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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]^^^^ Every single one of those is an ad hominem fallacy.[/quote]
No. You have asked multiple questions that rely on a literalist definition of Christianity. You've been informed that your understanding of Christian doctrine is incomplete, because text-based literalism does not represent the majority of Christian theology. That's a substantive criticism of the content you are bringing to the discussion, not an attack on you personally.

To summarize some of the questions and answers:
-You asked why Christians believe in eternal hellfire. The answer is that the majority of us are not literalists, so "burning forever" is not our literal belief. Burning in hell might be a metaphor for disconnectedness from God or a commentary on humanity's search for justice in unjust times. But hell is also not the focus of our faith. We focus instead on living a life of love and service.

-You asked how we can believe in the Bible without taking it literally. The answer is that there are centuries of religious thought that have grown around the Bible that inform modern church doctrine. And we believe in the Bible as a guide for our lives, where we can glean wisdom through metaphor, rather than literalism, and that those lessons from God are relevant without being literal about it.

-You asked about politics and the Supreme Court. The answer is that there is a problematic evangelic Christian political lobby that has outsized influence on our laws. You can see it in the abortion debate, where the vast majority of Americans (including religious Americans) support abortion access, even if they would like to limit it to save the life of the mother or "viability" or something else. Where super-restrictive laws have been on the ballot, they have been soundly defeated. It's a problem, of course, that we're in a position to be defending abortion rights from the tyranny of the minority. None of that changes the fact that the majority of Christians are still not literalists.

-You asked why God lets bad things happen. You'll say that the answer is that there is no God. The religious answer is that there isn't actually a knowable answer to this question, but grappling with the question is an exercise in finding meaning in chaos and seeking humanity in crisis.

Were there other questions that you don't feel were answered?[/quote]

PP you are responding to.  I didn't ask any of those questions, and while I did mention the supreme court I did so in response to a claim that biblical literalism wasn't an important thing or a problem.  Those other questions were other posters.

Your responses that followed were all (until this post of yours) laden with ad hominem fallacies.  That was my point.  And it remains proved.[/quote]
Question for you and the other atheists on the thread: Why do you ask questions about what religious people think if you're just going to dismiss the answers?[/quote]

Maybe in hopes of religious people seeing how dumb their answers are and they will rethink their belief in God.  That's how it happened with me.[/quote]
Oh, evangelism. I wonder if that works in this context? Or if the denigration of religion (calling it "dumb" "Bronze Age mythology" and misrepresenting it by the extreme of literalism, rather than addressing the majority's lived belief system) just hardens people into place?[/quote]

Sounds like you're talking about being stubborn - continuing to believe  out of spite because  atheists aren't sensitive enough.

I really did realize how dumb it was to believe in God and religion and an afterlife.  Meanwhile, I was very well educated in science and had just never put it all together.  Science and the afterlife just don't mix.  Darwin saw it too -- which is apparently why he put off publishing his findings for such a long time.  His wife was very religious.[/quote]
I'm talking about the difference between argument and persuasion. Belittling a person is not going to make them amenable to hearing your arguments. It's going to shut them down.[/quote]

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