Apologetics and Evidence

When someone makes a truth claim or statement, no matter who it came from, this claim must come under the Three Fundamental Laws of Logic . If the claim is true, then the source of the claim is irrelevant and arbitrary. The genetic fallacy ultimately reduces the significance of a claim because of its origins. For an extreme instance, Adolf Hitler said that smoking cigarettes are unhealthy, and tried to convince those around him to stop smoking. We think of Adolf Hitler as being an evil person and with anything he might have said, we perhaps want to dismiss it as something that is false, or we do not want to give what was said the time of day, so to speak. The problem is, sometimes the truth hurts, not always the claim itself, but where the claim or statement came from.  If a person does not like the source, no matter if he is usually described as an expletive, or if it is your mother-in-law, or a biker, or a janitor, or the Bible , it has nothing to do with the validity of the...

All religions can be false, but not all of them can be true . One religion can be true , which is what I argue for Christianity , but not all of them can be true because they oppose one another. Religions by their own existence imply exclusivity. Think about it… Would a religion exist if it thought another religion were the truth? Think of what is likely the most extreme example: Hinduism. Hinduism teaches that “there are almost no restrictions on personal beliefs, but in order to qualify as a Hindu, a religion has to (1) regard the Vedas as divinely inspired and authoritative, (2) accept the caste system, and (3) respect the veneration of the various levels of deities and spirits, including the protection of cows.” [1] Notice the wording in this citation: not that a person must do these things to qualify, but a religion must do these three things to qualify as Hinduism. The reason Hinduism is such an extreme example is because it is a polytheistic religion, having up to 330 mi...

I have been to several predominant Buddhist countries, I live in a place with Buddhism being a predominant worldview (with a large Dharma center being less than a 40 minute drive from my home), and so this compels me to help people to see Buddhism for what it is. Many people like to say that Buddhism is not a religion , because of the negative connotations that the word “ religion ” has with it today for several ridiculous and poor reasons, but also because many emphasize the philosophical nature of Buddhism so much that it blinds some from seeing it for what it really is, and not seeing how it falls short of offering hope to the world.      Consider with me, if you will, the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism. The first is the idea that suffering exists . The second is that we suffer because we are attached to people, places, animals, and things (basically, nouns). The third noble truth is that if we release the attachment to people, places, animals, and things , then ...