A reader writes:
I may be a little young to start dreading oblivion after death. But I
can’t help it. Whenever I am told to believe in some religious truth, I
always find myself asking “why?” So often people only talk about what they
believe, but never why they believe it. My constant questioning ensures that
I will have many sleepless nights, but it also makes me think of religion as
an intellectual pursuit of some ultimate truth. I want to be comforted by
truth, not seek truth in only that in which I am comfortable.To ease my fears of infinite nonexistence, I try to rationalize faith in an
afterlife. I think to myself, “if God exists, and there are eternal
consequences for going against his will, then he would make his will known
to me.” I base this opinion on the fact that God is obviously a fan of free
will. He allows us to make choices, even if those choices hurt ourselves or
others. Therefore, any damnation would only occur after a knowing rejection
of his will. (A “knowing” rejection because I also assume that God is
merciful).That’s why I appreciate Catholic websites like yours. On Catholic websites
have I found honest historical/logical arguments for objective truth, not
merely “look inside your heart and you will know the truth.” As implied
above, I have looked into my heart and it has made me want to find God.
However, people can easily confuse their desire for something to be true,
with truth itself (i.e. Jim Jones’s Kool-Aid, 9-11 hijackers, etc…).Therefore, my question is this: At what point does reason give way to true
religious faith? Authentic faith can only occur if the person has “faith” in
some objective truth. Consequently, is faith only possible after you’ve
proven a religious fact to be objectively true? Or, is faith the leap from
the cliffs of reason to the rope of objective truth? In other words, is
faith a necessary component in proving an objective truth about God? I want
faith, but I need to ensure that I am not one of the billions of people with
the wrong faith.
I want to commend the reader for his thoughtfulness and the obvious sincerity of his search, as well as his openmindedness. Truth is what is important, and the diligent search for the truth is something God will certainly reward. A verse that was very important to me when I was at an early stage of my journey to the Christian faith was John 7:17, where Jesus tells us that "if any man’s will is to do his [God’s] will, he shall know whether the teaching
is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority." I took that to mean that, as long as I was sincere about trying to follow the truth and willing to do what God wants, he would make sure I would get the evidence I need to support embracing the faith.
I’d commend this verse to the reader as well.
To answer the question, we may distinguish between two types of truths that are part of the faith.
The first class of truths is those that can be proven by reason. A classic example of this is the existence of God. The existence of God can be proved by human reason, though it is not always easy for everyone to do this. Not everyone has the training in philosophy or the patience to follow the lines of reasoning that show this.
That’s not surprising, becasue we all have different areas of expertise. I, for example, do not have the training or the patience to follow the lines of reasoning needed to show that certain concepts from physics are true. Therefore, on those concepts, I must defer to the experts who have studied matters.
We thus see that there are two ways in which a provable truth can be believed: On the part of those who have thoroughly studied the matter, it can be believed on the basis of having studied the demonstration of the truth. On the part of those who have not thoroughly studied the matter, it can be taken on faith on the word of the experts.
There’s nothing wrong with taking the word of experts. In fact, most of our knowledge (everything that we haven’t studied and proven ourselves) is based on taking the word of others, and unless we have reason to think that the person whose word we are taking is untrustworthy, it is reasonable to operate in this manner.
Indeed, humans are designed in a way that makes it impossible for us to function if we systematically mistrust others. We crash and burn if we try that kind of global skepticism.
It is thus normal for people to simply accept the religion in which they are raised. Their parents teach it to them, and kids are biologically programmed to accept what their parents tell them. They’d never survive if they weren’t, because it would be impossible to pass on human culture from one generation to another.
Because this is the way humans are built to operate, we may trust that God recognizes this and does not hold people accountable if they have grown up in a religion that has false elements or that is entirely false. People are only responsible for how they handle the grace that they are given, not the grace that they are not.
Some–such as the readers–are given the grace of desiring to press further and to examine the rational basis of religion, and I would encourage him to do so. At the end of this post, I’ll recommend some books that can help him further his study of this, but to answer his question about the relationship of faith and reason, when it comes to provable truths of religion, these can be accepted either on the basis of proving them oneself or on the basis of the testimony of experts who have, just as it is in every other field of human learning.
The trick, of course, is making sure that you’re listening to the right experts, which gives us a nudge to at least study a little bit so that we can have something of a feel for which experts are right.
All that I’ve said thus far applies to provable truths, but there are also truths that human reason cannot prove. This is something that exists in every field of learning. There are truths about history that cannot be proved because the data to prove them no longer exists. There are truths about astronomy that cannot be proved because they concern stars whose light hasn’t yet reached earth. And there are truths about biology that can’t be proved because we haven’t studied the relevant life forms sufficiently. In the same way, there are truths about religion that cannot be proved–or at least proved directly–because we don’t have access to them in this life.
