Spring 2014, Volume 8, Issue 2
featuring
In Defense of Miracles also inside
Does Divine Mercy Contradict Divine Justice? Debunking Galileo’s Science v. Faith Controversy Law, Craig, and Lewis on the Problem of Evil
A Letter from the Editors
I
n today’s increasingly individualistic world, Christianity is being pushed to the sidelines of serious conversation by the claim that it is nothing more than a convenience. Many no longer see Christianity’s fundamental reason for existing as the worship of a living God but as ensuring the happiness of its adherents. These people claim Christianity is only valuable because of its usefulness. Corporate worship provides community, prayer releases tension, tithing and acts of mercy increase moral capital, doctrine helps cope with sorrow, and the idea of Heaven helps soften the fear of death. This understanding of Christianity, however, raises some interesting historical questions. If Christianity is about convenience, why did early Christians remain steadfast when recanting would have saved them from death in the Colosseum? Why did German Christians choose to remain orthodox and risk deportation to concentration camps rather than profess the Nazi state religion? Why do Christians in North Korea to this day sit in prison when recanting could secure their freedom? Surely for these people Christianity is not a convenience. A convenient Christianity also raises an interesting doctrinal question, for the Bible bluntly asserts in II Timothy 3:12 that the Christian life is inconvenient. The Apostle Paul writes, “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.” Suffering and ridicule are the expectation, rather than the exception. Christianity is a difficult religion from beginning to end. It makes demands on its adherents’ time, thoughts, actions, and emotions. It calls them to a standard of action that is much beyond their comfort and that frequently runs against societal norms. Christianity is not about convenience but the salvation of souls. Paul follows his warning to Timothy by saying, “continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed,” for Scripture “is able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.” Christianity’s core is not about feeling good but about salvation through faith. The uncomfortable truth is that God does exist, that all have sinned against him, and that all therefore are in need of divine forgiveness. But, the good news is that God has extended an offer of forgiveness and salvation to all who will accept it. At the Apologia, we believe Christianity is about much more than convenience. We therefore write to remove this and other misconceptions about Christianity, responding to questions about why we believe what we do. In our writing we hope to demonstrate that Christianity offers an intelligible framework for understanding the complexities of the world. We do not claim to understand these complexities completely, but this journal is our humble attempt to articulate what we have seen to be true. We hope that you, reader, may see and understand the heart of Christianity.
Betsy Winkle Editor-in-Chief
Submissions
We welcome the submission of any article, essay, or artwork for publication in The Dartmouth Apologia. Submissions should seek to promote respectful, thoughtful discussion in the community. We will consider submissions from any member of the community but reserve the right to publish only those that align with our mission statement and quality rubric. Email: The.Dartmouth.Apologia@Dartmouth.Edu Front cover image by Natalie Shell ’15
Nathaniel Schmucker Managing Editor
Letters to the Editor
We value your opinions and encourage thoughtful submissions expressing support, dissent, or other views. We will gladly consider any letter that is consistent with our mission statement’s focus on promoting intellectual discourse in the Dartmouth community.
Spring 2014, Volume 8, Issue 2
Editor-in-Chief Betsy Winkle ’15 Managing Editor Nathaniel Schmucker ’15 Editorial Board Chris Hauser ’14 Hayden Kvamme ’14 Steffi Ostrowski ’14 Chris D’Angelo ’16 Sandy Fox ’16 Business Manager Macy Ferguson ’16 Production Manager Janice Yip ’15 Production Staff Michael Choi ’14 Lauren Gatewood ’14 Macy Ferguson ’16 Angela Seo ’17 Photography Natalie Shell ’15 Contributors Jake Casale ’17 Danielle D’Souza ’17 Sara Holston ’17 Rachel McKee ’17 Jess Tong ’17 Josh Tseng-Tham ’17 Faculty Advisory Board Gregg Fairbrothers, Tuck Richard Denton, Physics Eric Hansen, Thayer James Murphy, Government Leo Zacharski, DMS Special thanks to Council on Student Organizations The Eleazar Wheelock Society
Apologia Online
Subscription information for the journal or bi-weekly blog is available on our website at dartmouthapologia.org. Past issues of the journal are available online for archival viewing.
The opinions expressed in The Dartmouth Apologia are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the journal, its editors, or Dartmouth College. Copyright © 2014 The Dartmouth Apologia.
WHY STUDY THEOLOGY? 2 Sara Holston ’17
INTERVIEW: 6
Why Apologetics? Mr. David Skeel
CHRISTIANITY AND 9 PERSONALITY:
Looking Past Myers-Briggs Jake Casale ’17
JUSTICE AND MERCY: 16
Does Divine Mercy Contradict Divine Justice? Danielle D’Souza ’17
IN DEFENSE OF MIRACLES 19 Rachel McKee ’17
CONFLICTING 24 INTERPRETATIONS:
Debunking Galileo’s Science v. Faith Controversy Macy Ferguson ’16
HURRICANES AND 29 ANIMAL SUFFERING:
Law, Craig, and Lewis on the Problem of Evil Josh Tseng-Tham ’17
THE ART OF RECONCILIATION 34 Grappling with the Tragedy and Gravity of Suicide Jess Tong ’17
T
he Dartmouth Apologia exists to articulate Christian perspectives in the academic community.
