re: According to a new survey, only 16% of Christians believe in the doctrine of the Trinity

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It’s as preposterous as asserting Muslims or Jews are Christians because they believe in the God of Abraham.

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Lumen Gentium 16 is an infallible teaching of the Catholic church.

It says Muslims go to heaven.

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The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator. In the first place amongst these there are the Muslims, who, professing to hold the faith of Abraham, along with us adore the one and merciful God, who on the last day will judge mankind.

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the Catholic Church is the original and the true church that Christ founded on earth. There is no argument with that.

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Some Baptists will disagree with you on this.

I also know that Pentecostal Holiness consider Catholic beliefs and practices to be heretical.

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Because there are an infinite number of incorrect answers to the problem 2 + 2 =______, does that mean that I should laugh at someone who says "4?" as though they are absurd for thinking that any answer could be correct when so many incorrect answers are possible? Of course not.

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I hate to be the one to break it to you, but religious beliefs are not the premise to compare to a math problem.

If you want to get into it over this simple comparison I’m willing. But hopefully you recognize the absurdity of your attempt to make a valid response using that strategy and can move on to a more compelling line of reasoning.

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But again, I reject this premise. I don't think religions exist to provide a feeling for someone.

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Why not, it’s created for humans? And it was created by the most primitive version of thinking humans.

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I think religions exist to provide truth. Metaphysical truth. Just like science exists to provide physical truth.

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It’s not even comparable to science. Science is valuable because it uses the scientific method. It demands moving beyond a hypothesis. Religion demands that you stick with a hypothesis. They are on opposite ends of the logic spectrum. One leads you to a probable truth. The other simply offers a series of competing hypothesis which mandate that people who believe they are interested in truth just stick with a hypothesis. One even dares call itself Scientology. Spoiler alert: it rejects science.

For brevity purposes, the above response also addresses your remaining thoughts from that same post.

This is false. 100% of Catholics/Christians believe in the Holy Trinity

People who don’t believe in the Holy Trinity are LITERALLY not Christians.

Correct. It still exists. It’s called Protestant beliefs (false teachings)

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But hopefully you recognize the absurdity of your attempt to make a valid response using that strategy and can move on to a more compelling line of reasoning.

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What is absurd is the claim, "All religions are false because there's lots of them and they all say different things."

It's an obvious logical fallacy and the math equation illustrates that quite well.

All religions MAY be false, but not because there are lots of them and they say different things...that's ridiculous. If they are all false, they are false because they teach things that do not conform to reality. That has nothing whatsoever to do with how many of them there are.

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If you want to get into it

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I don't know what that means. You asked a question about why it is a problem for people to not accept all aspects of a religion and I answered it.

The problem is that you really weren't asking a question because your question is loaded with presuppositions that I suppose I am just supposed to accept because you say so. You were making a statement.

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Why not, it’s created for humans?

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So was science. Was it created for humans to provide feelings or to reveal truth about the physical world to them?

Here's what you just said: "Religion was created for humans, therefore, it was created necessarily to only make them feel a certain way." There's no logic basis for that association. It's another one of your assumptions that you demand be accepted because you say so.

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And it was created by the most primitive version of thinking humans.

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I don't think you're really claiming that primitive humans created any of the major world religions (if you are...well). What I think you're saying here is that even primitive humans wondered about metaphysical realities and tried to come up with answers for those questions.

The problem with that is that primitive humans also wondered about physical realities and tried to come up with answers for those questions too. So the subtle criticism you're trying to introduce here cuts both ways. If you're going to claim that religion is the product of primitive humans, then you have to accept that science is too.

And the scientific method is only a few hundred years old. It wasn't solidified as such until the 18th century, and even more importantly, what is considered the gold standard tool of scientific proof now (the randomized, controlled, double blind study) didn't exist until 1948, not even a hundred years ago.

But human beings had already figured out A LOT of stuff without the benefit of either. In fact, the vast majority of knowledge of the physical world we have was gleaned before the scientific method was the standard.

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It’s not even comparable to science.

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Like just about any statement involving two things in some ways that's true, but in other ways it is not. It's comparable in that it is a tool that humans use to make sense of certain types of knowledge or answer certain questions.

Science works great in answering "what" and "how" questions. Things that can be repeated and observed, things that can be falsified or confirmed.

A bit less useful when it comes to answering "when" or "where" questions, to the degree that the opportunity to repeat and falsify or confirm isn't available and deductions have to be made indirectly.

It's completely useless in answering "why" questions.

For answering those questions humans have to use religion and philosophy.

And yes, there's a difference in the methods because there's a difference in the origin of the knowledge.

IF there's a Creator who communicates with humans (which is the basis for all major world religions except Buddhism, which IMO is more a philosophy than a religion), the nature of the knowledge that Creator reveals is concerned with primarily revealing Itself. The nature of God and how humans should relate to that God.

That God gets to provide that information. After all, He's telling people about Himself. The scientific method is a method of human discovery. If a God exists and communicates with humans, human discovery takes a backseat to God's communications. It may be necessary in determining details or filling in gaps of knowledge that aren't explicitly communicated, but imagine a human telling God, "Hey, you know that thing you said about your character being XYZ? Well, I've done some experiments and determined that you were wrong about yourself."

I suspect you don't see this because you will not—even for the sake of discussion—let go of your presupposition that a Creator doesn't exist and therefore cannot communicate with humans (and therefore, religion must be entirely made up by humans). I'm used to that...it's very common among atheists. Makes me wonder just how sure they are about that dogma that they can't let it go even for the sake of exploring the logic behind the possibility of God...talk about "demanding that you stick with a hypothesis."


But like I said from the outset, if that dogma is true, then I don't know why anyone would waste their time. I agree with the atheist argument that gets made frequently in the other direction, namely: "The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one."

If there is no God and no revelation, I agree.

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Science is valuable because it uses the scientific method

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Which somehow presupposed a rational brain in the head of most humans, though this in itself is unprovable.
And the scientific method, along with reason and logic in itself, is immaterial. So how does the immaterial exist in a world that is only composed of material things?

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Science works great in answering "what" and "how" questions. Things that can be repeated and observed, things that can be falsified or confirmed.

A bit less useful when it comes to answering "when" or "where" questions, to the degree that the opportunity to repeat and falsify or confirm isn't available and deductions have to be made indirectly.

It's completely useless in answering "why" questions.

For answering those questions humans have to use religion and philosophy.

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Well done. This works too: Hey science, why shouldn't I kill six million Jews?