Last night, my friend Matt and I had an opportunity to go to one of the church services that I talked about in my last post. As I mentioned there, this is a series of lessons surrounding the topic “Can We Believe the Bible?” by an evangelist / college professor / apologist that I corresponded with several years ago, named Doy Moyer. I was excited about going, but also nervous. It had been almost 5 years since I was last inside a conservative Church of Christ, and I knew I would probably see a couple of people that I knew. It was really nice having Matt along for the adventure.
Once we came in and got seated (last row, stage left, which I guess placed us firmly in the “goats” section), I noticed my in-laws sitting in the center section as well as the preacher from their congregation — the same one who was there when I attended. Let me state upfront that I still care deeply for all three of them. My wife’s parents are genuinely great people, and I couldn’t have gotten better in-laws. Granted, things aren’t as good now as they once were, but they’re just as hurt by all that as we are. And the preacher is a great guy as well. We were pretty close, once upon a time.
Anyway, while we waited for the service to begin, the PowerPoint was showing the topics that they plan to cover each night:
- 3/30/15 — How Is Bible History to Be Perceived?
- 4/6/15 — Can We Trust the Gospels?
- 4/13/15 — Have the Gospels Been Hopelessly Corrupted?
- 4/20/15 — Can We Use the Bible to Prove the Bible?
- 4/27/15 — What About God and the Slaughter of the Innocents?
- 5/4/15 — How Can the Bible Really Be Understood?
Those are interesting topics. And though there’s no way I’ll be able to make each one of them in person, I plan to listen to them all. But last night was the second topic, “Can We Trust the Gospels?” It more or less went the way I expected it would.
Moyer started by quoting Simon Greenleaf, who once said something to the effect that every witness should be considered credible until proven otherwise. He then spent some time talking about presuppositions — and this is apparently something he talked about at length during the first session as well. He said that atheists (I don’t remember if he implied “all” or “most”) start with the presupposition that miracles are impossible, so of course they don’t accept the Bible. He also said that when examining the Bible we should avoid modern biases. In other words, he implied that some parts of the Bible might look problematic, but that’s only from our modern mindset. He pointed out that the authors of the gospels displayed historical intent and referenced Luke 1:1 as evidence for that. He also mentioned that CS Lewis was convinced that the accounts did not bear the markers of legend. Moyer stated that the authors seemed to know what they were talking about. And he said that their bias was not a reason to discount their testimony, since we all have bias of some kind or another.
All in all, I didn’t disagree with much of his introduction. I wish he had pointed out that presuppositions can run both ways, but I can’t say I was surprised by that omission. Of course, I disagreed with his assertion that the main reason people reject the gospels is because they’ve eliminated the possibility of miracles. But the rest of his points were decent, in my opinion, though I could tell he was going to take some of them in directions I wouldn’t agree with.
He then got into the guts of his presentation, laying out several arguments that supported his belief that the gospels can be trusted. Much of his information came from Lord or Legend?, by Gregory Boyd and Paul Rhodes Eddy, and Can We Trust the Gospels?, by Mark D Roberts. I’ve read the latter, but not the former. The rest of Moyer’s presentation went as follows:
Were the authors in a position to know?
According to Moyer, some of the gospels make eyewitness claims. This was one of the first statements that really stood out to me. Is that true? I don’t really think it is, but I haven’t looked into it for a while and haven’t had a chance to since last night. I’d be interested in anything you readers might have to say about this claim.
Moyer also asked, if the gospels were fabricated, then why were the names Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John chosen for them? He pointed out that pseudonymous works typically used names that were well known and carried weight: like the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Peter, etc. Why would anyone have used Mark and Luke, since neither of them were eyewitnesses or knew Jesus? In fact, Moyer argued, the anonymity of the gospels suggests legitimacy, since they didn’t feel the need to claim the names of well-known disciples.
But I didn’t find this point particularly compelling. First of all, his point would only hold true for Mark and Luke, since Matthew and John were both very well known disciples. Furthermore, he made it sound as though we didn’t really know why the names Mark and Luke were assigned to these, suggesting that the Christians who began using those names must have known something. But we do know why those gospels are named as they are. Mark carries its name, because Papias said (about 100 years after Jesus’ death) that Mark was simply transcribing dictation from Peter. But the majority of modern scholars don’t accept that claim. And the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts are said to be written by Luke, because of some pronoun usage in Acts (Luke was a companion to Paul). But again, most modern scholars don’t accept that position, since parts of Acts are not in agreement with statements made in Paul’s epistles.