Why Study
Theology? By Sara Holston
D
avid Hume’s Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion is structured as a debate between three different philosophers on the subjects of God, evidence for His existence, and whether or not we can ever truly comprehend his nature. The first Dialogue focuses on the question of when in the course of a student’s education he should begin to study theology.i The traditional, mystic Demea argues that this study should come at the end of one’s education because the study of theology can only be safely entrusted to those students capable of exercising mature judgment, whose minds have been enriched with the study of the other sciences. He also argues that by the end of their education, students will have been fully exposed to the limits of philosophy and man’s reason, which will prevent them from being so arrogant as to think that reason can overthrow religious beliefs.ii Philo, the skeptic, expresses the concern that by
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the end of his education the student will have already rejected the opinions of theology in favor of the other subjects to which he has been properly exposed.iii The third philosopher, Cleanthes, does not take his own position on the issue but rather tries to prove to Philo and Demea that one cannot build belief in something on skepticism. Rather than focusing on our limitations and what we cannot know, Cleanthes argues that we should do our best to know what we can, because there can be no faith without reason underlying it. Though the Dialogues were written over two hundred years ago, the question of if and when we should study theology remains relevant and largely unanswered. The study of theology is left largely to each of us to pursue on our own initiative, and therefore the question of when we should begin is also left to us. In fact, today, the definition of theology is not widely understood and the importance of studying theology at all is rarely
Portrait of David Hume by Allan Ramsay, c. 1766
discussed. We cannot begin to think about when we should study theology unless we understand what it really means, and why we should do it. So what does it really mean to study theology? The word theology is made up of two different parts, theos, meaning God, and logia, affiliated with the Greek logos, meaning word.iv Ancient cultures understood theology in this literal sense, encompassing any and all studies of, debates on, or conversations about God. Anyone who asked a question about God was engaging in theology.v In more recent times, the definition of theology in western culture has narrowed to focus on an extended, focused process of studying God and his nature. Today, the dictionary definition of theology begins with “the study of religious faith,” and extends to “a four year course of specialized religious training.”vi
Primarily, studying theology can help us to become more confident in our own beliefs, because theology, at its most basic level and however you approach it, deals with an attempt to discover whether a certain religion’s beliefs are true. For many of us, we believe what we were taught by our parents, teachers, or other authority figures when we were young. As we step out into the larger world, however, we will more frequently encounter people of different ideologies who may argue with us about what is true. If we do not fully understand the theology to which we ascribe, we will be unprepared to have these conversations with other people. But, when we do have an understanding of what different theologies teach, we will also have better reasoning for why our theology is true and evidence for why others are false. When we find ourselves in conversations with people who ascribe to different theologies, we will not be shaken in our beliefs by the arguments they bring against us, but we will be comfortable enough to engage in a dialogue without feeling that we cannot defend our beliefs. We should also study theology in order to determine for ourselves whether or not the teachings of any one religion are actually true. Religions differ greatly on the answers to questions like, “what is our purpose for being” and “what happens to us upon our death;” the decision about whether or not we should follow a religion, and, if so, which one, is one of the most crucial decisions we can make. The more we study theology and engage with others working through the doubts and questions we have, the more information we will have about the different world religions and what they teach. From this position, we are more likely to make the right decision about what is true. We cannot rely merely on the word of others; we must fully understand not only the religion itself but also how it resonates with us personally and fits into our worldview. C.S. Lewis, a twentieth century Christian
In fact, today, the definition of theology is not widely understood and the importance of studying theology at all is rarely discussed. Across time and continents the two definitions retain one common element: the study of God and his nature. Theology should be regarded as something more than simply talking about God on occasion, but it does not have to mean pursuing a degree in Theology or Religious Studies or devoting years to exclusively religious research. Engaging in theology is thus accessible for everyone, as it should be, for it is important for everyone to engage at some level in the study of theology.
