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It rarely gets as good as this. Last night, on a flight from Detroit to Ithaca, I wound up sitting next to an academic who identified himself as a sworn enemy of the Faith, and who wanted to discuss it with me! It was as if Divine Providence had seen my “Wanted: Atheists” post from a month or so ago, and obliged by sending a juicy one right to me.
He opened the conversation when he saw me taking out my copy of St. Thomas’ Disputed Questions on the Virtues and beginning to read it. “Are you a philosopher?” I introduced myself. He was also in philosophy, a Harvard PhD, currently an adjunct at Georgetown and now on his way to interview for a job at Ithaca College. Before takeoff I had already revealed that I was a convert to Catholicism, and he had explained that he was a “militant atheist.” I think it was obvious that we were both up for a debate; we circled for a little, testing each other out with a little discussion of the Catholicity of Georgetown, but then he sent us into deeper water with a comment about a former teaching job he had had at a major public university in Arkansas.
He told the story of one of his early classes there, in which he had realized a short way into the semester that he was not connecting well with the students. He did a brief class survey. Out of forty students, one would admit to believing in the theory of evolution. They all (he claimed) thought that the Bible was inerrant. All believed that marriage was an institution solely intended to unite a man and a woman, which had been instituted by God. This was when he had realized that he was not in Boston anymore. Here he paused for a moment to let me respond.
“Impressive,” I said mildly.
He went on to explain that he had dumped his intended curriculum for the semester (I’m not sure what the course was supposed to be, actually, but I think it was something about world religions) and instead focused on reading the Bible with the students, looking always for opportunities to take shots at it and undermine their religious faith as systematically as possible. “Of course I couldn’t be too overt about it,” he admitted. “But there are plenty of ways to do that. I think just reading the Bible at all is enough to make most people begin to doubt their faith. The craziness sort of speaks for itself.”
I agreed that, as Tertullian observed, all heresies come from Scripture; this is obviously why the Church claims the right to interpret it for us. But I remarked that I always find it a terrible shame when people get all worked up over problems that they themselves have identified in the Bible, without even bothering to check what has been said about these issues by great Christian minds throughout the centuries. The poor souls that he taught in Arkansas were presumably Protestants, so no doubt they were robbed of this heritage, not only by philosophy instructors intending to destroy their faith, but even by pastors and parents trying to build it up. But I went on to brightly reassure my new friend that his mission to de-Christianize the Evangelicals was being continued in his absence. My fiancé teaches at a public university in the South, and he has found that many or most of the faculty there (who of course come from the same liberal, atheist graduate programs that produce the professors in Northeastern liberal arts colleges) see it as their mission to save the beleaguered and benighted South by leaching away their unfortunate Christian prejudices.
I explained these things conversationally, but the accusation of bullying was not all that heavily veiled. He moved in by asking me whether I knew what these great Christian thinkers had said about some key, “difficult” passages, and whether he could run some of his favorite objections by me. I told him to fire ahead.
I won’t describe everything we discussed, because we wandered around a fair amount, and some of his “objections” were really much too silly to be worth repeating. For example, he thought that the Sermon on the Mount was flat and tepid and lacked the “internal coherence” proper to a great spiritual text. What can one say to such absurdity except, “millions of holy souls have seemed to think otherwise. Offhand, would you suppose that the problem is with them, or with you?”
But we did get onto one line of discussion that I thought interesting enough to mention here: the psychology of the ancient Israelites. He brought this up by referencing the “genocidal” passages in Deuteronomy. I was explaining that Christianity does not condone murder or genocide, but that it can sometimes be permissible to kill for a just cause, and that the preservation of the Israelites evidently required that the land be cleansed of infidels who would, as God himself pointed out, erode their faith in the Lord. I pointed out too that it might have been essential to the development of the faith for them to do this job themselves, learning in the process that obedience to God’s will would ensure safety (he was not just A god, but rather THE ONLY true God), and that the faith was something that had to be defended, not just verbally but also sometimes physically.
