The Reason for God, Belief in the Age of Skepticism

Timothy Keller

I read this book  for the second time since receiving it in 2017 this past month. The premise of the book, then as now,  pulled me in: an Evangelical minister sets up a church in downtown Manhattan against the advice of just about everyone. The demographics are wrong: single, liberal, self centered people working in the dynamic center of the economy that is the USA. His church proved a success. There is a lesson to be learned there!

The first half of the book sets the tone of why he was successful. He addresses common questions from a population moulded in a liberal democracy. He does it well..

The second half of the book attempts to influence— from sermons undoubtedly given in his church.  It is much more dense and makes clear he has talent and skill with the discipline of rhetoric—developing and making arguments.

Examples of what appealed to me:

He was not always a Christian. He struggled (he points out that it is hard to be a Christian without struggling)— he required three hurdles to be jumped before he found his true faith:

Intellectual: is there more than one god, what is a true religion, why would God let bad things happen,  etc.

Subjective: a feeling of the presence of God.

Social: you need a peer group to work within having similar beliefs—this both sustains faith and allows one to grow.

He criticizes absolutism in his  Christian peers, people of other faiths, and Secularists for not leaving room for civil discussion and acceptance in “the other.” This point was made pre-Trump.

Doubting Biblical perspectives is good: we should all have doubts-this is how one processes thinking and belief. Just as you might have doubts about your spouse or children or parents, the love you have should allow you to work through those doubts while retaining that love. It can be trying. If your beliefs are antithetical to Christian Faith, he asks that you consider on what basis your faith—whatever it is,  rides—what are its assumptions? I developed a similar approach with the diversity of odd beliefs and actions of patients who sought my advice, filled with doubts about what I offered. No wonder I liked his approach!

How can God allow Evil?  He uses the story of Joseph to suggest we simply don’t have the perspective as humans to understand God’s intentions, role, and tools. Good can come from evil and he offers a number of examples to illustrate this. For the person who never sees any good coming from their tragedy, he is sympathetic and offers to help find Faith in that premise of God as it is an article of Faith that our perspectives is meaningless when compared to God’s purpose.

Is Christianity a straightjacket? Are Christians stuck with one point of view to the exclusion of everyone else?  He points to the diversity of beliefs and versions of Christianity world-wide to suggest that that is not the case. The politics and beliefs of Christians cover a vast realm of assumptions, cultures, and behaviors. Christianity finds favor and is appealing to a broad swath of the world’s cultures. I agree with this: Latin America brought us liberation theology—who knew? African Christianity is more granular and has parallels with evangelical Christians in the US.  Consider Mormons as our American home-grown form of Christian multiculturalism. Christians adopted to situations around the world— many Christian holidays align with Pre Christian Mediterranean holidays. Holidays in Mexico align with pagan celebrations before the introduction of formal Christianity. He summarizes, anticipating our current reality:  We should criticize Christians when they are condemning and ungracious to unbelievers. But we should not criticize churches when they maintain standards for membership in accord with their beliefs.

The Church is a source of so much injustice: He offers no resistance to that fact other than to say, Christians in authority with power have abused power; they are human. One can find examples of fair-minded, decent, and tolerant leaders. He sums up: “church is a hospital for sinners and not a museum for saints”

The church as a source of violence: yep; religion, but not just Christianity, has caused great suffering and can be a multiplier for ethnic or cultural differences—-but there are plenty of secular examples that demonstrate that this human characteristic does not reside solely in Christians or in other religions  Ghengis Kahn (my suggestion), Stalin, Hitler, Mao, and French Revolutionaries stand out as secular examples..

Proclaiming yourself a Christian and not acting like one is a huge problem. The Sermon on the Mount is cited as his critique of the hyper-religious authoritarian figures whom he broadly labels, pharisees.

How can a living God send people to Hell? He sees individualism guiding this refusal to accept judgement.  CS Lewis notes that magic is thought by smug people to be commonly believed in by the ancients—-in fact it was an uncommon belief in the middle ages but rose dramatically with the rise of science in the 16th and 17th centuries—when witches were burned. He believes belief in science and magic are driven by the same impulse—a new approach to moral and spiritual reality divorced from what our ancestors were taught. He offers this:

“There is something which unites magic and applied science while separating both from the ‘wisdom’ of earlier ages. For the wise men of old, the cardinal problem had been how to conform the soul to reality, and the solution had been knowledge, self-discipline, and virtue.  For magic and applied science alike, the problem is how to subdue reality to the wishes of men: the solution is a technique; and both, in the practice off this technique are ready to do things hitherto regarded as disgusting and impious.”

