Tag: Apolgetics
Understanding the New Atheists
Understanding the New Atheists
For the last few years I have been trying my best to understand the new atheist movement and all of its ranting and raving against God and religion. Then it dawned on me, that I could not understand them because we were not talking about the same things. The god and religion that they are ranting against is not the God I believe in or the religion I practice.
The majority of them talk about a god that I believed in at one time and a religion I was a part of when I was a young man. However, I no longer believe in that god nor do I practice that religion. It took a number of years on my journey to find The Wholly Other; or should I say for him to find me and to lead me out of the forest of religious idols I was lost and hiding in.
Looking back on my journey it is hard to understand why it took so long to be found by the Lord seeing that “We live and move and have are being in him”[1], though he, himself has no being, for He is being[2], i.e. He does not have existence rather he is existence[3]. Therefore, there really is no way to argue for his existence for he does not exist in the way we think of existence. So, what are we arguing for, or against?[4] I will get back to this later.
I found that not only do the new atheists have a different vision of The Totally Other, they (at least the majority) had a different vision of religion, which is as narrow as their vision of the God symbol. They seem to believe that all religion is the same, which in their minds means that all religion is bad. Of course, it does not take much thought to realize that the word religion is a word that points to a concept which is as deep and broad as the ocean. Therefore, when the new atheists start bashing all religion and lumping it all together it makes me wonder how much real thought they have put into their subject. I have found some so allergic to the word religion that they cannot even admit that religion can be good or bad. This strongly points to the level of maturity of so many in that movement. They take a thumb full of the ocean and believe that they have captured the ocean. I am not saying this in malice but I believe that many these people have some deep problems.
You may have noticed that I have tried to avoid using the word God, the reason being that the word has been so vulgarized and distorted that it has lost any value in helping us to understand the mystery that I refer to as The Wholly Other. The distortion of the God symbol is one of the real problems with religion.
Religion should help us in our journey to The Totally Other. However, instead of helping it often hinders by giving us false ideas of God, these false images in ancient times were called idols. The problem with idols is that there is no image or thing in reality or in the mind of humanity that can picture The Totally Other. All images of God created by humanity whether in mind or in stone, are idols because they are too small and distort the symbol we use for The Totally Other, i.e. God. The false ideas of God in turn solicits a false responds e.g. the new atheists.
This means that the atheist that has a pure heart may be closer to having a correct view of God than many believers. That is, if he has no image of God in his mind[5]. You see nothing is better than the something if the something is wrong. This is why I call the something that you cannot image or speak about, The Wholly Other, The Uncreated One, I Am or maybe Nothingness? I do it to keep people from creating a false image of God that is too small.
Of course, the problem is that for both believer and atheist, religion stands as a mediator between them and The Wholly Other. You see, for the atheist to argue against God he must have an image of that God in his mind. Whatever image he has in his mind is simply an idol. This is the only reason why they can form an argument against it for no argument can be formed against the Wholly Other for he lies beyond all argument. The majority of men will never get beyond the idols of this world whether they claim to be atheist or theist, i.e. their God is too small. I often wonder how humans could become so corrupt that the scripture would tell us that every imagination of their heart was corrupt, I now know; their God was too small, they were idolaters.
The theist often creates a God in their own image and then projects that image into heaven. The atheist then comes along and says that is not God and they are right. It is an idol that can be manipulated and controlled by man. It is the god of the religious man and the atheist. A god that is created for the opium of the people; or as a tool to control the herd. On the other hand, the deist created an aloof impersonal God that is somewhere out there beyond everything, located in some distant heaven, too aloof to be involved with his creation. Of course, any god that can be herded into some small corner of space and time is just too small to be the Totally Other. It also is an idol[6].
The high theists of the world know The Wholly Other, since they know, that they know little or nothing of being much less than non-being. They confess that they are quite ignorant of the Total Other. They understand, as Isaiah the prophet also understood; “His ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts.” To them the word God is a symbol which stands for the limits of their knowledge. This knowledge calls for humility and they are careful not to over speak on the subject of the deity. As one old seer said, those that don’t know speak and those that know do not speak.
You may ask, “Are you saying we can know nothing of non-being?” No, I am saying that you can only know what He has revealed to you. How does He reveal Himself? One way is through nature and the study of it, that is science. The study of nature has reviewed how great and powerful the Wholly Other is and how different he is from humanity. This knowledge should create awe and wonder in ones spirit, which is true spiritual worship. Unfortunately, many that study nature end up worshipping nature, failing to see that she is an arrow pointing to that which is beyond her. As the seer says when the prophet points at the moon the majority look at his thumb. For many science and religion has become the study of the thumb.
Some may say that this Wholly Other dwells in a cloud of darkness and mystery. Why does he hide Himself? Why does He not reveal Himself? Well, I do not think He is the problem, I think the trouble lays elsewhere. Could it be that He is so awesome and so glorious that in our present form we cannot approach Him without melting into nothingness. This unapproachableness is pointed out in the bible when God tells Moses, “You cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.” (Exodus 33:20)
There is the real possibility that the darkness that hides the Wholly Other is the darkness that is in the human heart. Jesus said, blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God”. Now by pure in heart I do not think Jesus is talking about not having impure thoughts e.g. lust, greed, etc. but rather having the right focus of one’s own being. He refers to this as the single eye. “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness! (Matt 6:22-23).This may be why children find it easy to see God until their parents or their culture (which includes religion) fill their eyes with darkness and forces them to see the world through dark colored glasses. It is no wonder Jesus said “unless you convert and become like little children you will in no way, enter the kingdom of God.” So, let’s stop blaming God and the devil for our bad eyes and poor sight. For that matter let’s stop blaming our parents and culture and accept responsibility for the condition of our own heart. Our hearts are filled with darkness because we have made God too small and are about the business of building idols.