Moyer also made it sound like the authorship of the gospels was pretty settled, which is definitely not true, unless he’s only considering the opinions of ultra-conservative scholars.
In all, I didn’t think this point was particularly strong.
Are the copies reasonably close to the originals?
Here, Moyer went through the typical points about the number of manuscripts, how the textual attestation for the Bible is better than any other document from antiquity, etc. These points were pretty accurate, but a little misleading. For instance, while he mentioned that the Greek manuscripts date from about 50 years after the originals to about 1500 years, he didn’t point out that about 94% of those manuscripts date from the 9th century or later, or that the oldest manuscripts are just fragments. Nevertheless, the actual facts he referenced were pretty accurate.
He did point out that he’ll cover this in more detail in the next meeting. And for what it’s worth, I do think that the biblical texts are likely very close to the originals — at least in most cases. In some ways, this is actually a problem for Christianity, in my opinion, since it makes it very hard to claim that all discrepancies are the result of copying errors.
Are the reports consistent with eyewitness testimony?
Here, Moyer referenced things like Aramaisms (the recording of an Aramaic saying in another language, like “Lama, Lama sabacthani”) and references to places and people. Here, he referenced another book, Richard Baukham’s Jesus and the Eyewitnesses.
These points have never seemed especially strong to me. Maybe they should, I don’t know. But when a Spider-Man comic references Barack Obama, or Michael Bloomberg, I don’t suddenly think it must be true. And Aramaic was still being spoken at the time the gospels were written — would it be weird for Greek-speaking Christians who were educated enough to write these gospels to know some Aramaic as well?
The gospels contain self-damaging material
Moyer pointed out that if the gospels were being invented, surely the authors would want to portray the protagonists in the best possible light. Yet the gospels talk about the disciples being inadequate at times, they reference some people thinking Jesus was crazy or demon-possessed, and they show his disciples either betraying or abandoning him in the end. On top of that, the first people to find Jesus after his resurrection were women, who were considered unreliable back then.
But I don’t know many skeptics who think the gospels were pure inventions. Most believe (like most scholars) that the gospel story began as oral traditions that circulated among the believers. I think each gospel was written by someone who believed the bulk of what they were writing. And is there really no value in having stories that show the weaknesses of the disciples? It’s a great way to illustrate the supremacy of Jesus’ wisdom, as well as provide a compelling character arc for the disciples.
Do the gospels demonstrate reasonable consistency?
This was probably the one that bugged me the most. You have to remember that this was being presented in a Church of Christ, and every member of the CoC that I know believes in biblical inerrancy. Yet you can see from the wording of this heading that Moyer was playing it safe with phrases like “reasonable consistency.”
Moyer again stressed that the gospels weren’t written from a modern point of view. He also stressed that there was a difference between a “difficulty” and a “contradiction” and that the bar for proving an actual contradiction was extremely high. He referenced the synoptic problem, but complained that when the gospels differ people say they’re contradictory, yet when they agree people claim it’s evidence of collusion. This is a false dichotomy, of course. Otherwise, no one would ever be able to recognize plagiarism. The simple fact is that parts of the synoptics are direct copies of one another, while other portions of the gospels are diametrically opposed.
Moyer also showed his hand on the subject of inerrancy a bit by stressing that “for core historical events, it’s not necessary to prove flawlessness.”
Is there other literary evidence?
Moyer ended things by talking about the references to Christ and Christians in ancient sources like Tacitus, Seutonius, Josephus, Thallus, Pliny, Trajan, Hadrian, and the Talmud. He didn’t go into details, but did acknowledge that none of these sources corroborate things like the resurrection, etc. But he felt that they did demonstrate some basic things, like Jesus being a real individual, that he died by crucifixion under Pontius Pilate’s authority, and that Christians believed in the resurrection.
I didn’t have any real problems with his points here.
Conclusion
He didn’t say much in the conclusion, other than again stressing the problem with an a priori position that miracles are impossible.
