Can I have both Faith and Reason?

[John54]

In the thread entitled An Honest Question, Criada said:

As I see it, none of the "reasons" we can give are going to convince you in any way.
Because ultimately, it comes down to faith!

This was my reply.

Yes, that's the core of my problem, Criada.

I can't see any merit in faith. I read what so many others have said about it in the past and find myself nodding in agreement.

"Faith is the effort to believe what your common sense tells you is not true." Elbert Hubbard

"Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable." H. L. Mencken

"Faith is believing what you know ain’t so." Mark Twain

"The deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence." Thomas H. Huxley

"[Children] are taught that it is a virtue to accept statements without adequate evidence, which leaves them a prey to quacks of every kind in later life, and makes it very difficult for them to accept the methods of thought which are successful in science." J. B. S. Haldane

"Because religious training means credulity training, churches should not be surprised to find that so many of their congregations accept astrology as readily as theology, or a channeled Atlantean priest as readily as a biblical prophet." Barbara G. Walker

"The most pernicious of absurdities is that weak, blind, stupid faith is better than the constant practice of every human virtue." Walter Savage Landor

"I do not support religion because it demands that we give up our most important human asset, the ability to question. It demands that we simply believe. Isn't that true of any dictator, of any totalitarian society? Insofar as social development is concerned, nothing is of greater importance than the human function of questioning. . . . Questioning led to the development of civilization." Vladimir Pozner

Statements like the above make complete sense to me. I trust reason in every other area of my life. To allow faith in through the door and kick reason out of the window when it comes to the most important area of all seems crazy.

* * *

I thought this core problem was worth its own thread, so here it is.

Is it possible, given the above, to have Faith in the concept of God without throwing away the faculty of reason?

Any thoughts?

John

 

[ContentInHim]

John - there is absolutely a way to reconcile faith and reason. Looking at your quotations above, I see that they are all from unbelievers. There are also wonderful writings by smart, reasonable people of great faith. What you believe can often depend upon what you read. For instance, my stepdaughter constantly bemoans her lack of faith/her pessimism, etc. And yet, those are the only theological authors she will read - as though someone who doubts will help her overcome her doubts. See what I mean?

You are a very thoughtful (as in full of thought) kinda guy. You are going to work it out. I can't even discuss this properly with you - I'm still working out how "I know what I know". But you are being prayed for and if you keep seeking, you will be blessed by finding what you want to know!

 

[John54]

Thanks for the response and the kind words, C-in-H.

I have read books and articles by people who do believe, but I'm trained to look for logical errors and slips in rationality - and I always seem to find them.

It's the leap from reason to faith that does it. At some point, the believer always says 'OK, I can't explain why I believe in a rational fashion - but I do believe. I have faith.'

And then I'm back where I started.

I guess I'm looking for someone who can give me a rational reason for belief - but I suspect there simply isn't one.

John

 

[parsa]

John54,

I'm thinking about your question from a different view point. See what you think.

People use beliefs all the time in almost everything, and not just religous ones. Or at least this is my observation.
Aside from whether you believe in this or that religion or don't at all, on the practical level, I mean in your day to day life you are using many beliefs that if someone asks why or tries to get something logical out of it they'll just hit a brick wall.

Now I understand that believing in God is not like loving ice cream and it is something fundamental that is supposed to make a fundamental change in your life. But I just want to bring your attention to the fact that acting out of belief is not something unusual in anyones life.

 

[John54]

Hi, Parsa:

I agree. People do use beliefs of various kinds in day-to-day living. Some of those beliefs are sound, others are not.

It's raining here at the moment. I believe it will stop at some point, because rain has always stopped in the past. My previous experience suggests that's a fairly well-justified belief.

I believe my car will start when I turn the key, because it's a decent car and it's started thousands of times before.

But I know someone who genuinely believes he's ill because aliens are constantly beaming rays at him from a spaceship.

I know someone else who can't leave her house without touching the doorbell six times.

I know people who hold all kinds of crazy beliefs.

The fact that they hold them, and act out of belief, is hardly a sound reason for thinking belief in God is justified.

There are people who still believe the earth is flat!

John

 

[Secundulus]

You can have both faith and reason but you cannot reason your way into faith.

