Christianity Fails the Insider Test for Faith Too!
I've defended the Outsider Test for Faith here at DC and in my book, but when compared to that test the Insider Test for Faith is a much stronger one, and Christianity also fails THAT test! You must read this well-written story of a Christian who lost his faith even as an insider. My question is why God would allow so many insiders like us to lose our faith? Why, for instance, if the evidence favors Christian theism, do so many of us leave it even when approaching it from an insider's perspective (or presumption) that it's true? We can just forget about the outsider test. Christianity doesn't even pass the insider test! In any case, this is a heart wrenching story (notice him struggle!). Here are some interesting quotes from it:
There’s just something about explaining theological concepts to a hostile audience that reveals just how convoluted the arguments are. By the end of the summer, when I thought about religion, neither of us had to open our mouths for my faith to get stomped – the internal skeptic in me was stronger than the Christian in me.
I began taking an online theology class that switched me from presuppositional apologetics to evidential apologetics. You mean I don’t have to assume the Bible is true a priori, but there’s actual evidence for it? Hallelujah!
While I had suspected I was losing my faith off and on for over three years, I didn’t think there was a chance I actually would, even up until the moment it happened. I sincerely believed it was true, and thus I believed that sincerely seeking the truth would lead me to God in some way.
On April 19, 2008, I went to see the movie “Expelled.” I was unsurprised to see ID propaganda, but what surprised me was how many arguments for atheism were presented and how good they looked when paired with Christianity’s most foolish tenants. As far as I was concerned, the movie ended when Dawkins was asked what he would say to God were he to meet him after death. Dawkins replied, “Why did you take such pains to conceal yourself?” This retort was crushing as I thought about my lack of a relationship with God.
When I finally de-converted, I could best describe it as the final scene in a mystery movie, where the detective has been following the bad guy for a while, and finds the smallest clue out of place. A montage follows as he remembers the dozens of times something was amiss, and one-by-one, puts the clues in the proper position and sees he has enough evidence to convict the real villain several times over. After I de-converted, my first thought was “Wow … What took me so long?”
But my second thought was that I had just lost something very dear to me. My identity and purpose for living have been ripped violently away. I have to completely reforge what I think about everything. “Why don’t I just kill myself” was a thought that went through my mind – not that I was actually suicidal, but why not? Instead of protecting myself socially from ungodly influences, I have to find a way to re-enter the world without God.
But the more I know about a secular view of the world, the better it gets. I no longer need a belief in a second life to make this first one precious. Far from being nihilistic, I care about humanity with a passion that I seldom had as a Christian. God isn’t helping us – the only peace and justice to be found in this world are the peace and justice we fight for. I’m finding in free thought more morality and purpose than I ever found in Christianity.
21 comments:
Although I am 45 years old, I've just recently learned how to use a computer. I'm telling you this because some of the terminolgy
used on this site, such as "fundy" is new to me. I kinda like it and hope I can return the favor with a cute nickname for you atheists. You atheists truly fascinate me. The problem I have with your idealism is it sounds a whole lot like us fundy's. We fundy's go to the movies and watch the passion. You guys (like the guy in the original post) goes and sees Expelled. Fundy's buy books written by C.S. Lewis and you guys buy Dawkins. Fundy's get mad when you guys put anti-God stuff on the side of a bus and you guys get mad because we use the word Christmas.
We go to the local coffee shop and talk about how great God is, you go there to talk about how there is no God. We are both probably equally guilty about being somewhat dogmatic in our beliefs.
My point is, as hard as you guys try to say that atheism is no religon, you haven't convinced me.
Please no quotes about bald being a hair color. So I just thougt of a new nickname for you all, how 'bout the great pretenders.
P.S. To John. I don't doubt you would do very well in a debate with anyone on these topics. But the same could be said for our guys doing well against you.
But I wonder how your skills would match up to the likes of Jesus.
Peace out, feeno
feen, Jesus really doesn't impress me in the Gospels at all. He uses bad analogies, misunderstands the OT, and makes points that his contempraries could easy argue against. It's just that how they would've responded isn't recorded.
Cheers.
Thank you for getting back to me.
I feel kinda special. My bible tells me that the religious rulers of the day marveled at what he said. Personally I don't know how anyone could argue over anything he said, just read the sermon on the mount. Thanks Big John for responding. Hope to hear back.
Peace out, feeno
"You guys (like the guy in the original post) goes and sees Expelled."
Only to laugh at it. I doubt you go to see the Passion to do the same.
"Fundy's buy books written by C.S. Lewis and you guys buy Dawkins."
I have books by Strobel and Lewis sitting beside one by Sam Harris. I enjoy reading both sides of the debate, rather than saturating myself with one side only.