Then, there is the Bible. What is the Bible? The Bible is a collection of writings from men who were searching for the Totally Other. It is the history of their journey and their interaction with the Uncreated One. It records their successes and their failures. It shows them as groping, sometimes searching as a lost children would search for their parent and slowly, in due course growing into adolescence. The Bible also reminds us that the story is not over and that adulthood is still away off.
What about the contradictions and mistakes in it? Would you not expect to find a few anomalies and problems in any writings trying to explain the Total Other? It is a book of symbols that point to something that is on the border of human knowledge, known yet unknown. The Bible itself is a symbol which claimed to be both human and divine. The divine part is perfect in doing what it was created for, which is the building of souls as they journeyed towards the Totally Other.
However, there is a consistent theme and a trend that run though the whole of Scriptures, which connects all of its parts, though sometimes overshadowed, it is always there. It is the central symbol of Scriptures and God’s people throughout the ages. We could summarize that one central symbol with the word ‘someone’. Someone is coming, someone is here and someone is coming again.
The someone of Scripture is the Promised One, the Anointed one, the Messiah or Christ. The one who would save the people from their enemies. Their greatest enemies being sin and death. The Scriptures gave clues to help people recognize this someone. It said that he would be extraordinary and different from other men. His words would be different and his life would be different, he would be Other like the One who sent him.
One man has said that it takes extraordinary evidence to prove an extraordinary claim.[7] The scriptures say that the someone in himself is the extraordinary evidence that the Total Other has given to man. This someone is the final and perfect symbol that points to the Total Other. He spoke like no other man and lived like no other man. When he spoke things happened, people were healed, water was changed into wine, storms were stilled and the dead were raised. No man has ever had so many people believe in him and at the same time has had so many hate him and despise his teachings. He truly is the extraordinary man, the someone sent from the Totally Other. This totally other man is still calling people “To come follow me”.
[1] Acts 17:28
[2] When I say He has no being it might be better to say he is super being. We live and move and have our being in Him, but we are not Him.
[3] Existence is beyond our comprehension though we apprehended it through our own existence and the existence of things around us.
[4] When humans argue for or against the idea of God they are arguing for or against a human construct that at best can only point to the One that stands behind it. Therefore we spend a great deal of time arguing about the idea of God. Now it is true that some ideas of God surely are better pointers than others but all fall short of the reality. This is true in science as well, for there is no theory of reality that is reality. The map is not the territory.
[5] It is unlikely that most atheists have no image of God in their minds, because if so, they would have nothing to argue against.
[6] The true God is super personality and has a knowledge of everything going on in creation. Therefore, he is more like the God that Jesus’ images than the God of the Deist. Jesus says, “that he knows every hair of our heads.” His nature is reflected by Jesus referring to him as “Father.”
[7] Unfortunately, Carl Sagan did not define what extraordinary evidence would look like. For some skeptics, there would never be any evidence of any kind or enough to prove the existence of God.
Hate the Sin and Love the Sinner
Hate the Sin and Love the Sinner
I have heard a number of the new atheists mock and ridicule the expression, “hate the sin and love the sinner.” Of course, it does not take a great deal of thought to realize that every morally thoughtful person applies this ideal to others and especially to themselves. We all fail to live up to our own standards and we often hate our short comings. However, we still continue to love ourselves and forgive ourselves.
If a person or a group does not learn to distinguish people’s failings from the people, we are all in trouble. In the end, the person that cannot separate the sin from the person (sinner) will become a very lonely person and perhaps a moral monster.
The Jack and Jill of unbelief Naturalism and Atheism
The Jack and Jill of unbelief
Naturalism and Atheism
Naturalism and atheism are the Jack and Jill of unbelief[1]. Naturalism is the world view and ideology which teaches that nature is all there is and rejects all spiritual or supernatural explanations of the world[2]. On the other hand, atheism is simply a non-belief in the existence of God. However, when someone is challenged to prove their atheism they usually turn to naturalism, which is a belief and a world view.
Now, naturalism assumes that its explanation of reality is true, but its explanation is based upon s the fundamental assumption that there is no God and nothing, other than nature, exists. In order for any of their explanations to be true, they must first prove their fundamental assumption within their own world view, but unlike atheism they have a belief to prove. Furthermore, their basic assumption cannot be proven by science because the question of the existence of God is outside of the realm of science[3].
So, the naturalist explains everything, as though there is no God and then they say that their explanation is proof that there is no God. But, if their explanation does not come from science, where does it come from? Could it be their imagination? And is not their claim just circular reasoning? They say that their explanation proves their assumption, and that their assumption proves their explanation. Their whole argument is based on faith in their assumption that there is no God. Since when does simply having an alternative view ascertain that view as the truth?
Their explanation, which I call the ‘tall tale’, does not in itself prove it is rational or true. It is simply a human construct that offers an alternative view to theism[4]. A naturalist is different from an atheist in that the atheist denies the existence of God; the naturalist has a world view or a belief which does not include God and it assumes that he does not exist. Then they use their assumption that there is no God to prove their naturalistic explanation of everything and then they use their explanation to prove their assumption. Remember that an explanation and an interpretation are not the same as evidence or reality. The interpretation is not the reality. The map is not the territory.
Atheism is a denial of God’s existence and it is a non-belief. However, atheism is seldom alone and it needs materialism and naturalism to support its non-belief. As soon as the atheist commences to explain the world though naturalism, they become a believer and begin to live by faith within the naturalistic explanation and assumptions. When this happens the burden of proof is as much on them as it is on the theist. Of course, they have no proof but only the explanation and assumptions of materialism and naturalism. Their so-called evidence and proof all hang on their tall tale, most of which come from their fertile imagination.
