Sometimes I think that I might like to study philosophy at a graduate level. To cure myself of this notion, I've found it to be effective to simply open up a scholarly journal of philosophy and read some of the articles (or even just the titles). For example:

Does Existence Itself Exist? Transcendental Nihilism Meets the Paradigm Theory – William F. Vallicella

I mean, come ON. (Love the conspiracy-theory-site type design on that site; this article was published in a scholarly collection of philosophy long before being posted here.) I can see how the topic would be of interest to some, but personally I couldn't endure writing about such a subject. Even as someone who's interested in epistemology and ontology, I don't feel the need to debate whether existence exists.

I guess I'll leave this particular area of philosophy to real pro philosophers.

That said, Dr Vallicella (author of the existence article above) does run an interesting blog called Maverick Philosopher that I read on occasion … it's where I came across the article, and his blog is worth checking out.

I'm weird in many ways. One could say I'm abnormal, just like everybody else. 😉 One of the 'weird things' is that I don't feel comfortable saying Jesus' name aloud. I don't really know why that is, but I've heard other people say that they have the same aversion. This was the case even before I became Christian, before I even started thinking about spiritual things. So it's not like its a reverence thing per se … although I do of course revere Him now, I didn't then. When I pray, I'll usually say "Lord" or something as a circumlocution.

Maybe that's why it bugs me when people take God's name in vain. I don't mean when people say "Oh my God" or even "Goddammit", but more when people feel free to define Jesus however they fancy. I was deleting some spam on the 'ol Discuss Da Vinci Blog today when I came across this old comment by "Shannon":

Jesus said Who do you say I am.
Jesus is who you believe he is.
He will love you no matter what you believe!

Here's my response … (I responded in the original post as well, but I prefer the expanded response below)

It's true, Jesus did ask the question "Who do you say I am?" (Matthew 16:13-20, Mark 8:27-30, Luke 9:18-27). But he wasn't asking the question rhetorically. Peter, as ever overzealous, responded by saying "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus affirmed that Peter was correct. It seems as though there were potential answers that Jesus would not have accepted here, especially since He apparently deemed the general public opinion on His identity ("Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.") to be insufficient.

"Jesus is who you believe he is."

So if I believed that Jesus was a Pagan sorcerer, or a 12-foot tall two-headed giant, or a rhinoceros, would these be valid options? No, if we really care about Jesus, we should want to know as much as possible about who He really is and not just create some imaginary image of Him in our minds, tailored to our own distorted whims.

"He will love you no matter what you believe!"

So if someone believed Jesus was ___ (fill in the blank with the most detestable thing you can think of) would Jesus still love them? Yes, but He would love them in the midst of His pain and sadness! I remember one of my seminary professors said that God's wrath is His love burning hot. It pains Jesus when people turn away for him and worship the detestable idols that they've set up and affixed with his name.

You don’t get to know someone by imagining how you’d like them to be. You need to know about a person as they really are so you can get to know them on a personal level. The best way to learn about Jesus is to examine the writings of the people that knew Him personally, that knew Him best. These are not the writings of Rhonda Byrne, or JZ Knight, or Sun Myung Moon. The ones that knew Him best lived with Him for years: His disciples. Their writings are found in the New Testament. To know Jesus, this is the best, the only place to find Him.

Related reading:

• Watch the Jesus Film – Available in literally hundreds of languages … or click here for English.
• Jesus: Fact or Fiction? – Video interviews with leading scholars where they answer tough questions about Jesus
• LeeStrobel.com – Lots more streaming video answering tough questions from the author of The Case for Christ and his newest fantastic book The Case for the Real Jesus.

Was pointed to this photo today re Christopher Hitchens' book God is not Great:

Nice job Target employee, whoever you are.

I'm reading through Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion and hopefully will be able to make comments here soon on each of its chapters. I'm making notes as I read, and being careful to note the things I agree with and the points where I disagree. It bothers me when I read a review of a book where the reviewer feels the need to try to refute every single thing the author says. Did they really not say anything of value? It's somewhat disconcerting to say that I disagree with a guy who teaches at Oxford and has a PhD and everything, but as Sideshow Mel said, "My opinion is as valid as the next man's!" 😀 And of course Alister McGrath, holder of two PhDs from Oxford (one in molecular biophysics, the other in theology) who also teaches at Oxford, has already written a book in reply: The Dawkins Delusion?

In the meantime, if you're interested in a short review of Dawkins' book check out Skeptical Christian's review of The God Delusion.

Do all religious paths lead to God? Greg Koukl says no, and I agree with him. Here he responds to the idea that all religions are basically the same and in a sense "all roads lead to Rome":

Click to view the streaming video: »» (more…)