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From: tedr@athena.cs.uga.edu (Ted Kalivoda)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Atheist's views on Christianity (was: Re: "Accepting Jeesus in your heart...")
Message-ID: <Apr.21.03.25.55.1993.1334@geneva.rutgers.edu>
Date: 21 Apr 93 07:25:55 GMT
Sender: hedrick@geneva.rutgers.edu
Organization: University of Georgia - UCNS
Lines: 32
Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu

In article <Apr.19.05.13.48.1993.29266@athos.rutgers.edu>,
kempmp@phoenix.oulu.fi (Petri Pihko) wrote:
> 
> Jason Smith (jasons@atlastele.com) wrote: 
 
> Another answer is that God is the _source_ of all existence.
> This sounds much better, but I am tempted to ask: Does God
> Himself exist, then? If God is the source of His own existence,
> it can only mean that He has, in terms of human time, always
> existed. But this is not the same as the source of all existence.
> This argument sounds like God does not exist, but meta-exists,
> and from His meta-existent perspective, He created existence.
> I think this is actually a nonsolution, a mere twist of words.

Always existing and being the source of the existence of all other beings
is not problematic.

But, as you put, Being the source of "all" existence, including one's own,
would mean that God came from nothing, a concept alien to Christianity and
Theism.  It is better to understand the classical concepts of Necessary and
Contingent existence.  God exists necessarily, always.  God created
contingent beings.  This is a coherent solution to existence, so long as
the concept of God is coherent.
 
> The best answer I have heard is that human reasoning is incapable
> of understanding such questions. Being an atheist myself, I do not
> accept such answers, since I do not have any other methods.

Not a very good answer.  If reason cannot by any means understand something
then it is likely that "it" is a null concept, something not in reality.

Ted Kalivoda