We shouldn’t forget that there was an exclusive element to the faith at this time. Of course God was the Creator of all, but the Jews were the chosen ones. That’s a confusing concept for us to get our minds around these days, and my interlocutor brought this up and contemptuously dismissed it as “racist.” I, of course, would hasten to add that we really don’t know what the possibilities were for the salvation of the Jebusites or the Amorites or any of the others; what we do know is that they were killed and not converted. Why should God play such favorites? I can’t give a fully adequate response, but it presumably has to do with the absolute singularity of Christ. The Chosen People were chosen, and were prepared from the time of Abraham, precisely because they were the people from whom the Messiah was to come. Once that light had broken onto the world, the doors were opened wide to all who would repent and believe, but before that time, the faith was like a nursery with tender shoots that might get eaten by animals, or like a small flicker of flame that could easily get blown out by the wind. It had to be protected at all costs, and nourished and nurtured in the appropriate ways.
That seems reasonable enough it itself, but the particular measures used by God to do this can sometimes seem strange to us. Why was it necessary for them to wander around forty years in the desert? To mercilessly kill women and children and all manner of people whom we’re inclined to classify as innocents? There’s no pat answer to all of this, but I think we can make a start. It’s easy to say, but hard for us to internalize, this basic fact: for the ancient Israelites, temptations against the faith came not in the form of atheism or materialism, but in the form of polytheism. The medicines needed to combat their spiritual sicknesses were thus rather different, and least in some respects, from the ones needed in our time and our country. The Israelites needed to learn (and it was very difficult for them to understand it) that their God was not just their God, but the Lord and Creator of all.
My philosopher friend pointed out to me that the psychology of the ancient Israelites was laughably unrealistic. God takes them away from the Egyptians, parts the Red Sea to let them through, brings them victory in battle, rains manna on them from Heaven, cures their sick with the lifted serpent, and all manner of other miracles. You’d think they’d be pretty darn committed after all that. But the second they run into some sort of hardship, they’re off building a golden calf or adopting the gods of the local peoples. How plausible is that?
On face it does look pretty ridiculous, but remember again the principle: the main temptation for them was polytheism. My atheist friend is sure to misunderstand the psychology of people who are in some respects quite his opposite. He would probably be quite impressed to see food appearing on the ground in the morning when he was hungry – maybe sufficiently impressed even to become a Christian. But he’s spent his whole life denying that there are supernatural forces, so the event would be much more momentous for him. The Israelites had exactly the opposite problem. They were never in much doubt that there were some kinds of supernatural powers; quite the contrary, they took them for granted. Having seen ample evidence that it’s good to have a God in your corner, is it really so strange that, in times of hardship, they would want to go on the market for a better God?
It’s an unfortunate thing that we Westerners are often inclined to shy away from the Old Testament; it seems to us rather strange and forbidding. That’s a terrible shame because, as this conversation with an atheist reminded me, the lessons taught by these Old Testament stories are very poignant. Once we let ourselves get inside the polytheistic mindset that seemed so natural to them, we find that the spiritual struggles of the Israelites are more familiar than we might have expected. Most of us have never been tempted to employ golden calf to sort out our problems… but how many are tempted to find a better church or a more lenient confessor? Or, more subtly, how often do we try to distract ourselves from guilty feelings by filling our lives up with other things (ambitions, social activities, television, or whatever)? There are certainly parallels to our own failings.
Another example of this kind of application might be seen in the story of the serpent that Moses lifted up to cure the suffering Israelites of their disease. They only needed to look at it and they would be cured; nevertheless, many refused to look, and died instead.
