Though I walk through the valley

If you have ever wondered what happened to Kirk Cameron, the teen star of the 1980's sitcom "Growing Pains", this is what he is doing now. He and an associate are enthusiastic advocates for an overzealous brand of Christianity, and they have their own religious program called “The Way of the Master”.

I am a militant atheist, but I find Cameron’s program extremely entertaining and I watch it just for fun. I get a real kick out of the bold claims made on the program, and the lame and logically fallacious arguments that are offered in support of those bold claims. I don't mean for that to sound too harsh, I respect Cameron's beliefs, as he and others should respect my right to challenge those beliefs.

There are two major claims that are made on the show which I want to briefly address. All the wording is mine, but I have tried to summarize their arguments as fairly as I could:

Claim 1: God exists. We know this because creation exists. If you see a painting, the existence of the painting is proof of the existence of a painter. The same logic applies to the existence of creation and the existence of God.

This argument shoots itself in the foot. I presume that anyone who buys into the above painting analogy would assert that God created the painter. So, who created God? Obviously, this argument sets up an infinite regress and relies on God to terminate it. I’ll put my money on the Big Bang over God as the end point of the regress, thanks.

Claim 2: No one has enough knowledge to be an atheist. Most people who claim to be atheists are really agnostics because no one can disprove the existence of God. It takes more faith to be an atheist than to believe in God.

This argument is an intellectually corrupt word game. You cannot logically disprove a negative; this is why the person making the positive claim has the burden of proof in our justice system. I cannot disprove that invisible gremlins follow me around like the Verizon network everywhere I go, but it is ridiculous to pretend that the possibility that such gremlins exist is on equal footing with the non-existence of said gremlins. It does not make sense to say that you are agnostic about the existence of Smurfs, Santa Claus, Zeus, H.R. Pufinstuf, the tooth fairy or any number of other man-made creations of the imagination. We know that that likelihood of any of those things existing is impossibly small. To suggest that we are relying on faith to dismiss the existence of the tooth fairy, for example, is ridiculous.

Somewhere I read something that can be paraphrased as follows: with respect to most Gods that mankind has created, we are all atheists. Some of us just take it one God further.

Amen to that. Here is required reading on this general topic.