Thank you. I appreciate your willingness to validate my experience, even if it came with a caveat. I also appreciate your candor in telling me how you began and how you arrived at your conclusions. It means something to me that you would disclose such a personal thing.

I'm aware of all the things you've mentioned, trust me. Although these ideas are intriguing, I don't agree with all your points and conclusions, and the information in your sources is not something I would be inclined believe just because someone assures me it's the real truth. I take from alternate sources what seems plausible by their arguments, but I hold that lightly until I see enough credible corroborating evidence to convince me their contentions might be true. On the other hand, I tend to believe people who risk their livelihoods or even their lives to speak out against an injustice or refute an official lie, but even then I look for corroborating evidence of their contentions, which usually comes from others who have taken the same risks. (It takes less to convince me in this case. Nobody does that without an unshakable belief in what they are saying.) In terms of spiritual truth, the evidence that I might be wrong in my beliefs would need to far outweigh the proof of them in my soul for me to consider changing them, and it would have to be pretty heavy to have a chance of overturning my convictions.

I don't trust anyone who comes with "secret truth" they say will bring enlightenment and spiritual advancement, even if it's a "powerful" Christian who claims to have gotten it right from God (I don't care if they even have miracles in their pockets). It's an old trick, and people fall for it because they don't know the same cheese has often been used before, soaked in a new flavor to be palatable to people of the times.

We see the church and even the universe quite differently. I do not regard the church to consist of the organizations we see, and I do not believe that God is one of a host of aliens who meddle with our world. I never will, and I don't care if people think I'm stupid for being stubborn about that. God revealed Himself to me through Jesus as the only living God, eternal and unbound by time and space, and that is not something I can un-know or trade for some inferior vision of the universe.

Even so, I am not a fan of powerless Christianity. I have been in churches like that, the ones that hold their religion entirely in their minds because spiritual things scare them. But I have also been in churches where the presence and power of God wasn't outside the door. I know the difference, and I can usually spot it from the parking lot, even in churches that cheaply copy the emotional aspects and forms of God's presence to convince themselves He is there.

I've enjoyed talking to you, but at this point I don't think it will be productive to continue. The discussion seems to have devolved into a back and forth of trying to inspire a conversion, and I'm not into that. I don't think either of us could even be bullied or shamed into a slight concession, so it might just be better to move on.

Before I close, I do want to make one final point relating to something you said: Focus matters. Believing in Christianity and believing in Christ are not the same thing at all. I expect you know that, but I thought it was important to say.