When discussing typical “liberal” beliefs not grounded in formal religion, he asks “why should western sensibilities arbitrate the validity of Christianity or other religions? You can see how this might hook a thirty year old Manhattanite. For many in the world, “turning the other cheek” is ludicrous and yet we judge them for that. Circumcising at birth? Not eating pork? Segregating sexes in public? Slavery as an acceptable human condition?

He argues that believing in Divine judgement or punishment can mitigate cycles of violence which is to say, if you believe in such a god who judges everyone, you can stand down and even forgive, believing justice will come.

When discussing the reality of the resurrection, it occurred to me that it serves as a metaphor for letting go of hatred or a need for revenge and when successful, is a sort of self resurrection.

Can you take the Bible literally?  He does! He points out contradictions often found and used as evidence for the Bible’s fallacies but makes an analogy, which I think holds but does not change the nature of the big question which relies in the end on Faith and not a logical argument. Related to doubt, when talking about a personal relationship with Jesus, he suggests that any loving and intimate relationship by necessity has to have conflict, ambiguity, and contradictions. Without that, you have a “Stepford God” serving us instead of being of a viable, real relationship.

“Critical Rationality:” He uses a metaphor from CS Lewis who responding to a Cosmonaut who reported that in space, he had not found God: “That is like Hamlet going into the attic of his castle looking for Shakespeare…….”

It is an article of Faith you cannot directly “see” God any better than you can directly “see the sun to understand it.” What we meaningfully know about the sun is determined indirectly through experiments, math, and so on. What we know about God is found indirectly as well. When using logic, he points out there is no direct way to “see” or prove God. That the sun exists is obvious to us all. God is just as obvious, to him.  And so he employs “critical rationality.”

God’s Fingerprints: ie indirect evidence suggesting a higher being—  Scientist believe in the big bang; what was before that? He argues that “natural laws” are awfully convenient for working as smoothly as they do for us (the melting point of water, the habitable zone around the sun we find ourselves in) and “what are the odds” they exists elsewhere? He thinks infinitely small.  Interesting term, infinitely small: one in a million? One in a billion? One in a trilion?  That is different than infinitely. He makes the “design hypothesis” re the natural world. It’s an interesting idea, one of Faith.

Are there “human rights” we can all agree on and do they exist when we don’t agree? If so, where do they come from?  Can we agree that rights should exist regardless of their utility? Are you content for utility to be the only reason for rights? If  “you” decide on human rights, when addressing a larger body of people how do you answer the question,  “sez who?” These are great questions in a Humanities class!

If you believe in human rights because you just know or feel it, how do you reconcile that with different opinions across the globe; what authority can there be?

Lastly,  he discusses Sin—in a counseling group, a polished single man with attitude about being a victim expressed a need for revenge - He was betrayed by others over and over; he would not stop talking about the injustice of it all.  A dreadlocked black man commented: “I used to feel that way too, before I achieved low self esteem.”  His point becomes, “you can’t save yourself, that is because of your ego;  finding Christ means giving that up, surrendering yourself.”

Examples of my secular humanist persistent stubbornness:

I am fascinated by the theme he expresses, one of unity and of a healing when one finds Jesus and becomes a true Christian. I agree with his argument that you can’t “prove” God or that one  does or does not exist and have to infer much from the world as you understand it to come to your own conclusion. It is certainly easier in an authoritarian society where all this is set—no arguments allowed. Do NOT eat with your left hand! It is harder in a multicultural democracy. The recommended podcast this month on Radiolab relates an Islamic-raised woman taking on Evolution as the object of her advanced college studies with the purpose of demonstrating or proving its falsehood; she has a crisis of faith clearly expressed when she comes to accept that evolution is a fact.

Many of his arguments when dealing with interpretation and motivation trying to come to belief or a conclusion about belief finds him using a technique I embrace. For example, to the liberal concerned with the “Straightjacket” that Christianity can put you in— he notes that Christianity adapted and changed, culture by culture yet maintaining a “whole.” I would argue, the variation comes to the point that it is hard to see the similarities between various interpretations of Christianity. Consider evangelical African Christians, Orthodox Christians in Russia, and old-fashioned Mormons. Culture is as important as the application of theology. They share a small kernel of tradition but an important one: faith in Jesus and his resurrection. When countering the argument that the Church(s) have been violent and committed atrocities, he agrees and then notes other religions share this characteristic as do non-religious regimes. That is a humanist’s argument, I think.