He opened the floor up for questions, and he got a few. Nothing major. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to jump in. I didn’t want to be a jerk — that would have been the wrong move with my in-laws, and they were the only real reason I was there. At the same time, I figured that most people in the audience hadn’t realized how soft Moyer’s position on inerrancy is. And while I think that’s appropriate for a Christian who’s aware of all the information, I knew that he was essentially pulling one over on everyone there. Most of them view inerrancy as a major piece of evidence for Christianity, but that’s not how Moyer sees it.
So I raised my hand (I was pretty nervous, I have to admit), and when he called on me, I asked, “It seems like the authors you’re quoting from imply that inerrancy isn’t very supportable… am I understanding that correctly?”
To me, he seemed uncomfortable, and he didn’t really answer the question. He talked about first needing to determine what the gospels were trying to say. Then, based on their historical reliability, one could think more about things like inerrancy. As a Jesus follower, he would need to establish what Jesus thought about scripture and inerrancy and then follow that.
As you can see, he didn’t really say what he believed Jesus’ position on that was. He was trying his very best to be noncommittal on the subject of inerrancy. I’m not sure how noticeable that was to everyone else, but maybe they picked up on it.
After the service, Matt and I walked over and spoke to my in-laws and the preacher from my old congregation. Matt knows all of them as well. The interaction was friendly — a little awkward maybe, but still friendly. I also introduced myself to Moyer, but I don’t think he remembered me from our previous correspondence.
All in all, I’m glad I went. My in-laws are obviously attending all of these, and I want to know what they’re hearing. We should get an opportunity to discuss all of it at some point, and I’m looking forward to that. It was still weird being in a church, though. 
Finding Truth 
Gary, the points you make are valid.
But yet we see the internet turning young people to radical Islam. It seems based on a certain presentation of the evidence that persuades Muslims are persecuted. In just one infamous example ISIS used movie footage and alleged it was an atrocity against Muslim’s.
I come from Australia and the story of Jake Bilardi is telling. He was an intelligent and thoughtful teenager who self radicalised through the internet and became a suicide bomber in Syria.
http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2015/s4196529.htm
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Peter,
You are correct. The internet is making dramatic changes in society, for better and for worse.
Let each of us who has “seen the light” about the falseness of supernatural-based, fundamentalist religion, use the internet to share this truth with those who are still “in bondage” to the superstitions and fear-based control of these ancient religions. I encourage every ex-Christian, ex-Muslim, ex-Hindu, ex-Mormon, etc. to start a blog and share the real truth with the world.
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Make no mistake, Christianity is in a death spiral in the United States and other western industrialized nations. Check out this article regarding the Southern Baptist Convention:
http://www.religionnews.com/2014/06/04/southern-baptists-meet-membership-baptism-decline-continues/
The article states that the SBC, the largest Protestant Church in the US, and the flagship of Christian evangelicalism, is in steady decline. One startling statistic is this: 80% of the 46,000 SBC congregations report that they had one or less baptisms of a person under the age of 30 in one entire year! You won’t last long as a Church with those kinds of numbers among the younger generations. Young people are rejecting Christianity in droves.
One SBC pastor stated that 1,000 churches (of all Christian denominations) are closing their doors in the US every year!
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I have concluded that the reason more people seem to leave Christianity than Islam is primarily social. To leave Islam is a very high cost, which at the least will involve social isolation and possibly cost a person their life. Also Muslims are actively dissuaded from questioning. Those who publicly question are in danger of their life. This used to be the case with Christianity around 500 years ago.
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What’s really scary is the Pew Forum has concluded that Islam will grow faster than any other major religion. They say that if current trends continue, by 2050, the number of Muslims will nearly equal the number of Christians around the world.
http://www.pewforum.org/2015/04/02/religious-projections-2010-2050/
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The internet and other cultural forces will certainly change the landscape. But to what degree remains to be determined. There are plenty of Christians who follow atheist blogs and know every atheist argument in the book, just like the atheists tend to know every apologetic in the book. The phenomenon of belief or doubt is not simple at all.
In the Pew study Nan and I referred to, in the US Christians are projected to decline from 78 to 66% while “unaffiliated” are projected to increase from 16 to 26%. Breaking down the “unaffiliated” further shows the actual number of atheists is quite small. Atheists are only 1.6% in US, agnostics 2.4%, and the remaining 12% are “nothing in particular”. If atheists comprise the same fraction of the unaffiliated in 2050, then there will be 2.6% atheists.
