Of course I wasn’t trying to actually undermine your faith. I merely was pointing out one reason why Pascal’s wager is a weak argument. It does not necessarily lead to the conclusion that God exists. In fact, it has been used in the opposite way to conclude that it’s safer to not believe in any God at all. To wit: if I choose to believe in the Christian God, then I’ll be punished by Krishna (I don’t know enough about Hinduism to know if that is truly what Hindus believe, just using Krishna as an example). If I choose to believe in Krishna, then the Christian God will punish me for all eternity. I’m better off just not believing in any god, and hopefully whichever (if any) actually exist will be forgiving.
I suspect (since I’m not one, I don’t know, but I have had discussions with many) that most atheists are not atheists based on faith, but rather on lack of evidence. Most know that nothing is ever proven in science. In fact, it is scientists themselves who will most freely admit that we haven’t figured everything out yet, otherwise there’d be no need to pursue science any more.
Almost all the atheists I’ve ever dealt with point mainly to the lack of evidence for God. If you don’t accept the Bible as an authority (doing so does require faith) then evidence for God is in fact lacking. That’s really what faith is: believing WITHOUT evidence. Atheists simply don’t have faith; they must have evidence to be convinced. I strongly suspect that if God, just for an example, wrote in big letters on the moon “I am God and I exist”, that very few atheists would remain atheists. There would now be evidence.
LOL. I see "I am God and I exist" when I look at a full moon on a clear night.
In your explanation, you point out that lack of evidence is given as the reason for their (atheists) lack of faith. Yet when we get down to it, the root question is at the very foundation of Science and faith. Where did we come from and why?
I contend that science doesn't answer this any better than faith. And to believe in any theory that has been proposed regarding the origins of the universe takes.... Faith. Science is easier to "believe" because we can turn water to ice and call it science (which it is). Things associated with science can be observed with senses. Things with faith have to be experienced. If a soul has never experienced such things that our faith bestows upon us, it is hard to simply explain.? How can an atheist cherish life and not fear death, thus living in fear? They must then be sure of the futile and insignificant thing their own existence is?