What we have in naturalism is a series of assumptions (1). All that exists is nature and she is the whole show. There is nothing outside of her to intervene in her course (non-provable assumption). (2). That reason alone can figure her out (non-provable assumption). (3) That she is controlled by certain laws, that allow reason to work. Of course this raises the question, how can mindless nature create the laws of nature?[5] (4). Reason then assumes that she (nature) is irrational and chaotic, no design and direction, which contradicts number two (reason cannot figure out chaos). (5) Based on reason (physics) nature had a begin and an end. This seems to indicate that there is something outside of her that brought her into existence. However, this contradicts assumption number one, that there is nothing outside of nature. Is the idea of something coming from nothing reasonable, or is this an unreasonable faith which comes out of an atheistic necessity?
[1] Like Jack and Jill naturalism and atheism stands or falls together.
[2] Seeing that we only have a limited knowledge of what makes up the universe, it takes a great deal of faith to believe that nature is the whole show or the only thing that exists. My word, we cannot even define nature.
[3] The US National Academy of Sciences has gone on record with the following statement: ‘Science is a way of knowing about the natural world. It is limited to explaining the natural world through natural causes. Science can say nothing about the supernatural. Whether God exists or not is a question about which science is neutral.” Taken from “Who made God? Searching For a Theory Of Everything” by Edgar Andrews.
[4] Both naturalism and theism have a story to tell.
[5] The naturalist usually responds by shrugging their shoulders and saying they were always there. You can have eternal laws but you cannot have any eternal lawgiver.
Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence
Extraordinary evidence
Carl Sagan said, “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” The problem with this is that Sagan does not define what would constitute an extraordinary claim[1] or what would represent extraordinary evidence. So, no matter what evidence you give the skeptic he will simply say it is not evidence or it is not extraordinary evidence. The skeptic then becomes the judge of what is evidence, what is not evidence, and what is extraordinary evidence. From this simple observation I would have to conclude that evidence is for the seeker or for a person who has the will to believe. A seeker or a person who has a will to believe is surely not a person who has a prior commitment to skepticism.
Usually, what the skeptic wants is absolute or overwhelming evidence. In other words he wants you to beat him into submission. Of course, this is a requirement and condition that many skeptics only apply to the existence of God. For example, many of them believe in the string theory and the existence of aliens, both of which have no evidence at the present time, yet they believe these highly speculative theories. So, what is the difference between these beliefs and the belief in a deity? These theories seem to be extraordinary claims, which means they should all have extraordinary evidence to prove them. However, they have none and yet they are believed. This is said not to disagree with Carl Sagan but rather to show the inconsistencies of skeptics and their bias towards faith in God. Many of them have a prior commitment to materialism and atheism[2].
We also need to point out that you can prove very little to a person who has a will to doubt. René Descartes the famous French philosopher believed that you could only prove to yourself your own existence. Thus his famous statement, “I think therefore I am”[3]. When people demand proof before they will believe something, they are asking for a lot. Proof and evidence seem to be somewhat in the eyes of the beholder. Absolute proof cannot be given, because a person could claim that the thing to believe, or the evidence, is an illusion or that we live in a matrix where everything is not real. On the other hand, there seems to be room for different degrees of evidence which point to the truthfulness of something. There can be circumstantial evidence which is inferred from other things and there can be eyewitness evidence.
However, I do believe there is some extraordinary evidence for the existence of God. That extraordinary evidence comes in the form of miracles. By miracles I mean something that cannot be explained by natural causes or by the laws of nature. When we use the word miracle we also are inferring that the things that we are talking about are very rare or only happened once in the history of the universe. These miracles are (1) That something came from nothing. (2) That part of the something was alive. (3) That some of the living stuff had consciousness (4) That something which was alive changed into something else.
Let’s look at each one of the above. First, that something came from nothing.[4] This miracle happened when the universe came into existence. Science refers to this event as the big bang theory. If you wanted a detailed explanation of what happened in the big bang, you need to go to science. If you go to the book of Beginnings (Genesis) it simply says in concise speech, “In the begin God created the heavens and earth”. In this we find that the something came not from nothing, but was rather created by a something (God). For the how of that, you would have to go back to science again.
My question is this, what is more of extraordinary claim. That God, an intelligent being, created the heavens and the earth or the claim of the naturalist atheist, that something came from nothing. If you believe that something came from nothing please send me your extraordinary evidence.
The second miracle is that a part of the something that was created is alive. When we look at the universe, its order and its complexity, we must stand in awe not only of the universe but also of the fact that there is life in it. Life is a miracle and there is no evidence of life coming out of nonlife today[5]. That secures the creation of life a place among miracles of miracles.
The third miracle is that some of the living stuff had consciousness; certainly we are talking about the existence of man. The fact that the universe gave birth to a conscious being like man is an extraordinary happening beyond imagination. There is one thing that is more miraculous than consciousness and it is that conscious beings could believe that consciousness came from unconsciousness.
The fourth miracle is that something that was alive, changed into something else. Yes, I am talking about evolution or continuous development. Did you ever think about how much of a miracle, evolution is? In essence the universe and life does not exist but it is becoming and we do not know what it is becoming. Some say it is dying, but I don’t think so. I think it is simply changing, growing and maturing. Could it be evolving toward the omega point?
A part of this growth and development is still another miracle which was the resurrection of Christ into a higher life form, or the new being. His resurrection was the last evolution of mankind into his final and complete form. In his pre-resurrection form he was called “a root out of dry ground” which expressed the unlikelihood of his existence. His existence like the other miracles was a onetime happening that is hard to explain. In his death and resurrection he demonstrates something coming from nothing, something that was dead coming to life, and something changing from one state to another and becoming something else. In this, he is the one that all existence points to. As scripture reads, “He is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end”. He is the over man of Nietzsche or the omega man who is over all of creation.
I know that all of these miracles can be explained away by materialists and their tall tale of naturalism. They tell an unbelievable story of how these things happened and then declare the story as evidence that all these miracles just happened naturally without an intelligent guide behind it. In other words they were just accidents. It is up to the reader to choose what they will believe. Accidents or miracles?
