By Dennis Diehl When I was kid, I loved to ask my minister questions about things that, to my young mind, made no sense when I read them in the Bible or more likely heard them in Sunday school. His answers were always rather bland and not a little aloof since, after all, he was the pastor and I was just a kid. I remember asking about how humans and dinosaurs could coexist. After all, they had to be a part of the creation story, even though not mentioned specifically. Or why would dinosaurs be taken on the ark, only to go extinct such a short time after? And how do you cage a T-Rex or fit a Brontosaurus on such a boat, much less a pair of all sorts? I got a lot of looks but very few answers. As the years went by, I concluded that none of it was either possible or even addressed in the Bible. I realized humans and dinosaurs had nothing in common (unless you live in the SE USA) and the pastor was either ignorant, deliberately deceptive or hung up somewhere in between himself, not knowing ...

By Dave, the WM Though by no means the only understanding of soteriological free will, the overwhelmingly popular view expressed by Christians visiting this site is that all humans are free to choose or reject God's offer of salvation. If people freely and sincerely choose God's generous offer to save them, then HE will. If people freely reject God's loving gesture, then they will suffer everlasting horror. On the flip side of this interesting "truth" is the belief that once a person accepts God's offer of unconditional love and acceptance, there is no way the person can ever change his or her mind about it. In other words, once a "True Christian™," always a "True Christian™." This is expressed in the frequently repeated mantra, "There is no such thing as an ex-Christian." In a nutshell, what these Christians believe is that people have free will before salvation and are robbed of free will after acquiring salvation. Salvation is...

By Butch It seems many theists are certain that because they claim their own morality comes from their faith alone, then those without faith must inevitably be immoral. The facts, however, show faith is not required for humans to lead moral lives, and sometimes hinder it entirely. If you examine Americans for the "fruit" of their morality, what you see is striking. As an example, Christians make up about 75 percent of the overall U.S. population and, as expected, about 75 percent of the prison population. Atheists make up between 5 - 12 percent of the population, but only 0.2 percent of the prison population. If the measure of morality is based on so-called "traditional family values," the facts are equally damning to those trying to promulgate the falsehood that atheism necessarily equals immorality. For instance, 25 percent of Americans have been divorced, but for "born again Christians" it is 27 percent, making it higher than the overall U.S. population...

By Lorena Inspired by Notabarbie's post, I created the Lower Mainland’s Ex-Christian Meetup Group . If you live around Vancouver , B.C., or know somebody who does, join this Meetup or invite your friends. You may join even if your location is far from Vancouver , as meetings will be organized all over the Lower Mainland, to give everyone a chance to attend. The Lower Mainland includes several cities around Vancouver, B.C. : Richmond , Delta, New Westminster , Burnaby , Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam , North Vancouver , West Vancouver , Surrey , and others. Click here to check out The Lower Mainland Ex-Christian Meetup Group! To monitor comments posted to this topic, use .

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By FightingAtheist As an Atheist and a former Christian, I am frequently confronted by Christians claiming that Jesus was real and I should believe in him again. These Christians fail to realize that I do believe Jesus existed. I believe he may have been crucified. I do not believe he rose from the dead. If Jesus existed then there are a few possibilities. He was either, the actual son of God, a con artist, a mentally deranged man, or a normal man that had embellished stories written about him after his death. We can examine evidence to determine which of these is most likely. For those who are not sure he existed, there are several people that have written about the existence of Jesus outside of the Bible. Cornelius Tacitus born in 55 AD wrote that Christ suffered at the hands of Pontius Pilate. This is an example of a non biblical writer recording the existence of Jesus. There are several others. These writings make a strong argument for the existence of Jesus. But did Jesus ha...

BY dano Is it not self evident that an omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, omnibenevolent, God would not need our worship, or want our worship? Is it not self evident that an omniscient God would already know everything we are thinking? Is it not self evident that an omnipotent God would eliminate sin, if he found it to be displeasing to himself? Is it not self evident that an omnibenevolent God would find a way to get everybody into heaven? Is it not self evident that an omnipresent God would fix anything that he found to his disliking, anywhere, and everywhere? Is it not self evident that if there is a God, that same God, made everything? What is it about EVERYTHING that you don't understand? Isn't it self evident that is there is a God that made everything, he can do anything, change anything, eliminate anything, fix anything? What is it about ANYTHING, that you don't understand? What is it about SELF EVIDENT that you don't understand? To monitor comments...

Perceptions of religious imagery in natural phenomena include perceptions of religious imagery and themes, especially the faces of religious figures, in ordinary phenomena. Many instances that are reported involve images of Jesus or other Christian figures seen in food, but it has an equivalent in the Muslim world where structures in food and other natural objects are perceived as religious text in Arabic , particularly the word Allah or verses from the Qur'an . Many religious believers view them as real depictions of miraculous origin; the predominant scientific view is that such perceptions are examples of pareidolia . — Wikipedia To monitor comments posted to this topic, use .

Just for laughs... To monitor comments posted to this topic, use .

I think many people find discomfort with the idea that our ancestors of millions of years ago were primates, or single-cell microorganisms billions of years ago. And I think many theists are used to believing that their religion holds a monopoly as a source of moral behavior and values. I disagree. I don’t think we have a moral mandate because God said so. I think we have a moral mandate because our actions, nevertheless what we think, make a difference. We affect the people around us in material and emotional terms, and our actions set an example for others to follow. We have a moral mandate to take responsibility because we are in the rare position among life forms on earth to think, reflect, and take consideration of consequence. I think to fail to excogitate on our actions with our unique mental capabilities is tragic. And we see the problems that arise out of this failure, both in problems of hurt emotions and damaged relationships, and in problems of brutal violence and conflict...

