I think I’m ready to try my hand at the 10 questions, but as I do, I want to do so formally, one at a time, and give people a chance to accept or reject my answer before moving on to the next one.
In order for this to work I’m depending upon the intellectual honesty of the atheists this board to admit it when I’ve actually resolved one of the 10 questions. This of course will not prove god exists or Christianity is true, just that the 10 questions do not prove it isn’t. Based on what I’ve seen on the board I think it’s safe to expect that.
I’ll also set up a criteria for what we’ll call “answered”. I’m hoping to demonstrate that good Christian theology is internally consistent in these 10 areas, In other words, that even when you consider these questions, Christianity remains viable, or “possible”.
Because this seems to be the goal, most of these answers will incorporate elements of theological teaching. In other words, I believe the same things I teach Jr. Highers in catechism, to make their theology more robust and consistent, will also help you to understand how Christianity can stand.
I can see that it is important to the author of the WWGHA video and website that I do not make excuses for God, so everything I say about Christianity is going to be backed up by the bible, examined under “good exegesis”, which is to say, I will provide a good scholarly argument for any interpretation of scripture that I make, such that it would hold up as reasonable in a discussion with a professional biblical scholar, pastor, or professor.
I want to remind you again that I will be making these interpretations in order to demonstrate that I am not just making excuses for God, and that Christianity is internally consistent, NOT because I expect you to believe it’s true. All I expect is that you understand that it is what Christians believe.
I might also use the bible as a historical document, by which I mean a document from history, not a document that necessarily accurately records history.
Finally, I may make conjectures about what I believe is going on, of what one explanation might be, based upon the evidence. In such cases I’ll try to establish a case that there are no verses that lead to a definite explanation, and that therefore, It’s appropriate to guess. However, It’s very hard to demonstrate the non existence of something, so in these sorts of cases I’ll be subject to any verses you can find to the contrary.
I’ll make a thread for each one of the 10 questions, in backwards order, ending at number 1 (if I get that far)
But before I get started:
Is this criteria fair? Or do I need to tweak it?