philosopher and writer said, “I believe in Christianity as I believe the sun has risen, not because I see it but because by it I see everything else.”vii If a religion is true, everything about it should fit in with everything else we know, and may only just be learning, about the world around us. How can we know if this is the case, without fully understanding the teachings of that religion? An understanding of different religions is also important in a world where theological beliefs enter
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Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem, c. 2009
into the political field on a regular basis, particularly as the world becomes increasingly globalized. We cannot leave our beliefs at the door when we enter into the political arena. Many conflicts across the globe have their basis in religion. The Arab-Israeli conflict is a pivotal political current event that many consider rooted, at its most basic level, in a conflict over the rights of certain religious groups and a struggle to control Jerusalem, the holy land.viii To best understand the conflict, we must understand the beliefs of the two groups and why the groups are willing to engage in such a protracted struggle over their beliefs. We may have a rough understanding of the other parts of the conflict without knowledge of the religious parties involved, but without grasping the religious elements, we cannot comprehend the entire picture. Additionally, extremist minorities in religious groups, such as Al Qaeda or the Westboro Baptist Church can be viewed as representatives of different theologies as
when we will find ourselves in a situation where our beliefs are challenged and we have to defend them, both to other people and to our own consciences. We never know when something happening on the global political stage may have roots in religion. As students at Dartmouth College, we are not only in a position in which we are more likely to encounter both of these situations, but we are also in a place with extraordinary resources available to us. It will never be easier to engage with theology than right now, when we have classes, books, professors, and fellow students right at our fingertips. Starting now will prepare us to face these kinds of situations in the present, and also in the future when we leave Dartmouth and enter the world at large. It may seem like a daunting task, especially if your goal is to know everything. In Hume’s Dialogues, Demea repeatedly argues that humans, with our limited mental capacities, can never truly know the
It will never be easier to engage with theology than right now, when we have classes, books, professors, and fellow students right at our fingertips. a whole, yet do not accurately represent the beliefs, values, and practices that the religion champions.ix If we do not recognize that these factions stand apart from the beliefs of the groups as a whole, we risk rejecting faiths that actually teach the truth before we even have a chance to explore them. So why would we want to wait until later to embark on such an important journey? There is no better time than right now to start this exploration. If we are rejecting religions based on the opinions or perspectives of others, or even our own incomplete perspective, then now is the time to remedy it, while we have the opportunity and tools. We never know
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nature of God.x Maybe this is true. Coming to know or understand God is an eternal journey; He has perfect knowledge, we do not. But, we can hope that by continuing to strive towards perfect knowledge, we grow ever closer and the knowledge we do have begins to resemble that perfect knowledge as closely as possible. We may never know everything, but we do not need to, and the sooner we start, the further we will be able to get in our lifetime. We also notice different things as we continue to study and learn. The more time we spend engaging with any subject, the more things we see in a new light and think about differently. Over time we reach new levels of understanding and
by, each other in our own explorations of theology. Each of us has our own unique perspective to bring, new questions for us all to ask and new ideas that we can all learn from. In the words of Andrew Schuman, our first Editor-in-Chief: We endeavor to think critically, question honestly, and link arms with anyone who searches for truth and authenticity. We don’t claim always to be right or to have all the answers. This is a journal of seekers, people who desire to love God with their minds as well as their hearts and souls. The Dartmouth Apologia does not exist to proselytize but to discuss, and I warmly invite you to join us in this discussion.xi
We are all asking ourselves the same questions, but we all have unique viewpoints, experiences, and resources to bring to the table. If we hope to come closer to finding answers to our questions in our lifetimes, we will be wise to work together.
David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion and Posthumous Essays (United States of America: Hackett Publishing Company, 1998). ii. Hume, 3-4. iii. Hume, 3. iv. “Theology,” Merriam Webster Online Dictionary, 5 March 2014, <http://www.merriam-webster.com/ dictionary/theology>. v. Kelly Kapic, A Little Book for New Theologians (Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 2012) 15-6. vi. “Theology.” vii. C.S. Lewis, Weight of Glory (New York: HarperCollins, 1980) 140. viii. “International Religious Freedom Report: Israel and the Occupied Territories,” United States Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (2002). ix. Charles Kurzman. “Islamic Statements Against Terrorism” (University of North Carolina, 2012). x. Hume, 13. xi. Andrew Schuman, “Letter from the Editor,” The Dartmouth Apologia 1 (2007). i.
Jacobsburg State Park, Northampton County by Nicholas, c. 2010
notice additional things about the same material we have been studying. Starting this process earlier allows us more time to grow and to reach deeper levels of thinking and understanding. So again, why would we want to wait until later to embark on such an incredible journey? Hume’s Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion presents a possible jumping off point for the next steps in studying and thinking about theology. While the Dialogues open with the question of when the study of theology should come in the course of a student’s education, the scope of the Dialogues expands beyond this question to explore further arguments for the existence of a Creator and attempt to decide whether or not we could ever come to know, even vaguely, the nature of such a being. If you want to learn more about God, evidence for his existence is as good a place as any to start. Hume’s Dialogues were written in 1776 from a general perspective, rather than one championing the view of any particular religion. There are countless other writings throughout history, representing countless different perspectives. After looking at theology from a general perspective, we can begin exploring different religions in more depth. As the staff of the Apologia, we believe in the truth of Christianity and approach theology from a Christian perspective. But what we do and have always tried to do in the past is to study theology to gain a greater understanding of the questions we all deal with in our lives. We help, and are in turn helped
Sara Holston ’17 is from Wayne, PA. She is a prospective Neuroscience major and English minor.
