withallyourmind.net

I don’t know when it officially happened since it isn’t listed on the main website, but Stand to Reason’s weekly radio show has now been made into a podcast. I can’t reccomend Stand to Reason’s radio show, or any of their resources, highly enough. *Joy!*

In my previous blog, I reviewed Francis Schaeffer’s, How Should We Then Live?. A current which was found throughout the book is his belief that modern man is marked by a dichotomy, or two completely exclusive, unrelated orders.

“The dichotomy here is the total separation between the area of meaning and values, and the area of reason.”

He uses this concept of a dichotomy throughout the book, beginning with Plato’s realm of the forms and the realm of the particulars. Aquinas presented the nature/grace problem. The Renaissance dealt with universals and the particulars. Roussea saw autonomous freedom in contrast with autonomous nature. Kant postulated a noumenal world and phenonomenal world. Kierkegaard’s dichotomy was non-reason(optimism)/reason(pessimism).

A Christian worldview makes sense of the two realms, because it grounds all particulars (including humans and moral values) in objective truths and principles, in particular in the Christian God. The modern man in secular society is ultimately led down a road to despair because his practice of founding his worldview on the basis of the autonomous man, apart from God.

Just to clarify, the dichotomy is artificial and unnatural. There are two realms, however. There is a realm of the particulars and a realm of the universal. For example, there is the universal of “redness” and the particulars of a red ball or a red house. It is the universal that gives meaning to the particular. There are particular moral acts which only have meaning if they are grounded in the universals. So, the two realms are not artificial. The artificiality is the severing of the relationship between the two.

The problem of modern man is he has made these two realms into a dichotomy (a division or the process of dividing into two especially mutually exclusive or contradictory groups or entities, according to m-w online). He has severed the relationship of the particulars to the universals. Modern science has declared that knowledge and reason is found only in the lower realm. One can do with the upper realm as he wishes since we can truly never know that realm anyway.

Schaeffer, speaking of the art of the Renaissance states:

“Up to this point it could have gone either way. It was good that nature was given a proper place. And there could have continued an emphasis on real peole in a real world wich God had made - with the particulars, the individual things, important because God made the whole world…Or at this point humanism could take over, with its emphasis on things being autonomous.”

Kierkegaard, a Christian existentialist believed that everything in the area of reason is absurd and leads to pessimism. The only way to find meaning is to create your own. For Kierkegaard, this was done by a “leap of faith”. Abandon reason and concepts of objective truth and just have faith. According to Kierkegaard

“Subjectivity is truth” and “Truth is subjectivity”.

“The thing is to a find a truth which is true for me, to find the idea for which I can live and die”.

For Kierkegaard, this was God, but I don’t see how he could argue that his “truth” was any better than any other truth. Finding meaning in drugs or eastern religions is just as valid. One might as well take a leap of faith to anything, as long as he finds fulfillment. As Schaeffer said, If we place everything which is religious into the realm of non-reason, there is no room for discussion.

Unfortunately, this view of faith is not just found in secular philosophy, nor in the philosophy of Christian existentialists of old, but is manifest in the church today. The emergent church movement echoes these same sentiments. But, when we all free to find our own truth, truth is meaningless.

Eternal Power, of earth and air!
Unseen, yet seen in all around,
Remote, but dwelling everywhere,
Though silent, heard in every sound;

If e’er thine ear in mercy bent,
When wretched mortals cried to Thee,
And if, indeed, Thy Son was sent,
To save lost sinners such as me:

Then hear me now, while kneeling here,
I lift to thee my heart and eye,
And all my soul ascends in prayer,
OH, GIVE ME–GIVE ME FAITH! I cry.

Without some glimmering in my heart,
I could not raise this fervent prayer;
But, oh! a stronger light impart,
And in Thy mercy fix it there.

While Faith is with me, I am blest;
It turns my darkest night to day;
But while I clasp it to my breast,
I often feel it slide away.

Then, cold and dark, my spirit sinks,
To see my light of life depart;
And every fiend of Hell, methinks,
Enjoys the anguish of my heart.

What shall I do, if all my love,
My hopes, my toil, are cast away,
And if there be no God above,
To hear and bless me when I pray?

If this be vain delusion all,
If death be an eternal sleep,
And none can hear my secret call,
Or see the silent tears I weep!

Oh, help me, God! For thou alone
Canst my distracted soul relieve;
Forsake it not: it is thine own,
Though weak, yet longing to believe.

Oh, drive these cruel doubts away;
And make me know, that Thou art God!
A faith, that shines by night and day,
Will lighten every earthly load.

If I believe that Jesus died,
And waking, rose to reign above;
Then surely Sorrow, Sin, and Pride,
Must yield to Peace, and Hope, and Love.

