Help. Am I losing my faith?

Faith & Science Conversation
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Michaela, Let me quote some very smart people. The Apostle Paul got us started by noting that
”now, we see through the glass, darkly”. Albert Einstein is supposed to have said that God does not play dice with the universe. In response. Neils Bohr is supposed to have said “It is not for us to tell God how to run his universe.” “What God had done, however, is to permit us to try to figure out just how it works.” Richard Feynman is reported to have said “Religion is about faith, science is about doubt.” Richard Smalley made one of the most important chemical discoveries of the 20th Century, the discovery of the Buckyball which laid the foundation for the whole of nano science. With respect to evolution, I think I found a statement where he said “I have read their books and it does not work that way.” He went on to say “I believe that God created the heaven and earth 13.6 Billion years ago…..and HAS BEEN INVOLVED IN CREATION EVER SINCE”.

My view of Genesis is that the story is a reasonable viewpoint.

Day 1: God created the heavens 13.6 Billion years ago and dawdled around for 9 Billion years before creating earth.

Day 2. Gravity brought the Sun into action and the planets condensed and the earth started to rotate, creating day and night.

Day 3. For the next 3 Billion years, the Earth brought forth plants of all kinds. Three miracle chemicals arose. Water is the most miraculous. When nearly all other liquids condense, they are heavier and sink to the bottom of their vessel. But, water floats. Hence, in that new season of winter, ponds and lakes freeze over, but the ice stays on top and keeps the water in liquid form below where animal life can continue. The next miracle chemical is chlorophyl. It takes Sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide and produces carbohydrates whose consumption, in turn produces the rest of life. These plants grew, evolved, died, new species arose, evolved, died, producing a planet rich in plant life of all kinds.

Day 4. That Earth with its rotation coupled to the Sun was a dull place, no seasons, etc. So…..a body collided with the Earth and was captured to be what we call the Moon. The process tilted the axis of the Earth by 23 degrees and generated seasons. And the period of time for rotation of the Moon about the Earth turned out to be 28 days. All in preparation for animal life. Is it a surprise that the human gestation period is…..28 days?

Then on Day 5 animals arose and spread over all of the earth. With all of the plants around to produce carbohydrates for energy animal life evolved. Extinction was a part of this process. In the Permian extinction 250 Million years ago, about 3/4 of all of the plant and animal species became extinct. After that dinosaurs evolved and had the run of the Earth for 166 Million Years. An extraordinary species. They became extinct in the K-T extinction, opening the way for whatever happened on Day 6.

Day 6. Male and Female, created He them. So, back to Richard Smalley, God has been involved in creation at all times, and Neils Bohr….it is not for us to tell God how to run his universe. We just get to study it and see what we can figure out. But, we need to remember what Paul said….”we see through the glass darkly”.

After each burst of creation, God declared it good. And on Day 7…set an example for all of us, and …..rested.

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It’s worth noting that the grammar of the Hebrew does not require that the days be consecutive, only that they be sequential, so this approach has that much going for it.

Though it still falls into the trap of trying to make ancient literature talk science.

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Honestly, I’ve faced a lot of similar issues to you (you may have actually described some of my own doubts better than I could :smiling_face_with_tear:). However, I would like to assure you two things. One, this place is amazing. I’ve been looking years for a place where I can unload my overly complicated questions and actually get good responses. Secondly, when I came to the position you are in, I felt that there wasn’t anything left to back my faith. That is, until I found out about the Resurrection. I do not know how much research you have done into it (and it is quite unfortunate that many Christian help sites don’t have this information towards the top), but there is a very strong case that Jesus did rise from the dead. Considering this, I would say that there is reason to trust what he said, and thus the source of where he got it. Like you, I cannot say where myth and history begin or end, I just know that somewhere in this beautiful text, there is an amazing story for each of us to be told.

I hope this helps a bit. Keep holding on to God, we all believe in you!

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Yes, Max. And that’s precisely why, for so long, people were led to think that the Gospels were written centuries after the events they recount, that Paul somehow “invented” Christianity, or that even his genuinely Pauline letters (and let’s remember that the deuteropauline letters have still been recognized as divinely insipired by the Church, irrespective of their deuteropauline nature) were not authentic at all, but second-century compositions, and so on. The point wasn’t necessarily to “destroy” faith outright, but to make it seem unreasonable, to reduce it to mere wishful thinking.

