The other day I started thinking about what would have happened if I had stopped looking critically at Christianity after reading those articles that first made me question the Bible’s legitimacy. What if I had turned from them and decided to never look at anything else that might cause me to doubt my faith? If I had, I’m sure I’d still be a Christian today.
But would that really be good enough? Obviously, the things my faith were built upon weren’t solid enough to withstand scrutiny. So if I had maintained faith only by refusing to investigate my reasons, would that kind of faith be pleasing to God? I think that’s a question believers should consider. If that level of faith is good enough, we’re essentially saying, “oh, if only you hadn’t taken your faith so seriously!” But that seems crazy.
The alternative is that my faith might have been good enough until the day I ran across things that made me doubt. At that point, the only way to remain pleasing to God would be to investigate the claims and come out the other side with a stronger faith. Of course, that’s not how it worked out for me. If God’s real and Christianity’s true, then I think this view makes the most sense. However, it causes problems for those Christians who have refused to look at any evidence that might call their beliefs into question. I’ve had several tell me that they won’t read anything an atheist has written, or don’t want me to point out the passages that I found problematic because they don’t want to lose their faith. How does that make sense? If their faith is worth keeping — if it’s true — then further investigation should only support their beliefs, not call them into question.
I’m not trying to pick on Christians here, we can all be guilty of this from time to time. It’s essentially an extreme case of confirmation bias — one in which we realize we’re being biased and we even think of it as a good thing. In fact, it’s extremely dangerous, and if we feel ourselves thinking along those lines, it should be a red flag. What’s wrong with our current position if we have to hide from information in order to keep it?
And in the end, I’m glad I didn’t stop looking. The journey out wasn’t easy, but I feel like things make so much more sense with my current worldview. Even if I’m still wrong, I’m closer to the truth than I was before, because I’ve learned new information and corrected some past misunderstandings. That can only be a good thing.
Finding Truth 
Nate-
Your explanation that what I’m describing is simply a part of human nature is not at all helpful. I am sorry that you find Christianity to be a source of confusion and despair. That is exactly how I see your view of the world, though. So, I understand the sentiment.
That you feel confident to claim you know I’m “not as bad as you think you are”, and that you feel comfortable flippantly dismissing a serious amount of self-reflection and intimate conversations with close friends basically with one unfounded sentence is almost insulting. You may have done a lot of the hard work in relation to evidence for Christianity. But, to be blunt, only arrogance could lead you to claim the knowledge about me that you claim in your last sentence.
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Hi Nate, yes I wasn’t wanting to accuse William of anything, just wanting to make a point! I agree too that many christians only look superficially at evidence – but so do many non-believers! It’s a people thing, not just a christian thing. I try not to mis-characterise atheists, so I thought I’d make a point about being fair to christians too.
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Josh I think Nate was just trying to be nice. Maybe you are really bad person there’s really no way for us to know over the Internet you come off as a sincere enough and nice guy and I think Nate is just trying to give you the benefit of the doubt. Don’t mistake his kindness as an insult.
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I think it’s probably a fair assumption that all of us have done and said things that we wish we never did or said. I know for myself that this is the case anyway. But the past can’t be altered, only the present. I don’t think this takes away or minimises your self reflection. I mean you know yourself best 🙂 based on what you’ve expressed, I have come to similiar conclusions around my hypocrisy and past behaviour and sins, although how that looks like for you and me might be different. I relate your your thoughts on self capacity and ability and love and my own selfishness and sinfulness.
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Josh, I think understand partly what your saying. The cruel, selfish and evil things I have done, and have wanted to do really can’t be resolved unless my heart changes. Because it’s not that I can’t stop and action (or lack of action). It’s that I simply don’t want to. I simply dont want to stop some things that are sinful and destructive and start other things instead that replace them. It’s the desire, and how can we change the intent of the heart? What we want? Even if I have the capacity to care for others, but I would rather seek my own self serving to others expense and my own destruction, how can such a thing be fought, when I don’t want to fight it? I believe God has to change the heart. If we didn’t need saving, then we wouldn’t need a saviour. And for me, this has to involve God saving me from myself.
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Agreed, newport. Thanks 🙂
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Josh, it’s possible that you’re an evil douchebag, but from all the interaction we’ve had online, I’d bet that isn’t the case. I wasn’t trying to minimize anything you said or feel, and like you and newport have said, I also have feelings and urges that I don’t like and I’ve done many things that I’ve regretted. My only point is that this seems to be the case for every single person who’s ever lived. No one is perfect, nor can they be. It’s my position that while we should be ashamed and should atone for the specific things we’ve done wrong, we shouldn’t be ashamed or atone for simply being human. And I do think that some of what you’re referring to is just human nature.
