't debate Ham. Here are some reasons why:

The DOs and DON'Ts of Prayer

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Here is Andrew Lamprecht's Deconversion Story

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Andrew Lamprecht is a former Christian living in Adrian, Michigan, who is an aspiring author. Enjoy. See if his story resonates with you.

Does God Exist? A Debate Between Dan Barker and John Mark Reynolds

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Satanists Unveil Design for Okla. Capitol Monument

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"The Satanic Temple says Oklahoma's decision to put a Ten Commandments monument at the Capitol opened the door for its statute."

"Oklahoma City — A satanic group unveiled designs Monday for a 7-foot-tall statue of Satan it wants to put at the Oklahoma state Capitol, where a Ten Commandments monument was placed in 2012."

See link:  The Associated Press

Also of interest: The Satanic Temple website

Dr. Matt McCormick On Immortality

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Here's An Interview I Did With Red Tani of the Filipino Freethinkers

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Get Peter Boghossian's Audio Book, "A Manual For Creating Atheists" for Free

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Seth from the Thinking Atheist podcast has a link to get a free audiobook and to get 30 days free access. You can hear Dr. Boghossian talking about his new book right here, then you can go to this link to get it free. Just search for the title "A Manual for Creating Atheists," and listen to the free, unabridged version of the book as read by the author, Peter Boghossian himself. Plus, you're helping support TTA I'm told.

Anyone Want to Improve On This Quote of the Day?

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Give it a try, I want you to:
Not only is fundamentalist Christianity the greatest threat in the United States to science, tolerance, and social progress, but it is also the most prevalent form of Protestant Christianity to be found in our nation, whether you like it or not. It is the fundamentalist religious right that holds the reigns of the Republican party (which currently controls the nation, in case you didn't realize), and it is this same fundamentalist religious right that lobbies for the teaching of lies in public school and fights against funding for embryonic research that could potentially save the lives of millions. Whether you like it or not, it is this flavor of Christianity that makes the loudest, most obnoxious, most dangerous impact on the world today, giving us plenty of good reason to direct the brunt of our attacks in its vicinity.

Russell Blackford Comments On the Book, "God or Godless"

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Russell Blackford is a philosopher with numerous books to his name. On Facebook he said this:
I'm currently reading God or Godless?by John W. Loftus and Randal Rauser. From my perspective, the former is intellectually demolishing the latter. You may think I'm biased, but it's not that simple. I suspect that I would (to my dismay) have had the same response even in my Christian days. Loftus is very good in this debate, but even that is not the problem for Rauser. So much Christian apologetics may be internally consistent... but still looks bizarre and implausible the moment you try to look at it from the outside. There's not much Rauser can do about this.
Biblical scholar Robert Price said the same thing. Dustin Lawson, Josh McDowell's infidel disciple, agreed wholeheartedly.

This is all gratifying to me personally. For anyone who has not seen it, co-author Randal Rauser and I debated each other in Edmonton, Canada, on June 5, 2013. Enjoy it below:


The Science Guy Bill Nye to Debate Ken Ham

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Bill Nye to Visit Creation Museum for Debate
"Bill Nye "The Science Guy" is set to visit Kentucky to debate evolution and biblical creation with the founder of the Creation Museum."

No Question About It, The Bible Debunks Itself

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Pastor Mark Driscoll’s Holy Ghost Porn.

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Mark Driscoll, pastor of the Seattle-based Mars Hill megachurch is no stranger to controversy.   Early in his career, he was known as the ‘cussing pastor’.  As things rolled along, he garnered a devoted following by preaching a macho Jesus who would probably enjoy watching a UFC cage match, deriding effeminate male worship leaders, and telling Christian wives that they should drop their husband’s trousers and ‘serve’ them by performing oral sex.   His sermon videos on the topic of sex are often too controversial to be carried by GodTube (the Christian version of YouTube).  Recently, he has been in a new kind of controversy, as charges of plagiarism have been leveled at him.
What is perhaps not as widely-known is his claim that he sees replays of sexual encounters and child molestations in his head, courtesy of a ‘gift’ of the Holy Spirit.  That’s right folks.  We have a pastor claiming that he has a Holy Ghost porn channel in his head.  As Mark puts it, “I see things.”

I’ll let him tell you about it:

Frederick Douglass On Christianity and Slavery

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At this point I'm beginning to write a chapter on the Bible and slavery for my new anthology. Frederick Douglass (1818-1895) escaped from slavery and became a leader of the abolitionist movement. This is what he wrote in his Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave [Norton Anthology, Vol. 2, 6th ed.]:

Henry Bibb, An American Slave, Tells of the Best Case of Slavery He Knew

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At this point I'm beginning to write a chapter on the Bible and slavery for my new anthology. Here's something I ran across concerning Henry Bibb (1815-1854), an escaped slave, who became a leading abolitionist. In his autobiography Bibb describes his life as an American slave. He describes the cruelty, the beatings, lashings, and the riches gained by the slaveowners at the expense of slaves. Then at the end, in chapter twenty, he does something remarkable. He describes the best case scenario, the mildest kind of slavery he ever knew.

Faith Doesn't Need a Factual Basis In Order To Work

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Bible Prophecy Fulfilled (Part 3): The Christmas Murders

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The story of the wise men being guided by a heavenly star, to the house where Jesus resided has been a key element of many a Christmas play.    What has not been talked about very often is how this little piece of razzle-dazzle got a bunch of kids murdered.  Yep.  This is one of those not-infrequent moments in the Bible which makes a person (of even average intelligence) face palm and say “Really God?  Really?  This was the best you could come up with?”

James Lindsay to Tom Gilson: "Repudiate All Unreliable Epistemologies"

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The fact is unavoidable. The word faith is used to mean "I don’t have enough evidence to warrant belief in X, but I’m going to believe anyway." It’s unavoidable because they’re using the word faith for exactly this purpose, to jump an epistemic gap that can only be bridged by evidence. It is used that way because faith is not a reliable method for obtaining knowledge, and the methods that faith is based upon--tradition, authority, and revelation--are also not reliable.

Believers do this because they lack evidence and yet want to believe, so strongly in fact that they appear not to care whether or not faith is a reliable methodology. That is, Christians do not care to know what is true as much as they want to pretend to know things they do not know.

Again, Mr. Gilson, I call upon you to drop your argument with Peter Boghossian and to repudiate all unreliable epistemologies, faith--and the resulting Christianity--among these. Link

Technically Speaking, We Can't Disprove the Existence of Witchcraft, But...

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Technically speaking, we cannot conclusively prove that a Devil or his demons don’t exist, or that witches cannot work their magic. There just isn’t any evidence that they do. Furthermore, with the advancement of science, supernatural explanations for any given event in our lives become unnecessary and superfluous. A Devil empowered witch may have caused a particular illness by her spell. But what best explains why we can usually trace the illness to some undercooked food that was eaten, as an example? And what best explains why the right medicine always cures the illness? If an illness was caused by the spell of a witch there is no reason to think we could find a natural cause for it. Nor is there a reason to think the right medicine could always overcome the power of the spell by curing it either.

What Went Wrong? Where is Their God? The Sad Tragedy of Christianity

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In posting this News Video, I would like comments from Christians on why the Christian religion failed to control the situation and from any non-theists on your take of the situation. 
(The video has been removed, but you can still read the story  here:
  http://www.foxcarolina.com/story/23701174/pastors-sermon)