Christianity Illogical?

[IvanKaramozov]

Right, I constantly hear atheists claim that Christianity “illogical”

I’m genuinly confused what exactly is to be meant by this, how is it illogical.

 

[MarcoPolo]

Athiest logic tends to think anything that is true can be observable by their 5 senses.

And they call Christians illogical. Ironic, huh?

 

[Jordan_Francis]

I think Chesterton said something roughly as this…

"That Christianity is logical where it should be, and exactly illogical where it should be. "

The basis of this kind of thinking is that faith and reason have to work together. Pure rationalism or pure logic tend to lead us farther away from both reason and ourselves.

The Church is up to its neck in reason, but it breathes in the air of mystery.

Anyone looking for a purely logical religion is certainly not looking for a religion meant for man, but for a machine.

 

[Mirdath]

Why ask atheists when you can read Hebrews 11:1 and have it from Paul himself?

Don’t think ‘illogical’ is a slur. Not caring about logic is one of Christianity’s greatest strengths, and one of the worst things one can do for the faith is to try to justify it through logic.

 

[IvanKaramozov]

Why ask atheists when you can read Hebrews 11:1 and have it from Paul himself?

Don’t think ‘illogical’ is a slur. Not caring about logic is one of Christianity’s greatest strengths, and one of the worst things one can do for the faith is to try to justify it through logic.

I think Vatican I came down fairly hard on that fideism

 

[Newbie2]

Well…think about it. Christianity IS illogical by human standards, no?

 

[EphelDuath]

Why ask atheists when you can read Hebrews 11:1 and have it from Paul himself?

Don’t think ‘illogical’ is a slur. Not caring about logic is one of Christianity’s greatest strengths, and one of the worst things one can do for the faith is to try to justify it through logic.

Christianity can be reconciled with both faith and logic. They subsidize each other.

 

[Nino]

Right, I constantly hear atheists claim that Christianity “illogical”

I’m genuinly confused what exactly is to be meant by this, how is it illogical.

…this is easy…if you believe that this earth is all there is…so buy,spend,etc etc…supporting the corporations and their junk …then if a person says…'no I believe this earth is just a short pause in the meaning of life…that I have all eternity ahead of me and so I will give any extra money I have ,or time…or just a smile and hug to another poor neighbor…well that ‘Christian’ will seem illogical…no sense…gooky…not pc etc etc…in a secular humanistic society only the wealthy ruling class wins…they reap the harvests in excessive profits…in a Christian society…where in we spend within our means…have a family, give to the poor ,and keep our eyes on the after life…thats what we want…and so the epic battle has been drawn and is heading for a climax…may Jesus return and help us…we need it…

 

[crowonsnow]

Not sure if you just wanted to preach to the choir here.

By Christian logic, the universe is only accounted for by imagining something that cannot be accounted for. I’ve always thought that to be contradictory, and therefore, I suppose, illogical.

 

[VociMike]

Not sure if you just wanted to preach to the choir here.

By Christian logic, the universe is only accounted for by imagining something that cannot be accounted for. I’ve always thought that to be contradictory, and therefore, I suppose, illogical.

But the exact same thing can be said (in fact, must be said) for the “atheist universe”. No atheist can account for existence.

 

[VociMike]

Right, I constantly hear atheists claim that Christianity “illogical”

I’m genuinly confused what exactly is to be meant by this, how is it illogical.

I too cannot make much sense out of this charge. I would insist that anybody who made that charge show that Christianity (Catholicism in particular) is less logical than the world view of the person making that charge. That would immediately get to the heart of the matter.

 

[IvanKaramozov]

Not sure if you just wanted to preach to the choir here.

Nope, I truely wanted to know

By Christian logic

What is Christian logic?

the universe is only accounted for by imagining something that cannot be accounted for. I’ve always thought that to be contradictory, and therefore, I suppose, illogical.

I reall don’t see how that is illogical, but I suppose I need to know what you mean by “accounted for”

 

[crowonsnow]

I really don’t see how that is illogical, but I suppose I need to know what you mean by “accounted for”

By “account for” I mean “to explain.” You know the oft posed question, ‘why is there something instead of nothing?’ The Christian response - correct me if I’m wrong - is that a god made it.

But that leaves the god unaccounted for. So I naturally respond, ‘why a god instead of no god?’

So to account for the universe the Christian response is to imagine something else that cannot be accounted for, instead of just accepting that the universe needs no explanation.

 

[crowonsnow]

But the exact same thing can be said (in fact, must be said) for the “atheist universe”. No atheist can account for existence.

Well, I guess I’d ask you to show me some “existence," because to me that’s just a word that has comunicative value. In other words, I can show you a “universe” - parts of it anyway - but you can’t show me any “existence.”

So I’m not attempting to be cute or argumentative, just trying to make the point that people can be confused by language.

To put it differently, I would ask you to tell me the difference between the universe, and the universe’s “existence.”

