Last year I wrote a critique of John Loftus’ essay “Christianity is Wildly Improbable” from the book The End of Christianity. In the essay John focuses on “ten creedal affirmations” that many (evangelical) Christians accept. He purports to show that it is exceedingly unlikely that all these claims would be true from which it presumably follows that Christianity […]
The End of Christianity
John Loftus admits he uses exaggerated, slanted and/or misleading language
Last year I wrote a series of essays critiquing the book The End of Christianity edited by John Loftus. The series was called “The End of Christianity: A Skeptical Review” and it included more than fifteen installments (including sidebar essays). Sadly, John Loftus was largely absent in terms of providing a response, though he did […]
The End of Christianity? A Skeptical Review (Part 12)
I was not very kind to David Eller’s first contribution to The End of Christianity. I shall continue my curmudgeonly ways as I review his second contribution, an essay titled “Is Religion Compatible with Science?” I shall begin my complaints with the topic. Why “religion”? Why not focus on Christianity and argue for the incompatibility […]
The End of Christianity? A Skeptical Review (Part 11)
Hell. It had to come up sooner or later. And it takes center stage in Keith Parson’s contribution to The End of Christianity, chapter 10, “Hell: Christianity’s Most Damnable Doctrine”. I took away one important lesson from this chapter: Keith Parsons doesn’t like Dick Cheney or Sarah Palin. In fact, I thought these were the […]
The End of Christianity? A Skeptical Review (Part 10)
Chapter 9 of The End of Christianity brings us to Robert M. Price’s essay “Explaining the Resurrection without Recourse to Miracle”. In this chapter Price argues that “recourse to miracle is completely superfluous…” (219) as a means to explain the “resurrection data”. To prove his point, Price dusts off three long forgotten theories that seem […]
My conversation with Matt McCormick: A Disappointing Conclusion
Matt McCormick has yet to reply to my third post on his essay in which I directly critiqued his Salem argument in response to his repeated requests that I do just that. But he did post a comment today which suggests to me a shift of tactic away from engaging my arguments and toward marginalizing […]
On putting Matt McCormick’s argument to rest
Let me summarize my arguments against Matt McCormick’s argument to this point. I will then quote his most recent full response and offer a final comment that engages his Salem argument. So first off, where we’ve come so far. As I noted, the central issue was the issue of rational belief. In particular, is it possible […]
From Jerusalem to Salem: A Conversation with Matt McCormick
After being ignored by all the essayists of The End of Christianity for so long it’s nice finally to get a little attention. And now Matt McCormick has responded to my critique … promptly … on a holiday (Labor Day) … courteously … with arguments. Looks like I hit the jackpot. Thanks for joining us Matt! […]
The End of Christianity? A Skeptical Review (Part 9)
After a couple weeks hiatus I find myself picking up my review of The End of Christianity once again. Although I have published about fifteen posts in critique of The End of Christianity over the last couple months, I have not received a single response from the essayists. Well okay, there was one response: John W. […]
The End of Christianity? A Skeptical Review (Part 8)
In chapter 7 of The End of Christianity Ken Pulliam argues for “The Absurdity of the Atonement”. In fact, his essay is focused not on the atonement per se but rather on a penal substitutionary theory of atonement (henceforth PST). This is a crucial distinction to which I shall return. However, before continuing let me […]
The Edsel of Christianity?
I have now completed Part II of The End of Christianity, a section which aimed through the essays of Hector Avalos, Jaco Gericke and Valerie Tarico, to establish on biblical grounds why Christianity needs to end. At this point I’d like to take a look back at the section by identifying a set of assumptions […]
The End of Christianity? A Skeptical Review (Part 7)
Chapter 6 of The End of Christianity brings us to Valerie Tarico’s essay “God’s Emotions: Why the Biblical God Is Hopelessly Human”. While the argument of the essay is not altogether clear, it would appear that Tarico hopes to extend Jaco Gericke’s assault on the biblical portrayal of God by arguing that the presence of “human” […]
Yahweh and Yahweh: A second and final footnote to my Jaco Gericke review
I cannot help but make one more point in response to Gericke’s argument. I apologize because this should have been included in my first footnote. Unfortunately it comes from that wing of philosophy which Gericke refers to as “fundamentalist and analytic”. (152) (Incidentally, Gericke seems to have a thing about labeling people. He even calls Walter […]
The End of Christianity? A Skeptical Review (Part 6)
“Can God exist if Yahweh doesn’t?” This is the question at the center of The End of Christianity chapter five written by Jaco Gericke. Some of the other chapters in The End of Christianity have bad arguments, and at least one chapter seems to lack an argument altogether. But the argument of this chapter is strange. Let me […]