[1] Sagan being an atheist or at best an agnostic only used this criteria when talking about religious questions. He seemed to have no problem with the speculative theories of physics, i.e. string theory, big bang theory and black holes. All of which are based on very thin scientific evidence. Sagan is a classic example of scientific bias, which comes from a prior commitment to materialism.
[2] Richard Lewontin (evolutionary geneticist), s,” hints at this predisposition and bias when he says “[The public] take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism.” “Billions and Billions of Demons,” page 31 Quota in Never Pure by Shapin Steven
[3] A statement by the seventeenth century philosopher René Descartes. “I think; therefore I am” was the end of the search Descartes conducted for a statement that could not be doubted. He found that could not doubt that he himself existed, as he was the one doing the doubting in the first place. In Latin (the language in which Descartes wrote), the phrase is “Cogito, ergo sum.”
[4] “A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing” By Lawrence M. Krauss is an attempt to explain the universe without God or a first cause. The book is a disappointment, for the nothing that it propounds that the universe came from, turns out to be a something. Jan 1, 2013 by Lawrence M. Krauss and Richard Dawkins
[5] There was a time when some scientists believed in spontaneous generation, however, this theory was disproven by Louis Pasteur when he established beyond a shadow of a doubt that spontaneous generation is impossible under present day conditions. Even if science were to create life in the laboratory, it would only confirm that the lesser comes from the greater. For such an experiment would show that it took consciousness to arrange the elements to make life. In 1953 the Miller-Urey experiment created some of the chemical ingredients that are found in basic life forms. However, these scientists’ claim that they had done this by reproducing early earth conditions has been proven false. Plus, it is basically a false presupposition that they created life. A few of the building blocks of life is not life. A few bricks are not a house. Even if science were to create life in the laboratory, it would only confirm that the lesser comes from the greater. For such an experiment would show that it took consciousness to arrange the elements to make life.
Godless-A Portrait of a New Atheist
A Portrait of a New Atheist
His name is Godless[1]. He is a young college educated white male with a high opinion of his intellectual ability. Like most young white males in American he is angry, without knowing what he is angry about. He has a thirst for recognition, meaning and purpose and has little or none of any. He was born into a liberal progressive society that promised utopia and has not delivered on the promise. He is angry and empty, and he needs to blame someone for this fallen world which does not meet his bourgeois expectations. He feels that he deserves better. Because of his liberal ethos which represses anger, he is passive aggressive. His continual attacks on religion are an outlet for his repressed anger at the world and the God who made it[2].
His passive aggressive anger comes out in his blogs where he projects himself as a truth seeker and often as a mild-mannered individual while at the same time using sarcasm and cynicism to belittle religious folks. The majority of the time he stays anonymous because he is too timid to put his name on his writings and is afraid of the backlash which might come from his sarcasm and hubris. In his private life he preys on average people who he feels he is superior to, he tries to draw them in to debate in order to destroy their faith and convert them to his non-faith. I am sad to say there are some believers that behave in the same obnoxious way. Of course, this behavior is the mark of most fundamentalist movements, whether religious or secular.
In his blogs Godless has a habit of stating rather than arguing his positions, which he does very well. His favorite story is the tall tale of naturalism, in which he gives an account of the universe and the world as though his story was fact or history instead of theory and speculation. His writing is an example of authoritarian rhetoric masquerading as explanatory argument. Of course, he has no personal authority, which means that much of his thinking is nothing but his opinion or the bloviating of talking points from his atheistic websites. Therefore, it is not surprising to see very few footnotes or references[3]. When he does quote someone, the references are vague and his inferences are embellished to reflect his position. Like so many atheists, he uses rhetoric and assertions in the place of explanatory argument to the point that his opponents give up from exhaustion in any attempt to answer his rhetoric. If they attempt to answer him, he accuses them with ‘using the same-old arguments’. What can I say? It is the same-old augments because it the same-old rhetoric. How much can a man say about a so-called non-belief without repeating himself? Godless is truly a sophist.
He uses negative rhetoric to belittle religion and its practitioners, often inferring that they are unethical, ignorant or even stupid. Recently, Godless told me that I was lying when I told him that I had two neighbors that were atheist and that they would not talk to me about their atheism. From then on, he inferred that I was a liar. In his delusion, Godless seems to glory that he has x-ray eyes which can see things in religion and in people, that others cannot see. Even while ranting and raving he seems to be quite ignorant of the fact that theologians have been pointing out the same anomalies in religion that he does, for centuries.
He fails to see that anything that humans touch; whether it’s religion, science or even atheism, they will corrupt it. This all tends to make Godless shortsighted and extremely narrow. I do wish he would get a new set of glasses. We could use someone with x-ray eyes to take a good look at our government. However, the problem would be that Godless would see the corruption in government and conclude that all government is evil. You see, Godless is an extremist like the fundamentalist that he criticizes.
Like so many of the new atheists, Godless’ whole self-esteem seems to depend on his ability to out argue the theists. He has become his atheism. He has no self, apart from his atheism. In this, atheism has become his purpose, meaning and life. He reminds me of the apostle Paul, who said, “For me to live is Christ” However, for Godless it would be “for me to live is atheism” Godless does not drink, smoke or party; he has no addiction other than atheism. I know that Godless will respond by saying that all of this could be said about the theist as well. I agree to a point. There are some theists who are addicted to the wrappings of faith, which we call religion. In fact, many ex-Christians were addicted to religion and when religion could no long satisfy their ego; they simply changed addictions.
Godless could not be an agnostic because it would not help his self-esteem to say I don’t know. How could being an agnostic set him apart from the herd and demonstrate his superiority? Agnosticism would leave him without a self and quite empty. You cannot be lambasting faith and be noticed by saying, “I don’t know.”
In a true sense of the word, Godless is not a skeptic for he is quick to accept any philosophy or science that comes down the pike as long as it supports his atheism[4]. In many cases, not all, Godless is so ill-prepared intellectually that he is incapable of discerning true science and philosophy from pseudoscience and sophistry. He prides himself on being open-minded; however, his openness is often a smoke screen to cover up his hubris pride in assuming intellection superiority over all other world views and it also services as a smoke screen to cover his anger. His anger and passive aggressiveness is the thing that separates him from the old atheist type.
