Hey FrGamble!

Quote: FrGamble

You guys are cracking me up with agenda and closed mindedness.

You crack me up that you believe archaic
nonsense is actually real, with zero evidence
to back it up. Less than zero, actually. Logic
and common sense are against you.

How is logic and common sense against the existence of God? Are you getting tired of being the only voice saying there is no evidence. There are miracles, personal experiences, historical evidence, the fact there is something rather than nothing, many modern scientific discoveries point towards God's existence, the witness of the saints and countless other good people, the coherance of the Christian teachings, the reasonableness of the answers Christianity provides to our biggest questions, etc. Can you be specific in why none of this is evidence for God's existence?

Quote: FrGamble

Can you be specific in why none of this is evidence for God's existence?

It's only evidence if you want it to be.
If you have no opinion going in, it's
not evidence at all. Think of the progress
you'll have made when someday you
realize all you have is faith to go on.
Which I think is what your god myth
requires.

I've repeated this story before. Joe Campell
was swimming in the pool with the
Monsignor one day. The priest asked him
if he believed in god. He answered that
he had once, but not anymore. The priest
replied "I suppose there is no provable evidence
of gods existence." To which Campbell
replied: "If there were, father, what would
be the point of faith."

Exactly.

Evidence does not replace faith. God gives us an intellect not just to ignore it when we believe in something, but rather to know what we believe is reasonable and not something illogical like believing in Zeus or even worse thinking there is no God.

That conversation with Joe Campbell only makes sense if they were discussing proof of God not the available evidence that exists. We don't have proof of a lot of the things we believe, but we have reasonable evidence that inspires faith.

Quote: FrGamble

I think you answered your question at the end of your post with the example of atoms that exist whether or not people believe so or not.

Now to the question of do number of people who believe something make it true or not. I think I have mentioned it many times before but this is a logical fallacy. However, if Zeus was real it stands to reason that were would be believers. The fact that there are not is some evidence that points strongly towards the fact that he does not exist. This is further brought out by the rest of the difficulties that a belief in Zeus must overcome.

Yet you keep mentioning, often as your first reason, that the number of believers in god somehow proves that he is real. You also point to the longevity of the religion as proof, but only when it is your religion that you are talking about. Yes, they are logical fallacies, and you keep using them!

Whether or not Zeus has followers, god has followers, or people believe atoms exist also has NOTHING to do with whether or not any of those things exist. It is again another logical fallacy that you keep trotting out, and I keep trying to point out that things that EVERYONE believed to be true at one point or another have been subsequently shown to be not true.

In short, telling me that a lot of people believe something, or that people have believed something for a long time, does nothing to convince me that what they believe is true. I need to know WHY they believe in something, and I need to find the evidence to be convincing.

Look, in America, the number of christians is declining. People are being lost to other religions, or to more generic "non-affiliated" religions, and to atheism and agnosticism. This is particularly pronounced among younger people. See http://www.pewforum.org/2015/05/12/americas-changing-religious-landscape/
More and more people are becoming unconvinced, and are either shifting to a non-christian religion, a non-affiliated christian religion, or no religion at all.

I'm sure you are already aware of these declining numbers, at least of Catholics. The question I also ask here is WHY? That webpage doesn't reveal the why, just the what. To me, the why is very important. I'm sure it is important to you, too. Since the webpage doesn't say why, any reasons we come up with are going to be opinion and speculation, unless you find something else to back them up.

The first "why" might be that people don't believe in something about a religion anymore. Not sure what, but from there you should immediately ask why don't they believe in the religion, or something about the religion, anymore?

If you follow this for a while, you might be able to draw some conclusions. One conclusion might be that society is collapsing. Another might be that people are wising-up. But, that is pretty far down the analysis chain. I'm sure it is also something that the leadership of the major religions have discussed.

Edit: I was reading the webpage again, and noticed that there is more than one page. I only read the overview/summary on page 1. The "whys" might be in the later pages.

Quote: Dalex64

I'm sure you are already aware of these declining numbers, at least of Catholics. The question I also ask here is WHY? .

That's easy. All religions eventually lose their
usefulness and fade away, to be replaced by
a different brand. The purpose of modern
Christianity isn't to 'save' anybody, it's to
provide a social atmosphere for members
to meet, have fun. That's why so many churches
look like a movie studio/rock concert stage
inside now. They have to keep gearing it
up to keep peoples attention.

The new religion for young people is social
media. As it continues to grow, it will become
their answer to church and religion. It will
grow and religion will fade away, it's happening
already. It has to if we have any hope of
moving into a productive future.

Quote: Dalex64

Yet you keep mentioning, often as your first reason, that the number of believers in god somehow proves that he is real.

I keep trying to mention that I am in no way saying that the number of people believing in something makes it real, ONLY that when so many people do believe something that there might be something to it. That we should be careful in calling billions and billions of people wrong in a fundamental and strong belief they hold to dearly. I think you can respect that as evidence we should consider. I continue to scratch my head why so many people like Donald Trump. It is NOT proof that he is right, but that something about what he is saying carries with it some meaning that resonates with others. It would be foolish to not recognize this.

Quote:

In short, telling me that a lot of people believe something, or that people have believed something for a long time, does nothing to convince me that what they believe is true. I need to know WHY they believe in something, and I need to find the evidence to be convincing.