"Fundy's get mad when you guys put anti-God stuff on the side of a bus and you guys get mad because we use the word Christmas."
I really don't care whether you say Christmas or not. I say it too. Christmas, Christmas, Christmas! Just because I don't believe Jesus was the Christ anymore, doesn't mean I can't say the word. I don't think this comparison holds by any means. Atheists don't usually protest over the words people say.
"We go to the local coffee shop and talk about how great God is, you go there to talk about how there is no God."
I'm sure the coffee shops are grateful for the business.
"We are both probably equally guilty about being somewhat dogmatic in our beliefs."
I fail to see the comparison. There are certain beliefs that all humans hold dogmatically (or a priori, if you will), but we don't say that the belief that there is an objective reality beyond our senses is a religion. Atheism is only a religion if you are prepared to call a-fairyism, a-leprechaunism, and a-unicornism religions too. As for whether we're pretenders or not, well, I guess you got us. We're all just your typical, baby-eating, devil-worshipping atheists...
Matt, maybe later I'll take this question of yours up, but I don't want to sidetrack the discussion from the insider test.
Yes sir.
Happy holidays
peace out
Faith - a reason to believe without reason.
What is meant by faith? How is faith different from "belief"?And is it possible to have faith in some belief and be wrong? If so, how do we determine which faith to but our faith in? It seems to me that it is inevitable that reason, on some level, must be used. Otherwise, it would be possible to have faith in something impossible or contradictory.
anon
John, not only did you decline my challenge on another post of yours, you seem to have missed the point which spoke directly the insider test.
Insiders defect because the theology they have accepted is flawed. I called it Sunday school theology, but in effect it is the same theology you were exposed to at Lincoln and Trinity. No matter the breadth of a curriculum (and a shame where it is restricted and promotes a narrow world view) people only internalise what they want.
Christ's teachings to the Jews addressed the same point - formal religion had missed the point and focused on the wrong things! ...
The simplistic theology of the evangelicals is appropriate for many – it worked for you for a while. But you and other insiders seem not have been able to stay within its narrow confines, so you questioned and challenged - then the expected result … the discovery. The theology you had being internalising is not complete and it does not stack up to the challenges of atheists and more liberal theologians.
So the “insider” feels deceived by those they trusted – they don’t find the emotional or theological support in their circle and some find the pseudo- logic of atheism extracts them from their predicament. This applies equally to the evangelical seminary educated as the Sunday school taught.
In the personal account of your post it says what surprised me was how many arguments for atheism were presented and how good they looked when paired with Christianity’s most foolish tenants. Atheims at its best, pairing its best arguments with the worst and often misrepresented of theism.
You speak of the gullible being caught in the crossfire – I respectfully suggest that there are areas in everyone’s life where they are gullible. The emotional stress of discovering flaws in the Sunday school theology that they accepted makes people vulnerable and perhaps gullible – certainly those who buy into the arguments of atheism seem gullible to me.
That you ask My question is why God would allow so many insiders like us to lose our faith? exhibits the naivety of your theology – it is still at Sunday school level.
Certainly some Christians make the transition from Sunday school to real world theology without much drama and go on to develop close spiritual relationships that way …
… certainly some make the transition via atheism …
… certainly some seem to get “lost” at the atheism stage …
... it remains an individual journey for each of us and at the end of the day it is the quality of our lives that matter not crying “Lord Lord …” - Matthew 25: 34- and perhaps Luke 13:26&27 speak to the point.
Sala kahle - peace
I don't think the insider or outsider test are very useful. How could someone possibly forget all of their background and history? These worldview decisions are very personal and involve not just intellect but also emotions, desires, and outside forces. John, you're position as an insider was influenced by outside factors and other influences that I don't even know. I think a much better model is laid out in N.T. Wright's NT and the People of God. He outlines how we tell ourselves stories to explain the world around us, and we try to fit the information into our personal stories. (He isn't a solipsist, however, he calls his approach critical-realism)
To Jeff
Didn't laugh at the Passion, but I laughed at Bruce Almighty.
Saturate, be careful look what happened to C.S. Lewis when he got saturated.
Atheist usually don't protest over words we say. Oh please. Try to buy a Christmas card or a Christmas lights. This week alone I was invited to a Winter break party and a Holiday gathering. If you really didn't care the ACLU would be out of business.
My local coffee shop likes me so much some cute little hottie gives me free coffee.
Please stop eating babies.
Peace out, feeno
Aka,
Your posts are very condescending. You pass off intense criticisms like the Problem of Evil and a whole assorted host of "Why wouldn't God..."s with unsupported statements like "that's a strawman" and "that's not a problem for mature theologies," without letting us in on why your personal theology is impervious to these very difficult problems.
