Several of the blogs that I've been reading lately have been having uh....lively.... discussions about atheism. The number of atheists that apparently read Christian blogs is surprising to me. What are a bunch of avowed (and apparently very angry!) atheists doing trolling around Christian blogs, anyway, for goodness sake??? I know, though, that these particular atheists may be a vocal and well, kinda mean, minority, and that many of today's atheists are our neighbors, our family members, our co-workers, our friends. It occurred to me, while reading these interactions, that the intellectually honest atheist (which is, after all, how they describe themselves) really should be asking themselves ONLY the following five questions, and only in this order. Anything beyond these five questions really cannot be seen as seeking TRUTH honestly, but is reaction to experiences... is bigotry, is anger, is based on emotion.
Here then, is my list of five things every atheist needs to answer - a continuum of rationale.
1. Is there something beyond what I can see in the material world? Something possibly spiritual? And can a part of my own existence belong to that spiritual world, either during or after life?
2. Is there a higher power?
3. Is it God, in the Judeo-Christian sense?
4. Is Jesus the Son of God?
5. Did Jesus leave behind a Church that I can still see today?
These are not easy questions, and the answers are not cut and dried by any means. They're not meant to be. It occurs to me, though, that nearly EVERY SINGLE religion on the planet can find itself somewhere on this continuum, where they see themselves as answering some of these questions, but then STOP before asking the next question. Wiccans, agnostics, New Agers ask themselves question #1, and find answers they are content with, and don't move on. An agnostic might answer question #1 as "I don't know, we can't know." and be happy with that. Hindus and other pagans might move on to #2, Jewish, Muslims and Christians up to #3, Christians of all ilk to #4. A progressive "YES" is an assent to God and His only Son. A progressive "YES" can't be cogitated, sifted through like so much data, though. A person can only be guided along the journey by the Holy Spirit. An open heart to the possibility of a "YES" is the work of Someone much greater than ourselves.
The following are things I've heard from atheists, which have nothing to do with seeking TRUTH in the existence of God, and everything to do with emotional reactions. They are excuses for choosing not to believe, they are not valid reasons in and of themselves:
1. The religious are hypocrites - saying one thing and doing another.
My answer? I'm here to make that one easy on you. You're right!! We're not perfect. That doesn't mean what we're saying is not TRUE. It means that we're not perfect. We share that trait with the whole history of the human race.
2. Look at all the wars/atrocities that have been done in the name of religion.
My answer? see #1 above. Again, that does not disprove God or Truth. It does prove the frailty of the human condition.
3. A loving God couldn't possibly let so much suffering happen in the world.
My answer? This in no way disproves God. This is solely a rejection of what YOU feel the nature of that God should or shouldn't be. This is highly subjective.
4. Religion is only a way to control the weak masses.
My answer? Cave men, prior to the MASSES (read... civilization) showed evidence of spirituality in their cave drawings. Religion may have been used over the years to "control" people, but...see answer #1. This again does not disprove the fundamental HUMAN realization, present from the earliest manifestations of humanity, of a spiritual realm.
5. Only the unintelligent believe in God. God was "developed" throughout history simplyas a way for people to explain the unknown in this life. Smart people don't need such crutches now.
My answer: This means that YOU, personally, are the pinnacle of human evolution. YOU are smarter than Michaelangelo, DaVinci, the ancient Greeks. YOU are smarter than every other human being in the history of the world. I find that hard to believe. People in the past weren't DUMBER than people are today. We have a greater body of knowledge, a greater human experience. We've learned from the past and adapted, experimented, had time to figure things out. I struggle to believe that YOU are smarter than the first person to develop the arch, or the Roman column. The greatest minds in all of known history were believers in a spiritual realm. Show me a time in history where atheism was the norm rather than the rare exception. Spirituality is part of our human condition. Get over yourself. Intelligence and faith are not mutually exclusive.
To answer the intellectually honest, seeking atheist would lead him on a continuum towards the fullness of faith. It's very possible, though, (and I think it's very likely that there's a great deal of people that fit into this category) that there are some atheists out there who aren't so much seeking for Truth, as they are REJECTING what they see as the status quo. They see religion over history, and they want no part of it. That is not intellectual honesty. It's the equivalent of saying "I don't want to be bound by gravity, because look at all the falls and deaths that have occurred over time as a result of gravity. Look at how gravity has oppressed people, held them down for years. It's not for me, and I won't have it."
I was discussing creation once with an atheist. I said that the complexity and perfection, the ideal conditions for life on this planet make me believe in a Creator, because the likelihood of that happening by accident was INFENTESSIMALLY small. Impossible, really. He countered that he thought the liklihood increased if you just believed that our universe formed and collapsed billions of times, and that during ONE of those billions of times, conditions were just right... and here we are. There's not one SHRED of evidence to support such a theory, whereas I see God around me everywhere. I told him that theory took a heck of alot more faith than believing in God did. He begrudgingly agreed. Sometimes NOT believing in God takes alot of faith as well - the faith is just misapplied to science.
I'm certainly not saying that anyone who seeks will find. I do believe, however, that anyone who seeks with an open heart, a blank canvas, devoid of biases, will find SOMETHING. And where the seed is planted, the Holy Spirit can take root.
Stay tuned.
