Straight away I’m going to ask a question or two. Questions like: “how did you come to that conclusion? Can you tell me what you mean by faith? Can you give me an example of blind faith? ” Faith means a lot of different things to different people. A definition of what a sceptic means by “faith” is crucial, so that we don’t talk past each other.
One simply need look no further than a Bible dictionary or concordance to see that faith, in the biblical sense, is not blind. “Faith” just means trusting God, and we can have very good reasons to trust someone. Once the sceptic finds out that we agree it is wrong to believe without thinking, it usually diffuses the situation. We then have a chance to talk about biblical faith, and how it requires evidence and trust.
We should also ask atheists for evidence . Some will say: “atheism isn’t a belief”. To which we can reply, “you don’t believe atheism then?” If an atheist says that atheism isn’t a belief they don’t actually believe their own atheism. Now, it takes a lot of ‘blind’ faith to believe in something you don’t believe in! Bottom line: if he wants me to be an atheist he has to give me reasons. If he doesn’t have any good reasons for his atheism, his atheism is blind.