Yes, the why is what we should be looking for. With the reality of a contingent universe that does not explain its own existence we need to find a cause. In order to avoid an infinite regress there needs to be an non-contingent cause that hold existence in itself that began everything out of nothing. This cause must be truly eternal, outside of time and space, spiritual, and all-powerful. This is what we all call God. This is the philosophical evidence for God's existence and the why for God's existence.

The question still remains after the obviousness of God's necessary existence are understood as to why this matters. It explains why there is something rather than nothing, however for it to truly matter this "God" needs to answer other questions for us. Is there meaning and purpose to the universe? Why do we have consciousness and intelligence to ask these questions? Are there universal moral laws and objective truths?

Quote:

I'm sure you are already aware of these declining numbers, at least of Catholics. The question I also ask here is WHY? That webpage doesn't reveal the why, just the what. To me, the why is very important. I'm sure it is important to you, too. Since the webpage doesn't say why, any reasons we come up with are going to be opinion and speculation, unless you find something else to back them up.

The first "why" might be that people don't believe in something about a religion anymore. Not sure what, but from there you should immediately ask why don't they believe in the religion, or something about the religion, anymore?

If you follow this for a while, you might be able to draw some conclusions. One conclusion might be that society is collapsing. Another might be that people are wising-up. But, that is pretty far down the analysis chain. I'm sure it is also something that the leadership of the major religions have discussed.

This is a really good question and worth discussion. I think society is falling victim to a secular materialism. We believe more and more, especially in America and Europe, that our happiness can be found in things, technology, and entertainment. The result is the dumbing down of society the abandonment of good philosophical thinking. We are not wising up we are dumbing down. We don't like anything that challenges us or makes us uncomfortable so we accept a worldview that rejects God and moral requirements. Live for yourself and do whatever makes you happy. So we legalize drugs, make sex a commodity, and chain ourselves to computer and tv screens. The fact that religion, especially in young people, is declining is like a canary in a cave. If we don't recognize the warning that our environment, literally and spiritually, is becoming poisonous we are all in serious trouble.

Quote: FrGamble

Live for yourself and do whatever makes you happy. So we legalize drugs, make sex a commodity, and chain ourselves to computer and tv screens. .

And you think Christians live in communes
and wear hand me down clothes and eat
humble meals while waiting for Jesus to
come and get them?

They drive new cars, take out 30 year
mortgages on McMansions, send their
kids to expensive private schools, and
have 60" TV's, just like everybody else.

My brother in law is a Catholic and his
parents live in an 8 bedroom house with
a pool. Spare us your pious nonsense
about secular people. There's a bishop
in NYC who got into trouble recently because
it was found out he lives in a half million
dollar home.

Quote: FrGamble

The question still remains after the obviousness of God's necessary existence are understood as to why this matters. It explains why there is something rather than nothing, however for it to truly matter this "God" needs to answer other questions for us. Is there meaning and purpose to the universe? Why do we have consciousness and intelligence to ask these questions? Are there universal moral laws and objective truths?

I still have issues with these statements.

If a god was required to create the universe, how can you possibly know that it was your god? If it wasn't your god but rather some other unseen force, as I think you have suggested as an acceptable proposition before, then your god is not the first mover or the ultimate cause, and himself was caused by another. Still, there is a huge gap in unrecorded history between the creation of the universe and the story of Adam and Eve. Seeing as there was no one to witness anything before Adam and Eve, I don't know how you can be certain at all what happened between the time of the creation of the universe and the formation of Adam and Eve and the start of history via oral tradition. (I'm assuming. we know people didn't discover written language for some time)

Why do we have to have a meaning and a purpose? It seems to me that our desire to find meaning and purpose is a byproduct of our consciousness and intelligence. our desire to seek it, not proof that one exists.

Consciousness and intelligence are a byproduct of our brains, the most complicated brains on the planet. We can look at simpler brains, and see more limited intelligence, and even limited consciousness. We can chemically and physically block our brains from providing us with intelligence and consciousness. If you want to suggest that our souls and consciousness exist outside of the body or the universe, that would be interesting, especially if that means we have found a physical or chemical way to block the connection between our bodies and our extra-universe-residing consciousness.

If god did give us consciousness, I suggest he gave it to us via complex brains.

universal moral laws and objective truths... are relative to the societies that created them. I'm sure you wouldn't agree that we should strike all of the morals that aren't held in common with the other abrahamic religions, or the other religions that you say still ultimately derived their law from your god. These universal moral laws and objective truths are in a constant state of flux. you yourself has said that your religion is the apex of this change or evolution or revelation, or whatever you want to call it. How can you know that this is the final evolution, and there won't be a post-christian revelation that is even more true? How can you know that yours is the correct truth, compared to the other current religions? How can you know that this truth didn't already exist in the past, and we have moved away from it? All of that still presumes that there IS a universal moral law and objective truths, and they aren't just another thing that our minds SEEK and DEFINE, but may not exist.

Quote: Evenbob

They drive new cars, take out 30 year
mortgages on McMansions, send their
kids to expensive private schools, and
have 60" TV's, just like everybody else.

Hence the decline in religion.

Quote:

Spare us your pious nonsense
about secular people. There's a bishop
in NYC who got into trouble recently because
it was found out he lives in a half million
dollar home.

Its not pious nonsense. The secular mentality is promoting a false salvation that comes from material possessions that is more and more disappointing for people and causing great unhappiness. One of the byproducts of this is an increase in drug use, the epidemic of suicide, and increased violence throughout society. If we are to turn this around we have to recover a sense of happiness that is found in God, community, education, the arts, and loving service of each other - exactly what religion promotes.