Pitting incompatible Supernatural beliefs against each other, Part 2

Religions, other than Christianity, have made miracle claims. This fact is unavoidable. Even Christians acknowledge that miracle claims are often made from members of other Religions. Some examples of miracle claims in the names of Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism can be found here, here and here. New agers have a substantial amount of miracle claims, so I wont bother linking to any. So, how do Christians deal with this diversity? Well- some of them just throw their arms in the air and claim agnosticism. During a discussion on miracles at Victor Repperts blog, one commenter claimed that miracles done in the name of other Religions can actually be proof for Christianity, since, apparently, God had no quips about deceiving people into the wrong faith. And of course, many Christians will just outright deny the validity of other Religions' miracle claims, and happily affirm their own.

Now, I am not a trained theologian, so I can't really conclusively comment on the success of any of these strategies. However, that doesn't mean I can't hold a inconclusive opinion. For one thing- how can we determine which Religion is correct if they all make similar claims? If every miracle ever documented were done for and by Christians, than that would be good evidence that Christianity is the true faith. However, what we see instead are many miracles being claimed by many religions. The only possible scenarios I see are that, either God allows miracles to happen that inevitably draw people away from Christianity, or that these things all have natural causes. Well... I guess one can argue that there exists an all loving, Universalist God that does miracles for everyone. But even this scenario doesn't seem to fit in with the Christian concept of hell and atonement, does it? In the end, it just seems intuitive that all these miracle stories are false.

Also, even if we granted that miracles occur in Christianity alone- one would have to ask why they even exist in the first place? What is the criteria in which someone is allowed to witness a miracle, and someone is denied that opportunity? Because it seems to me that the person who witnessed a miracle will have a better chance of being/remaining a Christian than the person who does not- giving them an unfair advantage. A Theist could claim that God works in mysterious ways, or that he rewards people who would've believed anyways, using his Omniscience. Answers like these are clearly sound- but that doesn't mean they are good. For one thing- they are both unfalsifiable, and cannot ever be tested or proven false.

Just to conclude, I wanted to mention NDE's again- since they are generally considered the best evidence for an afterlife. I have argued before that, since NDE's occur to members of other faiths, they are probably of naturalistic origin. Ed Babinski argues this at length during the conversation about miracles he had on Victor Repperts blog.

"Same with Near Death Experiences, the majority of which are positive, even for people who do not become orthodox Christians. In fact Mormons have a journal devoted to recording and studying the Near Death Experiences of Mormons (some of them saw Lincoln in the afterlife, and guess what, Lincoln converted and became a Mormon after he died), which sometimes are quite detailed and involve a trip to a very Mormon-looking heaven. Betty Eade wrote several books about her Mormon NDE that were on the bestseller lists about ten years or so ago. "

Surprisingly, many commenters agreed with him that Miracles can't be used as evidence for the existence of God! I chalk that up as a victory for Atheism.

HT to Russ, Ed Babinski and the many other anonymous commenters

Pitting incompatible Supernatural beliefs against each other

Supernatural claims are a dime a dozen now adays. Many of them can be consistent with Christianty, like NDE's, Apparitions and Poltergeists. However, many aren't as adaptable, such as Reincarnation and Alien sightings. Furthermore, amonst the phenomena that are consistent with Christianity, I think that many cases can be shown to be incompatible with it as well- such as non-Christians having NDE's featuring members of their Religion. I have used this strategy in various posts, such as this one, this one and this one.

Here is an interesting article I discovered recently that illustrates my point. What makes it interesting, however, isn't the story itself- but the couple starring in it- Sarah & Michael Feeley. These two claim that they experienced  angelic visitations. Now, angelic visitations aren't incompatible with the truth of Christianity- as a matter of fact, they are what we'd expect if Christianity were true! Therefore, this couples experience serves as evidence that Christianity is true, right?

Wrong! In addition to the beliefs they hold that support Christianity, they also hold many absurd claims that don't gel as well with it- such as that they experienced ascended masters, energy meditations and even alien encounters. They also believe that  they had past lives in Egypt and Atlantis- a claim that is completely in conflict with most forms of Christianity since it removes hell from the picture.

So- if we were to assume that an angel did, in fact, visit them- one would have to ask why they hold all these absurd beliefs- some of which are irreconcilable with Christianity. Perhaps a demon disguised as an angel decieved them. That's a possible explaination- but than, how can ever we know whether "genuine" religious experiences are authentic? After all, they have just as much evidential merit as this couples experiences, don't they? Plus, the demon hypothesis can't be disproven, so it's on quite shaky ground. Only two other possibilities stick out in my mind- that they are all correct beliefs, or that they are all incorrect beliefs- and I think we all know what the answer is.

Now, as well as a being a good example of pitting incompatible beliefs against each other, this couple should also shed light on the power of belief. For those that have read the article, you'll know that these two aren't just superstitious tribals- their ex-police officers! This should demonstrate how even the most credible of witness' could be utterly, utterly deluded.

NDE's and universal salvation

Remember my post on Apparitions? Well, everything I said about them can be applied to NDE's. Also, we just so happen to have an NDE report from a member of the Baha'i faith. I wonder how Christians will respond to this?