This seems like a particularly good idea if they’re already trying to foist works of apologetics on him; it seems that it would encourage them to believe that the fair arrangement is to suspend the conversation and read each others’ material.
Agreed—this will probably work best for the incredible mass of people ahead who may or may not know (through the grapevine), but who I’ve never addressed the topic with in person (and who may volunteer some apologetics or want to know exactly why I don’t believe).
There are other types of situations where this wouldn’t help as much.
Some of the nearly-as-awkward conversations are the close friends who are aware of the situation and always want to know “if there’s been any progress” or “where I’m at since the last time.” Or those who feel that it’s necessary to tell me repeatedly that they miss the common ground we shared or even like a part of me is missing.
While I fully admit that we’ve lost the common ground, I don’t think I’ve necessarily lost any “part” of me. I think I’ve simply applied a studious tendency that was already present toward a new area that happened to be something we were incredibly immersed in. I wrote about this in a series of posts about my attempt to debunk a multi-level marketing scheme HERE. The pertinent passage is from part 3 (the preface was discussing my “anal” researching nature about other decisions, then connecting it with the current topic of interest, god):
...somewhere deeply ingrained in my nature is a desire to learn, understand, fiddle, and to know. I can’t tell you that I had anything to do with it being there, but it’s there. It comes out all the time when it’s not convenient (e.g. when I should be sleeping but am on Wikipedia or reading books until 3:00am instead).
When I questioned god, I simply did what I always do. I applied my reasoning skills in the best way I knew how. Suspend judgment and belief and try to prove Christianity to myself. It hasn’t worked. I think it’s a great idea, but I was met with immense dissent from fellow believers. But why?
My reflection on my nature has led me to think of how others perceive my decision making and analytical tendencies. Honestly it’s with almost unanimous respect...No one suggested that my reasoning or decision making is flawed.
But what about now? Now I am criticized for stepping outside of the bubble and suspending belief. I’m told that I should have had faith seeking understanding in order to come to the truth. For some reason, one can only reach “the truth” if approached from one of two starting positions: assuming that god exists and that Christianity is true.
Anyway, perhaps that wasn’t entirely pertinent, but I wanted to highlight that there are, indeed, other circumstances where someone might not be presenting new material for me to read… they just disagree a priori and are unhappy about it. And decide to reiterate that dissatisfaction frequently. This isn’t in a way that blatantly says, “It’s your fault that you don’t believe”—it’s just a verbal lamentation that has the same effects as following it up with, “Yeah, so I feel like shit about our relationship and you cause that upon me.”
I have not figured out what to do in these situations rather than simply say, “Yeah. I can absolutely see where you would feel that way.” That’s about it.
But what about now? Now I am criticized for stepping outside of the bubble and suspending belief. I’m told that I should have had faith seeking understanding in order to come to the truth. For some reason, one can only reach “the truth” if approached from one of two starting positions: assuming that god exists and that Christianity is true.
Perhaps you’ve already tried this, but I think I would point out that people who who have “faith seeking understanding” tend to end up with the same beliefs they started with in other religions as well, and indeed, with any sort of belief, it has a marked tendency not to change one’s mind. You can tell them you don’t think a benevolent god who wanted people to believe would provide so little evidence that people can’t come to the right conclusion without using methods that aren’t generally useful for finding out what’s true.
Absolutely. I should have added that, ever since I heard it, I have come to see “faith seeking understanding” as roughly equivalent to “believe that you may believe more.”
You can tell them you don’t think a benevolent god who wanted people to believe would provide so little evidence that people can’t come to the right conclusion without using methods that aren’t generally useful for finding out what’s true.
Indeed, and I think this is one of the easiest, simplest ways to offer a reason for non-belief. Theists also don’t go down so easy and would suggest that it’s possible, given the weight of the consequences, one should never give up and spend their whole lives seeking after a way to believe.
This is pretty much a prettied up version of Pascal’s Wager.
My wife was on retreat this weekend and talked glowingly of a talk in which a guest speaker said that he struggled with non-belief but concluded that since heaven is possible, he is going to dedicate his entire life to study and religious living so that if it exists, he will go. She thought that this was about the most admirable thing ever.
And hence, even if you don’t believe now, surely god has a plan and you need to keep your head in Swinburne and Kreeft until your death bed. There seems to be no way out that a theist will accept is honorable and justified, which is quite unfortunate. I dialogued with the author of Daylight Atheism, who made the great point that to join a religion, you just need to say a few words, but to leave you need to conclusively refute every theologian who’s ever lived...