He claims to be a seeker of truth, sometimes even professes an attempt at believing. Yet, he continues to waddle in and feed at the trough of his atheistic propaganda. He spends hours of his time perusing the Internet looking for talking points and arguments against religion. He actually spends more time on his atheism than many people of faith who do on their religion. Some even assemble regularly to learn and rehearse their negative beliefs. Of course Godless justifies all of this by thinking of himself as an angel of light that is trying to save the world from religion, which he views as the ultimate evil[5].
You see, like all people Godless needs meaning and purpose in his life. Yet, he has denied the most fundamental and ultimate foundation of meaning. The result of this denial is that he must seek meaning in a lesser purpose and at the same time elevating this lesser purpose to his ultimate concern. He fails to see that other people do not have the ability to create an illusion of ultimate purpose as he does and they really need faith to have meaning.
A friend was placing Bibles in the public schools of Russia and he was called into the office of education by the head administrator for the entire nation. At first, he was afraid that he was going to lose his visa for handing out Bibles. Then to his surprise the administrator thanked him for what he was doing. In their discussion, the administrator rehearsed the years of communistic atheism and their indoctrination and went on to say that as a result of it; the children had what he called “empty eyes.” You see in Russia, the atheistic communist had their ‘thought police’; which did not want the people to even ask the question “why” because it would lead them to look for meaning, and in their search for true meaning, it would lead many to God.
I know the new atheist types believe they can find meaning in something less than God. Maybe in their relationships or in spreading their belief, or should I say the lack of it? Some may find meaning in the belief that they are saving the world from the ultimate evil of religion[6]. However, in view of the mindless universe they propose and their atheistic world view can any meaning be real? Is it not really nothing more than an illusion? I think it was Nietzsche, who said that if a person was brave enough to face reality (no God) that the reasonable thing to do would be to kill yourself or to go insane, for the alternative would be to live a life of despair or a life of illusions and dishonesty. The majority of the new atheists are neither brave enough nor honest enough to take their belief to their logical conclusion, so they live in a world of self-created illusions[7].
Some may feel that I am being hard on the new atheist. No, I am simply trying to get them to think outside of their world view and their talking points and to know that there is another way of viewing life, the world and God; which are all reasonable positions from within a theistic world view. Assuming that they have a will to believe as many of them profess, here is what they must do to move toward faith.
They must recognize that there is a difference between religion and faith and that there is a difference between good religion and bad religion. Yes, there are a lot of crazy things going on in the Christian faith, but they do not have their source in Christ and those that know Christ the best believe that much of American Christianity has little or nothing to do with Jesus Christ. So, I would suggest that atheists and believers alike refocus their eyes off the Christian religion on to Jesus Christ.
An important step for those who would like to explore faith in Christ would be to stop acting like an atheist. This would include not reading and writing the propaganda that is on the Internet and stop reading the books of the superstar atheists, who, by the way, remind me of the Televangelists who have made millions of dollars selling books on atheism. Likewise, I would also encourage Christians to stop listening to the TV celebrity preachers and get serious about knowing your own faith.
Another step would be to start calling and thinking of yourself as an agnostic. This will take the ego out of your belief system and at the same time make your belief more rational. If you believe that theism is unreasonable because it cannot be proven, you will have to believe that the opposite is just as unreasonable, for both positions cannot be proved or disproved empirically to the other side.
[1] In using the expression Godless I have no individual in mind, but am using it as a synonym for some, not all of the new atheist types. Many of the new atheists think they are all radical individuals and therefore cannot be critiqued as a group. However, like all movements there are many similarities of the people in the movement. This paper may not apply to the old atheist type some of which even view religion as good or at least a necessary evil.
[2] His passive aggressive anger is usually directed towards religion and government. This is all clearly seen in the poster boy of atheism Karl Marx, who was an atheist and hated religion and government and believed his system would usher in a new utopia free of religion and government. One thing which can be said of Karl Marx is that he believed his system would fix the problem, he erred in his analysis of what constituted the problem, but at least he had an answer. However, Godless has no answer to the problem other than sucking all the air out of it and hoping it will collapse. He has no system to replace what he is trying to destroy other than putting him and his kind in command. Could you imagine what a world would be like following men like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens? If these men were believers I would not like them because of their hubris. Their demeanor and disposition makes me shiver.
[3] There are a number of reasons for this lack of references. Godless wants people to think that his ideas are original. This makes him look more intelligent and above the herd. It also denotes a person who has bought into the subjectivism of age while condemning religion for being subjective. He fails to see that subjectivism in the end destroys his idol of reason.
[4] He is likely to believe in aliens and in the string theory even though there is not one bit of scientific evidence for either.
[5] This is one of the hall-mark beliefs of the new atheists. Therefore, the extremist in this movement views believers as evil and if consistent, could treat believers as the communist atheist did in Russia and China.
[6] Are they really angles of light? “An honest unbeliever, Dr. E. Wengraf once confessed, “Every piece of anti-religious propaganda seems to me a crime. I surely do not wish it to be prosecuted as a crime, but I consider it immoral and loathsome. This not because of zeal for my convictions, but because of the simple knowledge acquired through long experience, that, given the same circumstances, a religious man is happier than the irreligious. In my indifference and skeptical attitude toward all positive faith, I have often envied other men to whom deep religiosity has given a strong support in all the storms of life. To uproot the souls of such men is an abject deed. I abhor any proselytizing. But, still, I can understand why one who believes firmly in a saving faith tries to convert others. But I cannot understand propaganda of unbelief. We do not have the right to take away from a person his protecting shelter, be it even a shabby hut, if we are not sure, we can offer him a better, more beautiful house. But to lure men from the inherited home of their souls, to make them err afterward in the wilderness of hypotheses and philosophical question marks, is either criminal fatalisms or criminal mindlessness.”
