Also, Abraham didn’t observe the Sabbath. He was never commanded to, either. Neither were Gentiles…which is why the apostles in the book of Acts concluded through the direction of the Holy Spirit that Gentile believers did not have to become Jewish (oh, BTW, are you a Jew?) before they could be saved. We get God’s grace on the same basis as Abraham: through faith. Not our adherence to a law not directed to us, a fact illustrated quite clearly in the institution of the Passover.

Now, God’s law is, as stated in Romans 7:12, “holy, and just, and good.” Just like God. As such, only God can follow it. So you keep on trying to live up to His example in hopes that it’ll be enough, and I’ll keep on trying to live up to it because I want to…all the while having peace in His accomplished work and His continuing rest.

And if you don’t want to listen to me, read the first half of the book of Romans, particularly chapters 4-7.

First off, Shane, there’s no such thing as “aggressive Christianity”. It’s an oxymoron; abortion clinic bombers are not Christians; they’re activists who wrap themselves in a Bible to justify bloodlust. WWJD? Besides that, it’s not like there’s some sort of epidemic of that happening in the first place. As much as I hate abortion, I’m not going to kill someone else over it…it’s the state’s job to kill killers, not mine. As for basic rights for homosexuals, the last time I checked they could still buy property, vote, sit at the front of the bus, etc. My opinion on that is complicated so I won’t go into it here (I’ll save it for my next blog post, which should be due sometime next year), but there is no basic right being opposed by anyone for gays.

As for the whole evolution big bang stuff, I want to say something I’ve made clear to friends across the table of this debate for years: I want the evolution and the big bang taught in every high school in the universe. This might shock some of my Christian family and friends, but I highly encourage the teaching of current and ongoing scientific work in all fields. My only issue is that it be presented wholly. For instance, evolution does not answer the origin or proliferation of life, which may or may not be ironed out in the future. The big bang theory provides a strong framework upon which cosmological studies can take shape, but it can’t and doesn’t explain the building blocks of that framework.

They are not set in stone, and they never will be…like all science, even those premises accepted as scientific law. But they should be taught and explained as what they are–the current understanding and study of science–and not what they are too often held up to be–the epitaph on the tomb of religion.

Where religion is concerned, I have nothing to fear from science. The scientific record and the biblical record are largely found to go hand-in-hand in the majority of cases, and, when they don’t, it’s because of a lack of understanding of one or the other, or even both.

You mentioned the second law of thermodynamics, which is often used as an attempt by creationists to disprove evolutionary science…basically, that the universe is breaking down rather than becoming more complex. This is often dismissed because earth is not a closed system and energy is constantly being added to the system (i.e., sunlight). It’s also where the big bang falls on its face, barring a few spurious suppositions that by nature can’t be verified. And statistics show that no amount of glorious change-inducing energy being poured into this planet would kickstart the evolution of the variety of life it has sustained at the rate at which it has flourished in such a small amount of time. You wind up at every turn looking headlong into an uncaused cause.

These are just the largest issues of these well-developed but still lacking courses of study…all of which, again, I believe should be explored in science classes across the nation.

Xam, atheists have as much variety in their personal beliefs as Christian groups do. It’s impossible to explore the minutia in the limited time I have available for such flights of fancy. But, as you said, atheism is the belief that there is no divinity and therefore no loyalty to one, and it is to the Freedom From Religion group my ire was aimed.

The problem is that you, like the two who were ahead of you, are responding to the snarky little picture rather than the article itself. Your reference to methodological naturalism has absolutely nothing to do with what I was griping about in the article, which was, in a nutshell, an atheist group making jerks of themselves for no good reason.

Ultimately, all three of you totally missed the point. Are you so thin-skinned that any resistance to your preferred creation account must be bludgeoned with the flail of ignorance so as to brand that label into it? All you were able to beat was a dead horse. I hit the nail on the head in the article with my reference to “puerile peevishness”!

Atheism is not believing or an active disbelief in god(s). It is one position or stand on one topic: the existence of god(s). It is not an entire worldview or philosophy, hence the variability in what different atheists believe.

While many atheists are naturalistic in some manner, not all are and they are not the same thing (there are atheistic existentialists, atheistic Marxists, and so on who could care less about science and metaphysical naturalism).

Mind you, I don’t support aggressive atheism like this but it’s a hell of a lot better than aggressive Christianity blowing up abortion clinics or trying to hold down homosexuals from having basic rights the rest of us have.