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An interview with
MR. DAVID SKEEL Conducted by Nathaniel Schmucker
Mr. David Skeel is the S. Samuel Arsht Professor of Corporate Law at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of Icarus in the Boardroom (Oxford, 2005) and Debt’s Dominion: A History of Bankruptcy Law in America (Princeton, 2001), as well as numerous articles and other publications. He has been interviewed on The News Hour, Nightline, Chris Matthews’ Hardball (MSNBC), National Public Radio, and Marketplace, among others, and has been quoted in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and other newspapers and magazines. Mr. Skeel has twice received the Harvey Levin award for outstanding teaching, as selected by a vote of the graduating class, and has also received the University’s Lindback Award for distinguished teaching. In addition to bankruptcy and corporate law, Mr. Skeel also writes on sovereign debt, Christianity and law, and poetry and the law, and he is an elder at Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia. His newest book, A Tue Paradox: How Christianity Makes Sense of A Complex World (Intervarsity) is due out in September 2014.
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You have had a long history of teaching law at the University of Pennsylvania, and you have long been involved as an elder at your church. Recently, you have increased your time spent involved in Christian apologetics, especially on college campuses. What motivated this shift?
Although I began doing an increasing amount of writing about Christianity and law in 2003 or 2004, the principal motivation was two invitations from the Veritas Forum: an invitation to participate in Veritas Riff, which is designed to train young and midcareer scholars to address a more public audience, in 2010; and an invitation to participate in a Veritas Forum event on the theme, “What is Justice?” at Amherst College in 2012. The mission of the Veritas Forum is to encourage public conversations about the most important issues in life on college campuses and to ensure that Christianity is part of those conversations. I have
apologetics, so apologetics will usually take different forms. I happen to be a legal scholar in a country that values free speech. For better and worse, I love to talk, as most lawyers do. So, public apologetics seems just the right fit for me, at least at this point in my life. What are some of the benefits and challenges of oral apologetics, particularly in the format provided by the Veritas Forum? How have you responded to the challenges?
The Veritas Forums I have done have generally been structured as a conversation with another scholar who does not identify him or herself as a Christian. If the conversation works well, each of us will offer both scholarly insights and more personal comments on why we believe what we believe, and there will be an opportunity for extensive engagement with the audience. This gives students and others who attend
It can be almost magical. It can be the kind of deep and personal engagement with important issues that most of us long for. since spoken at a number of other Veritas Forums. I have repeatedly heard Christian and non-Christian students say how much they appreciate these events and that they wish there were more discussion of these issues on college campuses. In part as a result of these conversations, I became increasingly convinced that I should make apologetics a focus of my own intellectual life and that there were opportunities to bring my legal expertise to bear on apologetics issues. How did your past experiences prepare you for more focused work in apologetics?
I was not raised in a Christian home, and I did not become a Christian until my junior year of college. I still remember the questions I had about Christianity and the kinds of apologetics that I did and did not find helpful. In addition, I hope that my career as a scholar has given me insights that will prove valuable to others. I think, though, that the best preparation for apologetics for me is knowing the kind of questions that gnaw at many people, because these questions have gnawed at me. What is the purpose of apologetics and who should participate in apologetics?
I believe that all Christians are called to be apologists in one way or another. As Peter writes in Scripture, each of us should be “prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.” But, I also believe that this will mean different things for different Christians. In some Middle Eastern countries, it is dangerous to engage in public
an opportunity to see their professors share much more personally about themselves, and it is also an opportunity to see the professors address big issues in a more candid fashion than they would in an ordinary classroom. Probably the biggest challenge, though, is to have a vibrant conversation that brings out the deep differences in our perspectives, but does not simply become a debate. When a forum works well, it can be almost magical. It can be the kind of deep and personal engagement with important issues that most of us long for. This fall, you will be publishing a book, A True Paradox: How Christianity Makes Sense of A Complex World. Can you provide a brief synopsis of your book?
The complexity of the contemporary world is often seen, even by Christians, as an embarrassment for Christianity. A True Paradox proposes that this perception gets things exactly backwards. Christianity actually explains the central puzzles of our existence—such as consciousness, our experience of beauty and suffering, or our inability to create a just social order—far better than materialism or any other set of beliefs. After describing several popular recent apologetics strategies that seem to deny the complexity of the world, A True Paradox explores a series of paradoxes that each of us experience. A True Paradox argues that Christianity has a more compelling explanation of each of the paradoxes than materialism or any other religion or system of thought.
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What motivated you to write?
My friend Bill Stuntz—a brilliant criminal law scholar who died of cancer in 2011—and I had talked about writing a book like this one together, but we were not able to write it before he died. I knew I would want to revisit the project at some point. In Spring 2012, after I moderated a Veritas Forum featuring the
making and consciousness. The second strategy was to include chapters on issues that are relevant to every one of us, such as the reason for suffering and the question whether there is an afterlife. I have been very encouraged that different readers have pointed to different chapters as their favorite in the book.
Rather than assuming that most people hold loosely Christian views, or trying to demonstrate that non-Christian views have no foundation, I focus on how Christianity explains the world as we actually experience it. Oxford mathematician, John Lennox, an atheist postdoctoral fellow at Penn’s medical school contacted me. We began meeting for coffee periodically to discuss the truth of Christianity. He is remarkably well informed about Richard Dawkins and other New Atheists, as well as about current apologetics debates. After a couple of these coffees, I started thinking that perhaps I should go ahead and write the book to put on paper the answers to questions like the ones he was asking. So that is what I did. It took me about a year to figure out what the book was actually about, so I have had to do an enormous amount of rewriting. But not for a moment have I regretted writing it the way I did. What have you done to ensure that your book addresses a pertinent topic to your reader?
