Thanks for the vote of confidence, Ebbie...but even that does not encompass what I really think.

"Where his logic falls down, in my opinion, is that he is far too ready to DISbelieve.

No... I am a **skeptic** which does NOT mean DISbeliever.... it means 'doubter' in the full, formal philosophic meaning of the term, whether about religion or phrenology or astrology...etc. René Descartes tried to explain this to the clerics of his time, but they would have none of it...they equated the very IDEA of doubting with DISbelief, and Descartes was never that....but just using the word got him in trouble.

The point...the serious, major, relevant point is: I see & hear others making claims, or simply following blindly certain claims that have been made, and this worries me.....BECAUSE... **IF** any of those claims are not, in fact, true, it casts doubt on many, many other claims/beliefs which are based on the assumptions made IN the claims.

I have posted before the logical truism: "From false premises, anything follows!". This is not just some silly slogan...it means that IF one accepts some facts that prove to be incorrect, it is possible to derive realms of other incorrect conclusions from them. This can easily be demonstrated by the history of Astronomy and Geocentric ideas about the Universe. Galileo fought it...and had to recant ...publicly.** IF the earth WERE the center of the Universe, THEN it might well follow that there WAS a 'purpose' behind it, and it was important to the church of the time to guard that idea...so they invented all sorts of theology to support it!
The question arises... exactly where in the church theology did the error sneak in? Was it just that they didn't yet have a grasp on proper scientific method? They were wrong about the nature of the universe, but could they have been mistaken about anything else? Enquiring minds have asked that ever since....and I ask it.

There ARE ways to maintain a religious life and moral approach and still avoid rubber-stamping some specific claims handed down by 'authority' (Joe Offer does it in his many posts about his Catholicism!...I am not Catholic, but I can't argue with Joe's approach.)

Ebbie, you say: "I think he believes that if we did examine many of those beliefs that we would see the irrationality of them."

Well...almost. Some might prove to be irrational, in that they are even faulty in the way that they are deduced from their premises, but what we 'might' see is the very status OF the premises themselves and how we often don't even recognize when we ARE making unwarranted assumptions that allow irrational conclusions.

*sigh*...some of all that is kinda technical, and I try to note that I am using words like 'doubt' and 'assumptions' in a formal manner...but it is necessary for me to clarify the very important difference between "denying" X,Y, and Z and merely asking those who assert X,Y, and Z to be careful of the implications.

And I assure everyone, that when I attended the Walker's Chapel Freewill Baptist Church in McComb, Mississippi, and then the High Episcopal service on the First Sunday of Advent, I was reverent and polite...and impressed by the feelings conveyed, and when I was a member of the First Unitarian Church of Wichita, Kans., I was appreciative of a tone of acceptance of ALL the varied viewpoints about religion. Locally, The Washington Ethical Society embraces what *I* would want in a church-like community.

So much to try to convey.... but *shrug*...if I keep commenting on stuff, I gotta try to put what I say in perspective, or *I become just another exponent of some attitude....with inadequate understanding of my own viewpoint. It has taken me 'about' 55 years to sort all this out, and having to explain it in text here on Mudcat has helped ME focus my own thoughts. Now, if I don't mess up this post, I'll have it to refer back to sometime... here goes!















**"Galileo's championing of Copernicanism was controversial within his lifetime, when a large majority of philosophers and astronomers still subscribed to the geocentric view that the Earth is at the centre of the universe. After 1610, when he began publicly supporting the heliocentric view, which placed the Sun at the centre of the universe, he met with bitter opposition from some philosophers and clerics, and two of the latter eventually denounced him to the Roman Inquisition early in 1615. In February 1616, although he had been cleared of any offence, the Catholic Church nevertheless condemned heliocentrism as "false and contrary to Scripture",[10] and Galileo was warned to abandon his support for it—which he promised to do. When he later defended his views in his most famous work, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, published in 1632, he was tried by the Inquisition, found "vehemently suspect of heresy," forced to recant, and spent the rest of his life under house arrest."