Faith versus Reason?

When dealing with unbelievers one will usually hear, during the course of the conversation, something to the effect that they simply cannot accept this “faith” so blindly. They are “forced” to use their reason which, to them, rejects any and all aspects of faith. They often resort to stating that believers are blindly following a “faith.” They insist that faith and reason are not compatible. Are they not compatible? How does one respond to some of these charges?

 

Legislating Morality?

Often in the public square, religious people are told to keep quiet and get out of politics because … well, just because.  Some argue that the so-called religious right are attempting to legislate what they “see as immoral behavior so as to … keep[] them right with what [they] think God wants.”

Here are a few quotes from those who are outspoken in their positions with respect to conservative social policies, which dispel this rumor of wanting certain social policy positions simply because “God told them.”

 

Secular humanism/atheism is a religious belief. (Part III – Atheistic churches, camps and chaplains)

5) Atheistic churches, camps and chaplains 

a) Atheist churches 

Not only are two of the court cases cited earlier, Washington Ethical Society and the Fellowship of Humanity, examples of atheistic/secular groups identifying with religious churches, there are scores of others seeking to equate themselves as churches (in the religious sense). 

Several years ago, a couple of Brits, Sanderson Jones and Pippa Evans, brought their successful mega-church style of atheistic churches to America.  The “inaugural Sunday Assembly in Los Angeles attracted more than 400 attendees, all bound by their belief in non-belief.”  The hundreds who attended were treated to “more than an hour of rousing music, an inspirational sermon, a reading and some quiet reflection.”  It was like an old-fashioned Baptist revival as the “attendees stomped their feet, clapped their hands and cheered as Jones” entertained the congregants.[i] 

Secular humanism/atheism is a religious belief. (Part II – Court Cases)

4) Court Cases 

a) United States v. Kauten - 1943[i] 

Mathias claimed he was a conscientious objector and could not serve in the services.  The court granted the conscientious objector status to him because of his “religious conscience." The court concluded: "a conscientious objection to participation in any war under any circumstances... we think, may justly be regarded as a response of the individual to an inward mentor, call it conscience or God, that is for many persons at the present time the equivalent of what has always been thought a religious impulse.

Secular humanism/atheism is a religious belief. - (Part I – Humanist Manifestos)

While it is normally agreed that definitions have meaning and should attempt to actually convey something consistent that has not been the case in many instances.  (Fundamentalism comes to mind!)  The goal to have secular humanism identified as a religion has been waged by those who are secular humanists.  They are the ones who have insisted that they are indeed a religion.  So it is difficult to understand how, letting their own definitions of themselves be used as an attack upon traditional religionists.  Just for clarification here are a few points that are germane to this topic. 

Chex Mix Christianity

It appears more and more people are rejecting organized religion, preferring to pick and choose which parts of religion best suits their desires.  Instead of determining which is the most rational and logical, it appears easier for most people to "mix and match" whatever appeals to their emotional state of mind. This in effect adds to the religious confusion and divisiveness that some of those very people detest.  

Point of clarification: by effectively stating that "my personal views" are such and such... two very vital problems arise. The first is the fact that if one is free to "mix and match" religious beliefs every other person also has that freedom. As has been rightly observed by those same people, many things have been done in the name of religion that appears inhumane. But that is according to whose standards of belief?  Mine?  Yours?  Others?  

Can We Be Good Without God?

In December 1989 Atlantic On-line, had an article with this title. There are many people today, and it is a growing percentage, who believe that morality can be apart from God. This article delves into this expression of faith.    

Glenn Tinder, the author, goes into Enlightenment rationalism and states that it "has translated certain Christian values into secular terms and, in an age becoming increasingly secular, has given them political force." But he continues that it "is doubtful, however, that it could have created those values or that it can provide them with adequate metaphysical foundations."    

Even Robert Bork speaking of morality apart from religious underpinnings wrote: "That might seem to suggest that religion is unnecessary to morality, but the counter argument is that such people are living on the moral capital of prior religious generations." Even as the author stated, "customs and habits formed during Christian ages keep people from professing and acting on such" impulses as imagined by "the one Dostoevsky thought was bound to follow the denial of the God-man: ‘Everything is permitted.’"    

So even if one today professes a faith that morality can be apart from religion, they still have not answered where that morality came from in the first place; other than to borrow existing morality from religion. Tinder uses Nietzsche’s belief that "if Christian faith is spurned ... then Christian morality must also be spurned." Tinder continues: "We cannot give up the Christian God--and the transcendence given other names in other faiths- and go on as before. We must give up Christian morality too. If the God man is nothing more than an illusion, the same thing is true of the idea that every individual possesses incalculable worth."  Tinder does ask a pertinent question; "To what extent are we now living on moral savings accumulated over many centuries but no longer being replenished?"    

Without borrowing from the moral capital of prior religious generations, it appears difficult for the atheist/non-theist to find a reasonable framework for morality.

 

Can We Be Good Without God?

“NO LONGER A CHRISTIAN” - Is the only meaning to life to be found in the political?

