Coexisting Faith and Reason both

Faith has been getting some bad press -

Professor Richard Dawkins, arguably a human face for modern atheism, appeals to science, reason and logic as the only valid basis for a world view to meet the challenges of our time and to bring true understanding of our existence. To believe in even the possibility of an unseen God, requiring at least some element of faith, represents to him a contradiction in terms - as he describes in this way:

Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence.(2) 

Differing opinions about belief in God have become prominent in our 21st century world. We see traditional views, often associated with ‘faith’, jostling with those from people who believe that new discoveries, and a growing body of knowledge about how our world and universe works, can lead to ‘freedom’ from a faith mindset that is seen to have become repressive and irrelevant.

These views tend to see values and thinking from the past as based in inadequate and incomplete information that should be abandoned to make way for progress – progress in developing more informed ways of understanding our human existence and the challenges facing it. There is a logic to this perspective that is understandable and compelling enough for it to be presented often in the manner of a self-evident truth – hence the growing numbers of census respondents who wish to be identified as having no religion (being purely secular) or non-believers such as agnostic or atheist.

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2. A lecture by Richard Dawkins extracted from The Nullifidian (Dec 94), http://www.simonyi.ox.ac.uk/dawkins/WorldOfDawkins-archive/Dawkins/Work/Articles/1994-12religion.shtml

 Are we in danger of losing a quality of inherent human capacity and value if we negate faith - an attribute that once might rather have been revered and aspired toward(3) – now to be denied and discarded? Is there a scepticism within atheism that limits human potential, i.e. restricting it to a perspective that sees non-belief as the only valid response to some of the (admittedly) difficult arguments raised against the existence of God?

This site hopes to offer something of value for those willing to look into the idea of faith as being something helpful and positive - who are open to exploring implications that might follow if we should turn away from age long traditions of faith which, despite their problems, have also inspired much by way of human endeavour and achievement.

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3. "Faith and Reason," by James Swindal, The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ISSN 2161-0002, https://www.iep.utm.edu/faith-re 23/05/2018.

 It is a hope of this site to present some insights into the nature of coming to a faith and belief in God, not as something that negates thinking and reason, or something beyond the reach of thinking, fair minded people; it hopes to offer a foundation that makes faith possible, despite the way in which belief has come to be defined, and the many disparaging opinions about faith that all too readily receive public prominence.

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Professor Dawkins is candidly consistent at times in taking his views to their logical conclusions. He sees Darwinian evolution as completely and ‘elegantly’ providing the explanation for all life on earth, with its diversity and apparent design. He is therefore committed to believing in naturalistic causes for everything. Yet he does admit to not at all knowing how life and the first self-replicating molecule originated but believes nevertheless that through science ‘we shall end up understanding literally everything’.(4)

This and other statements by Professor Dawkins are hard for the writer of this site to see as being anything other than also a statement of faith - which raises a question as to whether it is not faith itself that is so much to be contested, but the issue of whether we are focusing on the correct object for our faith.

It may be that there is a stealth about faith, i.e. it can possibly drift into our deliberations unaware. If we were to assume, for the sake of argument, that the existence of God may be true, then perhaps an inherent capacity for faith may well be his gift to us, i.e. giving us a capacity to relate to him - this One, the nature of whose being is not so immediately observable in this material world. If this reality should be so, then his expectation of us to have faith is perhaps to ‘help’ us to know and believe in him, rather than trying to make it more difficult.

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4. "Darwin gives courage to the rest of science that we shall end up understanding literally everything, springing from almost nothing - a thought extremely hard to comprehend and believe." - Richard Dawkins  Rowan Williams vs Richard Dawkins debate on Human Origins held in Oxford on 23rd February 2012

This would seem to be a reasonable expectation, but the contested issue is about the existence of a ‘God’ who describes himself as being in a reality and dimension beyond that of our material world. Nevertheless, he has already provided evidence of himself. Initially it is through his handiwork in the creation that we see around us, but because he recognises that there is an alienation between him and humanity (because of our ‘fallen’ human nature), he has also given us his word through the various inspirations of the biblical authors, along with a culminating revelation through the sending of his son, Jesus, in human form to whom we can more readily relate.

Here on earth, knowledge from evidence, reason and logic are concepts that work well and have consistent validity. However, to reject our aptitude for faith would mean that we have put ourselves in a position of demanding that God meet challenges set by us (with the limited information we receive through our five senses) to ‘prove’ his existence which is in a dimension beyond our conceiving. He may also well know that such tests would be defeating of his purpose - that of winning our heart to come into a reconciled relationship with him.

From God’s perspective, then, if we are looking for him to ‘pass’ what he likely knows to be a self-defeating test of our making, have we not then set God up to fail? The ‘lack of evidence’ can then justify a rejection of him and his reality. If we reject his gift of faith, then it is going to be us who miss opportunity for knowing of himself, who longs to heap upon us of his goodness, help and love.

This is not to deny the challenges and apparent contradictions that argue against a position of faith, but recognises that reason alone cannot be relied upon in seeking to resolve some of the issues. Finding a faith in God also needs an engagement of the heart and an active responsiveness that can lead to dimensions of knowing that are more reassuring and fulfilling than come from reliance on intellectual reasoning alone. Each of our most tentative steps can lead to that pathway of discovering that his promises are sure – based on his own words: ‘those who search will surely find me’.(5)

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5. Proverbs 8:17 NLT

This would also seem to be a reasonable and logical position to adopt in view of the challenges about knowing whether there is a God not seen. On consideration, though, it leaves those who adopt this way of thinking, equally with non-believers, to be without the assurance of being made right with God on his basis, i.e. faith.

What good reason could we have to not access a means to knowing, - faith - when it is offered as a gift and made freely available? Added to this, when we are finally ushered into the realm of the one about whose existence we have chosen to remain doubtful (based on an assertion of not having been provided with more ‘concrete’ evidence), will we then find that having waited is what brings us into an alienation from his sustaining life? Our own arguments against belief may well be what brings us undone, having brought us past the opportunity to exercise faith (which we can’t opt for once seeing the evidence face to face) and therefore beyond further possibility of coming into a loving, free-will relationship with the one who has been reaching out to us.

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