A fresh challenge
I have enjoyed my discussions with Simple Faith but there’s a new challenge on the horizon, so I’ll have to say goodbye to him meantime and address the issues raised by a guy who calls himself Skeptic. I suspect he’s American with a spelling like that, as our UK spelling is usually sceptic. Anyway, this is what he says. I read your blog with interest but I’d rather you cut to the chase and tell us really what makes you so sure that there’s a God, an afterlife and all that. Most intelligent people just don’t believe that crap any longer. We’re born, we live, we die and that’s the end of it. Give me one good reason to think otherwise and I might change my mind. By the way I’m a university professor, so don’t talk to me like a child!’ I decided to write my reply to him in this blog. This is it:
(Photo: Scott Murray)
Dear Skeptic,
I’ve no idea who you are or what you’re a professor of. If you’re a professor of English, you’d probably cuff me for ending the last sentence with a preposition! But maybe that’s an old rule. You ask me to cut to the chase.’ I’m sorry if I’ve been long-winded. You seem to imply that faith is a simple matter and not only that but that only stupid people have faith. Naturally, as a person of faith I don’t believe either of these comments!
Come to think of it, I don’t believe you’re a professor of English. Such people are usually aware of the nuance and tone of statements, and the slightly abusive use of the word crap’ in relation to believers gives the lie to the idea that you are a professor of English. In any case, I want to keep the discussion rational and civilized, so I’ll definitely avoid rising to your bait. You ask me to tell why I’m sure there’s a God, an afterlife and so on. Here then are the main reasons why I believe:
Three main headings
The reasons can be placed under three headings which would be 1) personal experiences 2) God’s revelation of himself in history 3) God’s revelation of himself in nature.’ Being a professor, you’ll understand that these headings cover a multitude of sub-headings and I’ll only be able to cover a fraction of them in this note. Indeed, I can only deal with some issues belonging to the first heading today.
(Photo: Scott Murray)
Worldview
So, the personal experiences. First, I should come clean on what my worldview is, namely, Creation Fall Redemption. Creation means that all reality came from a source outside’ of time. I place quotes round outside’ because we all have to use metaphors of the world of time to speak’ about the noumenal (see my previous blog). Strictly speaking we can’t speak’ about the noumenal, but all of reality strongly points to it.
Faith what puts all in perspective
But, importantly, God, the primary noumenal consciousness, can reveal himself to ordinary folk and has revealed himself in history in Jesus Christ. For some fortunate people faith is a simple thing, not for me. For me, faith, humanly speaking, comes after reflection. Of course faith is a gift of God, but then viewed correctly, all created reality is the gift of God. Faith is just another free gift, but not everyone accepts what’s free.
Remember Dooyeweerd’s 15 aspects. I came to faith after thinking hard about the other 14 aspects, including the physical, logical-analytical and aesthetic. Faith is the last aspect, what puts all the other aspects in perspective. I almost got side-tracked by other aspects, for example, poetry and philosophy and science. All these studies are useful in themselves, but they don’t necessarily lead to faith.
Incredible mesh of events
All the credit must go to God for leading me to faith. If you read my blog, as you’ve said you have, you’ll know very well what I’m talking about. An incredible mesh of events, going back many years, including, importantly, trans-physical events, proved to me beyond a shadow of a doubt that a noumenal realm exists. But I can go further. All that happened to me and my wife demonstrated that God is love. To you, a skeptic, this might sound a very strange notion when one considers all the suffering and misery of the world. We are all faced with that reality. Personally, it only makes sense if there is a God who can see things from an absolutist/eternal perspective. This life, for everyone, is only a part of the journey.
The role of intuition
Another thing that’s important for me is intuition. Fortunately, everyone has it. It’s the ability, to put it crudely, to know by instinct’ that this reality couldn’t have created itself. We are all born with this ability to a greater or lesser degree. I believe that’s why some people find it easy to believe in God. We are made in his image which is why it is impossible to be rid of the idea of God (although the image has been severely defiled). I can’t rid myself of this idea, this instinct, however hard I try. So that’s an important reason for me believing in God. It’s what some philosophers call a basic belief.
(Photo: Scott Murray)
Faith and practice
But faith isn’t just belief. Practice always follows from true faith, in fact, they’re like the two sides of the same coin. You can’t have one without the other. It’s in the practice of faith or practising the believing that you find out the believing is true. But then I hear you say, But then what makes one faith/belief better than another? Isn’t that the truth of postmodernism, “Believe what you will? Not at all. Reality works according to very specific and refined temporal laws which come from God the Source of all things. If it wasn’t for these laws, there would be no meaning, no perception, nothing. We can acknowledge God and live with meaning or we can deny his existence and live ultimately meaningless lives. God revealed the true meaning of existence in Christ. The experience of Christ’s redemption and forgiveness is the final experience, the proof for me of God’s existence. But more of that later.