We are experiencing a phenomenon that has been called “post-Christianity” and we are simply lagging behind Europe in this matter. Nietzsche had predicted it would take centuries for God “to die” and church buildings to become empty. I don’t think he had predicted how Islam would impact post-Christian Europe though.
There are several political pundits who think Islam is going to take over Europe. Secular folks have a low birth rate compared to Muslims and Muslims are immigrating to several European countries. We all know most Muslims are so-called “moderate” peace loving folks just worried about basic things in life. The problem is the so-called “extremist” ideology with jihad and Sharia law. So, these secular countries who fail to assimilate Muslims run a future risk of an Islamic revolution. How high is that risk realistically? No one really knows for sure.
There are other pundits who argue that secular humanism is rooted in Christianity and so when Christianity declines to a certain level, secular humanism will die. They argue the only alternative is nihilism. This is also what Nietzsche argued. This would make a society unstable and ripe to be overtaken by some totalitarian regime whether it be political or Islamic. This might be the case. Every atheist I’ve talked to is just a few handshakes or a stones throw to a Christian or a church. They think they have established their own values and can pass it on to their children, but where there is no anchor, how many generations will it take to float off into the abyss?
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Brandon,
Every skeptic has heard the story that without Christianity the world would fall into totalitarian genocide. We don’t buy it. I would encourage you to read some posts on this subject on popular skeptic websites such as Debunking Christianity and the Secular Web.
“Atheist” is still a dirty word in this country. Even I don’t use it, even though I doubt that there is a god. Most people in a survey will just say, “I’m not religious” and leave it at that.
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Gary, there arguments are not as simple as “without Christianity the world would call into totalitarian genocide.” You know about the argument: we inherit our religion from our parents and culture? These pundits are saying that we also inherit our values in the same way. And, when it is no longer linked to something “other” like God, values will sprout off or die evolving in new directions until “secular humanism”, with no strong rational basis, is no longer recognizable as “secular humanism”. It could take generations for this to happen, it won’t be overnight. There are other effects besides inheritance too. For instance, there are less suicides in neighborhoods with churches because of a moral spillover effect, even in people who are nonreligious. There could be other moral spillover that will get lost if Christianity declines. Also in a democratic society, when a significant number are Christians, this has a political effect. The important thing is there is a more nuanced argument here than a totalitarian regime taking over.
The interesting thing is there are even atheists who agree with these pundits. They think that what we need is to replace religion, not eradicate it. Religion fulfills a fundamental impulse and grounds our society ethically, to Marx it is an opiate in a harsh world, to Habermas it carries the only language to describe why humans are valuable. Could secular humanism fulfill this? Some people like Daniel Dennett think so. He already thinks of TED talks as sermons. And, there are atheist “churches” springing up around the country. But, like I said, we are an infantile post-Christian culture. Look at Europe who is older to see what the future may hold for the US. And, we’re talkin’ just a few generations. Culture will evolve, and if we cut off its moral sustenance, it may take decades to centuries to evolve into something unrecognizable, something we would be shocked by.
Also, I agree with you that perhaps many of these “unaffiliated” are simply not identifying as atheists even though they are functionally there. It could be because of culture’s perception. Atheists are the most disliked group in the US second to fundamentalist Christians. On the other hand, I think the fact that only 1.6% identify as atheist suggests that it is more like a religion because it has a positive epistemic claim that most people don’t care to espouse. They just want to live their lives and not worry about those kinds of questions.
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*their arguments
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Brandon,
Here is an excerpt from an excellent article by skeptic and former Christian, John Loftus of Debunking Christianity Website, on this topic:
On God and Objective Moral Values, One More Time
By John W. Loftus at 9/23/2013
I don’t think there is a way to break through the thick skulls of many Christians on this, but let’s try again. When it comes to morality, overwhelming numbers of people hold to basic ethics (as opposed to dilemma ethics), expressed even by C.S. Lewis in his book, The Abolition of Man (even though I disagree with his conclusions). What best accounts for this? Certainly not any given provincial deity. Otherwise everyone should embrace the rest of the moralities commanded by these deities. Yet they conflict with each other over a wide assortment of moral issues (theocracy, homosexuality, marriage and divorce, chauvinism, war), and religious issues as well (praying five times a day facing Mecca, genuflecting, washing in the river Ganges, wearing burkas, eating habits, fasts, hair length), since after all, they are also required by these same deities. Moreover, within the Christian tradition itself, the one I know the best, there are serious disagreements in justifying a specific kind of Christian morality that go beyond what most everyone accepts as basic morality. In order to become informed of this there is no better book to read than J. Philip Wogaman’s Christian Ethics: A Historical Introduction. You see, Christians cannot come to an agreement about ethical theory much less the additional moral duties themselves.Come on, before you spout off the phrase “Christian morality” again, look at the facts. Stop your special pleading. Stop begging the question. There is no such thing as “Christian morality.” Never has been. Probably never will be.
