Overcoming the Conspiracy Against Christianity

Ideas matter. They matter because they shape how we understand the world in which we live. They matter because they motivate us to want to change or why we desire to keep things the same.

Dallas Willard made his living in a world of ideas. As a Christian philosopher he would routinely think through different ideas and how they could impact the larger society. His book, The Divine Conspiracy, is a masterful work provoking Christians to live their lives consistently with Christian ideals.

In one section, Willard underscores how powerful ideas are b quoting economic John Maynard-Keyes. Keyes states:

"…the ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back."

Willard then goes on to opine:

One could wish this were true only of economics and politics. But it is true of life in general. It is true of religion and education, of art and media. For life as a whole, Keynes's words apply: "I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas." Not immediately, as he acknowledges, but after a certain period of time. The ideas of people in current leadership positions are always those they took in during their youth. "But, soon or late, it is ideas, not vested interests, which are dangerous for good or evil."1

The power of mere ideas is a matter about which intellectuals commonly deceive themselves and, intentionally or not, also mislead the public. They constantly take in hand the most powerful factors in human life, ideas, and most importantly, ideas about what is good and right. And how they handle and live them thoroughly pervades our world in its every aspect.2

People love to believe in conspiracies. Whether it's the grassy knoll, a faked moon landing, or the CIA blowing up the World Trade Center, it's easy to think that evil acts can only be brought on by some powerful group hiding in a secret back room.

The truth of the matter is that the "conspirators" are those who teach in classrooms or make subtle claims in otherwise benign entertainment. They want to remake society into their particular view. That shouldn't surprise anyone. If a person believes their views are true, of course they would seek to persuade others to hold it as well. But it does mean that Christians should also be prepared to argue how those views are not true and have good reasons demonstrating the truth of Christianity.

If Christianity tells us the truth about good and evil, man and morality, and the nature of the world, then we must inject our ideas into the public sphere. It's the best way to thwart a culture of evil.

References

1. Willard, Dallas. The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1998. 5. Kindle Edition.
2. Willard, 1998. 5-6.

It's Crippling to Believe Only in Science

I've written several times on how today's culture holds an over-inflated view of science. Science is a great tool that helps us to learn about one very specific subset of knowledge: the mechanics behind the natural world. It cannot tell us about other crucial pieces such as what constitutes knowledge, what constitutes a meaningful relationship, or how to stop people from being evil. Given its limited scope, therefore, science is of a certain limited value.

This isn't to say the study of science is of no value or marginal value. Some of our gravest problems do come from mechanical interactions. Illness would be one example. But it is wrong to think that because one can claim "science says so" and therefore the discussion should end. With politically contentious and highly complex issues like how modern humanity may be affecting climate, a large degree of caution is warranted.

The fact is science doesn't always get it right. Thomas S. Kuhn explained scientific advancements do not come in a pattern of smooth upwards growth, but in a very herky-jerky set of fits and starts, as those holding to old paradigms are hesitant to give their particular views up. Even if there is a strong consensus of opinion on how some particular point, scientists are still people and people are capable of being wrong and being persuaded by others who are also wrong.

Here are just a few areas where claims based on accepted science were either rushed, fraudulent, or simply wrong:

• AETHER: Aether was believed to be an element permeating the universe. The view was held by a consensus of scientists for many centuries, including names such as Issac Newton, Thomas Young, Maxwell, and Lord Kelvin. In the 19th century, more and more scientists held to the theory of luminiferous aether as the all-encompassing medium through which waves of light traveled. So strongly was the theory held that published student references works would claim: "The cumulative evidence for thinking space filled with a ponderable medium of exceedingly minute density grows stronger every day."1
  
  However, the entire enterprise and the many, many well-thought explanations of how our universe works were completely overthrown after an 1887 experiment couldn't detect the aether2 and Einstein showed the medium wasn't necessary. It is now considered scientifically obsolete, however it took decades for the theory to be completely abandoned as the 1914 student reference work demonstrates.
  
• PILTDOWN MAN Palentologists in Britain announced Piltdown Man in1913 as a find of one of the "missing links" between ape and man. The general accepted it for years, but in 1953, Piltdown 'man' was exposed as a forgery. The skull was modern and the teeth on the ape's jaw had been filed down.3
  
• ACADEMIC FRAUD: The US National Institutes of Health investigatory panel found the immunologist Thereza Imanishi-Kari had fabricated data in a 1986 research paper authored with the Nobel prize winner David Baltimore. The findings claimed in the paper promised a breakthrough for genetic modification of the immune system.4
  
• N-RAYS: A French physicist, René Blondlot, claimed to have discovered a new type of radiation, shortly after Roentgen had discovered X-rays. American physicist Robert Wood, however, revealed that N-rays were little more than a delusion. Wood removed the prism from the N-ray detection device, without which the machine couldn't work.5

None of these events show that all of science is corrupted or questionable, but it does illustrate that science has no claim on being the only way to really know something. That's why anyone who says they only believe in "science" has crippled him or herself from the truth before they've even begun to search for it.

Evolutionist Stephen Jay Gould said "Scientists cannot claim higher insight into moral truth from any superior knowledge of the world's empirical constitution."6 I always take exception when in conversation an atheist will claim to "only believe in science."

References

1. Beach, Chandler Belden, Frank Morton McMurry, and Eleanor Atkinson. "Ether." The New Student's Reference Work: For Teachers, Students and Families. Vol. II. Chicago: F.E. Compton, 1914. Online. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_New_Student%27s_Reference_Work/Ether
2. "Michelson–Michelson–Morley ExperimentMorley Experiment." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 23 Nov. 2015. Web. 11 Jan. 2016. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelson%E2%80%93Morley_experiment.
3. "Piltdown Man." Natural History Museum. The Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London, n.d. Web. 11 Jan. 2016. http://www.nhm.ac.uk/our-science/departments-and-staff/library-and-archives/collections/piltdown-man.html.
4. Research Integrity Adjudications Panel ."Thereza Imanishi-Kari, Ph.D., DAB No. 1582 (1996)." Departmental Appeals Board, Department of Health and Human Services, 21 June 1996. Web. 11 Jan. 2016. http://www.hhs.gov/dab/decisions/dab1582.html.
5. Carroll, Robert Todd. The Skeptic's Dictionary: A Collection of Strange Beliefs, Amusing Deceptions, and Dangerous Delusions. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2003. 63. Print..
6. Gould, Stephen Jay. "Nonoverlapping Magisteria." Natural History 106 (March 1997): 16-22; Reprinted by The Unofficial Stephen Jay Gould Archive. 1998. Web. 11 Jan. 2016. http:

Critics of God Ignore the Biggest Part in the Problem of Evil

One point to consider when discussing the problem of evil is just how much evil infuses all of life. We tend to think of evil as something separate from us. A Hitler or a Pol Pot or a Kim Jong Un. Maybe evil is found in the latest serial killer or corporate pirate. But that's really thinking of the problem in a backwards kind of way. Because evil isn't confined to those names on a list produced in some office of the FBI or Interpol. Evil can be found in the grocery store when a person snatches a few grapes from the produce table. It can be seen on the highway in how drivers treat one another. Evil is everywhere.

