Contradiction between our life and Christ’s instruction

Tolstoy on the contradiction between our life and our Christian conscience by classes:

“The man of the so-called educated classes lives in still more glaring inconsistency and suffering. Every educated man, if he believes in anything, believes in the brotherhood of all men, or at least he has a sentiment of humanity, or else of justice, or else he believes in science. And all the while he knows that his whole life is framed on principles in direct opposition to it all, to all the principles of Christianity, humanity, justice, and science.He knows that all the habits in which he has been brought up, and which he could not give up without suffering, can only be satisfied through the exhausting, often fatal, toil of oppressed laborers, that is, through the most obvious and brutal violation of the principles of Christianity, humanity, and justice, and even of science (that is, economic science). He advocates the principles of fraternity, humanity, justice, and science, and yet he lives so that he is dependent on the oppression of the working classes, which he denounces, and his whole life is based on the advantages gained by their oppression. Moreover he is directing every effort to maintaining this state of things so flatly opposed to all his beliefs.

We are all brothers—and yet every morning a brother or a sister must empty the bedroom slops for me. We are all brothers, but every morning I must have a cigar, a sweetmeat, an ice, and such things, which my brothers and sisters have been wasting their health in manufacturing, and I enjoy these things and demand them. We are all brothers, yet I live by working in a bank, or mercantile house, or shop at making all goods dearer for my brothers. We are all brothers, but I live on a salary paid me for prosecuting, judging, and condemning the thief or the prostitute whose existence the whole tenor of my life tends to bring about, and who I know ought not to be punished but reformed. We are all brothers, but I live on the salary I gain by collecting taxes from needy laborers to be spent on the luxuries of the rich and idle. We are all brothers, but I take a stipend for preaching a false Christian religion, which I do not myself believe in, and which only serves to hinder men from understanding true Christianity. I take a stipend as priest or bishop for deceiving men in the matter of the greatest importance to them. We are all brothers, but I will not give the poor the benefit of my educational, medical, or literary labors except for money. We are all brothers, yet I take a salary for being ready to commit murder, for teaching men to murder, or making firearms, gunpowder, or fortifications.”

[Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God Is Within You: Christianity Not as a Mystic Religion but as a New Theory of Life]

Deep stuff.

Thoughts?

What would Jesus Christ tell our churches today?

Semi-fictional arguments given by today’s churches…

“We need a larger church building.  To do that, we need to take on debt…”

“God wants us to grow, grow, grow…”

“We can serve God better by being a larger church…”

“With more members, we can offer more programs…”

“It’s an unfortunate reality of today’s times that to grow, we need to take out a mortgage…”

“We can’t meet the needs of the community unless we grow…”

“More members, means more income so we can offer better opportunities…”

“People won’t come to church unless it looks like a church…”

What would Jesus Christ tell the leaders of our modern church?

Would He look at the large buildings and the debt and say, “Well done!”

OR, more likely, would He be aghast that we spend money [that isn't ours!] on things that will pass away??

IF God wants your church to grow, DON’T YOU THINK that He will provide the means for it???

How often does the Bible teach about going into debt?!   Would Jesus say it is “ok” to go into debt because you are serving Me?

OR, would He instruct us in the feeding of the hungry, and the clothing of the poor and disadvantaged.

You decide.

Conscious of my ignorance…

From: http://www.templeton.org/belief/

William D. Phillips, a Nobel Laureate in physics, is a fellow of the Joint Quantum Institute of the University of Maryland and the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

The Question: Does science make belief in God obsolete?

An Answer:

“Now that we have scientific explanations for the natural phenomena that mystified our ancestors, many scientists and non-scientists believe that we no longer need to appeal to a supernatural God for explanations of anything, thereby making God obsolete. As for people of faith, many of them believe that science, by offering such explanations, opposes their understanding that the universe is the loving and purposeful creation of God. Because science denies this fundamental belief, they conclude that science is mistaken. These very different points of view share a common conviction: that science and religion are irreconcilable enemies. They are not.

I am a physicist. I do mainstream research; I publish in peer-reviewed journals; I present my research at professional meetings; I train students and postdoctoral researchers; I try to learn from nature how nature works. In other words, I am an ordinary scientist. I am also a person of religious faith. I attend church; I sing in the gospel choir; I go to Sunday school; I pray regularly; I try to “do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with my God.” In other words, I am an ordinary person of faith. To many people, this makes me a contradiction – a serious scientist who seriously believes in God. But to many more people, I am someone just like them. While most of the media’s attention goes to the strident atheists who claim that religion is foolish superstition, and to the equally clamorous religious creationists who deny the clear evidence for cosmic and biological evolution, a majority of the people I know have no difficulty accepting scientific knowledge and holding to religious faith.

As an experimental physicist, I require hard evidence, reproducible experiments, and rigorous logic to support any scientific hypothesis. How can such a person base belief on faith? In fact there are two questions: “How can I believe in God?” and “Why do I believe in God?”

On the first question: a scientist can believe in God because such belief is not a scientific matter. Scientific statements must be “falsifiable.” That is, there must be some outcome that at least in principle could show that the statement is false. I might say, “Einstein’s theory of relativity correctly describes the behavior of visible objects in our solar system.” So far, extremely careful measurements have failed to prove that statement false, but they could (and some people have invested careers in trying to see if they will). By contrast, religious statements are not necessarily falsifiable. I might say, “God loves us and wants us to love one another.” I cannot think of anything that could prove that statement false. Some might argue that if I were more explicit about what I mean by God and the other concepts in my statement, it would become falsifiable. But such an argument misses the point. It is an attempt to turn a religious statement into a scientific one. There is no requirement that every statement be a scientific statement. Nor are non-scientific statements worthless or irrational simply because they are not scientific. “She sings beautifully.” “He is a good man.” “I love you.” These are all non-scientific statements that can be of great value. Science is not the only useful way of looking at life.

