I'm not sure God is beyond rationality, however the Judeo Christian idea is.That is my problem with their belief set, it has evolved out anything that is capable of reason.There may be a god, maybe not. Organised gangs of JC's on the other hand come up with all sorts of "proofs". My favourite being Creationism, which is unique amongs major religious doctrine as being obviously dishonest to a 10 year old.

Why is creation so dishonest? A couple of points:- To a strong believer in creation, dinosaurs, geological history etc. were all part of the way it was built. - To a believer in a divine creator, we don't know how long a "day" was for God - about 2 billion years might be about right. - The "order" of creation isn't too dissimilar to current cosmological thinking - I would say only the sun, moon and stars are in the "wrong" place as they should come before the earth.

I happen to like the Einstein version of 'religious':"The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art and true science. Whoever does not know it and can no longer wonder, no longer marvel, is as good as dead, and his eyes are dimmed. It was the experience of mystery -- even if mixed with fear -- that engendered religion. A knowledge of the existence of something we cannot penetrate, our perceptions of the profoundest reason and the most radiant beauty, which only in their most primitive forms are accessible to our minds: it is this knowledge and this emotion that constitute true religiosity. In this sense, and only this sense, I am a deeply religious man... I am satisfied with the mystery of life's eternity and with a knowledge, asense, of the marvelous structure of existence -- as well as the humble attempt to understand even a tiny portion of the Reason that manifests itself in nature."

Why is creation so dishonest? Creation isn't, Creationism is.I don't know where the universe came from, or why it has the properties it does. Theories that have it coming from some earlier/larger system merely beg the question of where they came from. A notion of God follows from this that I find hard to dispute.Creationism is not merely wrong. It is an attempt to suppress dissent and push things that are known by its promoters to be false. In this it differs from almost all mainstream Judeo/Christianity, most of whose doctrines are unprovable either way. I can see how someone believes that "because God created everything, he must love me". I disagree with both the logic and the fact, but accept the honest of that belief.Most people are unaware of the profound lack of evidence for Jesus, even though he did things in the public gaze and famously interacted with officials. Igorance of the facts is a poor basis for belief, but again it is genuine belief. In any case the absence of proof, is not proof of absence.If one assumes an all-powerful god, then of course he could have made the universe look 10 billion years old, indeed anything is possible of any kind at any time.Creationism is wilful misrepresentation. Yeah, god might have created fossils, but they use marine fossils on top of hills to "prove" the great flood. They lie about the laws of thermodynamics is a quite stupid way.A problem I face as a father is finding Creationists in Britain. They are almost entirely an American problem.I would like one to explain his views to my son. Kids know about dinosaurs, they love the bloody things, and study them out of all proportion to their utility. Given a proper educational base ill come to recognise Christianity for what it is. If I merely tell my son that Christianity is essentially a sexually driven mental illness, he may believe me, or he may not, as part of his rebellion against me, he might even try it. However, one afternoon with a "Creation Scientist" will immunise him really quite effectively.

I'll agree with you on creationism as I concur that it is a closed minded approach. I'm not a great fan of the schools that we hear from time to time that refuse to teach classical cosmology or evolution. Science is very much about modelling and building theories and the more models there are, the more there are to find counter-evidence. It is pretty tricky though to prove that God didn't make the world...

IMHO, all religions have a core message: To be good and helpul to everyone around us. That is the gist of it.The rest is just the packaging, which has been created by different people to satisfy different needs. Some people prefer colourful packaging and others something simple. It doen't make them bad or good as long as they do not loose sight of the core meaning.

IMHO, all religions have a core message: To be good and helpul to everyone around us. That is the gist of it.Which religions are these then ?Buddhism, I suppose, but to read the Bible, Koran or Torah is to see almost nothing on being good to others. For every "do as you would be done by", there are 3 or 4 "kill them if they don't obey your God". Christianity has made a lot of effort over the last century on spinning the "love one another" bits of the Bible. This is clearly part of their message, but can hardly be seen as core. I see it more as makerting froth. Christians talk a lot, a real lot about "tolerance" when they are not iin a position of power.Then they get power, and that 'message' drops away real quick.

DCFC is right that Christians are taught quite often to do the "love one another" bit. They often fail - look at Ireland. One of the UK's most prominent and powerful Christians (denomination often ambiguous) seems to be on the "eye for an eye" kick sometimes (like when he's talking to his best buddy), while loving his neighbours (or at least supporting theirmore cautious stances). I know which face I'd prefer to have running the country. Regarding Christian calls to arms, I can only think of one genuinely violent incident from the life of Christ - the sacking the temple in Jerusalem. I believe that pretty much all of the violence that occurs in the name of Christianity (and indeed other religions) is not from God, it is the invention of mistaken, misguided man.

Did anyone else see this and this in the UK Guardian newspaper on Jan 23rd? The article are by Paul Davies - one of my favourite scientist / philosopher / writers.

As a schoolboy I used the power of pray before exams. Previously, I had been taught to pray for anything that I hoped would come about. But in seventh grade just before a history exam I felt like giving up and did not pray because the teacher was known to be tough. Although I breezed through the exam, I was very skeptic. On the hour when the exam scores were released I apathetically ignored the notice board, until one of my classmate came and congratulated me for achieving the highest score. Well, despite my early religious upbringing, I have never prayed since.

How well did you do before you lost belief in the power of prayer?