But whereas in other areas of learning we’re simply out of luck if something can’t be proven by human reason, when it comes to religion we aren’t in quite that situation. The reason is that–according to the revelatory religions like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam–the realm of the divine is willing to make contact with us and tell us about the things that we can’t observe or prove by human reason.
The situation is analagous to a traveller from a foreign land telling us about what his homeland is like; the homeland in this case being heaven. Or, to use a different analogy, it’s like a person who can see telling a blind person what color objects are. The blind person can’t know this directly, by his own experience, but he can know it indirectly with the help of someone who can see.
God and his messengers, the angels, thus can reveal to humans truths that cannot be proven by human reason alone. A classic example of this is the fact that God is a Trinity–three Persons in one Being. That’s something we can understand, at least partially, once it is revealed to us, but it is not something that human reason alone can prove.
The question is why we would want to accept truths of this sort. Why wouldn’t we want to just stop with a religion of what can be proved by human reason alone?
The fundamental answer is: Because if something is a truth then we should accept it. The real question is how we can know which things that cannot be proven by human reason alone are true.
Here we are in the same situation as someone who has never been to another country or who does not have the ability to see. We can learn things that we can’t sense for ourselves from others, but we need a way to establish whether the person telling us about them knows what he’s talking about and is reliable or not.
What people who are questioning what they’re being told by others need is a reason to believe them, or what is sometimes called a "motive of credibility." The more motives of credibility they can establish regarding the truthfulness of what they are being told, the more reason they have to accept it.
For example, if a person who was blind from birth wants to know why he should believe, on the word of someone else, that grass is green and that the sky is blue, he is asking–in essence–for a motive of credibility. He can’t perceive these things for himself, but he’s seeking a reason that make the claims credible.
The logical one to offer in that case would be the testimony of others. The sighted person who has just told him that grass is green and that the sky is blue might say, "Don’t just take my word for it. Ask other people! They’ll tell you the same thing."
While a person blind from birth could never completely rule out the possibility of a society-wide conspiracy of Santa Claus-like scale to deceive blind people about the colors of objects (or even the existence of color itself), each person he talk to who confirms that grass is green and that the sky is blue provides him one more motive of credibility to accept these facts, and at some point the volume of the motives becomes such that (if he is rational), he’ll end up saying, "Okay, I can’t see these colors for myself, but it’s reasonable for me to believe both that color exists and that grass is green and the sky is blue."
This is essentially the same situation as that of a person inquiring into the rational basis of religion. While he can’t (unfortunately) go ask a bunch of angels about various truths of the faith and test their answers against each other the way a blind person can with sighted people, he can nevertheless see what motives of credibility can be offered for particular belief systems.
Some of those motives of credibility will be related to things that can be proved (e.g., I can prove that God exists, and this religion agrees with that, so it’s a sign that this religion may be on the right track). Others will be based on things that can’t be proved but that are consistent with our intuitions (e.g., this religion teaches that killing innocent people is morally legitimate, and that seems wrong to me, so it’s a sign this religion is not the right one).
Ultimately, if Jesus was right about people who are open to God’s will finding out if his teaching is true, we’ll get the motives of credibility we need to accept the Christian faith (and, I would say, the Catholic understanding of it).
The process thus involves reason leading to faith. Motives of credibility are assessed by reason and, though not everything about the faith can be proved by human observation and reason, the reasonable evaluation of motives of credibility leads us toward the act of faith–that what we place our faith in is itself true and reasonable.
The study of motives of credibility is known as "apologetics," and there have been many works of apologetics that have been written in support of the Christian faith. I would particularly recommend the following:
THE HANDBOOK OF CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS by Peter Kreeft and Ronald K. Tacelli
MERE CHRISTIANITY by C. S. Lewis
MIRACLES by C. S. Lewis
If the reader decides he’s looking for something on an academic level, I’d also recommend
SCALING THE SECULAR CITY by J. P. Moreland
And since he’s expressed particular interest in the subject of life after death, I’d recommend
BEYOND DEATH by Gary Habermas and J. P. Moreland (though I have to mention on this one that the authors are Protestant and the book’s treatment of purgatory is innacurate)
Hope this helps, God bless the reader on his journey, and I hope he’ll ask more questions when he has them!
20
Neat post, Jimmy! I’ve personally found that, on an academic level, N.T. Wright’s writings are very helpful. Particularly “The Resurrection of the Son of God”, all 817 pages.
Sigh. I love any post with a book recommendation. Thanks, Jimmy!
Jimmy you consistantly write so well and answer the question so fully I often wonder if there will be anything to discuss!
I will certainly pray for the reader and doubly encourage the C.S. Lewis recomendations. I’ve yet to find any material that is more exciting and logical to read than the works of C.S. Lewis.
Those C.S. Lewis books helped me a great deal.
I don’t have the philosophical chops to take the arguments for God all the way to their conclusions, but I found I did not have to.
During college, Christianity began to look unlikely to me. Then I started to really look at the logical underpinnings of competing worldviews and found they fell apart rather quickly.
