"The Language of God" (surprisingly I like this book!)

Book cover for "The Language of God"

I recently read The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief by Francis S. Collins (published in 2006) and surprisingly, I really liked it! This is a really good book! It gives Collins's perspective, as a scientist and Christian, and it's just very reasonable. It doesn't come across as "let's fight those atheists" or fearful of science. It's about his own reasons for leaving behind atheism and converting to Christianity, and it's about how evolution is just true and Christians should accept that, and creationism and intelligent design just ain't it, and how science and faith are compatible. 

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Francis Collins

Collins was the director of the Human Genome Project. This was a team that sequenced the entire human genome, billions of DNA base pairs, which is pretty amazing. (The title, "The Language of God" refers to the idea that the DNA base pairs are the "language" that God used to create life.)

I've seen Christians make a big deal about how Collins is a Christian. The argument goes, see, Francis Collins is a Christian, and he's a famous scientist! So, our beliefs *are* legit and compatible with science! The assumption is that Collins holds all the same beliefs that the Christians who claim him as a symbol do. Turns out, this assumption is very wrong! All throughout this book, Collins comes across as thoughtful and reasonable, rather than holding on to dogmatic beliefs that we can't question and we just have to keep saying louder.

Case in point: evolution. A big chunk of this book is about how evolution is true and Christians should accept that. Collins discusses creationism, and talks about why it's wrong. He discusses intelligent design, and why it's wrong. And then he talks about theistic evolution, which is the position he holds.

I was totally surprised. I really had no idea what this book was about; I had no idea that Collins accepts evolution and I had no idea that he was openly advocating for Christians to accept evolution. Really, no idea. All those times that I've heard Christians say "look, Francis Collins" as if that proves that their beliefs are reasonable- wow, I really had no idea that he was out here telling Christians to accept evolution. In the Christian subculture I grew up in, we all knew that of course Christians do not believe in evolution.

On demons and what really matters

Palm branch. Image source.

Here's a post from Tripp Fuller: I Am Undefeated Against Demons. 1 and 0. (via) It's about this one time where someone came to Fuller's church seeking an exorcism, claiming to be possessed by a demon. I love the part where the church secretary says to Fuller, "Since you’re the only one here from the South and you used to be an evangelical, we figured, you could handle this."

Fuller doesn't believe in demons. But here's someone coming to him, in need of help. He needs to help him, and the way to do that is just go along with the "it's a demon" framework, even though it's not.

He started talking. And while he was talking, his face would do a thing, and the voice would change, and the demon would pop out to say hi like an uninvited co-host on a podcast. Then he was back. Then the demon was back. Then he was back.

As I listened, here is what I was actually hearing. This guy was a horrible boss. He was making piles of money off people he treated badly. He was a workaholic. He had an addiction problem. He was taking all of it out on his family.

Now, friend. If anything is going to count as demonic, that will do.

Really fascinating that Fuller is witnessing this odd behavior and still totally doesn't believe it's a demon. The *actual* problem is that this guy is mistreating the people around him. 

Fuller tells this guy that the way to get rid of demons is to let the love of God in. Accept God's love for you, and stop hurting the people around you. And Fuller prays over this guy, while hitting water with a palm branch- not that he believes the palm branch is doing anything, but because this "demon-possessed" guy is looking for some kind of ritual to get rid of the demon.

I'm really interested in this post because it's a perspective on demons that I've totally never heard before. Basically, the idea is that when people talk about demons, there aren't *actually* demons, but if people want to use spiritual concepts like that to describe their experiences, fine, whatever- BUT the important thing is about how people treat each other, about relationships, about emotional health. And these spiritual concepts like "demons" are maybe acceptable to believe in, but only in service to what actually matters (love, community, emotional health, etc).

(Here's a question: so apparently Fuller doesn't believe this "demon" is really a demon- but he tells this guy to "let the love of God in"- does he believe "the love of God" is a real thing, or is that also just an imaginary concept that we can believe in if it's helpful for us, sort of a metaphorical way to think about accepting yourself and caring for the people around you?)

Let's contrast this with the mindset where these spiritual things- heaven, hell, God, the devil, angels, demons- are real, and they are more real than the physical world we can perceive. The gospel I was taught said that what really matters is whether you go to heaven or hell for all eternity. Our lives on earth are just the blink of an eye; it doesn't really matter what we do here. The only important thing we can do in our earthly lives is to correctly believe in Jesus and "get saved" so we go to heaven instead of hell.

And so, in this mindset where the spiritual world is more real than the physical world, ideas like morality, human connection, and emotional health are kind of... orthogonal to what really matters and what's really real. Yeah sure, God wants you to be a good person, love others, etc, but that's just some arbitrary rules that God made up- we just have to do them because God said to, not because they are central to the things that really matter.

And there's a tension... The more you believe in hell, the more you believe that your friends are in danger of going to hell, the more you will harass them, lie to them, coerce them- anything you can possibly do to push them toward "getting saved." Belief in the realness of the spiritual world is at odds with common-sense morality.

At the church where I grew up, people didn't talk about demons lurking in the world around us, possibly affecting our lives. (With one exception: I heard warnings about Harry Potter. Specifically, the concern that Christians had was that the spells in Harry Potter are real, so if kids read the books and then try those things out, it really will summon demons.) I know there some churches where people talk about demons all the time, but that wasn't my experience. Then when I was in college, some of my Christian friends would describe things that happened to them as "spiritual warfare"- like "I had a really good conversation with a non-Christian friend, I told her about Jesus- but then after that, I felt really discouraged and just kept thinking about all the things I should have said differently- maybe it's spiritual warfare." Ie, maybe the devil is planting these thoughts of discouragement in your head, because you did a *good* thing by talking to your friend about Jesus, and the devil is trying to stop you. I kind of believed that, but also I felt like, "really? We really believe that the devil himself is influencing our emotions? Isn't that kind of, uh, crazy?" I always thought it was suspicious that people would call it "spiritual warfare" like a vague and abstract euphemism, comes across as less bonkers than "the devil is doing this to me."

I have 1 anecdote about demons. So, when I was a college student, I went to a Christian conference. At one point, there was a group of us just hanging out and talking, maybe 5 students, and one of the other students there (let's call her Claire) told this story about when she personally had cast out a demon. So this is something I heard secondhand; I have no way to tell you how true any of it is. But anyway, Claire said there was a girl, let's call her Hannah, who was acting weird one night, and putting her legs in weird positions, and Claire and her friends were sure it was because Hannah was possessed by a demon. (I think there was more to it than that, like Hannah had a history of weird/"sinful" behavior, so she was thought to be more likely to be demon-possessed than the average person, but I don't remember the details.) So Claire and her friends stayed there with Hannah all night, commanding the demon to leave "in the name of Jesus." Claire told us, if you say "in the name of Jesus," the demon has to leave, it has to. Apparently they sat there with Hannah for quite a long time telling the demon to come out "in the name of Jesus," and eventually, by the time it was morning, Hannah seemed to be back to normal. 

When I heard this story, the main angle I viewed it from was "if this is true, this is PROOF that the spiritual world is real, and our Christian beliefs are true." That's what I wanted back then: proof. To get the enticement of atheism out of my head. Sure, there are plenty of people out there claiming some kind of miracle happened to them, but how do we know they're not making it up? Is there photo/video evidence? Do we have statements written down, by the people who witnessed it, immediately after it happened? Can we ask these witnesses a bunch of questions to get a clear picture of what happened, and make sure they're not mistaken about it?