I have tried to make the book pertinent in several different ways. One strategy has been to try to address a wide enough range of issues so that people with very different interests will find the book relevant. One chapter talks about beauty and the arts, which may be of particular interest to those who love poetry or art; whereas another chapter talks about questions of justice; and still another talks about idea
Tenth Presbyterian Church, date unknown
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What are some of the benefits and challenges of written apologetics? How have you responded to the challenges?
Perhaps the most daunting challenge is saying anything new, given that so much great apologetics has been written already. Every time I think I have developed a new idea, I discover that C.S. Lewis wrote about it seventy years ago. What I hope is novel about the book, however, is that it has a different focus than most apologetics. Rather than assuming that most people hold loosely Christian views, or trying to demonstrate that non-Christian views have no foundation, I focus on how Christianity explains the world as we actually experience it. Remarkable features of our experience, such as the fact that seemingly arcane mathematical insights have proven essential to understanding how the universe works, make sense if the universe is a reflection of an intelligent God and we are made in his image. What is the relationship to the church of those engaged in apologetics?
One risk with apologetics is that it will take part entirely apart from the church and will leave the impression that our faith is something that involves only the individual and God. But Christianity is a community. That is why the Bible refers to the church as the body of Christ. So apologetics should always point toward the church. Similarly, I believe that the church should be involved in apologetics, rather than simply circling the wagons and leaving apologetics to others. What is most rewarding about your work in apologetics?
Probably the most rewarding aspect of my work in apologetics has been the relationships that have developed. I hope all of these friends will be persuaded by the truth of Christianity in time, but even if they are not, I cherish the friendships. I also have found the opportunities to directly combine my scholarly interests and expertise with my faith to be a great blessing.
CHRISTIANITY & PERSONALITY: looking past myers-briggs by Jake Casale
And blessed are those Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled, That they are not a pipe for Fortune’s finger To sound what stop she please.i
H
amlet is a man paralyzed by the tumult in his soul, unable to control his powerful feelings of rage, betrayal, and sadness enough to follow through on the course of revenge he has planned; he longs to be among those more balanced in spirit. The question of what this balance actually consists, however, is relevant far beyond the pages of Shakespeare’s magnum opus. Though the Bard is one of the most potent elucidators of the human condition, writers have noticed and commented on the duality of the human soul since the beginning of the Common Era, centuries before Hamlet was penned— and have continued to do so to the present day. The societal struggle to define the proper relationship between logical thought and passionate feeling within the human cognitive process is a recurring topic of discourse, one on which it seems a lasting consensus cannot be generated. Reason and emotion are often
cast as opposing players in the drama of human motivation, with one or the other emphasized as more conducive to right living. The pendulum has swung back and forth throughout history—for example, the Stoics in the Roman Empire sought to achieve inner peace through the subjugation of emotion by rationality, but writers in the Renaissance and Romantic eras fought against this classical interpretation by arguing that all of man, including his mind, is ruled by the heart. Though the dialogue continues today, it has become more subdued after the cultural rise of postmodern thought, which suggests that as long as an individual is true to his or her inner self, he or she will lead a happy and fulfilling life. Even so, why is this struggle—the subject of numerous debates, poems, and household squabbles— such a prevalent part of human history? The preoccupation arguably stems from the human capacity for
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Cognitive Reasoning by Jake Beech, c. 2013
contemplative self-reflection, which fosters a desire for self-understanding. There are two tiers of questions surrounding the self: the most basic involves foundational identity, or the ubiquitous musing, “Who am I?” The second, more complex tier involves twin components: how the self functions and why it functions that way. The avenues through which people have historically pursued self-understanding are multi-faceted, but two are particularly prevalent: personality theory and spiritual exploration. Indeed, within the Christian community of twenty-first-century America, the topic
