In a lecture on the “Role of Reason in the Life of the Soul,” Christian philosopher J.P. Moreland recounted a lecture he had in a Christian gymnasium. In the lecture he presented a couple of arguments for the existence of God. After the lecture, he had a Q&A section, and a woman (a believer) said, “Dr. Moreland, your talk has troubled me this evening.” And Moreland said, “Well, I’m sorry, mam, what’s the problem?” Then she said, “The more you prove God exists, the less room you leave for faith.” This is a very weird definition of faith, one that completely misses the point about faith.
The lady mentioned by Moreland believes, in Moreland’s words, that “as Reason increases, Faith decreases, because Faith is believing something in the absence of Reason.” Moreland, on the other hand, said that Faith “is trusting what we have reason to believe is true.” And this is very interesting. Faith is not something one arbitrarily chooses without evidence.
The Hebrew word for truth, emeth, in fact means something firm, something we can trust. This does not mean that faith decreases by reason, but that it increases.
October 7, 2007 at 7:03 am |
Hi Closet Catholic,
Good post. I have always been puzzled by the attitude you mention in your post. It is very common over here in the US. How do people reconcile this view with Scripture saying eternal life is to know the One True God?
October 7, 2007 at 7:06 am |
What I mean is that if faith is better than knowledge, then wouldn’t that make earth better than heaven, since in heaven we will know God while on earth we have faith?
October 7, 2007 at 6:50 pm |
Exactly! The way I regard faith, is that it’s trust in God.
It is interesting that the Hebrew word for truth is emeth. In “Men Without Chests,” the first essay/talk in The Abolition of Man, C.S. Lewis writes (in note 19):
Therefore faith is not something arbitrary chosen, but trust in what we know to be true. We in fact use the word in this way all the time. The more we know about a subject, the more faith we can have in its truth.
PS! Are you Bonaventure from DCF?
October 7, 2007 at 10:57 pm |
Yes, it is me. Bonaventure (my real name is Dan) from DCF.
I didn’t know you had an English blog until recently. I believe it was either Viking or Ivar that told me you did, so I had to check it out. I have visited before, but this is the first time I had anything intelligent to say!