Christian Apologetics…What’s the Use?
by katejohnson77
I was just wondering if my Christian brothers and sisters could answer a couple questions for me.
1. Is it really possible for believers to create a solid “argument for God,” when God has designated faith as the chief means whereby man might find God (Hebrews 11:6).
2. Perhaps I am not understanding it, but could someone please tell me the purpose of Christian Apologetics if faith actually means: NO EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE?
3. Science basically means to know. Faith basically means to believe. If our lust to know severed humanity’s relationship with God, then the logical way back to God would not be through our scientific “proofs” or “arguments” for God’s existence…indeed, it would not even include our “cognitive” arguments for his existence. In this case, there can be absolutely no “hypothesis,” nor “theory,” nor “model for reality,” for the Christian thinker. This is because, in our modern world, these three terms I have mentioned cannot be employed by non-testable “ideas,” such as those embodied within our faith.
4. Christian Apologetics can no longer make use of scripture in its arguments…further confounding me as to the purpose and meaning of apologetics, in general?? Is there any purpose…and what is your clean, humble definition for Christian Apologetics?
Let me know if you think it worth our time to argue our faith, when influential people are standing up…such as Stephen Hawking (who has a lot of credibility) and telling our youth that “God is no longer necessary for explaining the universe??”
PURPOSE AT BACK OF THESE QUESTIONS
I am currently writing a paper, which I had originally titled “The Complete and Unified Theory of Everything That matters.”
Since I now know that I am not “allowed” to call it a theory, I’ve changed the title to “We Shall Never Find God Through Science.”
I’ve spent countless hours for one full week writing up this paper and am now typing it into a document to submit for publication…but the longer I type, the more I feel that I may be wasting my time??
Just looking for feedback.
THANK YOU FOR TAKING THE TIME TO MAKE A QUICK COMMENT.
Kate,
I have to believe you were dreading me answering this post.
I would argue that apologetics (APs) is really designed to “square the circle”, and by that I mean that the bible cannot stand on its own facts or logic. It requires interpretation to address the reality of the world it exists in. Bible verses contradict each other? There is an AP for that.
Bible verses don’t comport with new discoveries? There’s an AP for that.
Bible suffers from twisted logic? There is an AP for that.
I would argue that God could be found through science, but it is unlikely. I believe that this is because God doesn’t exist, but also because we have never witnessed anything scientifically that can’t be explained by natural processes. I don’t buy the argument that science cannot accept a supernatural or extra-material explanation, just that proper methodology would insist that all other possibilities be investigated first.
If that is illogical, or unfair, I would like to know how.
This is your reply, I’d like too keep the conversation here, as it does not pertain to my “About” section and I think you and I can have a good conversation here:
My contention, as I hinted in my first response, is that apologetics aren’t meant for non-believers. They are formulated to plug the holes in the boat, to circle the wagons against the onslaught of logic.
Apologetics is not meant to persuade me to believe, they are there to persuade you to keep believing. They only exist within the bubble of an a priori assumption of God, outside that world they are exposed for what they are. You have to believe, or want to believe, to make them work.
That is where their strength lies. They do have some benefit, but also a Shakespearean flaw. They can serve to reach out to the atheist who desperately wants to believe, but only so far as they are willing to suspend disbelief. Those people exist, I assure you. They serve to confound an untrained mind and place doubt in those not capable of forming an informed reply. In doing so they also serve to bolster the faith of the person using the argument, if they feel that they have stumped the unbeliever.
The Shakespearean flaw I refer to (are you aware what that concept is? Shakespeare routinely uses a plot device where the protagonist’s greatest asset is in fact his/her undoing) is that when the atheist or doubter sees through the scam they see it as a personal slight, that they are being intellectually victimized by semantics and shell games. This only serves to turn them against the source of the falsehood, the religion itself. Especially when the source claims moral superiority.
This, in a roundabout way, is the source of my apostasy. Absent specifics, it is a pretty good overview.
Take CS Lewis, who I know you to be a fan of. His liar, lunatic, or lord trichotomy leaves out all other options and does not give a solid case to discount the former two options. What about legend? Is that an option? It even starts with an L. So when someone sees through the fog of apologetics, they wonder why they are being deceived. Why would an absolute truth require deception at all?
If you love to write, then write. If you need to make it apologetics, then so be it. Apologetics can be a personal profession as easily as a foundation to believe. I love to write, and I don’t consider my work apologetics. I love to argue, and win, as much as the next person. None of those things require faith, or apologetics. Yet, they can.
I will say it again. You always seem to be one step away, deathly frightful of the unknown. Read, write, question, repeat. That is the key to knowledge. If you open your eyes a little wider the unknown becomes a little more familiar, then a little more comfortable, then reveals itself in all it’s splendor. There will always be unknowns, but you shouldn’t be afraid to follow them…..
I look forward to your response…
I will begin my response by referring to your suspicion that I am afraid of the unknown, afraid to pursue it…as though I am terrified of what it shall reveal.
If your assessment is accurate, then I have certainly succeeded at placing myself within a fog of apologetics.
Relative to my perspective, what I see is two-fold. First, what I am perceiving DOES NOT MATCH UP WITH a lot of what modern Christian Apologetics seems to be saying (meaning that I am needing to write my own apologetics against the error I have discovered within my own religion’s apologetics—whew, that’s weird)!
