The Dishonest Atheist

 

100% DISHONESTY EXPOSED

The atheist who says he merely lacks a belief in God & therefore has no burden of proof to meet, is playing a game. Atheism often survives by acting as though it does not have to prove anything. But are we really to think that, behind the scenes, there is nothing but a blank screen?

The atheist will tell us that atheism is not a belief or a worldview, but merely the “lack of belief in God” & nothing more. But don't buy it—because nobody lives in a philosophical vacuum. Every person must operate with assumptions about the nature of reality. After all, in the absence of God’s existence, everything in our phenomenal world—including both the seen & the unseen—must have come about through purely natural causes & processes. It is either God or nature. So even if one claims to lack belief in God & nothing more, that absence necessarily gives rise to a network of views, assumptions, values, & conclusions about reality.

They will inevitably hold positions—whether explicitly stated or not—about the purpose & meaning of life, about birth, marriage, death, & even the possibility or impossibility of an afterlife. And it is reasonable to suppose that all of these positions rest on an epistemological foundation that is naturalistic.

If the atheist dismisses the existence of God & maintains that a Supreme Being had nothing to do with the origin & formation of our extraordinarily ordered, mathematically structured world, then let that account be shown. Let it be demonstrated how blind, impersonal, haphazard, random, accidental, & purposeless processes could unintentionally produce such coherence, intelligibility, & order. If it cannot be shown, then it is not known. And if it is not known, it should not be asserted with confidence.

What, then, is their explanation of reality in the absence of God? And what is the proof that this explanation is true? Put simply: don’t merely assert it—show it. Don’t assume it—justify it. If God is not the foundation of existence—the ultimate grounding—then what is? If not God, then some alternative “not-God” model of reality must take His place. But what is the basis for that model? What evidence secures it?

In the end, the issue is not whether one has a worldview, but whether one is willing to acknowledge its presence & shoulder the responsibility of defending it. Every denial carries implications, & every implication carries a burden. The claim of “mere lack” does not escape this—it simply obscures it.

--Paul Ross