I soon arrived at the point of believing that, even IF Christianity was absurd, it was still the LEAST absurd philosophy going. People often attacked Christianity as nonsense, but I found they attacked it with even greater nonsense.
That’s when I started to get the delightfully eerie sense that Christianity might be a bit wonky, but it seemed to be wonky in exactly the same way that the whole universe was wonky.
In other words, if you accept a few basic Christian absurdities (though Chesterton might call them “paradoxes”, and others “mysteries”) then the whole world begins to make logical sense. In the other philosophies, you start with a basic logic that is supposed to make sense of everything, but ends in absurdity.
Other good books:
“Stories of Padre Pio” – Katerina Tangari
“Wonder of the World” – Roy Varghese
“Josef Pieper: An Anthology” – Josef Pieper
The reader might want to watch the ewtn program:
FINDING GOD THROUGH FAITH AND REASON
Fr. Robert Spitzer, S.J., Ph.D., lends insight into new evidence gathered from the fields of contemporary philosophy and physics which supports proof for the existence of God. The universe itself connotes the existence of a creator and the principle of intelligent design leads to logical conclusions about the nature of God.
Tim J.,
I soon arrived at the point of believing that, even IF Christianity was absurd, it was still the LEAST absurd philosophy going. People often attacked Christianity as nonsense, but I found they attacked it with even greater nonsense.
Sounds like Pascal, whom Peter Kreeft refers to as the greatest Christian apologist of all time. Kreeft’s Christianity for Modern Pagans — which he describes as a “festooning” of Pascal’s Pensees — is a particularly splendid read on these topics.
Oh, I’m also reading Ratzinger’s “Introduction to Christianity” which may be very applicable. Like everything our current pope has written, it draws the reader in very well, imho. I find that I don’t have to struggle to get into his writings, though obviously there’s plenty of ideas therein to struggle mentally with.
Amazon Link.
Here are the passages in ‘Introduction to Christianity’ which immediately lept out at me, and I think they are spot on the subject the questioner here is interested in.
“It is the basic pattern of man’s destiny only to be allowed to find the finality of his existence in this unceasing rivalry between doubt and belief, temptation and certainty.” is a great sentence to meditate on.
Here are the passages in ‘Introduction to Christianity’ which immediately lept out at me, and I think they are spot on the subject the questioner here is interested in.
“It is the basic pattern of man’s destiny only to be allowed to find the finality of his existence in this unceasing rivalry between doubt and belief, temptation and certainty.” is a great sentence to meditate on.
“Therefore, my question is this: At what point does reason give way to true religious faith? ”
The only thing I would add to this great explaination of Jimmys is that faith is a gift from God. If you ask for it, with humble and true intentions, then you will receive it. Like the tree that starts off as a tiny seed and grows massive. Remember, tho, it is a gift.
Keep reading and asking quesitons. At some point, things should start to fall in order…and the only way I can describe it is.. the grea AHAAA! will happen.
CCC153 When St. Peter confessed that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, Jesus declared to him that this revelation did not come “from felsh and blood, ” but from “my Father who is in Heaven. ” Faith is a gift of God, a supernatural virtue infused by him. “Before faith can be exercised, man must have the grace of God to move and assist him; he must have the interior helps of the Holy Spirit, who moves the heart and coverts it to God, who opns the eyes of the mind and “makes it easy for all to accept and believe the truth.”
Also 154-165 could be helpful.
This gift of faith is given through Baptism and strenghtened through the scaraments of Penance and Holy Eucharist. Confirmation solidifies and makes strong the person to defend the truth.
I’ll echo the recommendation of Lewis’s _Mere Christianity,_ which I accidentally raed in college and which had the effect of yanking me out of happy agnosticism.
And I’d also recommend a book called _Modern Physics and Ancient Faith,_ by Stephen M. Barr (University of Notre Dame Press, 2003) which argues that the discoveries of modern physics imply that the universe has a Designer. This isn’t “Creation Science” — Barr is a serious mainstream physicist and an intelligent Catholic.
As a matter of fact, I find that any “Physics or Math for Non-experts” book makes a Designer pretty evident. It’s the materialists who are constantly hedged in by an arbitrary dogma.
for any intellectual-type searching I’d not want to miss Newman. Among many other things, he was (I think) the first to point out, as Jimmy argues, that almost all of our beliefs come from adding up probablilities, not from formal logic or personal scientific inquiry. He called this the “illative sense.”
A favorite quote:
“Certainty, in its highest sense, is the reward of those who, by an act of will, and at the dictate of reason and prudence, embrace the truth, when nature, like a coward, shrinks [from it]. You must make a venture; faith is a venture before a man is a catholic; it is a gift after it. You approach the church in the way of reason, you enter it in the light of the spirit.” — Newman
On Saint Augustine:
Augustine emerged in the late fourth century as a rigorous defender of the Christian faith. He responded forcefully to pagans’ allegations that Christian beliefs were not only superstitious but also barbaric. But he was, for the most part, a strong compatibilist. He felt that intellectual inquiry into the faith was to be understood as faith seeking understanding (fides quaerens intellectum). To believe is “to think with assent” (credere est assensione cogitare). It is an act of the intellect determined not by reason, but by the will. Faith involves a commitment “to believe in a God,” “to believe God,” and “to believe in God.”
