David Wayne at JollyBlogger invites his readers to submit their ten most frequently encountered objections to Christianity. It's an interesting challenge. I can only come up with nine off the top of my head, so if Viewpoint readers, Christians or non-Christians, want to weigh in on this topic feel free to do so via our Feedback Forum.
Here are the nine objections which I've encountered most frequently from non-Christians and which they tend to feel most strongly about. They are also, incidentally, perhaps among the most challenging for a Christian apologist:
1)The difficulty of reconciling
suffering with an all powerful, benevolent deity is
perhaps the most formidable impediment to belief in God
and hence in accepting Christian faith.
2) Christianity, by restricting
eternal life only to Christians, is incompatible with a
God who allegedly loves all people, and is offensive to
those whose deceased loved ones may have been very pious
and moral but not Christian. Moreover, it is a belief
that few Christians even hold themselves.
3) Christianity is based upon the
authority of the New Testament which is historically
questionable.
4) Christianity is contingent upon
miracles, or at least one miracle, the Resurrection, but
belief in miracles is philosophically
problematic.
5) Similar to #1, the doctrine of
eternal punishment is incompatible with any notion of a
just God. Eternal punishment for one's sin, no matter
how egregious, is by definition disproportionate to the
offense and is therefore unjust.
6) Christians try to impose their
morality on others and that, many say, is
offensive.
7) Many Reformed Christians hold to a
view of predestination that is impossible to reconcile
with the notion of human accountability and also with
the concept of a just and benevolent God.
8) The Christian creation story is
scientifically unsound and the doctrine of original sin
is literally incredible.
9) Christianity derives from ancient
pagan myths of dying saviors and virgin births. The
similarities between these myths and Christianity make
it unlikely that Christianity is independent of
them.
It might be worthwhile to attempt to tackle some of these objections, if a humble layman might have the impertinence to undertake such a daunting task, in future posts. In fact, Viewpoint has already addressed some of them in past essays. Objection #1, for instance, is discussed here and here, and objection #3 is considered here. If anyone else wishes to take a shot at some of these, either pro or con, please feel welcome.