Master Debators

Three nights ago I went to a debate on whether or not the Christian God exists. It was held on campus in the main auditorium. There was a pretty good showing, about 1,200 people went to the actual event, another 50 or so showed up to a separate live screening, and about 600 logged in to youtube where it was broadcast live. I went to the actual showing. The debate was between an atheist, John Loftus, and a Catholic, Dinesh D’Souza. I know the guy who organized the event and I asked him why this particular topic was chosen rather than just simply debating about whether God exists. Debating the existence of the Christian God is significantly more challenging than just a God, and it seemed out of place for an atheist who won’t even admit to a God let alone a Trinitarian one. He said it was requested by Loftus himself, because he is willing to allow for the philosophical God, although he simply chose not to believe in one.

The two debators were quite educated. Loftus has a couple degrees in theological studies, and it wasn’t until later that he decided God doesn’t exist. One of the nice things about the debate was that the debators got to talk to each other. It wasn’t like the political debates we see on TV where the politicians just answer questions that are asked to them by the moderator. Seeing the back and forth conversation was excellent.

Most people I talked to felt the D’Souza won. And I had to agree but not overwhelmingly so. What a lot of people liked about D’Souza was that he was very clever and quick on his feet. But, as I tried to point out to some of my more enthused friends, being witty didn’t make his arguments any more relevant. And ultimately that was the significant problem with the debate. The content was lacking. As I predicted, it’s too difficult arguing for a Christian God when one of the debators doesn’t allow for any God to begin with. So the whole night treated the two subjects instead of just the one. I was expecting the whole debate to be essentially about the pros and cons of Christology. But it turned out that only a very small portion of time was spent on Christ. And that was shortened to more of an afterthought by both debators on Lewis’ liar, lunatic, legend and Lord.

Ultimately I felt the D’Souza won because I found many of Loftus’ arguments could have been used against him as well. In terms of whether or not God exists there are only two possibilities, He either does or He doesn’t. Loftus was making arguments that could possibly nullify both claims. But that is impossible so the argument itself must be flawed. In my opinion, the error was that Lofus’s arguments were highly subjective. A few of D’Souza’s were too but not nearly as much so. In his first episode, Stephen Colbert illustrated the absurdity of using subjective arguments to make assertions about objective truths. He defined this phenomenon as ‘truthiness’, where the truth of a matter lies in how I feel about it.

Okay, you’ve made it this far so I’ll get to what most of you may be more interested in. As I mentioned, the girl I’m interested in was also going to this debate and she did. And I got another dose of that lacking enthusiasm I keep picking up on from her. In this case, as I was walking out of the building I met my friends at to go to this debate, I ran into her walking in to meet her friends. She said ‘Hi’ and knew I was going, but even though I was walking out she didn’t inquire about where I’d be sitting. Instead she asked if I saw her guy friend who she was supposed to be meeting. But it’s not just that. I’ve seen her twice at Mass since Friday and again conversation stops at ‘hi’. Nevertheless, I am stubborn and will continue to do what I do to change our situation. I should be seeing her Saturday night for a volunteering project we’re both involved with but she will be working with a separate group of people. I still don’t know about tonight and dancing, but I do know that I have to run right now if I hope to make tonight’s class so that I can have some moves to practice this Friday if things should happen to work out. I have decided I am going to get her a Valentine’s Day gift, but I want to save the details of that for a different post.