Belief In God

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Belief In God

By Rowland Croucher and others ⋅ January 5, 2003 ⋅ Post a comment
Subject: Belief in God
Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 18:05:07 +0800
From: "Nigel Mitchell" <>
Newsgroups: aus.religion.christian,nz.soc.religion

Hi, Chris.

We apologise for this break in transmission, and now return you to
normal programming.

I wrote:
>> If you ask me for a definition of "God", I would answer in similar terms
>> to Tillich and Einstein above. "God" is the origin, the first cause, and
>> the reason for existence of all that is. We live in a tension between the
>> chaos of un-being, and the perfection of Being. It follows that all
>> movement towards order, improvement, and whatever is good, is movement
>> towards God, and movemenet towards disorder, destruction and whatever is
>> bad is movement away from God. When I said that atheists do not have the
>> imagination to see God, I meant that, for me, God is visible in every
>> tree, in every wave, in cute cuddly animals and grand ferocious ones, as
>> well as ugly ones that clean up the scraps on the forest floor. God is also
>> there in my daughter's eyes when she smiles, and when she cries. What I do
>> not understand is how other people can see these things, and not see God.
>> What do they see?

On Wed, 16 Jun 1999 7:00:31 +0800, Chris Ho-Stuart wrote
(in message <>):
> I probably see much the same thing, actually, and refer to it by different
> terms.
>
> I particularly empathise with the fact that you see "god" in the ugly and
> the ferocious. I'd go further and remove the qualifier "grand" on ferocious,
> and the qualifier about "cleaning up" for the the ugly.
>
> Whatever it is that I see, I see it no less in ichneumon wasp, which lays
> its eggs in the body of a living caterpillar, so that its young have a ready
> source of food as they grow.  I see it in the smallpox virus, and yet also
> in the scientists who have now made it almost extinct.
>
> I think this is in contrast to the view that creation is fallen, and than in
> an ideal world nature itself would reflect more closely the ideals
> attributed to "god". For example, Isaiah (ch 65) speaks of the wolf lying
> down with the lamb, and the lion eating straw like the ox, and the snake
> being no longer poisonous -- clear echos of a vegetarian creation in Genesis
> where plants were given to the animals for food (ch 1).

... or a not very well thought through idea of 'perfection'. Death and
destruction is part of the perfection of creation. If there was no death, there
would be no new life. You have alluded to this above (unless I am reading
something into your words that isn't there).

> The problem with using the word "god" to refer to our wonder of the natural
> world is that the word carries a connotation of goodness and perfection that
> does not fit well with the natural world.

It depends _why_ you think the natural world exists.

I know it sounds a bit simplistic, but what would you change about the
natural world to make it 'perfect', if you do not think it is perfect
already?

> I am an atheist with respect to an ideal "god" which is somehow better than
> the natural world. I do not believe in a fall from grace which is reflected
> in the natural world.

Do you believe that human beings have the ability to choose between
right and wrong?

> I am also an atheist with respect to to the notion that the "god" or
> "godliness" we perceive in the natural world is something which is concerned
> with our moral conduct, or with any continued existence after death, or with
> a personal individual meaning for each life beyond what we construct for
> ourselves.

What about if you narrow the 'natural world' down to humanity. The Christian
understanding of God is that the perfection of humanity is revealed in what Jesus
said and did. He taught that the key to understanding God, the Universe and
Everything is in love of God and neighbour, self- sacrifice, and treating other
people better than they treat you. That is the Gospel, as I understand and preach
it.

I acknowledge that many Christians get this wrong much of the time (and I don't
exempt myself from that), and far too many turn the teaching of Jesus on its head
and end up doing exactly the opposite. But I also believe that it is possible to
cut through all that and recognise that Christianity provides us with the
resources to construct a meaning for our lives which is greater than it would be
if left to our own devices.

