In science it is “Don’t know how yet.”
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I agree with the rest of your post—but not with this point (assuming that with “no afterlife” you mean eternal annihiliation, not a temporary annihilitation before the final resurrection, this would be the stance of those who refuse the intermediate state but it wouldn’t mean “no afterlife” at all, it would only mean no intermediate state).
In 1 Corinthians 15:19 and 1 Corinthians 15:32 which are just as much part of the New Testament as the Gospels and equally authoritative, Paul writes:
“If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.”
“If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”
And frankly, I couldn’t agree more.
I’ve never been able to see a middle ground between a life rooted in transcendent meaning and full-blown nihilism. I know that’s not a popular view, but I genuinely believe that meaning is something to be discovered, not invented. You can invent it, sure, but it’s delusion, at the end of the day.
In my view, the human mind isn’t made to live without purpose. That’s why there are so few people who are truly and deeply convinced of their atheism—at least, not without some sliver of hope tucked away. Nihilism, to me, is the inevitable consequence of believing there’s no afterlife and that this life is all there is. If that’s true, then whether you’ve lived like Maximilian Kolbe or Amon Goth, you end up in the same oblivion. All your memories, thoughts, and experiences would vanish—as if they had never existed. There’s no justice, no redemption, no lasting truth—just annihilation.
I haven’t always been a theist, let alone a Christian. I was an agnostic, leaning toward atheism—until something happened in my family that made my conversion almost unavoidable. To remain who I was would have required deliberate blindness. And I thank God every day for breaking through.
But even before my conversion, I never lied to myself about “creating meaning” in a meaningless universe. That’s precisely why I went all in with YOLO and, admittedly, licentiousness, in the years preceding my conversion. Because…well, because why not? Why the hell not? If we are just biological machines, flickering briefly between two eternities of nothingness, there’s no true reason to do anything at all—except maybe follow utilitarian calculus. Even love wouldn’t hold up as a meaningful reason in that case, because in a meaningless and indifferent universe, ‘love’ would be nothing more than a biochemical reaction — devoid of purpose and inherent value.
Thank God the truth is different. And thank God He reveals it to those who are even slightly open to hearing and seeing it with a sincere heart.
That is a “belief.” That science has closed a lot of primitive (prescientific) and a few modern (premature) gaps doesn’t mean it will explain everything or that it could ever provide a complete explanation or understanding of anything.
Vinnie
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But it will certainly continue trying.
You just said that it has “closed” gaps which would imply it has explained/understands some things.
Those are good thoughts. I have to say that I hope for and look forward to afterlife, just wonder how it could work with intellect preservation. However, I think we have to be careful that our salvation and Christian life does not become a transactional agreement in our eyes.
Nothing wrong with that.
It can rule out contrary explanations and provide models that work very well even if it can’t offer a complete description of something.