> I think this testimony really gets to the heart
>of the problem. I have participated in other
>forums where one particular person (occasionally
>supported by others) attempts to have his
>questions about God, faith, etc., answered by a
>variety of people who do believe in God et al.
>These discussion become an exercise in
>frustration for all parties involved. I think
>the reason for this is that us believers do not
>talk enough about the real reason we believe.

What *is* the real reason you believe, then? My reasons for believing in things are always (or at least, as close enough to always as I can possibly make them) based on supporting evidence external to myself. I may firmly believe that chocolate ice cream is far superior to vanilla ice cream, but I don't ever claim as Truth that "Chocolate ice cream is better than Vanilla ice cream" because I know that the only evidence I have for this is internal and therefore necessarily subjective.

But if I'm going to present something as Truth to somebody else, I damn well make sure I have evidence external to my own thoughts and feelings to back that up. If I need to convince someone that gravity pulls equally on all objects, I don't rely on my own internal thoughts about this. I can either prove mathematically that it is so, or I can do a simple experiment to show the person.

This thread started as a heated argument and quickly cooled into a more civil debate about the nature of Truth and the convictions of people who claim to have found it. We've sort of moved tangetally from there into the issue we're on now, which is the external evidence for the existence of God, the historical man Jesus, and the events described in the Bible. To me it all goes back to the original topic of Truth, but the new way of approaching the discussion has certainly proved to be more fruitful than the last way we tried.

> Let me try to explain it this way: we have a
>group of people saying, "I believe in D." Then
>we have one person saying, "I don't believe in
>D. Why do you believe in D?" The other people
>say, "It's because A + B = C." The one person
>doesn't agree at first, until sundry people
>produce solid proof. But then the one person
>says, "Even so, that doesn't prove D. You
>haven't answered my question." This continues.
>Perhaps the group of people will mention that C -
> B = A. Regardless, discussion will continue in
>this fashion, until people gradually lose
>interest and then quit.

Well, that's what we *were* doing anyway. We're not doing it anymore because it wasn't getting us anywhere. I can follow A + B = C, but you're right, that doesn't in any way prove D, and may not even *relate* to D. I'm convinced of the idea that to get to D you have to use tools other than straight reason and logic. I'm still not convinced that that is a valid path to take, however, and I'm certainly not convinced that you can then claim to have Truth.

> Occasionally, we get a different perspective,
>like that of Mr. Monkey here.

Don's experience is certainly worthy of thought, but I've seen enough demonstrations of hypnotism and read enough about spiritual practices such as Voodoo and Shamanism to know that Chrstianity by no means has an exclusive claim to spiritual occurances such as this. To me, if this proves anything other than "people are impressionable and the power of suggestion is indeed powerful" (and my first thought on the matter is that it does not) then all it shows is that there *is* something unexplained going on, not that it necessarily proves that the Holy Ghost is working through Don and his churchmates.

> I think it is fairly obvious to Dave that we do
>not have a logical and rational answer for him.
>I know that I could never provide one that would
>be completely convincing either. This is
>because my belief has no roots in logic or
>rationality. And I believe that this is the
>only way to communicate such a belief.

You're actually the first person to claim this at all. In fact, the reason we're having this debate at *all* is because others are insisting they *do* have a logical and rational basis for their beliefs. If all the religious people on this board came out and said "I believe because I want to, and I have no basis for it other than that" the debate would be over. There's no real point in discussing people's internal thoughts and beliefs that have no basis in anything other than personal taste. You don't ask a person why they don't like blueberries, they just don't like blueberries. But the very reason we're even debating this is that Grishny and Sam and Don and other Christians are making the claim that they *do* have rational, logical, external reasons for believing as they do, and therefore have a claim to Truth.

-- Dave