So I viewed it through the lens of wanting proof, wanting to know if my beliefs were true or false. I noticed that my friends didn't seem to view this kind of story in that way- I had this urge to collect and preserve evidence, but other Christians didn't seem to have that. I guess they weren't viewing it in terms of "I need to prove this to myself and to other people." I guess they don't have something inside them that's always telling them to be an atheist.

It's very interesting to me, reading Fuller's blog post, about how he sees this guy right in front of him, exhibiting such odd behavior, and it doesn't affect his non-belief in demons at all. He just ignores all that, and says the real problem is the way this "demon-possessed" guy has broken his relationships with his family and co-workers, and the solution is to get this guy to accept the love of God, and then to treat people better. Like the question of whether the spiritual world exists- whether demons are real- doesn't matter at all. The only thing that matters is how we treat each other.

It's a perspective that views religion not as the realest thing, but as a tool that is useful only to the extent that it helps with the things we feel are most important to our lives in this physical world. Human connection, community, emotional health, that kind of thing. It's the opposite of "our earthly lives are just the blink of an eye, and all that matters is eternity in heaven or hell."

It feels like it's basically the same thing as "none of these religious claims are true at all, but they are good because they are useful for encouraging people to live in a moral way and love each other." (One could also make the argument that religion encourages people to do bad things, though. So maybe if all this is not true anyway, we'd be better off with no religion at all.)

So it's not "we believe our religion is true, now let's live according to the implications of that, no matter how strange they may seem- that's what faith is supposed to be." It's more like, we have our own experiences, real experiences and feelings in the physical world, and we're very rooted in that- that's real. And if religion can kind of give us a framework for viewing those experiences, great- but if religion ever tells us something too weird or not matching what we see in the real world, well then religion has reached the end of its usefulness, and we don't take it that seriously. Have common sense instead of having faith.

On the one hand, I like this, because it's something that actually makes sense (we should treat each other right) rather than something that depends on arguing about if demons exist/ if God exists/ etc. On the other hand, isn't this the same thing as saying my religion is not true? I don't like that; I want it to be true. I'm not just here for metaphors and inspiration; I really believe He lived and died and His tomb is empty.

But I'm stuck in a weird place where I feel that religion only matters if it leads you to do counter-intuitive things, things that look like a bad idea to people outside the religion; but also, don't ever do that- history is full of the wreckage of things that people did because their religion told them to, which everyone outside the religion could quite obviously see were bad ideas.

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Related

Don't know why I never realized this about Old Testament prophets

Faith, Fruit, and "Do you actually believe your religion?"

"The Kingdom of Children" (a book about child liberation theology)

Being Right vs Doing Good

So. Demons.

Katy Perry's God-Given Freedom

The Rich Man and Lazarus (and Atheism)

Artwork showing the rich man enjoying a feast in his home, with Lazarus outside his door. Image source. 

In Luke 16:19-31, Jesus tells this parable:

“There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.

“The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’

“But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’

“He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’

“Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’

“‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’

“He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”

Reading this parable now, I'm astounded at how the meaning of it is so completely different from how I understood it when I was evangelical.

Here's how I interpret this story now: Jesus introduces us to 2 characters, a rich man and a very poor man. The poor man, Lazarus, begs outside of the rich man's house, for years, but the rich man does not do anything to help him. In the afterlife, Lazarus goes to heaven and the rich man goes to hell- Lazarus goes to heaven because he suffered so much on earth, so he deserves to have a better life, and the rich man goes to hell because he had a good life on earth but didn't help the poor. Jesus doesn't directly state that these are the reasons they went to heaven/hell; it's treated like it's just obvious. Also, these reasons are emphasized by what Abraham tells the rich man- that in his earthly life, the rich man had good things, while Lazarus suffered.

Now that the rich man understands how serious it is that rich people need to help poor people, otherwise they will go to hell and be in agony forever, he asks Abraham to send Lazarus to go and warn his brothers about this. But Abraham says, no, they should already know, because they have access to the teachings of Moses and the prophets. The rich man knows that his brothers won't take Moses and the prophets seriously, because he didn't either during his life, but surely if someone comes back from the dead, that will convince them.

And Abraham says, no, "If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead."

The main point of this story is our obligation to help others. And also, that someday there will be justice- God will help people who suffered on earth, and send rich people to hell for not doing anything to help.

The secondary point is, rich people should know this. They have the teachings of Moses and the prophets, or other religions, or moral philosophies. Of course they are able to realize that they have a moral obligation to help others. But they don't want to. They will make excuses. The rich man in the story says his brothers will definitely believe if they see someone come back from the dead, but Abraham tells him, no, they'll still make excuses.

You shouldn't need a miracle, or a religion, or anything like that. It's obvious that people who have enough money for their own life should give to help others. And if you don't accept that basic obvious fact of morality, then even if you did see a miracle, you would still come up with reasons to ignore the people in need around you.

Just reading the parable by itself, without bringing in any of one's own beliefs about heaven and hell, it seems pretty clear that this is what it's saying. If you are rich, you need to use your money to help others, otherwise you will go to hell.

But of course, for evangelicals, Jesus can't possibly be saying that.

Evangelicals "know" the criteria for getting into heaven or hell: It's not about what you do, it's only about your faith in Jesus. If you believe in Jesus, and you "prayed the prayer" to commit your life to him, you will go to heaven. If you didn't do that, then by default you go to hell, because everyone is a sinner and deserves to go to hell. 

Evangelicals strongly disagree with the idea that people go to heaven just because they had a bad life and God feels bad for them. No! God has actual standards! You have to have the correct faith; God's not going to let you in just because They feel bad for you. And as for the rich man going to hell because he didn't help Lazarus- evangelicals would say, there totally are rich people that go to heaven, don't worry if you're a rich person- but maybe it's a little more difficult for rich people because they tend to rely on their money rather than realizing they need Jesus. And of course God *wants* you to use your money to help others, so if you *truly* believe in Jesus (at the level required to go to heaven) then you would do that, but let's be clear, going to heaven does not hinge on whether you helped others, it hinges on your faith in Jesus.

So we have this situation where evangelicals are totally sure this parable cannot mean what it obviously means. (Similar thing for the parable of the sheep and the goats.) Lazarus must have gone to heaven because he believed in Jesus- yeah that's not mentioned at all in the story, but that was definitely the actual reason, despite Abraham's words, "in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony." And the rich man went to hell because he didn't believe in Jesus- and if he had believed in Jesus, then his faith would have inspired him to help Lazarus. And when he talks about sending Lazarus to warn his brothers, he means sending Lazarus to tell them about the necessity of believing in Jesus. And the rich man says that his brothers won't believe just based on Moses and the prophets- I mean, yeah, when you're trying to convince someone of a particular religious doctrine, and your argument is "here are some ancient religious writings" this usually fails to convince them to convert to your religion. The rich man says it would convince them to give up their atheism if they saw an actual resurrection, but that's actually not true either. Atheists are really stubborn and unreasonable like that.

Wait, what? Why are we suddenly criticizing atheists...?

Yes, seriously, this is the interpretation of the parable I had when I was evangelical: There *is* enough evidence, from the bible, from "Moses and the Prophets," that people should *know* they are supposed to believe in Jesus and commit their lives to him. But when you talk to actual atheists, they tell you that's not enough evidence. They may give you examples of what kind of miracles they would have to see, that *would* count as evidence of the supernatural- but they're actually lying about that. Like Jesus says here, even if they saw someone come back from the dead, they would still not believe. So don't feel bad about how your apologetics arguments fail to convince those atheists. It's a *them* problem!

