Lee's Walk

A New Year

2010-01-02T20:00:00.000-08:00

Last year was a fairly sparse year for my writing. I have a ton of notes on the books I've read as well as a number of half-finished essays, sermons, meandering thoughts on various subjects that might end up here. But, unfortunately, most of my writing was rather technical in nature ("press the 'add' button to add a new patient") which, while ultimately satisfying, drains me of my passion for other forms of writing, including fiction and essays.

First, I need to finish up my proof's of God's existence project, my journey through thinking about why I believe in God. In order for me to feel like I've completed this journey (at least for now), I plan on giving my attention to the following:

Moral Argument
My Critique of the Moral Argument
Some thoughts on popular "proofs" of God's existence from history, science, anthropology, ect.
Fideism vs Logical Positivism and Faith as a necessary component of a useful epistemology (not just of God's existence
Bibliographic essay (I've read a number of really good books on this subject over the past few years that have been very illuminating to my process and, of course, some real losers)
Some concluding remarks on my reasoned conclusion that God exists or why I am no longer an atheist

After I've finished this project, I'd like to tackle another big picture issue in philosophy: existentialism, especially as it relates Christianity and our current post-Modern Church conversation and experience. I've briefly encountered the topic here and there, but, because my interests have consistently returned to Early Modern thinkers, I've not had much of an opportunity to dig into this subject. Existentialism, based on what little I know about it, seems to come up from time to time in many sermons and Christian advice I've heard lately and, considering the misuse of the word Angst (must be said with a terrible American accent too hehe), I'd like to make sure I understand the movement. I'm always curious where our ideas come from. I'll probably need some time to get a reading list together before I even start writing anything, so don't hold your breath--I know I won't! hehe

Finally, I have a number of half-finished thoughts that may appear as blog posts with topics ranging from moral climate of Weimar Germany to what I see happening philosophically to our increasingly technologically-addicted world.

I'm looking forward to another year of exploring the world of ideas.

As my New Year's resolution, I plan to work on some destructive self-talk. For a long while now, I have beaten myself because I have always been told I have thought too much. Nuanced and complicated ideas intrigue me to no end, whether I find them sound or not. I have no problem too with ideas that run counter my own biases or are "scary" and I'm pretty good about setting aside my feelings to think through most anything. But, from an early age, I've been continually reminded that that's not a "good" way of dealing with the world and I've taken that message to heart to my detriment. As anyone that knows me, I am a pretty emotional guy but, this year, I hope to give myself permission to be the geek-nerd that I am made to be even more this year.

On Hate, Love and the Sinner

2009-01-23T21:26:00.000-08:00

He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee. ~ Fredrich Nietzsche, Chapter IV: Apophthegms and Interludes, #146.

Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted. Galatians 6:1

Over the past three to six months, I’ve become increasingly aware of the controversy surrounding the use of Mahatma Gandhi’s now hackneyed line, 'Hate the sin, love the sinner.' While, like most slogans, it seems rather sound and has a certain popular authoritative quality to it, I also get the feeling that something fallacious lurks below said authority and popularity. Is it used to obfuscate the true intentions of the user? I’ve honestly never really had a problem with this saying, so it struck me as odd the way certain people were so quick to dismiss it. Then again, I’ve never really thought about it either.

My first refuge for answers on this is the Bible. I attempted to approach the question from a New Testament perspective (as we Christians seem to be the most likely to bandy this phrase) in an open-minded way. I wondered if 'Hate the sin, but love the sinner' is a true Christian attitude reflected in the words and actions of Jesus and the New Testament writers.

I won't dwell on the Old Testament, because there is clearly a different ethic going on. God, as depicted in the Hebrew Scriptures, seems to have a rather heavy hand; there are long lists of things that He hates (Proverbs 6:17-19) but there are a few passages that seem analogous to Gandhi’s phrase. For example, Amos 5:14-15 which reads:

Seek good, not evil, that you may live. Then the LORD God Almighty will be with you, just as you say He is. Hate evil, love good; maintain justice in the courts. Perhaps the LORD God Almighty will have mercy on the remnant of Joseph.

While this is not exactly what Gandhi had in mind, I think, someone who esteems the Bible could make a case from the Old Testament that God wants us to hate sin but be just (love, perhaps?) the transgressor (and maybe, just maybe He won't squash you like a bug). It also seems that the case can be made that Old Testament God hates the sinner as well. Nonetheless, there are things that God clearly hates.

But for a Christian, we must seek the example of Jesus. How does the character and actions of Jesus guide us? Did Jesus hate sin, but love the sinner? Would this be a motto He might have lived by in His dealings with others? I think these questions are answered depending on how you see Jesus: Is He your Friend, Rabbi or Judge? There are, of course, other ways of thinking about Jesus’ character—rebel, healer, savior, for example—but the three categories I have chosen seem to bear most closely on this issue.

For some people, Jesus is a groovy dude who, were he alive today, would have the world’s record for the number of Facebook friends. He laughed, told jokes and horsed around with everyone He encountered. This version of Jesus is often summed up in another slogan (which probably invites some examination itself): 'He accepts me just as I am'. Jesus got into quite a bit of trouble for hanging out with sinners (man oh man, are tax collectors evil or what?). Jesus was available to anyone who seemed to really want to know God, despite how messed up their thinking or their lives were. This Jesus is the Jesus of love, compassion, camaraderie and forgiveness. His main emphasis was friendship and nonjudgmentalism. For people who see Jesus in this way, judging others is the highest form of antichristian behavior. They are likely to passionately quote Matthew 7:1 ('Judge not, that ye be not judged.') and likely will have the entire chapter committed to memory (Matthew 7). Likewise, a person who prefers to see Jesus in this nonjudgmental light will cite the example of Jesus and the adulteress (John 8:1-11) which has an interesting tag in final verse).

For others, Jesus is seen as the completely just judge. He is quick to right wrongs and punish sin. He is seen as the Temple cleanser and guardian of righteousness. He demands that we be morally outstanding, to live our lives even more true than the most religious of the religious. He cast judgment on people, places and things, even whole towns), proclaiming 'Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand' (Matt 4:17). For people who choose to see Jesus in this way, Mark’s (Mark 11: 15-17) account of Him cleansing the Temple of moneychangers shows that Jesus can become angry and, perhaps, hateful of sin.

Finally, Jesus is seen as a sort of ultra-wise Socratic mystic. He is their 'favorite philosopher'; He is Rabbi Yeshua. He was here to reveal the Truth and to be the Truth. His job was to enlighten. On moral issues, he was revolutionary, teaching a strict personal ethic combined with a nuanced philosophy of the ‘Kingdom of God’.

In my mind, this Jesus is more balanced (if still simplistic) and, therefore, probably the more helpful image in relation to this issue. Clearly, He teaches that we need repentance (Luke 5:32) but warns that we should not put burdens on others (Luke 11:46-47) that we ourselves cannot shoulder. He warns that we should love our enemies (Matt 5:43-48), but to take care to avoid rubbing shoulders with evil too much (Matt. 7:6).

When we say 'hate the sin, love the sinner', we need to be careful who we are judging here. The New Testament makes it clear that we should not judge those outside of the Church. I Cor. 5:12-13 asks: 'What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. 'Expel the wicked man from among you.'' We should cast out heretics (I’m using the word in a very technical sense) as 2 John 1:10 suggests; our primary focus as Christians is inward and upward therefore. We need to clean our own house before we judge the world (and we all know how much effort that takes). Jesus did not come to judge the world (that will be later), and, we Christians, being imitators of God, should do the same (2 cor 5:19-20, Eph 5:1-2). Love first (see I Cor 13), forgive (we are commanded to forgive and forgive and forgive, Matt 6:12, Matt 18:15-35), then finally turn the sinner from his ways (James 5:20).

When St. Paul says 'Hate what is evil; cling to what is good', I think it is clear that he is referring to a personal struggle.

Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves. Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Share with God's people who are in need. Practice hospitality.

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. (Romans 12:9-16)

Christianity is a relationship with God and a radically ethical lifestyle (see Matt 5:20 for example). Both of these aspects are difficult (don’t I know it!) but having a 'Christian' lifestyle is what provides evidence to the outside world that our relationship is true. Jesus saved us to be better people, to be better citizens, neighbors, and friends, not to harp on others’ sins and make their lives more miserable. First see to the sins in your own life, then we can talk about the moral failings in your neighbor’s life (Matthew 7:3).

That is certainly not to say that we ignore the evils around us. There are evils that people do that should not be ignored. Where evil exists, it should be despised and combated, for I think that is also a Christian duty. Tolerance, in this sense, should not be our standard. As St. Augustine said,

Any and every unrighteous man must be the object of our hatred in respect of his unrighteousness and the object of our love in respect of his humanity; that by reproving the fault in him which rightly earns our hatred, we may liberate that in him which rightly earns our love, that is to say the human nature itself, and set right every fault in it.

We are, indeed, required to work toward removing sin in others’ life and in the world in general (Jude 1:22-23), but that must be tempered with the fact that we are not God, whatever God we attempt to imitate.

Following a Jesus who is the Judge may give intolerant and militant Christians 'permission' to go on elaborate and hurtful crusades against a particular sin or sins. The monster I pursue with such passion may spawn other monsters in my soul.

While, seeing Jesus as merely a Friend also has it's dangers. Those who focus too much on these aspects of Jesus may find that they begin to become more open to moral lapses. The abyss will open up to them, beckoning them toward lukewarmness, making excuses for sin in others and in themselves.

While we may be better served with a slogan more along the lines of ‘hate the sin in me, love all sinners as brothers and sisters’, in the end, I do think the phrase ‘Hate the sin, love the sinner’ has a certain utility to it. But it cannot be used to justify our own personal crusades against ‘unrighteousness’. We cannot attack the sin outside before we attack it on the inside.

Stage Fright

2009-01-11T16:19:00.000-08:00

I’ve been playing music in front of people since 1988 and I can’t remember a single moment of complete and utter stage fright. Don’t get me wrong, I screw up all the time. In fact, I clearly remember my first opportunity to play 'professionally' (I think we got free beer for our efforts that night). It was spring of 1988 and our band, The Pearldivers, had booked a gig in some tavern in downtown Portland. This was the sort of band who spend entire evenings going over one song, so I wasn’t unprepared to play. But nothing can get you ready to play in front of strangers. Needless to say, I kinda freaked out and had to stop playing for nearly the entire first verse.

But that was not true stage fright; that was just forgetting what I was supposed to be playing.

Earlier today, I was once again afforded the privilege to play in our church’s worship band. I’ve been doing that for almost 10 years now, so, in a lot of ways, it’s pretty routine. This morning we were playing 'Let God Arise' by Chris Tomlin and I was on bass. I wasn’t terribly sure how we were gonna play that little F-F-F-G lick and how I was going to swing back into it and messed up.

No biggy, like I say, I mess up all the time and recover pretty well.

What was incredible to me was that during the second service, I completely spaced it and began to freak. I couldn’t remember which of the four strings I was supposed to be on, much less where a G was. Maybe I needed to do it in another octave? Oh no, the lights are too dim; I can’t even see the music! What’s that!?! My hearing aid just died! EVERYOHNE’S LOOKING AT ME!

For nearly the entire song, I was flustered, but I troopered through and played . . . umm something.

I recovered pretty quickly though and the rest of the service was wonderful. I really felt connected to God through the music and through my fellow musicians (who always seem to do such a wonderful job!).

Long story short, I tend to see playing music at church much the way I see living life. We all have our parts to play. I'm a bass guitarist, which means to me just being there. I don't think most people really 'hear' the bass; it's just there giving support to the more 'interesting' bits. I like that feeling, I'm nothing special, but I can let other people shine.

But sometimes, I can get rather self-centered and let myself start to believe that my part in life is more important that other people's. (Probably why playing leadish licks makes me so nervous on stage.) For my part, the second I start to be something I'm not, something God has not made me to be, there is a momentary feeling of self-importance followed by me falling on my face. But if I stay in what God wants me to be (or pushes me to be!), then I have all the confidence I need.

Give the Gift of Friendship

2008-12-24T12:24:00.000-08:00

It's free.
It's fun.

So this year, I would encourage to find a geek and be their pal. Befriend a geek this year; we all need it!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Befriend a Geek from White October on Vimeo.

Information and the Teleological Argument

2008-12-22T21:31:00.000-08:00

Before I moved on to the Moral Argument for God's Existence, I was doing a little more reading and thinking about the Teleological Argument. Basically, the teleological argument says, we see design therefore there's a Designer. Nevertheless, how do we know we see design? What feature of a "machine" implies design? How does the blueprint for that machine play a part in these observations? Moreover, how does the concept of God connect with these “blueprints”?

Well, the simple answer is that "machines" have information associated with them. They are conceived immaterially and are birthed physically through a blueprint or plan that is expressed through some sort of language or code. Information is this code.

In English, the word information means to “give form” to something. It is not the thing ultimately formed, nor is it the medium that conveys formation. Information is the immaterial meaning that eventually has expression in the sensible world.

One researcher, Andrzej Chmielecki, claims that information really is just the ability to discriminate:

The fundamental feature of animate systems (which are all informational systems) is their ability to discriminate and select. From single cells to plants to animals and human beings the behavior of animate systems depends on what they can discriminate, be it the concentration of certain substances, or the magnitude of physical parameters like temperature, humidity, or shape. What counts here is thus some detected difference between things that can be distinguished by a system. "Difference" and "detection" are thus two key words in our enterprise of grasping what information is. Information is, roughly speaking, any detected difference . . . . .

And later:

Information is an abstract entity. It has no separate existence on its own, because no difference can exist save there are real states of affairs between which the difference holds, and which constitute its code.

I think this makes sense because the physical “blueprint” we usually call information (but isn’t), only comes about through an immaterial process (especially when we are looking at higher concepts such as art, love, morality, spirituality, ect.).

According to another researcher, Werner Gitt,* information equals the sum of the following:

Statistics: the number and kind of symbols used in the code.
Syntax: the permissible combination of symbols; the structural characteristics of the code.
Semantics: the sequential rules for the code which carries the actual meaning of the message.
Pragmatics: the sender's invitation to action; the intention of the sender.
Apobetics: the results, the consequences and outcome of the reception; the receiver's action predicated on the sender's intention.

Thus, information is a code made up of "freely willed" conventions and arbitrarily defined symbols designed to discriminate between states. There is no information without a code, and no code without an intelligent sender. Even if no "author" is physically present, you can still know that there was an author. It requires a material medium for storage and transmission but can only be generated from non-material sources--souls, consciousnesses, wills.# It cannot be generated from a material entities and, according to Gitt, is the basis for all program-directed technological and biological systems.

But how do we know that information is non-material? Gitt attempts to demonstrate this by imagining a sandy beach. On this beach, we take a stick and write out a meaningful English sentence. Then, we smooth it over with our foot and write another. The material in which the information was temporarily stored had not really changed. The sand's mass and energy had not changed; it's configuration changed, not it's material. The meaning in the code transcends (if I can use that word) the sum total of all of the silica, quartz and other materials found in the sand and is expressed in the arbitrarily-, but intelligently-, constructed code we call English. The meaningful English sentences, obviously intelligently designed and evolving (not to put too fine a point on it), is the insubstantial code. It is the active force that motivates structure, cohesion, discrimination and perception in the physical world. While it has no form in itself, it must reside in some kind media. Unfortunately, due to metonymic conventions, it is sometimes difficult to separate the media (the blueprint, speech, book, DNA) from the information it holds. For example, sounds (and their accompanying information, speech, music) are not stored on an MP3 file, rather they are merely causally connected to the 1’s and 0’s on the magnetic disk. In much the same, information is not on the medium.

Is it true that the material world cannot explain the non-material? Obviously, I'm not going to be able to elaborate on my belief that non-material entities exist here (for starters, I think that Kant's noumenal world, among other things, is generally correct), so for now I will just assume immaterial entities exist for sake of argument and try to elaborate on that at a later time. If non-material entities--such as minds, ideas, consciousness, spirits, God--exist, then we can should be able to see how they produce tangible results in the physical world. We have a thought (which, I argue, may have material components, but it is essentially immaterial) that is transferred into language, then becomes an impulse to do something. As this impulse is transferred, either through speech or action or set in some physical medium for future use, it now becomes able to form something in the physical world. If information is non-material and has a non-material origin, yet can be expressed in the material world (our English sentences written in the sand, for example), then it seems plausible that the ultimate creator of this code (God) exists.

Interestingly enough, this is exactly what the book of Genesis suggests that God did, through some kind of information stream (apparently, speech), when He created the world. In the New Testament, Jesus is identifies as the Word (logos, both speech and action). This is, perhaps, an apt description of what information is: arbitrary symbols that are designed to express, motivate or otherwise create or cause action in the material world. While I don’t believe Jesus was purely information (that seems rather absurd), it is clear from the Bible that before there was a material world, there was some sort of code in preparation for everything substantial. The author of this code is God.

For pantheists, this makes a lot of sense. God is, for them perhaps, the insubstantial code behind everything we see in the universe. From my point of view, this does not go far enough though because information is only an expression of the author’s intent. Therefore, there must be an author beyond, before and superior to the information itself; artificers are not the same as the artifact.

I’m not entirely sure that this line of argumentation is completely persuasive. I’ll have to give this some more thought, but information does, for myself, seem to play an important role in how I can properly apprehend the existence of God.

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* I first encountered Gitt's work at Answers in Genesis. AiG presents a lot ideas that are, frankly, interesting and supportive of my views in general, but also present some hastily constructed arguments that, to me, seem far fetched and not terribly defensible. Gitt, while controversial, raises some interesting points. I have ignored his major arguments about the validity of evolutionary theories, which--in all honesty--I don't completely understand yet and concentrated on his proofs for God's existence.

#Of course, animals and plants may produce information. It is probably a quantitative rather than qualitative difference between the information created by non-material entities (human souls, God) and reflexive, responsive information created by plants and animals; animals posses souls (nefesh) but human beings posses living souls (nefesh khaya) in the image of our Creator. Leave it to my cat-loving wife to destroy my carefully constructed argument; no wonder I'm so conflicted! hehe

All We are is Dust in the Wind . . .

2008-12-08T16:14:00.001-08:00

Not.

Pre-Game Coin Toss Makes Jacksonville Jaguars Realize Randomness Of Life

I laughed hard when I saw this again. And I think, in a way, it has finally brought me out of my funk. When I watched that video, I had my own little existential realization, even if the universe is completely meaningless, we still get to create our own meaning in life. I plan on getting out of my own locker room and making my own meaning.

Oh the absurdity of absurdity!

Bout of Doubt, Round 4,994,847

2008-11-18T09:24:00.000-08:00

So, my wife comes home last week and sees the complete mess strewn around the desk here, books splayed open, spine up, pages marked, scribbles of three Word documents, four Bibles all opened to the same passage and umpteen hundred Web pages open in my browser. For a brief moment, I feel like she's looking at me as if I were Ted Kaczynski hammering away at some old typewriter.

Perhaps, she's right.

She laughs and shakes her head, and we head out to dinner. We talk about the stock market, databases and computer games instead of what's really on my mind; we both know I need a break from my quest to discover The Truth . . . dun, dun, dun.

I had an entire journal entry written up that talks about my current bout of doubt and how other people have reacted to it. Instead, I think I'll just show you where I'm trying to focus my mind. So, here's a short list of things I've been trying to meditate on:

But he must ask in faith without any doubting (wavering), for the one who doubts (wavers) is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. ~ James 1:6

The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. ~ II Corinthians 10:4,5. (This passage is very interesting in The Message as well)

Knowledge and doubt are inseparable to man. The sole alternative to 'knowledge-with-doubt' is no knowledge at all. Only God and certain madmen have no doubts. ~ Martin Luther

If ours is an examined faith, we should be unafraid to doubt. If doubt is eventually justified, we were believing what clearly was not worth believing. But if doubt is answered, our faith has grown stronger. It knows God more certainly and it can enjoy God more deeply. ~ C. S. Lewis

If I doubt, I exist. ~ St. Augustine

I believe; help my unbelief. ~ Mark 9:24

Anyone out there really suffer with doubt in their faith? How do you deal with it?

Evaluation of the Teleological Argument

2008-11-12T16:29:00.000-08:00

Look round the world; contemplate the whole and every part of it: You will find it to be nothing but one great machine, subdivided into an infinite number of lesser machines, which again admit of subdivisions to a degree beyond what human senses and faculties can trace and explain. ~David Hume

I honestly don’t know how anyone can not stand in awe of the natural world, our bodies, our cells, the very particles that make up . . . well, everything. I am continually blown away by the natural world, both in it’s beauty and complexity. (The other night I caught The History Channel’s exploration of the brain--“the most complex machine in the known universe”--and was completely dumbfounded; well, my brain thinking about my brain is dumbfounded!) Indeed, the brain makes even the most complicated human invention look like a randomly tumbled stone. But does this complexity, this wonderfully amazing “machinery” we call life, compel us to believe in a creator? Does the “design” we see in nature require a Designer?

As with the other arguments for God's existence, there are some problems. First, the basic premise of the argument seems to require us to believe that bodies, organs, solar systems, ecosystems and planets behave as if they were machines. Paley (and others) want to say that our eyes, our cells, the very planet we live on is analogous to a machine (a watch in this case). This analogy has never seemed necessarily credible as it seems to break down rather quickly. Watches have makers; that much is clear. They are not made by themselves, but animals, plants, even planets and solar systems are self-replicating or self-organizing through the laws of physics. (It might be argued that the physical laws implies a creator, but that only says that God created a set of rules not the universe itself.) It breaks down because we are comparing non-living with living, self-sustaining with non-self-sustaining. Watches do not reproduce. Animals do, cells do. All of the systems we see today that appear to evidence design were formed through the use of preexisting materials; God, at least the God of the Bible, is said to have made the universe without that benefit. Without a doubt, the universe is a wondrous and complex thing, but an analogous argument never entirely convincing.

Next, while I am completely amazed by nature and how it appears that the universe evidences design, I am also aware at how wasteful and, dare I use the word, evil it can be. For all the carefully designed elements of life, there are also many maladaptions that seem to defy the notion of a thoughtful, entirely moral Designer. The abject waste of young life is an observable fact; it's pretty clear that for every "fit" individual in nature, there is massive majority of "unfit" individuals die before they can reproduce. Such waste must be addressed if I am to make claims about the perfect design of the natural world.

By way of a partial rebuttal to this objection: Sin may be a powerful explanation, but, if so, then we might not be able to have our cake and eat it too, perhaps, forcing us to make the rather weak claim that God only designed the good parts of nature. I personally think evil can be explained sufficiently to at least address this issue enough to set it aside.

There may be an "unconscious purpose" that has produced the appearance of design in the world. I can imagine, given some vast stretch of time, that the standard evolutionary story could become plausible. If a thousand monkeys hammered on a thousand keyboards for a hundred million years, something approaching the genius of Shakespeare could appear on the page through pure chance. But chance is not the only active force in nature: there is gravity, there are chemical interactions, there is natural selection (known most commonly by the tautological slogan: "survival of the fittest"). To my way of thinking, the all-to-common example of the human eye may have plausibly evolved gradually from a simple light-sensitive organelle through successive modifications, down to the variety of eyes we see today in the animal world. This doesn't mean that something has purposed to create an eye. Rather, it could be that my eyes are more adaptive than my ancestors and their eyes were more adaptive than their ancestors, etc., until we reach back in time to find a mildly photosensitive skin cell on some sort of primitive and completely unknown creature.

Finally, I think it is quite possible that we may be fooled into thinking that there is actual design, when there really isn't. Our brains, being, as I say, pattern--whether there really is a pattern or not--recognition machines, may be attempting to overlay meaning and cohesion onto the complexity we see. We see the amazing fine-tuning required for life on this planet (well, perhaps, life anywhere in the vastness of space), and we are required to interpret this data. Our limited perspectives and psychology may trick us into a false apprehension of purpose where there really is no purpose at all.

As probably the strongest line of reasoning for God’s existence, the teleological argument leaves some interesting questions even if I find the counter-arguments lacking. Even if this complexity leads me to the acceptance of a Grand Designer, what kind of God does the argument imply?

If I take the teleological argument at face value, I think I may be justified in saying that God likes death, suffering and meaninglessness as much as He likes life, pleasure and meaningfulness. God simply sets out the plans and hopes that things will turn out for the best. If you believe that God is the grand and wonderful designer of the universe, then how does one explain Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), Yersinia pestis (bubonic plague) or cancer? How does one explain why all animals (including, under normal conditions, humans) have far more offspring than usually don't survive until maturity? How does one explain earthquakes and famines? To me, this is not particularly good system design. (I could be wrong, of course, and I do think, as I've said, that a good argument can be constructed to tell us why evil is a necessary thing, but that’s for another time.)

I have studied evolution and I’ve studied creationism (in all their various permutations) and I find that either explanation is equally plausible. Both, though, have problems, crippling problems if you ask me. These problems require some kind of leap of faith to overcome. For some, the problems associated with the teleological argument are insurmountable, but for myself they do not hold me back from a belief in God. Indeed, while this argument does not come close, in my mind, of proving God's existence, it certainly makes for a plausible case. It seems likely that if there was a God, we could see some sort of design in the world and I think we see just enough of that to make it likely that God exists.

From the Depths CD Release

2008-11-07T15:42:00.000-08:00

It looks like 'From the Depths: Songs of Hope and Healing' is compete and ready to be shipped. Over a year ago, the worship team at our church decided to put their considerable talents together to record music as a fundraiser for Jacob Wacker. Jacob was in a pretty serious accident last summer and barely survived. Today, he continues to struggle with paralysis and, I can only imagine, discouragement but he is planning on moving out on his own. Medical costs are, as you all know, nothing to sneeze at and he will continue to need support. While the CD's main focus has been as a fundraiser specifically for Jacob, it's been my hope that it would be appreciated by a wider audience.

