Atheist Objections
The principal objections to Christianity can be condensed to these four.
- The hidden God
Objection. If God exists and loves us as Christianity proclaims, he would clearly show himself. The doubters ask, “Why doesn’t God make himself visible and show up every now and then? “What’s the big secret?” And they answer, “Because he isn’t there, and there’s no evidence for the existence of such a wildly implausible thing, no longer necessary, called god.” In fact., the hidden God is the number one reason for disbelief. And, besides, assuming there is a god, why should it be the Christian God? How about Allah, Yahweh, or the myriad of other gods worshiped.
Response. This first argument is addressed in Evidence Independently Verified and Glimpsing Eternity. We can be sure that God has shown himself, not only 2,000 years ago in the person of a suffering, dying and resurrected Jesus, but through continuing appearances by Mary, miracles, and by the photograph known as the Shroud of Turin. Because he has shown himself, the remaining three arguments should be irrelevant. But as we know, we are still haunted by the contention that the God of Christian theology cannot be real because of all the evil and suffering we see.
Objection. We are told that God is love, and that everything is subject to his control. Yet, we look about us and see pain, evil, suffering, natural disasters, and the cruelty of nature. We suffer and pray for relief and nothing happens. Moreover, a God of love could not consign some or many of the very people he created to eternal suffering in a place or condition called hell.
Response. We have an imperfect and limited understanding of reality and our place in the eternal progression of God’s plan of salvation. Just because we might have created a world order differently is not a legitimate reason to ignore Jesus. It’s an excuse. If you are looking for arguments to disbelieve, you can always find them.
Nevertheless, we see all this pain and suffering and then, to top it all off, are told that eternal fire awaits those who turn from God and we continue to wonder how this order can be consistent with a loving God. So, we speculate about these issues (just as theologians, philosophers, scientists, and everyone else has done for millennia), and puzzle as to how we can make sense of this apparent inconsistency. These questions nag and their harshness jar our spiritual journey. Consequently, we will consider these issues in A God of Love.
- Unreliability of the Bible
Objection. The four Gospels of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John purport to be the Word of God, yet they are internally inconsistent and of dubious authorship.
Response. The questions of authorship, dates of writing and other corollary issues relating to the four Gospels and other books of the Bible would be important if we didn’t have Jesus revealed to us in no uncertain terms by his mother at Fatima and elsewhere, as well as by his photograph. Still, these issues and others relating to the veracity of the Bible, in general, and the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus are considered by nonbelievers to be strong evidence against Christianity. These issues will all be addressed in Trustworthy Bible.
- An impossibly incomprehensible God
Objection. To accept the notion of an eternal omniscient, omnipotent being, who is creator and in control of everything in the universe, from the tiniest microbe in our pond to immense galaxies billions of light years away, is preposterous and flies in the face of all that makes sense. Modern day science can now explain the previously unexplainable, thereby demonstrating that the God of the Bible or any other god was a magical entity created by man to help him through life and explain the otherwise unknowable. That need no longer exists, and we should not be enslaved by ancient superstitions that have no basis in fact.
Response. The final issue, the vastness and complexity of the universe and the incomprehensibility of God, as well as his omnipotence and omniscience will be addressed in An Incomprehensible God. In doing so, we need to sweep aside all pretensions. Neither we, nor you, or any human or group of humans regardless of their level of intelligence, learning, and even spirituality, can ever satisfactorily resolve these issues.
Footnotes and Attributions
The picture is from the 1929 cover of the USSR League of Militant Atheists magazine, showing the gods of the Abrahamic religions being crushed by the Communist 5-year plan. The League’s slogan was “Struggle against religion is a struggle for socialism.” Accessed from Wikipedia.
Last modified October 10, 2019