Yes, really. Evangelicals take this parable about how rich people need to help poor people, or else the rich people will go to hell, and turn it into this bizarre cheap shot at atheists. It's such a weird feeling for me, reading this now when I'm so far removed from evangelical ideology, realizing how obviously Jesus' point is that rich people need to help others (or else they will go to hell!) and somehow evangelicals managed to make it not about that at all- because evangelicals already know that the way to get into heaven is believing in Jesus- and then take this line at the end and turn it into a claim that "you know how your atheist friends say they would believe in God if you had better evidence? Well actually they're lying about that."

The rich man in hell wants to send Lazarus to tell his brothers how to avoid going to hell- and so evangelicals know that obviously means he wants Lazarus to tell them to believe in Jesus. That's how you avoid going to hell. Like we're so committed to this idea that faith in Jesus is the be-all-end-all, *the* answer for how to go to heaven, that we don't even read Jesus' actual words in front of us. (Even if we saw someone rise from the dead, we still wouldn't read Jesus' actual words in front of us.)

Try this on for size: This is a parable about rich Christians who don't use their money to help others. They should know that they're supposed to do that. They have Moses and the prophets. They have the bible. They even believe that Someone rose from the dead, and this still fails to convince them that they need to give money to help others.

How many Christians do we see right now, who are sure that Christianity is about political power and making rules to control other people, rather than helping the poor? Jesus was right. His followers believe He rose from the dead, but we still won't do what he said.

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Related

The Parable of the Living Wage

Sheep and Goats

Jesus Weighs in on "Being Right vs Doing Good"

What kind of God will judge how we treat immigrants?

White Privilege and the Rich Young Ruler

Faith, Fruit, and "Do you actually believe your religion?"

Fruit tree. Image source.

In my post The Kingdom of Children: Eschatology, I had a little parenthetical aside that said:

And, to clarify, I'm not saying being religious is better than being non-religious. There's a wide range of different ways that people map their religious beliefs [or lack thereof] onto questions of morality/purpose/how we should live our lives, and I would not say that religious people's mappings are better than non-religious people's.

In other words, we should look at the way that a religious [or atheistic] belief affects people's views on "morality/purpose/how we should live our lives", and that's how we say if the belief is good or bad. We have some sort of "common sense" feel for what good morality is, and that is the yardstick we use to measure and judge religious beliefs.

Here's the thing, though: Yes, that's how I see it now. But when I was evangelical, I would have disagreed with this. I would have said, we can't judge our religious beliefs based on the effects we observe in the real world; the whole point of religion is that we're claiming there is something bigger than the physical world. In view of this bigger spiritual "reality", our behaviors and morality are good and right, though they might appear to be harmful and wrong if you're only looking at the physical world we can see. And if you judge the religious beliefs only by their observable effects in the physical world, you're already assuming an atheistic worldview, where none of the religion's claims are true.

One could argue, if progressive Christians want to live according to the reality of the physical world, and never do anything that seems like a bad idea (but is actually a good idea if the religion's claims about the spiritual world are true), why not just go all the way and be atheists? If you never side with your religion, when assessing a concrete truth claim that people outside your religion would disagree with, which has practical effects on the choices you make in the real world, do you even believe your religion?

Trusting God, Predicting God, Controlling God

Aslan the lion and Lucy. Image source.

Recently I published Miracles and Exceptions, and here's another thing I want to say about that. 

So, in my experience in evangelical land, we very much believed that we should trust God. We are supposed to have a close "personal relationship with God", setting aside time to read the bible every day, praying about everything, etc. We are supposed to know God, and trust God.

But when you know someone really well, and you trust them, doesn't that also mean that in some cases, you can predict what they're going to do? For example, if I offer my son a choice between several things, and one of them is a picture of a big ugly bug, eww, I know he's going to pick that one. For another example, my husband and I have been together a really long time, and he does this thing where he predicts what I'm going to say. Like, if he tells me something gross that I don't want to hear about, he expects that I will say "that's nice" sarcastically. He often does my side of the conversation- like, he'll tell me something about our children's bathroom habits, and then he'll immediately say "that's nice" in a fake high voice, because he predicts that that's what I will say. And then I tell him, I guess you don't even need me, you are doing both sides of this conversation. In later iterations of this, he will also imitate that part. It's really meta.

There's sort of an element of ... playing around, sort of messing with each other and teasing each other out of love because you know each other so well. You can put them into a situation when you know they are going to react in a certain way- this is almost like controlling their behavior, isn't it?

When we're talking about people, this is really not a big deal, this is just joking around. Or, in the case of my son and his interest in weird bugs, it allows me to choose things for him (toys, books, interesting pictures I saw on the internet) and I know he will like them. This is all very good and normal in human relationships, but what would it mean in a relationship with God? 

Or, the examples I've given so far are just kind of silly joking-around things, but this kind of trust that allows you to predict someone's behavior also applies to more serious things- like knowing your partner well enough to know what they would do in an emergency, even though you haven't explicitly talked to them about it. It may even be the case that you're so certain about what you think they will do, that it then allows you to make a decision about what you should do in response, in order to help them. (For example, "if he got lost, he would have come back to this location to find me, so I need to stay here.") You predict their behavior, and rely on your prediction being correct- you can do that because you know and trust each other so well.

I'm realizing I never thought it was possible to do this kind of "predicting their behavior" with God. Why not? Well, several reasons:

It feels kind of arrogant, kind of wrong, to believe you can say what God is going to do. If it's the sort of thing where you have a role in setting up the situation, then you're *making* God do something, making Them respond in a certain way because you know Their character and Their behavior well enough. And what if your motives are that you want to prove something to yourself, or to other people- God is not willing to do parlor tricks for you to make some kind of point. (Whereas if my husband wants to "use" me like that, that's fine, we're just playing.) If your motivations contain even a trace of this kind of arrogance or desire to use God to make yourself believe something or prove a point to other people, to show off, well, God will just refuse. Or at least that's what I believed when I was evangelical. Evangelicals are all about overanalyzing our feelings and motivations and finding some small aspect which is "sinful" and therefore explains God's total refusal to answer your prayers and/or give you any evidence of his existence.

In a human relationship, you *could* view this as controlling or manipulating each other, but, come on, it's not really. You both know you're just playing. But with God, everything gets turned up to infinity, everything gets magnified, and suddenly we're calling it "arrogant" and "sinful" to expect God to play along.

But what does it even mean to "trust God", then, if we can never make concrete predictions about God's behavior? How on earth can this be a "personal relationship" if you can never actually make concrete predictions about what God will do?

One thought I had was, maybe it's like the feeling a baby has about their parents. The baby doesn't understand what's happening, they don't know what you're gong to do specifically, but they trust your character, they trust that you will make everything okay. Except, I don't think babies do trust their parents in that way. You want the baby to sleep in their own bed, and the baby cries like you've abandoned them forever. The baby isn't thinking "I don't understand what's happening, but I'm sure Mommy will make everything okay." They're thinking "I only feel safe when Mommy is holding me, this situation is intolerable, I need to cry desperately to get someone to fix it." I guess. I don't really know what they are thinking. They're very attached to their parents, but I don't necessarily think we can describe that as "trust." So I don't think this analogy is useful, for thinking about people's relationship with God.

Or, here's another type of relationship: Maybe you have an incredible amount of respect for someone you view as a leader, and you devote a lot of your time/energy/resources into following their mission- you're so dedicated that you could even say that you love them. This is how I feel about Jesus. But it's not a "personal relationship" and it's not really supposed to be a personal relationship. Yes, this kind of relation exists and can be a good thing, but it's not a "personal relationship."

