It is vitally important for every person to know what they believe and why they believe it. It hardly makes sense to believe something just because it feels good to believe it. One's belief system should be based on reason and evidence.
At very least, a belief system should be derived from a credible source. In the case of Christianity, that source is believed to be the bible. However, I have come to question the credibility of that source. It should be reasonable that any source of religious belief be able to withstand some solid scrutiny. Following are just a few issues that I had to work through while investigating my own belief system.
If the bible was truly authored by a god in order to impart absolute truth and salvation to humanity, why is it so open to interpretation? Think about it- under the label of Christianity there are many different religious traditions. Let's name a few: mainstream Evangelical Christianity (Baptists, non-denominational groups, Calvinists, Lutheran, some Pentecostal groups, etc.), Seventh Day Adventists, Oneness Pentecostals, Jehovah's Witnesses (though they don't call themselves Christians, they do adhere solely to their translation of the bible), Catholicism, and the Orthodox Church, to name a few. The trouble is, amongst these different traditions, there are fundamental differences in key doctrines. Each of these traditions interprets the bible differently and claim to have the truth. I would propose that if a god desired to communicate such vital truths to humanity, he would do so via a better, more fail-safe method. Does that seem reasonable?
The bible is one of three things: It is either completely true, completely false, or it contains some truth and some falsehood. One must determine which of these three views applies to the bible. From there, a person needs to be able to provide a well reasoned defense of their view.
I would submit that the bible contains both truth and falsehood. By studying archeology, it is perfectly reasonable to determine that a few historical events recorded in the bible actually took place. On the flip-side, however, archeology also seems to indicate that the biblical record, in many areas, is either false or greatly distorted. Yet many people assert that the bible is entirely true, simply because it records certain historical events that actually took place. Can you see the flaw in this logic? A historical fiction novel will often narrate actual events throughout the course of the plot. And yet the novel is still fictional. A few true events (or even a whole bunch of them) don't automatically make a story true. How and why is the bible any different in this sense?
Christians will often use fulfilled prophecy as proof that the bible is true. I have come to realize a couple of problems with this logic. Firstly, many biblical prophecies are veiled in so much symbolism and imagery that one can easily interpret them to mean whatever they want them to mean. Secondly, (and this should be fairly commonsensical) it would be relatively easy to fulfill certain prophecies when one knows which prophecies are waiting to be fulfilled. Many old testament prophecies would have been well known to religious people in the biblical eras. In fact, the gospels record a number of cases where Jesus would supposedly do or say something "in order that the prophecy would be fulfilled." Does this not expose a fatal flaw in the argument of fulfilled prophecy?
When looking at these issues, one must make a serious point of being objective. For a long time, I thought that I was being objective in the defense of my faith. However, my objectivity was very much tainted by my religiosity. Quite simply, I had brainwashed myself into believing that I was objective and reasonable in this regard. It wasn't until I took a step back, and became truly objective, that I was able to begin seeing the flaws in my Christian reasoning.
I can't stress it strongly enough: Make it a priority to be truly objective and reasonable in the consideration of these issues- the truth depends on it.