You either will believe or you will not.

After you believe, reason and proof will be evident.

Before you believe, it will appear foolish.

 

[ralangley]

Hi John!

LOVE your quote from Mark Twain! I have struggled with the same questions, and I think every discerning human being has. Faith and reason are not reconcilable until we, well, believe. Kierkegaard called it a "leap of faith". Easy to say, difficult to do. Fortunately, God can give us the grace to believe. But we must first trust God enough to ask for it.

Keep in mind that you don't need a great deal of faith to ask for God's help or to even be a miracle worker. You only need a tiny speck of faith - the size of a mustard seed. If you can find that tiny faith, and give it all to God - even with your questions, doubts and all the things that hold you back - God can do the rest. The fact that you're questioning and brave enough to articulate your concerns, tells me you have at least a speck of faith.

For me, I had to say, "Jesus if you are real, make yourself known to me." That's all. Within 24 hours, my life, my belief structure was radically changed. You'll have to find your own way.

Hope this helps.

 

[ContentInHim]

Thanks for the response and the kind words, C-in-H.

I have read books and articles by people who do believe, but I'm trained to look for logical errors and slips in rationality - and I always seem to find them.

It's the leap from reason to faith that does it. At some point, the believer always says 'OK, I can't explain why I believe in a rational fashion - but I do believe. I have faith.'

And then I'm back where I started.

I guess I'm looking for someone who can give me a rational reason for belief - but I suspect there simply isn't one.

John

I didn't know how to do it either. So I didn't - I just kept asking for what I wanted! At the time it was consolation for what was unconsolable and comfort where there wasn't any to be found. With me, it did not happen right away - it was almost so slow as to be imperceptible. I can't even find words to tell you what happened, but the more I let God work in my life - going with His flow, if you will - the more answers to my questions and to what I had previously regarded as logical problems I found. I've more or less come to the conclusion that my leap from logic to faith had more to do with God than with me. Now something in me is so changed that I feel that only faith is logical. Wow - how did that happen? I haven't a clue!

Just don't stop asking/seeking/searching for it. Do not be frustrated - not everyone has an "aha" moment about this.

 

[John54]

Thanks for the responses, folks. I appreciate them. Food for thought.

John

 

[Angel4Truth]

Faith - the primary meaning is complete trust. Can you trust something you cannot get your head around at all? No and neither does God expect you to. He gives us a sound mind to reason with. does this mean you will always understand his logic ? No it doesnt mean that either - but if your faith has justification you will still be able to trust God even when you cannot understand the reasoning for something in particular. The balance is that He shows us (when we are willing to trust Him) enough to justify our trust in Him.

Can anyone have complete and total knowledge of another? No yet we completely trust people every day even when we dont always understand their logic on something dont we? We do this because they have given us enough "reason" to know we can trust them.

On the flip side - we could always go for the negative also and always examine someone or something to such an extend that we feel " we can poke holes all in it" based upon our own limited understanding but we can never crawl inside their mind and heart to know the full extent of anything. We are limited to basing our trust in them on the reasoning of what we do know of them.

God gave us His word so He obviously doesnt want us blind. He wants us to use the sound mind He gave us and He gave us imo enough to know that He is who He says He is.

 

[Digit]

Hey John,

Have you heard of the Alpha Course? I think it could be right up your street. If you don't think you would go to this kind of thing, then buy and read the book!

Digit

 

[ebia]

In the thread entitled An Honest Question, Criada said:



This was my reply.

Yes, that's the core of my problem, Criada.

I can't see any merit in faith. I read what so many others have said about it in the past and find myself nodding in agreement.