Okay, let me walk us through some examples where Christians expect God to do some certain thing:

Suppose someone has some kind of problem, and they don't know how they will solve it, but they say "God will make it all work out." Like maybe you were planning to travel for a few days without your kids, and you had a babysitter lined up to watch the kids during that time, but then the babysitter had to cancel, and now you're all stressed trying to figure out what to do. In this situation, it's common to hear the advice "don't worry, just pray about it, trust God, God will work something out." So we are predicting God's behavior- that God is going to cause a solution to materialize.

And sure, usually you do come up with some way to solve the problem. I don't think this is because of God; I think it's just because generally people are able to come up with ways to solve their problems.

But my point is, Christians would view it as a positive thing to "trust God" in this case- to predict that God will make sure you find a solution to your problem. This expectation wouldn't be seen as sinful, or arrogantly trying to manipulate God, or anything like that. Well, but there's an exception: If you were so sure "God is going to work something out" that you believed you didn't have to do any work at all. Just sit there and do nothing and expect God to come solve your problems- no, that is the wrong attitude to have, that's sinful, and so God's not going to help you. *You* are supposed to do what you can to try to solve it, and God works with you on that.

Here's another example: Back when I had a "personal relationship with God," I would always feel really ... like ... emotionally intense when we sang worship songs at church. I felt like God was in my heart, like I could feel God, and I was really into that feeling. But then I went through a period of time when I didn't feel that. Participating in worship songs and not really getting any amazing feelings out of it. And I wanted to know, what's going wrong here? I expected God to give me those feelings, I relied on him for that, I assumed that he would, and then when it didn't happen, I felt like it was clearly a problem and I wanted to know how to fix it. Was the problem on my end or God's end? And I don't think that desire- to feel emotionally intense during worship songs- would be seen as sinful, or seen as arrogantly expecting God to perform tricks for me. I think it was very common for Christians to want and expect that.

But I can also see how one can overanalyze it and find ways to interpret it as something sinful. Like oh, it's not good enough that the bible says God is always with us, I need to also "feel" him, wow that's really arrogant. How dare I expect God to do this for me, as if he owes me something. Do I actually love God, or do I just love this feeling?

I can see how one could convince oneself that the problem is one's attitude, expecting God to do something, and God just will not tolerate that, and that's why God's not giving you those feelings you want.

As evangelicals say, "every sin is an infinite offense against a holy God"- so you find these very minor aspects of your thoughts and feelings, and blow them way out of proportion.

But what would it even mean, to know God, to trust God, if it doesn't mean we can expect certain behaviors out of Them? If we can't rely on Them to do specific things?

And I guess the answer is that a relationship with God is a completely different thing than a relationship between people. Okay, so, then I don't want it.

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Christians do sometimes get an idea in their head about a really specific thing they think God is going to do- like "I know that God will not let [some bad thing] happen, so I am going to structure my behavior around the assumption that [some other thing] is going to happen." And then sometimes the bad thing happens anyway. I've heard examples of this... really tragic things, like someone dying, when you've convinced yourself that it's not consistent with God's character to let them die, and so surely God won't let it happen. It's devastating not just because of the thing itself, but also because your God failed you.

And then the Christian either has a crisis of faith, or they convince themselves it was wrong for them to pin their hopes on a specific thing- they should have just "trusted God" in a vibes-based way, which doesn't really mean anything in concrete terms but I guess it's supposed to make them feel better.

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Well, let's back up... when I was evangelical and I talked about "trusting God," what did I mean by that? I meant that no matter what happens, God is going to make it okay. It's all according to God's plan. Literally any bad thing could happen, and I could reassure myself that somehow it was actually okay because it's "God's plan." So "trusting God" didn't mean feeling confident that some specific outcome would happen; it meant that there exists some "big picture" perspective where everything works out okay, and if that doesn't seem to be the case from *my* perspective, then that's because I'm focusing on the wrong things, and if I could just learn to view things from God's perspective, then I would see that actually everything is fine.

That all sounds very nice and logical when it's abstract... but then I had health problems, and felt sick all the time, and I had to leave grad school and go back to my parents' house and lay on the couch all the time. (This was around 2012 ish.) I never thought that could happen to me. I had plans for my life and everything. What did it even mean, to "trust God," if this "I can't do any work and I just have to lay on the couch all the time" is within the range of things that God can allow to happen?

The abstract idea that "literally anything could happen, and we can reassure ourselves that it's okay because God is in control"... and then something happened to me which falls under the category of "literally anything" and I found out that I *wasn't* okay with "literally anything" happening to me. I would like a better reassurance than that. If I can't even trust God to not let health problems derail my life for no reason, then the whole concept of "trusting God" is meaningless.

(That derailed my life for about a year or so but don't worry, I got better.)

This belief that "we can trust God, abstractly, but we can't trust Them to do any specific thing"... that doesn't seem to fit with the idea of having a "personal relationship with God", of "knowing" God. Are there any other situations where you know and love someone very deeply but you can never make any reliable predictions about what they will do?

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The thread that's running through this and tying this together is God's apparent policy against ever giving anyone ironclad evidence of Their existence.

Wait, God has a policy of never giving ironclad evidence of Their existence? Since when? Good question! In the bible, God doesn't seem to have any such policy. God/Jesus/prophets perform miracles openly, with no one ever saying "hey shouldn't we be, like, less obvious about these miracles? We don't want to get rid of the role of faith."

(Perhaps one example is when Thomas has not yet seen Jesus after the Resurrection, and so refuses to believe that Jesus really did come back from the dead, and then Jesus *does* appear and allow Thomas to see him, and then Thomas believes. Jesus then says, "Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed." Is Jesus saying that belief due to an obvious miracle is less than ideal, and there's something *better* about having faith when you can't be totally certain? I don't really agree with that though.)

But modern Christians, as they argue with atheists, have made up this concept where faith is very important, and God doesn't want to make it so obvious They exist, because then there wouldn't be any room left for faith. God gives us enough evidence that you can kinda read between the lines if you're really motivated to do so, and figure out God exists. But if you don't want to believe in God, well God will let you go ahead and do that.

I don't buy this. It feels like something that we just made up because the atheists have raised a very good point about how God could have made it a lot more obvious that They exist.

So anyway, now we have this situation where supposedly we "trust" God, supposedly we "have a personal relationship" with God, but we can't ever count on God doing any specific thing. Because if you expect God to do any specific thing, well, no, you shouldn't want that, you should have faith that God exists anyway- you aren't supposed to, like, expect satisfactory evidence. That's sinful, and God won't play along.

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Or maybe it's like, there has to be a sense in which God is unpredictable, uncontrollable- dangerous, even- or else They wouldn't be God. As evangelicals say, "Aslan is not a tame lion."

They're so much bigger and more powerful than we can understand. They're unknowable. We can never understand Them well enough to make any concrete predictions of things that They will do. If we could, that would diminish Them; that would shrink Them down to fit within the limits of what we can reason about and predict. They wouldn't be God.

Yeah, I feel like, that makes sense. I believe that. And therefore I don't want to have a "personal relationship" with Them. I don't feel safe, and I can't trust Them.

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I don't have a personal relationship with God now- I don't want to- and it's because of questions like this.

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Related:

The Power Dynamics of the "Personal Relationship With God" 

God and the Overton Window

Blogaround

Links not related to the antichrist:

1. California considers allowing doctors to prescribe abortion drugs anonymously (September 10) "Now, as legal attacks against telehealth providers put shield laws to the test, some states have moved to strengthen the laws by allowing providers to prescribe anonymously, reducing their risk of legal or individual harassment."

2. This. Sudoku. Is. Insane. (September 11) 1-hour-35-minute sudoku solve video. This is one of those puzzles where you have to think about number theory for a while before you can place one single digit in the grid- my favorite kind! Also it has one giant arrow that squiggles around to every square- I have never seen an arrow like this.

3. America’s "Nones" aren’t as godless as you think (September 4) "While a lot of this isn’t surprising to those of us who have followed these surveys over the years, it still shows how U.S. Nones are not a cohesive bloc of secular thinkers but rather a fragmented coalition, many of whom still cling to spiritual or supernatural ideas."

Also from Friendly Atheist: Oklahoma's meaningless "America First" teacher test is just a PragerU ad campaign (September 3) "Here’s the thing about this “test”: It doesn’t matter what you answer. You’re literally unable to fail it. If you’re wrong on a question, you’re forced to keep guessing until you pick the answer they want you to pick."

4. Edelweiss from The Sound of Music (Official HD Video) My little toddler loves this song. She makes a little flower shape with her hands when she wants me to sing it. It's the sweetest thing.

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Links related to the antichrist:

1. Senior Democrat says Pentagon didn’t present conclusive evidence alleged drug smugglers killed in strike were gang members (September 12) I've posted links about this before, but here's another one. This is really serious. So the US government can just claim that anybody is a "drug smuggler" without evidence, and murder them, that's what we're doing now?

2. SCOTUS conservatives OK Trump admin's racial profiling of Latinos in low-wage jobs (September 9) "Kavanaugh’s opinion, concurring with the order granting the stay, continues like that throughout its 10 pages. It was at varying points racist, ignorant, privileged, lawless, or some combination of the four."

3. RFK Jr.'s MAHA report on children's health leaves something out: nicotine (September 14)

4. DOJ Reportedly Uses Anti-Trans Slur In Call To Disarm Trans Americans (September 9) "A Department of Justice official said they were considering “banning guns for transgenders” and used an anti-trans slur."

Also from Erin in the Morning: We Must Not Posthumously Sanitize Charlie Kirk's Hateful Life (September 12) "Quickly, political figures and pundits rushed to denounce the killing, as they should. But some went further, valorizing and lionizing a man who built his career on contempt of people he viewed as lesser."

And: Boston Children’s Fights Back For Trans Kids: Judge Quashes Trump Subpoena (September 14) "In fact, Joun found, federal officials failed to provide 'any support' at all that the information sought pertained to allegations of fraud 'as opposed to the Government’s stated goal of ending GAC.'"

What is the purpose of apologetics?

Clip art image of people having a debate. Image source.

I recently published my review of the book "The Case for a Creator". Here's the follow-up post, which asks, what is the purpose of apologetics?

First of all, let's be real here, apologetics isn't about defending Christianity in general- it's about the debate between Christianity and naturalistic atheism. I don't think I've seen any apologetics books specifically dedicated to answering claims from other religions, something along the lines of "okay suppose we assume God exists- here's why it's the Christian God instead of the Muslim God." The assumption is, if you're not a Christian, then you're an atheist.

That's a bit, uh, odd, but let's just accept this framing, and consider the effect of apologetics on people at various points along the "how confident are you about your belief in Christianity and/or atheism" spectrum:

Atheists who get into debates with Christians

The atheists who know what's what and are out there actually participating in these kinds of debates, they are quite unimpressed with apologetics. They say apologetics arguments are really weak and pretty much amount to nothing.

That's interesting, because the way apologetics sells itself, one of the main purposes is to be used in these kinds of debates. So here we see that there's a mismatch between what apologetics claims to be, and what it actually is. It sells itself as "here are some answers you can use to tell those strong outspoken atheists why they're wrong" but it very much does not work on that group.

Non-religious people who are "seeking"/ open to religion

There may be people who aren't religious, but are open to believing in a religion, and are curious and want to see what's out there. Yeah, I think apologetics can be convincing for this group. Author Lee Strobel himself seems to have been in this group (maybe he would disagree with my classifying him that way though?)- his story is that he was an atheist trying to disprove Christianity, but as he investigated and learned more, he actually became convinced that Christianity was true. 

So yes, I would say this makes sense, as a valid use of apologetics. There is evidence for Christianity- it's nowhere near as airtight as apologetics claims, but still... So it makes sense that telling people about this, if they are people who already think maybe they are interested in believing in some kind of religion, might convince them. I think this can be a good thing.

However, I think it kind of misses the point, when apologetics advocates talk about it this way. For the vast majority of people who convert to Christianity, it's not because of apologetics. Nobody is like "I became a Christian because Josephus's writings corroborate what the bible says." Nope, nobody.

Ex-Christians

Apologetics is very much NOT going to be of any use for this group. They already were Christian, they already went through the whole big struggle of doubting their faith, they likely already thought through the supposed "answers" and found them unconvincing, and eventually came to the decision to abandon the whole thing. 

And then the ex-Christian tells a Christian authority figure (parents, pastor, etc) that they no longer believe, and the Christian tries to convince them with apologetics arguments. Uh, don't do this. It's like, instead of actually listening to them, the Christian treats the ex-Christian's feelings and experiences as just annoying doubts to be argued away as fast as possible. The Christian acts like the ex-Christian needs their permission to no longer believe. The Christian buys an apologetics book and gives it to the ex-Christian. Like they're not allowed to say they're not Christian unless they read the whole book and put together a response and present it to the Christian authority figure.

Sometimes the ex-Christian then buys an atheist book and gives it to the Christian, so they can both understand each other. Then the ex-Christian reads their book and the Christian does not read theirs, but still acts like the ex-Christian has not given good enough reasons for leaving their faith.

Anyway, yeah, don't do this. This use of apologetics- as a way to try to make rules about what ex-Christians are allowed to believe or not believe, rather than listening to them- is unloving and it doesn't even "work." Don't do this.

I know that, in this kind of situation, the Christian is genuinely motivated by compassion and concern for their ex-Christian friend. They fear that if they can't convince the ex-Christian to become Christian again, the ex-Christian will go to hell. This mix of love for their friend, and fear of what their God is going to do to their friend... and how it plays out in ways that are really heartless in reality... I mean, I know that very well. I used to be evangelical.

Christians who are doubting

If you're a Christian who is having doubts about your faith, maybe you decide to read some apologetics.

In some cases, this can be reassuring. If your doubts are along the lines of "where did the bible even come from, is it just totally made up or is there some kind of evidence about its history?" Along the lines of, you fear that maybe somebody just made this stuff up for no reason, and nobody ever spent any time caring about whether it was actually true or made sense. If that's what you're concerned about, then yes, it will help you to read about the history behind various Christian beliefs. Yeah, don't worry, it's not like "nobody knows where these beliefs came from, but people at church told me they're true, so I guess they are." People have thought about these things!

But in other cases, apologetics resources act like they have good answers, but they really don't. Things like, the problem of evil- ie, why does God allow evil and suffering in the world? Or, the problem of hell- Christians teach that everyone deserves to go to hell, and the only way you can get out of it is by believing in Jesus the correct way, but doesn't that seem unfair? Yeah, if your misgivings about Christianity are about something that Christians are promoting, or that God is doing, which seems extremely unethical- apologetics resources aren't going to be any help. These resources will try to reassure you that whatever you are concerned about doesn't really matter. And that kind of reassurance will be fine for Christians who are just playing games in debates with atheists, but if you are seriously thinking about these things, taking them so seriously that it's threatening the whole foundation of your faith, well, the apologetics answers aren't going to do you any good.

For Christians who go to apologetics to try to get rid of their doubts, I think there's a lot of fear. The idea that we might be wrong about everything is just too scary- we hope that we're right and Christianity is true- we want to convince ourselves that it is. Following truth wherever it goes is very scary, if you're coming from this kind of Christian background.