And all the blessed words He said
Will strength and holy joy impart:
A shield of safety o’er my head,
A spring of comfort in my heart.

I’ve just read How Should We Then Live? by Francis Schaeffer. I thought I would take a moment to provide a brief review of this excellent work.

Schaeffer’s goal in this book is to make the reader aware of the presuppositions upon which one lives out his life and the impact of those presuppositions on how actually does live out his life. In several instances, he points to the profundity of the quotation, “As a man thinketh, so is he”. Our worldview affects who we are and how we act.
Schaeffer asserts that our world view has direct bearing on our strength to hold up to life’s pressures. This is not only true for individuals, but also for cultures. In the first nine chapters of this book he examines the worldviews of the ancient Romans, the Middle Ages, the Reformation, the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and on into our modern times. He deftly uses art, music and culture to illustrate the worldviews of the times. Rather than romanticizing Rome, he shows that it was “cruel and decadent as it came to the logical conclusion of its world view” (p.23). The Christians were hated in the Roman Empire because they stood for absolute universal values that were grounded in a rational, personal God. This made them dangerous for the totalitarian, authoritarian state of Rome.
In the Middle Ages, Schaeffer describes how humanism began to inject itself into the Christian faith as the authority of the Church took precedence over the Bible’s teachings and as salvation began to emphasize man’s ability to merit Christ’s merit, rather than salvation in Christ alone. This conflict between a humanistic base for culture and a base consisting of Christian principles of absolutes was to be played out for the next two millennia, up to the present day.
While not able to describe all Schaeffer had to say regarding this phenomenon, it is important to note his description of the contrast of Reformation thought and Renaissance thought. Renaissance thought found full expression in Enlightenment thought. Those cultures which were influenced primarily by Enlightenment thought based their society on the principle of the belief that man is basic to all things. Those influenced by Reformation thought remained, at least somewhat, based on absolutes and a God who is supreme. A worldview based on man’s supremacy leads to chaos, relativism, and authoritarianism. One based on Christian principles provides the basis of a coherent, stable, flourishing society. The way an individual views the world will also have a profound influence on his stability and well-being.

I am listening to some lectures by Dr. Lawrence M. Principe, Professor of the History of Science and Technology and Professor of Chemistry at Johns Hopkins University. The lecture series is titled, Science and Religion. I have (so far) found his lectures to be quite enlightening and helpful. The second lecture in the series concerns the “Warfare Thesis”, a particular formulation of the historical relationship between science and religion. This concept was essentially unheard of until the late 19th century, when it was advanced by two men - John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White.

According to Dr. Principe, this formulation rests on shaky, often fabricated foundations and was “contrived for quite specific political, professional, and racist purposes. Despite these facts, this model of the interactions between science and religion is very commonly encountered today. This model states that throughout history, religion and science have been opposed to each other and have always been at war. Religion is portrayed as having stymied the advance of science. Principe maintains that no serious science historian believes this theory today.

Richard Dawkins seems to hold this view however. Here is an excerpt from a promo for a TV program by Dawkins last month:

Richard Dawkins is astounded that religious faith is gaining ground in the face of rational, scientific truth based on hard evidence…Professor Richard Dawkins challenges what he describes as ‘a process of non-thinking called faith’. Dawkins is well known for bringing to a wide audience the complex scientific concepts that underpin evolution. His first book, The Selfish Gene was an international bestseller.

He describes his astonishment that, at the start of the 21st century, religious faith is gaining ground in the face of rational, scientific truth. Science, based on scepticism, investigation and evidence, must continuously test its own concepts and claims. Faith, by definition, defies evidence: it is untested and unshakeable, and is therefore in direct contradiction with science.

In addition, though religions preach morality, peace and hope, in fact, says Dawkins, they bring intolerance, violence and destruction. The growth of extreme fundamentalism in so many religions across the world not only endangers humanity but, he argues, is in conflict with the trend over thousands of years of history for humanity to progress – to become more enlightened and more tolerant.

More to come…

…Christianity is, and has always been, and always will be, not just essentially a religion of hope, but in itself, the most stupendous hope the world has ever known. Only Incarnate God would have dared to hold out to us all, mere men and women of every sort and condition, sweet mongols and pundits and professors and beauty queens, the sick and the well, the stupid and the clever, those who stumble equally with those who lend an arm, whoever and whatever we may be, a hope of being involved in a destiny set in eternity and encompassing the universe. Imagine telling caterpillars that they are destined to become butterflies. No A-levels needed, not even literacy tests, the only qualification being faith in becoming a butterfly, and lo, the poor crawler is flying, the worm has sprouted wings!

