This morning about 2:30 I was in my friend's apartment with a few guys, just shooting the bull and such. I happened to mention in passing about a Evolution case in Louisiana. My bud's roomate, who might be the last Enlightenment Rationalist left on earth, heard his faith being discussed and came in the room trying to "debate" me on evolution. I was half awake and told him that I was merely stating a legal case, not attacking his god. I then started talking about the evils of humanism and how no Christian can be a humanist. He said "Why Not?"

I said that whenever man makes hismelf out to be his own standard and his own lawgiver, he becomes his own god. He disagreed. I repeated my above statement.
He said he had Jesus's words on his side.
I disagreed and began quoting Jesus and said that he must bow to Jesus's lordship.
He began spewing off this "love" claptrap.
I said that he must bow to ALL of Jesus's revelation.
He said he picked and choosed what he wanted
I said, "By What Standard?"
He: My Own reason.
I think I held the ground well after he said that but he shifted teh debate to another topic.
Paul,
I need your help here. He kept appealing to Kant's Categorical Imperative. He defined it as a secular version of Jesus's Golden Rule and that it was the absolute standard for judging morality. How does one argue with liberals who at least appeal to the cudly teachings of Jesus? then again, it was at three inthe morning at that time.

__________________
J. B. Atken
John Knox PCA
Layman, M.A. student at Louisiana College

__________________
Nathan Olaf Brandal
First Baptist Church of Kirkland

"Man is nothing: he hath a free will to go to hell, but none to go to heaven, till God worketh in him to will and to do his good pleasure"
GEORGE WHITEFIELD TO JOHN WESLEY

My Blog

He also made the goofy statement that he uses philosophy to critique the Bible. I said philosophy is not internally consistent, as philosophers have disagreed.
He said that he takes the best of Nietzche to supplement what Jesus left out.
I said when it comes down to it and one differs with the other, who is right?
I can't remember what else I said. It is slowly coming back to me.

>>>I said, "By What Standard?"
He: My Own reason.
I think I held the ground well after he said that but he shifted the debate to another topic.<<<

Typical that he would shift the debate. When push comes to shove the atheist and/or secularist can't find any solid ground upon which to stand.

Your constant question - "by what standard?" - is right to the point. It's their Achilees Heel. It leads us then to other questions: "Who makes the standards?" "What criteria do they use to define the standards?" "Who, and why, do particular people have the authority to decide what criteria is used to define the standards?"

IOW, an entire plethora of questions constantly pointing back to their own individualistic subjectivity. When all is said and done the atheist/secularist stands only upon their own opinion. And anyone's particular opinion has no more weight or authority than anyone else's opinion - except if force is used. After all, there is no reason one has to accept Kant's categorical imperative. Viewing others as "ends in themselves" is merely an opinion. That is, unless, we're *forced* to accept it.

And that's what all atheist/secularist values come down to ... force. Their talk about "love" can easily be contradicted by anyone whose opinion is the opposite - hate. Hence there is no reason an atheist/secularist can give to prove Stalin and Pol Pot wrong. The reason and logic of these men is every bit as authoritative as those who claim love, reason, harmony, etc.

The finality of the atheist/secularist's point of view is that it's absolutely meaningless. There is no reason for the existence of anything - from the universe on down to an individual person - except chaos. It's all accidental, random collision that results in the bio-chemical reaction we call "consciousness." When it ends, there's nothing.

In fact, the earth, the solar system and our own galaxy will one day come to an end. And the universe is so large that it won't even be noticed. So what difference does *any* standard make?

I've often told atheists/secularists that if I were ever convinced that there is no life after death, that existence is merely an accident, then my own standard would allow me to butcher all the children in a neo-natal unit before taking my own life. After all, what difference would it make? It wouldn't be wrong, or evil. It would merely be meaningless. Like everything else.

Continue the good fight. Remember ... your opponent has nothing to stand upon. Only Christianity provides the necessary transcendental Authority to which we must all bend the knee.

(BTW, I'm originally from Eunice, La.)

__________________
Pastor Kevin Guillory
St. Andrew Lutheran Church
Baltimore, MD

"I don't interpret Scripture. Scripture interprets itself. And in the process ... scripture interprets me."

Thanks Paul,
Whenever I do email debates or message forum debates with him he is quite easy to rip to shreds (writing is NOT his specialty), but in person he is a little tougher--I will give him this much, he is a competent debater in speaking.) But if I, an unpolished good ole boy can go toe to toe with him, that gives me some hope in the future. His tactics never change. In the future he will advance the same arguments against the Faith. However, his greatest weakness is that he knows he is smart and will only read a small amount. He greatly overestimates himself. That is giong to be the rope that I hang him with.

Since I was there...

Said individual likes to state that, since he is a "scientist" (a very loose term, considering that he's a pharmacy major), he likes to approach the biblical text emperically. (Nevermind that his only emperical evidence is secondhand claptrap that he has gleaned from a couple of readings of the Oxford Companion to the Bible.) Once he has decided "emperically" which biblical texts he even accepts as fact or doctrine, he will "critique" them within his own philisophical framework, one that I have not been able to figure out in the year-and-a-half that I've known him.

His approaches are inconsistant at best, but he is very clever and one of the best I'm-talking-louder-and-faster-than-you-so-I'm-winning debaters that I've ever seen.

__________________
Vershal Hogan
Student, Louisiana College
Pineville Presbyterian Church (OPC)
Pineville, Louisiana (USA)

No Paul, Jesus didn't say that. He said that we ought to love and engage in lifestyle evangelism (I kid you not). Remember, Jesus's teaching on love is going to agree with my interpretation of Kant's Categorical Imperative. Secondly, Moses and the Apostle Paul are not authoritative, just Jesus (I pointed out to him the places where Jesus said that Moses was authoritative and was getting to Paul's commission).

Repeat 5X

I know, you are thinking, "How can someone get away with this type of thinking?" As Vershal said, he is one of the best thinkers and speakers on his feet. Fortunately for me, he knows that and wants you to know that as well. Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.

Note that I used the dread quotation marks around "emperically." Like I said, he is a fan of higher and textual criticism a la Oxford, and will buy anything that a liberal theologian says by virtue of the fact that the theologian in question is a liberal, and not one of those less enlightened conservatives.

An example of this would be to approach the Virgin Birth as a messianic myth; emperically, he has never observed a virgin birth, therefore Matthew must have made it up to show that Christ was divine.

I'd have to ask him. His hermeneutic is, at best, a pick-and-choose.

(I know how he would argue that, however: Jesus' death and resurrection empowers us to become better people.)

I'm trying to parrot his position as best I can, whether it makes sense or not, but I think that I am failing. Or perhaps succeeding.

I'm no good.

To quote Henry Adams,
His mind is like the New England soil: highly cultivated but naturally barren.

Aaaaaahhh.