In reply to:

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And if you are a Christian, you believe that the Bible is the inspired word of God

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I'm not sure I agree with that. [disclaimer - I am not religious, although I have vague Gaiaist/Buddhist leanings] I think you can be a Christian, and believe in the Christian God, Jesus etc but can be sceptical of the writings in the bible as they were just written by people. I mean, there are a reasonable number of what appear to be complete contradictions in there, and a whole number of things a 'good' God surely never said to anyone. Of course that does assume the Christian God is a good one...