dilemma

[Mydian]

I am in the process of trying to garner knowledge of why a person would choose to believe in god. A friend of mine knows a christian who is apparently very extreme, at least from what he has told me about this person. So I mentioned I would like to talk to him. My friend tried to set this up but the person does not want to meet face to face and would rather talk over the phone or through text messages. I know i do not know enough that would swade him from his belief but i am curious as to what type of argument he can come up with. I am by no means as good at debate or even have the knowledge that most of you posses on this forum but i am trying to learn hehe.

I want him to challenge me so that i can further solidify my own thinking. I just think that doing it over the phone or through text would be limiting at best and easy for him to get mad and just hang up.

I do not want to be antagonistic but i do want to be logical. Perhaps I am thinking of this wrong. If any of you have an opinion or think I am totally wrong please feel free to respond. I know i could post here but but i feel inadequate in my knowledge base and would rather talk to someone face to face first to see if my thinking has any merit or if i am going down a wrong path of reasoning.

Thank you in advance for your advice and comments.

[Nilloc James]

Remember logic=good.

Worst comes to worse demand evidence and say any reasonable person would want solid evadence for extravagent claims.

Also don't let them say you can't disprove god. They holdthe burden of proof.

[Fallibleone]

Don't get sucked in by appeals to emotion.

[McCulloch]

Ask why. Why do they believe in God? Why do they accept the Bible as God's revelation (if they do)? Why do they believe in an afterlife?

Challenge the validity of their answers. Are the answers objective and verifiable? Or are the along the lines of "God told me"?

[Mydian]

thank you all for your replies. I told my friend to give him my number so we will see if he even calls me.

[Mydian]

In case anyone wants to know the Christian guy did end up contacting me. I believe he is a lot younger than i am as we mainly discussed through text messaging on our phones. His main argument was God exists because its in the bible. My main argument against this was that men wrote the bible not God so it is what man wants you to believe. Then he got mad said he would never convince me I was too closed minded and i was listening to man not god. I immediately text him back stating i meant no offense to him or his religion but that I used reason to determine what i believe not blind faith.

Now he wants me to call and talk to his dad who apparently "knows" more. That his dad would be able to provide me with answers. So i will attempt to contact his dad and discuss things in a civil manner. So we will see, wish me luck lol

[Cathar1950]

Now he wants me to call and talk to his dad who apparently "knows" more. That his dad would be able to provide me with answers. So i will attempt to contact his dad and discuss things in a civil manner. So we will see, wish me luck lol

Most do need someone that knows more and they are usually apologist repeating the latest old stuff over and over.
It should be fun but there are resources out there.

[Nilloc James]

Good luck, however I doguht the dad will be too much more knowlagable.

[catalyst]

Now he wants me to call and talk to his dad who apparently "knows" more. That his dad would be able to provide me with answers. So i will attempt to contact his dad and discuss things in a civil manner. So we will see, wish me luck lol

Hi and welcome to the forum.

Whether his dad "knows" more or not I suppose will become self evident when you speak with him. As Fallibleone stated though, please don't let him suck you in with emotional pleadings or even attempts to "befriend" you as they are classic traits of someone trained to convert/recruit people. ( I took several courses to perfect the technique during my time as a xian).

I won't wish you luck or say "break a leg"..lol just use common sense and question the fathers comments. Question it ALL. By doing this, I don't doubt he will be like the son, claiming you are the one who has a closed mind, but the irony is when it comes down to it, all he will have is one "book" to gleen his allegedly "broad" world view from. IF however he starts "quoting" tacticus, josephus, pliny et al...let him know that any references to bible jesus these people were purported to have made, even biblical scholars agree that they are latter interpolations and therefore cannot be regarded as evidence to support the bible.

I hope it goes well. If it doesn't, PM me and I will be more than happy to email back and forth with the dad.

Cat..xx

[Mydian]

I finally spoke with the farther. I was trying to talk to the son to get a good time to contact him as i wasn't in a mood to really debate but he went ahead and called I guess it was that need to change me that drove him to heh. And he felt the need to witness to me. To tell me how he had been and how god changed him for the better. I really couldnt do anything with a personal experience except tell him that it was not evidence of the existence of God. He also would never answer my questions directly which i thought was odd. He kept trying to redirect the questioning to something he knew. Which of course was not a lot and I would answer and then go back to my previous question. Seemed like a lot of dodging around the issue rather than any confrontation. In the end he said he would pray for me and we left off i think on pretty good terms. I think he is an ok guy i just dont think he has put a lot of thought into his belief. I still dont think i know enough but I am learning and most of his "knowledge" i had heard before and even had read on this forum. So i think i did well even if i was not totally prepared to debate the topic last night.