"Faith is the effort to believe what your common sense tells you is not true." Elbert Hubbard

"Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable." H. L. Mencken

"Faith is believing what you know ain’t so." Mark Twain

"The deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence." Thomas H. Huxley

"[Children] are taught that it is a virtue to accept statements without adequate evidence, which leaves them a prey to quacks of every kind in later life, and makes it very difficult for them to accept the methods of thought which are successful in science." J. B. S. Haldane

"Because religious training means credulity training, churches should not be surprised to find that so many of their congregations accept astrology as readily as theology, or a channeled Atlantean priest as readily as a biblical prophet." Barbara G. Walker

"The most pernicious of absurdities is that weak, blind, stupid faith is better than the constant practice of every human virtue." Walter Savage Landor

"I do not support religion because it demands that we give up our most important human asset, the ability to question. It demands that we simply believe. Isn't that true of any dictator, of any totalitarian society? Insofar as social development is concerned, nothing is of greater importance than the human function of questioning. . . . Questioning led to the development of civilization." Vladimir Pozner

Statements like the above make complete sense to me. I trust reason in every other area of my life. To allow faith in through the door and kick reason out of the window when it comes to the most important area of all seems crazy.

* * *

I thought this core problem was worth its own thread, so here it is.

Is it possible, given the above, to have Faith in the concept of God without throwing away the faculty of reason?

Not if you define faith in terms of lack of reason (as the above do), but that isn't a proper Christian understanding of what faith is.

I guess I'm looking for someone who can give me a rational reason for belief - but I suspect there simply isn't one.

Not in terms of pure, post-enlightenment, late modern rationalism, no. Such a system of thought can have nothing to say about God. And it can't answer a lot of other questions adequately either.

But most converts don't arrive at Christianity through reason, but through experience. The path has never been (for most people) about being persuaded through argument, but of being interested through observing Christians, gradually joining in, and coming to experience God. Which is more pursasive - having someone prove something exists, or having them show you?

 

[John54]

Faith - the primary meaning is complete trust. Can you trust something you cannot get your head around at all? No and neither does God expect you to. He gives us a sound mind to reason with. does this mean you will always understand his logic ? No it doesnt mean that either - but if your faith has justification you will still be able to trust God even when you cannot understand the reasoning for something in particular. The balance is that He shows us (when we are willing to trust Him) enough to justify our trust in Him.

Thanks for that, Angel.

It does seem to be self-contradictory, though.

1. Can you trust something you cannot get your head around at all? No and neither does God expect you to.

2. Does this mean you will always understand his logic ? No it doesnt mean that either - but if your faith has justification you will still be able to trust God even when you cannot understand the reasoning for something in particular.

Assuming 'cannot get your head around' = 'cannot understand the reasoning' it seems to me that quote 2 contradicts the 2nd sentence in quote 1.

John

 

[John54]

Not in terms of pure, post-enlightenment, late modern rationalism, no. Such a system of thought can have nothing to say about God.

That second sentence seems quite dogmatic, ebia.

I think rationalism has something to say about every aspect of our experience - including the experience of God. Why do you feel so strongly that it doesn't?

John

 

[parsa]

John54,

Your examples about beliefs are very very nice. Sometimes just repetition of something we have observed leads us to a beleif, other times it could be something very intense and powerful that can happen only once, like a phobia.

Rule of thumb for beleifs, I believe, is to ask if they are working for you. If someone beleives in aliens and they are ok with whatever consequences that may have in their lives, I think it's ok. There's nothing instrinsically wrong about believing that the world is flat. It's definately not a useful model according to what I would like to let into my experience, but it works for someone else for some reason.

When it comes to God the whole thing is a little different. In terms of this life, well I like my life better with God in it, and for this aspect of it, it actually matters little to me if it's true or not. Of course I believe it's true and proving to me that God doesn't exist really doesn't bring me anything.

 

[John54]

If someone beleives in aliens and they are ok with whatever consequences that may have in their lives, I think it's ok. There's nothing instrinsically wrong about believing that the world is flat.

I understand your point, parsa, but I think beliefs that don't connect with reality are dangerous.

It may be true that Fred's belief that the world is flat does no real harm (although it'll make it difficult for him if he wants to become a cosmologist) - but once we accept the fundamental notion that it's OK to hold beliefs that don't have any connection with the real world, we're on a path that can lead to all kinds of problems.

Millions of white people still believe black people are inferior. The guys who flew the planes into the two towers believed they were doing a wonderful thing and they would get their virgins in heaven.

In terms of this life, well I like my life better with God in it, and for this aspect of it, it actually matters little to me if it's true or not.

I find that amazing.

If I'm going to build my entire world-view around a core concept, I need to know if that concept is true or false.

