Street Preacher vs. Atheist

I was walking around Burbank near some movie theatres and saw a street preacher standing on a bench. He had a small sound system set up and he had free Bibles to give away. There was a skinny 20 something guy on a bike talking into the mic. They were debating. I stopped to listen.

The guy on the bike was an admitted atheist. The street preacher was trying to convince the guy that he would be going to Hell unless he started believing in the bible and stuff like that there. And the preacher wouldn't wish going to Hell on anyone. The atheist demanded proof that God exists. (If you don't believe in God, you don't, therefore, believe in Hell.) The street preacher would reply with chapter and verse. This, of course, is his proof. The atheist wasn't buying it. "When I ask for proof you say, "in the Bible..." was the atheist's reply. It was really the preacher's only answer.

The street preacher didn't really see the flaw in his proof or couldn't argue something other than one way. He did ask the atheist if he believed in the Big Bang. "Yes." was his reply. "Prove it." was the street preacher's retort. "Well, science has proven there is background radiation left over fromt he Big Bang from 15 billion years ago." Atheist replied. "Prove that." Street preacher said. "It's science. It's been observed and tested." "But is can't be repeated," was the preacher's thrust. "Something doesn't need to be proven twice in a lab experiment to be true." Was the atheist's reposte.

The street preacher contested this as only theory and derided science. It was at this time I got bored. Neither person was going to win.One cannot change the opinion of a rock. The atheist would need to get bored because you can't really argue with people set on denying science. Now some would say that atheists are treating their belief in science as blindly as a religion. That's bollocks. Science changes it's view when shown other evidence. Religion ignores all science to hold onto a belief.

And the whirlygig of time spins on...