the reason-emotion dichotomy, but the results of such an exploration are equally applicable to other sectors of personality. First, it is important to understand exactly what is meant by personality in society at large before addressing how that definition has, in turn, interacted with Christianity. Personality psychology encompasses the wide variety of theories on what exactly constitutes an individual’s interior self. Before any real treatment of personality can be given, it is crucial to note that no consensus or universal definition exists within the academic realm, although a basic assumption is common to each theory: individuals are similar in some ways, but different in others.ii Beyond this fundamental postulation, several factors can contribute to a theory; dominant patterns of behavior and decision-making, expectations and preferences, reaction to social and cognitive stimuli, and self-perception are just a few major elements that can be emphasized. Generally, a theory will account for human behavior by suggesting a framework through which these factors can be organized. There is a clear difference, however, between being a psychological theorist who devotes years to mastering and reconciling the vast body of often contradictory conjecture surrounding personality, and an individual possessing a cursory knowledge of the discipline. Within the populace, the percentage of those in the latter category far exceed those in the former, but the desire for self-understanding remains constant— not just in an esoteric sense, but also as a matter of
Humans cannot live and work with other humans without forming relationships, and relationships demand some level of personal understanding. of spiritual personality has become popular. Some of the most widely used worldwide personality tests have been incorporated into the formation of church leadership and ministry teams, and discussions abound in small groups about how God, in his divine wisdom, creates every individual uniquely and purposefully. It is thus commonly accepted that wherever an individual naturally falls on the reason-emotion continuum is where God has placed them. Yet, the theological context in which this position is placed is often problematic, as is the notion of a reason-emotion “continuum.” Improper interpretations of the position give rise to several implications that are contrary to what Christianity has to say about God’s intentions for human personality and community. The most easily accessible path to explore and challenge these implications—and in doing so, re-contextualize personality within an accurate theological framework—is through
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necessity, since society is built upon organizations that depend on collaboration and partnership. In other words, humans cannot live and work with other humans without forming relationships, and relationships demand some level of personal understanding. This helps to explain the popularity of personality tests, which lend people a seemingly well-rounded measure of insight into themselves without the time commitment and mental octane required to digest academic literature. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is particularly ubiquitous in the commercial world, as “eighty-nine companies out of the US Fortune 100 make use of it for recruitment and selection or to help employees understand themselves or their coworkers.”iii It is estimated that 2.5 million Americans take the test each year, not accounting for the various facsimiles of the test taken online.iv After completing dozens of “either-or” multiple choice questions, the test-taker
is given one of sixteen possible types that arises from the combination of where a person falls in each of the four bi-polar categories the test examines: Introvert-Extravert, Sensing- Intuitive, Thinking-Feeling, and Perceiving-Judging. For example, David Keirsey (creator of a test closely associated with Myers-Briggs) speculated based on observed behavior that Oprah Winfrey is an ENFJ, while Marie Curie was likely an INTP. Ultimately, the MBTI provides an easily graspable framework through which differences in personality can be viewed. If Person X is a thinker, he or she processes largely through reason, just as Person Y, a feeler, would tend towards emotional processing. The key phrase here is “tend towards.” At best, the test can only indicate which type of processing a person naturally favors—taking it as a unilateral definition would be an exercise in folly, as research shows that “as many as three quarters of test takers show a different personality type when tested again.”v It is hardly a secret that humans are dynamic beings who change over time; thus, the MBTI functions well as a localized diagnostic (assuming, of course, that one has the self-clarity to answer the questions in a way that corresponds with reality). The test, however, is used as far more than a localized diagnostic by most companies, organizations, psychologists, and educators. Whether it determines aptitude for a specific job or tells an elementary school-age child how he or she learns best, the results of personality tests are rarely taken with a grain of salt; instead, they are accepted as truth. In the words of Annie Murphy Paul, “For almost a hundred years [the tests have] provided a technology, a vocabulary, and a set of ideas describing who we are, and many
The Thinker by Auguste Rodin, c.1904
While many theories speculate on the avenues of construct formation, one is particularly attuned to the role of personality tests. The theory of constructive alternativism postulates that “a person’s psychological processes are channelized by the way in which he anticipates events. This is to say that human behavior is basically anticipatory rather than reactive.”vii In other words, it is too simplistic to say a person’s self is formed through the accumulated effects of thousands of exter-
The results of personality tests are rarely taken with a grain of salt; instead, they are accepted as truth. Americans have adopted these as our own. The judgments of personality tests are not always imposed; often they are welcomed. And what, some will ask, is wrong with that?”vi The simple answer is that an approximation of truth is not a substitute for truth itself. To treat it as such is to miss the bigger, more complicated picture of the human psyche. In fact, an individual’s approximation of his or her own personality—her selfperception—can be termed a psychological construct.
