Hi Steemers! I'm a philosophy professor, but my specialty is not in philosophy of religion. It is a kind of hobby of mine, though, so I would like to jump in on the discussion here. I am a staunch atheist, and to be honest, I'm eager to see others share my views. But I also like to think I'm open to the possibility I'm wrong, and will happily (okay, maybe grudgingly) change my mind if given good reason. Meanwhile I promise to be respectful to all in my discussion.
Anyway, I have learned the hard way that before I can have any productive discussion of religion, I have to get a sense of your answer(s) to a crucial question: do you believe in supernatural stuff based on evidence, or is it a matter of "faith" for you?
I have different follow-up stuff to say depending on how you answer this. (Maybe I'll write one post for the evidence-ers, and one post for the faith-ers.) I'm eager to hear from you!
Sidenote 1: by supernatural, I mean, very roughly, stuff other than what's acknowledged by the standard sciences - stuff like gods, ghosts, chakras, torsion fields, etc. Even more roughly: it's stuff you couldn't get an NSF grant to study. So belief in standard Christianity certainly counts as belief in the supernatural, but I'd like to be more inclusive than that.
Sidenote 2: by evidence, I mean, roughly, truth-related reason to believe in something. So for example "because I hope it's true" is a kind of reason to believe, but not a truth-related one - hoping something is true is not, all else being equal, reason to think it is true. Similarly if I offer you $100 to believe that Wyoming is the capital of Nebraska, you now have (practical / financial) reason to believe that, but not truth-related reason. And for purposes here belief by faith just means belief without (or despite) evidence.