I really enjoyed watching the video below of a British atheist named Pat Condell. Supposedly addressed to "angry Christians," the video is actually more illuminating about atheists. Condell is ostensibly chastizing Christians for burning with inward rage and for secretly wanting people to burn in hell. Actually, I don't know a single Christian who fits this description, although perhaps there are some.
What is obvious for all to see is what a smug, self-satisfied character Condell is. On his website he boasts, "Hi, I'm Pat Condell. I don't respect your beliefs and I don't care if you're offended." Religion has its uses, he concedes. "I turn to it whenever I want my intelligence insulted." Ordinarily I wouldn't pay much attention to this guy, but in a strange way I think his attitude mirrors that of the big-name atheists like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens. If the televangelists are guilty of producing some simple-minded, self-righteous Christians, then the atheist authors are guilty of producing self-congratulatory buffoons like Condell.
Only Condell doesn't know he is a buffoon. He regards himself as super-sophisticated, a man of knowledge. Yet consider his argument in the video that Christ probably didn't exist. Condell says Christ's historicity is based on "hearsay." But all historical evidence is "hearsay," including the evidence for the existence of Voltaire and George Washington. In reality there is more evidence for Christ's existence than there is for the existence of most of the figures of the ancient world. Do you believe that Socrates existed? Alexander the Great? Julius Caesar? Think about this: we only know about Socrates because of Plato and Xenophon, and there are only a couple of sources for Alexander and Caesar. The documentary evidence for these men is limited to very few manuscripts which are sometimes dated centuries later. Yet no historian doubts that these men existed.
By contrast, Christ's existence is attested not only by the writers of the gospels and the Acts of the Apostles, who wrote in the first hundred years after Christ's death, but also because of Jewish, Greek and Roman sources, such as Josephus, Suetonius, Pliny, and Tacitus. There are innumerable early manuscripts of the gospels and they have been assiduously compared to establish their authenticity. The early church and its martyrs who risked death rather than renounce Christ all suggest that there was a man behind it all, a man who was crucified and who was believed by his disciples to have risen. Whatever you think of the miracles, no serious historian questions the historicity of Christ.
Next month my book What's So Great About Christianity hits the shelves, and atheists are going to find that they no longer have the public field to themselves. In fact, I'm scheduled to debate Christopher Hitchens in New York city October 22. So far Hitchens has been foraging around around the country beating up pastors who are unaccustomed to dealing with spear-chuckers like him. Mine is a book that will empower believers and challenge unbelievers. It meets skepticism and atheism on its own intellectual ground, which is the ground of reason and evidence. Michael Shermer, editor of "Skeptic" magazine, says of my book, "It takes the debate to a new level. Read it." And here is my old debating rival Stanley Fish, a noted scholar who hardly shares either my theology or my politics: "The great merit of this book is that it concedes nothing. Rather than engaging in the usual defensive ploys, D'Souza meets every anti-God argument head on and defeats it on its own terms. Infinitely more sophisticated than the rants produced by Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens, What's So Great About Christianity leaves those atheist books in the dust." If you are ready for the challenge, preorder the book here.
Reader Comments ( Page 59 of 62)
871. Intended to. My my. I know things but you guys dont respect me or something. What am I not man enough for you? Am I the commercials you put on mute?
Michelle at 10:43PM on Oct 5th 2007
872. WRONG pathological liar ray,
Polygamy has to start with at least one marriage because you can't be polygamous if you aren't already married! Thus you have to have 1 marriage before you can be in a polygamous arrangement! IDIOT! MORON!
Knight_of_BAAWA at 10:46PM on Oct 5th 2007
873. FINALLY YOU ADMIT IT
You wrote: "Thus you have to have 1 marriage BEFORE you can be in a polygamous arrangement!"
That is what I have been saying!
Note your own word BEFORE! You have to have ONE marriage BEFORE you can be in a polygamous marriage. Which means while you are in that first marraige, YOU WERE NOT POLYGAMOUS YET. Hence, the polygamy BEGAN with the 2nd marriage.
Just swallow your pride and admit you are wrong.
ray at 10:57PM on Oct 5th 2007
874. Michelle, not ignoring you. Just preoccupied.
For the record, I do not believe that all blondes are dumb. I read the posts (#845 & 846) between you and pboy to my wife (who is blonde) and she got the joke.
