There was alot of Nationalistic stuff there including something I got from the VFW that gave their definition of "Americanism". I was shocked to find the staement was almost pure nationalist. No matter what stand and believe in our country etc. There was nothing about supporting our leaders when they are moral and standing up for what it right. Nope it was all god and country, stand behind it no matter what. It was very scary.

As far as the previous statement he was in no way prepared for it.

I am sorry I do not understand your comment. Please clarify.

@DavidLaDeau Your interaction with Matt Hardy touches on a wider and deeper context than the agenda typical christians set for you. I wish I had my act together and I would like to marshall arguments that Christians I've known would find trenchant enough.

Besides the breadth of variety Matt mentions, most Christians have:

i terms they pretend to have
ii terms they really have but either won't face or haven't been informed of by their "betters", aren't even allowed to know. Stuff about growth and gifts.

They are functional atheists (but dishonest) themselves, because they don't have belief in what / who potentises and how. They trivialise their stories (and points around Paul) and don't see any meaning in these themselves. They don't have any principle of principle.

If our arguments are confined to i they won't hit home. If their eyes should be opened to questions of ii they will gain the chance to walk away from dishonest institutions like I have. I find 0.1 % belief of equal value to 99.9 % belief (and more "believable" ). Thomas wasn't a so-called Doubter (as if to look down one's nose at) he was to my thinking a Believer from the start; that he is portrayed as persuaded, in reality especially brings out that he realised that he already had been a more genuine "believer". My other favourite is Nathaniel whom you couldn't b*lsht. I've had a long struggle getting to where I've got.

Genuine faith is never supposed to be "blind". I sense profound allyship with everyone across the gamut of agnostics. I look to J H Newman as model for agnostics with his steady principle of assent to degrees of inference (he studied under Whately), however he or anyone might "dress it up": he drank to conscience first and conscience is in the intellect. Logic = honesty = ethics. What "is" leads to "ought" because what is, asks for our respect. I look for principle and not outward dressing. In my critiques of specific religions I speak mainly about what I've encountered from those I've mixed with and from their associates who have seized the media.

You are off to a very good start so please don't give up. But the key to breaking an unoriginal system is to be more original, ourselves. This shouldn't mean loading ourselves up. Your journey is just as unique as mine. The key will be by intuitional inspiration hitting upon that / those specific chisel glance (s) that will put a little crack in them. I sense it is especially in the area of growth, gifts and potentising. I could now, after years of despair and testing to destruction, beat them at their own real game, but often feel I haven't the energy.

And whatever relative miracles (unusual events) are for, it is not for evangelising. I love the growing trend for preachers' kids and "worship ministers" to declare themselves "unbelievers" out of sheer self defence - to gain space and peace to stay in their own real positions. If there was a hypothetical worthwhile enough god "it" wouldn't want to checklist us for our ideology. "It" would be looking for how we potentise the growth of others. If you're uncomfortable remaining as close to some of the sources as I do, good, just find your own excellent space.

@HenAgnDon Thank you for your thoughful comment there is alot to digest. In the mean time. I honesly think the whole "doubting Thomas" thing was simply a literary device to show that even the disciples doubted and that is why you have to have faith.

@DavidLaDeau The dumbed down version is made to say that yes. The challenge against most of those christians is whether they can get anything original, vivid and real out of it - and the answer in many cases is they can't, so they should be told to stop.

You are very correct! Christianity does not follow the teachings of Jesus but the Teaching of Paul. I have been wanting tomake a video about it but it would be too short! You have said it all!

In which part or parts? I was a Christians and this is how I came to my conclusion? There is simply no straw man that I can glean. Please show me my error.

@DavidLaDeau Hi, is that you in the video? I don't mean to offend. What I mean by "almost straw man" is that the predicates it sets up about christian belief are far from universal. Sure, if someone is a fundamentalist whose belief is predicated on 100% solid faith in the bible being the inerrant word of god then sure that's argument works against that narrow belief system. However that belief system doesn't describe the Christians I know.
Also comes across as confrontational, maybe even bitter.

@MattHardy You are correct there are many differing beliefs within Christianity which is the point that I make in the video. Thus how could you know you are correct in said Christian belief. I was a fundamentalist, creationist, Bible literalness, extremist. My channel is focused on this demographic. If this group can be reasoned with then the more moderate groups can be reasoned with much more easily as they do not hold such extreme beliefs. No offence taken. I like to be questioned as It is the only way to grow and improve. I have made mistakes and will what is important is that I learn and CORRECT mistakes. My opinion does not matter. The facts do. I may sometimes come across as bitter I was literally taught lies (unknowingly by my friends, family, and community) as a child and was living a lie as an adult. I wasted many years of my life and made serious life changing decisions based on mythology as opposed to reality. I actually hope it comes off as passion, but it is what it is.