Sorry for being so long-winded again!
Yours,
Maol Ìosa
Lifestory 
Glad to see you’re rising to the challenge! I like what you say although of course for a sceptic or unbeliever it will raise as many questions again …. people can’t be reasoned into faith, sadly – but our own experience is something that nobody can argue with.
I totally agree that reason alone can’t lead to faith. Strangely, however, it can be a major obstacle to faith and can be a main driver in unbelief, as the progress of modern philosophy and its effects on Western society amply demonstrates.
Your quote that ‘This reality couldn’t have created itself ‘ is open to objection that it is a statement without proof.
Empty space……………. is no longer viewed as empty ( as I was taught years ago ) but teaming with virtual particles popping into and out of existence. It looks as if all the material in the Universe emanated from the big bang.
I still believe in God the ground of our being as described by Bishop John Robinson in his book ‘ Honest to God ‘. I believe in Christ within.
The comment ‘This reality couldn’t have created itself’, I gave under the heading of ‘Intuition’. Logical proof, or indeed scientific ‘proof’, is something else. I’m approaching the question of reality from the standpoint of Dooyeweerd’s reformational philosophy. I’ve tried to explain this philosophy in previous blogs (although I haven’t dealt with his treatment of time). It is totally at odds with Bishop John Robinson’s ‘ground of being’ theology. In fact, it’s a sophisticated rebuttal of such theologies and, as it so happens, the belief that science can explain the origin of reality. But Dooyeweerd’s insights can only be understood in the context of his philosophy as a whole. He doesn’t duck any issues, including the issue of Creation. Everything temporal is in and through Christ and ‘unto’ God who is ‘outside’ time, although he reveals himself in time in the old root of humanity, Adam, and in the new root, Christ, the Logos, who is the Alpha and Omega.
‘God the ground of our being’ has nothing to do with science explaining the origin of reality. Sadly I’ve not heard of Dooyeweerd or his philosophy.
The attributes of God, all loving, all powerful, all seeing are often not observed in reality……. eg Tsunami God doesn’t intervene to stop its cruel havoc..so he sees it coming but doesn’t use his powers to prevent death and destruction……. so he isn’t all loving. So the view of God as a smart character hidden somewhere or out there doesn’t wash with me.
Where I imagine Bishop John Robinson sees God is in the hands of doctors nurses and volunteers who rush to help victims even at great risk to themselves………….
This view is intellectually much more satisfactory.
The Sermon on the mount underlines my case. Many other references to God make it difficult to accept God as a smart person hidden from our eyes …………………God is love, God is a spirit,
Jesus was asked by a Disciple ‘show us the Father’ and he replied something like ‘ you’ve been with me all this time and you ask that daft question ‘………… in other words Jesus was the epitome of love, kindness, compassion all aspects of God.
I agree with a lot of what you say, especially in your last post regarding Jesus as being the ‘epitome of love, kindness and compassion’ and, as you say, these are all aspects of God. Also I accept that God is spirit although I also believe that God is hidden – he is not part of our sensible perceptions – except in as far as he reveals himself and his chief revelation was, and indeed is, in Jesus Christ. I suspect that I have a ‘higher’ view of Jesus Christ than you have, namely that Christ is the third person of the trinity and that reality was created in him and through him; that he was with God in eternity. He is God revealing himself to us in time, and the new root of humanity.
As regards suffering and the horrors of this world, I have said a lot about that already in blogs 1-30. I can only say that without the Fall in the human root of mankind, i.e. man’s rebellion and separation from God, the horrors of the world are quite inexplicable, if you imagine God to be all powerful, as you say. Dooyeweerd’s philosophical position explains better than any other philosophy I have read why there is suffering in the world. It also explains why Christ had to be the solution. God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself. A key fact is the resurrection. If a person believes that, he/she can see that God is not a God of the physical only, but interpenetrates, through Christ, all that Dooyeweerd calls the 15 aspects of reality, although they are also a unity. His view of the heart, the I, the self is also central to his philosophy.
Note: Although Dooyeweerd hasn’t entered ‘mainstream’ philosophy, various scholars have lauded him as being equal to or even surpassing Spinoza in the depth of his thinking.