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I put it to you that people have a reason for their faith and they are the only ones who can talk about it. I resent atheists telling me about something of which they have no knowledge. What I cannot understand about atheists is how selective they are. For example they are happy to believe in Alexander the Great but they choose not to believe in Jesus which only goes to prove that people believe what they want. It also proves how irrational atheists are.
You are using the word faith in the sense of believing in something that cannot be proved. But equally we have faith in doctors and we believe or have faith in our car that it will start in the morning. Faith can be very positive and in the Bible faith (pistis) means assurance, confidence, or proof. (Its English meaning differs from the Greek word πίστις.)
We can see its use in Acts 17:31:
“For he has fixed a day in which he will judge the whole world with justice by means of a man he has chosen. He has given proof (pistis, πίστις) of this to everyone by raising that man from the dead!"
Faith in the Bible (pistis) means confidence, assurance or proof as in things seen, and people living in New Testament times had this faith which was based on evidence, so it was a firm faith. But even so there were many who doubted and even doubting Thomas asked to touch the wounds of Jesus.
Christ himself often spoke of people as having little faith, but those who had faith had the assurance that comes with the proof of what they have seen and heard for themselves and it was that which gave them their confidence and the assurance of their faith. It is this same assurance and confidence that Christians have today. I have the same faith in Jesus as I have in Julius Caesar except that one is dead and the other rose from the dead. My faith has a solid foundation based on the historical Jesus, fulfilled prophesy, and the historicity of the Bible and is something Richard Dawkins knows nothing about.
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