Tell me, aka, what is this brilliant new theology of yours? What is it about your worldview that makes it superior to other Christian theologies? From what you let on, it could be that you've just thought up even more excuses to excuse your god from acting mercifully or rationally. If I am wrong, please correct me with what is right.
That is, aka, please tell me if your "real world" theology amounts to any more than "God's going to do what He wants and we can't do anything about it."
Firstly let me say I don’t wish to appear condensing as Philip accuses me. If I do I apologise. Perhaps my tone has led to his.
Philip, you ask Tell me, aka, what is this brilliant new theology of yours? … well it’s not new, but it may well be brilliant…
... if want to track the development of my personal theology towards a liberal Roman Catholicism position please visit my blog – I don’t think John would appreciate going so far off topic here.
That said, I have to thank John and DC for helping me along that journey by teasing out many of the questions that I have had to find the answers to … answering each one has strengthened my catholic theist belief.
I some ways it is this very point I presented for discussion in my comment. I work my way through the atheist arguments and they strengthen my belief
– it seems that even some seminary trained evangelicals are unable to deal with the same questions -
That leads to my comment on the transition to a mature theology, one that withstands the level of criticism found here.
Certainly the answers to what DC sets out to be – an attack on fundamentalist evangelical teaching – are not to be found in that theology.
Hence my point that it seems easy to convert those who hold that simplistic belief through exposure to the type revelation and pseudo-logic contained in the atheist position we see here.
The point you should get is that none of the atheist arguments presented here on DC are new to Catholic scholarship which, from my exposure to it, does not shy away from addressing the difficult issues and certainly is not trapped by bible inerrancy.
You might want to read this summary of the differences in position on the bible.
What I see as intellectually dishonest is trying to replace a sometimes flawed theology with an atheist argument that is at least as flawed if not more so.
What I see as personally dishonest is presenting to your targets as unanswered and even unanswerable atheist arguments that you know have been found to be neither persuasive nor compelling, by those whose theology is competent to review them.
Where do I get that from – well John himself, who says My claim is that not a single one of you can effectively and honestly deal with every argument in my book, any one of which is fatal to your faith (and I mean conservative Christians). Call me arrogant if you will.
Now at least John acknowledges that his arguments are of little substance to non-conservative Christians, but they are not his targets here on DC … I still wonder why?
Sala kahle - peace
It seems to me that the difference between those who lose their faith and those who only have their faith strengthened is that some are not willing to try and make things fit and some are.
I, for example, was not willing to try and make Christianity make sense. I saw no reason. To me, if some of it didnt make sense, then i wasnt about to go out of my way to make it make sense. So the attacks made upon it were pretty good, in my eyes, and so my faith failed.
For others, they appear to purposely seek out reasons to keep their faith alive. They try to harmonize things, and the result is that they have actively attempted to explain away the difficulties in their worldview as opposed to taking the facts and making their choices based on those. I've seen this with young earth creationists as well as with liberal Christians that I've known in the past. The results have been ever more complex, contradictory, and shaky personal religious views.
A friend of mine, for instance, is convinced that homosexuality is a result either of molestation as a child, or an outright choice made because the person has no luck with the opposite sex. I asked him what he based this on: science or Christianity? He replied that he based it on "both ... but mainly Christianity." He knows that he needs homosexuality to be unnatural for his Christianity to make sense to him, so he actively sought out answers that made real life harmonize with his faith, regardless if they had a solid scientific base or not.
I'm not convinced that I'm right, not at all. I could be wrong. But I take things as they come, and the more convincing will prevail over the less convincing. I will not try to make anything make sense that does not truly make sense. Others, unfortunately, take the other route, and in essence create their own, private reality.
Dear guy who this post is about,just in case your reading this.
You said "The internal skeptic in me was stronger than the Christian in me." .............O.K.
You said "You mean I don't have to assume the bible is true".........
...No, you don't
You said "I believe that sincerely seeking the truth would lead me to God in some way"........It still can, however the Truth you seek starts with a capitol T.
And finally, Dawkins. Are you kidding me. The same Dawkins that filled in scientific gaps by using spaceships from some distant galaxy to come to earth to drop of animals. Yeah let's take advice from him. And by the way, I can't look outside with out seeing how evident God is.
P.S. AKA, You are not condescending, I guess intellect should be reserved for atheists only, keep up the good work.