In On Christian Doctrine Augustine makes it clear that Christian teachers not only may, but ought, to use pagan thinking when interpreting Scripture. He points out that if a pagan science studies what is eternal and unchanging, it can be used to clarify and illuminate the Christian faith. Thus, logic, history, and the natural sciences are extremely helpful in matters of interpreting ambiguous or unknown symbols in the Scriptures. However, Augustine is equally interested to avoid any pagan learning, such as that of crafts and superstition that is not targeted at unchangeable knowledge.
Augustine believed that Platonists were the best of philosophers, since they concentrated not merely on the causes of things and the method of acquiring knowledge, but also on the cause of the organized universe as such. One does not, then, have to be a Christian to have a conception of God. Yet, only a Christian can attain to this kind of knowledge without having to have recourse to philosophy.
Augustine argued further that the final authority for the determination of the use of reason in faith lies not with the individual, but with the Church itself. His battle with the Manichean heresy prompted him to realize that the Church is indeed the final arbiter of what cannot be demonstrated–or can be demonstrated but cannot be understood by all believers. Yet despite this appeal to ecclesiastical authority, he believe that one cannot genuinely understand God until one loves Him.
I’d like to point out a Case for Christ and a Case for Faith. Those 2 books brought me 99% of the way home. They’re not Catholic, but they can really hit at the intellectual doubts one may have.
Mr. Powers, you said that any book on physics reveals the will of the Designer.
While the general consensus on the world today pits religion aganst science in some sort of psychic dualism, the facts (and history) show science as an extension of religion. After all, no one has any business pursuing science at all if they believe in a random cosmos.
Much ado is made about clash between evolution and creation science in the media, but no one ever seems to remember facts like the Big Bang theory was first postulated by Georges Lemaître a physicist and Catholic priest in Belgium. Eistein thought it was the most simple and perfectly complete theory he had ever seen. When I see it, I think “in the beginning … FWOOOOM!!”
I have heard that the dearth of believers are mathematicians and the field with the least is biology (where man is most likely to succumb to the desire to play god).
As for the original poster, the statement: “if God exists, and there are eternal consequences for going against his will, then he would make his will known to me.” sounds a little like Pascal’s wager (also mentioned in Kreeft’s book on Pascal).
I really enjoyed his post. His question and Jimmy’s answer has been one of the best posts I have seen. (definitely print-worthy).
We are all book-lovers here, but I would add that much better than books is just being with smart solid Catholics. Faith rubs off on you somehow.
But it’s hard to find people who think in terms of “historical/logical arguments for objective truth.” Most people just don’t think like that, though their faith may be far stronger than mine or thine. Their eyes glaze over if you talk about such. You might keep your eyes open for anything with the word “Dominican.”
Sounds like Pascal, whom Peter Kreeft refers to as the greatest Christian apologist of all time.
And speaking of Pascal…
I’ve been reading up on him for a presentation on my Philosophy class. He’s mostly wonderful and I certainly do not regret choosing him among the post-Enlightenment I had to choose from. But there’s something I read just today on his Letter on the possibility of the commandments that is bothering me, and I don’t want to e-mail Jimmy about it, so if anyone can clarify:
[…] canon 22; for since it forbids, on pain of anathema, to say that all the justified have the power to persevere in justice, does it not necessarily imply that all the justified do not have the proximate power to observe the commandments in the next moment, since there is no difference between the power to observe the commandments in the next moment and the power to persevere in justice […]
This definition of the 22nd canon also necessarily implies that the justified do not always have the proximate power to persevere in prayer, for since the promises of the Gospel and the Scriptures assure us of the certainty of obtaining the necessary justice for salvation, if we ask for it through the spirit of grace and in the way we ought, is it not unquestionable that there is no difference between persevering in prayer, and persevering in the impenetration of justice[?]
From this you see how the necessary conclusion is that whilst it is true in one meaning tat God never abandons a justified person if that person does not abandon him first, that is to say that God never refuses his grace to those who pray to him as they ought, and never distances himself from those who sincerely seek him, it is, however, true in another meaning that God sometimes abandons the justified before they have abandoned him; that is to say that God does not always give the proximate power to the justified to persevere in prayer.
He’s using the documents of the Council of Trent here. Canon 22 states: If anyone says that the one justified either can without the special help of God persevere in the justice received, or that with that help he cannot, let him be anathema. Canon 23: If anyone says that a man once justified can sin no more, nor lose grace, and that therefore he that falls and sins was never truly justified; […] let him be anathema.