BTW - when you factor in your earlier post (843, "knock knock") I can understand you not catching the joke.
ray at 11:01PM on Oct 5th 2007
875. I always said it, pathological liar ray,
You just kept lying and saying that I didn't say it.
Poor pathological liar ray. Even when he thinks he's right, he's wrong.
Just swallow your pride and admit that you're wrong, pathological liar ray.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 11:02PM on Oct 5th 2007
876. Oh that’s right. You also said, “2 = at least 1”
“orthogonal = parallel”
Now “polygamy starts with at least one marriage” = “you have to have 1 marriage before you can be in a polygamous arrangement”
Well at least you admit that polygamy begins with n = 2.
ray at 11:36PM on Oct 5th 2007
877. BTW, take a look at your phrase "polygamy starts with at least one marriage"
Technically, you are arguing that polygamy could start with 5 marriages. After all, 5 satisfy the requirement of "at least 1".
ray at 11:40PM on Oct 5th 2007
878. Let's count the lies in ray the pathological liar's post #876
"You said [meaning me] 2 = at least 1”
Lie #1. I never said that.
“orthogonal = parallel”
Lie #2. I never said that.
"Now “polygamy starts with at least one marriage” = “you have to have 1 marriage before you can be in a polygamous arrangement”
Lie #3. I never said that.
btw: your entire post was a lie. Do you EVER post something truthful, ray? Why can't you be honest? Has christianity made you so hateful of the truth?
Knight_of_BAAWA at 11:49PM on Oct 5th 2007
879. Ray, I figured out 845 now. It clicked. No, I am not a "dumb blonde". I am not even a blonde. Sometimes I just have to put together the facts in my brain.
So Pboy, I dont appreciate your snap at my flatulence possibilities. I can rip with the best of um! No beans required.
Michelle at 12:44AM on Oct 6th 2007
880. Responding to 878:
[ from 878: "You said [meaning me] 2 = at least 1” Lie #1. I never said that.”]
YES YOU DID.
In 842, I wrote: “You have to have at least TWO gods to be polytheistic. "Poly" means MORE THAN ONE! As in polymer, polyethylene, polyvinyl, etc. Get it?
In 847, you responded: “You can't have 2 without having at least 1, ray”
[From 878, you wrote: “orthogonal = parallel” Lie #2. I never said that.]
YES YOU DID.
In 833, you wrote: “we can see that agnosticism is orthogonal to, and not colinear, atheism and theism”
In 840, I responded: “How can two lines intersect …?”
In 847, you wrote: “Now then, I have no idea what the pathological liar is talking about wrt "parallel lines intersecting".
[From 878, you wrote: "Now “polygamy starts with at least one marriage” = “you have to have 1 marriage before you can be in a polygamous arrangement” Lie #3. I never said that.]
YES YOU DID.
In 867, you wrote: “polygamy starts with at least one marriage”
In 872, you wrote: “Thus you have to have 1 marriage before you can be in a polygamous arrangement.”
Slam dunk – Knight s the liar! Filleted right in front of everybody. Enjoy it people, the loser has been humiliated and defeated once again for all to see. Please, show him pity.
ray at 1:50AM on Oct 6th 2007
881. Now what?
pboyfloyd at 2:49AM on Oct 6th 2007
882. pathological liar ray,
I proved that you lied. It was a slam-dunk. Now you're trying to evade that. How cowardly.
ray, for the good of yourself: STOP LYING!
Now then, I never said that 2 is at least 1, nor that orthogonal = parallel (because the parallel lines intersecting wasn't about orthogonality, but ray the pathological liar wants it to be about that. But that's because he's a pathological liar), we can see that ray once again has lied his way through an entire post.
ray: STOP LYING! I don't even pity you. I think you're just sick.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 8:19AM on Oct 6th 2007
883. To get back on topic...
I think that the atheist is smug... because he knows... he knows that it is simply pointless to shove your existential angst back one lousy step.
Why are we here...oh .. boohoo.. why are we here? Well, it's to get to Heaven...
... don't you imagine that when you get to Heaven you are going to be asking yourself... why am I here... oh ...boohoo... why am I here?
...or are Christians not thinking that far ahead?
pboyfloyd at 12:20PM on Oct 6th 2007
884. Eww, eww!
I thought that far ahead, teacher! I thought that far ahead!
Michelle at 9:46PM on Oct 6th 2007
885. Oh, yea... Michelle...
... and what was the upshot of your thinking then?
pboyfloyd at 10:17PM on Oct 6th 2007