In her essay "The Greatest Drama Ever Staged," Dorothy L. Sayers argues that this kind of evil is the type we do not want God to deal with immediately. In fact, we don't even count it as the problem of evil at all. She writes:

The problem of sin and evil is, as everybody knows, one which all religions have to face, especially those that postulate an all-good and all-powerful God. "If," we say readily, "God is holy and omnipotent, He would interfere and stop all this kind of thing"—meaning by "this kind of thing" wars, persecutions, cruelties, Hitlerism, Bolshevism, or whatever large issue happens to be distressing our minds at the time. But let us be quite sure that we have really considered the problem in all its aspects.

"Why doesn't God smite this dictator dead?" is a question a little remote from us. Why, madam, did He not strike you dumb and imbecile before you uttered that baseless and unkind slander the day before yesterday? Or me, before I behaved with such cruel lack of consideration to that well-meaning friend? And why, sir, did He not cause your hand to rot off at the wrist before you signed your name to that dirty little bit of financial trickery?

You did not quite mean that? But why not? Your misdeeds and mine are none the less repellent because our opportunities for doing damage are less spectacular than those of some other people. Do you suggest that your doings and mine are too trivial for God to bother about? That cuts both ways; for, in that case, it would make precious little difference to His creation if He wiped us both out to-morrow.1

Sayers touches an appropriate nerve here, i think. For a holy God to vanquish evil, he is required to vanquish all evil. Every drop. Christianity holds that the death of Jesus on the cross paid the price to conquer evil and reconcile all mankind to himself. Now, God is in the process of preparing the world to work in a way where people can live in an evil-free environment. His allowance of evil simply reflects his love for his people. God's first move isn't to wipe out the person who slanders or the uncaring friend. It is to deal with the reality of the evil that we euphemistically label "being human." I can think of no other belief system—faith-based or non-faith based—that so clearly identifies evil in all its forms and still offers a workable solution to it.

References

Sayers, Dorothy L. The Greatest Drama Ever Staged. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1938. Online. http://www.gutenberg.ca/ebooks/sayers-greatest/sayers-greatest-00-h.html,br /> Images courtesy mob mob and licensed via the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0) License.

2015 Top Five Apologetics Podcast Topics

The Come Reason Podcast has 470 episodes that boast a total of over 250,000 downloads since its inception. We've covered a range of subject in 2015, but issues central to apologetics have taken the top slots. Witnessing to Jehovah's Witnesses, atheists, Mormons, the reliability of the Bible and the fact of the resurrection proved to be the most popular topics and I m glad to see they still draw a wide range of listeners. Here they are in reverse order. I hope you enjoy them.

1. Answering Objections to the Resurrection
2. How to Talk with Mormons
3. Darwinism's Fatal Flaw
4. Archaeology and the Bible
5. Witnessing to Jehovah's Witnesses

2015 Top Ten Apologetics Blog Posts

2015 has been an incredible year for articles and issues requiring Christians to think. From the Planned Parenthood video exposé to atheist memes to natural disasters, there were plenty of questions that needed answering and topics to discuss.

Below are the top ten most popular posts for 2015 from Come Reason's Apologetics Notes. As I began to publish daily, there was a five-fold increase in readership. Some of the articles are specific to news events of 2015, others are general questions about the Bible. All will hopefully help you in your pursuit of truth.

With no further adieu, here are the top ten apologetic posts of 2015, from #10 down to #1.

1. How Would Stephen Fry Answer His Own Challenge to God?
2. Planned Parenthood is Selling Body Parts. Here's What You Can Do
3. Why Would a Loving God Allow the Earthquake in Nepal?
4. Secularism isn't a Neutral Position
5. Why Would God Command Women to Marry Their Rapists?
6. Six Errors Jesus Mythicists Repeatedly Make
7. Responding to Atheist Critiques of Christian Hypocrisy
8. No, Christmas Is Not Based on a Pagan Holiday
9. What Were the Crusades? Busting Some Myths
10. How to Quickly Debunk the Horus-Jesus Myth

Apologetics is Foundational to the Christian Faith

Apologetics is the discipline of thoughtfully and carefully defending the Christian faith. It is not only a calling in the Bible, but a command to which all Christians are obligated. I understand that most Christians won't have the background or the knowledge to become faith defenders in the manner of a C.S. Lewis. Neither will most Christians ascend to the ranks of Billy Graham in terms of sharing their faith. Yet, just as we are all called to evangelize (Matt.28: 19-20), we are all called to defend our beliefs (1 Pet, 3:15.)

Today, as more and more people are skeptical of Christianity and who Jesus was, apologetics has become integral to evangelism efforts. Yet, while Bible-believing Christians may not all share their faith, they usually don't doubt the fact they are called to do so. The same isn't true for defending their faith. They simply don't see such tasks as important. They claim such a task is "just head knowledge" or "a side project, not a necessary part pf Christianity." Nothing could be further from the truth.

In an article entitled "Defending a Defense of the Faith," Dr. Craig Hazen offers several key reasons why such claims fail. The first is that defending the faith is simply part of the original fabric of Christianity, beginning with Jesus and his disciples. Hazen writes:

Perhaps there is no stronger argument that Jesus himself was an extraordinary source for the apologetic impulse in Christianity than the fact that his closest followers, those who so deeply desired to emulate their Master, were such ardent proponents of Jesus' ethos of demonstration. Indeed, Paul, John and Peter seemed almost obsessed with offering evidence, testimony and argument at every turn in order to establish the truth of the gospel message. The case for the apostolic support for the full range of apologetic activity is very well known and has been affirmed by scores of preeminent Christian scholars in the last fifty years. Anyone wishing to downplay the significance of the defense of the faith to the apostles and the early church is truly swimming upstream against an overwhelming current.1

Hazen goes on to list several passages showing how the New Testament writers reinforced the call to apologetics. (You can find a similar list here.) He then writes:

Even if Christ's closest followers had not given direct commands to engage in apologetic activities, they modeled those activities so frequently and unmistakably in Scripture that their actions amount to a clear exhortation for all Christians to go and do likewise. The Gospel writers themselves were carefully attuned to this. Luke, for instance, has an explicitly apologetic purpose in the construction of his Gospel—a special focus he lauys out in the prologue of his book. Here, he highlights eyewitness testimony, careful investigation and accurate reporting all with an eye toward his reader, Theophilus, to know "the certainty" of the things he had been taught (Lk 1:1-4).2

Hazen is absolutely correct. One of the clearest apologetic encounters in the Bible is Paul's engaging the Athenians at Mars Hill in Acts 17:22-31. I've previously demonstrated how scripture records apologetic engagements even by Jesus himself (see here, here, and here).

All of this simply shows that apologetics is foundational to Christianity.  Jesus used apologetics to preach the arrival of the Kingdom of God. The apostles used apologetics to evangelize the lost. We Christians today should follow that example and prepare to know how to give an answer for our hope to anyone who asks.