nal stimuli. Rather, the self is pre-eminently formed by how a person anticipates the future will take shape. Furthermore, an element of “response planning” is involved as an individual comes to understand herself by identifying her most likely future responses to potential events. Such anticipation is predicated on selfreflection. The results of personality tests can thus profoundly influence the way an individual perceives her own tendencies of response. Armed with knowledge of
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her type, she may be drawn to self-select into certain response patterns that accord with the type, driven by an evidence-founded sense of predetermined inevitability. Thus, over time, tendencies can come to be seen as certainties, and the personal construct is molded according to the MBTI type. To pursue other avenues of response would upset the construct, which could cause anxiety, fear, and even guilt.viii Person X, who under-
it can also be seen as regulated by motivation in the pursuit of goals.ix This framework suggests that “goals influence ongoing thought and emotional reactions in addition to behavior [and that] goals are accessible to conscious awareness, although there is no requirement that the goal be represented in consciousness while the person is in active pursuit of it.” Finally, in this context, goals are defined as “objectives that a person
Both reason and emotion have inherent value, and the ideal construct would incorporate both in order to fulfill the broadest possible spectrum of both needs and goals. stands herself as a thinker, assumes she will respond to all events, problems, and trials with logic. Person Y, the feeler, believes her response will be emotional. The unexamined construct has become one massive, repeated, self-fulfilling prophecy. This process of construct formation, especially through personality tests, has an array of implications for the psyche, but for the purposes of discussing Christianity’s interaction with personality theory, it is also crucial to explore how the construct affects a second sector of human psychology: motivation, the pursuit of goals, and the fulfillment of needs. While behavior can be approached as construct-regulated,
C.S. Lewis by Arthur Stron, c. 1947
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strives to attain or avoid,” which is quite a broad statement that can be applied to both long-term pursuits and day-to-day activities. Indeed, the latter category could contain events that may seem positively mundane compared to those referred to by the former; after all, the gulf between “be home on time for dinner” and “secure a seat in the House of Representatives” is wide. Nevertheless, both objectives impact the nature of the cognitive process and require a motivational impetus to complete. Moreover, as for goals, it is not necessary for needs to be consciously represented in order to be pursued—some of these needs are ever-present in the human subconscious, compelling an individual to fulfill them. Note that needs are distinct from desires; if a desire is not met, a person may not experience a certain type of pleasure or gratification, but functionally and emotionally they will be no worse off. An unfulfilled need, however, is guaranteed to impact well-being.x So there are goals and needs, both of which are centralities around which behavior is organized in order to facilitate the most effective pursuit of both. According to constructive alternativism, humans also organize behavior based on how they anticipate they will react to events. It can be assumed that the achievement of goals, as a process fixed within the temporality of human existence, consists of a series of successive events, which opens up the possibility for an integrated theory of personality that incorporates both constructive alternativism and goal-oriented behavior: personal constructs become the anticipatory methodology through which humans pursue goals and fulfill needs. This integration has distinct ramifications for the Christian faith, in which a relationship with God is both the ultimate goal and the deepest need. This is where the thinker-feeler dichotomy comes into play, for, according to the philosophy behind the MBTI and other tests, individuals are fundamentally locked into favoring one over the other. Moreover, this “favoring” implies an opposite-poled axis of trust; if a
person trusts reason, he or she will naturally have an equivalent distrust of emotion, or vice versa. Yet, this seems to be an inherently broken psychological setup, as the presence of both needs and goals in the human psyche implies the necessity of both emotion and reason in the human cognitive process. Since it is characteristic of needs that they are felt (as opposed to thought), they are closely intertwined with emotions. Indeed, some needs are primarily emotional, including the needs for security, for goodness, for beauty, and to love and be loved.xi The satisfaction of such needs is necessary for inner peace and full mental health. The definition of goals is broader, for several goals that humans pursue have no emotional attachments, but require reason and logic to carry out. More importantly, reason is a certifier; it legitimizes actions and beliefs based on objective principles, a solid foundation that filters the instability that can arise from the subjectivity of emotions. Clearly, both reason and emotion have inherent value, and the ideal construct would incorporate both in order to fulfill the broad-
Three Dancers (Blue Tutus, Red Bodices) by Edgar Degas, c. 1903
is more, society sees the two as largely incompatible at best, enemies at worst. That is not meant to be the end of the story, however. By sending his son to die for the sins of humanity, God facilitated the road to redemption for creation, beginning with his son’s own resurrection. As a result, humanity is able to live in
For the believer in God, the stakes are even higher: whether emotion or reason is the missing element, the individual is ultimately robbed of the ability to know God in His entirety. No price is more costly. est possible spectrum of both needs and goals. As Shakespeare notes, however, such a harmonious synthesis is rarely observed, so much so that the individuals that exhibit it can truly be called “blessed.” As alluded to above, because God endowed mankind with both reason and emotion, it follows that his creatures cannot truly flourish in life without both. Moreover, since Christianity holds that all truth is contained within God, it holds that it is impossible to fully know God without both emotion and reason, just as human relationships require both to function with stability. Indeed, God created earthly reality good, and his first human creations, Adam and Eve, were no exception—until their disobedience released sin upon creation.xii Thus, one of the many tragedies of the Fall is that the proper intercourse between reason and emotion no longer comes naturally to mankind—and what