Again, if Jesus offers a solution for this, I’d love to hear about it. But as far as I know, Christians are still susceptible to human nature, so this “cure” Christianity offers seems a lot like snake oil to me.
I’m not trying to insult you, and I apologize if that’s what I’ve done. But if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to offer one more illustration. To me, the reason you’ve given for hanging onto Christianity sounds a lot like the reasons people give for staying with abusive partners. The abuser makes sure the victim feels inferior and worthless so they’ll be thankful for any scrap of affection they receive from the abuser. That’s why I see Christianity as such a negative thing. It’s like Paul says in Romans 7, unless someone came along to tell you how bad you are, you wouldn’t have known. Christianity has to first make you think you’re sick — then, wouldn’t you know it, they offer the only cure in town.
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UnkleE,
Thanks for the reply. I agree with everything you just said — you’re right that people of all stripes are really good at having strong opinions while being ignorant of the facts. I may have misunderstood your comment to William a bit, so thanks for the follow up. 🙂
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Nate as you know we’ve had discussions about this before, and the last thing I want to be is twofaced. To say one thing and do another I really don’t want to do that. And I have done it before. I just need to see where God takes me and be open to Him. And what happens, happens.
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And if we are talking about actions and impulse, I think the intent and also the heart needs to be changed in this process 🙂
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Nate, it’s rare that we disagree, but I have to in this case – I’ve always thought that Josh was an evil douchebag.
Oh, hey Josh – good to see you. 🙂
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And as in process I mean a transformative process that impacts the whole
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Howie – that made me laugh. Especially since i would you would be the last person who would respond like that lol 🙂
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Yeah, I like to surprise every once in a while. Glad you laughed newport. The comment served it’s purpose then.
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since I would think* you would be the last person who would respond like that lol 🙂
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Hi UnkleE,
I guess I should clarify on this: “… you gotta have faith, eh faith, eh faith!”
Paul made the comment, “you gotta have faith.” I wasn’t sure if he meant to or not, but I took it as a George Michael reference. My comment wasn’t a criticism of faith, but just a song reference to either George Michael or Limp Bizkit – whomever you prefer.
I do believe that you look fo revidnece. And you’re right, we don’t agree, but I do believe you’re sincere and I also believe that I am. I do think that faith has it’s part in most people’s beliefs, but I also think that some conclusions and some faiths are more grounded than others – but that is also debatable.
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“Funny thing is, the closer I get to the few people who really know me, the more I find out they are not the person they pretend to be, either. I find that we are both very close, give it one traumatic push or another, to being the people we so often abhor.” – josh
I also find this to be true.
We are human. Our bodies and brains are machines that operate off of chemicals and electrical currents. we have the potential for good and bad, just like a gun has the potential to be used legally or illegally.
We all feel anger, lust, envy, happiness, sadness, joy, selfishness and selflessness. Maybe instead of faking it, you’re tempering it. even paul talked about this conflict, and jesus said it like, “the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
I do not know if your struggles are the same as mine or if yours are worse or less severe than mine, but we all have struggles. We have an idea of who we’d like to be and it takes effort to get there. Set the bar high enough and you’ll fall short from time to time – but that’s life.
I say, don’t stay content, do not let yourself stagnate. Stubbornly press forward and achieve or die trying. Nothing eases that struggle except surrender; not religion, not prayer, not any book or meditation. If you’re trying, then there will be struggle.
Stay committed, pick yourself when you stumble and get going again.
i think that if the belief in an old book and its claims about a god-man help you press on, then use it and go on your way. But if that belief should fail, then you’d find another catalyst and keep going.
your morals wouldn’t change because you’ve thought them through and act with reason toward others, which is why you don’t stone people, etc.
underneath it all, we’re just people, with potential for love and for hate, for good and bad. What makes us different may be in which parts we strive for,
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Matt, Josh is a teddy bear who would never push his rather unique Christian outlook on anyone.
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Pauli – any chance you could take out the Energizer Bunny next?