 

[Sideline]

Something tells me that this is probably a mistake, but I’m going to take that question at face value.

First off… God.

God isn’t so much illogical, as pretty much meaningless. It is impossible to say there is no God, because God can adopt any property that people want him/her/it/them to have. I’ve heard it said that “God is.” This isn’t a definition of God, it is a misunderstanding of how English grammar works.

Secondly… Jesus.

Jesus is, of course, God. Which means, of course, that he is almost as meaningless as God is. However, no human being could hope to share the invincible vagueness of what God is supposed to encompass. At least with Jesus there is some limit to the ultimate mutability of God, but that limit isn’t strictly observed.

I am personally dumbfounded that Christians don’t seem to understand why the idea that a miracle worker living 2000 years ago is God doesn’t seem plausible. I’ve had it suggested, repeatedly, that it is harder to believe that 1st century Christians were taken in by a con-artist than that Jesus isn’t God. How exactly that works has never really been explained to me.

 

[MarcoPolo]

I am personally dumbfounded that Christians don’t seem to understand why the idea that a miracle worker living 2000 years ago is God doesn’t seem plausible. I’ve had it suggested, repeatedly, that it is harder to believe that 1st century Christians were taken in by a con-artist than that Jesus isn’t God. How exactly that works has never really been explained to me.

I think it has to do with the man Jesus saying He would rise from the dead after 3 days, and hundreds/thousands of witnesses heard Him say that, and then saw Him die, and then saw Him alive.

 

[Hastrman]

Something tells me that this is probably a mistake, but I’m going to take that question at face value.

First off… God.

God isn’t so much illogical, as pretty much meaningless. It is impossible to say there is no God, because God can adopt any property that people want him/her/it/them to have. I’ve heard it said that “God is.” This isn’t a definition of God, it is a misunderstanding of how English grammar works.

Oh, you know how English grammar works, huh?

Well, then why don’t you know that the intransitive predicating copula can, by a pecularity of Indo-European linguistic evolution, also be used as an intransitive non-predicating existential expletive–certainly in Greek and Latin, and probably in Germanic languages like English? And that that existential expletive is the verb used to express the nature of that entity whose philosophical name is Subsistent Act of Being?

I’m not going to explain that until you admit you need me to.

 

[IvanKaramozov]

Something tells me that this is probably a mistake, but I’m going to take that question at face value.

First off… God.

God isn’t so much illogical, as pretty much meaningless. It is impossible to say there is no God, because God can adopt any property that people want him/her/it/them to have. I’ve heard it said that “God is.” This isn’t a definition of God, it is a misunderstanding of how English grammar works.

There is a distinction between linguistic ambiguity and logical coherance, I don’t see how that spplies to actual logic, certianly it is a citique of current Christian popular thought, but not much more

Secondly… Jesus.

Jesus is, of course, God. Which means, of course, that he is almost as meaningless as God is. However, no human being could hope to share the invincible vagueness of what God is supposed to encompass. At least with Jesus there is some limit to the ultimate mutability of God, but that limit isn’t strictly observed.

I am personally dumbfounded that Christians don’t seem to understand why the idea that a miracle worker living 2000 years ago is God doesn’t seem plausible. I’ve had it suggested, repeatedly, that it is harder to believe that 1st century Christians were taken in by a con-artist than that Jesus isn’t God. How exactly that works has never really been explained to me.

None of that has anything to do with logic

 

[Sideline]

Oh, you know how English grammar works, huh?

Well, then why don’t you know that the intransitive predicating copula can, by a pecularity of Indo-European linguistic evolution, also be used as an intransitive non-predicating existential expletive–certainly in Greek and Latin, and probably in Germanic languages like English? And that that existential expletive is the verb used to express the nature of that entity whose philosophical name is Subsistent Act of Being?

I’m not going to explain that until you admit you need me to.

You are one of those people who think that you can’t split infinitves in English because you can’t split them in Lating aren’t you?

 

[crowonsnow]

Something tells me that this is probably a mistake, but I’m going to take that question at face value.

First off… God.

God isn’t so much illogical, as pretty much meaningless. It is impossible to say there is no God, because God can adopt any property that people want him/her/it/them to have. I’ve heard it said that “God is.” This isn’t a definition of God, it is a misunderstanding of how English grammar works.

Secondly… Jesus.

Jesus is, of course, God. Which means, of course, that he is almost as meaningless as God is. However, no human being could hope to share the invincible vagueness of what God is supposed to encompass. At least with Jesus there is some limit to the ultimate mutability of God, but that limit isn’t strictly observed.

I am personally dumbfounded that Christians don’t seem to understand why the idea that a miracle worker living 2000 years ago is God doesn’t seem plausible. I’ve had it suggested, repeatedly, that it is harder to believe that 1st century Christians were taken in by a con-artist than that Jesus isn’t God. How exactly that works has never really been explained to me.

I’m not really sure what you are saying here. Are you saying that the details of Christianity are just too bizarre to be believable, at least for a lot of people?