For me, I don't really feel scared about that any more. I'm not so incredibly dependent on this needing to be true. If it turns out Christianity is not true, I don't think I would regret anything... "Love your neighbor as yourself" would still be the principle by which we should live our lives. Maybe the other details are more about the way the human mind sets up a narrative to make sense of the world. 

But yeah, one's feelings and one's level of fear are very much dependent on what variety of religion you follow. If you follow a religion that pushes you to do weird things that only make sense if the religion's claims are true (ya know like me when I was evangelical), well, then you'll have a lot more at stake in needing them to be true.

Christians who are confident and not doubting

Honestly, these Christians are the biggest market for apologetics books. Yeah, apologetics is talked about like its purpose is to convince people who are non-Christians or who are on the fence, but I would say it rarely "works" for those groups. The people who actually buy these books are mainly people who are already sure about their Christian beliefs. 

(At this point, my brain was like, hey I'm a Christian and not doubting and I bought "The Case for a Creator." I feel personally attacked.)

Why does this group of people buy apologetics books? Well, when I was evangelical, I read a lot of apologetics stuff because I'm just that kind of nerd. Curious about everything, wanting to know the reasons behind everything. But now I no longer think that apologetics is about that kind of honest curiosity. I *don't* think apologetics is motivated by a desire to follow truth wherever it takes us. It's more about, here are the beliefs that Christians are required to hold, let's try to come up with some arguments to convince ourselves that they're intellectually reasonable.

To a large extent, apologetics is about "we're winning, we're right and those atheists are wrong." It's about making yourself feel better about your beliefs- not about actually seeking to believe things that are true. And a lot of it is about learning some clever arguments that you can use when you meet non-Christians. Get yourself prepared, so you'll know what to say and you might be able to convince them. (I would say this also does not really "work.")

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So what does this all add up to?

I have a really negative view of apologetics now. A lot of it feels very dishonest to me. Arguments about how God did something bad, but you have to kill your conscience and convince yourself it's not actually bad. Arguments that atheists have given good responses to, long ago, but the same talking points get endlessly repeated in churches because nobody is allowed to actually listen to atheists. Arguments that completely misrepresent science/ quotes from famous evolutionary biologists/ the beliefs of people who disagree with us/ etc.

There's always that fear, that people are going to hell if we can't convince them, so whenever you talk about your faith, it has to be a sales pitch, rather than being honest.

So I want to be like "ugh this is all bad" but I can't do that, because I actually believe a bunch of these arguments. If you asked me what evidence there is for this or that Christian belief that I hold, I would probably give an answer that you could also find in an apologetics book. Because I really do think in those terms.

I think, if you believe in God, there is value in learning about the arguments that people have used, historically, to support that belief. I'm not saying they're all good arguments, lol, they are not, but it's good to at least think through them. I *have* benefitted from reading apologetics and learning about stuff like that.

You know what I really want? If we could separate these 2 ideas:

1. How are one's views on big topics about God/ morality/ science/ etc informed by one's beliefs or lack thereof
2. Trying to convince people that we're right and they're wrong

Yeah, what I want is to read something written by a Christian who has thought about how their Christian beliefs interact with other ideas or scientific facts or whatever- someone who has thought about it a lot and has developed a view that makes sense of it. And the purpose is not to convince anyone to change their religion- the purpose is just to give an example of what a consistent, thoughtful belief system might look like. 

Hey, I don't just want to read a Christian take on that. Let me read the atheist take too. Or any religion. There's a lot of value in listening to other people and learning about how people think. I don't want it to be about debating who's right and who's wrong.

If someone asked me "why are you a Christian"... sure, there are a lot of apologetics arguments that come to mind, but if you want my real honest answer, it's because I just really believe in Jesus. That's not an argument that's meant to convince anyone. It's just a fact about myself. That is the real reason though, if anyone wants to know.

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What is apologetics for? Who is apologetics for? It claims to be about "defending the faith," about giving evidence to convince people of the truth of Christianity, about debating atheists. I don't think it actually does those things effectively- and yet I can't be entirely negative on it, because I actually do agree with some of the ideas. I just hate how they're framed in this dishonest us-vs-them fashion. What I want instead is thoughtful reflection on what our faith has to say on these topics, just for the sake of thinking through one's beliefs and putting them into words. Not for the sake of persuading anyone to become Christian.

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Related:

Just reading an apologetics book and asking "why are we doing this?" 

Sure Of What We Hope For

Just reading an apologetics book and asking "why are we doing this?"

Book cover for "The Case for a Creator"

So I was at a used book sale and saw this: The Case for a Creator by Lee Strobel, and snatched it up. Because I used to be an apologetics nerd, and I used to be a creationist, and I read Strobel's books "The Case for Christ" and "The Case for Faith" when I was in high school. But then, years later, I read atheist responses to them, and realized that those books came across like "we have such solid evidence for our faith, atheists don't even know what to say", but it's not true, atheists in fact have a lot of things to say. I got really turned off of apologetics after reading atheist responses. The atheists make some good points. Good for them.

Anyway I saw this book, "The Case for a Creator," (published in 2004) and I was like "ooh a creationist book, I wonder how it will come across to me now, since I'm in such a different place than when I read Strobel's other books."

So here's my review of the book, and also some opinions about apologetics in general.

Who Cut Samson's Hair? (a post about reading the bible for what it is)

VHS cover for "Greatest Heroes and Legends: Samson and Delilah." Image source.

I've been reading the book "Text, Image, & Otherness in Children's Bibles," which is a collection of academic papers about children's bibles. I love this book so much.

In this post, I want to talk about a little section from the paper "Samson's Hair and Delilah's Despair: Reanimating Judges 16 for Children" by Caroline Vander Stichele. This paper analyzes several different video adaptations of the story of Samson and Delilah, comparing the way they portray Delilah.

If you're not familiar with the story from the bible, here's a basic summary. (The part with Delilah is in Judges 16, but Samson's story actually starts a few chapters earlier than that.) God gives Samson super-strength, but only as long as Samson never cuts his hair. Samson is an Israelite, and throughout this time period the Israelites are fighting against the Philistines. Samson falls in love with Delilah, and the Philistines convince her to ask Samson the secret of his strength, so they can defeat him. (Delilah might be a Philistine but the bible doesn't say this explicitly.) She does convince him to tell her- he says that if someone cuts his hair, he will no longer have super-strength. She gets someone to cut Samson's hair, and/or cuts it herself (we'll get to that), and the Philistines capture Samson and gouge his eyes out. Later, Samson prays to God to give him his strength back one last time, and he is able to knock down the pillars in a giant crowded temple, killing a lot of Philistines, along with himself.

I want to talk about this part in "Text, Image, & Otherness" on p 304-305:

Apart from these gaps in the story, an important ambiguity in the biblical text relates to who does the actual cutting of Samson's hair, Delilah herself or someone else. The NRSV [New Revised Standard Version of the bible] suggests that "a man" cut Samson's hair: "She let him fall asleep on her lap; and she called a man, and had him shave off the seven locks of his head" (Judg 16:19). The Hebrew text does indeed mention a man (ish), but the following verb is in the third-person singular feminine, indicating that Delilah herself is the one who does the shaving. Who the man is, however, remains unclear. According to [Robert] Boling, Delilah called a man to bring her a razor and maybe to help her in shaving Samson's head (1975, 250), while [Jack M.] Sasson suggests that Samson himself is the man in question and that Delilah calls him in order to check if he is indeed asleep (1988, 336-38; Exum 1996, 183).