Anyway, perhaps that wasn’t entirely pertinent, but I wanted to highlight that there are, indeed, other circumstances where someone might not be presenting new material for me to read… they just disagree a priori and are unhappy about it. And decide to reiterate that dissatisfaction frequently. This isn’t in a way that blatantly says, “It’s your fault that you don’t believe”—it’s just a verbal lamentation that has the same effects as following it up with, “Yeah, so I feel like shit about our relationship and you cause that upon me.”
I have not figured out what to do in these situations rather than simply say, “Yeah. I can absolutely see where you would feel that way.” That’s about it.
You might try telling them that you’re trying to follow up a case of genuine curiosity, the sort they never condemned when it didn’t touch on matters of faith, and it hurts you to feel that you’re being discouraged from being intellectually honest. If God wants you to believe, he can do it by placing the evidence you’re looking for before you, rather than preventing you from carrying out an unbiased investigation.
I’ve done this with a few. The response has been varied. I think my wife understood that. I had another friend basically tell me I was obligate to “have faith seeking understanding” because I was the one who defected and that I owed it to my wife.
I still have an incredibly hard time seeing as how that’s proper.
If God wants you to believe, he can do it by placing the evidence you’re looking for before you...
Indeed. Many initially object to this idea because they think it fiddles with free will, but if god is the author of all events and permits everything to happen according to his will and has all knowledge… he already knew what would cause any given person to believe and necessarily allowed that evidence to come before them. I think of people as having a “threshold of belief” and think they are blind to where it lies. Some unpredicted thing comes along one day, breaks the threshold, and you change your mind.
If you can go along with that model as useful, then it could be said that god knows where my threshold is and isn’t meeting it.
I had another friend basically tell me I was obligate to “have faith seeking understanding” because I was the one who defected and that I owed it to my wife.
Have you tried asking if you were, say, a Muslim, if it would still be right for you to have faith seeking understanding? Does your friend think this is always the right thing to do, or just when you happen to start out believing the right thing?
Indeed. Many initially object to this idea because they think it fiddles with free will
If God can’t alter events that will affect our decisions, can he actually do anything in the real world?
Free will has always been one of the most frustrating arguments for me to deal with, because it’s subject to such an extent of doublethink. It appears that God is capable of everything, except when he’s incapable of anything. It’s extraordinarily difficult to get people to notice that they should be confused by this.
Does your friend think this is always the right thing to do, or just when you happen to start out believing the right thing?
In theory, I think he’d actually say that this is always the right thing to do if you are pre-committed in various ways to a life based on X and which affects close relationships.
In practice, I think he’d welcome me with open arms if I was a Muslim/Jew/Scientologist/Mormon and told him I was having doubts and wanted to seriously consider Catholicism as the one true faith.
If God can’t alter events that will affect our decisions, can he actually do anything in the real world?
Great point.
It appears that God is capable of everything, except when he’s incapable of anything.
Another great point. I played praise and worship at a friend’s wedding last summer as a non-believer (he asked and I wasn’t going to say no), and one of the songs was this one(I linked to the chorus), which has this refrain:
Savior, he can move the mountains
My God is mighty to save, he is mighty to save...
Having that in my head for so long to practice it and what not, I came up with a re-write that illustrates your point:
Savior, he can move the mountains
But he can’t do anything that’s tangibly observable...
This seems like a particularly good idea if they’re already trying to foist works of apologetics on him; it seems that it would encourage them to believe that the fair arrangement is to suspend the conversation and read each others’ material.
Agreed—this will probably work best for the incredible mass of people ahead who may or may not know (through the grapevine), but who I’ve never addressed the topic with in person (and who may volunteer some apologetics or want to know exactly why I don’t believe).
There are other types of situations where this wouldn’t help as much.
Some of the nearly-as-awkward conversations are the close friends who are aware of the situation and always want to know “if there’s been any progress” or “where I’m at since the last time.” Or those who feel that it’s necessary to tell me repeatedly that they miss the common ground we shared or even like a part of me is missing.