Another more difficult subject, using the same argumentation: A liberal comments that female circumcision is evil and should be stopped. He asks, “How do you know?”  “Just because,” doesn’t make it. He asks why the minority culture of the world, Western Culture should be the one to judge the rest of the cultures in the world? Because we are stronger? Because we are blessed with good judgement and if so, by whom or what? The difficulty for all us humanists is if you respect cultural differences that are abhorrent to you, how do you effect change in that culture without being an authoritarian-dogmatic, not to mention, “exterminating” that culture? Where do you draw your lines and why? He argues it can’t  simply be for expediency: “Napalming babies is not a culturally relative problem…….”

I commonly think of FOX TV evangelicals or those on the 700 Club as our American version of Pharisees—steeped in tradition and methodological application of interpretation “one way” that leads to very authoritarian conclusions along with the potential for atrocities and injustice. And then there is the Rapture, NOT an article commonly accepted by Christians world-wide. He gives me a nod on this point without naming names: “If your highest goal is family or tribe—-you will care less for others and allow harm to come to them.

If it is the nation or a race, you become a nationalist or a racist and put your own happiness and economics in place of others.

If God is your highest goal—-you become universal.”   This was written pre Charlie Kirk.

In principle, it can also be a Humanist tract.

Our Founding Fathers dealt with strong religious-authoritarian beliefs and saw first-hand how destructive their potential. Thomas Jefferson said something to the effect that if so-called Christians acted in accordance with the Jesus he admired—the one giving the sermon on the Mount—the world would gladly embrace Christianity as the one true religion. It was clear to him this was a pipe-dream. History has proven him correct, so far.

His discussion of secular evolutionary explanations for moral systems or personal decision making, for me, fell flat.  I have considered that altruistic behavior might be an inherited tendency that might benefit a group —evolutionarily speaking—he dismisses this. He argues altruism is a higher calling that humans have and it comes from God. He points out evolutionary thinking cannot explain everything. He used the same argument for making sense of bad things happening to good people. God is used to explain it but we cannot understand God’s “thinking” or “motivation”—it is beyond us. And so it is with evolutionary or natural explanations—-It is quite possible our brains are incapable of understanding the complexity of a human brain or evolutionary processes or the natural universe itself—just as it is impossible to understand the workings of God. Not understanding is not a logical basis of Faith but it sure drives it.

The “logic” of evolution: dogs performing seemingly altruistic acts (like humans, some jump into water to help another dog or animal or human. Mother animals will put themselves in danger to save their offspring) though I would argue we have a pretty limited idea about what guides dog behavior—though in the case of my dog it is pretty clearly food and my lap……Oh, and she clearly loves me. One of my first doubts of Faith a a child was the assertion that animals did not go to heaven.

The Big Bang brings us to the same dead end. If you believe in the Big Bang, what was on the other side of it ie before it? There are observations and math that lead to the Big Bang Theory—less than 1% of the population could demonstrate much less understand these. So Faith is involved when believing in the Big Bang just as the belief that the world started 6,000 to 7,000 years ago, but more than 1% of the population could counter that belief with “known” observations learned in school or on TV or in books. I promise you, your kids or grandkids will see it differently, regardless.

The inclusion of CS Lewis when discussing the growth of science and magical thinking is fascinating. To most of us at some point, what science and engineering have wrought is something of a miracle—yet I don’t believe in miracles—just events that I don’t have the capacity to explain.. For me, the complexity of nature and the nature of God make a perfect understanding impossible and so, relies on Faith. While I learned the math and observations that when applied, give us orbits and trips to the moon and beyond, in my day to day, I have only Faith to guide that belief system because I can no longer use those tools. For a person with great Faith and the Bible, they have to have Faith to make sense of the world and the science does not bear on that in the day to day other than to offer the convenience of our tools, phones, communications………. Those tools have led to a culture, not just in the US whereby they feed various forms of entertainment (podcasts, opinion sites, movies, video games, social media, newscasts)  to the detriment of ordered morality or even agreement on behavioral norms. This affects Christians, Islam, Buddhists, and Humanists equally. The goal it seems is to get a step ahead of everyone else which facilitates being, “ready to do things hitherto regarded as disgusting and impious.”  CS Lewis’ Christianity takes that on.

He started with his three barriers. He does a good job with the intellectual barrier. For someone like me, if you don’t feel a personal connection, the second barrier is a tough one.. Lastly, Faith needs a society to nurture it. I think that applies to all manners of Faith, including humanism.