What seriously bothered me was Pascal’s conclusion: that God abandons people even if they have tried everything to stay within His graces. I’m guessing he reaches this conclusion depending on his understanding of grace, which was heretical: he believed that grace was intrinsecally efficacious and irresistible. And then, I do think it’s questionable that there is no difference between persevering in prayer, and persevering in the impenetration of justice. But I’m no expert. Can anyone elaborate?
Nutcrazical,
Why not email Jimmy with this one? It seems to have something to do with grace and predestination, which was the subject of one the chapters of book Salvation Controversy.
As far the quote is concerned, all I can say is the Church never goes so far as to say a given person has gone to Hell after dying because we cannot judge the state of their soul nor can we guess the depth of God’s mercy. The theological underpinning of that would seem to point us away from any certain knowledge that God “abandons” anyone at anytime before they are finished.
Perhaps the abadnoment Pascal is talking about here refers to the soul conditioned by sin to become closed to His grace and confused in its orientation — ie the temporal punishments of sin. These bear a lasting effect on the body and the soul and if not properly counteracted can serve to further distance someone from God’s grace and will.
I dunno. I read a lot but my formal training was in language and not philosophy.
I’d also recommend Ronald Knox’s The Belief of Catholics. All throughout that classic and indispensable book, he hits on the intersection of faith and reason.
I’m so happy to see Miracles listed there. It doesn’t usually get the attention that Mere Christianity does. Nice work.
Someone above quoted CCC 153 and recommended 154-155. Here is the text to which reference was made.
This is a line worth quoting!
“I want to be comforted by truth, not seek truth in only that in which I am comfortable.”
It’s obvious that God’s grace has touched this person and I have no doubt that it will lead him to Rome.
Jimmy’s simple explanation about the ‘Motives of credibility’ is astute and concise – That’s the basis of EVERYONE’S faith isn’t it?
I think the problem is that for most people, once the person is convinced by the motives for credibility with regards to a wrong religion, it seems almost impossible that he would continue looking for motives of credibility; what results is what the reader first notices – they seek truth in what they feel comfortable in, to the extent that they will become unable to discern evidence that contradicts their religion.
I think not being able to see the flaw in Sola Scriptura is a good example of that point.
As usual, great work Jimmy.
And speaking of Peter Kreeft, he has some excellent writings on the arguments of God’s existence from many different angles, here:
http://www.peterkreeft.com/featured-writing.htm
The best books ever to teach the ‘life of Christ’, I believe, were written by Archbishop Alban Goodier, SJ, Titled “The Public Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ, vols.1 & 2”, and “The Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ”.
The well known priest, catequist and author, Fr. John Hardon, also recommends these books as the ‘best’ in analysing the actual life, words and general humanity of Jesus, without ‘over scrutinzing’ or doubting the historical underpinnings of the storys.
Basically, Goodier writes this ‘life’ accepting the Douey Rheims version, and putting ‘scriptural controversy’ aside, takes it from there, trying to find out…”Who exactly is Jesus Christ” given in the Gospel accounts? What did He say, HOW did He say it, and when, and under what motivations( ie. time constraints, weather conditions, political approval and opposition, etc.) did He do everything related in these Gospel stories.
Basically it is a scrutinization of every word of Christ, a scrutinization of the context of the times that the events and particular stories occured, tying the Jewish liturgical year and also the rhythm of the seasons(ie.harvest, sowing, feast and vacation days etc..,) together, to get as close to a real picture of the real Jesus–that walked and preached in the streets of Nazareth, Jerusalem Capharnaum and all of Judea–as possible.
Now, I agree, there are many great books on theology out there, but we must remember that Jesus Himself “is the WAY the TRUTH and the LIFE”…and unless we are exposed ‘very well’to this ‘Jesus’, we don’t have a very solid foundation on which to base all of our other theological opinions and conclusions.
I totally agree with Jimmy that we need good teachers in this! And Archbishop Goodier, who was very famous in His day, in the 1920’s and 30’s, and a writer of many excellent books…is a GREAT and reliable teacher of the Life of Our Lord!
Really, I am convinced that Archbishop Goodier needs to be canonized, if not for anything else ..than those countless detailed insights (and nuances) that he uncovers in both the “Public Life” and “Passion and Death” of Our Lord Jesus Christ. No where have I found such sensitivity and careful analysis, as in these books!
Nutcrazical,
it is, however, true in another meaning that God sometimes abandons the justified before they have abandoned him; that is to say that God does not always give the proximate power to the justified to persevere in prayer.
I don’t have the full context for this, so take my comments here with a grain of salt. But Pascal does say at the outset that this is “another meaning,” which I interpreted as another sense. In one sense, the Father abandoned the Son on the Cross: “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” I suspect that the “other meaning” which Pascal is trying to tap into may be tied into that reality.
It does not appear to me that he is necessarily drawing the conclusion you attribute to him, because he does say that “it is true in one meaning that God never abandons a justified person if that person does not abandon him first, that is to say that God never refuses his grace to those who pray to him as they ought, and never distances himself from those who sincerely seek him.”
