How should we respond to the phrase "It takes more faith to be an atheist?" Have you ever heard Christian apologists use that line, "It takes more faith to be an atheist?"
The thinking here is that atheists are making bigger assumptions than religious people have to make. As if accepting the Big Bang and evolution is somehow fantastical, but believing that Jesus rose from the dead makes perfect sense, even though all the evidence we've ever had points to the Big Bang and evolution and, as far as I know, there's no evidence for zombies.
Anyone saying this also assumes that atheists possess all knowledge. As if we don't believe in God because we looked everywhere and didn't find God.
But that's a silly assumption to make for two reasons. First, because it's a straw man. I mean, pretty much every atheist is not saying: "There is no God."
We know we don't have that sort of perfect evidence. We're saying, "We looked at the evidence and we don't believe God exists." And there is a difference between those two.
And second, you don't have to look everywhere to dismiss a really silly idea.
You know, if you tell me there's an invisible unicorn flying around my head right now, I don't need to look around and look up to make sure that's the case.
I can just hear you out and say: "That sounds like a really crazy idea." It's-- The onus is on you to prove your silly idea; not on me to dismiss it. Saying you don't have enough faith to be an atheist is just another way of saying, "I do have enough faith to be an atheist."
So, you know what? Turn the tables on anyone who's saying that to you. Ask them for the evidence. Ask them to prove to you why God exists.
Because they can't do it. They'll give you anecdotes. They'll point to verses in the Bible as if that does it justice. But it really doesn't. It doesn't take a leap of faith to dismiss all the other gods that are out there: Zeus, Allah, Thor.
No one's saying it takes more faith not to believe in those gods. Finally, I'll admit. There are things I don't know the answers to. Do you know why is there something instead of nothing?
I don't have an answer to that. But at least I'm honest about it. I'm not gonna make up an answer just to satisfy that question; just to satisfy my curiosity.
And I'm certainly not gonna sit around and just say, "God did it!" as if that answers the question. I think there's a lot of humility involved, and a lot of wisdom in just saying, "I don't know the answer. We may never know the answer."
But it's not like it takes faith for me to say that. That's just being honest.
