Comment by Great Dane on August 21, 2011 at 4:51pm

Sorry to hear about your waste of time. I think this is what is to be expected from most of these book challenge situations. Since religion is irrational so is any book trying to justify religion no matter how well it presents its arguments.

But keep trying - maybe one day you will catch your elusive friend and do some good ;)

Comment by Kris Feenstra on August 21, 2011 at 5:20pm

I misunderstood the first time I read this entry. I thought that he gave you a book to read and you, in turn, gave him a book of your choosing. After going back to the first blog entry, it appears that he gave you a book to read the he, himself, has not read? And despite the fact that you lived up to your word and read the first half, he has not? Wow.

Well, in this world you can only account for your own actions, and from the sound of things, you acted commendably by living up to your word, even in the face of a request that was absurd to begin with. At the very least, he's lost the right to criticize your openness to his religion. Even if you read the book with a skeptic's eye (not a bad thing in my books, mind you), you still humored him in a task that he, himself, was not willing to undertake.

Hopefully you picked up some interesting information here and there while dissecting the first half of that book. It's not such a bad thing to reevaluate your own arguments and do further research on them.

Comment by Dennis Smith on August 21, 2011 at 6:02pm

This is my take on it. He, as a youth pastor, wants to add your atheist scalp to his belt to get you into church and to have a good story to tell; how he brought a confirmed atheist to her knees in prayer and repentance.

 

However, problem is he doesn't have the goods so he gave you a book to read so someone else would do the work for him and he could just mop up after. Now he has to put up or shut and actually enter into a discussion for which he is woefully unprepared and outgunned. Chances are, IF he reads the book, all he will be able to do is regurgitate the contents without having intelligently interacted with it. Otherwise he would have just agreed to talk with you straight up.

 

Keep at him about the discussion!

Comment by Bailey Shoemaker Richards on August 21, 2011 at 6:08pm

You could always post a detailed takedown of it on here. I know there are those of us out here who would get an absolute kick out of it (at least, I would!). 

Comment by Frank Hamilton on August 21, 2011 at 7:15pm

The title suggests an oxymoron. Atheist precludes "faith". It was obviously not written by a FreeThinker but by a religious author. It's not even clever.

Comment by Godless Conservative on August 22, 2011 at 12:16am

It's never a waste of time.  You'll find it will come up again.  They have about three or four books they like to throw out there.  I've read at least parts of many of them.  That one is particularly bad since you don't have to get off the title to see it's moronic.

 

http://godlessconservative.com

Comment by Rick on August 22, 2011 at 6:39am

I agree with Bailey.It would be great if you would post your efforts here for us to see.

Godless C. also has a good point. There's no doubt you'll put what you have learned to good use.

Comment by Unseen on August 22, 2011 at 11:45am

I never take reading assignments or invitations to a book discussion. I will say that I will gladly engage the other person (the one who liked the book) in a discussion of its ideas, as they understand them, because it is how they understand them that really matters. Otherwise, I could just ask them to go read Lord Russell's Why I Am Not A Christian or some of the recent readings or lectures by Christopher Hitchens.

Comment by Scarlette Blues on August 22, 2011 at 8:36pm

Thanks everyone for the comments! I can see your points that it wasn't a waste of time. I actually did learn a lot from the book, specifically how Christian apologists cherry pick their science as much as their holy book. I have been thinking about writing a review of the first half of the book. Doing so would help organize my thoughts just in case he decides to continue.

To be honest, I don't think he thought I would take this task seriously. He was probably shocked to see that I actually bought the book, was researching claims and taking notes. Ah well, maybe he'll come around.

@Eric- "you have given the shining example the difference between people who actually want to seek the truth and those that just want to be confrontational and comforted in their beliefs." <- That was exactly my motive for accepting the challenge. I wanted to show him, and surrounding Christians, that atheists are willing to learn but will only accept true evidence.

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