Think of the children

[Rei]

Things can be told both by words and by actions. If someone claims to tell the truth and act accordingly, can you be held ignorant if you witnessed both but chose not to believe?

[hive_king]

How does one act accordingly? One problem with your reasoning is that there isn't one truth people claim. There's several. There's the Jewish claim, the muslim claim, the Bahai claim, the Buddhist claim, the Christian claim, among many others. And ever within the Christian claim, there's the Mormons, the Catholics, the Baptists, the Disciples of Christ, the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Coptics, and more than I could possibly count here. All of them claim to know better than any other group what "the truth" is. Almost all of them claim that if you don't follow what they claim is "the truth" it severely restricts or eliminates your chances of winning God's grace.

Then, there is the assumption that someone can choose to believe or not believe. I want all the Christians reading this to believe, for 5 minutes, that there is no God. Not pretend to believe or anything of the sort, but to believe wholly and completely that there is no God. You can't do it, can you? That's because belief is not a concious choice any more than nonbelief is. To say someone chooses not to believe is a faulty assumption.

[Rei]

One acts accordingly by practicing what he preaches. If someone is telling you to give to the poor, and does so himself, he is acting according to what he is preaching. As for what the truth is, you are right. There are very many groups who are all claiming different things. Does this mean that the atheist truth is the correct one, then?

And belief is indeed a decision. You are right in saying that a belief is not easily changed, not a strong belief, anyway. However, my inablility to actively choose to believe that there is no God does not mean that I do not actively choose to believe that there is a God. There are times when I find I doubt the presence of God and then I have to remember things that I have seen and experienced and remind myself why I believe and it is a very concious decision to continue believing, despite not feeling anything.

The same applies to atheism or any other belief. There is a choice involved, and once someone becomes settled with his choice, that belief often grows stronger and becomes difficult to change.