Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Christianity could possibly become a minority religion in US as early as 2045…

Even Bart Ehrman concedes that the New Testament has been preserved in more manuscripts than any other ancient written historical works in all of history.

Two questions:

A: Why are atheists so hostile to Christianity?

B: Why do Christians feel the need to engage them with arguments?

I won't argue with atheists. Their brains are configured in a manner that doesn't allow their thoughts to extend past the tips of their noses,..and that's fine,..."eyes to see and ears to hear".

Some have it,....some don't. There's no reason to argue with those who have yet to realize that their consciousness, their experience of the world around them is being transmitted to them via their souls.

That glob of meat in their heads cannot produce consciousness no more than a MacBook Pro can process conscoiusness.

You've got a tool in your head that keeps the system functioning. But it's not consciousness.

Being self aware comes from a metaphysical source that's much more complicated than a piece of meat can provide.

Bristoe - good questions and analysis well stated.
I don't have any definitive answers, but the answer for #1 could be that those atheists have some overwhelming guilt complex played out as fake intellectual curiosity.

For #2, even the most sound arguments, comments and Scriptural postings made by Christians only seem like stimulus for further bashing by some atheists, so I don't understand the "need".

For those reasons, I try to avoid arguing with atheists who attack - but feel it worthwhile to expose their unsupported assumptions, illogical and inconsistent comments and vivid hypocrisy. Some here seem convinced that those types are laborers for Satan.

The new atheists…the big hitters like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris…are fully aware that atheistic regimes have killed more people in the twentieth century alone than all of the combined religions in the world have killed in all of known history.

But they clearly and purposely dance around that fact.

Has anybody here ever read the Jefferson Bible? I am thinking of ordering one. I have heard that he went through the gospels and distilled them into one book of Jesus' teachings. Seems he left out the miracles.

Jefferson was an absolute genius, prodigious reader, able to read and write in several languages, and we can thank for his part in the formation of our governing system which until the last few decades has performed so admirably.

He publicly stated that "Paul was the first corrupter of the doctrine of Jesus". Of course he was centuries behind others that came to the same conclusion.

Thanks to his influence religion and government cannot join forces in this country.

Jefferson not only left out the miracles of Jesus, he purposely omitted Jesus’ resurrection, the very foundation of Christianity. He also purposely omitted the passages that made Jesus’ divinity crystal clear.

Sounds like it’d be right up your alley.

All atheists aren’t hostile. I have friends who are atheists. Good people and a joy to be around.

I’ve run into a few of these hostile types. I have found them to generally have a personal “history” with Christianity, something that causes trauma to the point that there is exaggerated mistrust that tends to convert into open hostility.

There is certainly no justification for the absurd amount of energy they consume and ends to which they go to rail against something that “Doesn’t Exist”.

There is always value in exposing atheistic reasoning and heretical teaching. Many can’t distinguish and fall for the lies.

Thanks, I know now why the hatred for Paul.

Circuitous tactics meant only to drive the conversation in circles, and flat-out denial of the evidence that is clearly there, are both examples of the efforts of those who are clearly and desperately trying to maintain their weak and tenuous position. And it’s never not funny when they continuously claim that they are simply countering and challenging “by rational argument” the position of those that they refer to as “opponents,” especially when the opposite of such is clearly evident to nearly all.

The goat rodeo that it is carries with it the morbid curiosity of watching a tragedy unfold.

He did just what you’re doing.

He rewrote Scripture to make it acceptable to him.

Why not just rewrite the Bible yourself?

Tear out the sections you find unacceptable, run a black sharpie over other sections, and you’ll have Jefferson’s Bible.

He has a good start on it already.

St John is gone so we can take away

The Gospel of John
1, 2 & 3 John
The Revelation of John

St Paul is gone so we can take away

Romans
1&2 Corinthians
Galatians
Ephesians
Philippians
Colossians
1&2 Thessalonians
1&2 Timothy
Titus
Philemon

That leaves us with

Matthew
Mark
Luke
Acts
Hebrews
James
1&2 Peter
Jude

He’s knocked the NT down from 27 to just 9 books.

Must be a genius or sitting on a goldmine of new knowledge.

#WWJD

If'n you don't 'like' Paul then you kinda have to get rid of Peter also, because he called Pauls' writing 'SCRIPTURE'.........

Good point. Now we are down to 7 Books in the NT.

Luke clearly documented in Acts of the Apostles Jesus’ own words where He said verbatim that Paul “is a chosen instrument of Mine to carry My name before the Gentiles and their kings and the children of Israel.”

So now we have to take Luke’s Gospel away.

6 books remain.

2nd Peter is thought by most New Testament scholars to be a forgery. Just search 2nd Peter forgery.
Did Luke hear the Lord say that? Or did someone report that to him?

I didn’t make the above quote that you attributed to me.

Luke was a historian who knew Jesus’ disciples and had conversations with Jesus’ disciples and with James, the brother of Jesus. Luke was a historian who actually knew the men and women who played key roles in the life story of Jesus. And he not only lived during the time of the people he was writing about…as did ‘all’ of the New Testament authors…he carefully investigated everything from the beginning. What Luke tells us, he got from the eyewitnesses. He talked to the people who were there. He knew Peter, he knew John, he knew James, the brother of Jesus. He said he interviewed everybody he could because he wanted to make sure there's at least one account that covers everything. With this in mind, he carefully investigated the events and wrote an orderly account for us all.