Chapter 3 - The Fundy Atheist Model of God by Mushfer Brains Who is this being that billions of people believe in? Who is God? If you consult the dictionary, like I did, and stop there, you can have plenty to complain about because it's much easier than actually picking up some really deep books with really big words in them by authors who have doctoral degrees in philosophy or Biblical studies. That said, we won't deny that much of Mr. Brains' "list of the fundamental beliefs of Christians" is accurate as it stands. There's a few things to quibble about, such as that Mr. Brains uses "soul" when he should use "spirit" (popular use of the words as interchangeable does not reflect the linguistic realities of the OT, though it does reflect some confusion in Greek at the time of the NT); also, it is doubtful that he understands "love" as anything but sentimentality. The largest error is the one in which he simply accepts without question the popular view of God as "my buddy" and the corresponding view of prayer as a gumball machine. That is the main deficiency in what he calls the "Standard Model of God" -- it turns God into a modern senile grandpa who passes out goodies every time we pinch his cheek. And despite Mr. Brains' narrow level of experience it isn't the model that every Christian accepts in terms of those criteria. Prayer is still extremely important to Christianity in our view, but not for the reasons Brains sees in the Standard Model. We still believe that we can pray to God (through Jesus as broker of the patronage relationship) and God hears our prayers. We still believe that God CAN reach down into our world and uses his infinite power to answer our prayers; we simply do not assume that He is obliged to or that He does so like a gumball machine. God can (but not "will" by any means) intervene to cure diseases. God CAN save our lives in emergency situations and protect us from danger; to say "will" is a presumptuous absurdity with no grounds in a proper contextual reading of Scripture. We do not say that God will "solve a wide range of personal problems" like ingrown toenails or needing a car repair. Mr. Brains will need more than "according to many Christians" or "conventional wisdom" as a reason to think this "Standard Model" is correct on this point. And he'll need to debunk informed views, not the "Standard Model" he derived from popular literature, to justify his criticisms of religious faith. Our model -- which I might call the Contextual or Patronage Model -- has no paradox inherent in it. Too bad, Mr. Brains. You'll have to find something else to complain about. Pass Go, Collect $200>>>

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