What we disagree on, of course, is whether there is good evidence on which to base this type of faith in God and Jesus.

Faith involves 3 things: knowledge (or, if you prefer, a proposition), belief that the proposition is true, and resultant action.

You can see that without any of these three faith is not excercised. Without a proposition, there is no object of faith. Without a belief the action is not by faith, but by some other reason (such as coercion, peer-pressure etc). Without action, it isn’t faith but belief.

You can see, also, that faith is not hindered by supporting evidence nor immune from contrary evidence. Far from it: supporting evidence strengthens faith by clarifying the knowledge and strengthening the belief, and while contrary evidence undermines faith, or causes it to be thrown out entirely.

For interest’s sake, I’ll share how the last one (action) is often illustrated:
One day in 1860, Blondin, the great tightrope walker, was again preparing to cross the famous falls. He turned to the huge crown that was watching him intently and asked if they believed he could cross the falls without falling. They shouted their assent. He asked if they believed he could make the walk while carrying another person on his back. Again the crowd roared about their belief in him. But when Blondin turned to a man who was standing nearby and asked if he would be the volunteer, the man adamantly refused.”

It is one thing to believe a man can do something, and quite another to entrust your life to that belief. That is faith.

In Blondin’s case, suppose he carried his manager across safely, showing that he can do it. There might now possibly be a man might be found in the crowd with enough faith (and courage!) to let Blondin carry him. Is his faith any less ‘faith’ for having more information? Of course not.

I appreciate your question, in response to “To atheists: one special request – get your definition of faith from one who claims to have it, not Dawkins” Belief in the face of evidence is not faith, but sheer stupidity. Evidence and true faith complement each other.
We excercise this true faith daily – cars, roofs, chairs, friends etc. A degree of faith in all those things is necessary to live a normal life. It isn’t dumb to live like that: your faith in each of those is based on good evidence. Christians have that same faith, but in Jesus.

… it seems to me perfectly obvious that if someone feels the need to misrepresent, say, Islam, in order to make Christianity look good, that person’s Christian belief is anything but confident.
If Christianity is uniquely true, its beauty will be best seen only when viewed amidst a full and fair account of the alternatives.

Of course, the principle applies to all viewpoints.

Imagine yourself as an art curator who is convinced that one piece in his collection has an unequalled quality. What will you do? Will you dim the lights on the ‘competitors’ in the gallery and put the spotlights on your favourite piece. Of course not. That would be a sure sign you were not actually convinced about the special beauty of your treasured masterpiece. I mean, if you’ve got to obscure the other pieces in order to make your favourite one look good, something is clearly wrong. A truly assured curator, that is, one with a deep confidence in the excellence of his prized item, would place all the gallery lights on full, confident that as careful art-lovers inspect the whole collection, viewing all the works in their best light, one painting, in particular, will draw people’s attention.

There’s not much more to add to that!

But on another topic, yes I too have found people often fire ‘objections’ at each other with no real desire for answers. They are probably better termed excuses. There is a certain point in some discussions where it turns into one person interrogating the other – who is then expected to make a defense. Its hard, at that point, not to feel discouraged as the questions pile on, the answers fall on deaf ears, and their mind will not be moved no matter how convincing your defense. Turning the discussion back into a discussion by up-ending a question can be helpful (“why do you think that?”).

To Christians: no amount of reasoning will convince those who suppress the truth (Romans 1). Pray that the Holy Spirit will open their heart.
To atheists: one special request – get your definition of faith from one who claims to have it, not Dawkins. No matter how many times he repeats it, faith is not believe in the face of evidence. And get your descriptions of God from the book about Him itself, rather than accepting a well-turned phrase.

To all: have a good evening!

I saw Dawkin’s show of the god delusion and frankly it was rubbish he isn’t the smartest of people and any half educated person can rip him apart as a show host on the BBC did.