AlbertoT, the Christian faith is based on the Bible, that's agreed by all Christian factions, but they do not agree on how to interpret the Bible. Most Christians see the bible as a work inspired by God, containing human thoughts about God, moral advices, poesy, parables, fables, and literature. They certainly dont see it as a history book and dont think that the fables really happened.
True indeed, but it's also the obvious reason why I have far more problems with the fundamentalist ideas (read: mainly only their interpretations of the Bible or in case of different religions the different holy scriptures). I respect either way. It's definitely not wrong to look at the Bible as something valuable in terms of literature, psychology, philosophy, morality and what more. It's reason number one why I think it's actually good for people to read through the Bible. I don't agree with organized religion in general for various reasons, but religious philosophy is very interesting.
Sadly the 'history book' belief by some Christians is used by Atheists to show that Christian faith is immoral, which it isn't.
Yeah. Most atheists have issues with the fact that the belief is based upon faith as the evidence for this 'truth' though. I don't agree that this is somehow only true for Christians with the 'history book' belief of the Bible. The faith basically is the immorality at hand. It may sound disrespectful, but the blindness people seem to rely upon is immoral. Especially when there are great arguments and when there is actual physical evidence that suggests many different stories. I'm not against the belief in God(s), but it's striking how many people seem to believe for practically no reason or who have never really given it much thought. Of course it's a bit different for those who think of the Bible as a nice book but nothing more, but only believing in a God doesn't make you a Christian, right? I mean, believing in a God makes you a theist. So, there must still be reasons why people think their 'Christian' God is the 'correct' God to believe in. You don't become a Christian, just because you live in a Christian country and happen to believe in a God. After all, that would be illogical, right?
Anyways, my point is, I've talked to many people that claimed to be (non-fundamentalist) Christians, but turned out to really be more agnostic about their true beliefs.
Most Christians accept logic, history and science like anyone else.
As long as it doesn't interfere with their deeper religious beliefs this is certainly true. But take for example the evolution theory and lots of moderate Christians
will sort of question science. It's difficult not to generalize here as there also are many (european) Christians that do accept the theory of evolution. But it's easy for moderate Christians to accept that their cars and what not are functioning because of science on one hand, but at the same time there's this serious hesitation when it comes to different kinds of scientific theories such as the theory of evolution or even basic history.
The Bible was inspired by God, but written by humans, with all their weaknesses, errors and in the context of their society, and often hundreds of years after the events that they describe, when the events are already faded behind fables and legends.
I know you were talking about what Christians tend to believe in, but when it comes to accepting logic, history and science.... what ever happened to the conclusion that seems to make more sense? Like; God was invented by humans and the Bible is just part of that? After all, Gods don't write books, humans do.
I guess perhaps believing in God (of the Bible) ultimately stands directly in the way of accepting logic, history and science here?
Cheers