He does not say that one is sometimes true, and the other is sometimes true. Both are true, understood in the right sense.
Esau,
The point you refer to in your commentary on St.Augustine, where you write:
“Yet despite this appeal to ecclesiastical authority, he believe that one cannot genuinely understand God until one loves Him.”
…is even more reason to study well the Life, mannerisms and words of Christ! If we cannot understand God ‘until we love Him’, then how are we to LOVE HIM …if we don’t KNOW HIM??
And this is the point. We KNOW GOD through knowing JESUS CHRIST, the ‘one’ teacher sent by God to reveal Himself to us. And in this, we also LOVE GOD…because all those who know Jesus well, know that He is COMPLETELY LOVABLE!
So we understand God only by loving Him, and we love Him by knowing Jesus Christ, who, when well known, is found to be ENTIRELY LOVEABLE.
Conclusion: Study well everything ‘authentic’, about everything concerning, OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST!
I have to say (lest anyone mistakenly assume from my posts above that I discovered the truth of the Church on my own) that I’m pretty certain I would never have given Catholicism a fair shake if not for the many hours I spent in conversation with Jimmy when he and I were in college.
That kind of thing doesn’t hurt. So, if you can arrange it, I recommend living basically across the street from a pretty brilliant philosophy major on his way to becoming a reknowned Catholic apologist.
On top of that, I prayed, read the Bible a lot, as well as the Church Fathers, discovered C.S. Lewis, Augustine’s Confessions (accidentally), and a bunch of other stuff. I attended a number of different churches.
Augustine’s Confessions forever changed my ideas about Catholic saints. I took his name at my Confirmation.
Tim, I didn’t know you and Jimmy were at college together! That’s very neat.
Sure, Eileen R… why do you think he lets me run amok on his otherwise perfectly respectable blog?
I know things. Hee hee.
Sir,
Existence of God and Religion is one who have the faith and their conscience. Likewise the Incarnation of God- Jesus Christ- the Second Person is based on their faith and reason.St. Paul clearly said in Rom.5:6-11 for the reason, we follow and live according to Gospel.
Esau,
The point you refer to in your commentary on St.Augustine, where you write:
“Yet despite this appeal to ecclesiastical authority, he believe that one cannot genuinely understand God until one loves Him.”
Actually, those weren’t my words; they were from a philosophical commentary, which is why I framed it in the manner I did above.
It makes sense, too.
(Surprising also that it’s from what can be described as a secular source.)
It is like what Fr. Corapi often says where if you really love God, then you would strive to know all you can about Him: Can you imagine if you were to love someone that way, if you didn’t want to know him? That would be absurd! And so, in wanting to love God, we want to get to know him.
After 33 posts, nobody recommends the *one* book that this young searcher *should* read: the Bible. Not just read it, mind you, but study it thoroughly through a good Bible study program (I’m sure good Catholic Bible studies are available). If the young searcher wants to find out what God’s will really is, then he should explore Scripture.
Now, to all of you who might accuse me of adovcating Sola Scriptura theology: Keep in mind that Scripture *is* divinely inspired and that it provides the foundation for the major Christian doctrines, ones that all the denominations agree upon (Christ’s divinity, His role as the ultimate atoning sacrifice to redeem humanity, the necessity of such a sacrifice in the first place), as well as the revelation of God’s character, personality and integrity.
Joseph,
Good suggestion (although I’m assuming it was implied in the above commens as well). In studying Scripture on this point, I would suggest beginning with the Book of Wisdom, which was written to address this pretty much head on.
He should read anything in the Summa by Aquinas.
When I was first embracing the True Church,I reinforced my weak faith by Aquinas irrefutable proofs of the Divine and all that pertains to Him.
God bless you.
Joseph– I view it as a highly advanced line of study– a body needs to understand where the book’s coming from before it makes sense. A really smart, gifted person with a really good Bible that has lots and lots of footnotes would be helped, but often folks get triped up when what they hear isn’t what was being said, if you understand me.
(Just as a footnote– the above is NOT in logical posting, it’s in normal speech. Those who were about to jump down my throat about the sense part can back down.)
I assumed, maybe incorrectly, from the person’s question that he/she was familar with Scripture. Maybe that was bad on my part. Good suggestion Joseph.
I second the [i]Summa[/i]., absolutely an indispensable thinking persons guide to reason inspired proof of the existence of God, and the validity of a moral framework. No wonder they used it as a supplement to the Bible at Trent.
Well, I stand by Fr. Jullian Carron’s claim that the human heart is an infallible criterion by which truth can be judged. Does this proposal satisfy my desire? If not, how can it be true? My desire is a fact. I did not create it, I cannot manipulate it. it is an essential component of my nature.
My judgement is still flawed by ignorance and impurity though.
StubbleSpark,
grace and predestination, which was the subject of one the chapters of book Salvation Controversy.
