The reduction of god to a notional statement, in accordance with the scientific spirit of the enlightenment, lead to the death of the deity. At least the belief in a god became unbelievable. But then again, this was exactly the difference between mythology and religions which attempt to historicize and rationalize the myth, thus killing its vitality and continuance.

Science as a human invention, as an outcome of evolution, as a tool for survival, does not propose an answer to anything, no more than language does, but is simply content with an anthropomorphic description of reality, hopelessly within the human perception of it. There is no way to gain a pure ontological view of reality, no more than there is a way of jumping out of our skin.

Now, I do not understand the New or the Old Testament as scientific documents. Historical perhaps, though one has to dig deeply within their layers. But they echo and par excellence the rich near eastern mythological bed from which they came to be. An example of which I will quote here from the Secrets of the Bible People by Kamal Salibi:

In the opening chapter of the Genesis story, Joseph’s ‘gem-studded tunic’ features with particular prominence. First, we are told that his father, who preferred him to all his brothers, made it for him as a sign of his special love. Second, we are told that when he caught up with his brothers at Dothan, they first stripped him of the tunic, then cast him into the waterless pit, before selling him as a slave for twenty shekels of silver. Third, we are told that Joseph’s tunic was dipped into the blood of a slaughtered kid, then sent to his father, to deceive him into believing that his favorite son had been eaten by a wild beast. Then we have the story of Joseph in Mizraim, where he starts from humble beginnings to achieve great prominence. This tale is remarkably reminiscent of other stories told about the fertility of gods of the ancient Near East (e.g. Adonis, Osiris) who die or who are taken to have died in one place, only to reappear again, alive and triumphant, elsewhere. What is involved, it seems to me, is a passion story, in a way much like that of Jesus, who was betrayed by one of his own disciples for thirty pieces of silver; who was made to wear the purple robe of a king before his trial; and whose ‘garments’ were subsequently divided by casting lots among those who were charged with his crucifixion. Fine garments, one might say, make fine gods. Joseph’s ‘garment’ features again in the story of his problem with Potiphar’s wife, which ended with long imprisonment—his second passion. This time it is a bgd, which can be any kind of garment, from the rags of a leper to the ceremonial robes of kings or priests. Potiphar’s wife, in this story, seizes Joseph by his ‘garment’, which remains in her hand when he flees her adulterous advances; she uses the same ‘garment’ to charge him with attempted rape, and so have him thrown into prison.

For me, the relevant frame of thinking the entire matter, is man’s fall from nature, man’s awareness of himself as something different from nature, as a being that transcends it without being detached from it, his desperate longing for a primordial oneness now forever lost, and his waking to an alien universe in which he apparently finds no ultimate purpose, no consolation except that which he makes with his own life. Within the first phases of this awakening, man still saw himself within the natural kingdom, as such regarded other animals as other peoples, worshiped them as a means of asserting his will over them. Later yet when his consciousness of himself was yet more certain and clear, he entered the realm of abstractions, god or gods became the very reflection of man’s ego and will.

But I do believe that religion does not offer a reconciliation with life, but at most offers a narcotic in the wait for the promised life. Instead of explaining, it explains away by submitting to the “mysterious ways” in which the deity operates. The important questions of “freedom of will”, “morality”, the problem of “evil”, and religion as invested in the social sphere as to keep the hierarchical lines intact are yet to be addressed.

I follow Hermiene’s lead in asserting that this is not a response to your challenge, nor an argument for or against in anyway, but merely a general outline of my own thinking. I am an Agnostic as a general philosophy, and when it comes to the matter of faith or the lack of it I quote Camus: I do not believe in God and I am not an Atheist.

(ever heard that song by ACDC, Highway to Hell)

The existence of God being logically prior to the existence of the universe—which is not the same thing as being temporally prior—results in the attribute of transcendence or existing independent of the universe. I appreciate the way William Lane Craig succinctly illustrated what transcendence means when he said, "If God did not exist, the universe would not exist. If the universe did not exist, God would nevertheless exist." That is what transcendence means (and the contingency of our world’s existence being a product of the necessity of his).

Do Christians believe that this transcendent God interacts with the physical universe? We certainly do. Is this a logical contradiction, as you contend? It does not appear to be, in any obvious way. If highly limited entities such as ourselves can interact with dimensions beyond the four spatio-temporal dimensions at which we exist, then surely there is no logical obstacle to an unlimited entity doing the same thing. (Think about the advances made by theoretical astrophysicists in the last fifteen years, the counter-intuitive discoveries at the quantum level, the experiments being planned for the LHC in Geneva, etc.) There is no obvious contradiction to God existing at one dimension while interacting with other dimensions. If there is a contradiction, it is being produced by a hidden premise that should be flushed out.

Incidentally, I actually do believe in the damnation of non-believers. That is a fundamental tenet of the gospel, the rejection of which is unmitigated heresy in virtue of being a direct attack on the justice, righteousness, and glory of God. Somewhere along the line you misunderstood something. I believe you are referring to my conversation with Rufford, but what I revealed there was my rejection of the doctrine of eternal torment in hell. I affirm the damnation of non-believers and I posit hell and its fires as being something real. What I vehemently deny—for a score of reasons—are the ideas that (i) hellfire is eternal and (ii) the damned live forever. No, the fires of hell will be temporally finite and the damned will perish therein. When there is nothing left to burn, the fires will go out. Fire is kind of like that.

The Bible is rather explicit about immortality being something that only believers will one day receive; i.e., no one possesses it now as if inherently, and only a specific group receives it. We are all by nature mortal, i.e., corruptible and perishable. The Bible specifies a time when mortality gives way to immortality and it is given only to God’s children. In other words, the damned stay mortal, subject to perishing in the fires of hell. One ought to notice that when the Bible talks about "perishable" giving way to "imperishable," the subject is God’s children only. Ergo, the damned remain perishable. They can and will die. That is their lot. "The wages of sin is death" and all that.

(It might also be noteworthy, and pointedly relevant, that I obviously reject the idea that man inherently possesses an immortal soul. Such an idea arose from Hellenist influences, being foreign to Judeo-Christian communities before then. The Bible talks about man being a composite of physical matter and the breath of life from God; indeed, it talks about all animals in such language. Upon death, the breath of life returns to God and the body decomposes back to the Earth. Where was the soul? In the creation narrative, at no point do we find it being said that God gave man a soul. Rather, it says that man "became" a living soul. We do not have souls; we are souls.)

To be fair, I don’t know much about your specific beliefs. I’ve gathered from elsewhere that you don’t believe in the damnation of non-believers, for instance, which surprised me a bit when I learned of it. So what is it? Can God work miracles, or not?

As for your challenge, I’m afraid I can’t meet it. I already accept that you can’t disprove the existence of anything, which includes gods.