While I fully admit that we’ve lost the common ground, I don’t think I’ve necessarily lost any “part” of me. I think I’ve simply applied a studious tendency that was already present toward a new area that happened to be something we were incredibly immersed in. I wrote about this in a series of posts about my attempt to debunk a multi-level marketing scheme HERE. The pertinent passage is from part 3 (the preface was discussing my “anal” researching nature about other decisions, then connecting it with the current topic of interest, god):
Anyway, perhaps that wasn’t entirely pertinent, but I wanted to highlight that there are, indeed, other circumstances where someone might not be presenting new material for me to read… they just disagree a priori and are unhappy about it. And decide to reiterate that dissatisfaction frequently. This isn’t in a way that blatantly says, “It’s your fault that you don’t believe”—it’s just a verbal lamentation that has the same effects as following it up with, “Yeah, so I feel like shit about our relationship and you cause that upon me.”
I have not figured out what to do in these situations rather than simply say, “Yeah. I can absolutely see where you would feel that way.” That’s about it.
Perhaps you’ve already tried this, but I think I would point out that people who who have “faith seeking understanding” tend to end up with the same beliefs they started with in other religions as well, and indeed, with any sort of belief, it has a marked tendency not to change one’s mind. You can tell them you don’t think a benevolent god who wanted people to believe would provide so little evidence that people can’t come to the right conclusion without using methods that aren’t generally useful for finding out what’s true.
Absolutely. I should have added that, ever since I heard it, I have come to see “faith seeking understanding” as roughly equivalent to “believe that you may believe more.”
Indeed, and I think this is one of the easiest, simplest ways to offer a reason for non-belief. Theists also don’t go down so easy and would suggest that it’s possible, given the weight of the consequences, one should never give up and spend their whole lives seeking after a way to believe.
This is pretty much a prettied up version of Pascal’s Wager.
My wife was on retreat this weekend and talked glowingly of a talk in which a guest speaker said that he struggled with non-belief but concluded that since heaven is possible, he is going to dedicate his entire life to study and religious living so that if it exists, he will go. She thought that this was about the most admirable thing ever.
And hence, even if you don’t believe now, surely god has a plan and you need to keep your head in Swinburne and Kreeft until your death bed. There seems to be no way out that a theist will accept is honorable and justified, which is quite unfortunate. I dialogued with the author of Daylight Atheism, who made the great point that to join a religion, you just need to say a few words, but to leave you need to conclusively refute every theologian who’s ever lived...
You might try telling them that you’re trying to follow up a case of genuine curiosity, the sort they never condemned when it didn’t touch on matters of faith, and it hurts you to feel that you’re being discouraged from being intellectually honest. If God wants you to believe, he can do it by placing the evidence you’re looking for before you, rather than preventing you from carrying out an unbiased investigation.
I’ve done this with a few. The response has been varied. I think my wife understood that. I had another friend basically tell me I was obligate to “have faith seeking understanding” because I was the one who defected and that I owed it to my wife.
I still have an incredibly hard time seeing as how that’s proper.
Indeed. Many initially object to this idea because they think it fiddles with free will, but if god is the author of all events and permits everything to happen according to his will and has all knowledge… he already knew what would cause any given person to believe and necessarily allowed that evidence to come before them. I think of people as having a “threshold of belief” and think they are blind to where it lies. Some unpredicted thing comes along one day, breaks the threshold, and you change your mind.
If you can go along with that model as useful, then it could be said that god knows where my threshold is and isn’t meeting it.
Have you tried asking if you were, say, a Muslim, if it would still be right for you to have faith seeking understanding? Does your friend think this is always the right thing to do, or just when you happen to start out believing the right thing?
If God can’t alter events that will affect our decisions, can he actually do anything in the real world?
Free will has always been one of the most frustrating arguments for me to deal with, because it’s subject to such an extent of doublethink. It appears that God is capable of everything, except when he’s incapable of anything. It’s extraordinarily difficult to get people to notice that they should be confused by this.
In theory, I think he’d actually say that this is always the right thing to do if you are pre-committed in various ways to a life based on X and which affects close relationships.
In practice, I think he’d welcome me with open arms if I was a Muslim/Jew/Scientologist/Mormon and told him I was having doubts and wanted to seriously consider Catholicism as the one true faith.
Great point.
Another great point. I played praise and worship at a friend’s wedding last summer as a non-believer (he asked and I wasn’t going to say no), and one of the songs was this one(I linked to the chorus), which has this refrain:
Having that in my head for so long to practice it and what not, I came up with a re-write that illustrates your point: