Recent discussion with Pete August 2006.

Peter.  Hi Mike,   As mentioned I was brought up Strict Catholic in a blue collar city (it was once known for Anthracite Coal Mining - something my Grandfathers did). It seems back in the early 60's we were blinded into accepting religion, mostly sin, guilt, and fear. The Catholic Church was very strict back then, my parents are still devout Catholics. I would never want to burst their bubble regarding their beliefs. The church never taught us Christianity in an intelligent manner. It was memorization and no questions asked. I remember when I was about eleven someone asked the nun what would heaven be like, she said, "we will all be around Jesus praying to him", I was very disappointed and of course felt guilty. I wanted to play baseball with my friends in heaven and have the prettiest girlfriend.

One thing about the church is if you do a search on the Web Site for "Catholic Doctrine" you will find a very intelligent presentation of the church's beliefs something we were never exposed to growing up.

Why am I a skeptic? A few reasons: (1) There was nothing in the teachings of Christianity that wasn't stated in prior religions (I haven't read the "Christ Conspiracy" but a summary, (2) The stories of Christ seemed to be more incredible when he died then when he was alive, (3) Contrary to what I was told Christianity did not grow because of the Holy Spirit within man, but through force and brutality and (4) if we had to create a god (and we did) we would have wanted a just, loving, and one who would have given us an eternity in paradise.

I look at Jesus Christ the way I look at Santa Claus there is no one on this planet who wishes both stories were true more then your truly.

On the other hand, I feel and even a few scientist feel that this planet is so complex it is hard to believe we just evolved. It would be nice to believe there is a creator.

One thing we do disagree on might be politics I sympathize to the far right. Here is a question, do you believe in integration among races, if so, when in history did integration excel? Thank you for your time.

G’day Pete

 Thanks for you comment.  Your point is not only a good one, but also a very profound one.  The cliché’s that roll off people’s tongues just don’t cut it when these sorts of problems arise.  Personally, I think that it is much easier to understand and appreciate the world in which we live without God.  If we are the result of random chance then this randomness explains the injustice we see much better.  The problem with the traditional ideas of God is that it raises more questions about why terrible injustice continues.

Even if we do live in a so called random world, then we still need to fight injustice.  Unfortunately, religion is often, not always, the source of injustice.  In