Secular and atheist friends

There is no secular creed, so start by asking rather than assuming. Broadly: an atheist holds that there is no God, or no good reason to believe in one; an agnostic holds that the question cannot be settled, or that they personally have not settled it; and a great many people are simply secular, living without reference to God, not hostile, not curious, occupied with other things. Common threads, when they are articulated: that the sciences give us the most reliable knowledge we have, and that what cannot be tested should be held loosely; that the universe and life are explained by physics and evolution without a designer; that morality is real but human, grounded in our shared nature, our reasoning and our need to live together, not in divine command; that religions are human constructions, often sincere and sometimes beautiful, which have also done harm; that suffering and evil count against a good and powerful God; that the many religions cancel each other out; and that meaning is something we make rather than find. Many secular people were raised in a church and left it, and the leaving usually had a reason: an unanswered question, a hypocrisy they watched up close, a scientific claim the church seemed to deny, a hurt. Younger secular people are often less argued out of faith than never argued into it; the question simply did not come up. Most are decent, thoughtful, and tired of being treated as a project. Some hold their view with real intellectual seriousness and have read more philosophy of religion than most Christians; assume that until you learn otherwise.

Truth matters, and it is not whatever you want it to be. Evidence should be followed where it leads. Hypocrisy is worse than honest unbelief, and the church has often earned the criticism it gets. Science is a gift and a discipline, and a Christian who fears it has misunderstood the God who made the world intelligible. Suffering is real and terrible and demands an answer, not a slogan. Human beings have dignity and should be treated justly whatever they believe. Religion has been used to justify cruelty, and saying so is telling the truth. Meaning, love, beauty and moral obligation are among the most important things there are. On every one of those points you and your secular friend can nod together, and you should, out loud, before you differ.

First and deepest: whether there is a God at all, and therefore whether the universe is the kind of place in which persons, reasons, and moral obligations are at home or are accidents that happened to arise. Christians hold that the order of the world, the fact that it exists at all, the reliability of reason, and the reality of right and wrong point beyond the world to its maker (Romans 1:19-20; Psalm 19:1-4; Acts 17:24-28). Second, Jesus: not whether a wise teacher lived, but whether he rose from the dead, which Christians hold to be a claim about history with witnesses, records and consequences, not a claim about feelings (1 Corinthians 15:3-8; 1 Corinthians 15:14-19; Luke 1:1-4). Third, the human condition: not that people are basically good and occasionally fail, but that something is broken in each of us that we cannot fix by information or effort, and that the answer is forgiveness and new life rather than improvement (Romans 3:23; Jeremiah 17:9; John 3:3). Fourth, suffering: not a proof that God is absent but the place where God most fully showed himself, in a cross, and a condition he has promised to end (Isaiah 53; Romans 8:18-25; Revelation 21:4). Fifth, hope: whether death is the end. Notice that the secular friend often believes many Christian things without the foundation: that people have rights, that love is real, that cruelty is wrong, that history is going somewhere. The honest conversation is about where those convictions come from and whether they can stand without what they grew out of.

Read these before the conversation. Each one opens in the Bible reader.

• 1 Peter 3:15-16

  A reason, with gentleness: your friend expects to be preached at, and this asks something better of you.

• Acts 17:22-31

  Paul with philosophers: he quotes their poets, honours their search, and names the God they do not know. The model for this whole conversation.

• Romans 1:19-20

  What can be known of God from what has been made.

• Psalm 19:1-4

  The heavens declare: the created order as speech.

• Ecclesiastes 3:11

  Eternity in the human heart: why the questions do not go away.

• 1 Corinthians 15:3-8

  The resurrection stated as history with named witnesses, within the lifetime of people who could contradict it.

• 1 Corinthians 15:14-19

  Paul stakes the whole faith on a fact: if Christ has not been raised, our faith is worthless. A secular friend will respect that honesty.

• Luke 1:1-4

  Luke's own account of his method: eyewitnesses, careful investigation, an orderly account.

• Acts 26:24-29

  Paul before Festus and Agrippa: true and reasonable words, said to a sceptic, without apology.

• John 20:24-29

  Thomas, who wanted evidence, and got it.

• Romans 3:23

  The diagnosis your friend may already half believe about people, applied to all of us.

• Isaiah 53:3-5

  Where God was when it hurt.

• John 3:16

  The whole of it, plainly, because a secular friend may never have actually heard it said by someone who meant it.

Listen first, and for longer than feels comfortable. Ask what they believe and why, what they used to believe if anything, and what happened; the story behind an unbelief is almost always more important than the arguments in front of it, and a hurt from a church needs an apology before it needs a syllogism. Do not pretend to certainty you do not have; say what you are sure of, what you find hard, and why you believe anyway, because a secular friend can smell performance and respects honesty. Keep the conversation on Jesus and the resurrection more than on the existence of God in general; an abstract debate about a first cause can go on forever, but the question of whether a particular man rose from a particular tomb is the kind of question your friend already knows how to think about. Know the standard objections well enough to state them better than your friend does (the problem of evil, the many religions, the harm done by the church, the silence of God, science) and answer them without a script, admitting where the answers are partial. Do not defend everything: some things done in Christ's name should be condemned, and your friend will trust you more when you condemn them. Let your life do most of the talking; the best argument most secular people ever meet is a Christian who is kind, honest, unafraid of questions, and visibly not in it for themselves. Invite them to read one of the Gospels with you, Mark or John, and to judge Jesus for themselves rather than through his followers. Pray for them; and if the friendship lasts years without a conversion, it was still worth it.

• Do not say atheists have no basis for morality and therefore cannot be good. Many are better people than many Christians, and Romans 2:14-15 says the law is written on every heart. The honest question is where that law comes from, not whether they keep it.
• Do not claim science and faith are enemies, or that evolution disproves God, or that Christians must choose. Many serious scientists are Christians; keep the conversation on the questions science does not answer rather than on contradicting what it does.
• Do not use Pascal's wager as if it were an argument for Christianity being true. It is at most an argument about prudence, and a thoughtful friend will point that out.
• Do not say there are no atheists in foxholes or that your friend secretly believes. It is condescending and often false.
• Do not claim the Bible has been proven by archaeology in general. Specific findings confirm specific details; say those, and do not overclaim.
• Do not answer the problem of evil with a formula. Say that the Bible's own answer is a person on a cross and a promised end to suffering, that it is not a tidy answer, and that you find it truer than the alternatives.
• Do not make the person a project. If they can tell your friendship depends on their converting, the conversation is already over.

What your friend is likely to say, and an answer you can give in your own words, with the passages behind it.

Example conversations: what was said, what worked, what to avoid, and the passages used.