References

1. Hazen, Craig. "Defending the Defense of the Faith." To Everyone an Answer: A Case for the Christian Worldview: Essays in Honor of Norman L. Geisler." Francis Beckwith, William Lane. Craig, and J..P. Moreland, Eds. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2004. Print.39-40.
2. Hazen, 1999. 41.

Top Five Apologetics Blog Posts for November 2015

November proved that sometimes practical posts make a big splash. The top posts of the month include answering a popular meme that's been circulating around the Internet, looking into the claims of biblical inspiration by the New Testament authors, and how to better communicate your viewpoint by offering analogies in your witnessing efforts.

Here then are the top five blog posts for November.

1. Three Intractable Problems for Atheism
2. Why Would God Command Women to Marry Their Rapists?
3. Are Atheist Countries Really More Moral?
4. Did the New Testament Authors Know They Were Writing Scripture?
5. Here's a Tip: Use Analogies Cut to the Heart of Controversies

Defending Your Faith in the Classroom

Last week, I told you about someone who asked for help when his Sociology professor broached the subject of religion, but basically dismissed it as a fabrication. The student wrote:

Some notable points he brought up, which are straight from the Sociology textbook, is that all religion is "socially constructed" and that faith is "belief without scientific evidence." ...

He stated that religion is constantly evolving and falsely asserted that Christianity was the first to develop monotheism. His final statement was made near the end of the lecture that "we all need to exercise some level of spirituality in order to survive" since religion provides comfort in the case of tragedy.

How does one, especially as a student, respond to such claims? It's apparent the professor has already chosen where he stands concerning religion. When another spoke up during the lecture, it was clear all he wants to do is debate. As Christians, should we speak up or not cast our pearls before swine?

For the answer to the main charges, you can read my last article here. As to the question of engagement, let me say that I've received more and more of these kinds of questions in recent years. Sometimes, they even come in the form of a plea, where the Christian really wants to defend his or her faith but doesn't know how. There's a real conflict here. On one hand, we want to share the truth of the Gospel message with others and not let mischaracterizations about our faith remain unanswered. On the other, the student recognizes the professor holds the position of power, not only in terms of stature and who gets to speak in class, but ultimately because the prof assigns the final grade for the course.

First, Pick Your Battles

My first piece of advice to this student is to be thoughtful. Exchanges with those in authority need to be judicious and part of that is weighing what the reaction to an objection may be. Jesus told us, "Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves" (Matt 10:16, ESV) and that applies here. The professor is the "man with the microphone," which means he controls the conversation. That also means you probably won't be able to have a sustained argument in class, which is appropriate since that's really not what the class is for anyway.

We have a couple of good examples of how Christians faced such conditions in the New Testament. Peter and John faced the Jewish rulers. Paul was also brought before the Jewish High Council and later before Felix. In each of these cases, the Christians never tried to steamroll the questioning authority. Instead, they first waited until it was the appropriate time for them to speak. Notice that Peter and John don't respond until questioned by the elders (Acts 4:6). Paul waits five days until he is summoned and even then only speaks when the Roman governor Felix "nodded to him to speak" (Acts 24:1,10). So, it is important to have a good "feel" for both the prof and the teaching style of the class before trying to engage at all.

Clarify Through Questions

Next, in each instance they pointed to their own good conduct (Acts 4:8, 23:1, 24:12) and asked questions about exactly what the main issue was. This is so important that I want to emphasize it again. Questions are the primary way to open a conversation in a respectful and open manner. They can be hugely effective when engaging someone who is antagonistic to your point of view, as demonstrated here.

In the classroom especially, questions are expected. They allow you to not make assertions but ask for clarification which can serve to show a contradiction in the teacher's positions. For example, compare the two opening charges listed above. The prof claimed 1) religion is "socially constructed" and 2) faith is "belief without scientific evidence." The prof clearly mis-defined faith, as has been argued multiple times in the past. Leaving that aside, I would ask for clarification of his point. When the prof talks about religion, does he mean the various expressions people may produce in trying to reach out to the divine? I don't think it's controversial to recognize that the worship music of 21st century America will be colored by our current culture and be very different from the practices of a second century church in Antioch.

The question isn't how culture affects our stretch toward the divine, the question rally is whether God really exists and what is the most appropriate way to know how he has revealed himself. Feuerbach and Freud would say God isn't real, and I think this is also the professor's claim. If that is so, the next question should be "If scientific evidence is the standard for believing a claim, then what scientific evidence can be offered for holding that God does not exist, but is simply a socially constructed belief?"

The prof has alluded to the standard of science to determine truth value it seems to me. But there are a lot of things I believe that science has no bearing on. I believe I'm not in the Matrix, for example. I believe my memories for the most part accurately represent what happened to me previously. I believe that when I see the color green I have the same experience as you do.

A Little is a Lot

Lastly, know when to be done. One or two key questions are usually enough to break the façade of assurance originally presented by the prof but not so much that the exchange begins to feel like a confrontation. Paul would wait for Felix to call him and they would then have conversations. But Paul didn't try to "eat the entire elephant" at once. Be patient and trust that God will provide the proper opportunities and the proper words for such times. Those are the marks of wisdom and gentleness, as Jesus commanded.

The Logical Incoherence of Arguing God is a Social Construct

Yesterday, I received a message from a Christian student who was frustrated at his professor's dismissal of religious belief as socially constructed. He writes:

Today in my Sociology class, we covered a very controversial topic--Religion. My professor explained to us that his goal was to be as objective as possible, but still, implemented his ideas into the lecture.

Some notable points he brought up, which are straight from the Sociology textbook, is that all religion is "socially constructed" and that faith is "belief without scientific evidence." He then brought up the Council of Nicea, concerning the nature of Christ, which reconciled the two ideas that Christ was both fully man and fully God, but attributed it to maintaining unity in the church. In short, we made this up in order to keep peace.

He stated that religion is constantly evolving and falsely asserted that Christianity was the first to develop monotheism. His final statement was made near the end of the lecture that "we all need to exercise some level of spirituality in order to survive" since religion provides comfort in the case of tragedy.

How does one, especially as a student, respond to such claims? It's apparent the professor has already chosen where he stands concerning religion. When another spoke up during the lecture, it was clear all he wants to do is debate. As Christians, should we speak up or not cast our pearls before swine?

There are really a couple of questions here. On Monday, I'll tackle how Christians should respond when placed in these difficult situations, but first I want to talk about some of the professor's claims, many of which are demonstrably false. The easiest one to dismiss is the one the student already recognized: that Christianity was the first to develop monotheism. Simply put, no one believes this! Judaism had monotheism down well before Jesus ministered on earth, a fact that is widely accepted by sociologists of all stripes. Either the prof misspoke, was misunderstood, or chose to ignore an accepted point of history on this.

