Only a delusional nutjob would imagine that someone asking for EVIDENCE that a book was telepathically dictated by an omnipotent space deity believes himself to be ‘clever.’ It’s the same sad, pathetic little ‘argument’ that a lot of people use when they desperately want to cling to a point they know they cannot win. Instead of even attempting to debate the topic you choose to apply all these false and nonsensical assertions about the motivations of the person who’s argument you cannot overcome. It never works for anyone and you are no different.

Belief in a deity requires some level of self-delusion because you take the LACK OF EVIDENCE and argue that it’s irrelevant to whether or not a deity exists. In no other discourse in your life would you just arbitrarily choose to believe in magic. However, you convince yourself that once something becomes your ‘religion’ then no facts, evidence, reason or independent corroboration are necessary. That may be a satisfactory conclusion inside your own imagination, but when you are affirmatively asserting it and want the world to believe your hypothesis, then your point must have supporting evidence or it collapses on itself. Sorry 🙁

Correction: You missed MY point.

I would say that you are the one missing the point, at least the one that I and some others here are making.
Of course, to claim that this text is factual at all let alone inerrant, proofs need to be presented. And, of course, no one has yet provided any compelling proof of any sort. But that does not change the fact that many people do believe it to be inerrant and that they do live their lives and often try to make others live their lives by those beliefs. That is the problem and the point.
Cassandrus is arguing that ‘modern christians’ don’t believe these things, but has offered no list of what they do believe.
My point is that as long as Cassandrus and other christians who claim not to believe the entirety of their bible, continue to claim that the bible is the holy book of their religion and do not publically repudiate the portions they disagree with, they will be viewed through the same lens we see the extremists who do believe it all.

Please inform me of what argument you think I was making? As far as I’m concerned – how literally someone interprets the bible is utterly meaningless so I have not presented any ‘choice.’ The book (just like every other religious text) is a collection of myths assembled from, in the case of the bible, a random assortment of writings by Middle Eastern nomads. No one has ever proven that the words were REALLY telepathic messages divined into their brains by a deity in space (the very notion is just ludicrous). Accordingly, anyone who argues that the bible is the ‘word of god’ is delusional.

@ GROW UP: Your argument is a loser. Here’s why: I am guided by logic, reason and a quest for knowledge. Those are, quit obviously, much larger than myself. The fact that it’s more important to me to be RIGHT (ie, have evidence to support my conclusions) rather than COMFORTABLE (ie, just make $hit up whenever something seems too complex to grasp) is a problem for you; not for me.

it’s also ironic that a religious zealot, who wholly accepts that the words of a 2000 year old book are the telepathic messages of a deity in space (who got EVERYTHING about biology, geology and astronomy totally wrong) would call ANYONE’ blind.’ Got back to school – you need it.

You’re missing the point entirely. The fact that I am more clever than you or more rational than you is completely irrelevant to the conversation. You’ve built a straw-man (that atheists consider Christians inferior) even though NO ONE has ever actually said that. The difference between religious zealots and atheists is that theists require credible, testable evidence in order to accept something as true, while religious observers believe that ‘faith’ (the belief in things without evidentiary support – look it up) is a legitimate foundation to accept the unproven as true. Regardless whether you’re a moderate, extremist or just observe the holidays is WHOLLY IRRELEVANT to the whether the bible is anything but a work of fiction. The amount of faith someone has in the text (or how literally they interpret it) does nothing, whatsoever, to overcome the burden of FIRST proving that the words of the bible were, indeed, the telepathic transmissions of an omnipotent space deity (rather than just the personal thoughts of the scriber). And since that hurdle has yet to be overcome, by anyone, there is no reason -at all – to pretend it’s the ‘word of god.’ Sorry 🙁

You’re missing the point entirely. Regardless of if you’re a moderate, extremist or just observe the holidays is WHOLLY IRRELEVANT to the whether the bible is anything but a work of fiction. The amount of faith someone has in the text (or how literally they interpret it) does nothing, whatsoever, to overcome the burden of FIRST proving that the words of the bible were, indeed, the telepathic transmissions of a ghost in space (rather than just the personal thoughts of the scriber). And since that hurdle has yet to be overcome, by anyone, there is no reason -at all – to pretend it’s the ‘word of god.’

I guess you didn’t bother to read the previous portion of the thread or (like most Christians) ignore the portions of the texts that don’t serve your purpose. I never, at any time, claimed that Christians endorse slavery. I was pointing out the FACT that the BIBLE endorses slavery. I was correcting a previous posters lie/mistake that the bible does not endorse slavery. Sorry 🙁

First, which modern Christians? Christians are not all the same. There are many that do believe in the exact literal interpretation of the Bible (although there are problems with this, such as a 6,000 year-old Earth and how this claim is crushed under the weight of scientific evidence). Children have died because transfusions are considered against God (Jehovah’s Witnesses). There is no such thing as a typical Christian just as there is no such thing as a typical atheist.

Second, the book is attacked because it is used to justify and support some terrible things in this so called modern world – not necessarily by your brand of Christianity, but by those who don’t see it as outdated or conradictory – (e.g. witch burning in Africa, Catholic Church not wanting the use of condoms in AIDS torn countries, blowing up abortion clinics, crimes agains gays). You can’t separate your religion from the text that drives it. Text that has been changed and added to through the centuries (Google Dr. Bart D. Herman – a well respected scholar – not a preacher). The point of showing the Bible is not inerrant is to show that you can’t use it to defend your prejudices or morality.

Finally, the point of this article is that Hobby Lobby’s objections is based on an archaic belief system – one base on an outdated book riddled with contradictions and errors. Having faith without evidence means you can believe in anything – no matter how it affects others.

I think it was an adequate reply to someone who made statements based upon no evidence. In fact, the overwhelming evidence is that scripture has been forged, misquoted, re-written, altered, made up out of whole cloth and sometimes cherry-picked in order to appear to have been prophesized. The latter is known as “typology.” See: http://www.theopedia.com/Biblical_typology and note the second paragraph..