Dr. Leonard Susskind , the Felix Bloch professor of theoretical physics at Stanford University in the field of string theory and quantum field theory , is widely regarded as one of the fathers of string theory for his early contributions to the String Theory model of particle physics . In this video he discusses his most recent book The Cosmic Landscape: String Theory and the Illusion of Intelligent Design Does trying to understand modern string theory have you tied in knots? Have you ever wondered what a layman can learn from hadrons or the anthropic principle ? Enjoy this lively program as Susskind explains the nuts and bolts of modern string theory and asks, "Can science explain the extraordinary fact that the universe appears to be uncannily, nay, spectacularly, well designed for our existence?" This video is one hour long. To monitor comments posted to this topic, use .

By Dave, the WM "Don't pay any attention to that man behind the screen." — Wizard of Oz Dogmatic Christians tend to be some of the most confident people I know — at least in pubic. I was one of those Christians. Secretly I was skeptical... of myself. I'd put on the expected airs and broadcast self-assurance. But, barely hidden under a thin leaf of conviction lay naked self-doubt. How could I, an average guy, be entirely sure I really knew what I was talking about when it came to impossibly supernatural things? Even a minute of honest self assessment would clue me in that my limited mental capacities were probably not up for the job. The solution to this frustrating dichotomy was infantile in its simplicity: I tried not to think about it. But that only worked for awhile. Eventually I started thinking again: "What if I'm just kidding myself, and none of this weird religious stuff is true? What if I've been deceived or am just mistaken? What makes me think t...

"The enlightenment is under threat. So is reason. So is truth. So is science, especially in more... the schools of America. I am one of those scientists who feels that it is no longer enough just to get on and do science. We have to devote a significant proportion of our time and resources to defending it from deliberate attack from organized ignorance. We even have to go out on the attack ourselves, for the sake of reason and sanity. But it must be a positive attack, for science and reason have so much to give. They are not just useful, they enrich our lives in the same kind of way as the arts do. Promoting science as poetry was one of the things that Carl Sagan did so well, and I aspire to continue his tradition." — Richard Dawkins Clinton Richard Dawkins (born March 26, 1941) is a British ethologist, evolutionary biologist, and popular science writer who holds the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University. www.richarddawkins.net T...

Author Sam Harris talks about some of the things he wrote about in his recent books. In "The End of Faith" , he argues for the deep link between religion and violence. In "Letter to a Christian Nation," he addresses the arguments made attempting to refute his claims. To monitor comments posted to this topic, use .

"Sin Trek," a "Star Trek" parody from Acceptable TV that gets some laughs at the expense of Evangelical Christianity's rapture mania. To monitor comments posted to this topic, use .

By DagoodS Today, in a parking lot I saw a Bumper Sticker: “TRY JESUS! If you don’t like Him, the devil will always take you back.” There is so much wrong doctrinally and theologically from a Christian standpoint on that sticker, I hardly know where to begin. Yet what it reminded me was of those phrases I often heard, and even as a Christian, did not understand how pragmatically one was supposed to implement them. “Try Jesus.” I know how to try the No. 5 at the local China Buffet. I know how to try Para-sailing. I know how to try on a pair of shorts. How does a person “try” Jesus? Can I take a sample and see how He tastes? How he feels? Whether I am comfortable “trying” Jesus? I think Christianity is an all-or-nothing prospect. What would we say if we heard a Person saying “Oh, I have been trying Jesus for a few years. Seems a pretty good fit, but I’m not certain I want to commit to it yet.” And what are the steps I am to take to “Try Jesus”? Attempt to be a Christian by my ...

A short debate about the $27 Million Dollar Creation Museum which opened on 28-May-07 in Petersburg, Kentucky . John Kasich fills in for Bill O'Reilly in a debate between Ken Ham the Answers in Genesis CEO (which funded the building of the Museum) and Lawrence Krauss , PhD, Professor of Physics, Professor of Astronomy, and former Chair of the Physics Department at Case Western Reserve University . To monitor comments posted to this topic, use .

Is Canada joining the US in a downward spiral into scientific illiteracy? To monitor comments posted to this topic, use .

A couple of stories from Old Testament shot on video in the style of " The Real World ." The Covenant: Sacrificing Issac: To monitor comments posted to this topic, use .

I'm currently reading a manuscript by an aspiring author, Eric Zuesse, entitled "CHRIST'S VENTRILOQUIST: How St. Paul Engineered the Hoax that Shaped Our World." He is hoping to get the book published, and has asked for a little help from the frequenters of ExChristian.net. But first, what is his book all about? He describes his book as the first-ever legal/forensic analysis of the evidence regarding how Christianity started. "Legal/forensic," simply put, is the methodology which is employed in courts of law in a democracy. A court presents to the jury not the largest quantity of evidence regarding a particular matter (as scholars are accustomed to doing via huge bibliographies and numerous footnotes), but instead the highest quality of evidence regarding any specific question. For example, DNA evidence trumps witness testimony, and that's why many people have been released from death rows after the advent of DNA testing. Similarly, the exclusionary r...