Dealing with the "Socially-Constructed Religion" Charge

What about the larger point that religion is "socially constructed?" The charge isn't new. It was probably most famously made by the philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach in his The Essence of Christianity in 1841. There, Feuerbach lays out the argument that human beings will see and interpret their world to reflect their own nature. In other words, God doesn't really exist; he is an expression of understanding the world in human terms and is a super-human projected onto the world.1 Freud taught a similar concept, that the belief in God, salvation, and the resurrection was simply forms of wish-fulfillment to satiate the desires of humanity's frailty.2

Feuerbach's charge has been offered over the years as the trump card to explain the universality of belief in the divine. There's only one problem; it doesn't follow. Another philosopher named Eduard von Hartmann spotted the logical flaw in Feuerbach's argument and clearly dismantled it. Alister McGrath explains:

At the heart of Feuerbach's atheism is his belief that God is only a projected longing. Now it is certainly true that things do not exist because we desire them. But it does not follow from this that, because we desire something, it does not exist. Yet this is the logical structure of Feuerbach's analysis. Eduard von Hartmann pointed this out nearly a century ago, when he wrote: ‘it is perfectly true that nothing exists merely because we wish it, but it is not true that something cannot exist if we wish it. Feuerbach's entire critique of religion and the proof of his atheism, however, rest upon this single argument – a logical fallacy.'3

The thing von Hartmann realized is that people wish for all kinds of things. Snowboarders in California have been wishing for the drought to end so they can go snowboarding, for example. However, just because people wish for something doesn't mean the thing they wish for is untrue. If the meteorologists are right, California is in for a very wet winter this year! Similarly, whether or not people wish that God exists has no bearing on whether or not he does in fact exist. Those are two separate issues and von Hartmann rightly notes that Feuerbach, and Freud by extension, have staked their dismissal of God on fallacious reasoning. They're being illogical to hold to their position.

Nicaea Was Not About Making Nice

On the idea that Nicaea was held to reconcile the divinity and humanity of Jesus so that everyone could, to quote Rodney King, "just get along" is simply untrue. The concept of the Trinity predated Nicaea by some time. In fact, Tertullian used the word to describe God at least a century earlier. By 325, there were the Trinitarians who held to Jesus's equality with the Father and the Arians, who held that Jesus was divine but not in the same way as the Father. Both sides held to their views adamantly and Nicaea was called to discuss which view was correct.

The Council at Nicaea clarified the orthodox stance that most Christians already held, but it certainly didn't make everyone get along. The fight continued for another fifty years and got so heated that Pope Liberius who had supported the Nicaean Creed was exiled by the Arian Emperor Constantius II. He was then pressured to excommunicate the Trinitarian champion Saint Athanasius and ultimately even signed off on a creed that espoused Arianism and rejected Trinitiarianism!4 It wasn't until the Council of Constantinople in 381 AD that Arianism was definitively defeated and Trinitarianism was solidified as the orthodox position of the church. So, if the Trinity was invented at Nicaea to maintain unity in the church, it was an incredible failure!

As you can see, when one studies the history and the background of these claims, a much different picture of them emerges. I will address the thorny issue of how to engage in class discussion on these topics next time, but one thing you should consider is that the more you know about the history of your faith, the better prepared you can be when such discussions arise.

References

1. Feuerbach writes, "Religion is that conception of the nature of the world and of man which is essential to, i.e., identical with; a man's nature. But man does not stand above this his necessary conception; on the contrary, it stands above him; it animates, determines, governs him. The necessity of a proof, of a middle term to unite qualities with existence, the possibility of a doubt, is abolished. Only that which is apart from my own being is capable of being doubted by me. How then can I doubt of God, who is my being? To doubt of God is to doubt of myself." Feuerbach, Ludwig. The Essence of Christianity. London: Trubner, 1881. Print. 20.
2. Holt, Tim. "Sigmund Freud Religion as WishFulfilment." Philosophy of Religion.  Philosophy of Religion. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2015. http://www.philosophyofreligion.info/arguments-for-atheism/the-psychogenesis-of-religion/sigmund-freud-religion-as-wish-fulfilment/.
3. McGrath, Alister. "God as Wish Fulfilment?" Bethinking.org. UCCF: The Christian Unions, 12 May 2005. Web. 04 Dec. 2015. http://www.bethinking.org/does-god-exist/god-as-wish-fulfilment.
4. Pavao, Paul F. "Pope Liberius." Christian History for Everyman. Greatest Stories Ever Told. Paul Pavao, 2009. Web. 04 Dec. 2015. http://www.christian-history.org/pope-liberius.html.
Image courtesy Maciej Chojnacki and licensed via the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0) License.

Here's a Tip: Use Analogies Cut to the Heart of Controversies

It's difficult to discuss hot-button issues today. On certain topics, people hold positions which make communicating the underlying principles much more difficult. Take the conflict between same sex unions and the wedding photographers or cake bakers as an example. Because the conflict has been framed in terms of bigotry and discrimination, the question of whether the state has a right to enforce people to violate their consciousness or their beliefs can become lost. Rather than debating the principles of the freedom the act in a way consistent to one's own beliefs, the discussion usually gets mired in the rights of two people to marry whomever they wish, which is beside the point.

I had the opportunity to share breakfast this morning with Dr. Francis Beckwith, and he noted that in cases where the rhetoric overwhelms the discussion, it helps to draw upon analogies or thought experiments. If the analogy is drawn well, one can construct a similar situation that calls upon the same ideological parameters but offers a different circumstance, perhaps one in which the recipient isn't as emotionally invested.

Beckwith said he has effectively used this type of approach with his students or in conferences when talking about the question of a Christian photographer being compelled by the state to photograph a same sex wedding. As I mentioned, the whole topic of same sex unions has been beaten down with overheated rhetoric and it can really overshadow what is a different issue here—whether a person has a right to be faithful to his or her conscience. So, if I'm concerned about keeping the sanctity to make choices that are faithful to my own conscience, a good way to communicate that is to use a situation that removes the same sex marriage component completely but still displays the conflict.

A Beef About A Bris

One example he gave is to imagine a Jewish couple hiring a photographer to record their eight-day-old son's bris. The bris is a religious ceremony that includes the circumcision of the infant. It is deeply significant, especially to those holding to Jewish orthodoxy, and signals the addition of the child to the Jewish covenant and to the community. However, circumcision is actually pretty controversial these days, with organizations believing that the cutting of the child's foreskin amounts to genital mutilation and coupled with the fact that the child cannot give consent to such a procedure, it is immoral.1

In his thought experiment, Beckwith asks the listener to imagine that the photographer has some deeply held beliefs that circumcision is child abuse and mutilation and therefore he cannot on good conscience photograph the bris. Does he have the right to refuse this request? Given the central importance circumcision plays in the Jewish identity, is it bigotry on the part of the photographer to refuse this couple? What would you think if they sued him on grounds of discriminating against their Jewish heritage and forced him to take pictures of the bris? Would such a judgment be right in your eyes?

As you can see, this thought experiment puts the very issue of fidelity to one's moral beliefs at the center of the discussion. If the principle should be applied in a specific way in the circumcision case, we can then apply it in the same-sex union case.