I forgot Jimmy had written a book by that title. I’ll check it out, now that I’ve been forcefully dragged into the topic (which I always thought too complicated for me to even touch it).
…and Anon,
How I wish it was something among those lines, but Pascal later put what he meant more explicitly. I should have quoted this before, but it jumped out at me just now:
[we can conclude] that God never abandons a justified person, if he does not abandon God first, and in another meaning, God sometimes abandons him first, and that one has to be quite blind or insincere to find a contradiction in these propositions which coexist so easily. For it is only another way of saying […] that God never refuses what has been sincerely asked for in prayer, and that God does not always grant perseverance in prayer. That is not contradictory in the slightest.
Well, now I understand why saying that grace cannot be resisted, and that therefore it’s clear that God hasn’t given everyone at least some grace, is such an awful thing to say.
It’s so annoying, too, that he is looking at canon 23 yet doesn’t seem to notice that it makes a distinction between not sinning and losing grace: …sin no more, nor lose grace…
He’s still great, though. It’s only in this issue where he falls.
On reason:
And faith:
-Blaise Pascal, Pensées [Sellier numbering]
Annonymoose/Foxfier, I’m sure our young searcher can pick up a good Catholic Bible study either at a Catholic book store or through an apologetics agency (hint, hint, Jimmy…)
Wow, interesting topic. I sympathize with the Seeker. As a young intellectual, I set aside the practice of my faith. I may have poked fun at religion, but never outright denied it. Mass was just dry as dust to me, and I was in the choir because the only way to endure it was to sing! I only went when I was with family, because the parents just expected it. On my own, fuhgeddaboudit.
I guess the beginning of the end of the Reign of Reason as my god (idol!) was really getting to know a bunch of intellectuals very well. Some of the silly ideas they embraced, that flew in the face of ordinary common sense, was astounding. There is no one stupider than an intellectual.
Evil, either. They were condescending and hateful towards ordinary people who weren’t intellectuals. Beware of intellectuals who think they should be the ruling class; more blood has been shed by this impulse than anything else, including the wars of religion.
There was just a point in my life where Reason alone didn’t work any more. My life was fine on the surface, but the invisible structure was crumbling. God bless natural consequences; what I denied were sins started feeling like sins and they wore me down. I was peeled to the core; I had to step down off the throne of Self.
For a while there was just emptiness and dryness and nothing. But then a friend dragged me to see a speaker, a faithful Catholic man whose faith caught fire and he really did radical things–gave away all his wealth, started feeding the poor for free at his high-class restaurant, and ran himself to ruin–joyfully–because he was an evangelist saving souls by the thousands with his powerful witness and teaching from the heart. All his rich, successful friends turned their backs on him. I made a vacation to hear him lead a teaching retreat for a week, and it changed my life. The wisdom of Christ is upside down to the world–and it was explained to me–and I understood it. Truth is finally after all is said and done is a Person – Jesus Christ. No one has ever said anything like what he said; and backed it up with resurrection from the dead.
I didn’t immediately become a good Catholic. For a long time, I just loved Jesus and read the Gospels over and over to learn of my beloved (eventually branching out to the entire NT). Finally, Jesus was really alive to me and it was personal.
Cancer ended my pagan vanity-worship of my perfect young strong body. It was a blessing.
When my mother died, and I saw her empty shell at the wake, I knew the butterfly had flown. I just knew to my bones that there is an afterlife. Later I learned about our own resurrection and glorification at the last day. The older and crumblier I get, the more this means to me. I have more gray hairs and wrinkles, surgical scars, and yes, a second cancer, and I just laugh. I will be perfect again, so I don’t have to grieve with aging. My mother will have her breast back and she won’t be obese; I will have that chunk of my leg back and no scars and no paunchy belly. Therefore, I don’t need to call the plastic surgeon.
After being a solo NT reading Jesus freak, it occurred to me that I had received many good things in my life and I ought to go to Mass out of gratitude. Then I finally heard and understood the Mass. All my Bible reading had made me a convinced Catholic, before this whole apologetics movement got going. It was rich and wonderful to worship with others. No more dry as dust.
Really, it boils down to just a few things:
Who is Jesus? –read at least the Gospels to find out.
(Don’t worry if you don’t understand everything at first. Pay attention to his own words–get a red letter edition of the Bible if you need to–Jesus’ own words printed in red.) Who else ever taught such things? He takes it beyond any other religious or philosophical tradition.
After getting to know him, what is Jesus? An evil and cruel liar, a raving lunatic, or the Son of God?
How does he back up what he says? Resurrection from the dead–bodily resurrection, not just some ghost. Socrates, Buddha, Confucious, Mohammed, Zoroaster, Mary Baker Eddy, Joseph Smith, Ghandi, etc. etc. etc. through ages of ages never did that. It is a radically unique claim.
