I have blogged on this here:

http://sntjohnny.com/front/archives/35

I had 12 years of formal Christian education apart from "Sunday School" and was still practically reduced to non-belief even in the midst of studying to be a pastor.  In the course of regaining my belief, I was stunned to see how much I had been taught was overly simplistic and positively unhelpful when interacting with the ideas in our modern society.

"The Da Vinci Code" does not sell however many hundreds of thousands of books if people actually know history- not just the history of the Christian church, but history in general.  Clearly, the history of Christianity and the development of its principle books helps, too.  I mention this only by way of an example proving my point:  Christian education as it has existed up until this present moment is completely inadequate and is actually creating more nonbelievers.

If I had a dime for every time an atheist objected to the assertion that their non-belief is in reaction to a strawman understanding on the grounds that 'they went to Sunday School their entire life' I'd easily have five or six dollars.   You can't read Dan Barker, Sam Harris, Richard Carrier, and Richard Dawkins, without marveling at their complete failure to grasp Christianity.  Dan Barker is a good example of what I mean, as he was active in his church and a music minister (some of his music apparently still gets play in some churches) and according to his book was stumped by "Who created God?"

It is not a difficult piece of logic to see that besides the fact that Christian theism speaks of a God who is by definition uncreated, the alternative is basically to accept a universe that is uncreated.  So the theist and the atheist alike accepts that something exists uncreated- it can't be maintained then that the notion that God would exist uncreated is logically incoherent.  But in Barker's case, the damage was done.  It could have all been prevented if in the seventh grade some religion teacher had explained what it is exactly Christians mean by 'God.'  (And don't tell me seventh graders can't get it- I taught that age- I know they do).

Similarly, you see on this forum and practically everywhere else these days (see my Dawkins's review) notions that misunderstand 'God,' believing that conceptually Christian theism is no different than Baal worship or whatnot.   Its easy to take aim at the atheists on the matter (way too easy if its Barker objecting to an uncreated God but accepting an uncreated alternative of his choice), but doesn't it all stem from a failure of the Christian church to step up to the current challenges and adjust their educational style and substance to match?

Christians, what say you?