At first glance, it seems utterly crazy. If you’re already dying, why not try whatever solution presents itself? What have you got to lose? But this thought betrays a misunderstanding of the struggle that they were enduring. We might be inclined to be skeptical that a disease could ever be cured by something so simple as looking at a staff. We’re inclined to project that same skepticism on the reluctant Israelites, but this probably isn’t accurate. The Israelites probably had no difficulty believing in the possibility of miraculous cures. But they were being punished. On one level they no doubt knew that they were themselves responsible for their suffering. To accept mercy from the one who has inflicted pain on you, particularly when the pain was administered as a rebuke, is deeply humiliating. The Israelites who refused to look at the serpent are not very different from people who refuse to go to Confession, even on their deathbed, because they harbor bitter feelings against the Church. Perhaps they believe that God will not forgive them, or perhaps they just aren’t sure they want to be forgiven, with the humiliation that such forgiveness always entails. In any case, this is a spiritual condition that we can readily recognize. And of course, it’s no accident that, as the Gospels tell us, this incident with Moses and the Israelites prefigured the much greater saving power of Christ, lifted up for us on the cross at Calvary.
I love the New Testament, but so many of the figures that we find there are heroes, worthy of imitation but sometimes unlikely figures for identification. The beauty of the Old Testament is that it gives us lots of non-heroes. We see the struggles of more ordinary people, which can at times be inspiring, and at times gut-wrenchingly tragic. I’m quite grateful to my new acquaintance from the plane last night for giving me a chance to pontificate a bit on a topic that I find so interesting. I hope he was at least a bit nonplussed at meeting a fellow philosopher who could gladly discuss his “tough questions” without losing composure or suffering a crisis of faith. It may have been good for him, for a change, to pick on someone his own size instead of bullying Evangelical undergraduates.
And here’s the funniest or perhaps saddest part: he was interviewing for a job in the philosophy of religion!
St. Louis-Marie de Montfort,
Pope St. Pius X,
St. Joseph,
St. Ambrose of Milan,
St. Thomas Aquinas,
St. Francis (and St. Clare),
St. Catherine of Siena,
St. Alphonsus Ligouri,
St. John Chrysostom,
This post brought a thought that considers atheism- though it would have seemed more precise to have been polytheism, but this is what struck me, nonetheless.
Atheism is irrational.
Let’s use the greatest point of origin for all modern atheists for our logic: ethics and existentialism.
Kant (ethics) would have us act only on the things on which we were certain.
Concerning logic, Kant represents a great deal of work and schools of philosophy that would support that only facts- things which can be certain- ought to be considered in drawing conclusion of which we are certain- i.e. only certinty ought to be used in deductive reasoning (yes it is ipso facto).
Again Kierkegaard would have us consider that we must have a leap of faith, even if we doubt all things. Whether it be atheism or theism, or admittance to a continuous existence itself; reason needs a leap of faith. And, importantly, faith is a thing which is of certainty.
However, to be certain of something we must have experienced it- or we must experience those things which will occur without fail due to their existence/essence, per se.
Atheism, is the less logical choice even by these standards. At most, it is only logical one can be an agnostic.
Atheism is a leap of faith- faith which is made of certainty. Certainty is only that thing which we have experienced. But, to say that God exists, one must say that they have experienced “non-existence,” which is a logical flaw and impossibility. Logically one must merely say “I have yet to experience God.” This is agnosticism. To be an atheist means to be certain that there is not a God, but to be certain of what one has not experience is to be illogical.
Peace be with you and may God bless you.
May the Holy Mother protect you and aid and guide you.
St. Christopher be at your side.
-Christopher
One explanation of the wandering around for forty years in the wilderness that I heard from a Scripture professor is that that entire generation had to die out before the people were able to enter into the promised land. What they were about to embark upon was so radical, that a new “mindset” had to be instilled into a new generation before the people were ready to enter the promised land.
Anonymous theophile
“My philosopher friend pointed out to me that the psychology of the ancient Israelites was laughably unrealistic. God takes them away from the Egyptians, parts the Red Sea to let them through, brings them victory in battle, rains manna on them from Heaven, cures their sick with the lifted serpent, and all manner of other miracles. You’d think they’d be pretty darn committed after all that. But the second they run into some sort of hardship, they’re off building a golden calf or adopting the gods of the local peoples. How plausible is that?”