[7] If there is no God, humans have a choice of living in a world of illusions or a world of despair. If they choose illusions, the question then becomes what is the best illusion? Is it the illusions of atheism or religion? What would be the criteria for making this choice? Would it not be happiness? If so the atheist loses because there have been a number of studies done recently that demonstrate that people of faith are happier than those that have none.
Does Science Argue for or against God?
Make sure you check out the other videos and articles on my blog. LD
What is Religion?
What is Religion?
In my conversation with people about religion I have found that the term itself is difficult to define with any degree of concreteness. Some have attempted to define the word by limiting it to what people call organized religion but in doing this, they are inferring that there are other meanings. If there is an organized version of religion there must be an unorganized version. I believe if we attempt to define the concept too narrowly we will end up limiting its usage to an unwarranted degree and may subvert some usages of the word. Of course, for some subversion might be their intention.
Let’s begin with how the word is used. It is used to denote a person’s behavior or belief that they are intensely committed to. “John exercises religiously or John’s religion is exercising.” Both expressions work well to relay the idea that John is extremely committed to exercise; to the point of being fanatical. In this context the word is used to denote excess in something, which it does not deserve it. Exercise is good, but it should not be made your ultimate concern.
Religion can also denote a commitment to an organization as “John belongs to the Roman Catholic religion” or Dick is a follower of the Moslem religion. This commitment can go beyond a commitment to an organized religion. It can be a devotion or commitment to a belief, behavior or lifestyle. The stoic religious was to practice virtue. This seems to be the way that is used in the Bible. When James says, “Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world” (James 1;27).
From the above, we can gather that the word has various shades of meaning, which is determined by context. Can a non-belief or a negative belief be a person’s religion? Yes, if one is committed to it intensely. e.g. .if one spends an inordinate amount time on it. It could be said to be one’s religion[1]. “John’s religion is playing video games or debunking theism.” The latter is the religion of many of the new atheists.
When the word is used for organized religion you run into another problem of defining the word “organized.” You could say that there is no universal definition of what constitutes an organized religion. For some, a group with a leader is an organization. To others, it may take a written Constitution with a formal membership to be classified as an organization. You can organize around a man, a group, a belief or an idea. People can organize against a belief or an idea; in this, they organize around their commonly held un-belief, which could be any negative idea. The Protestant religion was formed around a group of non-beliefs. People can belong to certain movements, which are loosely organized and formed around a set of ideas and led very informally by a group of charismatic leaders. You see this kind of religion in the New-Age movement and in the new atheist movement. Both could rightly be called religion but their followers viciously contend that their movements are not a religion. However, just recently the seventh court of appeals has ruled that atheism is a religion[2] and the Supreme Court has ruled prior that secular humanism is a religion for legal purposes[3].
I have found that when people begin to split hairs about what constituted religion, they usually have an agenda. It could be a religious group (usually a cult) that wants to set itself apart from a larger group or an atheists group or individual who does not want to be compared to a faith group. In their spitting of hairs, these groups and individuals actually demonstrate they are very must a part of a religion. If not, they would have no reason to be protesting. Protestantism is a religion when it demands your attention and especially if it is your ultimate concern or an all-consuming interest as some of the new atheist have done, many of which have been taught to hate what they call religion to the point they are allergic to the word itself. Get over it you guys, your movement is a religion.
After reading the article my wife said to me, ” you did not answer the question what is religion?” No, I did not. There have been books written on the subject and to some degree they have all failed to encompass the entirety of the subject. To me, the best concrete definition of religion was given by Paul Tillich when he said religion was ones “ultimate concern.”[4] So, what is your ultimate concern? When you answer that question, you have found your religion.
[1] The Supreme Court has held that non-theistic viewpoints can qualify as religious when they “occupy the same place in [a person’s] life as the belief in a traditional deity holds United States v. Seeger, 380 U.S. 163, 187 (1965).
[2] Note (Kaufman, James v. McCaughtry, Gary) “Without venturing too far into the realm of the philosophical, we have suggested in the past that when a person sincerely holds beliefs dealing with issues of ‘ultimate concern’ that for her occupy a ‘place parallel to that filled by . . . God in traditionally religious persons,’ those beliefs represent her religion.”
“We have already indicated that atheism may be considered, in this specialized sense, a religion. See Reed v. Great Lakes Cos., 330 F.3d 931, 934 (7th Cir. 2003) (‘If we think of religion as taking a position on divinity, then atheism is indeed a form of religion.’)”
[3] Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U.S. 488 (1961)
[4] Paul Tillich, “What is Religion?” and his “Systematic Theology”.
One Thing Missing-One Thing Missing An Argument Against the Existence of God
One Thing Missing
An Argument Against the Existence of God
Not long after I started to study atheism, it dawned on me that atheists lack one thing in their philosophy. That one thing is an argument against the existence of God. Now, this is not to say that they do not have arguments, for they have numerous arguments ranging from the nature of the world and the universe to arguments attempting to prove the superiority of their reasoning power over believers in God. They have arguments showing the source of faith and the evils of religion. However, the one thing they lack is a clearly defined argument against the existence of God.
This is one reason why they are continuously trying to shift the burden of proof to those that believe in God. Of course, their arguments about the burden of proof somehow, in their way of thinking, it seems to further justify their arguments or should I say their lack of arguments for the non-existence of God. However, shifting the burden of proof to the believer is really a confession that they have no actual argument for their faith. If they did have a real argument, we would hear little about the burden of proof.
What about their arguments from science? They have no arguments from science[1]. The so-called arguments from science are mostly the pointing out of things that we now understand which in the past were not understood and were contributed to God by some religious men. The atheist often uses the expression, “God of the gaps”[2] as though the only reason for belief in God was to fill in the gaps in human knowledge (an assertion without any evident to support it). In fact, theologians were warning Christians not to use God in this way before atheistic scientists even came up with the idea or the expression.