- From Malcom Muggeridge, Christ in the Media, pp. 44-45

I’m sure most of you who visit blogs like this have already heard this story by now, but just in case, I’m going to mention it anyway (and I couldn’t pass up the chance to use a good alliteration). Daniel Dennett has come out with a new book Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon (I’m sure you can guess the gist of the book). Anyway, it received a very bad review by the New York Times Book Review, as well as by fellow darwinist Michael Ruse. Ruse allowed William Dembski to post the heated email exchange that was had by Ruse and Dennett over the book.
The two highlights are the admirable and worthy critique of Dennett and Dawkins by Ruse (from which we can all learn something):

“I think that you and Richard [Dawkins] are absolute disasters in the fight against intelligent design – we are losing this battle, not the least of which is the two new supreme court justices who are certainly going to vote to let it into classrooms – what we need is not knee-jerk atheism but serious grappling with the issues – neither of you are willing to study Christianity seriously and to engage with the ideas – it is just plain silly and grotesquely immoral to claim that Christianity is simply a force for evil, as Richard claims – more than this, we are in a fight, and we need to make allies in the fight, not simply alienate everyone of good will.”

And Dennett’s subsequent statement that Ruse is “being enlisted by the side of darkness,” that the NYTBR is “under the spell of the Darwin dreaders,” and the seeming threat to Ruse: “You may want to try to extricate yourself, since you are certainly losing ground fast in the evolutionary community that I am in touch with.”

Daniel Dennett is coming here to FSU next month to give a philosophy department colloquium. The topic hasn’t been announced, but I hope it’s something to do with his new book.

For anyone who may be interested, here is a pdf file of the “fact sheet” I gave out after my presentation last weekend on the reliability of the gospels. It discusses some of the main relevant topics such as authorship, dating, purpose, canon, and preservation. I think it is pretty useful as a good list of things to know in case you are engaged in an apologetic discussion on the gospels.
The event itself went pretty well, although it was significantly smaller than I expected. As well, it was my first time speaking publicly for more than 10 minutes or so, so I still had some nervous habits that will hopefully get worked out as I, God willing, get more opportunities to speak.

My soul, there is a country
Far beyond the stars
Where stands a winged sentry
All skilful in the wars:
There, above noise and danger,
Sweet peace sits crowned with smiles,
And One born in a manger
Commands the beauteous files.
He is thy gracious friend,
And (O my soul, awake!)
Did in pure love descend
To die here for thy sake.
If thou canst get but thither,
There grows the flower of peace,
The rose that cannot wither,
Thy fortress, and thy ease.
Leave then thy foolish ranges;
For none can thee secure
But One, who never changes,
Thy God, thy life, thy cure.

Subjectivism is one of two types of ethical relativism. It states that there are no objective values of morality. An action is right or wrong depending on the individual’s attitudes about that action. What is right for me, may not be right for you. Pojman, in his article, A Critique of Ethical Relativism, states his students would put it this way:

Morality is in the eye of the beholder.

It is amazing how many people consider themselves subjectivist, yet have not truly thought through the consequences of their beliefs. Adolf Hitler and Ted Bundy are as moral as Gandhi. Joseph Stalin is as moral as Mother Theresa. Absurd consequences follow. From Pojman’s article is a paraphrase of a tape-recorded conversation between Ted Bundy and one of his victims in which Bundy justifies his murder:

Then I learned that all moral judgments are “value judgments,” that all value judgments are subjective, and that none can be proved either right or wrong. I even read somewhere that the Chief Justice of the United States had written that the American Constitution expressed nothing more than collective value judgments. Believe it or not, I figured it out for myself - what apparently the chief justice couldn’t figure out for himself - that if the rationality of one value judgment was zero, multiplying it by millions would not make it one whit more rational. Nor is there any “reason” to obey the law for anyone, like myself, who has the boldness and daring - the strength of character - to throw off shackles….I discovered that to become truly free, truly unfettered, I had to become truly uninhibited. And I quickly discovered that the greatest obstacle to my freedom, the greatest block and limitation to it, consists in the insupportable “value judgment” that I was bound to respect the rights of others. I asked myself, who were these “others”? Other human beings, with human rights? Why is it more wrong to kill a human animal than any other animal, a pig, or a sheep, or a steer? Is your life more to you that a hog’s life to a hog? Why should I be willing to sacrifice my pleasure more for the one than for the other? Surely, you would not, in this age of scientific enlightenment, declare that God or nature has marked some pleasures as “moral” or “good” and others as “immoral” or “bad”? In any case, let me assure you, my dear young lady, that there is absolutely no comparison between the pleasure I might take in eating ham, and the pleasure I anticipate in raping and murdering you. That is the honest conclusion to which my education has led me - after the most conscientious examination of my spontaneous and uninhibited self.

Subjectivist ethical realism makes morality a useless concept. We can never condemn another for what he does.