Be Careful with Your Analogies

One note of caution you should keep in mind when offering an analogy in this way: the analogy must be as close as possible to the original situation. In both cases above, you will note that both marriage and the bris are identifying, major life events. For a segment of society both are steeped in religious meaning; marriage is a sacrament in the Roman Catholic Church and the bris is fundamental to the Jewish faith. Both are real modern-day issues with a diversity of sincerely held opinions. Even the photographer's job is the same. The only variable is the circumstance in which the photographer is being asked to violate his or her conscience. This makes the analogy particularly effective and it focuses the debate where it should be, on the issue at hand.

Analogies and thought experiments are useful tools in gaining understanding for abstract concepts wile dodging the emotional reactions that can accompany controversial topics. Sometimes, they don't form immediately. They may be developed and refined over time to increase their effectiveness. But their power to cut through much of the rhetoric and get to the central conflict makes those efforts more worthwhile.

References

1. Robbins, Martin. "Infant Male Circumcision Is Genital Mutilation." The Guardian. Guardian News and Media Limited, 6 Dec. 2011. Web. 19 Nov. 2015. http://www.theguardian.com/science/the-lay-scientist/2011/dec/06/1.

Three Examples of Leveraging Hollywood While Witnessing

Communicating Christian truths is difficult, especially in this day and age when the Christian worldview is foreign to more and more people. Because many today don't understand the necessity of holding true beliefs or how unspoken expectations can bias one's views, apologetics and evangelism become that much more challenging.

One way I like to get my point across is by using popular movies as common points of reference. Good filmmakers have a wonderful way of telling stories and getting the audience to all feel the same way about characters and unlike books, most people have watched blockbuster movies and are very familiar with them.

Below are three short videos I had the pleasure of shooting with Bobby Conway, the One Minute Apologist. Each uses a different film to tackle a different topic.  Watch all three to see how effective leveraging movies can be in your witness.  For more detail on this, you can listen to my podcast series "Using Hollywood Blockbusters to Share the Gospel."

Image courtesy  John Joh, aka Star5112 (Flickr) [CC BY-SA 2.0],

Deconstructing the "Atheist Nations are Better" Meme

Yesterday I wrote about a spate of memes on the Internet that assert countries with atheist majorities are faring better than those whose cultures reflect a religious majority. In that article, I distinguished that the concept of "better" is used pretty loosely, as suicides and the value of life itself seems to be much lower in Scandinavian counties offered as examples of secular states. Today, I'd like to approach some of the other problems with the assertion to provide a fuller response to those who would believe such hype.

Secularism is not Atheism

It must be mentioned at the outset that many of the memes out there are not accurate in their presentation of the facts. For example, the Iceland meme defines Iceland as an "Atheist majority population." According to the CIA World Factbook, the population of Iceland is actually "Evangelical Lutheran Church of Iceland (official) 73.8%, Roman Catholic 3.6%, Reykjavik Free Church 2.9%, Hafnarfjorour Free Church 2%, The Independent Congregation 1%, other religions 3.9% (includes Pentecostal and Asatru Association), none 5.6%, other or unspecified 7.2% (2015 est.)."1 Taking the Nones and the unspecified together, it means 12.8% of Iceland's nearly 332,000 citizens don't identify with any religious group.  That isn't even close to a majority.

The question changes if one makes a distinction between a secular culture and an atheist culture. Even sociologist Phil Zuckerman, from whose research most of these ideas were taken, tried to be a bit more careful in his definitions, defining an atheist as "someone who doesn't believe in God and/or finds the very concept of God meaningless or incoherent" and a secular person as "someone who is non-religious, irreligious, or generally uninterested in, indifferent to, or oblivious to religious beliefs, activities, and organizations."2 As Zuckerman rightly notes, there are a wide range of beliefs, self-identifications, and even overlapping views. So, while Iceland may have a population that is uninterested in religious beliefs (we don't know if that's the case as no statistics are provided in the meme), it cannot be claimed to be atheist.

Selective Sampling

In another article written for Psychology Today, Zuckerman claims "those democratic nations today that are the most secular, such as Scandinavia, Japan, Australia, the Netherlands, etc., are faring much better on nearly every single indicator of well-being imaginable than the most religious nations on earth today such as Colombia, Jamaica, El Salvador, Yemen, Malawi, Pakistan, the Philippines, etc."3 Interestingly, why did Zuckerman include the qualifier "democratic" in his assessment of secular nations but not of the religious ones? What about the human rights of the citizens of China or North Korea? Here, he doesn't say, but he does mention it in his other work. There, Zuckerman admits such nations "do miserably on various indicators of societal well-being" but he blames this on the dictatorships themselves.4 He may very well be right, but then what to do with including nations like Colombia and Yemen in the list above?

Also, while Zuckerman's article is written to counter what he says is a charge by "religious conservatives," the claim is too broad.  I don't claim that being religious or a belief in God is all one needs for a society to thrive. It is specifically Christian ethics and a society influenced by a Christian worldview that we must discuss.  Islamic nations have a whole host of other problems they must deal with.

In the next article, I focus specifically on the conclusion offered by Zuckerman that countries like the Scandinavian nations are faring better due to their secularism. For now, know that such claims rely more on assumption than fact.

References

1. "Iceland." CIA World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency, 28 Oct. 2015. Web. 03 Nov. 2015. https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ic.html.
2. Zuckerman, Phil. "Atheism, Secularity, and Well-Being: How the Findings of Social Science Counter Negative Stereotypes and Assumptions." Sociology Compass 3.6 (2009): 951. Web. 2 Nov. 2015.
3. Zuckerman, Phil. "Secular Societies Fare Better Than Religious Societies." Psychology Today. Sussex Publishers, LLC, 13 Oct. 2014. Web. 02 Nov. 2015. https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-secular-life/201410/secular-societies-fare-better-religious-societies.
4. Zuckerman, 2009.

Witnessing Tips: Identifying Logical Fallacies (video)

Christians can sometimes get intimidated when others throw out objections to the Gospel message. However, many times the objections offered are a result of bad reasoning or biased thinking.

In this short video clip, Lenny identifies several logical fallacies that are frequently volleyed against Christians and provides ways to show how to defeat flawed logic.

B.B. Warfield on Why Churches Need Apologetics

B.B. Warfield was one of the great theologians of the early 20th century. His writings are influential with many pastors even to this day. When Warfield was asked to write an introduction to a book of apologetics by Francis R. Beattie, he didn't take the standard route of providing a mini-book review. Instead, Warfield chose to answer a viewpoint within the church that had been growing in popularity, which is the idea that apologetics is an eccentric field of study, which is of little use to most Christians. Such a view was held by Warfield's peer Abraham Kuyper, as reflected in his Encyclopedia of Sacred Theology.

I offer this snippet from Warfield's introduction because it reflects the mindset of many churches even today. Though Christians are bearing the burden of greater and greater assaults against their beliefs and their worldview, a majority of church leaders are reticent to provide their congregation with any type of apologetics training. Warfield's words are a good reminder as to just how important apologetics is to the task of evangelism.