You can get more info on the CD project, Jacob himself and even order the CD here: Jacob's Hope CD

PS. I started this post it looks like almost an entire year ago, but God has a way of moving things along in His own time.

Teleological Argument

2008-11-07T10:50:00.000-08:00

The next argument I would like to address in my continuing quest to figure out why Lee believes in God, is the Teleological arguemnt, a subargument of the cosomological argument. In short, the argument goes something like this:

All things designed have a designer.
The universe (from galaxies to single cells) evendence design.
Therefore, the universe has a designer (and that is God).

Today the argument is most often accociated with the English theologian William Paley, who presented the argument in his 1802 book Natural Theology. Paley suggests that the analogy—watch is to watchmaker what universe is to God—pooves that there is a designer, because the universe, the planet, our eyes, even the very cells of our bodies exhibit positive signs of being designed. They are so dazzlingly complicated that they must have been intentionally created. Even if one had no real idea what the purpose of a particular part of the world, we reconginze the difference between an erroded stone and the complex mechinism of watch. In short, as A. C. Ewing demonstrates in the following passage, we are allowed to attribute design when we see complexity:

Suppose we saw pebbles on the shore arranged in such a way as to make an elaborater machine. It is theoretically possible to they might have come to occupy such positions by mere chance, but it is fantastically unlikely , and we should feel no heistation in jumping to the conclusion that they had been thus depositinted not by the tide by some intellegent agent. Yet the body of the simplest living creature is a more complex machine than the most complext ever devised by a human engineer.

Systems in nature, it is argued, appear to be not unlike machines built by human beings. Therefore, there is a Great Designer.

To avoid the weaknesses of an analogy (analogies always seem to break down, don’t they?), two supporting theories have gained groundin recent years: irreducible complexity and fine-tuning.

Since the mid-1990’s the teleological argument has been repackaged by supporters of Intelligent Design into what is known as irreducible complexity. First fully articulated by Michael J. Behe, irreducable complexity is

a single system composed of several well-matched, interacting parts that contribute to the basic funtion, wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning. An irreducibly complext system cannot be produced directly (that is, by continuosly improving the initial function, which continues to work by the same mechanism) by slight, successive modifications of a precursor system, because any precusor to an irreducibly complext system that is missing a part is by definition nonfuctional.

Even in the highly unlikely event that a complex system (say an eye or bacterial phygelum) came into existance by random, grandual and undesigned means, as complexity increases the less likely that it came to be without the benefit of a designer. Specifically, Behe is speaking about biological systems, but as early as the mid-1960’s larger systems, including the universe itself has been looked at in a similar light.

The other modern extension of the teleological argument has come from astronomy and astrobiology, namely the idea that the universe is finely tuned to support life and, for some, human life in particular. Astronomers had now identified more than 150 finely tuned characteristics. In the 1960s the odds that any given planet in the universe would possess the necessary conditions to support intelligent physical life were shown to be less than one in ten thousand. By 2001 those odds dramatically shrank to less than one in a number so large it might as well be infinity (10 to the 173th power). In other words, if the universe were actually different in any of those 150 ways, we wouldn’t be here at all.

For many observers, this would only be possible if the universe was indeed created to support life. And the creator of the universe is none other than God.

It's Been Fine to Have a Chance to Hang Around

2008-11-04T11:28:00.000-08:00

Today, I begin my 43rd year on this lovely little planet. Which means, I’ve lived through 15,706 days (including 11 extra leap years days). About a third of that time was taken up in sleep, so I’ve been only been awake for about 27 or 28 years. Probably a bit less if I factor in sick time, recovery from surgeries, and my increasingly frequent late afternoon naps. I have no idea how many years of my waking life I’ve wasted watching TV and I’ll never get back the time I spent reading “Thus Spoke Zarathustra”. At any rate, I’ve always thought of birthdays as a great excuse to slow down and think about my life, to contemplate everything that has made me me.

I remember listening to "Poems, Prayers and Promises" by John Denver when I was growing up and thinking that it was a very sweet song, but it has only been since I've been married that I've really begun to appreciate it. I looked it up on YouTube the other day and was fondly impressed. I really like this version, because I've never sat around a fire passing a pipe. *grins*

Happy Halloween

2008-10-31T06:30:00.000-07:00

This year will be rather subdued compared to other years. I didn’t really do much decorating. In fact, I only yesterday decided to bring down some of my props and set up a little display out in the back yard. I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to set them up even if we don't plan on being around tonight. So this is tucked away in a corner of my backyard (for those of you who've been back there, please note the huge new two-story house in the far background that was shoved into my neighbor's backyard . . . why in the world they thought that was a good idea, I have no idea.)

We’re planning on being out tonight (over at our church’s “Halloween Extravaganza”) so I didn’t feel like making a to-do for a dark and candy-less house.

I’ll just leave y'all with some thoughts on Halloween and ghosties from last year:

Have a safe and enjoyable Halloween!

On Being a 'Thoughtful' Christian

2008-10-21T20:50:00.000-07:00

I started writing about my Christianity a couple of years ago while in the middle of a crippling bout of depression. My councilor wanted me to double check some of my assumptions, history and associations I had to see if anything in Christian life, either due to faulty thinking or unhealthy habit, may be contributing to those dark thoughts. What follows is the concluding remarks from my 'book' on how I became a Christian.

Rightly or wrongly, I, probably, will always be a little suspicious of people who have been Christians their whole life. They were born Christian and will die Christian. I wonder, hopefully not too cynically, whether they have actually made a choice to become a Christian or was that simply the default setting, as it were? Did they ever come to a point when they made Christianity their own? Have they ever really had to struggle with the difficulties involved in accepting the Bible the way I have? Have they ever been “bad” enough to realize what they’ve been saved from? Do they ever actually philosophize about their faith or is it a purely reflexive worldview? Granted, this suspicion may, in some part, be born out of a sense of envy; I wish sometimes that I didn’t have to struggle as much as I do with my faith. I wish it was as easy as some Christians seem to want me to believe, especially when I so often feel like a weird space alien where ever I go.

Dr. Brian Leftow, professor of philosophy at Forham University, says “I am a philosopher because I am Christian.”[1] I suspect for many modern people that makes little or no sense, but to me, I could never see it any other way. This claim, of course, is a problem for both the theologian and the philosopher. Philosophers tend to think religion isn’t worth the trouble, and theologians tend to think philosophy is more trouble than it’s worth. Philosophy is an act of the mind and will, which is often seen as unreliable “fleshly wisdom” by the religious. Religion, on the other hand, is seen as too subjective to be rationally examined by the philosopher. Both sides, though, are equally guilty of calling out the Thought Police. In Christian circles, it is quite alright to think and question, as long as you think correctly and quickly accept the right answers to your questions, and, in philosophic circles, is quite alright to be Christian as long as your faith does not contaminate your intellect and interfere with your quest for the “truth”. Both sides eye each other with suspicion and both sides too often take their point to an absurd extreme.

I seem to be reasonably well suited to live with uncertainty. I have always been fairly pessimistic about the world, people, the future, but I have always been able to navigate the tensions between my Christian faith and the rigors of reason in an almost aloof sort of way even as faith and reason seem to be polar opposites.[2] For example:

Faith is stable, eternal. While reason is always tentative, speculative, probing.
Christianity is orthodoxy. Reason requires testing new ideas; it requires avoiding the crowd (Kierkegaard) or herd (Nietzsche) mentality and anything that interferes with sober thinking (Marx).
Faith is seen as the opposite of reason. Faith is the evidence of things unseen, while reason requires evidence and argument. Faith is subjective; reason is objective.
Intellectual pursuits are often seen as unimportant in the light of God’s eternity.
Intellectuals are seen (often rightly) as the enemy of the Church.

It is sometimes difficult to maintain a sense of worth when you “sit on the fence” the way that I do. While Church and Academia so often stand in open hostility, the world at large generally isn’t much help either to the self image of a philosophically minded person. Popular culture is extremely pragmatic; it wants to know how to get something done. Being a “thoughtful” Christian doesn’t usually produce anything of practical use. The education we all receive in school is extremely utilitarian; you need to learn enough to get a job. Thought life is not necessarily entertaining, quick or upwardly mobile. So, my questions are generally kept to myself. I have to pick and choose my battles, and make sense of all this religion-talk as well as I can away from the prying eyes of the Church, Academia and the world at large.

My questioning is sometimes more accepted in secular circles, though. In the Church, I often am met with offended stares if I openly raise questions or present opposing viewpoints. (Though I think in some circles this is becoming less of an issue.) I’ve been told by very well meaning Christians, that my methods are completely wrong. That I just need to stop questioning and “surrender to Jesus”. OK, so how should I do that, I ask. The answer usually is something like: just read the Bible and all your questions will be answered.

This solution to the problem is, for me, entirely insufficient.

While obviously I believe the Bible is the “Word of God”, I still struggle with some of the same old questions about its authenticity, accuracy, legitimacy and its moral lessons. Some parts of the Bible are easy to grasp and accept. Others are not. If we are honest, we all have our favorite books, passages and verses in the Bible and (if we are being honest with ourselves, right?) we are guilty of completely ignoring certain passages in the Bible that are difficult to understand, or that the meaning is at odds with our current views. We act as if certain passages are divine commands for everyone and at all times, yet deliberately break others. We take verses and parts of verses out of context to fit our own needs. Indeed, whole religions and denominations have sprung up because of this tendency. For example, I seriously doubt the Mormon Church would be what it is today if John 10:16 (“And other sheep have I, which are not of this fold . . .”) did not exist.

That said, it should come as no surprise that I believe that this isn’t always a bad thing. Every human being is different, with different backgrounds, needs and desires, giftings and purposes. For myself, I will honestly say there are things about being a Christian (and being a Christian probably means, in the final analysis, believing what the Bible has to say) that are anything from mildly disagreeable to down-right offensive (rightly or wrongly, I’m still working that out). There are things also that seem to completely contradict what I think the rest of the Bible is saying about God. There are things in the Bible that I don’t understand and there are others that I flat out don’t agree with (at least as far as I understand them). And, I firmly believe, that’s OK with God. Our Christian-hood does not rest, in general, on our philosophical views, our ability to comfortably interpret key biblical passages or even our wants and desires. But I think we should recognize that certain passages are absolutely meant for us for a particular time and place in our lives. There are others that we simply won’t understand. Our lack of understanding may be due to any number of things, including pride, mistranslations, poor study and prayer habits, or God may be withholding understanding for a particular time. We may be resistant to abandon a “black and white” perspective to more fully understand the truth, such as when we tackle “loving the sinner yet hating the sin” or “consumer Christianity”. We may need to look at a variety of issues and Bible passages from radically different points of view that we may really understand them. In other words, the Bible is not accessible without interpretation and application. Sometimes, this requires others to highlight parts of the Bible that are meant for us at a particular time. This is why I spend so much time reading, not only the Bible but also, what people have to say about it. That means dealing with the, more often than it ever should be, evil and inefficient organization called The Church.

My feelings about religious organizations have not changed much since my atheist days. The people who comprise the Body of Christ continue to, on the one hand, disappoint and appall me, and, on the other, educate and inspire me. (That doesn’t surprise me though!) Where would I be without Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, Kant, Lewis, McGee, Swaggart and, despite the fact that I think he’s completely off his rocker, John Shelby Spong? Where would I be without Lucile [a woman I met just after becoming a Christian who really taught me alot about the Bible, prayer and Christian love], or that nameless librarian [who helped me to become a Christian by pointing me to a stack of really great books]? Where would I be without my pastors and friends at Greater Portland Bible Church? The most likely answer is a complete mess, or, just as likely, dead. Obviously, I now hold that the Church is a God-inspired organism, created as an instrument of salvation, authentic spirituality and physical healing, comfort and reconciliation on earth. But,

The parallel reality, however, is that at the same time the church is an institution which operates, consciously or not, like other human institutions. The primary goal of all institutions and subcultures is self-preservation. Preserving the faith is central to God’s plan for human history; preserving particular religious institutions is not. Do not expect those who run the institutions to be sensitive to the difference. God needs no particular person, church, denomination, creed, or organization to accomplish His purpose. He will make use of those, in all their diversity, who are ready to be used, but will leave to themselves those who labor for their own ends.

Nonetheless, questioning the institution is synonymous, for many, with attacking God—something not long to be tolerated. Supposedly, they are protecting God, an almost humorous notion if its consequences were not so hurtful. Apparently God is fragile, His feelings easily hurt, sort of like Mr. Suffleupagus on “Sesame Street” who feels sad and frustrated when people don’t believe he exists. Actually, they are protecting themselves, their view of the world, and their sense of security. The religious institution has given them meaning, a sense of purpose, and, in some cases, careers. Anyone perceived as a threat to these things is a threat indeed.">[3]

This tension between the needs of the earthly institution and the authentic Will of God is so often a difficult and narrow path (as all members of my church can attest to over the past couple years). On the one hand, we can begin to see that church is really all about our own individuality and start to demand that it tolerate anything we have a notion to complain about. On the other, it is tempting to circle the wagons and burn the heretics. The intellectually lazy notions of conformity so often squash the awesomely sublime reality of biblical unity. Authoritarian unanimity can be manufactured, measured and enforced, while biblical unity is a mystical phenomenon that transcends all outward identifiers. The true Church is a product of unity, not conformity. In my case, conformity actually did its best to destroy my chances of experiencing unity.

For me, the intellectual life is one of the major ways I combat uniformity and selfishness. It is also how I attempt to promote biblical freedom. More often than not, thoughtful consideration on a deeply philosophic level is what makes religion tolerable for me. It makes God seem more real to me. It helps me live a moral life, one pleasing to God. It roots me in the full meaning of Christian life, allowing me more fully grasp the awesome realities God may hide from those who may just skim through the Bible, or simply “do their time” Sunday morning. It helps me reconcile what I see with my eyes with what I see with my spirit. There really are bad reasons for being a Christian; hopefully, reason itself helps me to properly evaluate them for what they are. All in all, I could never be a “good Christian” unless I led a questioning and examined life.

Are there dangers of the so-called intellectual life? Of course. An over-examined life really isn't much better than an unexamined one. The Bible is full of warnings against overly intellectualizing the spiritual, of rationalizing our wants, excusing our sin and relying too heavily on our own thinking. These should be heeded. Thinking too much may cause all sorts of problems, such as:

Pride, we know the mind of God
Lording it over people, we are better than those who are not as intellectually curious.
Objectification of God.

If you think about it though, over-emphasizing any aspect of ourselves (mind, heart or body) will get you into trouble, but it may be more tempting for “thoughtful” Christians, like myself, to feel superior to “emotional” Christians or those who are always seem to be doing something (the Martha Syndrome, different hang-up, same sin). We can start to believe that a “simple” faith isn't really faith at all. Because we've “studied” and are “smarter” than those who seem to blindly accept and are so easily swept up by their emotions, we can easily start to believe that God has favored us. Worse still, we can begin to believe that our methods are somehow a particular blessing to God, a blessing that feeling and working can’t even begin to compare. We can even set ourselves up to be the very priests of Truth.

Sometimes this can go beyond simple pride when it turns into cancerous suspicion (something I myself must take steps to actively avoid). When someone talks of a miracle, revelation or some blessing from God, I often immediately wonder if it is really true. Is this person looking for some kind of undeserved attention? Are they making it up, or are they completely fooled by their unreliable emotions? There’s nothing wrong with a healthy dose of skepticism, but when it becomes reflexive and cynical, then we have problems, especially when we can help to destroy the fragile faith of others (or my own faith, let me tell you!). Of course, we sometimes find it difficult to realize that our own over-analysis can come off as arrogant or unintelligible to those who have a less cluttered (for lack of a better word) faith until we get smacked in the face with that fact. Sometimes, people like me put our faith in our ability to reason, rather that faith in the Living God, which, of course, defeats the whole project of Christianity.

The final point is probably much more insidious and difficult to correct than simple pride. Philosophy is, in the final analysis, the act of defining things. For all practical purposes, each of the four major branches of philosophy tries to “box up” a single word. Epistemology tries to define the word “knowledge”, ethics the word “good”, aesthetics the word “beauty” and metaphysics the word “real”. Theology, or the philosophy of religion, tries to tell us what the word “god” means, among other things. (True spirituality and devotion, on the other hand, is the act of trying to get “god” out of a box.) We might end up knowing a lot about God, but we only think about “god” as long as “it” is safely under a microscope. And, before long, we can entirely loose sight of the object of our study and begin an endless and sometimes pointlessly destructive obsession with the microscope itself. We loose sight of the fact that our theology, our world view, our philosophy, the handy box we put God in (the microscope) is only a tool. We wake up one day completely unable to tell the difference between the eternal God of the Universe and the divisive philosophies we hold so dearly. In trying so hard to understand Christianity, we can entirely miss the point of even being a Christian.

Does that mean we should just give up trying to understand God? God forbid. While, there may be a very thin line between thinking too much and thinking too little, I believe God created human beings complete with (or later grants us, I’m not sure which) a set of mental and spiritual tools for determining truth and (re?) discovering Him. (If not, then free will is a sham, right?) For me, that means always questioning, testing and having the courage to abandon ideas that I once held sacred. I will give up any untrue belief I have because I believe God still holds me to my first prayer. In order to do that though, I must always test whether I have become complacent in my thought life. Have I taken something for granted? Do my beliefs justify something impure in myself? Do my philosophies help others backslide?

And this approach has served me well from the very beginning. Through loneliness, joblessness, deaths, injuries, disappointments and suicidal thoughts, I have never encountered a new fact or perspective that has lead me to believe that my decision to become a Christian was ever in vain.

Granted, there have been times when I needed more than a little help. These are times when religion, that old self-absorbed emasculator of truth, actually fulfils the purpose for which it was created. If allowed to step in from time to time (in prudent doses, of course!), it allows one to see God in action in a concrete way and reinvigorate failing faith. For me, this is especially helpful when I don’t particularly feel like being a Christian. Other people who share my convictions can encourage and support me (and I them in turn, hopefully). These are other people who maybe, just maybe, know something I don’t, who have powerfully experienced the truth recently and can help me to reclaim that vision for myself again. So, the trick is to avoid having faith in my own mental abilities and rely on the help of other people, and, more importantly God Himself.

In the end, the “thoughtful life” is only a set of tools, not the solution itself.

As the years have passed along, I have become increasingly aware of the fact that these tools cause me to do a good deal of fence sitting. I know it and it quickly becomes apparent to anyone who gets to know me. I've been told it’s a bad thing; I've been told it’s a good thing. Perhaps, it’s really the fate of all people who live east of Eden. Some of us embrace it more than others. In the end, it probably just is. It will remain a source of constant torment for me while continually spurring me on toward the full and joyful knowledge of God. It’s just who I am and how I deal with the world.

[1] Morris, Thomas V., ed., God and the Philosophers: The Reconciliation of Faith and Reason, Oxford University Press, New York, 1994, p. 189.
[2] Williams, Clifford, The Life of the Mind: A Christian Perspective, Baker Academic, Michigan, 2002, pp. 61-70.
[3] Taylor, Daniel, The Myth of Certainty: The Reflective Christian & the Risk of Commitment, InterVarsity Press, Illinois, 1992, pp. 29-30.
[4] Deuteronomy 6:5, see Matthew 22:37.
[5] Ephesians 4:4-6.

Evaluation of the Argument from Contingency

2008-10-16T14:27:00.000-07:00

So what to make of the Argument from Contingency? Is it persuasive? Does it prove that God (or god) exists?

Let me first lay out the arguments again. First, here's Leibniz's version:

Every existing thing has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
The universe is an existing thing.
If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
Therefore, the explanation for the existence of the universe is God.

And Aquinas':

There is cause for everything; nothing can be the efficient cause of itself and everything must be caused by something.
Either the chain goes on forever or there is a first cause.
If there is no first cause then there will be no other causes or effects; the chain of causes can't go infinitely backward.
Therefore, a first cause exists (and this is God).

Without giving this much thought, these arguments seem reasonable to me. At least, I've never really thoroughly questioned them until recently. It seems rather obvious that every effect has a cause and that we could either trace those causes back through time. This could go on infinitely (that is the universe has no beginning) or to a specific first event and therefore to an uncaused cause. Furthermore, it seems reasonable to say that every thing in the universe contains within it one or more logical dependencies. That is to say that everything is made up of or depends on other things to constitute that thing or effect. A thing is either necessary (it exists because of itself) or it is dependent on something else. In the case of the universe itself, it may be that it is necessary by itself.

First, the most troubling problem with these arguments is that, as Hume points out in his An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (§XI), we can’t really say much about a particular cause other than what is necessary to produce the effect in question. The effect may actually be an arbitrary outcome not a necessary one. As we follow the chain of causes backward, as Aquinas would have us, we may wrongly attribute design (more on that later) to a particular outcome. When we toss dice, for example, we know what the cause is but the necessary effect (the number of pips on the top side of each die) is random, unguided and thus we only say that the dice were thrown, but we can say nothing about the individual craps player.

There is some skepticism on my part as to whether there is anything necessarily illogical about an infinite, eternal and non-contingent universe. In other words, what makes it impossible that there was no first cause? Just because our finite brains has difficulty accepting the idea of the infinite (which is only to be expected, no?), does that mean that the universe must be finite as well? But don't we encounter infinities all the time? (How many times have I screwed up a computer program because I failed to close my loops somehow, I don't really know. But then again, does that make me the First Cause of that infinite loop . . . .) It may be that there is nothing but the universe and that everything in it, including all causes and effects. Meaning, because we have only seen these causes, effects and dependencies within the universe, it may be that the universe itself is non-contingent. Having no way of apprehending the universe's contingency, we can not, with any measure of certainty, decide the matter.

Finally, on a related note, I think in some ways this argument fails because it really is a thinly disguised ontological argument. I think Kant would agree (see, if you dare, Transcendental Dialectic in Critique of Pure Reason) that in order to turn the idea of a First Cause into an actual fact the ontological argument must be invoked. What the Contingency argument may be doing is saying: "God is that thing that we conceive is holding the universe together." This doesn't prove God exists, rather it only gives us a name for that thing which, if our argument is true, started or is the necessary dependant for everything in the universe. Again, just because we have an idea (especially an a priori concept) of some being does not require us to accept its reality.

In the end, the best that can be said for these arguments is that they may prove that something exists, but that "God" is fairly impotent in today's world. The Uncaused Cause, if true, is merely the "inventor" of the universe and, as far as the argument goes, has only been idly watching the unimaginably complex chain of cause and effect since time began. Or, if Leibniz is correct, God is merely the extra-substantial necessary property of the universe, the "spiritual", super-small particle/energetic glue that binds all effects of energy and matter.

Faith and Confession

2008-10-12T10:14:00.000-07:00

This morning I missed church, so I watched a little “church” on TV. I’ve always enjoyed Pastor Fred Price of Ever Increasing Faith Ministries. I’ve not always agreed with him, but his sermons are always challenging, uplifting and reasonable. This morning, he was talking about how to increase our faith, an area I have always struggled with. For me, thinking is how I relate to God (as demonstrated by the inordinate amount of BS in this blog). I most strongly connect with my “faith” through rational means. This, of course, leads to all sorts of problems if I over-weight my time and energy in religious philosophy without taking the time to connect emotionally, practically and relationally.

The most striking thing about Pastor Price’s sermon today was a point about confession. “My faith,” he said, “will never rise above the level of my confession.” How true! For myself, I often have a real hard time believing the God of the Universe cares, much less loves, me. Though I tend not to dwell on my circumstances, I do not necessarily always believe what the Bible has to say about me and my relation to God. I am by nature too much of a skeptic and, as I’ve said elsewhere, I don’t always find doubt to be a necessary evil.

I need to remind myself of this, because faith, despite my unhealthy fixation with rational religion, is really the only thing that leads one to God and faith is only exercised by what we confess in faith.

The Argument from Contingency

2008-10-11T19:57:00.000-07:00

“It is self-evident that truth exist in general, but not self-evident to us that there exists a first Truth.” (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I, Q2, art. 3)

The Argument from Contingency is the probably the most popular and, perhaps, the oldest cosmological argument for God’s existence. While the Bible does not attempt to prove God exists (it assumes it), the argument can be found in the Bible itself, as typified by Psalm 19:1 which reads “The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament shows His handiwork.” The cosmological argument says in an oversimplified nutshell, “hey, look at the universe—something must have created it!” The argument from contingency says “even the universe depends on something for its existence and that something is God.”

Key to understanding this argument is the notion of contingency. Contingency is used in this argument in two distinct ways. One, contingency is used to denote an unknown state in the logical necessity of a given claim. A contingent claim is one that may be true, but there is nothing that forces us to accept it as truth. To say that a thing’s existence is contingent is to acknowledge that it need not exist at all or that its existence is merely possible. For example, it appears that human beings are contingent (that is, there’s no reason why we could not exist). Some truths depend on something else. This sentence depends on each word; each word depends on many letters. (For all you other database nerds out there, think functional dependencies between attributes in related tables.) Others do not in the same way that a triangle with three sides depends on nothing else. In fact, it appears that the entire universe is contingent because each element or property of a whole is required before we can say a thing exists.

But why was there a universe at all? Under what circumstances could we conceive that it not exist? Why, as Leibniz asks, is there something rather than nothing at all? There is a universe; that much is obvious but how do we explain its existence? The answer given by those who subscribe to the cosmological argument is that, because it appears that everything we can experience could not exist (that is, they are contingent and dependent on their various relationships), a necessary cause (as opposed to contingent one) must act in such a way to hold the universe as an existent whole.