After all, Christ could still have risen even if the Gospels had been written much later; the truth of an event doesn’t depend solely how close in time its written transmission is to the event itself, but the reasonableness of the claim does depend on the proximity, fidelity, and historical credibility of the witnesses. And that matters enormously for many people (which is why the secularists have tried for many centuries to destroy the historical credibility of the New Testament: because they knew that destroying its historical credibility would have been a stumbling block for many, many people, especially in the post-enlightenment era)

That is why I believe the so-called Third Quest has been providential. The unfortunate thing is that many people don’t actually know this, and instead simply absorb the standard secular narrative about the New Testament (namely, the one I pointed out at the beginning of the post, which has been debunked by modern historians) which many continue to press on others, relying on the fact that most people aren’t aware of what contemporary critical scholarship now actually says.

At this point, even setting aside our particular faith commitments, one can argue that the resurrection of Jesus is by far the most compelling explanation for the events that followed his death, unless one begins with the dogmatic assumption that both God and the supernatural are impossible (but that assumption itself creates a whole series of explanatory difficulties when one tries to account for the aftermath of Easter, on top of the other problems regarding free will and human morality -if the supernatural doesn’t exist neither does the soul- which have been treated in other topics).

And we could not say this if the older skeptical account of the Gospels and the New Testament in general ( account that was once dominant even in circles academically influential) had actually been vindicated.

Which is why even Michaela in my opinion should focus on the fact that there is a very strong rational case for believing that Jesus is God and that He actually resurrected from the dead.

Everything else, especially the fact that we can’t read Genesis in strictly literalist terms (which btw doesn’t disprove at all the fact that at some point two humans were endowed with souls and rebelled against God, it merely disproves a strictly literal reading of Genesis which even some of the Early Fathers didn’t hold), is secondary when we recognize that fact.

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I understand your struggle, as I have come along that path myself. I’d like to send you something on Gen. 1 - 7 that will show you why what you (and I) were taught is the literal meaning of Genesis is not the literal meaning of Genesis. If you want to see it, write to me at roy.a.clouser@gmail.com

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Determining what your ultimate authority is may be a helpful exercise. If Scripture says X but you believe Y, which do you go with? If it’s Y, what is driving that choice?

The Lord calls us to conform our thoughts to his. It sounds like perhaps you’re applying an outside standard to evaluate scripture. That likely will affect our spiritual state.

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Many times in history people of all sorts (Christians included) have had faith in things that were just plain wrong, and thus it is a good thing to lose your faith in some things. The mistake to avoid is thinking that if one thing is wrong then everything must be wrong, because that is a terrible logical fallacy. One of the great things about science is the ability and ready willingness to change the details when these are proven incorrect. This doesn’t mean repeated revolution as some have suggested because the results of experiments do not change. It is just new experiments with slightly different conditions show that some previous generalization were wrong and thus the details change.

Perhaps, part of the problem is making a too black and white distinction between the two. The fact is the meaning of the word “history” has undergone change. The memory of events told in fireside tales for generations is different from what history has become in academic institutions. What was very general serving many purposes from history, law, to entertainment, became far more specialized and restricted. And the Bible is not a single book written at a single time but a collection accumulated over an expanse of time. And thus the shift from “myth” to history is neither surprising nor unique in human literature.

I have concluded the inevitable result of looking for proof is to distort the understanding of God. I think you need to refocus your question on something more simple: “what sort of God is even worth believing in?” I think this is natural and unavoidable because for me belief starts with the realization that while science depends on objective observation (where what you want is irrelevant), life requires subjective participation (where what you want is central) and the latter is the role I see religion playing. So trying to make this some kind of objective determination is already in the wrong direction which can only make the results ultimately meaningless.

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To those worried about losing their faith I would suggest considering the possibility that it might be maturing into something deeper?

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Yes but there are limits to this. Subjective participation is undeniably part of life, but it doesn’t cancel objective reality.

A good example is this https://www.espn.co.uk/olympics/story/\_/id/48311534/transgender-women-banned-olympics-new-ioc-policy

“The IOC and its president, Kirsty Coventry, have wanted a clear policy instead of continuing to advise sports’ governing bodies, which previously have drafted their own rules.

“At the Olympic Games, even the smallest margins can be the difference between victory and defeat,” Coventry, a two-time Olympic gold medalist in swimming, said in a statement. “So, it is absolutely clear that it would not be fair for biological males to compete in the female category.”

You can “feel” like a female and want to be a female as much as you want but this doesn’t change the fact that you are objectively a male with all the physical advantages that come with it, and actual females shouldn’t be forced to compete with someone holding unfair advantages against them.

