Tercel

Well Stephen, here's one that doesn't. Same applies to you too: Goodbye 100% claim.

Given that many claim to have a Personal-Relationship-With-God and/or talk to and listen to God daily, it's understandable that they should view his existence as something they "know" rather than "believe". I think it's fair to say that I "know" you exist rather than just "believe" it.

I'm afraid I don't share your opinon. Whether or not it has to do with rational judgement is up to the individual. Personally I like rational judgement and have spent the last 3 years in fairly intensive analysis of my beliefs: And it is my considered opinion that they do stand up to rational analysis. Many of my friends don't bother with rational judgement and know about as much about theology as they know about how a toilet works. It's a personal preference.

Isn't it a bit narrow minded to think that your personal opinon represents objective truth?

An interesting thesis... I can't say I remember ever hearing any Christian go "WA".

So these objectively valid reasons can be discounted by justifications that can be devised with a little effort?

Why is the point to annoy them? I'm sure there's an equal number of witty comments they could use to annoy atheists.

This always strikes me as one of the worse claimed "errors". I think there are plenty of actual errors and contradictions in the Bible, so you could at least use those instead of claiming easily-explanable ones - it makes your case look weak to the inerrantists. In this case the obvious solution is that it's a vision (See also Luke's version of the story).

I'm always rather bemused when I read these statements. Come on people you're supposed to be intelligent thinkers, capable reasoners, brilliant logicians etc. How do you decide what you believe when you read the newspaper - after all (~gasp~) some of it could be wrong! And how do you decide what to believe out of what you see on TV - some of that could be wrong too! Would you have us admit defeat and fall over saying "well since I can't be sure what's true and what's not I'll just believe nothing instead"?

Well to some extent they already do and always have done. Expecting every difference to vanish is like expecting every politician to agree, but the failure of that is no reason to abolish government. But all Christians have for the past 16 centuries accepted the Nicene-Constantinopolitan creed as a universal statement of Christian doctrine.

Tercel

The situation is a rather complex one. The first obvious question is: What are Jesus' teachings?
The four Gospels in the Bible record some teachings, gospels that didn't make it into the Bible record others (not that I personally give much creedence to them, I merely mention them for the sake of completeness), given that I don't accept inerrancy I am not committed to the belief that Jesus really said everything recorded in the four that did.
After all, the four present rather different views of Jesus and him saying some rather differing things.

I can accept some teachings and reject others depending on how sure I am about whether Jesus really said what is claimed he did or something tolerably close. This surety or lack of it can be gained from a study of scholarly works regarding important passages, comparision with other more sure teachings etc. In many cases I simply can't be sure with any remotely reasonable degree of certainty whether or not Jesus said it, in which case I'm inclined to simply accept the teaching if it fits with my (already established from my overall understanding of Christianity) theology and reject it if it doesn't.

Why don't you ask your friend the same question you asked me?
Jesus never mentions Hell as a lake of fire - that's in Revelation (a rather dubious book, if you want my opinion). Jesus' "hell" is destroyed by being thrown into the lake of fire in Revelation.
Personally I go with the Orthodox/moderate-liberal Protestant teachings on hell, which most certainly do not include a literal lake of fire.

Some of what it says conflicts with other parts, and some ideas conflict with other ideas. To get a coherent theology you have got to dismiss or ignore some parts of it.
And the Bible is a collection of books, not a book.

Vinnie

I think Tercel may have forgotten "scholar". Very few Christian scolars today hold that conscious faith in this life of the work of Jesus on the Cross is required for salvation. Many lay Christians don't as well but they don't know it

Now many conservatives have inconsistent views on this.

They will say Jesus is the only way.

Now even if Jesus' death was objectively necessary for salvation then it does not necessarily follow that we must "know" about his work to recieve the benefits of it.

But many Christians do think that conscious fiath in Jesus is required for salvation in this life. That is why people ask about "those who never hear" and "babies who die in infancy." That is the reason for your "must hear the word to be saved".

But these same Christians also believe that babies who die in infancy do not necessarily go to hell. Some do, don't get me wrong. I've seen people express this view but the majority today, from my experiences do not.

Now these two claims are mutually exclusive as they were just formulated. But Christians hold to them all the time! Lets look:

Conscious faith in the work of the historical Jesus in this life is the only way to heaven/salvation/Father (Yes im equivocating a little but the terms are irrelevant)

Babies who die may still be saved.

Obviously if p (knowledge of the work) is strictly required for q (salvation) babies cannot be saved. So their belief system is inconsistent here.

P is not necessary for q but I would say that p (knowledge of the work of Christ) is a very good means of obtaining q.

Christians largely take John's "I am the only way to the Father" and mesh it with a few other verses and it gets equated into "everyone must have conscious faith in the work of Jesus to be saved."

Of course, knowledge of Jesus' work should be an effective means of pulling one to God but saying that we must have this knowledge makes intellectual belief a salvific criterion--and that is not a good thing.

See my wider-hope theory page for more information on this stuff:
http://www.acfaith.com/widerhope.html

Vinnie