There are 18 different interpretations of Quantum Mechanics listed on the Wikipedia article and 14 of the most common are compared in a chart. Why should one of these be the truth? Most physics professors explain three or more to their students and do not insist that only one is correct. Why? Because most are attempts to explain the same facts, and there are no objective facts to show that one is correct. The lesson here is that without demonstrable facts we cannot insist one way of thinking is correct over another. This is particularly true of religion. Does this mean I think there are many ways to God? No.
Light is composed of waves. No, light is composed of particles. Wait! Particles and waves are so fundamentally different it would seem impossible that both can be true. And yet it is accepted that both are true. The lesson here is that we cannot trust seeming contradictions. Thus a common insistence in most religious points of view (including atheism) that they cannot all be true doesn’t follow.
This at least is one of the things we learn from science. But science is one thing and life is another. Religion is primarily about life and life doesn’t wait for demonstrable facts and proof. You have to live now and so you have choose how you are going to live – such are the questions of religion. So you choose one and you live by it.
I wasn’t. I wasn’t raised Christian. Anything but. I was raised by two of the most extremely liberal people that most can imagine with ready criticisms of the Christian establishment all my life. And those criticisms are valid, so I am not talking about a bunch of propaganda which I later learned to be false.
But I am Christian now. And I don’t see how it can be just luck since I considered quite a number of different religions growing up.
So what are my reasons for choosing Christianity? Because I will tell you right now, not one of the reasons ylsalvus gave does anything for me (though #3 comes close).
- I was quite a bit surprised how much of the Bible consists of criticism of religion. Christianity is not blind to the problems of religion – far from it.
- Because of the doctrine of the Trinity, this is not a God made in the image of man. And yet this is not a God who is in any way less than we are.
- Christianity teaches both that this life is not all there is, but at the same time we have to get the most out of life while we can.
- What I see taught in Christianity is that there are no ways to God. We cannot do it. This is the gospel of salvation by the grace of God – not by religion or religious knowledge but by the work of God in our lives. Which is not to say that God does not use different religions to teach people.
- The God I see in Christianity is one who chose love and freedom over power and control.
Philippians 2:5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.
To be sure there are many notions of God in Christianity I do not believe in: meglomaniac, purist, hard hearted, unforgiving, controlling, wrathful, and sadistic. And I reject all of these. But there is also another uniquely Christian idea of God which I can believe in: the humble God, who is gentle and lowly in heart, who not caring anything about being God, set aside all His power and knowledge to become a helpless human infant, and after growing up perfectly blameless to show how we should live, He was mocked and whipped before being executed on a cross. This He did this in order for us to get past all the lies and misunderstandings, to show how much He loves us and thus to heal our relationship with the infinite God in whom we can find eternal life.