Peter

If you dismiss the historical basis of Christian faith, but equally do not feel that your view “entails Christianity as being a purely a spiritual, existential phenomenon” - then what exactly is your view of the faith?

I do not say that, for example, the resurrection did not happen, only that the historical/ forensic evidence is insufficient to prove that it happened; and I think that those parts of the Christian story that assert that something happened are generally deficient in such evidence.

Thus my approach is not reductionist in the sense that Bultmann’s is: as you have pointed out Bultmann finds the historical evidence for the gospel stories unconvincing but says it can reframed in terms of an entirely existential experience of God

On the other hand, if you are bailed up by Richard Dawkins with the demand to prove your belief in the resurrection, then my approach seems to leave you empty handed.

What is it to be intellectually respectable when it comes to something like belief in the resurrection? How does such a belief differ from superstition, that is, belief in magic? How does it differ from gullibility or self delusion? It seems to me that we need to explore these ideas quite a lot more.

Paul