Some unbelievers claim that religion slows down the march of human knowledge because people will fill the gaps either by ignoring them or by filling them in with God[3]. On the other hand, a brief survey of the history of science reveals that many discoveries, including some of the most outstanding ones were discovered by believers. I think the truth is that dogma is what slows down progress in any discipline and science has its own brand and share of dogma. If you work against the established tradition or dogma in science, just as in religion, you will be ostracized from the community. This God of the gap’s argument is a quibble and not a real argument, for it says nothing about God but rather demonstrates how ignorant or indifferent some men were in the past to science, and how some of them justified their ignorance.
Take, for instance, the big-bang theory, which explains how the universe came into existence. The atheists will say your see “You religious folks could not explain the creation of the universe, so you simply said God did it” e.g. the God of the gaps[4]. The believer could simply respond “We now know how God did it thanks to science.” Science tells us how, but faith tells us who; that a super-consciousness did it. He started with creating the universe out of nothing as taught in the opening verses of the Bible and then ordered it from the simple to complex. All this was taught in scripture while science was still teaching that the universe was eternal, without beginning or end. By the way, it was a Catholic priest who first set forth the theory that is now known as the big bang[5]. It seems he was not retarded by the God of the gaps.
It is amazing that very time science finds the mechanism that God used to create or make things the atheist heralds that God is no long needed to explain things. However, finding out how God accomplished something does not prove that he doesn’t exist, it simply tells us how he did it. Learning how Henry Ford built the first car doesn’t prove that Henry did not existence.
The only way unbelievers can prove that God does not exist, is by starting with the dogma or presupposition that He does not exist. But, if your view (opinion) of the evidence comes from a presupposition or a dogma, you are simple reasoning in circles. Your suppositions prove the evidence, and the evidence proves your suppositions. Now, that sounds more like faith than reason and more like religion than science. Yet, this is exactly what atheists often do. In the end, the God of the gaps is just another straw man to deflect people’s attention away from the lack of real evidence. Remember that the explanation is not the evidence. To explain everything with a naturalistic explanation is not proof in itself that your explanation is indeed a fact.
In reading the material of many atheists, I have discovered that many of their supposed arguments against God appear to be more like arguments against organized religion. Of course, if you do not have any facts or an argument against one problem (the existence of God) you need to find something else, another straw man. In arrogating their argument about the non-existence of God, they have chosen religion as their primary straw man. I had often wondered why atheists resist the idea that there is a difference between religion and faith in God, and then it dawned on me, that to make a distinction between faith and religion would take away their straw man of religion. Once faith and religion are separated, they would have no metaphysical concept to criticize. Atheism needs organized religion in order to survive[6]. It needs a target that it can construct arguments against. It cannot construct a sound argument against God so it must target religion.
In what I am about to say I do not wish to leave the impression that I am for or against religion. However, we should strive for an accurate appraisal of religion. When atheists argue against religion, they seem to try to focus on all the negative aspects of religion and they totally ignore all the good it has done. It appears that they believe that if you can heap enough dung on religion, it might kill it. For some this tactic may work, but not for the honest person. In most cases the target of choice is the Christian religion, for it is the biggest target and is hard to miss. It is made up of billions of people throughout the ages and has attracted all types of people, some good and some bad. Like people in general, it has done good and evil. However, to be fair, in the past before the welfare state came into existence it had taken care of the poor for centuries, and it continues to minister to the poor and disadvantaged around the world. It laid the foundation for Western civilization by building schools and hospitals. It has resisted the spread of totalitarian governments around the world, which includes atheistic communism. On the other side of the coin, where are the hospitals or nursing homes, which were built by atheists? In my experience (which I admit is limited) I have never seen an organized attempt by atheists’ to minister to people in nursing homes or hospitals. Yet they rail on the evils of the Christian church. At their best, atheists use the absolute power of the state to collect money in the form of taxation to help people, which seems to be nothing more than a form coercion, which they somehow interpret as a moral virtue.
This is not to say that religion does not have its problems. But, should we expect anything different? Religion is made up of human beings and humans have a propensity for messing things up. Where is the human system that has not failed to live up to its ideals? I think the best, that humans can do is to make sure that the system they cling to offer a higher vision of human potential, but we should not be surprised when they fail. This holding out of a high vision of human potential, I believe is done to varying degrees by most religions. Of course, like everything, there are good religion and bad religion. This is simply a fact that many atheists do not recognize. The radical atheist believes that religion poisons everything, and this faith demonstrates their distorted view of reality. It is totally out of balance and is just not true. What I am calling for is a fair and accurate view of religion, which many atheists have not done.
However, ones view of religion has nothing to do with the question of God. At this point, the matter of the utilitarian nature of religion is a question that can be debated, but is seldom actually brought up by atheists. Religion is typically brought up as a straw man by atheists to divert people’s attention away from the question of God’s existence, since they have no real answers or arguments. At best, they raise some questions and make shallow attempts to use science to prove their faith and dogmas.
Some may reply that their conclusion from science, that there is no God, is inferred from scientific fact. That may be true, but inferences are not facts. Facts, like stone lying on the ground, tell you nothing[7]. An inference is simply your interpretation of the facts. Inferences or interpretations are not based on reason alone. Reason is one part of the equation and is never alone. There) are hidden biases and suppositions in any inference. An honest person of faith will admit this by adding the element of faith to the equation. It is the atheist who hangs on to the enlightenment faith and dogma that reason can stand alone. In many cases, reason is the handmaid of one’s passion and dogma.