How can I believe in the Resurrection? This involves trusting other witnesses like Jimmy Akin’s description of the born-blind man accepting the existence of color on your word. The Apostles, Jesus’ closest followers, spread throughout the world teaching the same thing, never straying in their own direction with what was being taught. (How likely is that?) They were all martyred. Would they die miserable, torturous deaths for a lie? You’d think they’d recant and save their skins if they were just putting us on. We take their word.
From the beginning, Christians venerated the relics of holy people. There is no tomb of Jesus, and no veneration of his relics. If any relics should have been venerated, it would be his!
The oldest, longest continuing human institution in the world is the Catholic Church. It shouldn’t have survived if it were merely natural, especially when many Caesars and emperors have willed its destruction. (Much less its own unholy scandals!–We’re sinners, please remember this, of which I am the most miserable.)
I know well the reasoning way of the world, and none of this makes any freakin’ sense whatsoever, if you know anything about human nature. It must be supernatural.
Her ongoing freaky miracles attest to the fact. The eucharist miracle of Lanciano, and incorrupt dead holy people who don’t decay, unenbalmed, after centuries. The miracle of the sun witnessed by thousands, including skeptics and atheists, at Fatima. Inexplicable healings at Lourdes, even reported by skeptical Nobel prize winning doctors and scientists. Science doesn’t even attempt to explain this stuff. Science kneels silent before the God who rules Nature.
I don’t have to believe in those later miracles, but they are encouragers to my faith, and I still have a skeptical tendency. However, in spite of my tiny faith, the size of a mustard seed, I prayed over a woman once and she was healed. I still barely believe it really happened despite the heartfelt testimony of her friends. Jesus did the healing, and it’s nice to know he’s not limited by my tattered, tiny shred of faith. Proves to me that an unholy, unbelieving, scandalous priest can still confect the Eucharist. It’s the power of God, not man.
St. Thomas Aquinas, that tower of Reason, at the end of his life, called all his works as straw, silent before the loving power of God.
God is not a set of propositions. He can’t be Venn diagrammed. Any god that fits within my able yet small brain is not a god worth worshipping.
Pursue the paths of reason if that is what resonates with you. However, I would like to challenge you to a few things…while pursuing Reason, also read the Gospels. Begin with a prayer. God, if you exist, help me to know you. While I read this, please open my mind to understand and accept it if it is your will. Then, once you know something about Christ’s life, I double dog dare you to pray the Rosary for at least two weeks. Even if you’re not really sure about it. The important thing is to meditate on the mysteries while praying it, not just vocal recitation. There’s websites with instructions how to do it. Bring to prayer an impossible situation and see if something doesn’t happen–either the situation will resolve or you will be at peace with it no matter what happens. Then I triple dog dare you to go to Mass on Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Vigil.
May God bless you, earnest seeker. Ye shall find.
Great post, kentuckyliz. There is nothing more powerful than a person’s testimony, because it is real and personal. Your post really touched me. Thanks!! Jesus be praised!!
I agree with you Kentuckyliz, that we should always include the mystical, spiritual and heart felt experiences when discussing any topics concerning faith. And the reason is, as you put it very well, that.. “God is not a set of propositions. He can’t be Venn diagrammed”
Moreover, we have all experienced(I think), particular, inexplicable, occurrances of Divine Providence in our lives. These experiences, of which have sometimes inspired radical life changes, are often in no way associated with any sort of logic or reason. Really,they are more akin to ‘angelic’ intervention. And the varieties of this Divine Providence are infinite, and is also witnessed in ‘answers to our prayers’, as you described so well above.
So, the miraculous is in no way to be put aside, but rather we should be much more sensitive to the Divine Providence shown to us in the hundreds of ‘little’ miracles that might occur, and on an almost continual basis!
With everyone we meet, or talk to, there is an opportunity for a miracle of faith for that person, something that might indeed lead to his/her eternal salvation. It might even be just a charitable act, but something that sparks a fire in His heart and steers him in a new direction.
These, I think, are the seeds that Jesus talks about in the Gospel–the seeds sown everywhere, in both good soil and bad! And so all of this needs to be included when we talk about life and faith, and not just logic, canon laws and theological argumentation, however interesting these other topics might be. And you also reinforce this same idea, when you point out:
“St. Thomas Aquinas, that tower of Reason, at the end of his life, called all his works as straw, silent before the loving power of God.”
So these philosophical topics might be easier to discuss, due to the fact they are so objective, and are often based on documents, laws and established doctrines. But personal ‘communion’ with God, both through the knowledge of Jesus Christ in the Gospels, and in the partaking of the Eucharist, is what leads us to “eternal life”. Argumentation, logic and apologetics, only prepares the soul, and fortify the faith of a person, but the actual experience of faith, and living united and in communion with God, is the goal to which all these other things lead.
So, I am totally with you in your advice to first learn WELL who Jesus Christ is… both through His words and Gospel stories, and in then though the grateful and love-filled reception of Him in the Holy Eucharist.