DMcG, your arguments are plenty good enough for me, thanks. They are arguments, not pontifications. There is no need for you to get so defensive. But the thing is, you have not really answered my very simple, child-like question (not childish, I hope). Do you think that there is a God, a supernatural being, who created everything? That's what your religion teaches, whether you like it or not. Please don't make me quote all those Catholic prayers and hymns, let alone scripture. You know what I'm like. I really will if I really have to. Either you accept these things or you don't. Look here, I'm a really simple chap. I can't keep up with half the arguments on other threads with Rapparee, Donuel, gargoyle, Bill, Teribus and a good few others. I have trouble keeping up with Jim, one of the very finest people to post here (in spite of his lack of tactical nous, an attribute which I'm proud to share). What you see me saying is at the very limit of my intellectual capabilities. I am not trying to set you a booby trap. You appear to be a believer, and I'm trying to elicit, in simple terms that eschew the claptrap of theology, whether or not you think that there is a supernatural God who created everything. Don't tell me if you don't want to. I have to go to Asda tomorrow because they have nice wines on special offer. To me, alongside that, God has to take a back seat. That's me. Dead simple.

By the way. If you accept that God created the universe, etc., you are also accepting a suspension of all the laws of nature while he got on with it. "Magic", to you, appears to be a pejorative term. So how else would you characterise it?