The fact is, despite the richness of our apologetical literature, Apologetics has been treated very much like a stepchild in the theological household. The encyclopaedists have seemed scarcely to know what to do with it. They have with difficulty been persuaded to allow it a place among the theological disciplines at all. And, when forced to recognize it, they have been very prone to thrust it away into some odd corner, where it could hide its diminished head behind the skirts of some of its more esteemed sisters.

This widespread misprision of Apologetics has been greatly fostered by the influence of two opposite (if they be indeed opposite) tendencies of thought, which have very deeply affected the thinking even of theologians who are in principle antagonistic to them. I mean Rationalism and Mysticism. To Rationalism, of course, Apologetics is an inanity; to Mysticism, an impertinence. Wherever, therefore, rationalistic presuppositions have intruded, there proportionately the validity of Apologetics has been questioned. Wherever mystical sentiment has seeped in, there the utility of Apologetics has been more or less distrusted.

…

It is easy, of course, to say that a Christian man must take his standpoint not above the Scriptures, but in the Scriptures. He very certainly must. But surely he must first have Scriptures, authenticated to him as such, before he can take his standpoint in them. It is equally easy to say that Christianity is attained, not by demonstrations, but by a new birth. Nothing could be more true. But neither could anything be more unjustified than the inferences that are drawn from this truth for the discrediting of Apologetics. It certainly is not in the power of all the demonstrations in the world to make a Christian. Paul may plant and Apollos water; it is God alone who gives the increase. But it does not seem to follow that Paul would as well, therefore, not plant, and Apollos as well not water. Faith is the gift of God; but it does not in the least follow that the faith that God gives is an irrational faith, that is, a faith without grounds in right reason. It is beyond all question only the prepared heart that can fitly respond to the "reasons"; but how can even a prepared heart respond, when there are no "reasons" to draw out its action? One might as well say that photography is independent of light, because no light can make an impression unless the plate is prepared to receive it. The Holy Spirit does not work a blind, an ungrounded faith in the heart. What is supplied by his creative energy in working faith is not a ready-made faith, rooted in nothing and clinging without reason to its object; nor yet new grounds of belief in the object presented; but just a new ability of the heart to respond to the grounds of faith, sufficient in themselves, already present to the understanding. We believe in Christ because it is rational to believe in him, not though it be irrational. Accordingly, our Reformed fathers always posited in the production of faith the presence of the "argumentum propter quod credo," as well as the "principium seu causa efficiens a quo ad credendum adducor." That is to say, for the birth of faith in the soul, it is just as essential that grounds of faith should be present to the mind as that the Giver of faith should act creatively upon the heart.1

References

1. Edgar, William; K. Scott Oliphint. Christian Apologetics Past and Present (Volume 2, From 1500): A Primary Source Reader. Wheaton, Il.: Crossway, 2011. Kindle Edition.395, 398-99.

Movies Can Make Your Witnessing Efforts Easier

Engaging people with the Gospel is tough, especially in today's post-Christian culture. People hold to a different worldview; they operate using different assumptions and different stating points, making it more difficult to agree about things like the existence of God, objective morality, and what counts as sin. If someone doesn't believe in such a thing as absolute right and wrong, it's pretty hard to convince them they are sinners in need of a savior!

In the abstract, it's easy for moral relativists to deny absolute moral values and duties. When pressed, they will try to justify their position, even to the point of saying rape may be OK. Usually that type of reaction isn't honest, though. Because the discussion is happening in the abstract, the relativist is simply trying to save face and apply his or her pre-stated ethic consistently. Still, once the conversation has descended to that level, it's hard to get the other party to admit anything.

Try Using Film as Clear Examples

Most people are not taught to reason from a beliefs to its real-world implications. They separate these two concepts, which is why so many people feel so satisfied in their beliefs even though they may lead to contradictions. They simply don't see the connection and they therefore don't see the contradiction. One of the ways I've found that helps avoid this problem is to leverage popular movies as a common point of reference with those with whom I'm engaging.

Blockbuster motion pictures are one of the primary references that most people have in common. If the filmmakers have done their jobs, the audience will all have a similar experience understanding the story. We want Truman Burbank to discover he's being deceived. We recognize Neo as the hero and Cypher as a bad guy. We see the humans on the ship in WALL-E surrendering their full humanity for mere creature comforts. Film not only tells us a story, but it makes us feel a certain way and it makes us care for the characters. One has to only look at Anakin Skywalker's struggle with the Dark Side of the Force to see how film connects ideas and the ramification of those ideas.

The Apostle Paul Leveraged the Culture of His Day

The idea of drawing on the arts in witnessing is not a new one. In previous generations, books were the common cultural reference point and these could be used to quickly explain more abstruse ideas. The Apostle Paul modeled this kind of evangelism in Acts 17 when he began witnessing to the citizens of Athens. Given their Greek background and their worship of many gods, Paul would have a hard time communicating the Gospel message to them by using the Old Testament. Instead, Paul leveraged the popular poetry of the day to make his point. In Acts 17:28, he quotes two famous poets to show that there is one God to whom we are all accountable. He leads with the phrase "In him we live and move and have our being" which was penned by the 6th century BCE poet Epimenides in his Cretia:

They fashioned a tomb for thee, O holy and high one—
The Cretans, always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies!
But thou art not dead: thou livest and abidest forever,
For in thee we live and move and have our being. 1

In the same verse, Paul draws upon a line from the Phaenomena by Aratus, a poet who was popular at that time to demonstrate that all people owe their existence to God ("For we are indeed his offspring") and therefore should seek to finds out who God really is.

By leveraging the connections that people already have to films and characters, one can more quickly and easily make difficult ideas clearer. Because film is a visual medium, it also makes it more difficult to leave the concepts in the abstract. I offer these ideas a tools for you to try in your witnessing efforts. They don't work in every case, but they may speed up your discussion and give you a new and interesting way to engage with others. For more specific examples on how you can use film in your witnessing, check out my podcast series "Using Hollywood Blockbusters to Share the Gospel."

References

1. Hotchkiss, Mark A. Legend of the Unknown God. S.l.: Tate Pub & Enterprises Ll, 2014. Print. 170.
Image courtesy wearedc2009 Scholars [CC BY 2.0]

The Necessity of a Biblical Worldview (audio)

Recently, I was interviewed by Pastor Mike Spaulding of Soaring Eagle Radio on apologetics and how we are losing the Christian worldview, both in the church as well as in the greater culture. In this discussion, we discuss the need for apologetics in the church, how apologetics ministers to both believers and non-believers, how to answer questions nonbelievers offer, and ways you can grow in your own apologetics efforts. Listen to the recording below or click here to download the mp3 recording.

The Most Insidious Sin

Today I'm in North Carolina preparing to speak at a national apologetics conference. I'm staying at a hotel that was built in the 1980s as part of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker's empire. Of course, Jim Bakker is most famously remembered as one of the prominent televangelists who fell when his sexual sin was made public. The media ran with the story knowing the pubic loves a scandal, especially one where a minister—someone who is supposed to be a moral leader—has been caught in adultery.