The second, and perhaps more important, way in which contingency is used is more closely related to the idea of dependence. Specifically, any change is contingent (dependent) upon another. Things don’t simply change on their own, rather they come about because of something else. If one thing (the universe) is the creation of another, it is dependent (contingent) for its existence on that other. Things do not owe their own existence to themselves. Even if some things are eternal (suppose, for example, the sun or the universe itself), they do not owe their existence to their own nature. Their existence depends on, and is caused by, something else. That something is what we call God.

While almost every major philosopher throughout history has attempted to tackle this problem, the most oft-sited formulation for this argument comes from St. Thomas Aquinas (and a lesser extent Leibniz). Aquinas builds on St. Paul’s claim that “the hidden things of God can be clearly understood from the things He has made” (Rom. 1:20). He therefore argues that, if that were so, “we must be able to demonstrate that God exists from the things he has made, for the first step in understanding a thing is to know that it exists” (Summa Theologiae, I, Q2, art. 3). Aquinas claimed that, in order to know that God exists, we should be able to find God by tracing a linage effect to cause, infinitely backtracking. Each event, object or state is caused by something previous and each effect implies something about it’s cause. As we trace these implications backward, we see that, eventually, we must encounter some sort of uncaused cause. If not, we would not exist at all.

If we trace all of these effects back through time, carefully noting each cause in turn, we will, according to this line of reasoning come upon a moment when there was no universe at all and we will encounter God. Unlike Aquinas’ argument, the so-called Kalam arguments assume an actual beginning of time. But this isn’t a required element of the contingency argument. Aquinas simply states that God (the Uncaused Cause) is non-contingent to the universe; whether He created (in the conventional sense of the word) the universe is indeterminate. The universe simply depends upon God the way that the moonlight depends upon the sun. For most people today, we can, with some confidence, argue that the universe did have an actual beginning: the so-called Big Bang some 15 billion years ago. But this does not necessarily torpedo the argument. Not even God can bring Himself into being. Self-caused or uncaused, in this case, simply means that God exists independent of any cause whatsoever. He is necessary, though not the “first” cause in time, but the ultimate, primary cause of the universe. (The claim is that the Big Bang wasn’t the first moment IN time but rather the first moment OF time.) The universe depends on God to exist, perhaps, to hold it in place, to give it shape and meaning.

Whether or not there was a specific beginning of the universe in time and space seems to me irrelevant to the question. Rather, the point of the entire argument is that there seems to be a particular relationship between things in the universe. Whether we can trace these dependencies back in time (one cause/effect at a time) or in some kind of relational (the earth depends on atoms which depend on smaller particles), there is, according to Aristotle, Aquinas, Leibniz and Taylor, a direct pathway back to God.

I am not convinced that this is a completely sound argument in general and some problems seem to pop out at me immediately, but that is a task for another day.

Cosmological Argument for God's Existence

2008-10-10T19:24:00.000-07:00

As probably the most widely used argument for God's existence, the Cosmological Argument attempts to reconcile observed facts with the existence of God. We observe that there is a universe and that the universe appears to follow some kind of rules of behavior (if not, we could not really say anything about it). What caused the universe to be? What designed it to be the way that it is? We observe a set of facts (the existence of the universe, the apparent design found in nature and a universal sense of morality) and attempt to induce the existence of god. Where the Ontological Argument is a deductive, a priori argument, the Cosmological Argument is an inductive, a posteriori argument.

The Cosmological Argument usually takes of one of three forms:

Argument from Contingency
Argument from Design (teleological)
Argument from Morality

In a nutshell, the Argument from Contingency says that God must exist because something must have caused everything we see now. This is why it is often referred to as the "First Cause" argument. The most famous formulations of this argument come from St. Thomas Aquinas (I will also be relying on Richard Taylor's and a collection of Medieval Arab scholarly writings as well to explore this argument).

The second formulation of the Cosmological Argument is a result of the perceived order we find in all natural systems. It is often referred to as the Teleological (telos, purpose or end) Argument. If we look around, we, apparently, see only order. We see systems in some state of functionality. Where we see chaos, we are really seeing other systems acting upon other systems. Why does there seem to be design in everything we see? According to the proponents of this argument, the answer is God.

Finally, there is the argument that human beings are morally aware, then there must be an originator of that awareness. Most notably championed by Immanuel Kant, I will also be looking at some of the writings of C. S. Lewis to help me understand this argument.

I'll need to do a little re-reading and will attempt to tackle each of these sub-arguments in turn.

Criticism of the Ontological Argument for God's Existance

2008-10-03T17:26:00.000-07:00

As one of the weakest arguments for the existence of God, I thought it would be a good place to start. As stated before, the ontological argument basically says that if we have a concept or definition of God, then God must exist. This is true, Anselm and Descartes would argue, because God's basic traits (the greatest thing imaginable and that thing that cannot deceive) demand that we acknowledge the fact that God exists.

A number of very solid thinkers have pointed out several rather obvious problems with the ontological argument, namely, we can have all sorts of images in our head that do not, nor have ever corresponded with reality. For example, the contemporary of Anselm, Gaunilo asks "Now could it not with equal justice be said that I have in my understanding all manner of unreal objects, having absolutely no existence in themselves, because I understand things if one speaks of them, whatever they may be?" He further accuse Anselm of confusing the mental formation of an object with actually discovering whether it even is real. Gaunilo asks us to image the greatest possible island and compare it with the concept of a being that which nothing greater can be imagined. (What properties of this island would make it the best island after all?) If, according to Gaunilo, this argument works for the existence of God it should work for the existence of the perfect island, which, on the face of it, seems silly. Just because we can image the greatest possible island, for example, does that mean it exists? Does Santa Claus exist because every December I am bombarded with mental constructs of the Jolly ol' Elf?

A more coherent and real critique of the ontological argument comes from Kant. Without going into too much detail (and the much dreaded re-reading of Critique of Pure Reason), Kant says that existence is not a property of objects. Existence is only a property of a concept. Whether the ideas that make up the concept of God (which may or may not manifest themselves in reality) is yet to be determined. Existence (being) is not something we can safely call an attribute. Existence is not a predicate. Consider the following attributes of God:

God is good
God is all powerful
God is the creator of the universe

Each of these predicates (good, all-powerful, creator of the universe) is a real property of God. What Kant is saying, though, is that the ontological argument makes a fundamental mistake by neglecting to have a real predicate. In other words, the ontological argument simply states "God is" (simply because I can construct the concept of God in my imagination). This statement is actually contentless because existence is not a true property of God (or anything else for that matter). Therefore, the ontological argument fails. What Kant seems to be saying, and I think I agree, the ontological argument is really saying: God is, therefore God is. To which, Kant would ask: have you no other premises? (And, after showing that the ontological argument lacks the basic structure of a real agrument, God is what?)

I personally find Gaunilo and Kant persuasive, especially in the absence of other empirical or rational arguments for God's existence. There is just something wrong with the basic ontological argument; I feel like someone is playing some kind of word-game with me. But I cannot exactly pinpoint the problem any better than Hume, Aquinas, Gaunilo, or Kant. In essence, as a metaphysical realist myself, I reject the idea that if something can be imagined, conceptualized or defined then it must exist. All sorts of loony things go on my head that I thank God do not exist! Does this mean that God does not exist? That is yet to be determined (even if, obviously, I suspect He does). A purely a priori argument does not seem to be completely sound to me.

Predestination or Free Will?

2008-09-29T16:29:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine posed this question: Predestination or Free Will? For me, this was one of my first big stumbling blocks against Chrisitanity as my strong early preconception was that humans must have complete and total free will, yet the Bible repeatedly affirms God’s complete control over everything. We have Ephesians 1:4-6 and Romans 8:28-30 proclaiming unappologetic determinism. God gets to save whosoever it pleases him to save from hell. There is absolutely nothing we can do to avoid hell or choose heaven; it is completley in God’s hands alone. Yet, the oft-sited John 3:16 seemed to me to be saying that God has offered salvation to us, and we have the ability to accept or reject it.

In the end, I returned to my assumption that free will was a requirement for any kind of rational religion. While I could accept the power and authoritiy of God to make whatever He wants to happen happen, randomly earmarking a decidely small minority of human beings for heaven and the rest being sent to hell was not what a moral god would do. The most reasonable answer was that God valued free will over all other possible traits He could have endowed us with. So, it seemed most reasonable that God would only want to be in relationship with those who actually wanted it. Obviously, God would have some influence, whether through people or through some sort of direct action, but, if the word “morality” had any content, then people must ultimately be responsible for their actions, and their choices must be real choices. We can’t be punished or rewarded for something we have absolutely no ability to change. In order to end up with a moral god, I had to have an explanation for the apparent contradiction I saw in the Bible.

God, being omniscient and beyond time, could see how things would turn out. From our perspective, it appears as if God chose everything that happens to happen, but that’s not what is really going on. Though I was only really beginning my study of history at the time of my conversion, I was keenly aware of the odd way in which historical events appear to be predetermined. At any point, people could act in whatever way they want, but they don’t. They have free will to act in whatever manner they so choose, but their circumstances limit some options. The slow accumulation of limitations produces a smaller and smaller number of possible outcomes. Eventually, looking back, it appears that people don’t actually have a choice in the way they act as they are funneled into one, and only one, possible choice. This is the way I imagined God saw the unfolding of our lives. So, I became convinced that we see things as being of our own free will, and God sees things as completely predetermined.

The consequences of that was that at any given time I can choose to accept Jesus as savior, assuming that choice is a credible and known option given my circumstances, yet God has already seen (predestined) my conversion. I am responcible for accepting or rejecting the way that God has prepared for me.

Bible Code Skepticism

2008-09-26T11:43:00.000-07:00

After an interesting, but hopelessly short, discussion with a good friend last night on the topic of the so-called Bible codes, he wanted to know why I was skeptical. Basically, it is claimed that hidden prophecies can be uncovered in the Bible through computer-aided statistical analysis. Once a passage of Scripture is laid out in a grid, letters can be read in a crossword puzzle-like grid. Words and phrases can then be read by combining letters along this grid work. Believers claim that codes can be found in distinct patterns referring to the Holocaust, President Kennedy’s assassination, even 9/11. (I found this article interesting because it apparently predicted events that should have happened two years ago: http://www.halexandria.org/dward420.htm.) In essence, believers claim that this represents the “fingerprints of God”.

As I told my friend, I am skeptical. Firstly, I believe that the Bible is given to us by God (what that exactly means, as you may have noticed, I don’t exactly know). That said, these hidden prophecies, if they exist at all, do not necessarily add anything to the awe I feel about the Bible. In some ways, it detracts from it, because, if, as I suspect, these codes are really just artifacts of chance and how the experiment is set up, it makes it appear as if there is really nothing miraculous about the Bible. While I think it is completely possible for God to put these codes into the Bible, I can’t really see why He would if we appear to only be able to decipher messages about the past.

Additionally, the scientific skeptic in me wants to see what other dispassionate (if that is possible) researchers have to say about the topic. A number of credible researchers find fault with the methods, most notably Dr. Barry Simon, PhD. Indeed, the codes have been seriously questioned as early as 1994. I’m sure, if I gave Google a little more time, I could come up with more research to at the very least make me wonder.

Ontological Arguments for God's Existance

2008-09-24T10:19:00.000-07:00

Ontology is the study of the most basic or base metaphysical categories. The study of ontology seeks to place categories of reality into simple hierarchies. Therefore, ontological arguments for God's existence are derived from categories of pure logic and a priori reasoning. In this case, they seek to marry what we know with what is real.

There are a number of ways in which this argument for God's existence can be laid out, but I will focus on just a couple. St. Anselm of Canterbury's argument is probably the most famous. Essentially, Anselm's argument can be boiled down to the following:

God is a being that which nothing greater can be conceived.
Existence in reality is greater than existence solely in human imagination.
Therefore, God must exist in reality because if God did not, God would not be a being greater than anything that can be conceived.

Anselm observed that people have an idea of a perfect being, they can imagine a being that is so complete in its perfection that no other perfect thing can compare. How then did such a being come to inhabit human imagination if it did not exist in the first place? It got there because it actually exists. Something that does not exist is somehow lacking in perfection, thus that which nothing greater can be conceived actually exists. It seems to me, and here I agree with Karl Barth, that what Anselm is saying is that God isn't really proven by this argument, but rather that God cannot be denied once we know what He is: the most perfect being.

Later, Rene' Descartes expanded on this idea. He compares the knowledge of geometric shapes and the reality of God, writing,

But if the mere fact that I can produce from my thought the idea of something entails that everything which I clearly and distinctly perceive to belong to that thing really does belong to it, is not this a possible basis for another argument to prove the existence of God? Certainly, the idea of God, or a supremely perfect being, is one that I find within me just as surely as the idea of any shape or number. And my understanding that it belongs to his nature that he always exists is no less clear and distinct than is the case when I prove of any shape or number that some property belongs to its nature.

Clearly, as Descartes alludes, there are things that we know cannot exist--such as three sided squares--and there are things we know exist--three-sided shapes called triangles--without really giving it much thought. Because we have a clear understanding of what God is, according to Descartes, we know God exists. In other words, because the concept of God includes, by definition, the perfect goodness of God, God must exist. Because God, "a being subject to no defects whatever . . . [who] cannot be a deceiver, for it is manifest by the light of nature that all fraud and deception depend on some defect", cannot trick us into believing something that is not so and we can trust our perceptions about the world can be trusted--our perceptions of the world includes a perfect being--God must exist.

If this argument is sound, then it really does not tell us much about God in terms of our relationship with that Being. It only says that God is perfect in any conceivable way. God is all-powerful, all-knowing, eternal and entirely good.

Perhaps, that is all we can really say about God.

Another Long Vacation from Blogging

2008-09-23T10:14:00.000-07:00

Well, I think I've taken most of this year off from blogging. I've been distracted by a number of things including, taking a good look at the stock market (which I've been 'playing' semi-successfully since February), intentionally taking more time away from the computer, working on various volunteer projects and desperately trying to stay employed. Of course, there's been this little election thing that if frankly annoying the heck out of me. I'm honestly not having much luck feeling like anyone can make a rational choice because the media and the campaigns themselves have made it almost impossible to effectively wade through the bull and deal with real issues. Perhaps, I'll have something more to say about that in the future.

I think I'm in more of a position now to try to re-tackle my "proove God exists" project. I have already pretty much laid out my vision for the criteria for knowing . . . well, anything with a brief overview of my understanding of some basic epistemological issues. Now, I need to start tackling individual arguments.

Denominationalism

2008-06-12T18:27:00.002-07:00

Over the years, I've struggled with the my relationship with religion, especially as it relates to my relationship with God. Considering my background, I've always been at war with religion, as I firmly believe it is the biggest impediment to real spiritual transformation.

That said, I realized as I coming home from church the other day, as much as I hate religion, I hate denominationalism even more. We all have different needs, wants, comfort zones and tastes. It is clear to me that God made us all different for some purpose (what that purpose is, I’m stilly trying to understand). When we congregate or begin to think about spiritual issues, it's natural, even necessary to associate with others of a like mind. I suspect that is just the way human beings are made. I further suspect that this is the byproduct of sin; we seek to find others who will excuse, accept or even encourage our idiosyncratic selfishness.

These idiosyncrasies are what create denominationalism. Mind you, I don’t think peculiarities of thought or action are, in themselves, sinful. It only becomes sinful, when we assume that our way is the right way or when we require others to behave or think the same way we do. Denominationalism is, to me, the artificial distinctions between believers that supposedly our outwardly different traits, attitudes and practices make us more 'Christian' than others. When we take the excesses of our own religious cherry picking too seriously, we become dead to the Spirit. We become nothing more than a clique, despite our best efforts to be 'open', 'honest' or 'spiritual'. As I said before, I have absolutely no problem with differences in the Church in terms of our biases, practices, clothing, word choice, even biblical emphasis; we are all different and those differences need not be eliminated.

The bottom line: if you are a Christian, be yourself, who ever it is you are designed by God to be.

Problems with the Standard Definition of Knowledge

2008-05-06T14:00:00.000-07:00

While I think that the so-called standard definition of truth (justifiable true belief) the best description of knowledge, it does have some serious problems. First, truth is presupposed in the defintion. If knowledge is supposed to be the way in which we determine if something is true and we have truth already in our defintion of knowledge, then how do we know that what we know is indeed true. We need truth in order to have knowledge, but we define knowledge as something that is already true.

Another point of confusion for me is the belief part of the definition. In the past, science (which is supposed to be our unimpeachable bastion of knowledge, not so?) has touted as true certian theories. Each of these universally-accepted theories were fully justified and believed to be true. Indeed, they were concidered knowledge. But, as time passes, we discover new justifications for new beliefs and they become knowledge. Now, certainly, we now know that the earth is not flat. It was never true that earth was flat, yet, in the past, scientisists possessed justified beliefs that the world was flat AND claimed that that fact was indeed knowledge.

How does the disruption of the Standard Defenition of Knowledge effect the way in which we "know" God exists? I think, for some people, the Standard Defenition will only help to explain why they think God exists. For me, though, it slightly clouds the issue.

Better to Give than Receive?

2008-03-21T12:29:00.000-07:00

Well, it's about time science finally got around to figuring this one out. It is, according to new studies reported in Science magazine, giving to others increases happiness. "It's an intriguing result you won't find in Economy 101 textbooks," says economist Andrew Oswald of the University of Warwick, but you will find it in the Bible (Acts 20:35)

Jeff Healey Dies

2008-03-03T09:37:00.001-08:00

One of my all-time musical heros, Jeff Healey, died last night after a prolonged battle with cancer. He was only 41. Blind since the age of 1, Healey learned to play the guitar by laying it on his lap and fretting the strings overhand. He is most known for his 1988 album, "See the Light", featuring Grammy-nomiated song "Angel Eyes". Healey was a big influence on me at a time when I was feeling very sorry for myself. Granted the man was a musical guinius as far as I was concerned, but to be able to work as hard as he must have to play even half as well as he did was a major accomplishment for him.

Knowing God Exists

2008-02-28T18:23:00.000-08:00

So, what do we mean when we say that we know God exists?

Despite the undeniable weaknesses of the Standard Definition of Knowledge, I think it is our best bet in making sense of the statement, "I know God exists." Based on the preceding epistemological discussions, we can only know God exists if we have a justifiable belief AND it is true. Knowing God exists comes because we can believe a truth and we can justify it. This involves using reason, rationality and belief. Without all three, I don't think we can honestly say we know anything. Granted, what we have been able to justify and believe in the past has not always been true. As mentioned before, I am free to justify and believe all sorts of untrue things. The trick will be in determining if my my arguments and faith that are built on a foundation of truth.

Can I just believe that God exists? I have always acted as if that were the case. As a new believer in Christ, I never questioned whether God existed. I just assumed it because I believed that Christianity was correct. Christianity doesn't, as far as I can tell, require that you know God exists. Rather, you are required to believe in Him (John 3:16, John 3:18, John 6:29, John 11:40, Acts 15:7, Romans 1:16, Romans 10:9, Galatians 3:5, 1 Thessalonians 2:13, Hebrews 11:6, ).

It is interesting, though, that in several passages of the Bible there seems to be a relationship between knowing and belief. Obviously, they are two different things. It is my impression that belief for the Bible writers was a more subjective experience and knowing was somehow more objective. Yet there seems to be an order of operations; knowing follows from belief (see John 19:35 and 1 John 5:13). In other cases (notably John 6:69), belief and knowledge appear to be coequal. My personal take on this is that the Bible is saying that you must have faith before you can know and that faith is more important. Hebrews 11:6 says "And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him." So, knowing God exists doesn't seem as important as believing.

Perhaps, in the end, this is true. But I still feel I must have some kind of reasoned justification for my belief. Otherwise, I think, we are in danger of creating a completely subjective religion.

Knowledge, a Definition

2008-02-12T12:06:00.000-08:00

Epistemology is the study of how we know but it occurred to me that I may not even know what knowledge is. What does it mean to “know” something? How can I tell if I “know” that God exists?
According to Merriam-Webster (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/knowledge), the most useful definition of “knowledge” is:

2 a (1): the fact or condition of knowing something with familiarity gained through experience or association (2): acquaintance with or understanding of a science, art, or technique b (1): the fact or condition of being aware of something (2): the range of one's information or understanding c: the circumstance or condition of apprehending truth or fact through reasoning : COGNITION d: the fact or condition of having information or of being learned (a person of unusual knowledge>

In order to know that God exists then, it must be through personal experience, familiar acquaintance. I must be consciously aware of this knowledge and I must understand it.

As I've said before, epistemology is not my favorite subject. It always seemed to me that the major camps of epistemology are arrayed against each other like the old Nature v. Nurture camps. It's rather obvious to me that both play a major part in human development, and, thus epistemological subjectivism, rationalism, empiricism and faith all play a role in how we know anything. According to this definition, I may be required to use many different tools to know anything.

All of these tools have their weaknesses as well. Subjectivism fails because it cannot tell us anything about what exists outside of ourselves. Prepositional knowledge fails because it start from the general and makes assumptions about the specific and scientific knowledge fails because it starts from the specific and makes assumptions about the general. Faith fails because it attempts to know things that may have a variety of alternative and yet unknown explanations.

But all four have their own strengths. If we don't have a point of view (subjectivism) then we don't have any right to say that I know anything. If we don't think about why we know something (rationalism) or if there is nothing tangible (empiricism) to intuit, then there is no warrant to believe that we can know anything. Yet, there are things we cannot know for sure and we must make a leap of faith in order to accept. I wasn't at the Apollo moon landing in 1969 (I can barely remember 1969!) but it's reasonable to believe that it happened and I can actually touch some of the artifacts from the mission. That said, I cannot be 100% certain that it happened so some portion of my acceptance of the moon landing must be done on faith. All four theories seem to be necessary for a grounded view of knowledge.

According to the “standard definition of knowledge”, knowledge must contain the following three elements. I tend to agree with Plato by saying that knowledge must be "justified true belief". I only really know something if it is true, I believe it's true and can justify my belief in the truth of the matter. I cannot know untrue things, but I am free to believe all sorts of things that may not be true. There may be some true things I will never believed, so I do not know them. I can also believe untrue things; again, this is not knowledge. Thus what is known must be true by necessity and I must believe it is true.

As I said, one is free to believe all sorts of things, but we all know that there are many people who believe some pretty strange and obviously false things. Thus, belief alone is insufficient to knowledge. On the other hand, we can believe in something that is true, yet this is still insufficient. The belief must be warranted or justified. If I happened to believe that I have $1.35 in change in my pocket and there just by mere chance happen to be 4 quarters, a dime, 4 nickels and 5 pennies in my pocket and by pure chance there actually was $1.35 in my pocket, would I know it? The answer, of course, is no. I only guessed correctly and so the final element of knowledge is justification. My belief must be warranted somehow. In this case, I can reach into my pocket and count the change. In other cases, I may need to construct an array of evidence both logical and evidentiary.

So, on this view, that in order to know something, it must be true (some form of empiricism), it must be justifiable (rationalism) and I must believe in it (some form of faith). If I rely on any one theory to come to a conclusion, especially about the existence of God, I’m afraid this project will be hopeless. I think that’s why a lot of people fail in their attempt to prove God’s existence. Faith in God seems the most likely candidate for starters, but faith alone doesn’t seem to be sufficient to produce real, sustainable knowledge. For myself, I’m sure faith will continue to play a part in my relationship with God, but it cannot be the only way to know God.

Epistemological Rationalism

2008-02-06T15:07:00.000-08:00

The second major epistemological theory I would like to cover is Rationalism, the belief that we acquire knowledge by using our minds. Knowledge is only warranted if our intuition can fully apprehend the thing in question. Knowledge is a result of analytic truth (deduction) and, thus, can be reliably expressed in syllogism. In its simplest form, this takes the form of an argument. The modus ponens (or modus ponendo ponens, "mode that affirms by affirming") states that if X and Y are true, the Z must be true. For example:

If today is Sunday, I will be at church.
Today is Sunday.
Therefore, I will be at church.

This can also be used to prove a negative (a modus tollens):

If you are a human being then you are not a stone.
You are made of stone.
Therefore, you are not a human being.

Of course, there are examples that don't work because we can deny the antecedent. Take for example:

If God would show Himself to me personally, that would prove that God exists.
But God hasn't done so.
Therefore, religion is false.

Just because 1. and 2. are both true, doesn't necessitate 3. There may be other explanations. God may show Himself to us, but our senses may not fully grasp His presence or just because something is not “shown” does not mean it does not exist.

For a rationalist, the mind and argument (essentially) determine what we can know, as opposed to an empiricist who may claim that that the only way to know if God exists if we can somehow experience Him. Only because the world has an inherently logical structure, can we, as an rationalist would claim, know anything. In our case, it must be proven to be a logical necessity before a rationalist can accept God's existence. So, when I begin to tackle the arguments for God's existence, I will be venturing into the world of rationalism, but I have my doubts about this method.

South Park and Philosophy

2008-02-04T21:43:00.000-08:00

"South Park" AND . . .

What?!? Philosophy? Are you kidding me?

Well, the answer, of course, is no, they are not kidding.

It has taken me a while to really come to enjoy the Emmy Award-winning cartoon South Park. In fact, I really didn't like the show the first couple times I watched it. Mainly because it is a definitely not your average Saturday morning cartoon. I found it funny, but it's also extremely vulgar, crass, uncouth, needlessly controversial and it appears to have a bias against every possible interest group in the world. On top of that, it struck me as completely inscrutable. Case in point: Kenny. Why have a character the audience could not understand but the other characters could that died almost every episode? What's the point of that? Over the past year though, I've come to appreciate South Park, not just as entertainment (yeah, I feely admit, it's warped entertainment!) but as real social commentary and as way of beginning to think about the philosophical issues that swirl around us in modern and "sophisticated" people. If you're careful, at the end of a show, you can honestly say "You know, I learned something today."