That the man may be a barber is suggested by both the Septuagint A [ancient Greek translation of the bible] and the Vulgate [ancient Latin translation of the bible] translation, which identify the man as such (koureus and tonsor, respectively; Septuagint B has aner). As a result, the text has often been interpreted this way. This reading turns Delilah into more of a passive witness than an active executor of Samson's shaving. The interpretation of Delilah as witness is also reflected in numerous depictions of this scene and is also followed in the [Greatest Heroes] animation.

Wow, this is fascinating. The Hebrew text of the bible says Delilah called a man, but then the verb for cutting the hair is in a feminine form. So, what's going on here? Did Delilah cut Samson's hair? If so, who is the man she called? Did she call a man to cut Samson's hair? If so, why is the verb feminine?

[I'm curious to read more about this- googling it isn't turning up anything relevant- the English translations of the bible all seem to say Delilah called a man, and the man cut Samson's hair- with no indication that there's anything confusing about this verse.]

I always read this story from the NIV version of the bible, which says that Delilah called someone to shave Samson's hair, so I thought that was that. I didn't know there was anything unclear about the original text. I didn't know that the translator had to make a choice about how to make this make sense.

Honestly, if I had to guess, I would say that there's a lot we don't understand about ancient languages. Probably back when they were writing the bible, this grammar made sense, but the knowledge about what exactly this grammar means has been lost to time. Modern translators are doing their best, but the bible is written in ancient languages, and sometimes we really just don't know what they were trying to say.

Actually, I think it's misleading the way that I can open an English version of the bible and read sentences that are totally normal and understandable sentences. This does not reflect the reality that some things in the bible are confusing and unclear and the translators really don't know what they were trying to say.

But anyway, when I was reading the section about the question of who cut Samson's hair, I was thinking about how I would have viewed this when I was evangelical and had a "biblical inerrancy" mindset. I really believed the bible was completely true and without error- and therefore, this discussion about something in the bible that doesn't really make sense would have felt like an attack. I was used to thinking about biblical inerrancy in the context of arguing with atheists on the internet- ie, somebody posts a giant list of supposed "biblical contradictions", and then some Christian comes along and responds to every single one, to explain how it's not a contradiction. See, don't worry everyone, it totally is logically consistent to believe the bible is inerrant.

So, if you're a "the bible is inerrant" Christian, and some atheist on the internet says the bible has an error in this verse in Judges 16 where Delilah calls a man, but then the verb for cutting hair is feminine... Well I would have thought that this hypothetical internet atheist was being a bit ridiculous. Come on, this is such a small thing, nobody cares. It doesn't even count as an error. Clearly Delilah called a man to cut Samson's hair, and the verb is feminine even though it should be masculine, but that's just a minor grammar thing, you understand the meaning is that the man did it, and that's what's inerrant, regardless of this little grammar quirk. Why are you making such a big deal out of this? What do you got against the bible, that you spend your time arguing about feminine verb forms? Sounds like a you problem, hypothetical internet atheist.

In an inerrancy/apologetics mindset, you can't actually look at this for what it is. You have to see it as a potential error that we have to quickly gloss over before anyone notices.

I did so much of this "glossing over" when I was an evangelical. I read the bible every day, and I 100% believed it was inerrant, and therefore I was always subconsciously doing the work of reconciling the things in the bible that didn't exactly make sense. I wasn't able to even be aware of the possibility that something might be an error.

But wow, it's so DIFFERENT reading the bible when I don't have an emotional stake in it being inerrant. If this little detail about who cut Samson's hair is an error, well, that's fine, it doesn't affect my life, it doesn't completely invalidate everything I believe in. (Wow, on some level it's terrifying to read the bible if that's your mindset.) 

Instead of being so terrified that some atheist from the internet is going to pop up and say this is an error in the bible, we can go beyond that and ask more questions. Why did the writer of the bible write it this way? Did they think it made sense, or did they make a mistake? Or were they copying from multiple sources that didn't exactly fit together?

Maybe there's actually an interesting reason for this weird grammar in this bible verse! Maybe we can learn something from looking at it in an honest way, rather than trying to ignore it because we can't deal with the idea that something in the bible might not make sense.

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Posts about "Text, Image, & Otherness in Children's Bibles":

"Text, Image, & Otherness in Children's Bibles" (I LOVE THIS BOOK SO MUCH)
David and Jonathan's (One-Sided) Friendship
Who Cut Samson's Hair? (a post about reading the bible for what it is)
The way we write children's bibles is "an act of bad faith" 
Children's Bibles and the 2 Creation Stories
Children's Bibles and "presenting mass slaughter to children" 
Children's Bibles and "turning ambiguity into clear articulations"
Children's Bibles and the Victims of the Flood 
The Problem of Equating the Bible's God with a Real God

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Related:

The Bible and the Pixar Theory

The Bible Stories As I Read Them Were Never Actually In The Bible 

The Bible's Contradictions Matter, And It's Not a Logic Problem 

"The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind" (book review)

Modifying My Faith Because of Doubt

A house of cards falling down. Image source.

Back when I was a "good Christian", on fire for God, I was really into apologetics. Apologetics means arguing about why Christianity is true. I read lots of apologetics books which presented questions like "are there contradictions in the bible?" and "how can a loving God send people to hell?" and "what if Jesus didn't actually die on the cross, he was just pretending to be dead?" These apologetics books presented arguments for why the Christian answer to these questions was the right answer.

Initially I just read the Christian side of it, but eventually I started reading the atheist side too. (The apologetics resources don't really pay attention to any other religions- it's just Christianity vs atheism.) Instead of just reading a Christian book that said "here's what atheists say, and here's why they're wrong" I would also go to the atheist resources directly and see what I thought about their arguments. (Christians are warned against doing this, because you may be "led astray" if you directly hear what the atheists are saying, without a Christian authority figure there to immediately tell you why it's wrong. ... Yeah honestly very shady that they don't want you to listen to anyone else except approved authorities...)

And sometimes the atheist side raised some good points! The problem of evil, for example. Why doesn't God intervene in the world to stop evil and suffering? Is it because They can't? Then God is not all-powerful. Is it because They don't want to? Then God is not all-loving. Either way, this God doesn't sound that good. 

Of course, Christians have all sorts of answers to it, like God valuing free will and wanting people to have a choice to do right or wrong- but I feel like most of these arguments aren't that great.

So I recognized that there were some points where the Christian apologetics side didn't really have a good answer- but I viewed it as very all-or-nothing. I thought, I have all these other reasons to believe in Jesus, so I will continue to believe even though there are a few weak points.