Peace out, feeno
Philip you give the example of someone who has an irrational position on homosexuality and use it “prove” that some will cling to their beliefs and work hard to make the world they see fit that belief. OK so what? Your example happened to be a Christian – does that mean there are not similar atheist positions. If I present you with an example of an irrational atheist does that prove atheists to be irrational?
Clearly the fault can be found on both sides of the divide with individuals tending to deny that they may be bending things to fit. But this is exactly what one expects!
There are no absolutely conclusive proofs or arguments for or against a/theism. So either one is an agnostic or one takes a leap of faith to believe there is or not a God.
It is my view that the leap of faith necessary to be atheists is simply too large for me – it ignores too much evidence; it relies on too many weak arguments.
If you want to talk about self deception try atheists who rely on arguments applicable only to a simplistic Sunday school (or perhaps TED) theology and delude themselves and others that they have an argument against theism or mainstream Christian theology.
Sala kahle - peace
>Dear guy who this post is about,just in case your reading this.
That's me.
>And finally, Dawkins. Are you kidding me.
While I disagree with your assessment of him, it's not really relevant.
Dawkins is historically part of my rejection of Christianity and not so much intellectually. My intellectual reasons are the subject of my blog. Take him out and nothing changes except maybe my faith survives another week. Discrediting Dawkins doesn't discredit the life experiences which made his quip effective, and that was the real point.
I didn't even crack a book by him until November. As I expected, he's a great writer, a great scientist and he's hilarious. But knowledge of religion and philosophy are not among his strengths. I don't think reading The God Delusion sooner would have helped the process. (It may have sped up the non-Christian theist to atheist part, but not the Christianity rejected part.)
Dear Jeffrey
You said
"I'm finding in free thought more morality and purpose than I ever found in christianity."
Wow, I hope you were a horrible Christian, because if not, that sure doesn't say much about the church.
Most people leave the church due to some injustice they have encountered by someone inside the church. And FYI I also believe alot atheists' leave the church for similar reasons, It's not that they don't believe, they are just really pissed off at God. However your story is unique in the sense that you really seem to have left because of "intellectual reasons"
We can talk about those later, if you wish. But if you could please indulge me, I really would like to know if you have maintained a relationship with your old friends from the church, and have they tried to "bring you back in"
Peace out and happy holidays, feeno
@Matt:
>>Wow, I hope you were a horrible Christian, because if not, that sure doesn't say much about the church.
::What is your definition of a horrible church? Is it someone who actually follows the Bible literally since it is the word of god and hence believes in things like slavery? Or is it someone who is now called a buffet Christian who picks and chooses what is and isn't meant to be Gods word?
>>Most people leave the church due to some injustice they have encountered by someone inside the church.
::Do you have proof of this claim?
>>And FYI I also believe alot atheists' leave the church for similar reasons, It's not that they don't believe, they are just really pissed off at God.
::What? You have to believe in something to be mad at it. I don't get mad at gremlins for screwing up the transmission in my car because I don't believe in gremlins. I also don't get mad at God because I don't believe in him/her/it.
To Tracy
I didn't say all atheists are mad at God. But you are certainly helping me prove my point. If your not mad at God, then you don't feel he is worthy of your praise because he is pro-slavery.(an injustice for sure and maybe the proof you wanted) And that slavery bit is getting a little tired. Maybe your not mad at God, but you sound a little mad at me.
As far as "buffet Christians" That is a real problem, but it is ours, not yours.
I have no response to your Gremlins
in your transmission story, but I will say that Phoebe Cates was a smokin' hottie.
Peace out, happy holidays. feeno
>>I didn't say all atheists are mad at God.
::I didn't say that you did.
>>But you are certainly helping me prove my point.
::How?
>>If your not mad at God, then you don't feel he is worthy of your praise
::No. I'm not mad at God because I don't get mad at things that don't exist.
>>because he is pro-slavery.(an injustice for sure and maybe the proof you wanted)
::Proof of what?
>>And that slavery bit is getting a little tired.
::Hey. It's your book. I'm just pointing out one of the things that we now see as evil that your book says was OK. I guess I could have just posted this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWqgD7lGneU&fmt=18
>>Maybe your not mad at God, but you sound a little mad at me.
::Not at all. I'm sorry that pointed questions come off as me being mad at you but questions are just questions.
>>As far as "buffet Christians" That is a real problem, but it is ours, not yours.
::Ok. But that still doesn't answer my question. What is your definition of a good church? One that picks and chooses what is Gods Word or one that believes everything in the Bible is true.
>>I have no response to your Gremlins in your transmission story,
::Figured you wouldn't since it touches a bit to close to the question of God.
>>but I will say that Phoebe Cates was a smokin' hottie.
::That she is.
>>Peace out, happy holidays. feeno
::You too.
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