That is where the book, South Park and Philosophy: Bigger, Longer, and More Penetrating, comes in. My wife and I noticed it on the bookstore shelf and quickly thumbed through it. Our first impression was "this must be a joke." Even the essay titles suggested it was; there was already enough vulgarity on the first couple pages to make me think that this was a gag book (I counted eight potentially-offensive terms in the titles alone). But, in the end, the essays seemed like they might just be worth a read.

The book, as all the Popular Culture and Philosophy series books, is a collection of essays. This one is "cobbled together" by Richard Hanley, an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Delaware. He's a reasonably intelligent and knowledgeable writer, but, unfortunately, he doesn't mind being as vulgar and rude as some of the characters on South Park. I suppose that's the point; it IS a book about South Park, after all. That said, it got on my nerves pretty quickly. It's perfectly alright to point out other peoples' fallacies or be opinionated, but it's quite another to make personal attacks and slop vulgarities over perfectly good prose. Because he wrote fourteen of the twenty-two essays were written by Hanley, just getting through much of the book was a chore.

Even so, there is a lot about the book I enjoyed, particularly the essay on time travel by Sophia Bishop, the Golden Mean by Aaron Fortune and the essays on the philosophy of education and death by Randall Auxier. One can get a quick over-view of a good number of topics from almost all major fields of philosophy. It probably does require a little background in philosophy to truly appreciate though.

So what is "philosophical" about South Park?

I've always thought that South Park touches on quite few philosophical themes. In fact, almost every episode I've seen (and I've not seen them all by a long shot), centers around an ethical, metaphysical or epistemological idea. In a typical show, two extremes are pitted against each other and by the end of the show some third alternative presents itself, suggesting, perhaps, that that creators are big fans of the Middle Way. In addition, the book suggests that the Parker and Stone are astute students of Socrates (Auxier thinks Chef IS Socrates), Aristotle, Freud (the boys represent the Id, Ego, Superego and the Death Impulse--can you guess which is which?), and Heidegger, among others. While most of the episodes feature current events, movies and celebrities, the underlying message of South Park does not seem to be ABOUT those things. Rather, it seems to me (and the authors of the book), that South Park is about deeper issues that are drown out by the innane babble of today's media. It asks big questions: When does life end? How should we treat those with differing points of view? What is knowledge and how do you know what it is anyway? What is God like and why does the Devil always get such a bad wrap? Why should I believe my TV?

One last observation, one I've made myself, but the book brings out nicely. South Park seems to be anti-religious--it does a great job of bringing to light all of the silly, obnoxious, childish and plain stupid stuff the Church (well, any religious organization) can dredge up--but it really is simply against hypocrisy in any form. The show's creators have no problem taking on any kind of fallacious thinking but seem to be respectful of thoughtful consideration of a religious (even Fundamentalist Christian) view. There's nothing wrong with having a religious point of view, as South Park suggests, as long as you sincerely think about what you believe and allow others their due.

But for a couple of excellent articles, I can't say that I can recommend this volume, but I understand this is really the second South Park and Philosophy. I'll have to check that out South Park and Philosophy: You Know, I Learned Something Today and let you know what I think of it. I hope it's better than this one. If you are really into South Park and its sophomoric use of language, then you probably wouldn't find this book too difficult to read. On the other hand, if you prefer a little more sophistication and cool-thinking in your philosophy, then maybe you should pass on this one.

The Pope on Science and Religion

2008-01-28T14:02:00.000-08:00

Today, Pope Benedict warned that the "seductive" powers of science are once again denigrating humanity's spiritual nature, reigniting the old science vs religion debate. Calling for a more interdisciplinary approach, he said that,

the exact sciences, both natural and human, have made prodigious advances in their understanding of man and his universe. [But] there is a strong temptation to circumscribe human identity and enclose it with the limits of what is known. . . .

In order to avoid going down this path, it is important not to ignore anthropological, philosophical and theological research, which highlight and maintain the mystery of human beings, because no science can say who they are, where they come from and where they go. The knowledge of human beings is then, the most important of all forms of knowledge.

Human beings always stand beyond what can be scientifically seen or perceived. To overlook the question of man's 'being' inevitably leads to refusing the possibility of research into the objective truth of being [. . .] and, effectively, to an incapacity to recognize the foundation upon which human dignity rests, from the embryo until natural death.

Science cannot rest on its own, and, despite what "science" would have you believe, it is not value-free, nor should it be. All science (all knowledge itself, perhaps) is value-laden. Science for the sake of science, and progress for the sake of progress should be questioned, examined and harnessed, both in its limits and its potential.

"Man," says the Pope, "is not the fruit of chance or a bundle of convergences, determinisms or physical and chemical reactions." And I have to agree. There is more to a human being than nucleotides, neural transmitters or brain stem functions. In fact, we are much more than the sum total of our entire body and all of its magnificent functionality, including our ability to objectively reason.

Indeed, as the Pope alluded to, our humanity emerges from our biology, our reason and our ability to intuit the world of the spirit. In fact, I might say that our humanity rests of science AND faith. While science cannot even ask spiritual questions, it can foster or destroy human dignity.

Epistemological Subjectivism

2008-01-23T13:46:00.000-08:00

One of the most recent epistemological points of view, one that is growing in popularity, is call subjectivism. As mentioned before, epistemological subjectivism is the claim that all knowledge is purely a matter of perspective. The subjectivist may allow that there are knowable basic dimensions (space and time), but we can only know them and the things in them from a vantage point of the intersecting, and completely unique, dimension of our (my?) point of view.

Clearly, everyone has a unique point of view. We come from different backgrounds. We all learn through different means. We can really only know what what we, ourselves, have either thought about (as, generally, per Rationalism), physically experienced (Empiricism), found useful (Pragmatism) or simply believed (Faith). In other words, even if any other theory is correct, we must start with what is knowable from our own unique vantage point. When I was in school, one of the "big" questions running around was whether it was possible to be an atheist in Medieval Europe. On this view, it would have not been, because atheism was not a knowable position for the Medieval subject; his or her upbringing, teaching, culture and worldview precluded atheistic knowledge.

Often, we hear people say they "feel" God's presence or God has "spoken" to them. Of course, this is completely unverifiable. For the subject alone, this is proof of God's existence. In many cases, I imagine, this may be saying that God exists but God's existence can only be knowable through subjective experience. As much as modern Christianity claims to believe in objective truth, this, to me, is an interesting side-track to the debate. Is this what people really mean when they speak of the Holy Spirit as that "quiet voice" we hear in our heart (our subjective self)? Does "Jesus is real to me, because I have Him right here in my heart" mean the same thing?

The problem that these perfectly valid expressions pose is that it reduces God to an inner mood, removing Him from His essential quality of Other. Without denigrating these experiences, for I am convinced that many may be perfectly true and I would not wish to limit God's methods, it reduces Him to the role of Jiminy Cricket (which I suppose was originally a polite way to to take the Lord's name in vain).

Life After People

2008-01-22T11:48:00.000-08:00

I have always been fascinated with thinking about what this planet would be like if there were no people on it, or what life would be like for a very small group of humans surviving after the "End of the World". How would the artifacts of our modern life fare? How long would it take before all traces of of our complex, highly-advanced civilization disappear? Books like The Time Machine and The Stand have served in the past to spark my imagination in this regard, but recent scholarship (including a book I'd like to read, The World without Us) on the subject has been equally interesting.

Last night, the History Channel aired "Life after People", a "documentary event" on the fate of life and our material cultural if every last human on Earth suddenly died off or vanished. While never addressing the reason for man's demise (you can fill in the blanks: some kind of hyper-mutative flu virus seems like the most likely candidate in this scenario), the program takes us on a bumpy ride starting only a day after the death of humanity to several thousand years into the future.

In a series of die-offs, several species would find life difficult in that first year or two after people. Of course, those most likely to be effected would be pet, zoo and domesticated food animals who rely directly on human contact for survival. Only if they escape the confines of their cages or homes would most of these animals have a chance. Other animals, such as cockroaches, gulls and rats would temporarily glut themselves on our leavings, but would soon find food difficult to come by and they would have to "earn an honest living" again . . . in the wild.

Other species, most notably plants, would immediately begin to thrive in a post-human world. All of our carefully manicured lawns and tamed green spaces (Central Park and Tom McCall Waterfront Park) would quickly revert to woodland. Every possible crack in the pavement would soon sprout dandelions and clover, and moss and dead leaves would begin to cover every trace of asphalt. Slowly, they would rip into and cover over our abandoned buildings.

For a while, skyscrapers and decaying houses would become “vertical ecosystems” with complete systems of flora and fauna, predator and prey. In time though, even our most enduring structures would burn, corrode, erode and fall to the ground, leaving no trace of our presence behind. In 10,000 years, only Mt. Rushmore, the Great Wall of China, the Pyramids and perhaps a handful of other massive structures would remain to give future intelligent life pause to wonder what came before. Strangely, the program never mentioned plastics, which, to my knowledge, is nearly eternal.

This was a great tour of the earth of the "future". The CGI and science was fair to excellent, grounded in repeatable observation. While all in all, Life after People was a good program, a few questions occurred to me as I watched it. Once I swallowed my general irritation with the History Channel's reluctance to produce programs about, umm . . . HISTORY (they were pushing yet another speculative, goofy SciFi Channel original called "UFO Hunter", a spin-off of it's "popular" "Monster Hunter" series, during the breaks, and, just before "Life after People" they aired for the zillionth time a ridiculous yet straight-faced exegesis of Nostradamus' work *sighs*), I wondered at the paradigm shift from traditional modern science's belief that man is, in some way, the dominate creature on earth, to a eco-New Age (for lack of a better term) view that the world would be just as well off without Homo sapiens. Granted, I am clearly no fan of civilization--it's far too messy, dehumanizing and exploitative not to see its shortcomings. But, there was clearly an ideological message.

But then again, you really can't help that, even in the realm of "pure" science.

At any rate, this got me thinking about what the earth might look like after Jesus returns. My wife has a hard time thinking that heaven can be on earth, with all the junk, pollution, urban sprawl and mess humans have inflicted on the planet. For me, this show only highlights the resiliency of the planet. Despite the warnings of global warming and mass extinctions, it seems to me that this world has seen it all before and that bouncing back and returning to a pristine state would only be a matter of time.

Of course, this brings up many other questions. I don't begin to have a clue how all the people on earth will live in the earthly Kingdom of Heaven without causing environmental damage. If people are here, in whatever state the Millennial Reign finds us in, then I have a hard time believing we'd let the Eiffel Tower rust and turn to dust.

Who knows?

Not I.

Human Cloning: A Viable Reality

2008-01-21T12:11:00.000-08:00

Stemagen Corp. of La Jolla, California announced last Thursday that it had successfully created cloned human embryos from donor DNA and eggs. Using somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT), a technique whereby the nucleus is removed from a donor cell and placed in a egg cell devoid of its nucleus to be reprogramed by the egg, the company produced five new human embryoic cells. The press release goes on to explain:

In the experiments, the researchers removed the nuclei of mature oocytes from healthy young women who had previously donated eggs for successful infertility treatments. The SCNT technique was then used to insert DNA from an adult male donor into the oocytes. The DNA was derived from a type of cell called fibroblasts, obtained from skin biopsies.
Subsequently, several of the reconstructed oocytes continued to develop as normal embryos, to the blastocyst stage. Extensive and carefully documented genetic tests were performed to confirm the genetic identity of the cloned embryos. In three embryos, tests showed the same DNA as the male fibroblast donor.
In one of the three cases, additional tests showed that the embryo had another type of DNA, called mitochondrial DNA, from both the female oocyte donor and the male DNA donor.
Mitochondrial DNA testing is viewed as an essential proof of successful human cloning -- particularly after previous fabricated reports from a South Korean research group. Amidst this background of controversy, the researchers took extraordinary steps to ensure that their experiments were properly conducted and documented. These included approval by an independent review board and confirmation of the genetic results by an independent laboratory, among other steps.

The primary hope is that this research can be used to combat infertility, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, and spinal cord injury, among others.

According to its ethical principles, "Stemagen's mission is to maintain exemplary standards in human embryonic stem cell research in accordance with the highest ethical and research principles." While I applaud their efforts to alleviate suffering and do so in an ethical manner, consequences of this research for the future needs to be carefully monitored. Creating human life (and despite the fact that we are talking about nuclei, DNA and eggs, we are still talking about a fully potential human being) for the purpose of taking it apart to see how it ticks is questionable. Additionally, there's nothing in this report that tells me that these clones could not be allowed to grow from blastocyst to fetus, from "full term" baby to adulthood.

If so, what then?

Basics of Epistemology

2008-01-11T23:40:00.000-08:00

In order to come to any conclusion about whether God exists, we have to examine how we might know that He (she or it) exists. Are we certain of God's existence? Or is there just a probability? How can our finite minds apprehend the concept of the infinite? How do we justify our claims to know anything?

These are the problems of epistemology. The defining questions of epistemology include the following:

What is the nature of propositional knowledge, knowledge that a particular proposition about the world is true? Knowing a particular proposition requires both that we believe it and that it be true, but it also clearly requires something more, something that distinguishes knowledge from a lucky guess. Let's call this additional element ‘warrant’. A good deal of philosophical work has been invested in trying to determine the nature of this additional element.
How can we gain knowledge? We can form true beliefs just by making some lucky guesses. How we can gain warranted beliefs is unclear. Moreover, to know the world, we must think about it, and it is not clear how we gain the concepts we use in thought or what assurance, if any, we have that the ways in which we divide up the world using our concepts correspond to divisions that actually exist.
What are the limits of our knowledge? Some aspects of the world may be within the limits of our thought but beyond the limits of our knowledge; faced with competing descriptions of them, we cannot know which description is true. Some aspects of the world may even be beyond the limits of our thought, so that we cannot form intelligible descriptions of them, let alone know that a particular description is true.

The third item, I imagine, will be particularly important while discussing the reality of God.

Out of these questions, five major camps have evolved: Subjectivism, Rationalism, Empiricism, Pragmatism, Faith.

Subjectivism says that there is only one thing anyone can know exists: our mind (rather, and more to the point, my mind, because I have no real basis for knowing you exist). Sometimes called epistemological idealism, this position holds that we can only understand the world through our own unique perspective and that other perspectives may or may not actually exist. Knowledge, therefore, deeply personal and entirely a matter of opinion.

Rationalism is theory that we acquire knowledge through thinking, using our minds. Rationalism relies on necessary, self-evident and universal truths, as well as syllogism (analytic truth and deductive reasoning). In other words, the real world is only knowable because it has a logical structure that can be analyzed and grasped through reason.

Usually opposing Rationalism is Empiricism, the view that we acquire knowledge by testing things out and using our sensory experience. It relies on synthetic truth, direct observation, induction (indirect empirical knowledge, generalization). A theories about the world must be tested against observations of the natural world, as per the scientific method.

Pragmatism is the view that knowledge is not, strictly speaking, out there waiting to be discovered. Rather, it is mutable and must be considered in relation to the consequences of its acceptance or rejection. There must be some conceptual agreement, practically speaking, about a given term. Essentially, if the theory, belief, or "fact" works, then it is true.

Finally, there is Faith (sometimes called Authority or Fideism). Epistemological faith is the belief that we quire knowledge through inspiration and revelation. There are some things we simply cannot know through our own personal perspectives, reason, experimentation or conventions. Reason is fallible and our sense can deceive. So, we must make leaps of faith toward any kind of knowledge. At the very least, we must suspend our skepticism and accept knowledge even though we cannot achieve certainty. Justification may be necessary for knowledge of this sort, but it is entirely insufficient to determine if something is actually true.

In the end, epistemology is as much about levels of certainty as it is about the way we know. Usually this is arranged from most certain or apodictic, to psychological certainty (does it feel certain?), to conventional ("all bachelors are unmarried men"), to pragmatic (is is helpful to be certain?), finally down to probabilities. For example, people can point to mathematical truths that can, supposedly, be proved indubitably. But is "1 + 1 = 2" a mere stipulative tautology? Is there any probability that this kind of knowledge is simply an useful convention? So, the quest becomes one of using whichever theory and then attempting to justify or examine our certainty.

To prove that God exists--to be certain in the way that many Christians appear to be--seems like a very difficult thing to do. But, throughout the history of the Church, subjectivists, empiricists, rationalists, pragmatists and fideists have, with various degrees of certainty, all taken their turns. Each one has used the tools of epistemology to make their case for (or against) the existence of God.

False Prophesy

2008-01-07T22:12:00.000-08:00

I don't usually comment on current events and politics, but this certainly has me thinking.

Last year, Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson announced that there will be an attack, possibly radiological or nuclear, on the United States that would cause "mass killing". The year before, he predicted that the Oregon coast would be hit by a massive Tsunami and that the Republicans would keep control of the Congress. In 2004, he "foresaw" the "landslide" re-election of President Bush. Noting that these events hadn't come to pass in the way he foresaw, Robertson said, "All I can think is that somehow the people of God prayed and God in his mercy spared us." Maybe, God changed His mind?

This year, Robertson claims that God told him that the world will continue to see violence (duh!) and recession will hit the U.S. economy. Oil will surpass $150/barrel as the dollar continues to loose ground. Additionally, "We will see the presence of angels," he prophesied, "and we will see an intensification of miracles around the world."

While I certainly believe and hope that miracles will increase, I am not sure how one might quantify that claim. Perhaps, that's what Mr. Robertson is hoping for. Perhaps, he's just hoping that we forget his mistakes as well. I'm willing to do so, if he stops pretending to speak for God. My Bible tells me that, at the very least, I should ignore people who claim that God told them something, that God Himself has informed the would-be prophet of an impending event, yet that event did not come to pass (Jeremiah 23:16, 1 John 4:1). It's just sound advice; people who don't know enough to question their own "visions" should not be a leader, in my opinion.

I used to enjoy The 700 Club even if I found some of the opinions to be unsound or unjustifiable, but I don't think I can support something that only helps atheism any more.

Proof of God's Existence, A Project

2008-01-04T20:07:00.000-08:00

Over the past year, I have written extensively (and privately) about how I came to be a Christian. Mainly, I did that in response to my councilor's suggestion that, perhaps, my conception of faith, reason, God, Jesus, Church life, fellowship, and so on may be contributing to my bouts of depression. This was not an attack on my faith. Rather, it was an attempt to get me to think through some of my own biases and preconceptions and examine them in light of how I process the world at large. Essentially, my councilor wanted me to see if I was sliding unhealthy thinking into my Christianity.

Long story short: I realized that I never really tackled the issue of God's existence during my conversion from atheism and would like to do that this year.

I've avoided the "epistemology of the ontology of God" throughout my philosophical life. Mainly because epistemology is something I've only had passing interest. I really enjoyed Kantian epistemology in school and was glad when The Matrix spurred some interest in the topic, but, for me, how we know what we know is fairly mundane. Either way, that is where I will need to begin.

Secondly, I would like to examine some of the major arguments for God's existence. On the outset, I'm skeptical that any one of them will hold much water for me, so this should be interesting.

Finally, I'd like to form some reasoned response to the question: "Why does Lee believe in God?" by the end of the year based on my examinations of these arguments. This sounds like something I can pull off in one year. Whether or not I am able to articulate my subjective belief (even if I believe there is ample objective evidence all around us) in God remains to be seen.

Related blog entries:

Basics of Epistemology (1/11/2008)
Epistemological Subjectivism (1/23/2008)
Epistemological Rationalism (2/6/2008)
Knowledge, a Definition (2/12/2008)
Knowing God Exists (2/28/2008)
Some Problems with the Standard Definition of Knowledge (2/28/2008)
The Ontological Argument (9/24/2008)
Criticism of the Ontological Argument (10/3/08)
Cosmological Argument (10/10/08)
The Argument from Contingency (10/11/08)
Evaluation of the Argument from Contingency (10/16/08)
Teleological Argument (11/7/08)
Evaluation of the Teleological Argument (11/12/08)
Information and the Teleological Argument (12/22/08)

Christianity, Atheism and Occam's Razor

2008-01-03T14:56:00.001-08:00

I saw the image to the right the other day (can't remember where exactly now, I think somewhere on Common Dreams) and had to laugh. Basically, it is saying that Occam's Razor demands a verdict toward atheism. Atheism is, according to this view, much more parsimonious. It is simple; it is elegant. Whereas Christianity is messy, conflicted, and "multiplied beyond necessity". In other words, all other things being equal, atheism is the simplest and most likely to be true.

Unfortunately, while I would be a fool and a liar if I did not admit that Christianity is indeed messy and often anything but parsimonious, Occam's Razor cannot be applied the way the author of this chart intended. The problem, of course, is that "all things" are not equal in this equation. The author is not comparing apples with apples, rather he or she is comparing "there is no god" with "there is a god and Jesus is His Son". What kind of Son? That is the "unnecessary multiplication" the historical Christian clades demonstrated in the chart.

If the chart were redraw to expose the true issue (whether or not there is a god), then both solutions would be equally simplistic.

I Am Legend

2008-01-01T17:23:00.001-08:00

I've been looking forward to seeing I Am Legend since I first heard it was being shot. Unfortunately, Will Smith's version didn't completely live up to my expectations.

The movie is a pretty good one, if you take it on it's own merits. There's little to no swearing, nudity, excessive gore or post-modern Angst. That is not to say that this isn't a scary movie. It is, but the PG-13 rating is actually quite appropriate considering the subject matter of this film.

Surprisingly, this movie doesn't really play the "God is dead" card. While in a moment of pure frustration and anger, Dr. Neville exclaims, "There is no God!", I can safely say, he doesn't really believe it. It seems to me that Neville is a God-fearing man. I know that because we see him praying with his family and he, rightfully, blames people for the vampire-disease and the subsequent human mass-extinction. Neville also refuses to call the infected anything but human, which is an interesting twist. In the end, he tells us that he's been listening to God's voice. In addition, throughout the film, we can see graffiti scrawled on the wall that reads: "God still loves us." As pointed out over at Christianity Today,

At first, it seems this may be an ironic jab. After all, this is a dark, apocalyptic film about one man left to rot in a seemingly Godless world. But by the end, that poster seems to be a subtle thesis statement.

Toward the very end of the movie, Anna, another survivor Neville meets, insists that God told her to come to New York. "The world is quieter now," She explains. "It's easier to hear God." If you've read Richard Matheson's book (which I have positively adored for almost 20 years), you'll be wary of Anna, so I was prepared for the probability that her religion spiel was just an act. Apparently, in the movie it is not.

What the movie lacked in my estimation (again, I loved the book so I had some expectations that must be forgiven) was a true sense of loneliness. The book's main theme was that we are all really alone. Our friends, neighbors, co-workers don't really give us human contact. We are all just dutiful, lonely slaves in the Kingdom of Means. We use others and others use us. Others just need our sweat and blood, and once they've got what they want, they leave us a hollow, shambling husk. Will Smith does a pretty good job of conveying this gnawing loneliness, but the writers of the movie decided to liven up the pace by inserting the dog in at very the beginning. For some, this might be a great foil for Neville's complete emotional isolation, but not for me.

All in all, this was a good movie, but falls apart in the last act. As is required of any monster movie, machine guns and impossible stunts are absolutely required (right!?). Unfortunately, when you push the action, meaningfulness goes out the door. The themes of salvation (Neville, it might be argued, is a Jesus-figure), humanity and our struggles with emotional isolation in our modern, impersonal world are lost by the end of the movie. Even with that criticism, I can cautiously recommend this movie . . . if you can handle a few boogie men jumping out of closets at you!

Yes, People in the Church ARE Human

2007-12-27T10:07:00.000-08:00

It is with continued awe that I am impressed, uplifted, edified and inspired while simultaneously (and in equal measure) appalled, dismayed and depressed by the Church. Just after Pope Benedict XVI urges end to conflicts in Darfur, Iraq, Afghanistan and the Congo, an embarrassing brawl breaks out between fellow believers at the traditional place of Jesus' birth. Merry Christmas! *sighs*

I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas

2007-12-25T12:29:00.000-08:00

For the first time in a long time, we have snow on Christmas. Well, it was white and cold and fell from the sky, I tell you!

I was hoping to get a snapshot of some accumulation but, alas, 'twas not to be.

Book Review: The Demon-Haunted World

2007-12-12T09:02:00.000-08:00

I have forever been torn between the rigors of reason and the undeniable reality of the spirit world. This tension though does not stop me from being a level-headed skeptic AND a firm believer. There are things in the world that can be easily confirmed (at least to a reasonable level of certainty) and there are other things that little evidence and argument can touch. We as a society seem to have lost touch with that distinction. Only the most credulous observers would find the dogmatic defense of such things as alien abduction, Nostradamus' and Casey's prophecies, vampires as the cause of malaria, Bigfoot and the vast majority of faith healings. While my worldview certainly allows for the possibility (even probability) of such things, I find it very difficult to accept most of the "arguments" put forth by those who do believe.

So, after over a three years of waiting patiently, I finally decided to read The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark by Carl Sagan. This is a great book and I would certainly recommend it to anyone wishing a brief introduction to critical thinking, logic and the world of pseudoscience. The chapters entitled "The Dragon in my Garage" and "The Fine Art of Baloney Detection" are often cited and are very good overviews of how science and logic work in the real world. Much of the book seems repetitive and probably could have benefited by being cut down by at least half though. I've heard that the chapters are actually stand-alone essays, and it certainly feels that way. Overlooking the lack of editorial review, this is a fine book.

