Faith versus Merit

If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can’t be taken on its own merits.

-Dan Barker, Losing Faith in Faith: From Preacher to Atheist

Something about this quote made me want to post it on my own blog (I found it on heissailing’s blog).

This is the basic difference between religious believers and non-believers. A religious person can’t prove their feelings, their spiritual experiences, their communion with their god. They can’t prove the existence of their god other than their own experiences. They can’t prove the sacred, holy writings they believe in are true. They just know it. They have faith that it is true. They believe because they choose to believe. They take that leap of faith and exclude the reasonable for something more.

I had a conversation with a long-time acquaintance the other night. We were talking about how our beliefs or in my case my non-beliefs and how they had changed over the years. She still believes in God/Jesus/Christianity but has a hard time with church and religion, legalism and the law. What she said to me was something I have often heard - the reason she still believes is because of some spiritual experiences she had as a teenager. She keeps her faith because of those experiences. Those experiences meant enough to her that she can forgive the downfalls of the church, religion, Christians, and the Bible and make the leap of faith that all is okay because God is who he is.

Do I fault her for that? No. I admire her. She is at least thinking about where she is and what she believes. She is not afraid to give up some things and retain what she feels is important.

For me, the scales of reason tipped so far that I can no longer make that leap of faith. I no longer need “hopping and leaping and praising God” to get me through my day or my beliefs. To me it feels more honest this way - admitting that if it takes faith to believe it, it probably isn’t worth believing.


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2 Responses to “Faith versus Merit”

  1. Ed Lynam Says:
    March 3rd, 2007 at 6:26 pm

    I’m not sure we must leap very far. If we can trust the testimony of the New Testament, great miracles were instumental in bringing about confirmation of the truth of the revelation. But, can we use the scientific methodology ascribed to naturalism to learn anything about the supernatural? One of the problems is trying to find a group of religious people who experience regular supernatural events that can be and actually are, studied by the methods of science. And here’s what I’ve come up with:
    1. http://www.lourdes-france.org/index.php?goto_centre=ru&contexte=en&id=1342&id_rubrique=1342
    2. http://olrl.org/stories/lourdes.shtml
    3. http://www.catholic.org/featured/sheen.php?ID=1202
    4. http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_n15_v45/ai_13284503

    Note that there is a group of medical specialists who carefully examine the medical findings before and after the healings, use medical literature to review the cases, and only refer on those that pass by 2/3 vote as medically inexplicable. Thousands are rejected due to possible medical cures or spontaneous remissions. I find it amusing that the one atheist woman tried to fake them out (in Buckley’s report) and really made a fool of herself! I also liked the WW I British soldier who had been severely crippled for years, outran his attendents for several hundred yards just after his cure was pretty humorous to picture in my mind. The atheist doctor who went there after his pious wife died in order to try to refute it made a French Friar of himself (sorry, bad pun). I’ve searched the web for a decent atheist response to Lourdes, and they are all superficial and dismissive. Not very worthy of honest inquiry on their part. I find it amusing that God chose a 14 year old simple peasant girl in avante guard secular France to bring on a challenge to the forces unleashed by an over-reaction against religion, started by a bunch of proudly intellectual men. I think God really has a sense of humor. And maybe he knows we can’t leap very far.

  2. Ed Lynam Says:
    March 3rd, 2007 at 8:02 pm

    Do we really need to just blindly leap? If we can trust the NT, then plenty of miracles confirmed the authenticity of the revelation. But can we use the scientific methodology ascribed to naturalism to learn anything about the supernatural? One of the problems is trying to find a group of religious people who experience regular supernatural events that can be and actually are, studied by the methods of science. And here’s what I’ve come up with:
    1. http://www.lourdes-france.org/index.php?goto_centre=ru&contexte=en&id=1342&id_rubrique=1342
    2. http://olrl.org/stories/lourdes.shtml
    3. http://www.catholic.org/featured/sheen.php?ID=1202
    4. http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_n15_v45/ai_13284503

    Note that there is a group of medical specialists who carefully examine the medical findings before and after the healings, use medical literature to review the cases, and only refer on those that pass by 2/3 vote as medically inexplicable. Thousands are rejected due to possible medical cures or spontaneous remissions. I find it amusing that the one atheist woman tried to fake them out (in Buckley’s report) and really made a fool of herself! I also liked the WW I British soldier who had been severely crippled for years, then outran his attendents for several hundred yards just after his cure. It was pretty humorous to picture in my mind. The atheist doctor who went there after his pious wife died in order to try to refute it made a French Friar of himself (sorry, bad pun). Emil Zola made a French Liar of himself. I’ve searched the web for a decent atheist response to Lourdes, and they are all superficial and dismissive. Not very worthy of honest inquiry on their part. I find it amusing that God chose a 14 year old simple peasant girl in avante guard secular France to bring on a challenge to the forces unleashed by an over-reaction against religion, started by a bunch of proudly intellectual men. I think God really has a sense of humor. Perhaps he also doesn’t expect us to leap too far.

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