They guy is just not as cool as Hemant! That is why his site is failing.

If this was the standard of blog success, all other sites would be hopeless

(Thank you for the short-lived ego boost. I shall now go back to reading other blogs written by people so much cooler than me.)

You’ll find that a surprising number or Christians (especially the younger/less traditional ones) will have the same mentality as me: live the gospel. Living the gospel isn’t limited to preaching, handing out bibles, or telling people about Jesus. To us it’s a more practical day-to-day lifestyle. Giving money, helping the poor, loving people, serving people, sharing our stories…things like that (as MikeClawson has said). We don’t hear from those people as much, though. Instead, you’ll find mainly the loud, outspoken RELIGIOUS Christians doing their thing on the Internet.

Which is sort of obvious. If the Christians who believe more in action than in preaching are out acting and not preaching, then of course you’re mainly going to hear from the outspoken preacher evangelist types on blogs, etc. They’re the ones still doing the talking after all.

It may depend on whether the Christians on the site are/were open to understanding the atheist perspective or not.

And vice versa.

The site is anything but failing. Our numbers are steadily increasing. I’ve just seen a significant drop in the number of Christians who comment. I’m the type of person who’s gonna call it like I see it. That’s really all the post was about.

I agree with MikeClawson & Skeptigator’s comment.

@grazatt…
You’re right. I’m definitely not as cool as Hemant.

@Greta Christina…
You’ll find that a surprising number or Christians (especially the younger/less traditional ones) will have the same mentality as me: live the gospel. Living the gospel isn’t limited to preaching, handing out bibles, or telling people about Jesus. To us it’s a more practical day-to-day lifestyle. Giving money, helping the poor, loving people, serving people, sharing our stories…things like that (as MikeClawson has said). We don’t hear from those people as much, though. Instead, you’ll find mainly the loud, outspoken RELIGIOUS Christians doing their thing on the Internet.

I’m with the original FriendlyChristian commentor. I’m all about building relationships, having discussion, and getting to know a person. For me this is much easier to do in person. The website is just another medium.

Personally, I don’t like any system that requires constant indoctrination.

I also disagree with this analysis. If it were true, there would be very few online blogs/ discussion groups/ etc. for Christians… and that’s clearly not the case.

I will say some of the comment exchanges got pretty heated and may have generated a bit of animosity. And ironicly the Christians were the ones who may not have felt very welcome anymore.

It’s a shame because Bill does a great job with the site and forum. It’s no small task to maintain a site where atheists and christians share a space. I just wish that if the Christians felt pushed out they would have spoken up instead of fading out.

They arrive with the intent to evangelize and then they’re intrigued when they find out that atheists don’t fit all the evil stereotypes they hear about in church. This, in my view, is the positive outcome of these sites – at least they come to realize that atheists aren’t all baby-killers.

However, once they get seriously challenged on their beliefs and they realize all the atheists have heard the gospel and found it flawed, there’s not much interest on their part in continuing the discussion. That’s when they disappear.

There are pastors who warn believers not to associate with unbelievers and scriptures that tell them if their message is rejected to move on and “shake the dust off their feet” lest they be tainted by worldly types like us. So, I guess they’re just following the teaching they get. Either that, or they’re deeply threatened by some of the discussions and they run away out of fear.