Sexual failings are pretty much guaranteed to grab attention. Even in local churches, people who have fallen to sexual sin, be it adultery, homosexuality, or pregnancy outside of wedlock will cause people to talk. We tend to think sins like these are "major;" ones that carry a stigma unlike lying or addiction. Even as the culture becomes more and more sexually charged, sexual sins are held to almost a different standard. But there is a sin that is more problematic in the church than abusing sexual desire, one that no one points and whispers about: the sin of pride.

The Leaven of Puffing Up

How much do you think about the sin of pride? How do you guard against it? While there are ministries that offer filtering of pornography for your internet connection, what filters are there for one's pride? As an apologist, I know first-hand just how easy it is to fall into pride. Anyone in a position where he or she is teaching or leading others can almost effortlessly fall into this sin. As the Bakkers built their Heritage USA center, it should have been obvious that they were no longer doing ministry toward others but constructing a monument to themselves.

Pastors and apologists can fall into the same trap. They are trying to do God's work. They preach, they witness, and they defend the faith which is good and important work. TI truly is ministry. However, when one begins to believe the ministry is so important that they don‘t have time to sit and listen to people or their calling has a higher value than another's, they've begun to elevate not God's blessing upon them but their won self-worth.  That's why I believe pride is the most insidious of sins; it is the leaven that corrupts by puffing up an individual from the inside. It replaces one's reliance on God with a reliance on one's own ability.

The Bible warns against the sin of pride quite a bit. God tells Jeremiah, "Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth" (Jer. 9:23-24). James reminds us "God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble" (James 4:6), and Proverbs declares "Everyone who is arrogant in heart is an abomination to the Lord; be assured, he will not go unpunished." (Prov. 16:5).

Guarding Against Pride

Because it's so easy to fall into pride but so difficult to detect, each of us must be extra vigilant to guard against it. One way to do so is to have an accountability partner or partners with whom you meet on a regular basis. Perhaps this partner may be a spiritual leader, but it should be someone who can be completely honest with you. You may even benefit by choosing a partner that has different spiritual gifts, so they can provide a balanced perspective. Regardless, being able to ask someone to watch and keep you humble is a big step in protecting yourself and your ministry.

Prayer and daily devotions are another way to guard against pride. As we seek God in his word and in prayer, we should be confronted by how reliant we are on him for all that we are. One thing I always include in my daily devotions is a time of reflection on Jesus's decision to go to the cross. I am continually amazed at his determination and self-sacrifice, how "he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross" (Phil. 2:9). I remind myself of how the Father was willing to sacrifice his only son for me and my gifts are only a result of that sacrifice. How could I be proud in my strengths in the face of these amazing acts of selflessness? Thus any boasting I would do should be boasting on the cross and how his acts saved me.

In his book I Was Wrong, Jim Bakker said that it took prison for him to realize his excesses were anti-biblical:

Tragically, too late, I recognized that at PTL I had been doing just the opposite of Jesus' words by teaching people to fall in love with money. Jesus never equated His blessings with material things, but I had done just that. I had laid so much emphasis upon material things, I was subtly encouraging people to put their hearts into things, rather than into Jesus.1

Don't let the sin of pride go unguarded in your life. It shouldn't take prison to make you realize that Jesus is the center of not just your ministry but all ministries and each serve an important function in the body of Christ. Remember, God can accomplish his plans with or without your involvement. Guard against the leaven of pride.

References

1. Bakker, Jim. "I Was Wrong: Excerpt From Jim Bakker's Autobiographical Book." Spiritwatch. Spiritwatch Ministries, n.d. Web. 16 Oct. 2015. http://www.spiritwatch.org/firejbwrong.htm.
Image courtesy jim gifford Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 via Commons.

Believing in God is not Believing in Magic

"You believe in magic!" Such is the charge that has been leveled against me and all religious believers by atheists who see the very concept of the supernatural as out of bounds. However, Christians do not hold believe in magic at all. In fact, the very idea of magic is antithetical to Christian theology.

The error that these atheists make is one of equivocation. They mis-define magic to mean anything that is outside of a purely naturalist worldview. Of course, this is very wrong. As Dr. Ewin Yamauchi notes in his article "Magic in the Biblical World," even in Old Testament times when cultures existed that believed in magic and tried to practice it, there was a marked difference in understanding religion and magic. He explains:

There can be no doubt that both the Old Testament and the New Testament were born in environments permeated with magical beliefs and practices. It should come as no surprise to find Moses contesting with magicians in Egypt, later identified as Jannes and Jambres (2 Tim. 3:6-8), as magic was a dominant factor in Egyptian culture. For Egyptians to attain to an afterlife they had to provide themselves with magical incantations such, as the Pyramid Texts in the Old Kingdom, the Coffin Texts in the Middle Kingdom, and the Book of the dead in the New Kingdom. Magic was also a potent force in other contemporary cultures, such as that of the Hittites.
…

Though magic and religion are not mutually exclusive categories, they have generally been understood to represent two different attitudes. Put simply, in religion one prays to the gods; in magic one commands the gods. In this sense Egyptian religion was, as often as not, magical. The Egyptian magician threatened the gods by gods by virtue of his magical power.

This prime distinction between magic and religion, which is usually traced back to the pioneer anthropologists, E. B. Tylor and James Frazer, was originally noted by the Protestant Reformers. The element of 'coercion', 'control', or 'manipulation' has been regarded as an essential element of magic in many definitions. For example, H. H. Rowley notes:

The line between magic and religion is not always easy to define, but broadly we may say that wherever there is the belief that by a technique man can control God, or control events, or discover the future, we have magic.

According to William Howells, an anthropologist, 'magic can compel things to happen, whereas prayer to a gad can only attempt to persuade. The psychologist Walter Houston Clark declares, 'Typical of the magical attitude is the idea that man may coerce or strongly influence God by adherence to proper rituals or imprecations'.

The anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski further argues that religion deals with ultimate issues, whereas magic focuses on the immediate concerns: 'While the underlying idea and aim is always clear, straightforward, and definite, in the religious ceremony there is no purpose directed toward a subsequent event.1

References

1. Yamauchi, Edwin M. "Magic in the Biblical World," Tyndale Bulletin 34 (1983): 169, 175-176.
Image courtesy Sean McGrath [CC BY 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Why "Many Ways to God" Makes No Sense

Oprah had a captive audience as she spoke on faith and belief. Referencing the book Ishmael by Daniel Quinn she states "One of the mistakes that human beings make is that there is only one way to live, and that we don't accept that there are diverse ways of being in the world. There are millions of ways of being a human being and many paths to what you call God…"

I'm certain that many in the studio audience as well as at home agreed with her. The idea that the Christian faith could be the exclusive path to God usually spurs discomfort on the part of people who hear it explained that way. They don't like the idea of only one way and their immediate reaction is to think the Christian who holds to exclusivity is being biased in his or her own favor. But is this so? Let's take a look at a few reasons why people believe in Oprah's understanding of multiple paths to God and see if they make sense.