Second, what I am perceiving when presented with the information pouring in from science DOES NOT MATCH UP WITH a lot of what the scientists are concluding…namely, that God is not necessary for explaining the universe (and of course, the suppressed clause which follows this and says, “and therefore, we no longer need God, period).
George, what I am SEEING/PERCEIVING looks altogether different from my religion’s PERCEPTIONS and science’s PERCEPTIVE CONCLUSIONS, regarding the existence of life which is not only extra terrestrial, but extra to our limited 3 dimensional sliver of the whole of reality.
I do want to thank you for clearing up for me who my audience was supposed to be. However, although I “see your point”–I should now like to “raise you a question.” If Science means “to know”, and Faith means “to believe”, then why should I, if I am all about practicing the faith my particular religion is CONSTANTLY showing and reminding me as my only path to finding or discovering God, then why on earth should I work to write papers which go the other way round…in fact opposite…and begin to build arguments which supposedly lead to God (as a fact of reality) THROUGH SCIENCE (KNOWLEDGE), INSTEAD?
Now, that would definitely seem to me like a waste of time and energy. You mentioned that we believers feel it necessary to secure or fortify our “wagons” or our “forts,” by encircling them AGAINST THE ONSLAUGHT OF LOGIC. But I am astonished to discover that the documents we all call “scripture” or “the Bible” have this Jesus character (who may be only a legend, I realize) being designated, literally, as THE VERY LOGOS OF GOD, (Meaning, the logic of God).
So, I suppose all of this leaves me with a final question.
Against what “logic” am I (who practices the faith as courageously as my cowardly self will let me) fortifying my fort when I put up arguments in her defense (meaning in defense of my fort of faith, not only in the existence of God, but in the promises expressed in his logos, or words)? Is it against the “Logic of God” (who may or may not exist, as the rigors of “faith” have made it a pretty air tight deal that– should God be a fact of reality–that we shall indeed NEVER expect to find him through empirical knowledge, evidence…in test tubes or laboratories. Only by faith will we find God, if this God of Faith be a fact). Or is it against The Logic of Man that I am so fortifying my fort?
It would disappoint me if I were to discover that God is a “fairy tale,” yes. But this has not prevented me from reading and re-reading Hawking’s “The Grand Design,” Dawkin’s “The God Delusion,” Scott Adams “God’s Debris,” Nietzsche’s “The Will to Power,” etc. Indeed, for three years now I have been in the phase of my exploration which I like to call “the temporary practice or testing out of agnosticism.”
I was not afraid to try Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, Taoism (which I actually still adore), nor am I currently afraid as i finish up my “tour of duty” within agnosticism. I am seeking truth, and shall take my key round to every door until I find the door which opens by the key–which is my “whole person,” to include psycho-social, emotional, moral reasoning/conscience, cognitive/intellectual reasoning, etc.
I am looking for what this “whole key” can open, George. I may be frustrated, and maybe I am a little scared, but how can courage ever be created within me if I’m never moving into and facing what “scares” me? A little “fear” actually does a character quite a bit of good…if it is opposed with faith instead of consented to with doubt. Life for me would actually be much easier if I were to settle in for what is behind the “atheist door,” because at least you guys will allow discussion, whereas my ideas among my own brothers and sisters have me “put out of the synagogue,” pretty quickly.
But just because I relate better with you guys, doesn’t mean I’m finished seeking out the truth…I have to hammer it out till I emerge with at least a small sampling of the pure truth…I know you can get that, even if I include all that “faith” stuff among the things I “consider” in my construction of meaning within this thing we call “reality.”
As always…love and appreciate your thinking! it keeps me sharp-witted and “on my toes!”
Katie.
[...] going to re-print a comment I made at my friend Kate’s blog, because it is appropriate to this discussion: My contention, as I hinted in my first response, is [...]
When I speak of using the whole man I am speaking in terms of man living within a living machine which he is trying to make fly. The airplane pilot does not merely have a single instrument he uses when flying an airplane, but a panel of instruments…and no single dial, but a panel filled with dials which show him all sorts of things about what is going on with the machine he is flying through the air.
The human machine is not comprised of merely one instrument. And yet, we are re-inventing man to run on one instrument, namely that of intellectual reasoning alone. Never mind those “emotions,” we don’t “use these” to fly the machine. Never mind moral reasoning, this is relative and we’ll just have to experience them…but we don’t want to “use them” when we are constructing our meaning (or attempting to get the plane off the ground). Never mind that pesky psycho-social apparatus…we’ll just have to put up with it, but let’s not “use this apparatus” as we construct our meaning. We shall construct our meaning using one instrument, and that instrument is “intellectual reasoning,” alone.
When I say I’m trying to “fit a key” to a door, it is the complex “whole man” which I am trying to find a fit for…and that I am “using” in my endeavor to “construct meaning.” Does that make sense?
I used to be a devout apologetic. Searching for the truth was my favorite past-time! I looked forward every day to coming home and arguing with atheists, evolutionists, and democrats about issues and controversies surrounding Christianity.
However God truly worked on my heart and showed me that the best way to spread God’s love is not through apologetics, sweet-sounding blog posts, or angry comments. It’s through truly showing them (words only on occasion).
You can see how apologetic and idiotic I used to be… http://garrettoden.wordpress.com/2011/01/10/i-was-an-idiot/