The book definitely has some great food-for-thought. For me, I am constantly annoyed at the amount of sloppy thinking, charlatanism, propaganda and pure, unadulterated bull shit in American culture. We see in almost everywhere from new theories of about the "power" of crystals to the ongoing war over Global Warming. We are especially bombarded with it on T.V. news, where science news in particular has been tragically dumbed down to meet the needs of the sub-average grade-school student as to not make anyone feel like perhaps they don't know everything. (Besides, we just HAVE to spend time talking about poor Britney Spears, right?) Truly useful and accurate health, biology, technology and ecological information is traded in for the latest Mother-Mary-in-a-pancake and alcohol-is-good-for-you stories.

Now, for a believing Christian like myself, I have difficulty sometimes knowing what the limits of science are and where I am allowed by reason to believe in God, Jesus, immortality, heaven and hell. When am I justified, logically speaking, to believe in Jesus' Resurrection? Is there really a separation between what I can know scientifically and what can be known "spiritually"? The standard I use is one I think Sagan would approve of (probably with some qualification on his part though) is one of subjectivity: is there some outward and examinable evidence that something is true? Where as in the New Age there's no objective truth. Rather, in the New Thought community we

make our own truth. There's no such thing as objective reality. We make our own reality. There are spiritual, mystical, or inner ways of knowing that are superior to our ordinary ways of knowing. If an experience seems real, it is real. If an idea feels right to you, it is right. We are incapable of acquiring knowledge of the true nature of reality. Science itself is irrational or mystical. It's just another faith or belief system or myth, with no more justification than any other. It doesn't matter whether beliefs are true or not, as long as they're meaningful to you.

Which is poppycock and potentially dangerous. Meaningfulness does not necessarily correlate to reality. What this fellow is talking about here is art, not science and has very little metaphysical basis for support. Art is meaningful only because it is interpreted to be meaningful. How strongly you feel something does not make it true (with the odd exception to the placebo effect). So, even if I felt strongly that Jesus was Lord and Savior, that does not mean that He really is. Something besides my feeling must support this reality and it does to my satisfaction. On the other hand, skepticism remains an important part of my life and The Demon-Haunted World will remain an important tool for apprehending and living in the real world.

Romans 14 and Church Music

2007-12-10T12:16:00.000-08:00

Since reading David Wilkerson's "Confessions of a Rock n Roll Hater!", I've had some more time to contemplate the relationship between musical style and its religious meaning. As Wilkerson points out, Romans 14 is an important passage for understanding our Christian responses to other styles or, what we consider, ungodly activities. I've reproduced the passage in question in its entirety here. As you read, I would encourage you to replace the words "meat" and "eating" with whatever issue seems important to you, whether that is loud rock music, Stephen King novels, long hair on men, Dungeons & Dragons, or anything else that might be an issue with you.

Romans 14 reads:

1Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters. 2One man's faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. 3The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him. 4Who are you to judge someone else's servant? To his own master he stands or falls. And he will stand, for the Lord is able to make him stand.

5One man considers one day more sacred than another; another man considers every day alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. 6He who regards one day as special, does so to the Lord. He who eats meat, eats to the Lord, for he gives thanks to God; and he who abstains, does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God. 7For none of us lives to himself alone and none of us dies to himself alone. 8If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.

9For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living. 10You, then, why do you judge your brother? Or why do you look down on your brother? For we will all stand before God's judgment seat. 11It is written:
" 'As surely as I live,' says the Lord,
'every knee will bow before me;
every tongue will confess to God.' "12So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God.

13Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brother's way. 14As one who is in the Lord Jesus, I am fully convinced that no food is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for him it is unclean. 15If your brother is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy your brother for whom Christ died. 16Do not allow what you consider good to be spoken of as evil. 17For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, 18because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men.

19Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification. 20Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food. All food is clean, but it is wrong for a man to eat anything that causes someone else to stumble. 21It is better not to eat meat or drink wine or to do anything else that will cause your brother to fall.

22So whatever you believe about these things keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the man who does not condemn himself by what he approves. 23But the man who has doubts is condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.

From the very beginning, differences of opinion has been a part of Church life. The Jewish converts believed that one must be circumcised to become a Christians, while to the Gentiles, this seemed unnecessary and ritualistic. Others believed that the Jewish Sabbath was the holy day of the week, while others felt that Sunday was. In the context of Romans 14, food dedicated to idols was a major issue. Should we, Christians, eat meat that was sanctified for pagan gods? Obviously, we are talking about issues of secondary importance here. Paul is not allowing for a radical reinterpretation the Easter experience, nor is he suggesting that the diminishment of the centrality of Jesus in Christian life should be tolerated. He's talking about preferences, style, personal liberty and a wider perspective on ownership of our lives.

In the context of Wilkerson's tract on church music, it is important to note that, in applying this passage, people are free to choose whatever music they wish. One person may like all music; others cannot even begin to concentrate on worship when the music is played a certain way. No one should look down on anyone based on his or her preference of music. If a certain song is worshipful for a person, then it is worshipful. If not, then it is not. This, in no way, reflects on the actual spiritual value or quality of the music (though there may be objective standards in terms of musicianship and sound design). While each person must make a determination about the “cleanliness” of any given music, all music can be good. It is still wrong to force someone to “enjoy” something that will cause them to stumble in the faith.

In the end, if the music is annoying to you, then it is annoying and you should speak to God about it. If you finally believe that a certain music style, volume or instrumentation is “unclean”, then you are completely justified in your beliefs and should feel no guilt whatsoever if you do not like the kind of music at your church. This, of course, does not mean that it is unclean for everyone else.

Whether we over-extend Romans 14 to cover church music is, in my mind, within the realm of possibility, but it is clear to me that Christians should always assume a posture of tolerance in dealing with other Christians’ preferences, whether that be in worship days, food and drink, secular music or other leisure activities. As long as those activities do not cause others to loose faith and we are sincerely convinced in our own minds of the ethical value of those activities, then we have no fear of condemnation.

Romans 14 Commentaries

On "Confessions of a Rock n Roll Hater!"

2007-12-02T21:31:00.000-08:00

Today at church, our worship pastor allowed up an opportunity to read and discuss David Wilkerson's tract, "Confessions of a Rock and Roll Hater!". I will be giving it some more thought over the following days and weeks as it specifically relates to our church, but I just wanted to get down some first impressions before they drift away.

Essentially, the tract follows Wilkerson's journey from a fierce hater of rock music to someone who could set aside judgment and allow substance to trump style in our church music. Wilkerson recounts his journey as "seven steps toward balance in music" (bullet points are every so important!). They read as follows:

STEP ONE--The Music offered to God must be solemn.
STEP TWO--All music must be sung as if in the direct presence of the Lord
STEP THREE--Loud music is encouraged by the Lord!
STEP FOUR--It is unscriptural to criticize another's taste in music!
STEP FIVE--There is nothing wrong with rightfully using that which has been served to idols!
STEP SIX--There is a risk in offending others by our music!
STEP SEVEN--There is a better way--above all controversy!

Step One seems the most obvious. Of course, if the musicians and singers are not solemn, then it makes no sense to call our music "religious" or even "Christian". Solemn music is often, but not always, joyful, and it must be designed to touch the hearts and minds of those who hear it.

The most important step, from my point of view, number two. We cannot be considered worship leaders if we do not realize that our only audience is God alone. We must be able to guiltlessly sing our song and play our instruments before God. "Just as I [Wilkerson] must give an account for all my preaching, so must musicians give an account for all their singing."

The issue of music volume in our modern, amp'ed up world can be tricky and I'll have to give this some more consideration before I write on this subject, so, I won't say much about step three here and now.

Step four seems so obvious to me that it almost doesn't warrant being said. I find it difficult to believe that people believe that the music they LIKE is Godly, while the music they don't is "the Devil's heartbeat". Music, in an of itself, is meaningless. Music is simply sounds (maybe noise) set to time. Our judgements about music are deeply cultural, personal, and, while there may be objective measures for good music in an aesthetic sense, are all individual expressions of emotion and thought.

Step five specifically addresses the idea that rock music was originally intended, perhaps, as praise "offered up to idols". Rock n Roll music (the name itself is derived from an immoral act) has been used or was an outgrowth of immoral, perhaps even demonic, behavior. But, as mentioned above, nothing in music itself is "clean" or "unclean". We as Christians are not bound by a religion of ritual, thus allowing us to use even those very things the Devil has made for our demise.

Because music is a cultural and personal thing, a matter of taste and preference, sooner or later, you will offend someone by our choice in music. If we use discretion and intelligence in our choices, without pandering, we will avoid most offenses, because we have gotten to know our audience. But that certainly doesn't mean we should apologize for every choice we make. "Mostly, God wants you to be free to enjoy what you do, and cause God's people to enjoy it as well."

Finally, there is a better way . . . be creative and bring YOU to the music. We don't have to borrow from the world. We should be the ones with the cutting edge music, the new and exciting, the heartfelt and meaningful music.

I honestly didn't find much new in the tract, nothing terribly ground shaking or awe-inspiring. But our church is still going through some transitions where basic conversation about music seems to be appropriate and necessary. I just hope that in the future, we can avoid lock-step unanimity--by forcing everyone to like the same music--and get back to a more basic reason for having music at church in the first place.

Contaminated Portland

2007-12-02T20:18:00.000-08:00

I always thought Portland was a clean place to live. At least it was when I was growing up. Apparently, it's not any more, becoming a regular Toxic Town. Pulling in behind Baltimore and Milwaukee, Portland has the highest number of leaky storage tanks (20,655) and has 10 corrective actions. I guess I didn't even realize that there was an air pollution advisory earlier this Fall. Maybe, I've just gotten used to it . . . *wheezes*

Battleground God

2007-11-28T18:44:00.000-08:00

Here's a fun little game called Battleground God. I'm not entirely sure how this is scored but I received a "Metal of Honor". Here is the analysis of my score:

The fact that you progressed through this activity neither being hit nor biting a bullet suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and very well thought out.

A direct hit would have occurred had you answered in a way that implied a logical contradiction. You would have bitten bullets had you responded in ways that required that you held views that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. However, you avoided both these fates - and in doing so qualify for our highest award. A fine achievement!

Apparently, I am part of the 7.66% of the people who have completed this activity who emerged unscathed with the TPM Medal of Honour.

Ghosts and Christians

2007-11-27T16:47:00.000-08:00

Over the past few years, my wife and I have been watching the Sci-Fi Channel’s "Ghost Hunter" series. For us, watching the trials and adventures of TAPS (The Atlantic Paranormal Society) has been an entertaining and thought-provoking experience. I enjoy "Ghost Hunters" because they truly seem to be trying to be rational, yet open to every possibility. They don't go in trying to prove that a place is haunted. Rather, they try to see where they can explain, in material terms, the so-called paranormal activity. I respect the sober and cautious manner in which they approach their work. They recognize that there are risks involved with the use of Ouija boards, and seem to agree (generally) with a Biblical view of demons (Demonology FAQ's). This gives me the sense that they are not trying to hype or exploit the supernatural like so many other show does.

But where does that leave a Believer? Aren't we told that ghosts don't exist or that communication with such beings are strictly forbidden? Are we not repeatedly warned to avoid spiritualism in any form?

Let's start with what the Bible has to say. As highlighted by the folks over at Got Questions, there are several passages in Scripture that may shed some light on ghosts and haunting. Let me quickly retell their findings and add some of my own:

In 1 Samuel 28:7-19, King Saul seeks a woman with a familiar spirit (demon) to inquire of Samuel about what to do. That she actually manages to communicate with the dead shocks her (v. 12) indicating to me that it did not previously happen.
In Matthew 17:1-8 and Mark 9:4, Peter, James and John see Moses and Elijah with Jesus for a brief period of time. Dead people from the past can, at least on some occasions, be seen by the living.
In Luke 16:19-31 Jesus tells the story of the rich man and Lazarus. In this story we learn of there being two compartments for the dead until the Great White Throne Judgment (Revelation 20:11f.). Also in the story the rich man asks for Lazarus to be sent back to warn the living. Abraham says it would do not good because if they will not believe God's written word, they will not believe though one should rise from the dead.
Luke 24: 36-43 tells about how the disciples reacted when Jesus greeted them after the Crucifixion. He surprised them by suddenly showing up, thinking He was a ghost. "He said to them, 'Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.' When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet. And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, 'Do you have anything here to eat?' They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate it in their presence.
1 John 4 tells us that there are a variety of spirits, many of which are not to be trusted.
Hebrews 12:1 tells us that there are many witnesses to our daily lives (this probably means angels of some kind, but it's not entirely clear to me what is being referred to here).
Ephesians 6:12 indicates that there exists invisible, fleshless "powers" throughout the "heavenly realms".
1 Timothy 4 indicates that there are deceiving spirits and there are demons.
God finds detestable the "practice of divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, or casts spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead." Deuteronomy 18:11-13.

As you can see, the Bible does not appear to be silent on the topic of ghosts. That said, I'm struggling to put together a coherent argument based on the Bible. But here's the general principles:

One or more non-physical dimensions exists which are overlapping of, adjacent to, or perhaps parallel to the physical world.
Various spiritual beings inhabit these dimensions (some seem to be good, others evil, and others still of unknown alignment).
Human spirits continue on after death and may be able to interact on some level with the living.
Because we can't necessarily tell what these beings want, we should avoid them, turning only to God for spiritual connections.

According to the Bible, the spirit of a Believer goes to heaven, while unbelievers go to Abraham’s Bosom, Sheol, Hades, Purgatory, or Hell (depending on your background and biblical interpretations). What and where exactly these places are, I am not sure. But it seems to me that According to one perspective, "Purgation involves purification of sins and these include worldly attachments. It is the souls with worldly attachments that manifest as ghosts on earth. Other souls also manifest in different ways mostly in dreams. Their purpose is the same i.e. to have prayer/masses said on their behalf." On this view, it seems likely that one form of purgatory might be an after-life existence fettered to a cherished place or thing in the physical world. Thus, it seems not unlikely that human spirits could remain unable to "move on" until they have completed some form of penance. Beyond that, I can not make any dogmatic statement concerning the fate of a lost soul (for I do not really know or understand what Hell is, beyond "a separation from God and an acute knowledge of that separation").

While I do not hold that there is a conflict between the belief in ghosts and basic Christianity, the Bible's admonition to avoid contact with spirits not of God seems sound and reasonable. If I accept that saved souls go to heaven, that leaves me with the likelihood that unsaved souls become ghosts (obviously, there are a few exceptions (Matthew 17:1-8, Mark 9:4, 16:19-31), but intentionally seeking out these spirits seems to be unwise at best, because we do not even begin to know what their motivations are.

Need we fear these spirits though? Absolutely not. We, disciples of Christ, have power over evil spirits (Matthew 10:1). We can, also, be comforted by the fact that our existence after we die will not be eternal one of moaning, chain-rattling undeath. Rather, our spirits will meet with Christ in heaven.

Sesame Street: Adults Only!

2007-11-21T08:34:00.000-08:00

“Sesame Street: Old School” (Volumes 1 and 2) now comes with a warning. “These early ‘Sesame Street’ episodes are intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of today’s preschool child.” Why you say? According to the New York Times:

Nothing in the children’s entertainment of today, candy-colored animation hopped up on computer tricks, can prepare young or old for this frightening glimpse of simpler times. Back then — as on the very first episode, which aired on PBS Nov. 10, 1969 — a pretty, lonely girl like Sally might find herself befriended by an older male stranger who held her hand and took her home. Granted, Gordon just wanted Sally to meet his wife and have some milk and cookies, but . . . well, he could have wanted anything. As it was, he fed her milk and cookies. The milk looks dangerously whole.

Riiiiight. So Bert and Ernie are oppressed, closeted gays, forced to live in a dingy basement apartment. Kermit refuses to be called an amphibian American. Cookie Monster is a cookie away from blindness and foot amputation. Oscar the Grouch is needlessly deprived of Wellbutrin. Stubborn denial of Global Warming and urban pollution! Rows of claustrophobia-inducing brownstones. Modeling of “wrong behavior”, such as smoking, domestic violence . . . having imaginary friends.

I understand that times change, societal values change. But come on now. Sesame Street, at least the ones I remember watching (I was part of the show's target audience the year it began), was about learning to pronounce "C", and the "agua" and "water" meant the same thing, and that two plus two equals four. It was also about getting along with people and our emotions. Life is not always happy. People are sometimes weird or annoying. And today's children's programing is any better at teaching children to be better people?

Ancient Giant "Bug" Discovered

2007-11-21T06:30:00.000-08:00

Buried in 390-million-year-old rocks, scientists have recently discovered the claw to an extinct Eurypterid (sea scorpion), Jaekelopterus rhananine. With the possible exception of the Arthropleura, this is the largest arthropod ever discovered. As reported by the Royal Society, the complete animal was about 2.5 metres long (a little over 8 feet).

Why these creatures grew to such lengths, no one is sure. Two possible explanations: greater amounts of oxygen in the atmosphere and a lack of predation. A correlation between the increase of carbon dioxide and (predatory) jawed fishes and the extinction of the Eurypterids?

The Bible as the Word of God

2007-11-20T16:11:00.000-08:00

The Bible has always fascinated me. Even when I was an atheist, the stories and explanations seemed intriguing. Yet I have always wondered how people can draw the conclusion that, according to my church, "The Bible is our final authority in every area of faith and practice." It seems reasonable, but what exactly does that mean? What about reason, interpretation? What about cultural differences and perspectives?

Let's look at what the Bible has to say about itself:

"All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work." (2 Timothy 3:16-17)
"These are true words of God." (Rev. 19:9)
"Did the word of God originate with you? Or are you the only people it has reached? If anybody thinks he is a prophet or spiritually gifted, let him acknowledge that what I am writing to you is the Lord's command. If he ignores this, he himself will be ignored." (1 Corinthians 14:36-38)*
"Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." (2 Peter 1:20,21)

All of these passages declare that God initiated what we now call scripture (or "prophecy") and that what we have in the Bible is "true".

I don't put quotation marks around the word true to be cute or make some oblique deconstructionist comment. I am not really venturing into a metaphysical argument either about the Bible's origin here. Rather, I am saying that the authors of the Bible recorded, as best they could, the words of God Himself. Note too what these passages are NOT saying:

They are not saying that every detail, every word, turn of phrase and punctuation is perfect. God did not reach down and write the Bible Himself. Rather, He prompted men to transcribe, for lack of a better word, what the Holy Spirit lead them to write. (Perhaps, it might be best to describe the process as transliteration from the Language of God to Hebrew or Greek.) The Bible is also something that requires some effort and faith to understand; it requires interpretation and application before it truly is the Word of God. Without our effort and the work of the Holy Spirit, it is possesses no power on its own.

To say that the Bible is the "final authority" may be correct in a pragmatic sort of way. Without the Bible as a uniform code of behavior and practice, we certainly would have a much more difficult time defining the word "Christian". How would we know what a Christian is if we had no recourse to the unifying set of beliefs represented by the Bible? Obviously, we wouldn't. That is why the Bible, as the Word of God, is useful as the binding document for Christianity.

The Bible claims that it's words are true, should be heeded as important and useful. They originate with and flow from God Himself. The Bible can make us "wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus" (2 Timothy 3:15); we can grow in our understanding of life and spirit when we put our hearts and minds to the task of learning from it. Certainly, I believe this to be so.

* or, perhaps more fitting, "If he is ignorant of this, let him be ignorant."

Preference, Priorities and the Committed Churchgoer

2007-11-13T13:53:00.000-08:00

Because I believe people get confused and begin to lump healthy discernment or muddle personal preferences in with selfishness (and because I have an unhealthy attraction to definitions in general!), I think it best to begin by defining “consumer Christianity”. According to the Berean Call, Consumer Christianity is, generally,

any attempt to build the kingdom of God or build up the individual Christian (or attract the potential convert to Christianity) by means and methods that appeal to the flesh, i.e., the deceitful and self-serving heart of man.

When we use business and Hollywood strategies to bring us closer to God, we are leaning on our own power. We attempt to make the world’s ways, God’s ways. This is where Church leadership over the past decade or two is at fault. In an honest attempt to feed their flocks, they set into motion a cycle of dependency and, instead of helping Christians to grow, end up making them short-sighted and weak.

We shop for churches, pastors, the slickest presentations, the newest fads in worship music and universal get-God-quick programs (what I call "Top Ten Christianity"). Consumer Christianity turns honest, God-seeking Christians into McChristians. The Church tries to offer what McDonalds does:

Lot's of menu choices designed to please our appetites and personal tastes. Give the people what they want.
Hold down the price of commitment in time and money.
The tendency to avoid intimacy. That's why many people love the mega-church environment where they can be anonymous consumers. You never have to get to know anyone!

The Church is dying of its addiction to spiritual fast food. Indeed, as historian Thomas C. Reeves says

Christianity in modern America . . . tends to be easy, upbeat, convenient, and compatible. It does not require self-sacrifice, discipline, humility, an otherworldly outlook, a zeal for souls, a fear as well as love of God. There is little guilt and no punishment, and the payoff in heaven is virtually certain. What we now have might best be labeled 'Consumer Christianity.' The cost is low and customer satisfaction seems guaranteed."

So, as you can see, by this definition Consumer Christianity is not what Jesus had in mind for His Church, for, if “anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will save it" (Luke 9:23-24, Matthew 16:24-26).

But can someone seek to maximize his or her well-being, edification or, even, comfort in church without being a Consumer Christian? Is it, essentially, ungodly to enjoy, even look forward to, the blessings of God that flow from a personally helpful sermon, a familiar song, or a favorite program? Is it wrong to seek fulfillment, renewal, and personal growth in church? Can we continue to offer various alternatives and choices in church, yet continually disparage the very act of choosing? Are we required to endure an intolerable church experience, just to avoid being labeled “consumer Christians”?

Let’s be clear here, I am not suggesting that our church experience should merely be judged on a value basis. Church life is not monadic, it is communal, it is spiritual, it is for others. A mature churchgoer will recognize this. A mature and committed Christian will recognize that being equipped, renewed and revived is also an important part of going to church.

Here lies the balancing act between our personal preferences and our biblical priorities. Our preferences are just that, preferences; it's the way we like things. That doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with wanting things to be one way or another. It just means that we prefer what we prefer, in an aesthetic sense. We all prefer a certain way of worshipping God and serving others. And, under those circumstances, we may just fulfil our God-given purposes at an optimal level.

The committed churchgoer is just that: committed. He or she is committed to growing in Jesus and finding ways to serve others. The committed Christian is also committed to looking into themselves with the aid of the Holy Spirit to discern what things in our church life that are just preferences (the way we like it) and those things that a biblical priorities worth speaking up for.

One final point to keep in mind: if a person leaves a church please don't simply write them off as "Consumer Christians". It may well be that they are, but, on the other hand, God may be using a certain situation in their church life to compel them to move on to other opportunities for growth and ministry. We are all made very differently; we are all on our own separate journeys.

Hike to Angel's Rest

2007-11-11T13:34:00.000-08:00

In an attempt to get myself back in shape, my brother and I decided to tackle Angel's Rest in the Columbia Gorge. It's a tough little hike, so my brother thought it would be a good one to gage my over-all fitness. Going up, I felt a little nauseous and coming down my arthritis was really screaming in my knees, but I did very well all things considered. We made the whole thing up and back in about three hours. With the wind whipping, we didn't stay too long up on the very top of Angel's Rest, just long enough to rehydrate and get the chills.

The Sentimentality of War

2007-11-11T11:00:00.000-08:00

Exactly 89 years ago, the First World War came to a whimpering halt. A year later, President Wilson proclaimed the first Armistice Day with the following words:

To us in America, the reflections of armistice Day will be filled with solemn pride in the heroism of those who died in the country’s service and with gratitude for the victory, both because of the thing from which it has freed us and because of the opportunity it has given America to show her sympathy with peace and justice in the councils of the nations.

Since then, this day each year has been celebrated in many of the former Allied nations as a day of remembrance. In many parts of the world, people take two minutes of silence at 11:00 in the morning as a sign of respect for the 40 million casualties of the War to End All Wars.

As stated elsewhere, I maintain that war cannot be justified unless a number of very specific conditions have been met. For the most part, that means that most wars are unjust in one way or another. I do hold that there can be just sides and motives for engaging in warfare; there truly are times when drastic measures must be taken. I have great respect for anyone who dons a uniform and fights for his or her country but is it not more appropriate to remember those killed in wars by calling an end to all war rather than "honoring" the sacrifices of those men and women who fought on behalf of my country?

I pose the question because I have no fear of being seen as somehow less patriot as my neighbor. I am a Christian first, an American . . . somewhere down the list. So, I do believe, despite the fact that those who decide to serve in the military are decent, honorable people and that their jobs are sometimes necessary, the preparation and execution of war is stupid, wasteful and immoral. Maybe this is a case of trying to walk the unwalkable tightrope of “Loving the warrior; hating the war”. I don’t really know. You might be right if you accused me of waffling. Perhaps, there is a part of me that believes that those who train to kill are knowingly engaging in condemnable acts. Perhaps, on the other hand, being a combat soldier is something I’ve always secretly wanted to be (at least while I’m being sentimental about the “adventure” war).

Whether you think the current war is just or not, I think it is very appropriate to give honor to those who have severed our country. As a Christian, I have the duty, no, high honor, of praying for our service people, the soldiers in the field and those who fought and died around the world and throughout history. We should, though, avoid the sentimentality of war. War is not fun or exciting. War is never a good thing.

In the end, the sentimentally I so often see should be replaced by an awed reverence. Astoundingly, Jesus instructs us to pray for our enemies. We are to bless those that curse us (Luke 6:27-28, Romans 12:14) and avoid usurping the authority of God by taking revenge (Romans 12:17-21).