The best explanation for our mutually shared basic morality is that it helps us get along in our respective cultures better than not having it.
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Here is a link to the full article:
http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.com/2013/09/on-god-and-objective-moral-values-one.html
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Gary, yeah it looks like Loftus has a postmodern angle, but he’s just one pundit in a sea of pundits. Honestly, IMHO Christianity will decline as predicted, and yes the atheist movement and the internet will be part of this but not the whole picture. From my memory surveys of young adults say there biggest problem with the church is their stance on homosexuality. So, there are already cultural forces working against Christianity independent of the atheist movement and the internet. Most people are not as introspective and cerebral as internet atheists. At the same time, all of these forces combined are only so powerful. It will purge the church of those with weak faith and the nominal, but it will not take it out entirely. To attempt something of that would take a totalitarian regime whether it be secular or Islamic like North Korea or ISIS. So, there will always be a remnant to influence culture. And, if the remnant is 66%, that’s pretty big.
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Actually, I don’t think religious belief is as important to morality as the data would seem to show. I do think it’s a factor, but I think it’s a minor one. It seems to me that the most important element just comes down to thinking about it. There are plenty of religious people who are pretty immoral by anyone’s standards. And typically, these are people who just never took the teachings to heart. The same is true of non-religious people. Plenty of them just never spent much time thinking about ethics and morality.
But for those who were engaged by parents or educators in thinking about what’s right and why it’s right, they typically grow up to be decent, moral individuals.
If society’s morality was mostly due to religion, then we never would have seen progress in civil rights. Sure, I know there were (and are) plenty of religious people who have been involved in civil rights issues, but our view on civil rights didn’t come from any religious text. The same goes for the death penalty. The OT was certainly in favor of it, but even the NT endorses it. It’s not an accident that these kinds of issues are getting better in our country while religiosity is declining.
That’s how I see it, at least.
However, I do think it’s important to consider the point Brandon’s making. We would be very foolish to assume that things will only get better without religion. Even placebos do some good after all. And Brandon’s right that we haven’t lived in a post-religion society yet. Better to go in eyes open and watch for potential issues as we continue down this trajectory.
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Ah what will the future hold?
I have a background in the finance industry and what I learnt from my time there is that humans as a rule or very inept at forecasting the future. There are two basic forces that impact on forecasts, one is called the ‘anchor effect’, that is being a prisoner of your starting point, the other factor is a tendency to extrapolate out current trends.
What actual history tends to show is that something inevitably happens that no one had expected and things end up very different from what forecasters had predicted. But what that type of event that will be, who knows?
I often think back to Francis Fukuyama and his famous 1992 book ‘The End of History’. I wonder if he would write the same book now?
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Coming back to the Muslim/Christian issue. I notice so many radical Muslim groups really hate modern education, indeed it is even in the name of Boko Haram. It is not hard to see why as modern education seems to have had a role in people turning away from Christianity. It will likely do the same to Islam if given a chance. My question is, will it ever be given such a chance?
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It’s a great question, Peter. I do think it will eventually happen for Islam. But it may take a while. Hopefully, we’ll have enough time.
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Peter, you should look into the kind of people ISIS is recruiting. These are well-educated Muslims from around the world including Europeans who hooked up through the internet. Check out Juergen Todenhoefer’s report and also an article on The Atlantic titled “What ISIS Really Wants”.