>> If you ask me how I know God, and what difference God makes in my life,
>> then my answer can only be anthropomorphic. The leap from "Ground of
>> Being" to "God I worship in Church" is made through my personal experience
>> of revelation, the study I have done and the teaching I have received from
>> the Christian scriptures, and the fellowship I receive in the community of
>> believers.
>>
>> The last of these is what comes first, for me and for most other
>> Christians. I became a Christian, and particularly an Anglican Christian,
>> because my parents made me a part of that community. I went through all
>> the rituals - baptism, confirmation, singing in the choir, Sunday school,
>> etc. Some of ht eontent was great. Some of it was dreadful. But the Church
>> was an extension of my family, and it provided nurture and support to me,
>> just like a family. One of the teachings of Jesus which I hold dear is in
>> John 13:31-35 where he taught that the distinctive thing that should make
>> Christians stand out from the crowd should be the love we have for one
>> another. It might not seem like it sometimes on this newsgroup, but
>> throughout my life that love has been a fundamental part of my experience
>> of Church. I was brought into a loving and supportive community, and I
>> grew up in it, and see no reason to leave it.
>
> I sympathise with this as well. The loss of this community is the single
> biggest loss for me that came with loss of faith.

It is not only your loss, but the Church's as well.

I realise that you are saying that it was a rational decision on your part to
leave the community of faith, so what I am going to say next may not apply in
your case, but IMHO one of the great problems we face is that people think their
experience of Church is the only valid option. We see that all the time here on
the newsgroup, where people tell members of other Churches that they are not
'real true Christians', and people who are atheists and members of other
religions presume to tell us what 'all Christians' believe and do.

Christianity is as diverse, and as inclusive, as nature itself. And just as in
nature, this diversity is both a weakness and a strength. The deluded and
magalomaniac try to establish a 'perfect' church, and the foolish think they have
found one, but in the real world such perfection will always be elusive.

>> In my case, personal experience of God is probably the next aspect. There
>> have been two times when the whole direction of my life has changed
>> because I felt a call from God. My ability to describe these events is no
>> better than the attempts of biblical authors to describe such experiences.
>> I could say I hear a voice, or saw an angel, but in fact what happened was
>> I just knew. One day I was thinking and planning along route X, and the
>> next day I knew God wanted me to go on route Y. Aside from those two
>> life-changing experiences, there have been many times, dating back to my
>> early teens, when I have known the presence and comfort of God. I know that
>> when I pray, God hears my prayers. This is an entirely subjective thing.
>> People who have had the same experience whill know exactly what I mean,
>> and people who have not will probably think it sounds like nonsense, but I
>> can live with that.
>>
>> The third aspect of my knowing God is through my studies of the Bible, and
>> the history and teachings of the Church. I won't go into this in too much
>> detail, except to say that the Bible, read in its proper context of the
>> tradition of the Curch, provides the content for what I say and do about
>> God.
>>
>> ... which is a rather long winded wy of saying that my understanding of
>> God is that God is the ground of Being, the cause of all that is, and the
>> One with whom I have a personal loving relationship, a relationship which
>> is shared and nurtured by my fellow Christians in the Church, and a
>> relationship which is formed and informed by my study of the scriptures.
>
> The question for me is, does God exist as a thing, or a distinct entity? Is
> there a sensible distinction between god and not-god? Or is God more of an
> ideal? Or a metaphor for the universe?

The Christian understanding of the Trinity provides an answer to your question.

The first person of the Trinity is the first-cause, the metaphor of the universe,
if you like.

The second person of the Trinity is the God-like spark of life which we know in
ourselves, and which we recognise and love (or hate) in each other.

The third person of the Trinity is the numinous, the source of poetry and prayer
and all that we call 'holy'.

The first person we can observe. We might not be able to see him, but we can see
where he has been. The third person allows us to have a relationship with the
second.

> For example, is it meaningful to say that God acts? Can we draw a
> distinction between some events which just happen, or are not particularly
> caused or willed by God, and other events which are caused and willed by
> God. I can think of three approaches...

> If God is the ground of being, one approach would be to deny the utility of
> such a distinction; all real events are grounded in God, and you cannot
> usefully distinguish some events as being due to God and others not being
> due to God.

This is a view which could apply to agnostics and members of most
religions.

> A second approach is to treat God as a kind of ideal; some acts are "good"
> and others are "bad", and thereby more or less aligned with the underlying
> moral foundation of the universe. It becomes hard to apply this notion to
> events like earthquakes or storms or a beautiful day, which are the outcome
> of the natural world.

This allows the cop-out which is the retreat of so many religious people. If
something good happens, we thank God. If something bad happens, 'it is a
mystery'.

> A third approach is what I have previously called the anthropomorphic
> approach. God, like us, is a player in the unfolding dynamic of the
> universe, and sometimes chooses to do one thing and not another, for some
> divine purpose, and with some definite consequences what can be seen to
> happen in the world. This is, I think, the usual Christian view.

And a good one too.

Do you have a problem with it?

cheers

N+