re the arrogance of christians in article apr geneva rutgers edu phs d vaxc cc monash edu au writes but what if the geologists are wrong and these people are warning of a non existent danger analogies can only push an argument so far on both sides both melinda s and yours assume the premises used to set up your respective analogies are true and thus the correct conclusion will arise the important point to note is the different directions both sides come from christians believe they know the truth and thus believe they have the right and duty to tell the truth to all christians can get offended if others do not believe what is self evidently to them the truth non christians do not believe this is the truth and get offended at them because they christians claim to know the truth the analogy does not depend on the premisses being true because the question under discussion is not truth but arrogance a similar analogy might be a medical doctor who believes that a blood transfusion is necessary to save the life of a child whose parents are jehovah s witnesses and so have conscientious objections to blood transfusion the doctor s efforts to persuade them to agree to a blood transfusion could be perceived to be arrogant in precisely the same way as christians could be perceived to be arrogant the truth or otherwise of the belief that a blood transfusion is necessary to save the life of the child is irrelevant here what matters is that the doctor believes it to be true and could be seen to be trying to foce his beliefs on the parents and this could well be perceived as arrogance steve hayes department of missiology editorial department univ of south africa p o box pretoria south africa internet hayesstw risc unisa ac za fidonet steve hayes p f n z fidonet org faq missiology is the study of christian mission and is part of the faculty of theology at unisa