You need to be this smart . . .

2007-11-10T10:14:00.000-08:00

. . . to understand my blog.

Which is about where I was shooting.

Kant and Religion Resources

2007-11-08T18:17:00.001-08:00

After finishing up Kant and the New Philosophy of Kant the other day, I decided to poke around the Internet to see what's out there concerning Kant. Here's a short list of some of the better sites I've found on Kant's religious philosophy.

Kant's Philosophy of Religion
Kant's Critical Religion, by Stephen Palmquist
Religion Within the Boundaries of Mere Reason
Philosophy of Immanuel Kant, Catholic Encyclopedia
Commentary on Religion with the Boundaries of Mere Reason
Kant's Reason and Religion
Kant's Moral Philosophy

Maybe I'll add to this . . .

Kant and the New Philosophy of Religion

2007-11-07T14:01:00.000-08:00

Recent scholarship has tried to paint Immanuel Kant's religion in an agnostic and, in at least one case, atheistic light. The religion Kant has, traditionally, been seen as one built entirely on reason, with clear metaphysical boundaries around those few phenomenal things we can actually say about God. Kant makes it clear that we can not speak with any certainty about the noumenal world and the irreducible essence of things (die Ding an sich). In fact, we cannot even begin to prove that God exists at all, nor can we even be sure that our religious language corresponds to any real object. Additionally, Kant's religion has also been seen as a reduction of the "spiritual" dimensions to pure ethics, where obedience to the categorical imperative overshadows obedience to “God”.

Fortunately, Kant and the New Philosophy of Kant, edited by Chris L. Firestone and Stephen R. Palmquist, rightfully combats these old stereotypes and places Kant's discussion of religion in a greater context of his life and other writings.

Kant and the New Philosophy of Kant, is a wonderful collection of dozen fine essays. It would be fair to say that all of the essays interpret Kant in a theistic light. Indeed, the entire book makes the claim that an actual theology can be constructed from Kant's work. In part I, the various authors attempt to create a foundation for Kantian theology. In part II, this theology is practically applied and finally, in part III, religious institutions are explored in light of this theology. I particularly enjoyed "The Tree of Melancholy: Kant on Philosophy and Enthusiasm", "Kant on the Rational Instability of Atheism", "Making Sense out of Tradition: Theology and Conflict in Kant's Philosophy of Religion", and "A Kantian Model for Religious Deliverance". For those who know Kierkegaard, you might find the "Imaginary Dialogue" between Kant and the Danish philosopher particularly enjoyable.

This book, in my opinion, corrects a great deal of injustice to Kant's philosophy of religion. While it is true that (along with myself) Kant possesses a deep suspicion of any so-called proof of God’s existence and religious “enthusiasm” (Schwärmerei), Kant does not deny the concept of God or its value in producing a moral society. We simply lack the means of apprehending God. Or as Kant explains:

The transcendental idea of a necessary all-sufficient original being is so overwhelmingly great, so sublimely high above everything empirical, which is at all times conditioned, that . . . one can never produce enough material in experience to fill such a concept.

If there is a God, though, obedience to the moral law comes first for Kant, because if we obey God first we are apt to corrupt religion and God. (On top of that, I would say that when we are obeying God, we are really subjecting ourselves to Kant's moral imperitive because God Himself is perfectly subject to these laws.) “Religion,” Kant says, “is the recognition of all duties as [if they were] commands of God.” Even so, God is not proven in morality rather God and immortality are implied in moral action. “Morality in no way needs religion,” Kant says, but “morality inevitably leads to religion." We don’t need God to understand morality, but when we are moral we can hope that God will universally complete the promise of our obedience to duty.

We wish to live in a moral world. We wish for a perfect object as a guide, a measuring stick, a complete being willing to commune with us. The object of that desire is God. We long for God, love and morality, but we cannot possess them.

If the presence of a desire can be seen as an absence in the being of the desirer, an absence that can be filled only by something outside of the desirer, then one can understand all desiring beings internally divided and alienated from themselves; what makes a desiring being whole is the object of its desire, which lies outside of it.

In the end, Kant’s religion can be seen, not moral reductionism or refuge of hardened agnosticism but rather, as one of radical fideism.

Kant believed that his work was not to constrain Biblical religion by reason alone, but to illuminate everything in the Bible "that can also be recognized by mere reason." Indeed, God could provide "an empirical revelation [Offenbarung] of theological truths". According to Kant, phenomenal experiences may just be the extension of the noumenal. Therefore, while God cannot be objectified (John 1:18), He may extend Himself into the experiential world. Kant does not come out and say it, but it is certainly an implied explanation of the deity of Christ (John 1:14).

For someone who has always been on the lookout for reasons to believe, Kant has (almost) always been a comfort to me. When I first read Kant for myself, years ago, I felt that I had found a fellow sojourner. Yet, the humanistic commentary seemed to drown out what I felt was valuable in Kant’s religion. This book brings Kant back from the blind precipice of dogmatic agnosticism.

Northwest Trek

2007-11-03T18:03:00.000-07:00

To celebrate my birthday, my wife and I went up to Northwest Trek, south west of Tacoma. It took about 2 and half hours to get there but it was well worth it. For a good sense of northwest wildlife, natural habitats and some basic conservation education, I'd really recommend the trip. The hour-long tram ride was nice, if a bit noisy; it really was geared for kids. The place has a zoo-like feel to it, but there was plenty of space to spread out and take things in. I was really impressed with the "wilderness" feel to the exhibits and the nature walk.

The only really good picture we got was of the wolves. (I'm still learning to use this new digital camera.) Had I known how to use the camera, I could have gotten some really nice pictures of the grizzly bear, bobcat, lynx and otters.

Halloween

2007-10-31T12:52:00.000-07:00

As a Christian, I sometimes struggle with how to celebrate (or not celebrate) Halloween. On the one hand, I have a great number of very good memories of Halloweens past. My mom loved Halloween and she always took great pains to make it a very fun opportunity for friends and family to gather and enjoy each other. Halloween was a big costume party that was a shared community event. I also recognize that Halloween was the eve of All Saint’s Day, a Christian celebration in honor of all the saints, known and unknown.

On the other hand, Halloween’s roots is actually Celtic, the festival of Samhain (pronounced sow-in). Halloween

marked the end of summer and the harvest and the beginning of the dark, cold winter, a time of year that was often associated with human death. Celts believed that on the night before the new year, the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead became blurred. On the night of October 31, they celebrated Samhain, when it was believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to earth. In addition to causing trouble and damaging crops, Celts thought that the presence of the otherworldly spirits made it easier for the Druids, or Celtic priests, to make predictions about the future.

Halloween was a very spiritual time of the year.

Does it bother me that any holiday celebration has pagan roots? Not really. I am not necessarily concerned that Halloween has pagan origins. My only concern is that Halloween may glamorize or trivialize death and evil. In fact, the older traditions did nothing of the kind. Rather, our modern skeptical worldview has created a Halloween where death and evil are celebrated.

We no longer think evil actually exists. Evil is seen as a state of mind rather than a real and hungry power. It is an aberration, a bump along the path of progress, a temporary hindrance to our human potential.

Evil is real; it lies in wait for us (Gen. 4:7, I Peter 5:8). And it should not be so quickly dismissed.

That said, our response to evil and death is very important. Do we cower in fear or do we acknowledge its reality with confidence and courage? Maybe Halloween is a time to thumb our noses at Satan. Tell him that I think all of his powers and strategies are "cute" and harmless like the little ghoulies in bedsheets. In a very real way, dressing up and decorating the house in a "scary" way mocks Death and Satan and, as a Christian, proclaims that they have no power of me or my life.

Preying on the Unethical Computer User

2007-10-31T11:01:00.000-07:00

It seems that spammers have created yet another way to get unsuspecting people to do their dirty work. A new Windows "game", which shows a half-naked woman, temps people into undressing her more if they can correctly type in text shown in an accompanying image.

The trick of the "game" is that the text players are asked to decipher are security measures placed on various forums, email and account registration forms. The scrabbled text images are almost impossible for spamming spiders and robots to correctly input, thus, keeping spammers at bay. With the help of an unethical computer user, this technique works because "the average male e-mail user would want to see more".

Happy Halloween . . . I guess.

Doubt

2007-10-29T11:59:00.000-07:00

Doubt:

1. To question or hold questionable; to withhold assent to; to hesitate to believe, or to be inclined not to believe; to withhold confidence from; to distrust; as, I have heard the story, but I doubt the truth of it....
2. To suspect; to fear; to be apprehensive of...
3. To fill with fear; to affright.

Particularly, in many religious traditions, doubt is equated with fear. In Christian circles, this can be interpreted as a lack or, even, opposition to faith. This can mean an abiding mistrust in the power of God to be present in our lives. It is the fear that, perhaps, God does not have our best interest at heart or, even if He does, He lacks the power to protect and guide us. Thus doubt may develop into a form of backsliding for the "committed" Christian.

While, I would not dispute the fact that an abiding doubt in God's faithfulness probably will lead to an unhealthy form of Christianity (or agnosticism or, perhaps even, atheism), doubt in and of itself is not a bad thing. Doubt, in the first sense, is an essential part of any honest approach to religious experience and spiritual awareness.

Doubt, in the first sense, causes us to contemplate, strive for understanding and even test the religious claims of our fellow sojourners and leaders. This form of doubt forces us to evaluate programs and movements in light of reason, faith and a commitment to truth. Forcing us to apply concepts and commands only after "owning" them for ourselves. Because I believe our Christian walk is, ultimately, a solo affair (in the sense that God doesn't judge us for the thoughts and actions of our community, only on our own choices in the context of our community), God expects us to be responsible for what we allow to enter our hearts and our minds. Doubt, as a sort of prudent skepticism, is the first line of defense against unhealthy ideas.

Doubt, in the sense of fear and suspicion, can only be harmful. This form of doubt is so often purely irrational and may stem from a variety of unhealthy and selfish impulses. This is where the first form of doubt may be useful (i.e. in helping to evaluate what can turn out to be unwise thoughts or courses of action).

In the second and third sense of the word doubt, we see the same power that faith has used in harmful ways. On that view, faith and doubt are both the attempt to convince ourselves of a certain outcome. Faith is the hope in something good; doubt the hope in something bad.

Davis Graveyard

2007-10-27T18:57:00.000-07:00

On my way to Prov. Milwaukie (Med. Asst. Program), I passed, what appeared to be an old hearse on Tuesday. Well, being the big Halloween decoration nerd that I am, my wife and I had to go back check it out today. What a great display! Guess I'll have to start work for next year!

Redheads are Neaderthals!

2007-10-27T08:55:00.001-07:00

It seems that we red-heads may just be descendants of Neanderthals. Apparently, a very similar mutation of the MC1R gene may have affected Neanderthals in much the same way as in modern humans, producing red hair and light skin color. This leads researchers to suggest that Neanderthals interbred with modern human populations.

Another reason to hate Ginger kids?!?

Quote of the day

2007-10-25T15:52:00.000-07:00

"Rational people will go quietly, meekly, joyously into a gas chamber, if they are only allowed to believe it is a bathroom" (Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, p. 203).

Forgiveness

2007-10-15T10:52:00.000-07:00

I just came across this wonderful article on forgiveness over at the Good Samaritan Ministries blog, and it really got me thinking. I am currently working through some forgiveness issues of my own and I need to remind myself exactly what Jesus taught about the subject.

According to the current Wikipedia:

Forgiveness is the mental, and/or spiritual process of ceasing to feel resentment, indignation or anger against another person for a perceived offence, difference or mistake, or ceasing to demand punishment or restitution. This definition, however, is subject to much philosophical critique. Forgiveness may be considered simply in terms of the person who forgives, in terms of the person forgiven and/or in terms of the relationship between the forgiver and the person forgiven. In some contexts, it may be granted without any expectation of compensation, and without any response on the part of the offender (for example, one may forgive a person who is dead). In practical terms, it may be necessary for the offender to offer some form of acknowledgment, apology, and/or restitution, or even just ask for forgiveness, in order for the wronged person to believe they are able to forgive.

In a Christian context, forgiveness is a prayerful action in which we allow God to handle the situation. Forgiveness should not simply crossing people off our list of perceived offenders. "It is a choice, it is specific, and," the authors of the article insist, "it is emotional."

I'm not entirely sure I believe forgiveness should be emotional, at least as far as I understand the author. Because forgiveness is a choice, it really can't be emotional. Emotions flow, not from our perceptions but, from our rational understanding of the world. Emotions are the bodily response to situations and our philosophical "rules" devised to deal with those situations.

So, in a sense, the author is correct. If we have decided that "I" am not going to hold something against another person, then we can say that our forgiveness is emotional. I can now feel positively towards a person who is no longer offensive to me. He or she has offended God and God is the one who gets to decide what to do about it.

The trick is that we can't really forget the perceived wrong to us. God may be able to do so, perhaps, but we can not. This is where the rubber hits the road. How does one deal with a person who continually wrongs you, shows no remorse and, apparently, plans on doing it again? If we "protect" ourselves by putting up boundries, are we interfering with the forgiveness process? Are we somehow telling God that we can handle the situation?

For a Christian, forgiveness may be the highest form of worship because we do not presume to act on behalf of God. In the end, forgiveness is just another cross we must bear in order to truly be called children of God.

Sacred Sanctuary

2007-10-14T20:40:00.001-07:00

At our church, it is customary to spend quite a bit of time before each service meeting with friends, talking about our week, our lives and our concerns. We talk about quite a bit about what the Lord has done for us, and what service we offer the Lord, but mostly we catch up on our daily life.

This got me thinking about my Mormon upbringing. In the Mormon church, there are certain ceremonies that are held at the Temple. People on the outside often make a big to-do about the secretive nature of these ceremonies. Mormons themselves are not permitted to speak openly of what goes on there. I submit that these ceremonies are secret because they are sacred. It's not that Mormons can't speak of these (I'm sure there are admonitions not to, but follow me here). Rather, because these ceremonies are indeed sacred, set apart, harm is done to the holiness and solemness of the encounter with God by publicly discussing what goes on in these sacred spaces.

In contrast, at our church, we take great pains (for good or ill, I'm unsure) to clearly avoid calling our "gathering place" a sanctuary. Rather, the space is simply called the auditorium. We tend to treat it like an auditorium too. It's a place of casual conversation, loud music and good-natured fellowship. It sometimes takes some time for people to transition from the horizontal into vertical worship.

I certainly do not want to press the point (because there is great value in a more casual church gathering), but it seems to me that something may be missed when people come to church and do not recognize the experience as "entering the sanctuary". When we bring our daily lives into a holy place, we may need more time to refocus our minds and hearts on the Lord. We may take for granted the fact that God wants to commune with us in a deep and real way. We may just distract others of the call God has for their lives for that very Sunday.

Just some thoughts . . .

Observe my Sabbaths and have reverence for my sanctuary. I am the LORD. (Leviticus 26:2)

Listen to me, Levites! Consecrate yourselves now and consecrate the temple of the LORD, the God of your fathers. Remove all defilement from the sanctuary. (2 Chronicles 29:5)

Halo 3, an Ethical Church Recruiting Tool?

2007-10-08T20:21:00.000-07:00

As a long-time computer gamer and programmer, I have mixed feelings about the use of violent computer games as Christian recruiting tools. As reported in the New York Times (Thou Shalt Not Kill, Except in a Popular Video Game at Church), Halo 3 has just become such a tool.

I tend to disagree with Daniel R. Heimbach, a professor of Christian ethics at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, when he says, “To justify whatever killing is involved by saying that it’s just pixels involved is an illusion." There is a qualitative (and, one might argue, quantative) difference between blowing up a pixelized, 3D alien and tossing a real life hand grenade into the lap of a real life person. The only illusion here is the illusion that opponents in a computer game appear to be "alive". They are, of course, not. There's no difference between "killing" a monster (or another "person" for that matter), in a computer game and knocking down mechanical ducks at a carnival.

That said, I certainly do not discount the power of video games to desensitize, dehumanize and disassociate our actions from any real consequences. I can personally attest to the insidious way in which a computer game can subtly change the ethical perspectives of a player. I have no doubt in my mind that violent computer games can contribute to unethical and criminal behavior.

On top of those general observations, to use something clearly designed for mature audiences (at least 17 years old) to draw kids to church seems mildly irresponsible. While it is important to be all things to all people in order to help them come to Christ, I don't believe this falls under that mandate. Hey, if people want to play Halo 3, be my guest. I hear it's a great game. Hosting a Halo party sounds like a great outreach. I just don't see how it really is appropriate for kids.

Philosophy & the Christian Faith

2007-10-06T21:09:00.000-07:00

After finishing Philosophy & The Christian Faith, by Colin Brown, I was surprised to see that the book is almost forty years old. Covering the history of the relationship between Christianity and philosophy from the Middle Ages to the mid-60's, this book touched on many issues we, today, struggle with. The tension between faith and philosophy has never been so well-focused for me before.

Starting with Medieval philosophy, Brown illuminates a tale of the endless quest for a philosophic harmony with sacred scripture. From Anslem's ontological argument (God was that which no greater can be thought), and Aquinas' cosmological and teleological arguments (God is the cause of the cosmos and the ultimate designer) we move through to Martin Luther, Pascal, Kant, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Feuerbach, until we reach Tillich, Buber and Schaeffer. Brown covers the 20th Century (until the time of the writing of the book) in fine detail.

For those of us who have a fair understanding of the history of philosophy, the final chapter (Postscript: The Christian and Philosophy) is the most illuminating and useful. While the Bible does not attempt to explain everything, nor does it tell us everything there is to know about God, it does raise innumerable philosophical questions. What does a Christian do with over a thousand years of thinking? How does that effect (or not effect) our lives today? For each of us, we have certain philosophical assumptions in our Christianity. We may even tenaciously defend our faith on philosophical grounds, despite the obvious observation that philosophical systems always turn out to be incomplete. The danger comes when we too closely ally our Christianity to these philosophies.

Sometimes when a philosophy is too closely wedded to Christianity, and that philosophy goes out of fashion or become inadequate, it is easy to fall into the mistake of believing that Christianity itself has been disposed of (p. 36).

In the end, this is what makes philosophy so interesting. Philosophy claims to posses the tools for explaining everything in a rational manner, to prove or disprove anything. But our faith, it seems to me, is beyond our ability to understand philosophically. Philosophy can only serve as an underpinning, not a substitution for our faith in God.

For someone who is interested in knowing where our current philosophic arugments for Christianity come from, this book would be an amazing read. It makes no pretense at going into any depth on any one subject, movement or philosopher, but instead it gives the reader a quick glance at the philosophic currents and cycles through the ages. It can be a bit dry (what philosophy book isn't?!?), but you might be surprised at how much you find familiar without even knowing its source.

Jesus, the Only Way?

2007-10-04T14:18:00.000-07:00

I was considering the claim that Christians are arrogant for believing Jesus is the only way to God today. I've always recognized that there are a lot of things that can really only be done way, but I've never been able to formalize that thought as a counter-argument to Christian arrogance. Today, I may have found a solution.

Let's say someone says that Christians are arrogant for claiming that they are the possessors of the "only way to God" and I respond, in turn, that there are, indeed, many things that require only one solution. The most common retort would be to create an analogy: "Are you saying that there is only one way to get from Portland, Oregon to Washington, D.C.?"

I believe, if my understanding of "getting to God" is correct (i.e. a walk), then my surprising answer is yes, there is only one way to get to Washington, D.C.: You must move from Portland, Oregon. Whether you drive I-5 south and take a left in San Diego or take a more direct route by flying from PDX to Ronald Reagan Washington National airport, you still MUST leave Portland. If my understanding of Christianity is correct (it may not be), then leaving sin ("Portland", yeah, analogies suck! hehe) is the only first step possible. God is not a simple destination. Rather, God will meet you as soon as you do that one thing, the only thing possible.

I will have to give this argument some more thought. While I think it's essentially sound, there are some holes. To be continued . . .

12 Angry Men

2007-10-01T14:30:00.000-07:00

It’s not often that I watch a movie and want to write about it, but 12 Angry Men was just too good not to think about. I love the long scene after the very bored judge gives his final instructions. You just don’t see movies anymore where the actors are required to concentrate on acting for a very long time; it was very immersing and play-like. Beyond simply entertaining (oh it was at that), the movie suggested a number of very interesting questions that I think are relevant for today.

First, is the issue of objectivity. All of the characters who immediately voted “guilty” had some kind of hidden agenda (except for Klugman’s character; we’re not sure why he voted guilty). We always bring something to any evaluation and our past always deeply influences our future. The genius of this movie was that it showed how each juror struggled with his past.

Secondly, the movie highlights a particular epistemological problem concerning doubt. While epistemology is not my favorite subject, the movie has brought some of those issues to mind. In this case, the jury was asked to determine if there was a reasonable doubt of the boy's guilt, and, if so, vote not guilty. In other words, determine the probability of guilt. A reasonable doubt was all that it took to acquit. In our every day lives, often use that standard to make judgements. Being in a state of doubt is not necessarily a bad thing.

The final important issue the film addresses is the issue of intellectual courage in the face of the crowd, or as the old man puts it "standing alone against the ridicule of others." This is not licence to rebel for rebel ion's sake. Rather, it is a call to stand up for what you believe in. I liked the way the Henry Fonda's character didn't question the others' motives, rather he questioned the facts, the interpretation of those facts, and his own ability to complete apprehend the truth of the matter. He maintained an open mind, not dismiss every possible option, but, rather, to find the truth.

Great movie. I'll have to put this on my "re-watch" list!

Philosophy and Christ

2007-09-29T20:15:00.000-07:00

See that no one makes a prey of you by philosophy and empty deciet, according to human tradition, accordint to the elemental spiritis of the universe, and not according to Christ. Col. 2:8

The Bible makes it clear that a, at a minimum, a healthy suscipicion of philosophical, "worldly" thinking should be maintained by all Christians. Paul tells us that the wisdom of the world is not used by God, rather it is Christ who should be our wisdom (I Cor. 1:21-30).

This, to me, is the greatest struggle I have with my faith. While there is no philosophy as such in the entire Bible, the words of Christ and Paul in partuclar raise countless philosophical questions. Am I to believe the God of the Bible has no interest in whether or not I seriously think about Him, His creation, existence, substance or ethics? Is "blind faith" more important than rational theology?

I'm not sure.

In the end, I don't think Col. 2:8 is saying that we shouldn't philosophize, but rather to, for me at least, rationally challenge false philosophies, to expose falicies and work toward a more concrete understanding of our own faith.

Been a long while since I posted anything

2007-09-23T20:36:00.000-07:00

It's been over a year since I had the energy to post anything here. I've felt burned out and my head just hasn't seemed to work quite right. During the intervening months, I have sought the council of friends and family, those I trust and those who don't understand. Either way, I think I'm back on my feet.

At Providence Portland's Chapel

2006-05-15T11:21:00.000-07:00

I had a client today that I was supposed to meet at 9:00 AM today at Providence Portland, but somehow we missed each other. A co-worker said the client wouldn't be in for another half-hour, so I had a chance to spend some time in the chapel.

For the most part, I was alone for just a half hour, but it was a very good half hour. I tried to focus my mind on God, but ended up thinking about the job I was at the hospital for. With some effort, I was able to turn my mind toward a prayer for guidance and, through the swirling thoughts in my mind, I was aware of one thing I think I've never really understood about holy places: God is not more available or present in places set aside for "religious activities". Rather, I am.

It's easy to think that, perhaps, God isn't with us during our busy days. But it's clearer to me now that He really is. It's just that, here I am in my office, with my job notes, my humming computer, my books, my snacks, I don't have as much time for God as God has for me.

The Future of Our Church

2006-05-07T20:50:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, our founding pastor retired, leaving an uncertain future for Greater Portland Bible Church. It's not that I, personally, have any trepidation. We have an awesome staff, solid elders and a congregation that, I hope, is mature enough to handle this time of uncertainty.

This morning, pastor John committed our church to unity. The staff created a statement of commitment that read:

We as a church community, highlight and respecting each other's strengths, steering clear of pride and hidden agendas, practicing dependence on God together, and moving forward with one accord.

The bottom line is that we, as a church body, are committed to being patient, listening to the Lord's leading, and working toward a renewed church, a church that is open to seekers and is a place where service and love is abundantly evident.

Granted, all sorts of bad things could happen as we find our new direction and renew our commitment to the Lord. But I just don't see that happening. Furthermore, I pledge to do my part that bad things don't happen. My job now is to love, listen and be a dependable part of the church body. May God grant me the strength to do so.

May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ Jesus, so that with one heart and mouth you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. (Romans 15:5-6)

Spong's Sixth Thesis

2006-04-16T19:57:00.000-07:00

6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

Spong believes that modern science and philosophy make the crucifixion obsolete and nonsensical. The ransom Christ supposedly paid allows Christians to slide, avoiding the hard work involved in self-improvement. For Spong, Newton proved that God does not act in the world and Darwin proved the non-existence of original sin therefore there is no need for atonement. Besides, writes Spong: "I would choose to loathe rather than to worship a deity who required the sacrifice of his son" (Why Christianity Must Change or Die, p. 95). On a deeper level, Spong believes in the modern conception of redemption; that is redemption is something only humans can do for themselves. As Dallas Willard points out:

Nowadays human redemption is not thought to amount to much, and what little there is to it can be dealt with by education and counseling, and perhaps a law here and there, or some improvement in living conditions. Mel Gibson's Passion and Philosophy, p. 168.

Spong denies that sin separates humanity from God. Therefore, we do not need a redeeming or atoning act. Therefore, Christ's sacrifice is nonsensical.