In my personal discussions with atheists, again I admit that it’s limited, I have sensed that their views of God and religion are influenced by strong passions of anger and hatred, which seem for most to be void of any real personal source. I have asked them what religion had done to them, to make them so bitter toward it. Some retort that their father made them go to church or that their parents were religious, and it did not help them; they were hypocrites. Others have pointed to all the bad done by religion in the past. But, does religion hurt people or do people hurt people. You see religion is neutral. Its character is made up of the people in it. In this, it is like government; it can be good or bad depending on the men and women in it. I can hardly believe that reasonable people will use reasons like this to reject God or for that matter, even religion. However, there is a reason for their rationale and in most cases; no one will ever know the true root of their unbelief. For those interested in reading more about the possible reasons for atheism see my article entitled the “Roots of Atheism, The Making of a Fundamentalist Atheist.”
[1] Werner Heisenberg physicist and Nobel prize winner for physics confirms this, “If anyone wants to argue from the indubitable fact that the world exists to a cause of this existence, then this assumption does not contradict our scientific knowledge at a single point. Scientists do not have a single argument or fact with which they would contradict such an assumption, even if it was about a cause which–how could it be otherwise– would evidently have to be sought outside our three-dimensional world” Wermer Heisenberg quoted by Hans Kung Pages 79-80 in “The beginning of All Things: Science and Religion”.
[2] The expression “God of the gaps” was coined by a Christian theologian Henry Drummond. He used it to point out that the Christian should never use God to fill in the gaps of human knowledge. Strangely the expression was picked up by some scientists who accused Christians of doing the very thing Drummond condemned.
[3] Atheists and scientist might consider that early man was just not interested in filling the gaps. History bear out that they were wholly capable of filling a number of the gaps if they so desired. However, they were busy building languages, systems of thought, religion and political theory, which were a necessary foundation for modern science.
[4] Christians and Jews have believed for centuries the universe was created. It was science, which lagged behind for thousands of years. Before the Big Bang theory science believed that the universe was eternal with no beginning or ending.
[5] Georges Lemaître, a Catholic priest, was the first to propose the bi… g bang theory and was given approval by the Pope to publish it.
[6] Atheism is a negative parasitical worldview which is wholly dependent on religion. Without religion it would contribute nothing to humanity.
[7] See my article on “Rocks on The Ground” on lyleduell.me.
Chaos or Cosmos? An Argument for the Existence of God
Chaos or Cosmos?
An Argument for the Existence of God
When we observe cultures around the world, we see what seems to be a continuous declension into disorder when things are left alone and in turn a constant reordering of things by human intelligence. We see this tendency in every culture, a disordering and a reordering. Otherwise any culture would soon slip into chaos. Moreover, when I examine my own personal life it is obvious that if I neglect to organize and reorganize my stuff, it will soon fall into disorder, suffer damage and eventually fall apart. I find the same thing is true in my thought life; it seems that I spend a great deal of time keeping my thought world in order. When a person’s thoughts are out of order, we say they have a mental disorder or that they are crazy. Don’t you find it strange that we must continually keep our thoughts ordered? Have you ever asked yourself the question, “Who is the I, which keeps the thoughts of me in order?” It seems that everything that is ordered must have an intelligence to set it into order and maintain it. The ordering does not just happen; it takes consciousness to set it into order.
However, when we look at the quantum world, it seems at first to be chaotic, but we know that there must be something working there, setting it in order, else it would fly apart and we know that out of the chaos of the quantum world comes the cosmos[1] or orderly world and universe. This raises the question, what kind of force keeps it in order and is that force unintelligent or intelligent? The naturalist tells us that the universe simply fell together and that it maintains itself without any intelligence to order it. But is that really what we see going on in the universe, our world and in ourselves?
The problems for naturalism are huge, but one of the biggest dilemmas is showing how order came out of disorder, without the aid of intelligence. This is like saying that reason came out of non-reason. They point to evolution and natural selection as the cause, but natural selection presupposes something to pick from, something which previously existed, something which has already been ordered. Natural selection never can be causal when it comes to ordering things; it always starts with something and develops it. It must start with something that is already ordered. If naturalists start with non-directed or Darwinian evolution, they are starting with a mindless process and are claiming that an irrational process ordered the universe. If this were the case, how could they trust their own reasoning?[2] Why should you trust the well-developed brain of a monkey? Darwin himself had doubts about mans power to reason correctly. He said in a letter to a friend “with me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man’s mind, which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy. Would any one trust in the convictions of a monkey’s mind, if there are any convictions in such a mind?”[3]
In all areas of life, we see the law or principle of “order coming out of disorder. This raises the question; where does this law come from and what is the force behind it? There can only be two hypotheses that can answer this question. (1) The hypotheses of the naturalist who says basically it just happened, or the law always existed. In other words, it was all an accident or that’s just the way things are. Some in this school go so far as to say that the order we see in the universe is an illusion and it only appears to be orderly. This is no answer but rather the quibble of a man in a corner with no place to run. To me, all the answers of the naturalist seem to be nothing more than begging the question. (2) Then there is the theistic hypothesis that a cosmic order, i.e. God created and ordered the universe[4] and in turn keeps it ordered by his divine power. This is not to say that the forces he used are beyond our discovery. Sometime in the future it is quite feasible that we will understand these forces. However, discovering the “how” will never do away with the cause as many atheists or naturalists would like to think.
[1] The word derives from the Greek term κόσμος (kosmos), literally meaning “order” or “ornament” and metaphorically “world,” and is antithetical to the concept of chaos.
[2] In The Weight of Glory, C.S. Lewis wrote, “if minds are wholly dependent on brains, and brains on biochemistry, and biochemistry (in the long run) on the meaningless flux of the atoms, I cannot understand how the thought of those minds should have any more significance than the sound of the wind in the trees” (page 230).
[3] Darwin’s quota: Letter to William Graham, Down (July 3, 1881), In the life and letters of Charles Darwin including an Autobiographical Chapter, edited by Francis Darwin (London: John Murry, Albernarle Street, 1887), Vol. 1, 315-316.
[4] To say that God created does not mean he created everything out of nothing instantly. He could have created things fast or slow. Seeing He is outside of time space-time.
Lyle Duell 