“So I am no longer a christian but just a person who continues trying to follow the example of Christ.”  So wrote Karen Cobb.  In detailing her fall from Christianity, she wrote, “Some of us have come to our beliefs as a result of careful and prayerful study of the scriptures.”  It is quite evident that her knowledge of the Bible is sorely lacking. (Of course that is to be expected from those who seek to justify their beliefs from the Bible as opposed to those who seek to judge their beliefs by the Bible.)

Her totally tawdry tripe is an attempt at self-justification of her personal political beliefs. She seeks to use the Bible as justification for her personal political beliefs while at the same time condemns others who do exactly the same thing. If there is no standard by which Christianity can be judged, then there will be people exactly like Cobb and those she attacks.

The spread of syncretism within Christianity.

Merriam-Webster’s on-line dictionary defines syncretism as “the combination of different forms of belief or practice.”  There is no doubt that syncretism has occurred within the ranks of Christianity. 

Yes, syncretism has been occurring in “Christianity” for many, many years. It is probably true that it has always be syncretistic, in the sense that many, many people have sought to mix certain elements of Biblical Christianity with local pagan customs.  Yes, Christianity is adaptable to all cultures, and at all historical eras. Christianity is indeed “cross-cultural.”   Yes, it is a cause of great concern that more and more people are not content in Christianity and see the need to supplement their beliefs by going outside of Christianity. 

The Pledge Case

The Pledge Case 

A California attorney, “Michael Newdow, filed suit in March 2000 against the Elk Grove Unified School District.   Mr. Newdow sued for his daughter, who was enrolled in the Elk Grove public schools, as ‘next friend.’  He said the words ‘under God’ in the Pledge of Allegiance amounted to an unconstitutional establishment of religion and that, as such, the daily recitation of the Pledge with the offending words interfered with his right to inculcate his daughter with his religious beliefs.”[i] 

On “June 26, 2002 … the United Ninth States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled that the Pledge violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.”[ii]  The case was appealed to the United States Supreme Court which ruled Newdow did not have standing to file the suit.  The Ninth Circuit court ruling was reversed.  

There have been several other court cases involving the Pledge and the words “Under God” brought by Newdow and by others.[iii]  This battle over these two words will not go away.  It appears the battle lines are drawn and sides are being chosen by competing worldviews determined to remove or retain these two simple words in the Pledge of Allegiance.  

After being asked several times about my “Christian perspective” on this case I will attempt to delineate it in the next few pages.   

WHAT DOES THE BIBLE SAY ABOUT ALCOHOL?

What does the Bible say about alcohol?

 

I hesitate to “talk” about these so-called “grey areas” as it is always evident that the views I espouse are somehow deemed legalistic, intolerant, narrow-minded, and/or any other type of adjective that is usually tossed into the mix of dissenting opinions. Still, with a desire to “set the record straight” let me plod on.

Let me preface my remarks by stating emphatically that these are my personal views I have applied to my life, teach my children and those that God has brought into my ministry. I also am quick to point out that good, godly Christians do have different opinions.

There are, IMHO, sufficient Biblical reasons to refrain from alcohol. Let me briefly list them.

Book Review: The Secularization of the European Mind in the 19th Century, Owen Chadwick

     Believing that “knowledge of God when acted upon generated human well-being and progress,” British jurist Adam Lord Gifford in 1885 funded “the Gifford Lecture series [which] has been one of the foremost lecture series dealing with religion, science and philosophy.”[i]  The 1973-4 Gifford Lectures in Edinburgh featured Regius Professor of Modern History at Cambridge, Owen Chadwick, whose series “The Secularization of the European Mind” was turned into a book published in 1975 titled; The Secularization of the European Mind in the 19th Century.  Chadwick, who was “ordained to the diaconate and priesthood of the Church of England,”[ii] has “distinguished [himself] not only as a historian, but distinctive in being a Christian scholar.”[iii] 

     In the Introduction Chadwick poses two questions that form the outline of his book; “Was the process [of secularization] the result of new knowledge, or the result of a new development of society?”[iv]  Realizing the necessity of both social history and intellectual history and their impact upon the secularization process the book is partitioned into two parts; Part I: The Social Problem and Part II: The Intellectual Problem.  Because of the vastness of the subject Chadwick limited his study in space and time; the space being modern Europe and the time being the second half of the nineteenth century.[v] 
 

“The Illusion of Moral Neutrality”

Although this article appeared in First Things twenty-two years ago, it seems more pertinent in today’s environment than in 1993.  Is it possible to be morally neutral in today's society? Another word identified with moral neutrality is toleration. Is toleration morally neutral?  

J. Budziszewski in an article with the same title, The Illusion of Moral Neutrality, states that "there is no such thing as Neutrality." The very word "toleration" declares that one has already made a judgment call, because "to tolerate something is to put up with it even though we might be tempted to suppress it." Thorndike & Barnhart’s Dictionary, defines "tolerance" as "a willingness to be tolerant and patient toward people whose opinions or ways differ from one's own." By expressing a belief in tolerance one has of necessity determined an opinion or an act as wrong, but at the same time have also determined that the prohibition of that opinion or act would be a greater wrong.  

In a similar vein, intolerance manifests itself in two different ways. Budziszewski calls the first way "softheadedness", which is "an excess of indulgence - putting up with something we should suppress." He calls the other way "narrowmindedness", which is "a deficiency of indulgence - suppressing what we should put up with."