IvanK

Let's examine just one of them, shall we? I'll exclude less important details from our discussion for now within parentheses:

A man (called Jesus) was crucified (under the authority of Pontius Pilate at the behest of some Jewish leaders because he had blasphemed). He was taken down from the cross the same day that he died, dressed for burial (according to Jewish custom) and laid in a tomb. A woman (called Mary) went to the tomb on the third day and found it empty.

It can be established through the available historical record that the usual custom for treating the bodies of people the Romans crucified was to leave them hanging until they rotted away. Why should this case have been different? Are there any other known instances where a person who was crucified by the Romans was taken down from the cross, dressed for burial and laid in a tomb? Is there any independent historical evidence for this case outside of the Christian tradition? If not, what does that say about the "historically verifiable" claims of the Christian religion? What might that say about the nature of faith with respect to Christian belief?

"Historically verifiable" to me means there should be some independent evidence, that is to say, evidence from other than Christian sources or sources probably corrupted later by Christian hands, for these facts. If you can cite any such evidence for these simple facts our discussion can continue.

Stephen T-B

First of all I would like to thank Atticus-Finch for contributing to this discussion and continuing to chuck balls at us so we can continue whacking them into the far distance.
To our dismay/delight, no matter how far they go, he's always there to catch them. I think he deserves a medal.
At this moment, however, it is a Class II medal rather than a Class I medal because I note that he hasn't addressed a comment I made earlier about the circularity of his logic which means that what he believes in is supported by what he believes in, which leaves those of us out of that loop at a complete loss.
Anyway, moving on, he made a remark about the exclusivity of Christian belief which I enjoyed because it raises an interesting phenomenon.
Judaism, Islam and Christianity all share this same notion of exclusivity, and all three evolved - if I can use that term without upsetting the Creationists - among the Semitic peoples.
Odd?
Maybe, especially when one considers the inclusivity of those other great religions, Hinduism and Buddhism which evolved elsewhere. Are there are others? Not being an authority on world religions, I don't know, but I suspect there are, and that there are many of them.
But back to our Semitic trio: their exclusive nature is reproduced, like an infection, among their followers to the extent that leaders who emerge with variant interpretations of what precisely god requires apply that same principle of exclusivity to their adherents:they alone will get to heaven/paradise/Abraham's bosom because they alone know what's needed in ordr to do so.
Fragmentation has occurred in all three religions, but because of historical/cultural reasons it is most prevalent in Christianity in which the number of sects, all claiming unique knowledge of the Truth and the Way, has grown to a vast number.
Attempts to find uniting principles so that Believers can somehow me glued together are doomed to failure for the very reasons that Atticus-Finch has articulated.