It’s always fun to watch Christains offer excuses on why they “don’t debate atheists”. Here, Russell Moore, who claims he was a “seminary dean” offers his excuses on why he doesn’t.
Apologetics are to keep the gullible in the cult. They rarely are why someone becomes a Christian. They are to keep the questions down, and insist that Christianity isn’t the contradictory nonsense it is. Moore does admit that it is emotion and trust in those around you, not logic and not reason. He says he finds “grace” aka emotion and circumstance more “amazing” than reason. Of course he finds them more amazing since it is far more gratifying to have someone agree with you and do no work for it. Every cult depends on that.
This is quite a tacit admission that Christianity has nothing. It also exposes how Christians will always attack each other, with Moore attacking those apologists that don’t measure up to him. He has to make excuses why it is “better” for apologists to not use reason. Rather than have their claims shown how they can’t stand up to reality, he wants to appeal to emotion, telling people how this god “forgives” their “sins”, rather than showing it exists. It’s about fear and ignorance, not about reason and knowledge.
This is how cults all work. Appeal to ignorance and appeal to fear. Claim how you love everyone, and use being helpful to lure people in. “But more than that, we face an opportunity when people all around us are exhausted by living like machines. Many of them will keep their guard up and argue confidently, but deep down they wonder, What if there is more than this? What if, behind all this, there really is someone who knows and loves me? “
Club Schadenfreude 