My post titled “Inherited Religion?” has generated so much flame comments that it was necessary to break the comment section down into a few parts. Part three addresses comments left by HeHe. I actually like HeHe. He is much more thoughtful than my other objectors, and he certainly doesn’t disappoint this time:

Well, the thing about religion being inherited is that that property should necessarily motivate someone to compare it with the other possible beliefs (or lack of beliefs). It’s like multiple people having a map to get to say, Destiny town. None of the maps agree. For some reason, you’re only holding onto map M because you were first delivered it in the mail, the others either didn’t come or came after you had read it and been convinced by it. You read it entirely, and it made some sense, if you accepted some unverifiable a priories (maybe severely unverifiable).

Now, if you’re a logical person, and you suddenly realize that there are hundreds of other maps, that people tend to believe the one they were delivered first, you should draw yourself away from the belief you have inherited, PRETEND IT IS FALSE, and look at all the possible beliefs available(about Destiny town) OBJECTIVELY. You may go as far as realize that there is no evidence that Destiny town even exists.

This is interesting, assuming that it is actually possible to do. Most people are unable to look completely objectively at anything. I’m not saying that I’m any better.

Now, at the risk of sounding pragmatic, I’ve found that Christianity just works. I can’t think of any of God’s promises in the Bible that he’s ever broken when it comes down to it. I’ve always had food and clothing, as have my kids (Mt 6:25-24). I sometimes go without my wants, but everything I need has always been provided.

I haven’t considered every single religion out there, and neither have you. But I have found much truth in Christianity.

Then, HeHe immediately follows with this:

Well, as for the rest, it makes God not seem very nice, I think that is indeed Calvinism or something, as Stoo said. So God has pre-condemned most of the world? I’m not an expert, but doesn’t that go counter to Paul’s teachings about converting the Gentiles or something? Shouldn’t people attempt to convert the other religions to Christianity? Doesn’t the bible predict that they would find great success (100 to 1, the sower’s parable)?

Yes, HeHe, I’m a Calvinist. Sorry to burst your bubble of autonomous free will. But this whole concept of predestination alleviates neither the human responsibility to turn to God for redemption nor does it exempt the elect from the command to preach the Gospel. Why it should be this way is a little harder to work out in a brief post like this one. Romans 9:22-24, however, contains a clue. God is enduring the vessels of wrath for a little while in order to make known his grace to those vessels of mercy in a way that would otherwise not be possible if he redeemed all of his creation.

In conclusion, I would just like to say that it was very tempting to categorize these last three posts under my “Comment Spam” heading, but I resisted. That was meant for a laugh. I won’t answer anyone who tries to act otherwise in the comment section of this post.