@DavidLaDeau Yeah I think i must be the resentment at those wasted years that I see coming across. I hope you find this exercise cathartic. I don't think that you'll convince many believers to come over but if you can work through some of their pain then that's a positive. Right now you have a strong passion against those wasted years, but maybe you won't truly be free until you just don't give a shit.

Easy for me to say, I was brought up in a spiritual melee and encouraged to find my own path. I bear no malice to the the moderate christians, muslims, hindus and jews in my life where their belief helps them in acts of kindness and compassion to all humans.

Look at us, two different atheists with two different approaches. We can't both be right. And if we can't be 100% certain in our fundamentalist atheism then I guess really we're Christians?

Just kidding but maybe you can see the flaw in that argument when I re-frame it? Possibly not, because re-framing introduces new flaws and our own arguments are that hardest to pick fault in.

Let me leave you with this, you're not responsible for what those other people believe. You're not responsible for what you used to believe. You believe what you believe and disbelieve what you disbelieve. You've been on a journey and put in the work to find what makes sense to you and that gives your belief system merit. I think that shows in your passion. However it sounds to me that maybe you live in a community where atheists are treated as second class citizens and that it wrong.I think some of what I'm seeing may be a counter offensive. What other people believe doesn't really matter. How they treat people who believe differently does. What matters is tolerance, and the injustice of religious privilege. You shouldn't need to shatter someone's belief system to get them to show tolerance. The hypocrisy of christian intolerance. That right there is a target worthy of your passion.

Best of luck.

@MattHardy If I can help others to avoid what I did then I have done some good. If I allow those around me to live their lives and make lives decisions according to mythology I am not being loving or caring. It is selfish to avoid confrontation when one can help others to consider whether their beliefs are based on reality. I am also very concerned about living in realty as I hallucinate every day. (I made a video about that also). Religion made my hallucinations much worse!

@DavidLaDeau I had a similar experience re: fundamentalist, creationist, etc. and I agree that it seems like the more hardcore beliefs would be the hardest to reason with. But... this may be a sort of chauvinism on our part. I mean, it overtook our lives, right? Surely something that powerful must be the very hardest thing to reason people out of!

I have found something different. I've found that the squishier beliefs are more resilient than the hardcore beliefs. Belief in a literal flood, for example, is much easier to tackle than the belief that it was code for some "greater truth" that God wanted us to learn. (What this metaphorical truth might be, of course, is easily manipulated to suit the agenda of the day.)

@DavidLaDeau ... according to a misinterpreted version of mythology imposed on the less powerful for control reasons ...
I sense you have a strong gift for spatial thinking.

Blind faith was indeed something I addressed as a focal point in the video. Many Christians have not heard any of these points at all and or have never thought about it. Magic and faith are indeed the throw downs. The points I made were not untrue at all by design.

@DavidLaDeau I omitted the word ‘many” in my text above, for which I apologise. It alters it a little and I’m amending it now.

@Marionville Gosh I have NEVER miss spoken or written! LOL!

@DavidLaDeau You are right to challenge them on magic.

Yes. People "believe in believing," as you put it, but they don't actually, really believe.

Yes when I first read that, there came much understanding. My x wife was that way. She just thought it was a good idea to believe and still does to this day. One day after we were divorced we had a talk about god. I told her this. If you don't really truely believe that a woman got pregnant without a sperm donor, that a corpse that was actively decomposing came back to life than you are an atheist. She gave me a very tight ambigious smirk. After 20 of having been married to her I knew she finally understood and knew that she really did not believe. I left it there as if I had asked her if she believed in god it she would have said yes and it would have undone the revalation. She does still delude herself with thinking she believes simply because she wants to.

To say the music was irritating is an understatement! So is this guy’s delivery and facial expressions!

@Marionville I liked his delivery well enough.

@AmyTheBruce Just a personal irritation...glad you didn’t share.

@Marionville I just had a discussion about that with my girlfriend. My editing software makes it sound great . Then when I upload it to YouTube it changes. I will lower the volume in future videos, Thank You! I can not help how "God" made my face or expressions. I am passionate about what I do. I may come out in my expressions.

One has to wonder, regarding these pretending people, whether their families are also pretending. Is it one big charade?

Sometimes kids will pretend to believe in Santa Claus, long after they know better, in order to keep the adults happy (and keep the presents coming!).

@AmyTheBruce I think to a lesser degree their parents and more so with their kids. Either way if religion were only made up of people who truly believed their numbers would be a lot smaller, to say the least.

@AmyTheBruce I am positive that for many they simply believe because everyine else does. It makes things so much easier in faamilies and with friends and work. I am one who wants to know the facts no matter how displeasing they may be.