John

 

[parsa]

Well I did mention that there is nothing 'intrinsically' wrong about...

What effect my beliefs have on another person is a whole other issue. When I said "work for you" I meant in a congruent manner. Now this is where my beliefs come in, because I don't beleive something is actually 'working for you' if you are harming others. You may or may not accept that and that is your choice.

*********************

I said it actually matters little to me if it's true or not.
Truth and false are not abstract ideas, they are bound to a set of rules and standards. I believe God is true according to my reasons and rules and standards. And there is no way I can meet everyone elses standards. Most likely I won't be able to meet the majority of people's standards.

 

[junezephyr]

Hello John54

Just wondering, have you ever read any books by C.S. Lewis? He was an extremely reasonable and intellectual man. He was an atheist for quite awhile who eventually became a Christian. I too have run into many questions regarding faith/reason, and let me say, after reading much of his writing, I am now able to reconcile the two quite nicely. The book "Mere Christianity" is a nice introduction, and so is "Miracles".

Just thought I'd suggest those readings for you, if you're interested.

 

[Merlin]

Christianity may include reason.
It's just that, you can reject any idea anyone presents about any subject..
Ultimately, you must decide..

Gravity is based on reason. To take an aircraft trip, no matter how much reasoning you do, ultimately requires an act of faith.

 

[LightHearted]

John,

Another book that might be of interest to you is a book called "A Case for Christ." I believe it's written by Lee Stroebel. I've only read a portion of it so far, but it seems to take a very analytical view of faith and of God.

I'm not sure if this story will help or not - I think that your doubt lays elsewhere than the character of the story, but I'll share it with you nonetheless. It's written by a man named Paul Harvey:

Now the man to whom I’m going to introduce you was not a scrooge. He was a kind, decent, mostly good man, generous to his family and upright in his dealings with other men. But he just didn’t believe all that incarnation stuff which the churches proclaim at Christmas time. It just didn’t make sense, and he was too honest to pretend otherwise. He just couldn’t swallow the Jesus story, about God coming to earth as a man.

“I’m truly sorry to distress you,” he told his wife, “but I’m not going with you to church this Christmas Eve.” He said he’d feel like a hypocrite and that he’d much rather just stay at home, but that he would wait up for them. And so he stayed, and they went to the midnight service.

Shortly after the family drove away in the car, snow began to fall. He went to the window to watch the flurries getting heavier and heavier and then went back to his fireside chair and began to read his newspaper. Minutes later, he was startled by a thudding sound. Then another, and then another. Sort of a thump or a thud. At first he thought someone must be throwing snowballs against his living room window.

But when he went to the front door to investigate, he found a flock of birds huddled miserably in the snow. They’d been caught in the storm and, in a desperate search for shelter, had tried to fly through his large landscape window. Well, he couldn’t let the poor creatures lie there and freeze, so he remembered the barn where his children stabled their pony. That would provide a warm shelter, if he could direct the birds to it.

Quickly he put on a coat and galoshes and tramped through the deepening snow to the barn. He opened the doors wide and turned on a light, but the birds did not come in. He figured food would entice them in. So he hurried back to the house, fetched bread crumbs and sprinkled them on the snow, making a trail to the yellow-lighted, wide-open doorway of the stable. But to his dismay, the birds ignored the bread crumbs and continued to flap around helplessly in the snow.

He tried catching them. He tried shooing them into the barn by walking around them waving his arms. Instead, they scattered in every direction, except into the warm, lighted barn. And then, he realized, that they were afraid of him. To them, he reasoned, I am a strange and terrifying creature. If only I could think of someway to let them know that they can trust me – that I am not trying to hurt them, but to help them. But how, because any move he made tended to frighten and confuse them. They just would not follow. They would not be led or shooed because they feared him.

“If only I could be a bird,” he thought to himself, “and mingle with them and speak their language. Then I could tell them not to be afraid. Then I could show them the way to the safe, warm barn. But I would have to be one of them so they could see, and hear and understand.”

At that moment, the church bells began to ring. The sound reached his ears above the sounds of the wind. And he stood there listening to the bells – listening to the bells pealing the glad tidings of Christmas. And he sank to his knees in the snow.