You are the one who set up the dichotomy of the religion (or non-religion) one believes in as truth, and all other religions as lies. You said, “For the atheist, Christ’s divinity and miracles are all lies based on a will to power.” You are the one who said to me, “[H]ow can you speak with authority about a well-defined faith if you consider Nicea a lie? If you believe it to be a lie, then where is your authority?” You are the one who then said, “I think the leading question game played by David Nickol deserves to be called what it is . . . .”

I think you have given me ample grounds for asking you a question such as, “How can you accept Nostra Aetate if you believe Islam is a lie?” In my so-called leading questions, I am not attributing anything to you so baseless as your suggestion that I consider the Nicene Creed a lie.

Is joke, right?

Yes, I understand that. In fact, I already addressed it.

And if someone were claiming that the KKK can’t be Christian because no true Christian would ever commit murder, then you might have a point.

Add “straw man” to the list of fallacies in your argument.

And this is the origin of non-Christian religions—all founded by liars and carried on by dupes. Very helpful.

Douglas Johnson,

Please recall that it was you, in your message of August 9th, 2012 | 12:12 pm, who introduced the concept of a religion one does not believe in as being a lie:

For the atheist, Christ’s divinity and miracles are all lies based on a will to power. . . .

. . . .but how can you speak with authority about a well-defined faith if you consider Nicea a lie? If you believe it to be a lie, then where is your authority?

You introduced the topic of religions as lies. I didn’t. I asked you a follow-up question about your own words.

Oh what the heck, I’ll indulge you. This time you ask:

Are you saying—and I trust this is not the case—that a Mormon or a Muslim or a Buddhist or an atheist must be a liar? Are you saying that, deep in their hearts, they cannot really believe what they say they believe? Or are you saying they believe lies deliberately made up by someone else?

Way back when magicians used to pass off their trickery as the real thing. What they were doing was a lie, and the people who were duped and affirmed it was real to others also told a lie. The fact that they didn’t know they were telling a lie didn’t make it less of a lie. No doubt those folks believed in their hearts what they were seeing was real.

David Nickol,

If you like I will rewrite the sentence where I said “I believe Islam borrowed a great deal from Judaism to construct a lie, and I believe the same thing about Mormonism borrowing from the Gospel accounts.” I can remove the word “lie” and say, “I believe Islam borrowed a great deal from Judaism to say something that isn’t true, and I believe the same thing about Mormonism borrowing from the Gospel accounts.”

The funny thing is that you were the one who, in your question to me, demanded I address other religions as lies. So as not to get into some relativistic dance with you I decided to answer the question exactly as you put it. Then, you are aghast because I answered the question just as you asked it. Then you declare:

I do not recall ever hearing a Jew declare Christianity a lie. The use of the word lie implies, to me, willful deception. Are you saying—and I trust this is not the case…

I get it. It’s obvious. It’s childish. It’s boring.

Douglas Johnson,

Lie is a very strong word, especially when used in regard to another person’s religion. I cannot find it in Nostra Aetate (Declaration on the Relation of the Church to Non-Christian Religions). I do not recall ever hearing a Jew declare Christianity a lie. The use of the word lie implies, to me, willful deception. Are you saying—and I trust this is not the case—that a Mormon or a Muslim or a Buddhist or an atheist must be a liar? Are you saying that, deep in their hearts, they cannot really believe what they say they believe? Or are you saying they believe lies deliberately made up by someone else?

Blake,

Please read this:

No True Scotsman is a logical fallacy by which an individual attempts to avoid being associated with an unpleasant act by asserting that no true member of the group they belong to would do such a thing. Instead of acknowledging that some members of a group have undesirable characteristics, the fallacy tries to redefine the group to exclude them. Sentences such as “all members of X have desirable trait Y” then become tautologies, because Y becomes a requirement of membership in X.

those who want to make white supremacist ideology into a “Christian” movement

White supremacy is not a Christian movement. It’s white supremacy. However, that does not mean there can’t be Christian white supremacist organizations, like the KKK or so-called Christian identity groups. Environmentalism is not an Evangelical Christian movement, but that does not mean there cannot be Evangelical Christian environmental organizations.

By your logic, every sin committed by every individual and every group prior to the point where atheism became socially acceptable is proof against Christianity.

This is basically the opposite of what I am saying. Just because some Christians—in fact, all Christians—fall short of Christian ideals is not “proof against Christianity.” Just because some Christians claimed to find justification in Christianity for slavery or white supremacy is not “proof against Christianity.” If someone could make a clear and convincing case that white supremacy is inherent in Christian thought, that would be damaging to Christianity. But the fact that a group of people claimed to find a rationale for white supremacy, no matter how sincere they were, is not damaging to Christianity if those people were wrong.