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Of course it does. It's a word, isn't it?

Well, no. Not all words have meaning. Some have apparent meaning until you analyze them and find that they don't refer to anything real.

Here's an example:

Sprite - an elf, fairy or goblin
Elf - one of a class of imaginary beings - with magical powers given to capricious interference in human affairs, and usually imagined to be a diminutive being in human form; sprite, fairy.
Fairy - one of a class of imaginary supernatural beings, generally conceived as having diminutive human form, and intervening with them in human affairs.
Goblin - a grotesque sprite or elf that is that is mischevious or malicious towards people.

And if you look at the synonyms for Fairy it says, sprite, elf, goblin.

So sprite is a goblin, a goblin is an elf, an elf is a fairy and a fairy is a sprite. Now let's go one step further.

Let's define a elgobfairspritathon as the yearly convention of elfs, goblins, fairies and sprites. Let's also say that because the other definition of 'fairy' is a homosexual, that fairies do exist, and if fairies exist, and by this definition they do, then sprites and goblins must exist as well.

Then I say to you, 'there was so much noise at the elgobfairspritathon last night I couldn't sleep.' Now, in reality we have a word, we have defined one, 'elgobfairspritathon' but does it really MEAN anything?

This is the problem I have with the word 'faith.' My dictionary gives 9 meanings to this word. Some of them I can accept and other I cannot. And this is why I am always saying "Equivocation" when these subjects come up. Because in one case a person will apply definition #1, and in the next sentence apply definition #7, and then go on acting as if they were the same thing and they are not.

A common religious definition for faith which I was recently reminded of, which is not in my dictionary, 'evidence of things not seen' is not the same as #4 - belief in anything, as a code of ethics, standards of merit, (logic) and this is what is continually done in these discussions. This is what I object to. It is saying that sprites exist because fairies exist because there are fairies standing on the street corner right now. The word is so equivocated that it has no meaning anymore.

This is what happens when someone equates 'faith' in God with 'faith' in evolution. It is an equivocation. It is dropping the context, applying a different connotation, and equivocating the issue.

The same can be said for those who insist that human beings are 'animals.' It is an equivocation of the word for the sake of proving a point that cannot be proved.