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Nate-
But, Nate, you agree that humans are bad in a great many ways. We don’t need christianity for that, it seems based on your others’ admission on recent comments here. The question, for me, is, if we are bad and don’t seem to be getting better (you and I disagree there), what, if any, worldview speaks to that? The perspective of a great many religious, spiritual and humanistic beliefs is, basically, that we need to will and work our way toward becoming better, or enlightened, in some way. Maybe that’s by treating others better, driving ourselves toward improvement in certain areas, etc. For those, apparently you being among them, that see that does work, we can improve ourselves, I can see how belief like christianity would be depressing. However, for those like me who see that, even if there is some basic improvement in one area, there are numerous other areas always popping up that show more of my seemingly true nature: manipulating others in work or personal settings to get what I want; doing things that maybe my fiance wouldn’t even care about, but hiding them in secret for fear that she will disapprove; becoming violently angry over some little thing my fiance says or does; etc, etc, down the line.
The truth is, whether it’s just human nature or not, I do a lot of very ugly things and I’m not getting any better. Had I grown up in a harsher environment, I can see how those tendencies could very easily have led to me being a much different, “worse”, person than I am. So, humanism, Buddhism, Islam – what I know of them simply offers no hope. You are asking about a “cure” Christianity offers. I don’t think it does offer a cure. At least not now, not one we can observe today. As you have observed, Christians can be just as bad or worse than anyone else. We’re not immune to any of it. I see Christianity offering hope amongst the chaos. Redemption and reconciliation with each other, all those whom we’ve harmed, all the parts of the world we have taken advantage of and destroyed. Do we see it now? No. Why don’t we see it now? I have no idea. Is it reasonable to look at the world and assume God cannot possibly exist, at least as he is described in Christian scripture? Absolutely. I certainly don’t think you are being unreasonable in your conclusions, Nate. In fact, were it not for my faith remaining in spite of many questions and doubts, I’d likely be where you are. I look at Jesus and I see a man who offers hope in a world of despair. He forgives in a world of condemnation. He calls out the proud and elite, and warns them their disgust and treatment of others will be their undoing if they are not careful. He teaches that God runs to the prodigal when the prodigal has wished his father dead, squandered all of his money and belongings. He teaches that God pays those who wandered in an hour from quitting time the same as those who have been busting their butt all day. He teaches that God roams the streets inviting everyone to his wedding feast, and only those who don’t want the dress robes or to attend the feast at all are the ones who are out.
What is hell? Looking at God’s apparently scandalous grace, and applying that to my life, I see no way I can look at anyone else – anyone – and say, but for circumstances, I am any different than them. I see others sneering at people “beneath” them, Christians decrying the inclusion of anyone who doesn’t meet their standards. Those people, if this God of ridiculous grace actually exists, would likely choose to reject that God than accept the fact that He is indiscriminate with his grace. They will, like some of the wedding guests, sprint from the feast as quickly as possible. That attitude, of hating those who would offer grace because I see myself as better than others, is what I see as hell.
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Thanks for the elaboration, Josh. I still don’t really understand what benefit you see in Christianity, though. Is it just that you see Jesus saying, “I accept you anyway”?
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Josh,
It looks like you choose to follow this God you believe exists partly because you believe he represents some form of good qualities and traits.
If you were truly an awful guy and you thought this God represented what was full goodness wouldn’t you choose to reject him even though you know he exists?
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I meant to respond to this, saying that I certainly see how it looks that way. I can also see, reading what I write, that it reads that way. But, that is not the way I see it. I see it as a truth that frees me to be who I am, not worrying that my attempts at getting better aren’t working. It also frees me to love others without condition. They may try and try and try to get better, and continue to do things that are disappointing and fail. I can still love them and help them unconditionally.
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Josh, you said the following:
The more you comment Josh the more you show us how evil and scary you are.
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I appreciate what you’re saying, but I don’t see Christianity teaching that at all. The God of the Bible is a jealous god — in the OT, he annihilates those who don’t serve him. In the NT, we’re told that one must put God above all earthly relationships, we must be prepared to give up everything in service to him, and that only those who believe in Jesus and serve God will receive salvation. I don’t see the teaching that we are loved (and accepted) without condition.
Furthermore, I think the only place to possibly find such an arrangement is in the earthly parent-child relationship. Even then, it’s not a given. The fact is, love and acceptance are conditional. You can’t be a first-class jerk to everyone and still be treated like everything’s fine. We all expect effort in our relationships, and I don’t think that’s a bad thing.
I mean, I can see how the idea of unconditional love and acceptance is appealing. It’s just that Christianity seems to teach something so opposite. If God really did accept everyone unconditionally, then the Bible would teach that all are saved, regardless of their beliefs and actions. I think it’s hard to make the case that the Bible teaches anything like that. Instead, it tells us that simply through being human, we’re imperfect. And not just that we’re imperfect, but that we need salvation from that imperfect state. In other words, God made us broken, and then has the nerve to be disgusted with our brokenness.
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