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You answered 14 of 15 questions correctly (93%)
Here's how you did on these 15 questions (excerpted from the larger U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey) compared with a nationally representative sample of 3,412 adults. Your responses on the quiz do NOT affect the U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey's results. Read the Full Report: "U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey" You scored better than 97% of the public, below 1% and the same as 2%.
My theory is it's because most atheists I know of have been raised in religious households and have actually THOUGHT about the truthfulness of it. Many so-called Christians have never had their faith challenged, and have never really taken the time to study it. The better comparison would be to examine those that have had their faith challenged, and either decided for or against Christ. I went through that faith crisis about 20 years ago and have been studying apologetics now for 20 years. I learned much much more about the Bible in the 1st 2 years after that than I did in 20 years before.
To be honest, I think you're lumping in nominal cultural Christians with those that actually have a real faith in Christ. But the folks down at 2nd Self-Righteous Baptist Church may not be a good indication of what it means to be a Christian. They're church-goers. That's it.
My theory is it's because most atheists I know of have been raised in religious households and have actually THOUGHT about the truthfulness of it. .
You said a mouthful there Vizio.
I can't speak for anyone other than myself, but it was an important thing to figure out so required a lot of examination.
I was born in 1957 when people still wrote paper letters -- in longhand -- and cared about spelling, punctuation and grammar. Not caring about those things was a sign of being a cretin and tended to be perceived as not caring enough about the audience you're writing for, to be clear, concise, and neat.
People born before me feel more strongly about it than I do. Women tend to feel more strongly than men, in my experience, too.
Since the advent of the Internet and things like "leet speak" (or "l33t" to the cognescenti, meaning: "the way the information technology elite communicate in a sort of private shorthand") it has become cool to hyper-abbreviate and creatively misspell, which in turn provides cover for people who for whatever reason can't be bothered to spell. From the perspective of old farts like myself, it has become cool to be lazy and disrespectful.
Since I am a software developer I have become fairly desensitized to this and don't take it anywhere near as personally as I otherwise would. And I know that it is all relative. For instance, as a child I had it drilled into me that you MUST, on penalty of DEATH, type two spaces after every sentence. My wife, a former journalist steeped in the ways of the various Manuals of Style, grinds her teeth when she sees me commit this horrible faux pas, which according to her never really was true, but is a common misconception. And a few other common errors she points out now and then ... compared to me she can be a bit of a Grammar Nazi, albeit a very sweet one ;-)
So I am pretty indulgent about the occasional typo or the occasional childish substitutions (e.g., "ur" in place of "your" or "you are", depending on context) but let's just say that I am highly tempted to think less of that person's erudition, too. If I am, then so are a lot of other people. If you don't care, fine; if you want to put your best foot forward, perhaps reconsider your lack of attention to this matter.
Learning to type and properly construct sentences and paragraphs is a dying art, and one of the facets of a civil society that, to my way of thinking, we are losing.
Last edited by mensaguy; 08-31-2015 at 01:43 PM..
Reason: Quoted post deleted
My theory is it's because most atheists I know of have been raised in religious households and have actually THOUGHT about the truthfulness of it. Many so-called Christians have never had their faith challenged, and have never really taken the time to study it. The better comparison would be to examine those that have had their faith challenged, and either decided for or against Christ. I went through that faith crisis about 20 years ago and have been studying apologetics now for 20 years. I learned much much more about the Bible in the 1st 2 years after that than I did in 20 years before.
To be honest, I think you're lumping in nominal cultural Christians with those that actually have a real faith in Christ. But the folks down at 2nd Self-Righteous Baptist Church may not be a good indication of what it means to be a Christian. They're church-goers. That's it.
I actually basically agree with you. If hell keeps freezing over like this, no one in hell will have to beg Father Abraham to brings a drop of water across the chasm anymore.
What we would not agree on is that being a "cultural Christian" is necessarily a Bad Thing, or that it is equivalent to "nominal" or that it's inferior. What we have is literalist / inerrantist thought over against a more loosely held belief. It may be that some of those liberal / cultural believers are as they are precisely because their faith has been challenged. Because becoming less doctrinaire / more liberal is one possible response to that.
For example, leaving aside the specific creation narrative claims, the Bible indirectly implies that the earth is a few thousand years old. Science has quite conclusively proven otherwise. The major / common responses to that for a literalist is:
1) "Double down" or "dig in" and follow the "let god be true and every man a liar" approach -- science MUST be wrong because the Bible disagrees with it.
2) Continue to believe in god and broadly in Christian doctrine but acknowledge that the holy book isn't infallible and either interpret it much more metaphorically or just allow it to be as it is ... just plain wrong sometimes. And/or, go with the "non-overlapping magisteria" interpretation of science vs religion. Let science answer the "how" questions and religion answer the "why" questions.
