Susan, I really appreciate both the honesty and rational thought behind your beliefs and your comment. Thank you for taking the time to fully share where you're coming from, and to further enlighten all of us. Your comment is a great example of how lines drawn in the sand get us nowhere, and how we can all learn from each other if we're willing to listen. I'm sure you're open to answering some of Ron's questions, below, so that we can learn even more.

Ron, those are great, very important questions for all of us to be thinking about as we have this dialogue. So often we don't even stop to consider how we might be talking past one another. What you're asking, of course, is not that we all define these things in exactly the same way, but that we at least try to work with the same set of definitions as we converse. If we can't start with an agreed upon glossary of terms, at least we can each be more clear about how we define these terms that we use.

credis, I am not going to continue responding to your comments, from this point on. This is not a reflection of your beliefs, but rather a result of how you choose to share those beliefs, your apparent lack of interest in true dialogue, and your lack of genuine respect for the beliefs of others. If other members of this blog community have the energy and time to engage you, they are more than welcome to.

xmartinj, that's one way to put it! :) I probably don't need to tell you that I think this statement "one of the great reasons to believe in god is that you no longer have to make sense" couldn't be further from the truth.