Reread what I wrote Chris. MOST xtians believe MOST of the bible. They claim they do and I'm not going to argue with them. I'm not even limiting myself to xtians and New Testament which would be valid since belief in the NT is a big part of what makes xtians xtians. Since one can make 'the bible' whatever one wishes, define xtians however one wishes, and define god however one wishes deists will always 'win' the argument if they carefully define the parameters to their liking but as written the statement above is true. More than 50% of xtians worldwide believe that more than 50% of the bible is accurate. I can find millions of xtians who don't believe in the virgin birth or Noah or whatever but most followers report that they believe most of the stories. I know most don't actually believe a great amount of what they claim to believe but that is a different subject of discussion and doesn't reflect on belief in the stories discussed in this thread.
>
>>> You have to believe the whole god impregnated a
>>>
>> virgin nonsense to even
>>
>>> be a xtian.
>>>
>
> No you don't. What you have to believe to be a
> Christian is that Jesus was a manifestation of God and
> died to redeem the world. Whether you believe he was
> literally God's son born of a virgin woman is a matter
> of individual belief and denomination.
>
Again the MAJORITY of xtians agree with the statement as I wrote it but since you prefer to believe that either a handful of 'sophisticated' theists or a small sub-sect be allowed to speak for the majority you'll always believe you prevail in this argument as well. Who gets to decide what defines xtianity if not the majority of xtians? If the majority of xtians believe something is part of their belief system then it is regardless of how silly the belief is and how many self-defined xtians in the minority disagree. When they become they majority that will redefine the belief. It's the same as saying I claim I'm a xtian but I believe Zenu fought with Jesus for control of the earth. My saying this doesn't make it a xtian belief even if I get 500,000 others to agree with me. You want "xtian belief" to be so amorphous as to be worthless as a definition. According to a recent poll:
"The majority of Americans believe the Biblical story of Jesus Christ being born to the virgin Mary literally, according to a survey released Monday. Three out of four adults (75 percent) said they believe in the gospel narrative of the birth of Jesus Christ, found a nationwide survey conducted by The Barna Group. Out of the sixty population subgroups in the research, there was only one group where a majority of respondents did not take the virgin birth literally. The exception was atheists and agnostics – among whom only 15 percent said the event happened literally. Surprisingly, a solid majority of self-described liberals on political and social issues (60 percent) believed in the biblical view of Christ’s birth. The next most literally accepted story is the turning of water into wine. Seven out of ten adults (69 percent) believe Jesus literally turned water into wine at the wedding in Cana. Yet there was a large discrepancy in subgroups, with born-again Christians most likely to accept the story (94 percent), compared to unchurched adults (42 percent). Protestants, African Americans, conservatives, and residents of the South were also more likely than their counterparts to embrace the story. The story of Jesus feeding the crowd of 5,000 with five loaves of bread and two fishes, and then collecting 12 basket full of leftovers was accepted literally by 68 percent of respondents. Meanwhile, a smaller but still majority of Americans believe in Noah’s flood (64 percent) and the story of the serpent tempting Eve to eat the forbidden fruit (56 percent)."
Yes, I know this is survey of Americans not xtians worldwide but since the majority of xtians worldwide are Catholic and they most definitely define this belief as a central tenet of their religion the statement MOST xtians believe the virgin birth is accurate, as is saying that this belief is necessary (as defined by to MOST xtians) is also quite accurate. They get to define their belief system themselves and they define it as just as nutty as scientologists define theirs. There are ~2.2 B xtians worldwide. ~1.2 B are Catholics leaving ~1 B protestants. Assuming the worldwide rates of belief in the virgin birth are 25% of those in the US (I'm being very accommodating to your position here Chris) you still get better than 60% of xtians worldwide believing that the virgin birth is both true and a defining tenet of xtianity.
I really enjoy reading most of your posts but you rather have a blind spot where religion is concerned just as I do where race is an issue. You seem to want religion to be less nutty than it is. Your personal beliefs may be less nutty (they probably are) but your fellow travelers on the religious road are, in the majority of cases, holding beliefs just as crazy as any schizophrenic person you could find.
John Thornton