As Clara pointed out, most atheists think they are the first person in history to come up with these objections. The prophet Jeremiah noted the contradiction between the Israelites being chosen by the true God and their continual apostasy:
“The priests did not say: Where is the Lord? and they that held the law knew me not, and the pastors transgressed against me: and the prophets prophesied in Baal, and followed idols. 9 Therefore will I yet contend in judgement with you, saith the Lord, and I will plead with your children. 10 Pass over to the isles of Cethim, and see: and send into Cedar, and consider diligently: and see if there hath been done any thing like this.
11 If a nation hath changed their gods, and indeed they are not gods: but my people have changed their glory into an idol. 12 Be astonished, O ye heavens, at this, and ye gates thereof, be very desolate, saith the Lord. 13 For my people have done two evils. They have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and have digged to themselves cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.”
Eric Voegelin uses this example to illustrate his claim that faith requires a kind of spiritual stamina that many lack. Because Israel had a clear revelation of the true God, awesome and demanding, the elements of uncertainty in that revelation became more troubling. They thus turned away from the invisible God in exchange for the tangible satisfactions of idolatrous polytheism. He calls this exchanging uncertain truth for certain untruth. So it is a puzzling psychological state, but one that is identified in Scripture itself. It is a cause for meditation on the necessary tensions involved in faith, but it is not evidence of an “unrealistic psychology”.
This is what happens when you apply your own 21st century experience to that of the -5th century +/-.
Back then folks had a tendency to worship a “better” god as opposed to the one true God (hence, Commandment #1). Today society just forgets God (well sometimes) and puts money, sex, drugs, etc. as a “god”.
Correction from “Moses” article in Catholic Encyclopedia:
“Hebrew liberator, leader, lawgiver, prophet, and historian, lived in the thirteenth and early part of the twelfth century, B. C.”
That would be the -12th century!
That bit was from Fr. Corapi, btw.
I think most of the readers could tolerate him, but that is another discussion.
Two things:
On polytheism: It seems to me that the problem with the Jews in the Old Testament is that they thought God could be played like a chump. This is because their neighbors viewed their gods in this way. There is a passage in the Hindu scriptures that explicitly says that humans feed the gods and the gods in turn feed humans. It is all tied into the eternal return, the eternity of the world, and the idea that in the end God is not a personal entity and neither are human beings (think reincarnation and the Buddhist concept of nirvana). The pagan view of the cosmos is a vision of impersonal and chaotic forces that destroy and re-make themselves constantly. Just look at the classical Greek tragedies.
When God says on Mt. Sinai, “I am who am”, he is literally telling Moses that His name is none of his business. In affect, knowing a god’s name meant having power over him in the ancient world. The message of God throughout Scripture is the same: you must submit to Me and love Me unconditionally, no strings attached. That is why He is insistent in the Old Testament that He does not eat or need the sacrifices of goats and bulls. He would rather have a contrite and humble heart as a sacrifice. This is new in the ancient world, and it is new since it is the truth. God reveals Himself in a pagan world in often odd, crypto-pagan ways, but the heart of what He is saying is a seed that will blossom in the New Testament.
Incidentally, I would say that the condemnation of the scribes and Pharisees in the New Testament is in a similar vein, since they were trying to use the Law itself to play with the things of God, but that is another story….
2. We live in a world where we are used to be able to walk the streets without being assaulted and where our families are protected by well-paid, professional law enforcers. This was not the case during most of human history, and it certainly was not the case of ancient Israel. The generalized brutality that has characterized human existence is very much present in the Old Testament because it is about human beings. The fact that your atheistic professor acquaintance could critize the ancient world from his comfortable chair on an airplane is truly myopic. Why does he not criticize the brutality of the Illiad or of the Bhagavad Gita as well? Their world was not our world. To be suprised that God dealt with human beings in the only way they knew how to behave is ridiculous.
