Answers to Atheism

[Crunchy Cat]

Leo,

75000 people (whom are beings subject to interpretation) do not creat
a fact if they assert similar claims. It also doesn't make it fiction; however,
without the existence of fantastic data to support a fantastic claim, it
remains unproven and unsupported. We're in an age where we can record
video, audio, microwave, magnetic, electric, heat, etc. data. Surely someone
will be able to record some of this fantastic data.

*BUMP* in the dark. Leo?

 

[Pete]

The Image of Our Lady of Guadlupe is on display. Its History is documented. Regarding Juan Diego -- with relatively few Clergy in the Field in Mexico, Juan Diego almost single-handedly arranged for the Conversion and Baptism of 10 Million Mexicans in 10 years. He had to exist. The Catholic Clergy by themselves simply were not that persuasive. The same Religious Orders then sent Missionaries to Mexico sent missionaries to all other parts of the Americas and only in Mexico was there the Tidal Surge of Conversions. The difference was Juan Diego.

Hi Leo,
The image of Guadalupe is an amazing story... but are you sure it is true? What are your sources, and why do you trust them?
Can you defend your sources against the sources cited in this document: 'Miraculous' Image of Guadalupe?


Genuinely Interested.

 

[Cris]

Leo,

The Catholic Church has amassed huge Libraries full of Evidence regarding God, Miracles, Revelations, Angels and Apparitions.

Totally false. What they have is a large quantity of apocryphal stories, imaginative speculations, and some unexplained phenomena. None of which have been able to get past the first hurdle in the discipline of the scientific method to qualify as evidence for anything. And nothing of this collection provides a scrap of evidence that a god exists.

The dismissal of All of this Evidence is exactly along the grounds that I have indicated. They require a burden of Proof that nothing can meet, if confronted with the same objections they make.

Then quote a single item that shows that a god exists and which cannot have any other interpretation.

Especially the Argument that "A Scientist who proves a Miracle is no longer a Scientist". Is that not a difficult one to get around?

Individual scientists are irrelevant – if the theory is demonstrable, repeatable and reproducible and has undergone significant peer reviews then perhaps it could be considered science. If you believe a miracle has been proven by science then show the scientific journals and peer reviews that support the claim.

Otherwise all you have is just more useless religious hot air.

 

[Pete]

Most of the 75000 "witnesses" to the miracle of the Dancing Sun at Fatima did not witness to the events.

There a small number of people who attested that "everyone saw it".

There were also those who attested that nothing strange occurred.

This site is interesting: Fatima and the Devil's Final Battle

It's a critical analysis of an odd-sounding book. I make no comment on the book in question, but the following extract of the review is pertinent to this discussion. It is discussing the Miracle of the Dancing Sun.

Extract:

However, the book doesnt make clear or mention several very important things:

1. Different people saw different things. Some only saw the dancing. Others only saw the colors. Others saw the sun come toward them. This is clearly documented in the evidence, although the book presents the events as though they had a definite sequence that everyone saw.

2. No where in the book does it mention that not everyone saw the miracle. The book implies that everyone saw it, calling it on pg 5 a public miracle witnessed by 70,000 people. This clearly was not the case. The book doesnt include this part of the O Secular article: "And next they ask each other if they have seen or not seen. Most confess that they have seen the dancing of the sun; others, however, declare they have seen the smiling face of the Virgin herself."(1) Most is not all. According to another source, about half of the people there saw nothing unusual with the sun that day at all. (2) Included in the list of those who saw nothing are Sister Lucia herself(3), and Judah Ruah, the photographer for the OSecular newspaper(4). Senhor Mendes, the man who carried Sister Lucia on his shoulders after the event, reported only seeing the sun move horizontally across the sky for a few seconds. If such main personalities in the event didnt see anything unusual with the sun, then it is reasonable to conclude that many people--maybe as many as half--really didnt see anything unusual at all.

3. People remember critical points differently: Although the book quotes the O Seculo, on pg 10 as saying the sun appeared at its zenith, clear of the clouds, the man who carried Sister Lucia on her shoulders afterward, Senhor Mendes, said that the sun was behind the clouds. (5)

 

[fahrenheit 451]

the miracle at fatima, is just another game of chinese whispers.
it's just something that's got, blown out of proportion.
there is no proof, and there will never be any proof.
just fictitious comment, in the guise of truth.

 

[SkinWalker]

Oh, that reminds me of Our Lady of Guadalupe -- the Supernatural Picture done on the coarse burlap-like material that could not have been expected to last beyond 20 or 30 years; that shifts in color; that has no evidence of pigment or paint stroke; and which survives miraculously

So, if any scientist would actually go over any empirical information you would readily see that Marian Catholicism is not a legendary Religion that is simply a perpetuation of a ossified Tradition.

As it turns out, the image of Guadalupe is a hoax that is still being perpetuated against supersitious Mexicans.

Nickell and Fischer (1985) reported distinctive evidence of painting of the image. Highlight areas of the image show an obscurring of the cloth's weave, "consistent with the application of paint." A seam even shows some flaking. A study done later to the image (El Vaticano, 5/19/2002) uncovered evidence through stereomicrospic analysis that calcium sulfate was used to prime the surface and that various water-based pigments were applied to create the image.

There is no evidence either to suggest that Juan Diego was a real person.

References

El Vaticano (5/19/2002). Proceso pp. 29-30 found at:

http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.proceso.com.mx%2Farchivo_com_interior.html%3Feid%3D872&langpair=es%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&prev=%2Flanguage_tools

Nickell, Joe; Fischer, John F. (1985) The Image of Guadalupe: A folkloristic and iconographic investigation. Skeptical Inquirer 9(3), pp. 243-255