This is one of many examples in which idealism clashes with realism, and realism prevails. For good reason, too: if we applied this principle consistently (“I am not what I am; I am what I want to be”), we would end up in complete chaos. For example, why should a 70-year-old man who feels like a 50-year-old not be entitled to demand that his ID be updated accordingly? Emile Ratelband, 69, told he cannot legally change his age Only because his case is less emotionally appealing to the average contemporary westerner?

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  • Kind of like “joining the Marines will make a man out of you”.
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I just want to reply to say thank you to everyone who has responded. I am reading through the responses slowly as I only have limited mental energy so I will start replying to people individually as well but thank you for your kind responses.

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Indeed. Not only should solipsism and things like it be rejected but the objective part of our existence (explored in our study of the laws of nature) is a necessity for life to exist. The point being made is only that everything cannot be reduced to science and the objective aspect of reality. It speaks to the need for addressing the subjective aspect of our existence because actually living our lives requires it. The point is to contrast it with the laws of nature and science where what we want is irrelevant.

Also this need to accept this subjective aspect of our existence and consider what we want, does not mean fantasy subsumes reality. It can come close as we explore it in books, films and games. And nobody can really say where this ends. Though I think most understand ignoring reality is ultimately unwise.

Personally I have little interest in vanity – feeling no need to change myself in any way. To me it feels rather superficial and I find it difficult to understand this motivation in other people. I once walked in to a gym to ask them about their prices and the guy wanted to know what my goals were. I said I just wanted to stay alive. So I walk to a gym close to my house often wearing my coat in winter and do my exercises that way – not caring at all about fitting some image or expectations.

It reminds me of a favorite novel by Michael Ende, “The Neverending Story.” The movie leaves out the second part where the boy loses himself by wishing to be all the things which he is not. Then his next desperate quest becomes the rather more difficult effort to recover himself before nothing is left.

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I don’t think it matters. God spoke through the worldviews available, and we get to share in those ideas.

Which is natural; it’s how we approach everything – from where we’ve been.
The trick is to recognize that as one of God’s people we should be asking where God’s people have been, and striving to see the way they saw – and to recognize that as a privileged invitation, not a chore.

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@Michaela

Augustine worried about this struggle as well!

Arm yourself with allegory to find the peace you seek!

G.Brooks

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In the case of Genesis, evolution poses no real problem, because it challenges only a literalist reading of the text. It certainly does not disprove the possibility that, at some point, God entered into a covenant with the first “metaphysical humans” (that is, human beings endowed with rational souls),

There are, however, other teachings that must withstand (and certainly will withstand) the test of time and science.Among these is the irreducible nature of consciousness ( the disproval of which would not only demonstrate the profoundly deceptive nature of the human brain -since billions of people throughout human history have reported experiences of the supernatural and of the spirits of the deceased- but would also directly contradict a very clear teaching of Jesus Christ and call into question the experiences of His disciples, who claimed to have seen Him risen from the dead; it would not, of course, necessarily refute the claim itself, but it would make belief in its truth irrational, even if the claim itself were in fact true) and the historical existence of Jesus Christ, and the early dating of the first testimonies concerning Him (which aren’t absolutely necessary for belief, but are necessary for the reasonableness of faith; a text making a claim may still be true even if it was written centuries after the event, but believing that it tells the truth would be wholly irrational, since no one who could have challenged the claim would still be alive, much less any eyewitnesses, which is exactly why the illuminists claimed that the entire NT was a forgery written many centuries later, too bad for them that the same historical-critical method they tried to employ to destroy Christianity turned out to be a major help for the same faith they wanted to destroy ).

In other words, the strength of Christianity lies in the fact that it is not unfalsifiable, and yet no one has succeeded in disproving a single fundamental and definitive (this is altogether different from teachings that may be contextualized: doctrines that have been held as true from the beginning cannot simply be relativized) Christian teaching.

If the opposite were to happen (if a scientific contradiction were shown to be definitive, accurate, and in direct conflict with a definitive and non-negotiable Christian teaching) then it would mean that Christianity was nothing more than a house built on sand. But that has not happened, and it will not happen, for one simple reason: Christianity is not a house built on sand, despite the world’s best efforts over at least the past 237 years to prove otherwise.

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I don’t think of myth as a lie while history is true. I think of history as the written account of what people have experienced as best they could understand it given the inescapable lenses of their perspective; in some cases it is a compilation of a number of accounts reflected though the perspective of the compiler. But mythos is the accumulation of a culture’s understanding of who we are and what we’re doing here crowd sourced by generations of oral story telling.

Which is more true? I think they offer different versions of truth and my preference is for mythos.

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