What about the second question: why do I believe in God? As a physicist, I look at nature from a particular perspective. I see an orderly, beautiful universe in which nearly all physical phenomena can be understood from a few simple mathematical equations. I see a universe that, had it been constructed slightly differently, would never have given birth to stars and planets, let alone bacteria and people. And there is no good scientific reason for why the universe should not have been different. Many good scientists have concluded from these observations that an intelligent God must have chosen to create the universe with such beautiful, simple, and life-giving properties. Many other equally good scientists are nevertheless atheists. Both conclusions are positions of faith. Recently, the philosopher and long-time atheist Anthony Flew changed his mind and decided that, based on such evidence, he should believe in God. I find these arguments suggestive and supportive of belief in God, but not conclusive. I believe in God because I can feel God’s presence in my life, because I can see the evidence of God’s goodness in the world, because I believe in Love and because I believe that God is Love.

Does this belief make me a better person or a better physicist than others? Hardly. I know plenty of atheists who are both better people and better scientists than I. I do think that this belief makes me better than I would be if I did not believe. Am I free of doubts about God? Hardly. Questions about the presence of evil in the world, the suffering of innocent children, the variety of religious thought, and other imponderables often leave me wondering if I have it right, and always leave me conscious of my ignorance. Nevertheless, I do believe, more because of science than in spite of it, but ultimately just because I believe. As the author of Hebrews put it: “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

God is not a scientific problem

From Abraham Joshua Heschel “God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism” pages 101-102

Not a Scientific Problem

What are the grounds for our certainty of the realness of God?  It is clear that we cannot submit religion to scientific logic.  Science is not the only way to truth, and its methods do not represent all of human thinking.  Indeed, they are out of place in that dimension of human existence in which God is a burning issue.

God is not a scientific problem, and scientific methods are not capable of solving it.  The reason why scientific methods are often thought to be capable of solving it is the success of their application in positive sciences.  The fallacy involved in this analogy is that of treating God as if He were a phenomenon within the order of nature.  The truth, however, is that the problem of God is not only related to phenomena within nature but to nature itself; not only to concepts within thinking but to thinking itself.  It is a problem that refers to what surpasses nature, to what lies beyond all things and all concepts.

The moment we utter the name of God we leave the level of scientific thinking and enter the realm of the ineffable.  Such a step is one which we cannot take scientifically, since it transcends the boundaries of all that is given.  It is in spite of all warnings that man has never ceased to be stirred by ultimate questions.  Science cannot silence him [man], because scientific terms are meaningless to the spirit that raises these questions, meaningless to the concern for a truth greater than the world that science is engaged in exploring.

God is not the only problem which is inaccessible to science.  The problem of the origin of reality remains immune to it.  There are aspects of given reality which are congruous with the categories of scientific logic, while there are aspects of reality which are inaccessible to this logic.  Even some aspects and concepts of our own thinking are impregnable to analysis.

Very, very well put.

God Bless.

Chris

Is Atheism a Belief System?

Definitions:

belief: noun

- the feeling of being certain that something exists or is true. 
source: Cambridge Dictionary of American English

- a state or habit of mind in which trust or confidence is placed in some person or thing
- something believed  ; especially : a tenet or body of tenets held by a group
- conviction of the truth of some statement or the reality of some being or phenomenon especially when based on examination of evidence
Source: Merriam-Webster Online

believe: verb

- to think that something is true or correct
source: Cambridge Dictionary of American English

intransitive verb 1 a: to have a firm religious faith b: to accept as true, genuine, or real 2: to have a firm conviction as to the goodness, efficacy, or ability of something 3: to hold an opinion : think

transitive verb1 a: to consider to be true or honest b: to accept the word or evidence of 2: to hold as an opinion : suppose
source: Merriam-Webster Online

faith:  noun

a high degree of trust or confidence in something or someone source: Cambridge Dictionary of American English

1 a: allegiance to duty or a person : loyalty b  (1): fidelity to one’s promises  (2): sincerity of intentions
2 a  (1): belief and trust in and loyalty to God  (2): belief in the traditional doctrines of a religion b  (1): firm belief in something for which there is no proof  (2): complete trust
3: something that is believed especially with strong conviction  ; especially : a system of religious beliefs
source: Merriam-Webster Online

Update 6/16/2009 – I realized I didn’t define “Belief System”

Belief System: noun

faith based on a series of beliefs but not formalized into a religion; also, a fixed coherent set of beliefs prevalent in a community or society source: Dictionary.Com

1. a set of beliefs, especially religious or political beliefs, that form a unified system 2. organized societal beliefs: a collection and organization of beliefs prevalent in a community or society source: Encarta

Summary of Belief/Believe/Faith:

A personal conviction of the truth/correctness of an idea, ideal, or opinion especially when based on the examination of evidence.  Groups of people are often marked by sharing the same body of beliefs [tenets].

Do Christians believe there is a God? Yes.

Do Atheists believe there is no God? Yes.

Can either prove [scientifically] that God/gods exist? No.

Are both Christianity (Religion) and Atheism belief systems?  Yes.

Arguments:

I don’t believe in god. I’m an Atheist.  It’s called ‘disbelief’.  I choose to ‘disbelieve’.

Response:

To disbelieve one thing, is to believe another.   You substitute something you can believe in for something you cannot believe in.