I doubt anyone will argue that crucifixion is not barbaric and the idea of a god that requires a sacrifice is indeed ancient and, on the face of it, quite disturbing. Sacrifice is a theme that reaches back to the very roots of religious thinking, a theme that probably existed before people even learned to farm. These concepts of sacrifice and estrangement (through sin) are an offense to the common picture of the "nice", God of Love, the white-bearded grandfather figure who just "loves you for who you are" sort. It is also an offense to anyone who believes that God can act in history. The pure absurdity of the Passion is only obvious, as St. Paul points out:

For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the cleverness of the clever I will thwart." Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the foolishness of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. (I Corinthians 1:18-25)

I will be the first to admit, that the atoning act of Christ's crucifixion contains many serious philosophical questions. But to those of us who "get it", there are forces and profound lessons in the barbarity.

Whether Christ's crucifixion is barbaric is really not the issue, though. Even if it were, indeed, barbaric, the aesthetics of the event do not correspond to the reality, the truth and meaning behind the act. In other words, we can look at the events of the Passion with horror and revulsion, find the agony of Christ on the Cross to be simply too gory to dwell on, and, thus, miss the true meaning of the event.

The way I have always looked at this issue revolves around that simple choice. Sure, the plain absurdity and horror of Christ's last day on earth are obvious. Some people will contemplate these events and be changed . . . if they allow it. Others will dwell on the difficulties (what DID Christ's death really do for me?) and reject any meaningful lessons, truths or applications for their lives. Or we can be moved by the suffering to act in accord with the words of Christ, to follow His lead.

If Spong finds these central tenants of Christianity a stumbling block to his understanding of God, so be it. But if Christ had not gone through what he did and then be raised, the word "Christian" would be nearly meaningless. It is our faith in the miraculous acts of atonement that defines Christianity (I Corinthians 15:17). Sure, you can believe that Jesus said some good things, perhaps he was even the historyÂs best teacher, but does that make one a Christian?

History shows, to my satisfaction, that human beings can only go so far in improving their lives. Our relationship (as a species) with God has not grown over the centuries, as Spong implies that it should through some evolutionary means. And that God, as primitive a concept as it may seem to Spong, is still entirely holy and good. Said God requires a price we humans cannot pay, thus the need for the God-Man Jesus to go through what he did. All that is required from us is our faith in that redeeming act and an honest desire to let God change our lives for the better.

Talk about your Devotion

2006-04-14T09:32:00.000-07:00

Man, oh man, can you imagine ACTUALLY having yourself crucified as a sign of your devotion? That's what at least 11 Filipino Christians did on this Good Friday. This was the 20th time for one of these fellows.

Jesus' Miracles Not Very Miraculous

2006-04-05T15:01:00.000-07:00

A "new" theory explaining how Jesus might have "walked on water" is being floated by Doron Nof, a professor of oceanography at Florida State University. Nof claims that Jesus may have been walking on ice patches. Apparently, the area around the Sea of Galilee was cold enough to freeze over between 2,500 to 1,500 years ago.

Naturalisticly, this seems to be a credible alternative to the miracles described in the Bible (Matthew 14, Mark 6, John 6). I suppose I could buy this if I could just get this ridiculous picture out of my head. Imagine Jesus, striding along the Sea, jumping from ice-flow to ice-flow, trying to keep his balance and not slip. I am also trying to ignore the fact that several of the witnesses made their living on the lake, day in and day out, summer or winter, fishing; they certainly would have been aware of these icy patches. Furthermore, at least one experienced fisherman actually followed Jesus into the water, yet failed to mention the ice. Maybe, the ice just sank under Peter's weight? Sometimes, the explanation takes more faith than accepting what the text describes.

Of course, this article has to highlight the fact that people are upset by this announcement and highlight the retarded emails from people wanting Nof to "go to hell where you [Prof. Nof] belong." Riiiight.

Mel Gibson's Passion and Philosophy

2006-04-03T11:33:00.000-07:00

In preparation for Holy Week I have pulled out a couple of books. The first book on my pile is Mel Gibson's Passion and Philosophy: The Cross, the Questions, the Controversy edited by Jorge J. E. Gracia. The book is divided into five main sections, with three to six wonderful essays each. Each section centers on a major question (Did Christ have to suffer violently? Is The Passion anti-Semitic? What is Truth? Why was Christ killed? Who is morally responsible?). All of the essays are designed to bring you to some final questions specific to the topic at hand (which may end up being nice little blog ideas!). The tone and depth was sufficient to the task, neither burying the reader in jargon or belaboring concepts to the point of obfuscation.

Don't expect to have this book resolve the issues for you though. In a fairly balanced and open presentation, this book merely explores the surface of the issues. Most of the authors point out biblical inconsistencies and attempt to show why Gibson made some of the choices he made.

For some people, the movie was nothing more than pornographic. It perpetuated stereotypes, gloried in violence and showed an easy way toward atonement (by having Christ work at being the scapegoat and allowing us to behave any way we want because "Jesus died for me"). Others felt that is was a moving experience that changed lives; witness the restored marriages, confession of crimes, forgiveness chronicled by Jody Eldred. I found myself sort of on the fence concerning the movie, so this book allowed me more time to reflect and think about certain issues.

Obviously, the "pornographic" depictions of violence played a part in my understanding of the film, as did the occasional extra-biblical scenes and lines in the movie. Frankly, I was concerned about possible anti-Semitic reactions from the film (I honestly thought Gibson could have done better at getting inside the heads of the Jewish leaders). But all in all the movie was very moving for me.

For my part, Mel Gibson's Passion and Philosophy did help to clarify some perspectives on the meaning of Christ's death (not so much the meaning of the movie). Most importantly, I re-evaluated the meaning of Christ's death. What exactly was accomplished by His death and how does that effect me, personally, some 2000 years later? Why did have to be such a gruesome death? With most of next week "off" from work, I suppose I'll have more time to write about these things.

Spong's Fifth Thesis

2006-03-28T12:18:00.000-08:00

5. The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.

Spong doesn’t really tell us what he is referring to when he uses the words “post-Newtonian world”. Could he simply be meaning “post-Modern” instead. I’m not entirely sure, but I assume Spong means something like the words of James Burke, author of The Day the Universe Changed, when he writes: Newton's theories

destroyed the medieval picture of a world as a structure moved by the unseen but ever-present hand of God. Man was no longer at the centre of a system created for his edification by the Almighty; the earth was merely a small planet in an incomprehensibly vast and inanimate universe which behaved according to laws that could be calculated. There seemed, for the first time, no place in the cosmos for the providential involvement of God in the affairs of mankind.

Spong believes that, because we can explain the workings of inertia, attraction, orbits and gravity, God is no longer needed to move the heavens and the earth. More importantly, miracles, as they are commonly understood (i.e. God's interference in His own laws), are nonsensical at best.

Seeing as how Newton (as well as Kepler and Copernicus, just to mention two) had no trouble simultaneously believing in the God of the Bible AND making startling advances in mathematics and physics, I, once again, am finding that Spong is simply overstating his own beliefs in derision of others. Granted, Newton was not what I would call a convinced Christian; in fact, he found trinitarianism to be a “corruption” of the “original” intent of the Bible. Newton, though, formed his ideas based on the assumption that the laws of the universe were knowable because there was a knowable God. As some have pointed out, science can't really tell if there is a "Watchmaker", more so how blind said Creator is. Obviously, I take differential and integral calculus, gravity, attraction and inertia for granted, but the way things work does not tell us, with a low degree of necessity, much about the Maker. More importantly to this discussion, it also does not tell us if the Maker can or cannot break His own rules.

My take on this issue has always been that, while there are scientific laws, we would not be able to make sense of them unless they were indeed lawful. That is to say, because there is a God who created the universe in a particular way, we can understand those laws. While this tells us very little about the Creator--other than, perhaps, His predilections towards order--it tells me, that there is indeed a Creator. This, of course, is an interpretation of the available data. It does not preclude the possibility of other interpretations. By overstating his position, Spong claims a monopoly on the truth--something he repeatedly claims to abhor.

The Bible and Dublethink

2006-03-03T10:38:00.000-08:00

Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye, neither desire thou his dainty meats: For as he thinkth in his heart, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; but his heart is not with thee. (Proverbs 23: 6,7)

Some explanation may be in order to reconcile my metaphysical outlook (I am an anti-anti-realist!) with my view of faith and it's effects on the real world.

Jesus said:

A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth evil things. (Matthew 12:35)

What we set our mind to becomes the circumstances of our lives. Our state of mind can influence how we act and what is attracted to us, not what realty is. In other words, as Frank Outlaw puts it:

Watch your thoughts; they become your words. Watch your words; they become your actions. Watch your actions; they become your habits. Watch your habits; they become your character. Watch your character for it will become your destiny.

The Bible tells us that when we do a thing, it has consequences (the principle of reaping and sewing, Galatians 6: 7- 10). This is often more of a psychological phenomenon than the way the world works, but the reality of our health, our finances, friendships, the state of our physical surroundings do change because of how we think. What IS reality is different than how we can change reality.

What of faith? Does faith change reality? If mustard seed faith can "move mountains" (Matthew 18:12) then reality is truly mutable, right? In a metaphysical sense, that is not a necessary conclusion. First of all, I doubt Jesus meant that, if I so chose, I could just think really hard about moving Mt. Hood to, say, Seaside, and it would suddenly appear on the Oregon coast. Faith, if it exists as I understand it, is a power, a real power not in our heads but one which flows through us. It does change reality, but in much the same way that a T.V. remote changes channels. The idea here is that our faith seems to be a tool to change circumstances, our attitudes and our relationship with God, not how reality itself works. I would, probably, still need to get a pretty big dumptruck to start hauling Mt. Hood to the beach. My faith though could still play a pretty big part in the process, by attracting helpers, financiers, equipment and the dogged determination to get this monumental task done.

Doublethink

2006-03-02T20:54:00.000-08:00

I just finished re-reading George Orwell's 1984 the other day and then had a nice little discussion with a friend who believed that reality is mutable, that how we think about things REALLY makes things. Needless to say, I was mildly shocked. This sort of metaphysical outlook is becoming all to common. Honestly though, the amount of BS in the world could lead someone to BELIEVE that reality has not concrete existence--an understandable extension of today's mass marketing of everything. Needless to say, I don't want to draw any parallels to any current political issues (not to say that this sort of philosophical discussion is completely irrelevant!) but here, in a more formalized way is how I responded to my friend.

In the dark world of George Orwell's 1984, reality is tortured. The hero of the story has been captured and tormented by the Thoughpolice, because he dared to question Big Brother, dared to hope that a firm reality, one that is not continually edited to fit the current social and political "truth" did, in fact, exist. Stubbornly, Winston sought to maintain a world in which reality existed beyond his thoughts. Living in a world that rejected the ancient precepts of "natural laws", laws which work, have always worked, in the world, regardless of human intervention, Winston is forced to confront the foolishness of the mutability of the past. His captor, in an attempt to "re-educate" poor comrade Winston Smith, explains clearly the underlying metaphysical sensibilities of Ingsoc ("English socialism"):

Only the disciplined mind can see reality, Winston. You believe that reality is something objective, external, existing in its own right. You believe that the nature of reality is self-evident. When you delude yourself into thinking that you see something, you assume that everyone else sees the same thing as you But I tell you, Winston, that reality is not external. Reality exists in the human mind and nowhere else.(George Orwell, 1984, p. 205)

Those words, as odd as they may seem at first glance, appear to fall into line with one of the two major metaphysical schools of thought: anti-realism. In the end, anti-realism, though a perfectly wonderful twist for a strange totalitarian government or stranger still science fiction, falls miserably short of being a sound philosophical position.

For many (real life ?) anti-realists, to linger on Thomas Kuhn who's writing primarily relates to scientific revolutions, the world actually changes when our minds, our paradigms change. He would argue that when a scientific revolution takes place, our paradigms change. Paradigms change because anomalies were detected in the previous paradigm. One can only see what is within one's paradigm, and there is no fixed reality, therefore, when a scientific revolution occurs reality actually changes to conform to the new paradigm. These changes in paradigms are of a religious nature; one actually converts from one worldview to another. The old one false, the new true. As others (Berkeley) would put it, when we perceive things in the world, we are actually perceiving our sensations, not the thing perceived. That is, there is only the mind and what is contained in the mind.

Anti-realism relies on a view of truth that is, for many, completely subjective, while realism holds that, though our perceptions and values may be subjective, truth exists concretely "out there." Realism presupposes a reality which exists, is true, regardless of how one thinks of it. The reasons, evidence, and justifications do not, in the end, make things true or false; the way things are determines truth. Past events, for example, contrary to the Party slogan, "Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past," exist however we interpret them (or assign cause to them) whether the event is recorded or even remembered.

For anti-realism to be true, it must follow that we actually conceive of objects before they can be real. In this account of truth, the mind orders reality. To some extent this is quite true. The world, nature, life on earth, does not classify itself in neat Linnean order; we humans, with our systematic brains do. Our minds make sense out of events, assigning cause and laying blame. Anti-realism, requires that there be a conception of the truth before it becomes true; in other words, we (society, culture, family and our individual temperaments and interests) must package it up in such a way that before it becomes true, before we can even "understand" it. But do our minds actually create reality?

Though, we do process reality (those millions of bits of stuff out there) into manageable portions, it seems clear that we do think and talk about objects, we actually can refer to those objects, before we have a mental theory of that object. Before we can talk about a "thing", there has to be a thing to talk about. Let us say that at some point in a conversation, I say that "I saw a leucosticte the other day." You may not even know what a leucosticte is, or even have a clue that such a thing might exist. Now, there must be such a thing before we can discuss what it was that I saw. (Nevermind that there really are such things as leucostictes, which are a genus of finches.) But let us suppose we were talking about "unicorns" or any other mythical or unreal creatures. Does it follow that there must be a real unicorn before we can talk about it? Yes, in the sense that everyone knows what a unicorn is: a horse with a horn on its head. Everyone knows what a horse is; we've all seen a four-legged, big creature humans, in English, have labeled a "horse." We all know what a "horn" is, too. When we refer to the mythical creature "unicorn", we are essentially speaking about "a horse with a horn on its head." The conceptual theory ("unicorn"), though a completely fanciful creation, is a composite of two very real objects. For anti-realist, the opposite is held as true; that is, we actually "make up" the concept of "horse", which, like the unicorn, is collection of non-related ideas. It appears though, that the anti-realists have the power to simultaneously hold in his mind two contradictory beliefs, and believe both equally. In 1984, this is called "doublethink". On the one hand, everything is subjective; at best, we might say or think we agree what a given word, concept or truth might mean, but, to even have a conversation about "leucostictes" or "unicorns", presupposes the reality behind those words. Though an anti-realist might make the claim that we can change reality, our words must refer to something outside of the text of our words. And if words alone have meaning, yet did not actually refer to external realities and contained so much personal, cultural contamination as to be unfathomable possibly even to the speaker, then true dialogue is at best extremely difficult.

But let us say for a moment that one could change or control reality by some mental miracle, that we could exercise some form of "reality control" as Wiston's captor O'Brian suggested. How does this actually work? In the words of O'Brian himself:

We control matter because we control the mind. Reality is inside the skull. You will learn by degrees, Winston. There is nothing that we could not do. Invisibility, levitation--anything. I could float off this floor like a soap bubble if I wished. I do not wish to, because the Party does not wish it. You must get rid of those nineteenth-century ideas about the laws of nature. We make the laws of nature. (1984, p. 218.)

"If he thinks he floats off the floor, and if I simultaneously think I see him do it," Winston later muses, "then the thing happens" (1984, p. 229). For anti-realists, the best that we can do is to agree upon the meaning of a word or event; humans do not have access to the true essence of a thing.

It goes without saying that we cannot communicate about things without language. Furthermore, it is understood that human language, itself, is a very imperfect mechanism. We are stuck with what we have. With that in mind, though, we cannot be lured into a world-construction wherein what is true can be, at the same time, in our minds and out there, as anti-realists seem to want to place it. It is untenable that two opposing, yet equally held, concepts be held and believed at the same time. (The anti-realist may argue that he really believes that true is completely mind-dependent, but, if that were true, any attempt at communicating those "truths" would be absolutely pointless, because the recipient is essentially living in a different world.) The language of a metaphysical realist is more concrete, despite the imperfections and difficulties in communicating. What one means by a given word, phrase, or concept, for the realist, actually refers to the truth or essence of a thing. Because we can actually compete the validity of a statement to the way things are, the realist can, with some confidence communicate.

Our perceptions are not, in fact cannot be, what makes a thing true; they are how we perceive that thing. If we go so far as to say that reality only exists as long as we agree upon its validity, that humans must experience it before it magically becomes real, then how does one person express reality to another? In the end, it becomes impossible, and we end up in a world in which, if one wanted to, one could levitate at will, change the way things are with a single thought, and reduce ourselves to speaking only of opinions which at any given moment can be re-written to suite current political or social needs. The world of Winston Smith is one filled with subjective reality, where objects, events, things do not come into existence until they are conceived of by human beings, where people can exist in a state of doublethink. This form of "reality control", relying on a truth which only exists between the ears, makes for great fiction, or ugly history, has very little strength of merit.

Darwin's Warm Pond Theory Tested

2006-02-15T09:43:00.000-08:00

On of the things that has always caused me to be skeptical of the Darwinian view of the origin of life is its inablility to explain how basic cellular building blocks came together in the first place. A cell cannot function without a very specific combination of amino acids, which at the start, requires the blue-prints found only in DNA. DNA does not exist in the wild, but amino acids do. What Darwin, and his followers, suggested is that life began when the raw chemicals of life found themselves in a "warm little pond" somewhere in the world a very long time ago. This theory is now being tested.

Unfortunately, the results do not bear out Darwin's theory. For nearly 100 years now, volcanic clays were thought to be the perfect place for the origin of life. But it turns out that surface of clays in warm to hot water do not polymerize sufficiently to cause organic molecules to form. In fact, according to resent research, clay binds to the organic compounds in such a way that no further growth can be measured.

I'm not about to suggest HOW God did it, but it's clear to me that the only way to get life in the first place is through some miraculous process. The origin of life, from a purely physical, scientific view is completely paradoxical. So, according to the article in question, we are required to push the origin of life back into outer space. Which only defers the question to speculation, unless one is comfortable with the idea of an all-powerful Creator. Next thing we know, we'll just skip Christmas and celebrate Darwin's birthday . . . oh wait, we are!

On Bullshit

2006-02-07T10:29:00.000-08:00

One of the most salient features of our culture is that there is so much bullshit. Everyone knows this. Each of us contributes his share. But we tend to take the situation for granted.

Thus opens the small--but very important--book by Harry G. Franfurt, On Bullshit.

Philosophy is about exploring the mundane in complex and disciplined ways. It is the science of apprehending truth behind space and time, love and good, meaning and meaninglessness. It is also about definition. What do we mean when we use the word "bullshit"? Why is there so much of it and what function does it serve? These are the main questions this book attempts to answer.

First of all, the book is ridiculously short. It really amounts to a short essay forced between hard covers. It can easily be read in an hour, but, with most philosophy, one reading won't be enough to thoroughly make sense of the argument. Don't be fooled, though, this IS philosophy at its best. Frankfurt is not a Hegel, Heidegger or Kant, but tackles his subject with a keen mind, philosophical methods and refreshing brevity. It is not meant to be funny (even though some of Frankfurt's observations and examples are), so if you're looking for a joke-book, I'd pass on this one.

So, what exactly is bullshit? Frankfurt enlists the help of Max Black, Ludwig Wittgenstein and, even, St. Augustine (in an interesting treatment of his eight categories of lying) to define and explain the phenomenon in question. What Frankfurt comes up with is no big surprise: Bullshit is speech that is not exactly lying. It is "hot air", empty, substanceless speech designed to enhanced the image of the speaker rather than advance the cause of truth.

It is impossible for someone to lie unless he thinks he knows the truth. Producing bullshit requires no such conviction. A person who lies is thereby responding to the truth, and he is to that extent respectful of it. When an honest man speaks, he says only what he believes to be true; and for the liar, it is correspondingly indispensable that he considers his statements to be false. For the bullshitter, however, all bets are off: he is neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false . . . . He does not care whether the things he says describe reality correctly. He just picks them out, or makes them up, to suit his purposes.

This is why, according to Augustine, bullshit is more dangerous than a lie, because the liar does not reject the authority of the truth. A liar unwillingly lies to achieve some goal or avoid consequences, while a bullshitter is indifferent to how things really are.

So, if it is so bad, why does there seem to be so much of it. Frankfurt believes that the world we live in makes bullshit almost unavoidable. Because we are so often required to speak about things we know little or nothing about (maybe we know "just enough to be dangerous"), especially in political and technical (don't I know it!) arenas, we can't help but sling a little. We're not lying and maybe we even care about the truth of a matter, but the image we want to project becomes more important than reality. This is especially true in our fast-paced democracy where there is immense pressure to have an opinion on everything.

There may be deeper reasons for the rise of bullshit in our society. The deeply held and popular metaphysical anti-realist assumptions concerning the seat of reality informs a highly mutable epistemology. That is, the modern belief that so much of reality exists in our heads as subjective experience ("brains in a vat") leads to heightened skepticism concerning what we can really know. People substitute the pursuit of correctness (reality) with a pursuit of sincerity, as Frankfurt puts it.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book. All in all, this is an important book that fills in a gap between informal logic and every-day common sense.

Video interviews of the author

Supreme Court Upholds Oregon Suicide Law

2006-01-17T09:39:00.000-08:00

With the vote count at 6-3, the Supreme Court upheld Oregon's 1997 "Death with Dignity" law. The Bush administration began the challenge in 2001, claiming that the law allowed physicians to prescribe drugs without "legitimate medical purpose". For the majority, Justice Kennedy said the "authority claimed by the attorney general is both beyond his expertise and incongruous with the statutory purposes and design." While dissenting Justice Scalia noted that "If the term `legitimate medical purpose' has any meaning, it surely excludes the prescription of drugs to produce death."

Oregon's law requires that a person be at least 18 years old, a resident of Oregon, capable (defined as able to make and communicate health care decisions), and diagnosed with a terminal illness that will lead to death within six months. After a specific seven steps, a physician may prescribe a lethal dose of "medication". The doctor must report the prescription and the Department of Human Services must collect and publicly distribute data in accordance with legislation passed in 1999.

Briefly, I am disappointed in the Court's ruling. While, on the whole, I am glad for this debate--it has done some real good in terms of palliative care--the idea of medicating people to death does not strike me as the most ethical of positions. My stance is pretty simple: if medications happen to cause or speed up the death process in the act of helping or improving (life-giving) a patient's ability to cope with illness or injury, then the doctor has done his job as well as he or she can. This is particularly true in relation to pain medications. On the other hand, intentionally shortening life through the use of drugs leads to the belief that, in some situations, some lives are not worth living. Allowing death and hastening death are two very distinct positions. Medications, by definition, are used to help a person, a substance used in therapy; intending to kill someone is not therapy.

It appears that, once again, the people of Oregon will be required to deal with this issue as, perhaps, it should be.

Good News: I am not a heretic!

2006-01-16T16:14:00.000-08:00

While it seems to be a little tongue in cheek, this little quiz does give you a sense of where you stand. Here’s my results:

You scored as Chalcedon compliant. You are Chalcedon compliant. Congratulations, you're not a heretic. You believe that Jesus is truly God and truly man and like us in every respect, apart from sin. Officially approved in 451.

Chalcedon compliant
75%
Pelagianism
58%
Nestorianism
42%
Adoptionist
33%
Apollanarian
33%
Monophysitism
33%
Modalism
25%
Docetism
8%
Albigensianism
8%
Monarchianism
8%
Socinianism
8%
Donatism
0%
Gnosticism
0%
Arianism
0%

Are you a heretic?
created with QuizFarm.com

I guess I'm still a "Fundamentalist", but I noticed that I score pretty high with Pelagianism (the belief in radical free will and the goodness of the natural world) and Nestorianism (the belief that Jesus was not a unified being, both God and man simultaneously). While I do not deny that human beings have complete free will--and, thus responsibility for their actions--I believe that humans are "tainted" with sin. That is not to say that physical mater is, itself, evil. Rather, that people pass on error from generation to generation. To what degree that genetics, family spiritual legacies or cultural environments play a part, I am not sure. Obviously though, I understand Jesus as a single being, who, from the beginning was God and was imparted into physical humanity through some unknown means. He was simultaneously fully human and fully God.

For more info on heresies, check out the following:

Christian Heresies

Heresies and Schisms in the Early Church

Doctrine and Heresies in the Early Church

Heretics, Heresies and the Church

Spong's Fourth Thesis

2006-01-09T12:17:00.000-08:00

4. The virgin birth, understood as literal biology, makes Christ's divinity, as traditionally understood, impossible.

Spong does not state his strong premise, something like: "divine intervention and manipulation of 'literal' biology is impossible". Not only does Spong fail to clearly state this foundational premise, he seems content to provide no proof that his corollary argument is indeed true.

I am not about to make an attempt to prove that miracles do, indeed, exist; perhaps, I will tackle that in future posts. My problem with Spong is not that he has a different (and I would argue, equally difficult to defend) position than mine. Rather, Spong sees himself as a pure scientist talking about religious issues. Science, as we all know, has a certain arena to which it is confined: observable, repeatable, empirical data. It draws general conclusions from that collected and double-checked by a community of professional scientists familiar with particular questions. Spong is, quite simply, confusing reproductive biology with a particular issue in theology.

No one in their right mind is going to say that Christ's birth, as depicted in the Gospels is natural. Which makes Spong's statement, on the face of it, quite correct; it is quite impossible for a woman to have a child outside of the normal biological processes. Then again, that's why it's a miracle.