Yes, very all-or-nothing. I felt my options were:

1. Christianity- specifically evangelical Christianity- and the whole package of beliefs that came with it: you have to have a personal relationship with God; you have to spend time reading the bible and praying every day- if you don't, it means you don't love God enough and you should feel bad about that; the bible is inerrant; the bible doesn't have contradictions; God created the world; all the miracles in the bible really happened; literal virgin birth; literal resurrection; evolution is not true; Jesus was fully God and fully man; every sin is an infinite offense against a holy God; everyone deserves to go to hell because we are all sinners; Jesus died as part of God's plan to pay for our sin and get us into heaven; God sees you as totally worthless and ugly because of your sin, but when you get covered by Jesus, God is able to accept you; only people who believe in Jesus get into heaven; if you are a good person but you're not a Christian then you go to hell; if you do terrible things like murder people and then repent on your deathbed, you go to heaven; also everyone secretly knows that God exists and the gospel is true but they deny it because they love to sin; everyone has a "God-shaped hole" in their heart; everyone worships something; God wants women to dress modesty; the husband has to be the "spiritual leader" in marriage; premarital sex is a sin; everyone who has sex before marriage regrets it; God is extremely interested in what everyone is doing with their genitals; masturbation is a sin; and the ideal is you shouldn't even have any physical contact at all with your spouse before marriage- that's the ideal because it's the most pure, though realistically it's not likely to actually happen; God answers prayer; if we have more faith and pray for things that are in "God's will" then God will answer those prayers; you have to sit quietly and listen to God because God really does plant thoughts in people's heads about what they're supposed to do, or you could even open the bible and point to a random verse and perhaps that will be a message from God for you; also, be ready for the possibility that God will "call" you, meaning you have to give up your whole lifestyle and your plans and change to what God tells you to do, like moving to a foreign country as a missionary; the bible is God's love letter to you; we need to always "put God first"- if you like something, that could be bad because what if you love it more than God; we need to put others' needs before our own, always sacrificing in order to help other people; it's good to "submit" instead of standing up for our own rights; suffering can be a good thing because it helps you get closer to God; God has a plan for your life; if something bad happens to you, it's fine because it's part of God's plan; God will never give you more than you can handle; God has picked 1 specific opposite-sex partner that you are supposed to marry; we need to do evangelism to get people saved; all the other religions are about people trying to earn their way to heaven, but Christianity is different because Jesus already did the work and we just have to believe; it's really not possible to have morality if you don't believe in God; the most loving thing we can do is warn people about hell; and also we need to warn gay people about their sin; being trans isn't a real thing; hate the sin, love the sinner; the reason for most of society's problems is the breakdown of the family- casual sex, divorce, acceptance of queer people, abortion, etc; everyone who gets an abortion regrets it; life begins at conception, and abortion is murder; and so Christians all need to vote Republican; if you're obeying God and other people don't like it (perhaps because you are telling them about their sin), that's a sign that you're doing the right thing, because Jesus said the world will hate us, hey it could even be "spiritual warfare" which means the devil is attacking you; Christians are persecuted in the US; the US was founded as a Christian nation and it's terrible that it's becoming more and more secular; there are lots of people who claim to be Christians but they're not real Christians, probably most Catholics are fake Christians; you have to go to church every week; people have all sorts of excuses for not going to church, but they are wrong, they should be going to church
2. Atheism

When I say "all-or-nothing", I mean that because overall, I believed the Christian side of the apologetics arguments, that meant I had to believe this whole package of quirky beliefs. That's what Christianity is, right? Perhaps I had heard of some Christians who didn't believe a few of these things, but surely they were fake Christians and we didn't need to listen to them. We know that the bible is true [citation needed], and the bible says all of these things [citation needed] and so they were all true.

It was because of Rachel Held Evans, that I learned it doesn't have to be all-or-nothing.

The things she wrote on her blog were unlike anything I had ever read. She knew how to speak evangelical, and yet, she frequently said things that good evangelicals weren't allowed to say. I was so confused; I couldn't figure out if she was a Christian or not. (Yes, she was.) She knew all the apologetics answers, but said those answers weren't good enough. She knew all the logical reasons why, for example, God needs to send all non-Christians to hell, but she also knew that her God-given conscience said that's terrible, no matter what kind of logic you can find to prop it up.

She had all the evangelical cred- she loved God, loved the bible, knew the bible so well, she was doing her best to follow Jesus. And she did NOT believe in some of those things that I thought all Christians had to believe- God sending people to hell, women not being allowed to be leaders, things like that. And yet she was still a real Christian.

That's how I learned it didn't have to be all-or-nothing.

For my whole life, I had been on the Christian side, in opposition to the atheist side. It was binary- I'm either a Christian or an atheist- and since I'm a Christian, I need to listen to the Christian leaders and find out the correct Christian view on all of these topics, and I need to believe that.

So, for example, why should I pray and ask God to do something, if God has already decided what They're going to do? Well, I couldn't answer that, but I believed in Jesus for a bunch of other reasons, so I could ignore this bit of confusion and keep believing it anyway. And keep praying to ask God for things anyway. The alternative would be to give up on Christianity entirely, right?

The other thing that happened was, in 2012 I had some health problems that totally derailed my life, for about 1 year. Before that, I had a very strong belief in the concept of "trusting God"- no matter what happens, it must be good, because it's God's plan! Even if it seems bad, you can trust that somehow it's actually good! But... my gall bladder just decided to try and ruin my life one day, for no reason- if that can happen, then what does it even mean to "trust God"? I can't trust God to not let some random health problem totally screw up my life. If I can't trust Them for that, then the whole concept of "trusting God" is pretty meaningless. (At the time, I blogged about it here and here.)

So I started to view my Christianity like this: If there's some belief I have that doesn't logically make sense, then I modify my beliefs to no longer include that bit of nonsense. Here's an example: Because of the problem of evil, I don't believe God intervenes in our lives, and I don't pray to ask God to do things. Because no, it doesn't make sense that there's a God who is always working in the little personal details of my life, and also allows suffering to happen on a large scale in this world. It doesn't make sense to attribute my success to God, when part of it was because of white privilege, and people with black-sounding names get called for job interviews less- maybe God should be working on that problem, instead of helping me. It doesn't make sense to believe I can pray and God will respond by helping me, when there are many people in this world in worse situations than me, and God hasn't stopped them from getting into those situations. It doesn't even make sense to postulate that the reason bad things happen to other people is that they don't pray- what a horrific God that would be, choosing to let bad things happen to people who don't have the correct beliefs and/or don't pray correctly.

So whereas before, my perspective was "I don't have a good answer for the problem of evil, but I do have other reasons for believing in Christianity, so just plow ahead and try to ignore the problem of evil," now I see it as "I don't have a good answer for the problem of evil, so I let that inform my Christianity, and I discard common Christian beliefs which are inconsistent with an honest awareness of the problem of evil."

I don't really believe in "I believe, help my unbelief"- the idea that faith and doubt kinda coexist in a person, and the overall belief system is totally true, so you *should* have 100% faith and 0% doubt, but we are flawed human beings and have doubts anyway, and that's okay, we don't have to be perfect, we just do our best to keep pushing ahead in the "faith" part and try to ignore the "doubt" part. No, I don't see it that way. Maybe you have some beliefs that are not actually true, and doubt is a useful indicator that you should examine them and maybe change them.

Doubt is not something to fight against. If you have "doubt", ie, you realize you believe something that doesn't really make sense, then you can consider what would happen to your overall belief system if you changed that one specific belief to something more logical. It doesn't have to be all-or-nothing. (Or, maybe you have some beliefs that you don't really have a good reason for, but you're okay with that. I do... That's fine, but you have to know you're not going to win any arguments with those.)

And some Christians will disagree with me, saying that this path basically leads to atheism. Someone starts out evangelical, and then they change it, one little belief at a time, and then eventually they become an atheist. Uh, okay, this argument is kinda lost on me, because I don't think there's anything wrong with being an atheist. But if that's your concern, then let me tell you, the house-of-cards religion where one weird little belief is overturned, and then the ENTIRE THING falls- that kind of ideology makes more atheists than what I'm advocating here.

Believe in something that you can actually believe. Not something that people say you need to believe, as part of a whole ideology. Doubt is not an attack; doubt is an indication that you should think about the reasons for your beliefs, and maybe change to something that makes more sense.

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The Slacktivist has a very good post on this: Hold on to the good 

Siggy has a post which makes some similar points: Christian Doubt

Related:

She was the first (Thank you, Rachel) 

On believing that "prayer works" 

Gotta Love That Full-Blown Atheism 

Taking My Kid To Church: "The Belief That Baffled the Best of the Buddhists"