Analyzing Christianity
My Breath Caught in My Throat.
In the wake of the murder of an atheist blogger at the hands of religious extremists, we examine the kinship of extremism in Christianity and Islam.
Analyzing Christianity
The Handbook: The second big mistake apologists make
Last time we talked about apologists, we talked about their first big mistake: that they start with a conclusion and find some kind of logic that will get them to that conclusion. That’s called arguing top-down. In bottom-up arguing, one starts with observations and measurements and builds the argument around Read more
Analyzing Christianity
The Handbook: The first fundamental mistake apologists make
The first fundamental mistake apologists make is that they don’t actually refer to any facts to make their various arguments, making their conclusions highly suspect. Indeed, apologists really can’t do that. It’s almost unfair even to make the request that they do so. After all: There is not one single demonstrable bit of objective evidence about the supernatural to which they actually could refer.
Analyzing Christianity
The Handbook: Examining the Evidence
I wasn’t stupid, willfully-ignorant, or mentally will when I made the decision to become a fundamentalist, and I really don’t like it when someone implies that about anyone. I thought the religion had evidence supporting its claims. On that count I was wrong, and here’s the list of what I was wrong about.
Analyzing Christianity
The Handbook: Learning to Move Past Religious Narcissism
We recently added another line to that cosmic address–did you notice? After “Virgo supercluster,” we now have Laniakea, a galactic supercluster that comprises Virgo and some other local superclusters. Scientists have figured out how to tell what galaxies and groups are part of our galactic supercluster, and in addition and almost as importantly, they finally have a model of it that fits predictions and equations both. And that discovery has spoken to me on a very fundamental level.
Analyzing Christianity
The Handbook: Unlearning a Rather Distorted Narcissism
It’s a seductive storyline. I can’t deny that. It’s powerfully alluring. Just imagine: You’re the klutzy, totally undeserving, inexperienced, vastly underpowered childlike person who catches the eye of some huge, unthinkably powerful, completely in-control and self-possessed being whose monstrous will and complete focus lands, laser-like and pinpoint-accurate, on you. You Read more
Analyzing Christianity
The Handbook: Generalizations and the Mommy Wars
We talked last time about a minister’s wife who is convinced she knows exactly how to nail this motherhood thing. I wanted to talk a little more about something in it that we only briefly touched on last time: this idea that we often see in Christians that what works Read more
Analyzing Christianity
The Handbook: Generalizing, Judging, and Shaming
Welcome back! I hope y’all’s weekends were fantabulous. I’m likely recovering from another one of those shots in the back as you read these words, so let’s all hope that Future Me is doing all right. Monday Night Me is doing fine for now. Today I want to talk about Read more
Analyzing Christianity
The Handbook: Building a Worldview Around Consent.
One of the biggest shifts I had to process in my thinking was my understanding of consent. Not to make it sound all dramatic or anything, but it was about the biggest 180 I could possibly have made, and chances are some of y’all are facing that same challenge now.
Analyzing Christianity
The Handbook: Understanding the Straw Man.
Christians are very, very fond of telling everybody who’ll listen that they just love non-believers. Oh my, they just love us to death. But if they keep talking, a curious thing happens: they show us exactly what they’re really thinking.