This morning, Joel Osteen had 6,956 followers on twitter and Richard Dawkins had 10,493.I find it interesting that Osteen has been criticized for the lack of scripture references in his sermons and the radical notion that a personal relationship with Jesus Christ is the only way to Heaven.
If I could ask Mr. Osteen one question, it would be this: do you really believe that a dead piece of meat started to rot and then came back to life? If so, why? Please be specific. When answering, please keep in mind the fact that the supposed event of a dead person coming back to life is far from unique to Christianity and was prevalent in several religious traditions which existed thousands of years before the birth of Jesus.
In my experience, some of the most apparently fervent and knowledgeable Christians have difficulty responding to this question.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteUmm . . . what do big bang theory and evolution have to do with the reanimation of a rotting corpse?
ReplyDeleteThe unfortunate part about this strawman is, that apparently you now have to be an atheist, and I don't really want you.
While I don't doubt that your "there is hope" comment isn't totally unfounded, I wouldn't point to the polls as the foundation:
ReplyDelete•Isn't Dawkins a way bigger deal for atheists than Osteen is for theists? I don't know if there are any big theistic twitterers though.
•I'm guessing that the population theists would be less likely to follow people on twitter compared to the population of atheists. In my experience, many theists are older, and many older people would say "what is twitter?" than would younger people. I suppose it could show that the generation that is replacing the less-technologically-savvy has a higher number of people per capita following a particular atheist than a particular theist though.
I did read/hear recently that, overall, Atheism is the fastest growing belief system in the United States—at least, belief in the traditional theistic/non-theistic sense—but I wouldn't cite twitter accounts as evidence of anything, other than the matter of fact that there are more twitter followers of Dawkins than Osteen.
It could be that you were just showing the poll as an aside.
How come the virgin Mary had a boy when a woman needs one Y chromosome from another male to have a male?
ReplyDeleteEasy:
If God created the universe and its complexity, then it was very easy for him to implant the Y chromosome required. The same way God was able to resurrect Jesus. Can't you see how easy this is to understand?
Disclaimer: the above logic was extracted from The Case for Faith by Lee Strobel, and it does not represent the logic of this poster.
Scott, calling it an aside would be an overstatement. A better description would be an "almost worthless piece of trivia". There is no question that a larger proportion of Dawkins' fans would be twitterers. Osteen is a televangelist who regularly preaches to millions. Dawkins is a mild mannered zoologist who just happens to be an intellectual mercenary when it comes to religion.
ReplyDeleteBrian, shame on you for trying to make the Christians think!
How many followers does the Pope have on Twitter?
ReplyDelete