On the other hand some Muslims assimilate into secular societies. They are more like cultural nonpracticing Jews in that sense. One problem is that some secular societies are not letting Muslims assimilate. They are sort of ostracized as immigrants doing lowly work. But, the main problem is that despite the forces pushing toward Muslim deconversions, which includes naturalist arguments, liberal culture, even Christian apologetics will likely not succeed for everyone. Just like in the US which is very secular with the free passage of information and science there has only been limited effects on religious belief. The other problem is the Koran has a very plausible interpretation as invoking warfare and domination. So long as the book exists, this will be there waiting to be internalized and put to action by some reader.
I’m not terribly confident that education is a complete solution, but definitely it will help. Honestly, I think what has gotten hold is far beyond our ability to repair with only education, money, or force. IMHO it comes from forces outside of nature, something more sinister than we give it credit.
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Hi Brandon what you say is very true. It is dangerous to jump to conclusions. I recall some years ago soccer hooligans was a big issue in the UK and Germany. It was assumed these were underprivileged people. But when a study was actually undertaken it was found many were highly paid professionals, letting their hair down so to speak. It seems the idea of bashing some else up appealed to them.
I do sometimes wonder if the ISIS brand of fighting and raping etc might actually be the appeal to some people more than the religion. The reports I have seen from disillusioned fighters seems often to be along the lines that they ended up doing menial jobs rather than the exciting things like fighting.
‘Civilization is hideously fragile… there’s not much between us and the Horrors underneath, just about a coat of varnish’. ~C.P. Snow
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The behavior of Muslims and Christians is no different, except that Islam is 400 years behind Christianity in adopting secular, humanistic moral values.
Four hundred years ago, Christians were burning people alive and chopping off heads in higher numbers and at a higher frequency than any such crimes committed by Muslims today. When your morality is based on an ancient middle eastern holy book, written by superstitious, scientifically ignorant people, what do you expect?
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Hi Gary
Yes what you say is correct. It is terrifying to read accounts of what happened in Europe, especially in the 30 years war of the 16th century.
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Yes, and while Jesus’ followers were burning people alive, chopping off their heads, and running them through with the sword by the tens of thousands, Jesus was sitting on his throne in heaven…doing WHAT exactly???
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Moderate and Liberal Christians like Josh and UnklleE want to sanitize their belief in the Christian god by separating the behavior of the god of the OT with that of Jesus in the NT. Sorry, guys. If what the Bible says is true, Jesus is just as much a sick, sadistic bastard as the OT god.
Jesus, Almighty Ruler of Heaven and Earth, has sat idly by on his throne, watching down from heaven, for 2,000 years, while we poor humans have experienced massive suffering…and done absolutely nothing about it.
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Hey Nate,
As far as the gospels we have being close to the originals I’d say that’s somewhat debatable given that the number of inconsistencies between manuscripts rises almost exponentially the closer in time we get to the first ones that are found. For some books we don’t have full manuscript data till 350, and for most books we don’t have data till about 200 – that leaves a large period where there were likely even a greater amount of changes in the texts. Either way it’s a long period of unknown for us. My biggest issue with this was when I used to do detail bible studies using commentaries and there would often be cases where interpretations would seem to hinge on the specific greek word that may have been used. Sometimes there would even be a question to the exact word given manuscript evidence. So while I would agree we probably have a reasonable feel in general for what the originals looked like, the specifics are in question and sometimes the details are important.
“A priori” rejection of miracles is interesting. I have never had the view that miracles are impossible, and I’ve found few atheists who do. Maybe he would have had a better case if he focussed more on saying that a lot of atheists set the bar too high to accept miracle claims. This is always a tricky thing. We feel it’s reasonable that we should set the bar at least at the same level as we hold other scientific investigations of reality (medical research is the best example), but this bar is actually quite high. History has shown us that not setting that bar high can lead to some bad mistakes. I think some theists see this as having an a priori rejection of miracle claims. We also feel ECREE is a reasonable method (although some would debate that), but that then sets the bar even higher. How do we know we’ve set the bar too high or too low? If we’re honest, I think we all deal with the unknown of whether or not our bars are set properly because whatever method we use to figure that out isn’t precise enough.
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Brandon writes
and I disagree. If we can’t change them through education, nothing can and if there is anything sinister driving them, it is a high degree of stupid
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Howie,
When Christians complain that we atheists/agnostics “set the bar too high” to accept miracles, they are really only referring to THEIR miracles. When it comes to the miracles of every other religion on the planet, they set the bar at the same level as atheists/agnostics.
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