Spong simply cannot image a God that intervenes in human history, much less one that bodily manifests Himself. Spong is not re-thinking the New Testament account of Christ's incarnation and birth. He is abandoning it, which is fine and good. As with the other issues, because Spong cannot image a thing, it must be false. This is not sufficient proof that his opponents are wrong and his thesis is true. It simply leaves it open for respectful debate . . . I hope.

Christian Consumerism

2006-01-06T16:54:00.000-08:00

Last night, our Worship Pastor invited everyone involved in the GPBC worship ministries for a time of prayer and consecration. It was a very moving and much-needed evening of news, supplication and fellowship. Dave did a great job of inspiring and challenging us to the possibilities God has is store for the church and Christ's Body in general for the coming year. I felt that Dave did a very good job of warning against consumer culture while balancing the need to meet one another's' needs.

For my part, I have struggled with the concept of Christian consumerism this past year. If looking to fulfill our needs is such a bad thing then why be at church at all? When I am feeling like I am bored with a particular song, should I just go through the motions, playing the notes and moving on to the next song? Doesn't God want to meet our needs?

What Dave was able to do though is to help me have a better understanding of the concept. While I have no problem with the fact that people DO come to church to receive, I am now more able to see how I might improve the situation. That is to say, we can only truly receive what God has prepared for us when we are willing to humble ourselves, submit, give and work hard. To often though, people (myself included) come to church to get something, be entertained, grab a blessing and, in the end, miss the opportunity to heal and bless others. This isn't what God requires of us. An attitude like that will only weaken the Body.

I will take Dave's admonition to heart this year. I will work hard to be a blessing to others, even though I may not feel like at the time.

My New Year's Resolution

2006-01-05T14:09:00.000-08:00

This year I resolve to act more in line with what I believe. It's sometimes easy for me to be fearful, even though I have faith in God's purposes for my life. It's even easier let things slide and procrastinate, when I know that my life is supposed to be purpose-filled. I don't see myself as a major hypocrite, but there are times in my life when I do not act like a child of God. I want to take the time to honor God by making real connections between the way I think (and believe) and what I do.

Merry Christmas

2005-12-25T23:35:00.000-08:00

. . . kinda.

This has been a very strange Christmas time for my wife and I. We spent last Sunday down with the nieces. We had a great time watching them do their "Mayhem in Bethlehem! A 30 minute Special Report". Then, had a nice lunch before we had to make haste to get home in a freezing rain storm.

Christmas eve we spent up in Seattle watching the Seahawks womp on the Colts on a warm and dry Pacific Northwest day. But for the rain coming up to Seattle, the weather was perfect. We listened to "A Christmas Carol" on CD on the way up as well as a little music to boot, but it just didn't seem like Christmas.

Christmas day, we were at church. Teresa was doing PowerPoint and we had a special guest leading most of the service from behind the piano. It was very nice. Then Teresa's dad, mother-in-law and her son went out to Sharis for lunch. The gamblers really put us all in the holiday mood! Later in the day, we went over to Todd's and stuffed ourselves, made small-talk and exchanged presents. It was very nice.

Needless to say, this has been an odd season for us. We got down all the Christmas decorations, but we only put one up--the lit star on the front door. It was good to take a break from the usual Christmas rush, but I think next year, we'll definitely be in more in the spirit. We're already making plans!

The Great "Happy Holidays" Controversy

2005-12-18T07:20:00.000-08:00

It's taken me a little while to digest the current "Happy Holidays" controversy, but I think I finally have my thoughts in order. Apparently, some people really take this sort of thing seriously. "It is insulting that Wal-Mart has chosen to ignore the reason for the season," Dick Otterstad of the Church of the Divide (pictured in the Santa costume) said. "Taking the word 'Christmas' out of the holiday implies there's something sinful about it. . . . This is a part of our culture."

As you probably already know, I'm a Christian, and I certainly can sympathize with Mr. Otterstad's concerns. There's a lot about the "holiday" season that is less than holy and anything that diminishes the meaningfulness of Christ’s birth should be held to a minimum. That said, I think that Wal-Mart and other stores are responding in a reasonable manner. By way of explanation, I celebrate a number of meaningful holidays in early winter, not least of all is Christmas, but I also celebrate to one degree or another Hanukkah, New Year's Eve, and Epiphany. Granted, I would probably be in Wal-Mart because of Christmas, but no one working there is going to know that. Heck, should they be expected to wish me a happy birthday just in case I was born in December?

In the end, store workers are simply saying, "hi, I'm glad you're spending your money here!" Do you really expect a private corporation to make a truly religious statement?

We should forget the so-called war on Christmas and declare war on Santa. What we should really be focusing on is not a simple gesture, but on the “new” mythology of Christmas. What do elves, flying reindeer, talking snowmen and especially omni-present bribe-masters have to do with the winter holidays, much less reality itself? More importantly, what are the messages this mythology sends? We better be good or we'll get a lump of coal?

Dear Santa, gimme stuff.

Spong's Third Thesis

2005-12-17T16:16:00.000-08:00

3. The biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.

In Spong's mind, the idea of a "good" (it was not "perfect" as Spong claims) creation and a literal Fall are not even ideas worthy of discussion because they are either unintelligible (he literal can't understand the meanings of these ideas) or are simply valueless (as in the content of the word "incarnation", "creation" and "fall" are valueless). In a word, they are nonsense for Spong. The crux of Spong's comments here center around his attachment to a Darwinian worldview. While I'll have to put off fully evaluating Spong's take on this worldview, I will make a few short observations.

Spong holds Darwin in high regard, speaking at length about the scientist's accomplishments and impact on our modern world (Why Christianity Must Change or Die, pp. 35-8). Essentially, Spong believes that Darwin conclusively demonstrated that life is evolving and that it was never in a final, finished form. Darwin proved that human beings are simply animals, with the same sorts of inadequacies, foibles, drives and brutish morality. In fact, the great divide between the soulless animals and the specially created, eternally loved human being had been completely smashed. The only difference between humans and "non-human animals" was a greater power of rationalism (which Spong later calls into question).

I will agree with Spong on one point though: Darwin is a serious challenge for traditional Christianity, especially if you already think theology itself is suspect. On the other hand, what Darwin had to say about the development of new species--while it may shape our view of the nature of God and His plan--tells us nothing about the nature and condition of spiritual qualities of mankind. I could, simultaneously hold true Darwin's belief that human beings evolved from a common animal ancestor, and hold that human beings are endowed with divine interest and connection. In other words, I could easily interpret the first couple of chapters of Genesis in a Darwinian light and still hold that God created us. While I find that idea in conflict with my understanding of God and evolution, I can certainly see where such an idea could spark dialogue between the likes of Spong and "Fundamentalists" like me.

Unfortunately, Spong packs his thesis with some extra baggage here. Spong attacks the Fall as improbably in light Darwinian explanations. If human beings are simply animals, he would argue, then we are neither good nor bad at the start; there is no original sin into which we are born. Therefore, we are not guilty of anything worth Godly intervention, especially in the way traditional Christianity sees Christ. In essence, Spong stakes out territory neither Darwin, nor science in general can.

On Disappointment & Depression

2005-12-10T23:03:00.000-08:00

The past few weeks have been extremely sucky. As you've noticed, I've not really been posting much (despite the fact, that I know, at the very least, it helps me continue to use my brain for constructive purposes). I'm making a valiant attempt to enjoy the holiday season in the face of dwindling clients, family deaths, people who waste my time and a general feeling of hopelessness, worthlessness and general mental and spiritual fatigue. It would be easy to abandon myself to an extended pity party, if I let myself.

I have even questioned my relationship with God over the past few weeks: whether God answers prays or if He listens at all. Why would He put me through this yet again? Is it punishment for sin? An essential flaw in who I am?

These are good questions, I believe, ones worthy of concerted mental effort, because the answers I come up with will either make or break me. I've sought help to work things through emotionally and biochemically, but I never wanted this blog to be yet another angst-ridden diary. Rather, I want this to be a place where I can come to grips with reality in a (more or less) public way.

I heard it said on TV not too long ago that Christians should not confess depression and disappointment in public. Such an admission, it was said, demonstrates the unsaved condition of the soul and was a poor reflection on the teaching and ministry of a particular church and pastor. The impression the speaker gave was that Christians were to be constantly happy, healthy and productive and that our circumstances never should have an effect on our lives. My first reaction, not being in a completely sound state of mind, was to agree. Why not feed the fires of self-pity? It seemed logical enough. But in a more reflective and less self-loathing mood, I reject such thinking.

That is not to say that whining and belly-aching are signs of a good Christian. Quite the contrary. Disappointment and, subsequent or related, depression may be a sign that we were too focused on our own hopes and plans. This is especially true if one does not adapt to the unfolding situation and attempt to move forward. If I do not take the time to really come to grips with these disappointments in a calm, rational and God-centered way, then I really am demonstrating some form of spiritual deficiency.

Here's where we have the tight rope: on the one hand, there really are things in the world that are, well, not right. Our hopes and dreams are generally in line with what God would want, yet they do not come to pass. Other people do misuse us and the people we love do die. I do not believe it is unbiblical or ethically unsound to acknowledge and, perhaps even, embrace those wrongs. This can be useful in many ways--strengthening our empathy for other people, kindling our righteous anger for justice, giving us an opportunity to see things from God's perspective, not ours--only if we are honest about our feelings and allow God to be part of the equation.

In the end, that is what I have tried to do: see things from God’s perspective and consider alternative scenarios and motivations. God still loves me and has a plan that is just right for me, despite the fact that I am not privy to the entirety of that plan. I, myself, don’t always know exactly what’s best for me. Almost always, disappointment and depression are for my ultimate good.

Spong's Second Thesis

2005-11-06T18:03:00.000-08:00

2. Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.

Assuming the first thesis is valid, this second would follow nicely. When I was an atheist, I could agree with Spong on this. The idea of God was simply a human invention used to control and give superficial meaning to lives. Therefore the stories set down in the Bible concerning Jesus as the "Son of God" was pure propaganda. This became my first concern: was Jesus who the Bible said he was?

For my part, it seemed rather elementary; either I accepted what the New Testament had to say about Jesus or I reject, in its entirety, the whole "story". Everything found in the last 27 books of the Bible is predicated on the idea that Jesus was somehow simultaneously a mere man AND God, from its basic intent to its historicism, especially its metaphysics and ethics. While the Bible MAY contain some good and helpful advice, its underlying view of the world is warped and suspect, if there was no incarnation. Essentially, Spong is correct: IF the Bible is wrong about God, it is also wrong about Jesus as well.

On to the real issue at hand. Is Jesus God incarnate? Spong thinks that this is an impossibility, or, more to the point, nonsense. Spong sees Christ as the "hero of a thousand faces" and no one can make a concrete claim about who or what exactly Jesus was (except Spong, of course). Jesus was whatever your influences indicate he was. Whatever the case, Jesus was "love"--From which Spong can make the claim that Jesus could not endorse such notions as hell, guilt of sin and Judgment. While I cannot formulate an iron-clad argument for Christ's divinity, neither can Spong refute such a claim, except through recourse to a particular view of materialism and advanced physics--even these raise as many questions as they do answers. In the end, this may simply be a matter of belief, of faith, one way or another. I can live it as such; Spong seems to be unable to do so.

Unfortunately for Spong, while conceiving of God and Jesus in theistic terms does not make it true, there are still many people, myself included, who can quite easily conceive of God in theistic terms. I wouldn't go so far as to accuse Spong of lying, as some have, on this point, but I will say, he's being very loose with his language. Again, if Spong can no longer conceive of a theistic God, then that is a failing on his part. (Note that the standard he sets here is only having a conception of a certain kind of deity.)

"That's not racial."

2005-11-02T21:49:00.000-08:00

You know things are bad when Black Democrats start calling Black Republicans "Sambo". Apparently, it's OK to point out "the obvious" fact that conservative Republican Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele, who is running for a seat in the U.S. Senate, is an "Uncle Tom".

Pardon me while I pick my lower jaw up off the floor.

Spong's First Thesis

2005-11-02T15:50:00.000-08:00

1. Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.

Spong is deeply aware of the "gallingly apparent" inadequacy of human language to fully capture what God is. "The God I know is not concrete or specific;" Spong tells us, "this God can never be enclosed by propositional statements" (Why Christianity Must Change or Die, p. 4). God, for Spong, "might not be separate from us but rather deep within us" and God is everything there is plus "something more"(Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism, p. 33). God is a what rather than a who (Why Christianity Must Change or Die, p. 60).

OK, fine and good. I think I understand Spong's distinction between "theism" and his view of God. That is, God is an awesome, irreducible reality, while theism is the vain attempt to define God through language. Theism, for Spong, seems to be a caricature of the "Man upstairs", a Freudian delusion invented to satisfy an unthinking population, a human father figure endowed with fantastic powers and abilities, an opiate. Perhaps, he's a hunched old man with a white beard down to his knobby knees. I agree with Spong on this point: these attempts to categorize God completely fail to capture the entirety of what God is. Then again, I don't know too many people who actually believe God can be packaged as simply as this. Sure, God-talk could be the expression of wishful thinking, power, or plain goofiness. But, taking a guess here, I'm sure most people who use these sorts of simple pictures to capture God are either trying to access a single aspect of God or have their tongue firmly in cheek. Serious theists do not really believe that their description, however detailed or thoughtful, contains the entire God-reality. For example, I don't believe a serious theist would actually commit to the idea that God is actually one gender or the other.

Now, we can address theism's supposed death.

What Spong fails to realize is that there is still a very sizable portion of the world that still finds theism--the belief in a person called God--quite worthy of our, ever so fallible, language. For many of us, God is a very personal, very real experience that can be approached in concrete, specific theological terms. Even if Spong cannot properly conceive of this reality, it exists for people nevertheless. If the language of theology is meaningless, it is meaningless to Spong himself not to those of us who understand God's presence in personal ways. Granted, there is a lot about our experience of God that goes beyond propositional statements. As I said before, I doubt that our language alone is up to the challenge of fully describing God. If Spong is up to the task of conveying information about his God without the use of propositional statements, I'd be deeply interested in how that might be done; frankly, I don't know how to talk about anything without the use of propositional statements.

In some ways, I agree with Spong though. So often, we gravitate toward what other people have said about God. We adopt other people's description of God and assume that we have "got it". The only way God can be real is through our own personal experience and cold hard logic. God cannot be put in a box, but we can approach God, not by dismissing the descriptors of the past rather, by embracing what He is despite the limits of human language. Theism is not dead but simplistic and naive caricatures of something completely outside of our tangible experience must be qualified. While using language to capture the infinite is not meaningless, it takes a great deal of discipline and honesty to proceed with confidence.

"Nonsense"

2005-11-01T09:19:00.000-08:00

Before I actually begin to tackle Spong's Thesis, I must address the word "nonsense". Nonsense, as defined by Dictionary.com:

Words or signs having no intelligible meaning: a message that was nonsense until decoded.
Subject matter, behavior, or language that is foolish or absurd.
Extravagant foolishness or frivolity: a clown's exuberant nonsense.
Matter of little or no importance or usefulness: a chatty letter full of gossip and nonsense.
Insolent talk or behavior; impudence: wouldn't take any nonsense from the children.

Merriam-Webster defines "nonsense" as:

1 a words or language having no meaning or conveying no intelligible ideas b (1) : language, conduct, or an idea that is absurd or contrary to good sense (2) : an instance of absurd action
2 a : things of no importance or value : TRIFLES b : affected or impudent conduct

In Spong's mind, traditional Christian ideas are not even worthy of discussion because they are either unintelligible (he literally can't understand the meanings of these ideas) or are actually valueless (as in the content of the word "incarnation", "creation" and "fall" lack appreciable correspondence to anything real).

"Nonsense" for Spong is anything encumbered by meaningless code words. For example, he might read The Apostle's Creed this way:

I believe in God, the 7371 89746422,
the Creator of 41112366 and earth,
and in Jesus 33896, 131456662 only 431, our 3131677

Where the numbers represent a correspondence to some long-dead code, which has no hope of being deciphered. Furthermore, if anyone claims to understand this code, they must be mistaken, because it, indeed, is indecipherable. What Spong appears to be saying is "I personally don't get it so it must be false."

A Call for a New Reformation?

2005-10-31T21:09:00.000-08:00

On this day, 488 years ago, the young Martin Luther nailed his Ninety-Five Theses to the door of the Wittenberg Church. This, of course, was not the first time the Church had been invited to openly discuss important issues, but this was the beginning of a much larger and much more violent exchange involving almost the entire Body of Christ in Europe. As the Right Reverend John Shelby Spong, points out:

Despite the hostile appellations of "heretic" hurled at Protestants and "anti-Christ" hurled at Catholics, anyone viewing this debate from the vantage point of this century would see that, while an acrimonious and unpleasant fight, it was nonetheless a fight that pitted Christian believers against Christian believers. The Reformation was not an attempt to reformulate the Christian faith for a new era. It was rather a battle over issues of Church order. The time had not arrived in which Christians would be required to rethink the basic and identifying marks of Christianity itself.

Now, he claims, is the time to face more fundamental issues.

It should be noted that I find Spong remarkably unprofessional and consistently un-philosophical. Not because he brings up probing questions (questions I myself continue to struggle with), or even coming up with answers that I disagree with (some of which I agree with, but only by degree). Spong repeatedly misinterprets facts to fit his own view of God, the Bible, Christianity and, his favorite bugaboo, "Fundamentalists". Spong has the flair for the dramatic, floating deeply idiosyncratic speculation as if it were solid "scholarship". His worst sin, in my book, is his habit of poisoning the well, labeling his opponents and assuming the worst when he finds something disagreeable. Unfortunately, Spong has a very wide and loyal audience; where other more reasonable liberal theologians get ignored, Spong has a way of hogging the spotlight.

That said, I can respect anyone who seeks the truth. While sometimes I feel Spong is a bit disingenuous about that task, I find his questions extremely worthy of investigation. Some time ago, Reverend Spong posted a list of twelve challenges. I plan to address each, in turn, over the next month. I will attempt to deal with these statements as discreet assertions, working through each on their own merits as philosophical postulates. That is to say, I plan on dealing with each thesis as a texually and philosophically as possible.

Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.
Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.
The biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.
The virgin birth, understood as literal biology, makes Christ's divinity, as traditionally understood, impossible.
The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.
The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.
Resurrection is an action of God. Jesus was raised into the meaning of God. It therefore cannot be a physical resuscitation occurring inside human history.
The story of the Ascension assumed a three-tiered universe and is therefore not capable of being translated into the concepts of a post-Copernican space age.
There is no external, objective, revealed standard writ in scripture or on tablets of stone that will govern our ethical behavior for all time.
Prayer cannot be a request made to a theistic deity to act in human history in a particular way.
The hope for life after death must be separated forever from the behavior control mentality of reward and punishment. The Church must abandon, therefore, its reliance on guilt as a motivator of behavior.
All human beings bear God's image and must be respected for what each person is. Therefore, no external description of one's being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection or discrimination.

Some notes on Sin

2005-10-26T17:20:00.000-07:00

Thomas Aquinas writes:

. . . sin is broadly used to mean any failure of activity, natural or designed, to reach its goal . . . . But the meaning of sin proper to morals is of cuplable failure of will to reach a due goal because it is drawn toward an unsuitable one.

Essentially, sin is "missing the mark", failing to measure up to a proper standard. The "mark", in this case, is God's Law. Biblically speaking, "Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness" (1 John 3:4, NIV) or in the King James, "for sin is the transgression of the law."

So, our duty to God is live our lives in such as way as to avoid clashing with His will. Put positively: Our best interest is served when we are in line His Law. Life should be lived in such a way as to avoid sin, to "hit the mark" as it were. The trick of it is, of course, learning what the mark is. I like how John Wesley's mother explained it (Letter, June 8, 1725):

Take this rule: whatever weakens your reason, impairs the tenderness of your conscience, obscures your sense of God, or takes off your relish of spiritual things; in short, whatever increases the strength and authority of your body over your mind, that thing is sin to you, however innocent it may be in itself.

For a more in depth look at a biblical view of sin, check out "What is Sin?" by Tony Warren.

Book Review: The Myth of Certainty

2005-10-22T22:46:00.000-07:00

"Doubt is not a pleasant condition," Voltaire tells the Prince of Prussia, Frederick the Great, "but certainty is an absurd one."

I'm not entirely sure I agree with Voltaire on this one, but I will say doubt and certainty are both my constant companion. I have always felt caught in the middle between two powers, intellectually speaking. My commitment to secular progress, rationality and open-mindedness sometimes feels at complete odds with my commitment to my Christian faith. And vice versa. So, when browsing the bookstore earlier this summer, I stumbled upon The Myth of Certainty by Daniel Taylor, I felt like, just maybe, there was someone else out there like me. The back cover reads: "Do you resent the smugness of close-minded skepticism on the one hand but feel equally uncomfortable with the smugness of close-minded Christianity on the other? If so, then The Myth of Certainty is for you."

The Myth of Certainty: The Reflective Christian & the Risk of Commitment is a fascinating read for someone like me who has been steeped both in academic liberalism AND conservative Christianity. All subcultures require certain degrees of uniformity; all institutions, secular or religious, require a certain degree of unquestioning loyalty. The Church's job on earth is to be Bride of Christ, to witness and to serve. As Taylor points out,

Certainly these are the goals of the church, realized here and there, now and then. The parallel reality, however, is at the same time the church is an institution which operates, consciously or not, like other human institutions.

The primary goal of all institutions and subcultures is self-preservation. Preserving the faith is central to God's plan for human history; preserving particular religious institutions is not. Do not expect those who run the institutions to be sensitive to the difference. God needs no particular person, church, denomination, creed, or organization to accomplish His purpose. He will make use of those, in all their diversity, who are ready to be used, but will leave to themselves those who labor for their own ends.

Nonetheless, questioning the institution is synonymous, for many, with attacking God.(pp. 29-30)

Every question raised becomes a mini-crisis of faith. Questions make people uncomfortable, in whichever subculture you find yourself in, religious or secular.

". . . each group is impatient with the recalcitrant who wants to retain parts of both worlds. Conservative Christendom will allow you to think, as long as you think 'correctly,' or keep dangerous thoughts to yourself. The secular world will allow you to be a Christian, as long as your faith is kept in quarantine and not allowed to influence your judgments or lead to you to question secular presuppositions. (p.60)

That is the difficulty addressed in this book.

The Myth of Certainty is a fascinating read and I should like to recommend it mostly to those of you who are firmly in one of the opposing camps, whether firmly secular or firmly conservative Christian. Taylor's honest approach is refreshing and non-threatening. Both sides could learn quite a bit about the other from this. In addition, it might just open some eyes to the condition of "reflective Christian".

Catholic High School Teacher Forced Out over Flag

2005-10-19T07:37:00.000-07:00

This summer, Stephen Kobasa, a teacher at Kolbe Cathedral High School, a Catholic high school in Bridgeport, Connecticut, was forced out of his job because he refused to have an American flag in his classroom. "Everything in the Gospel rejects what flags stand for: boundaries, hatreds, creation of enemies," Kobasa says. "For a Catholic Christian school that holds up the crucifix as a symbol of God's love, the flag can only be a contradiction. The Church can only function with its prophetic voice by standing outside the state."

I'm not entirely sure I agree with his entire assessment--especially "hatreds, creation of enemies"--but I do sympathize with Kobasa's point of view. There's something unsettling about a flag-waving church. Don't get me wrong: I'm awfully glad to be living in the United States. I feel that this country truly was God-inspired, but I can also see where Kobasa is coming from.

Christianity is about bringing people into the Kingdom of God. We, Christians, are sons and daughters of Christ, and "there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for [we] are all one in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:26-28). We are neither American or German, Chinese or Angolan and our first responsibility and our loyalty should be to the Kingdom of God first and foremost. We cannot serve two masters, God and money or God and country. While we operate in the world with both money and country, there are some obvious (or maybe not so obvious) difficulties involved.

That said, just to be clear here, I see nothing wrong with honoring our country, its myths, symbols, military personnel, etc.. Even actively participating in politics should be one of the ways in which we witness the truth of Christ's love and life in us. Finding ways of recognizing the importance of earthly citizenship during times of high patriotism while remembering our spiritual commitments takes some work; I can attest to this!

I'm afraid I come down on the fence when it comes to making public pledges of allegiance to any earthly institution. I certainly don't disparage anyone who take such oaths and I certainly can understand that there may be situations where refusing to display symbols or take a pledge that would offend the conscience. In Kobasa's case, I cannot pass judgment on either side; both obeyed their conscience (I will assume).

Book Review: Being Logical

2005-10-18T12:47:00.000-07:00

Since taking my first philosophy class some 20 years ago, I have always been struck with how ubiquitous bad thinking is. In my estimation, it's gotten worse in since then, especially on account of the rise of the Internet. That's not to say that the Internet is not a good place to have philosophical discussions, rather, the Internet seems to be a place where really bad thinking flourishes; you aren't required to have an editor when you write for the Internet!

In Being Logical: A Guide to Good Thinking, D. Q. McInerny presents informal logic in a meaningful and non-technical manner. In part one, McInerny sets the stage by preparing the mind to engage in logical discourse. In part two and three, discusses the basic principles of logic, gray areas, explanations, definitions, crafting a strong argument. Here's the meat of the book, for, after all, philosophy really is the activity of creating and evaluating arguments. The last two parts deal specifically with how to identify bad thinking, evasive agnosticism, emotionalism, common sense along with a fairly detailed list of informal fallacies.

Even at only 137 pages, including a reasonable index, this is a very nice read. After reading Kant's Logic or Quine's Elementary Logic, you can get a real appreciation for something that is written simply, and without a lot of tedious technicalities.