- When a critic or skeptic raises this charge against a Christian’s faith they are committing the Genetic Fallacy. This is an attempt to discredit a person’s beliefs by criticizing their origin.
- The problem with this charge, however, is that the origin of a person’s beliefs has no bearing on whether or not those beliefs are true.
- An Atheist may likewise be an Atheist because they were raised in a home of Atheists, but that’s completely irrelevant to whether or not their Atheism is true.
- When examining belief systems what ultimately matters is whether or not the beliefs that are held correspond with reality.
- Thus, the most appropriate way to judge any person’s beliefs is by examining the evidence for them.
- As a Christian, a great response to this charge is to politely state, “I may have been blessed to have been raised in a Christian home, but my faith is founded upon greater reasons to believe than that fact alone. If you’d be interested I’d love to share with you some of the compelling evidence for why I’ve put my trust in Jesus.”
For more answers to common charges against the Christian faith, please check out the Apologetics Study Bible for Students, available in our online store.