Exclusivity is Bigoted

In the Oprah quote above, you can immediately see how the television host reacts to the audience member who stated there is only one way to God. She called it a mistake and she tied the idea of communing with God to the diversity of human living on the globe. Many others I've spoken to have similarly challenged me, claiming that I was being bigoted by proposing my way as the only way to God. This concept has become even more prominent as we strive to become a more diverse and multicultural society.

Yet multiculturalism in and of itself tells us nothing about the truth value of any belief. For example, different belief systems vary greatly in how they understand even the fundamental aspects of who God is. Theraveda Buddhism doesn't hold to any kind of personal God at all while Judaism believes in a God who interacts with men. Islam is strictly monotheistic while Hinduism holds to a multiplicity of gods. How could these all be true?

All religions make exclusive claims about God. The fact that these claims exist tell us at least two things: not all religions can be right sine their claims about God stand in contradiction to one another and a claim of exclusivity does not automatically disqualify any belief from being right, lest they all be disqualified. The last point is simply logical and we recognize it in other areas. A lot of people wish to have children, but there's only one way to create a child and that involves combining male and female reproductive cells and gestation inside a womb. The process is exclusive. Men cannot become pregnant, but because it is exclusive doesn't mean that it is incorrect.

An All-Loving God Would Be More Accepting than Me

The second objection offered against an exclusive way to God is that an all-loving God would be more willing to look past the faults and flaws of individuals and see the desire to please him as enough. Such a position emphasizes one aspect of God's character at the expense of another; it touts God's grace and forgiveness without taking into account God's justice and holiness. It is very common for people to believe that all God needs is a sincere belief and a level of basic morality to please him. Of course, what counts as basic morality is left out of the discussion. Certain traditional Hindus would see the practice of sati (throwing a dead man's wife on his funeral pyre so she will burn with him) as proper. The word "sati" (sometimes transliterated "suttee") even means "good wife".1 Saudi Muslims believe that it is immoral for women to not be cloaked in a veil or in any space with a man that isn't an immediate relation. I'm sure that Oprah would see these kinds of subjugations as immoral, so the assertion strikes me as question-begging.

How do you know which actions done ion sincerity are the ones that would please God? Should God be angry with those who inflict female genital mutilation upon young girls? Would a just God allow that to "slide"? Does a perfectly holy God allow ANY sin a free pass or do they all need to be dealt with so that justice may be fully realized? Interestingly, only Christianity offers the solution to God's absolute holiness, God's full justice, and God's loving grace in the atoning death of Jesus.

The idea of many paths to God sounds good to our 21st century ears, but such a position usually shows the person who asserts such hasn't truly thought through the position carefully. God is not only forgiving, but holy and just. Any path to God must take those attributes into account before it can be considered viable.

References

1. Doniger, Wendy. "Suttee | Hindu Custom." Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 08 Oct. 2015. http://www.britannica.com/topic/suttee.

We are More than Our Brains – The Reality of the Soul

Last week I was invited to a college campus to answer questions about Christianity and the Bible. The event was hosted by the local Christian club and several members of the Secular Student Alliance were in attendance to offer their best objections. It was a good interaction.

At one point, the discussion came to ideas about the soul. The secularists held that all our thoughts, feelings, ideas, and even our consciousness could be explained by pointing to electrical signals firing across specific neurons. They claimed they knew this and that science has allowed us to see this happening. Of course, it is easy to assert such things but when one examines the details of PET scans or MRI-type imaging, we find out that the science isn't so precise after all. Neuroscientists cannot see thoughts at all. As the secular neuroscientist Alva Nöe explains, "images produced by PET and fMRI are not in any straightforward way traces of the psychological or mental phenomena. Rather, they represent a conjecture or hypothesis about what we think is going on in the brains of subjects."1 (See his fuller explanation here.)

The Problem of Physical Explanations

Given that scientific instruments cannot give us any real window into the inner workings of thoughts, I told the students that we can know our consciousness is different than simple brain activity by thinking about it a bit more. First, physical attributes can always be explained using physical descriptors. For example, if I wish to talk about why an apple has the attribute of redness, I can talk about physical wavelengths of light being absorbed or reflected on the apple's skin. If I want to explain why a computer completes a specific task, I can talk about binary code, chains of ones and zeroes that will affect the mechanical apparatus attached to it. Physical attributes can be explained using physical terms.

However, thoughts and intentions are not like that. When one asks about an intention to lift one's arm, where does that come from? Sure, you can explain the lifting of the arm in bio-mechanical terms, even if it were possible to trace the beginning of the action to an initial signal sent from the brain. But where did that initial signal come from? Why does that signal appear when you wish to ask a question but not when someone asks for volunteers to clean the bathroom? Who materializes the desire or intent to raise an arm? The electrical stimulus doesn't just appear out of nowhere; if it did we'd be raising our arms as a happenstance, which would cause quite a bit of confusion in the classroom, I'm sure! Mental attributes cannot be explained in physical terms.

The Difference Between Physical and Meaningful Descriptions

A second point is that there is a difference between physical descriptions of thoughts or ideas and meaningful descriptions. To demonstrate this to the students in attendance, I walked up to the classroom whiteboard, picked up a marker and wrote "John Loves Mary." I then wrote next to the sentence a bunch of scribbly lines that had no real pattern to them. I then asked "Is there a difference between the first writing and the second?" The class grew a bit quiet. I continued, "If I were to explain each of these writings using the language of physical and chemical properties, the sentences would appear to be exactly the same. It's the same board, the same ink, and the same kind of chemical bond that keeps the ink applied. Let's assume there is the same number of straight lines to curved lines and the same amount of ink was used. There is no way you could physically describe the sentences to show the difference between the first and second sentence. But there is a real difference between the two: the first one conveys an idea and the second doesn't."

I think this is a big problem for those who would reduce our conscious behavior to simply neurons firing and brain chemistry. Anyone can see there is a fundamental distinction in the words "John loves Mary" as compared to a scribble. In fact, the key difference doesn't even require the whiteboard. I can say the statement, I can transmit it via Morse code, or I can simply think about the sentence without it ever being physically output at all. No matter the physical medium, the central aspect of the message is consistent and remains unchanged

The Secular Student Alliance students didn't seem swayed by my arguments, but they didn't have any answers, either. They couldn't explain why the first sentence is different from the second. They had no idea where intentions or will comes from. Given that their "proof" of MRI imaging is far from conclusive, I think they need to seriously examine the fact that human consciousness requires more than a physical system to work. Consciousness is not physical; it's part of the immaterial aspect of human beings. Consciousness resides in the soul.

References

1. Nöe, Alva Out of Our Heads: Why You Are Not Your Brain, and Other Lessons of Consciousness.
New York: Hill and Wang, 2009. 20.
Image courtesy Wellcome Images and licensed via Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0) license.