3) Quit believing altogether.
I happen to have pursued #3 and ironically one of the reasons I wasn't at least salvageable as #2 is that I had such an "all or nothing" mentality drilled into me during my formative years that if any of it wasn't true, none of it was. I have moderated / matured somewhat and if my crisis of faith had come at this point in my life instead of many years ago, who knows, I might have just been a more liberal believer.
Of course I'm not sure you see a liberal believer as much of an improvement over an unbeliever ... my only point is that the rigidity of thought that was drilled into me, drove me further away from what you regard as Truth, than it otherwise would have.
Of course some people are less perturbed than I by cognitive dissonance. Some are less curious, and devote less to that aspect of awareness. And they just shrug and move on. I simply couldn't though.
The important thing is that one has the heart for the Lord, I have attested to people who have a prodigious amount of knowledge but really no love for the Lord. Too much knowledge without the spiritual factor is arrogance, as one is just trying to impress another individual with their big words or superfluous amount of reading.
I actually basically agree with you. If hell keeps freezing over like this, no one in hell will have to beg Father Abraham to brings a drop of water across the chasm anymore.
What we would not agree on is that being a "cultural Christian" is necessarily a Bad Thing, or that it is equivalent to "nominal" or that it's inferior. What we have is literalist / inerrantist thought over against a more loosely held belief. It may be that some of those liberal / cultural believers are as they are precisely because their faith has been challenged. Because becoming less doctrinaire / more liberal is one possible response to that.
If one's religion is based on something other than the truth of the religion, why bother?
Quote:
For example, leaving aside the specific creation narrative claims, the Bible indirectly implies that the earth is a few thousand years old. Science has quite conclusively proven otherwise. The major / common responses to that for a literalist is:
That's really neither here nor there. The age of the earth doesn't really make me believe or not believe in God.
Quote:
1) "Double down" or "dig in" and follow the "let god be true and every man a liar" approach -- science MUST be wrong because the Bible disagrees with it.
2) Continue to believe in god and broadly in Christian doctrine but acknowledge that the holy book isn't infallible and either interpret it much more metaphorically or just allow it to be as it is ... just plain wrong sometimes. And/or, go with the "non-overlapping magisteria" interpretation of science vs religion. Let science answer the "how" questions and religion answer the "why" questions.
3) Quit believing altogether.
I happen to have pursued #3 and ironically one of the reasons I wasn't at least salvageable as #2 is that I had such an "all or nothing" mentality drilled into me during my formative years that if any of it wasn't true, none of it was. I have moderated / matured somewhat and if my crisis of faith had come at this point in my life instead of many years ago, who knows, I might have just been a more liberal believer.
Of course I'm not sure you see a liberal believer as much of an improvement over an unbeliever ... my only point is that the rigidity of thought that was drilled into me, drove me further away from what you regard as Truth, than it otherwise would have.
I don't, to be honest.
Quote:
Of course some people are less perturbed than I by cognitive dissonance. Some are less curious, and devote less to that aspect of awareness. And they just shrug and move on. I simply couldn't though.
For the purposes of this discussion though, we're talking about people that either grew up having never been challenged in their faith, versus those that have been and have chosen to walk away. It makes sense that the ones that have looked at the issues and walked away probably know more about them -- because they have actually spent time looking at them.
Of course, the study says nothing about those that are simply non-religious and don't care one way or the other.
The important thing is that one has the heart for the Lord, I have attested to people who have a prodigious amount of knowledge but really no love for the Lord. Too much knowledge without the spiritual factor is arrogance, as one is just trying to impress another individual with their big words or superfluous amount of reading.
Horrors. Superfluous amounts of reading and using big words.
That's how those nasty intellectuals got so smart. They.....*gasp* .... read. And they read stuff the fundamentalists don't understand. Sinners!! Silence them!!!!
That's how those nasty intellectuals got so smart. They.....*gasp* .... read. And they read stuff the fundamentalists don't understand. Sinners!!
I think he was actually referring to people that have too much head knowledge of the Bible but they never let it actually affect their life. I roomed with a guy that told me he wasn't a Christian, but he could quote chapter and verse as well as anyone. He KNEW the Bible -- but he never let it sink in.
I don't think he was talking about "nasty intellectuals" that read physics books. Nor would I suggest that a "fundamentalist" would not want to be informed, or study, either.
I think he was actually referring to people that have too much head knowledge of the Bible but they never let it actually affect their life. I roomed with a guy that told me he wasn't a Christian, but he could quote chapter and verse as well as anyone. He KNEW the Bible -- but he never let it sink in.
I don't think he was talking about "nasty intellectuals" that read physics books. Nor would I suggest that a "fundamentalist" would not want to be informed, or study, either.
Vizio, you it right on the head
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