It is admirable that you formulated such an eloquent argument with a non-believer. I would have just tried to change the subject. I have a brother who is a militant atheist and I never discuss religion with him.
Clara, that was rockin! Great work! Give us some details on his responses. It sounds like this guy wants to believe, but got it backwards. He wants to see to believe instead of believe so he can see. I always find it interesting that these are the people that want to teach about religion in some manner.
Wow. Some of these responses are reminding me of another discussion on “What is faith?”….
Thanks, Hammerbrecher! I’ll admit, it isn’t that often that I get called ‘rockin”! And yes, isn’t it fascinating that someone who is presumably not completely devoid of intelligence (anyway, he has a Harvard PhD), and who claims some specialization in religious questions, would have such short-sighted criticisms? It’s fairly obvious that he is so engulfed in the claims and values of modern liberalism that he really can’t understand Christianity at all. As you say, he wants the understanding first, and then the faith… though of course, he likely decided well in advance that he would never get as far as the faith.
Pseudo-Iamblichus, I like the way you explain the attitude of the Israelites towards God. It seems quite true, that they saw God as someone who could be tricked or bested or used. We can see the contrast being drawn for us in the Genesis story (especially if compared with similar mythical creation stories of the time — skeptics always like to see these as “evidence” telling against the idea that the Bible is divinely inspired, but actually, setting the story against that backdrop only shows us more clearly the distinctiveness of the truths being conveyed.) God doesn’t form the world out of pre-existing matter; he creates it ex nihilo. And at each stage, he declares it to be good. Not chaotic and disordered, but beautiful and orderly and good.
On your point about the violence of other religious texts — I think you’re right, and we certainly agree that these stories need to be considered in the context of their time. God communicates to each in the way that he can understand. But if push came to shove, my atheist acquiantance would probably have been willing to spread the condemnation to other religions as well. He would relish it a lot less with regards to the Eastern ones (he claimed to be a great admirer of “Eastern thought.”) But people like him tend to see the history of the world as a massive story of progress, with humanity moving out of the dark ages and into the gloriousness that is modern life. It’s instinctive for people like that to patronize older thinkers, even the ones they claim to respect.
There was, by the way, one point that he brought up which I was unable to answer. He asked how the two different geneologies of Christ, as presented in Matthew and it Luke, could be reconciled. They’re quite different, and both claim to be the geneologies of St. Joseph, so it is a bit odd. I admitted that I just didn’t know what had been said about this. He was pleased for having scored a point, but also seemed kind of preturbed that I wasn’t particularly upset or concerned about it. I told him that that just wasn’t the sort of question I’d have been likely to research before, since there isn’t much in it that’s of philosophical or theological interest. He got mildly flustered, and asked whether I shouldn’t be just a little concerned (with pointed emphasis, just like that) that there was a glaring contradiction between different Gospels AND NOBODY HAD SAID A THING ABOUT IT?
At that point I just had to laugh. I assured him that someone, probably lots of people, had surely said something about it. This is what you learn when you start researching Catholicism: there’s pretty much no scriptural passage, problem, or inconsistency about which nothing has been said. And sure enough, if you look up “geneology of Christ” in Catholic Encyclopedia Online, you’ll get a whole entry explaining different ways in which the problem has been addressed.
He still seemed peeved, so I explained my attitude with reference to the theory of evolution. Suppose that you were an evolutionary biologist, and you happened to sit next to someone on a plane who pointed out to you some feature of some plant or animal somewhere for which you couldn’t think of a good evolutionary explanation. I’m not a biologist so I won’t be able to give a good example, but let’s just say the orange spots on cockatiel cheeks. Would it make sense to suddenly go into a panic: “Oh no! I didn’t even think about those cockatiel cheeks! IT’S ALL A LIE!!” Clearly that would be ridiculous; if you think you have enough good reasons for believing a theory, you’ll be prepared to accept some apparent aberrations as problems to be worked out without wanting to dump the theory entirely after every single one.
Great stuff, Clara. Thought provoking material to meditate on.