relationship with God once again, and dwelling in that relationship engenders a growth and transformation of the mind and soul.xiii Thus, ideally, an individual who has entered into a restorative relationship with God commits to surrendering all aspects of his or her life— including the personal construct—to God, who begins to mold the individual, psyche and all, according to his perfect vision of who he created him or her to be. It is at this critical juncture that misconceptions about the nature of personality among the Christian community, both at an individual and collective level, can impact the realization of this redemption. As stated before, the MBTI functions well as a current, localized diagnostic of an individual’s leanings in personality, assuming she answers in a way that corresponds with reality, but treating it as both infallible and fixed often leads the individual to reduce her capacities by
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anticipating that she will respond to events in certain ways. When the test’s bipolar categories are emphasized in group settings, this same attitude can be extended to a larger scale: individuals not only restrict themselves, they also believe that whatever capacities the test prescribes for their peers are unalterable as well. This ultimately fosters a community that is defined solely by the differences of its members, which counters the formation of cohesive relationships because it does not generally promote finding common ground. When reason and emotion are cast as enemies at war, the best that can be hoped for is a reconciliation: the enemies lay down their arms and call a truce. Yet a community that is predicated on a premise of difference has already begun to move away from reconciliation, instead functioning as a collection of closed systems; individuals have no checks in place to prevent their constructs from becoming restricted to one side of the dichotomy, which in turn limits the range of goals that can be fulfilled, needs that can be met, and ultimately, truth that can be known. C.S. Lewis, in his treatise on education, Abolition of Man, noticed a manifestation of this problem occurring in contemporary school systems in the form of instructors teaching “the belief that all emotions aroused by local association are in themselves contrary to reason and contemptible […] [the instructors] have cut out of [the student’s] soul, long before he is old enough to choose, the possibility of having certain experiences which thinkers of more authority than they have held to be generous, fruitful, and humane.”xiv Despite his own commitment to knowledge and education, Lewis feared that the loss of emotion in the youth of his era would result in stunted growth of the new generation’s mental capacities for creativity and morality, and his address was directed equally at secular and religious audiences. For the believer in God, the stakes are even higher: whether emotion or reason is the missing element, the individual is ultimately robbed of the ability to know God in his entirety. No price is more costly. What did Lewis think caused this loss of emotion? Simply put, the instructors had failed to understand reason and emotion as complimentary—as different approaches to the same body of truth. The problem thus lies with how the relationship between the two is contextualized. They are not diametric opposites; instead, ideally, they work together to push an individual towards truth and the ultimate joy of life. This
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Portrait of Sarah Bernhardt as Hamlet, c. 1880
completely contradicts the messages of unavoidable tension that personality tests transmit throughout society. Yet, because these messages are so ingrained within the societal mindset, it is hard to imagine what this improved situation even looks like. Indeed, the mindset itself may, at its root, be an inescapable result of the fallen world. Though people can indeed be redeemed and transformed by a relationship with Christ, the reality of brokenness continues to pervade this existence and will do so for every individual until he or she fully enters God’s presence in heaven. This does not mean, however, that humans cannot move towards this complementary understanding of reason
and emotion while still on earth, for Christ’s work within the human soul is essential for moving that soul to final completion. Therefore, the work’s importance cannot be understated, and it is through that work that we begin—however fleetingly—to glimpse God’s
with defining themselves at present, but instead look to their Creator in eager expectation of who they will become.
An individual who has entered into a restorative relationship with God commits to surrendering all aspects of his or her life— including the personal construct—to God, who begins to mold the individual, psyche and all, according to his perfect vision of who he created him or her to be. original design for the human psyche as a tool for understanding our lives. What is one way in which Christ enacts this work? The answer lies within a Christian community in which the members are tied together through fundamental kinship: God uses a sharing of life experiences on the corporate level to engender a complimentary perspective on the individual level. It is not surprising that community is a significant restorative avenue of Christ’s work, for God created us not only to be in relationship with Him, but also with each other.xv Indeed, God intends His children to share life with each other through mutual teaching and experience, for not only does God create people purposefully, He creates them in his image—mankind reflects God’s nature, both individually and corporately. The real intention and beauty behind Christian community, thus, is the collective imaging of God that arises only when the church comes together in relationship; a dimension of God is reflected that is not seen through the individual’s own power, but instead becomes apparent when he or she is joined with his or her brothers and sisters in Christ. This sharing allows God to use people as conduits for His truth in one another’s lives by providing living, breathing demonstrations of the various way in which he can be sought. When one Christian is brought to understand how another relates to God, he or she is invited to share in that relationship, and that period of time spent dwelling with God in the presence of another leaves him or her with a new layer of kinesthetic perspective that colors behavior, mental functioning, and spiritual life. Community, thus, is used by God to enrich the lives of each member and move his children closer towards both himself and his ultimate vision for their lives. These two results of God’s transformative work are simply not the focus of the MBTI, or any other such personality tests. The information such tests provide can be useful, but according to Scripture, an individual’s identity in Christ is preeminent. Perhaps it is these individuals of whom Hamlet speaks: people who do not appear preoccupied
William Shakespeare, Hamlet, III, ii, 62-66. W.F. Chaplin and E.G. Phares, Introduction to Personality (New York: Longman, 1997) 7-8. iii. “Myers-Briggs Widely Used But Still Controversial,” 12 December 2013, <http:// www.psychometric-success.com/personality-tests/ personality-tests-popular-tests.htm>. iv. “Myers-Briggs.” v. Annie Murphy Paul, The Cult of Personality Tests: How Personality Tests Are Leading Us to Miseducate Our Children, Mismanage Our Companies, and Misunderstand Ourselves (New York: Free Press, 2005) xxi. vi. Paul, xiv-xv. vii. George Kelly, The Psychology of Personal Constructs: Clinical Diagnosis and Psychotherapy (New York: Routledge, 2003) 3. viii. Kelly, 7. ix. Robert A. Emmons, The Psychology of Ultimate Concerns: Motivation and Spirituality in Personality (New York: Guilford, 1999) 22-23. x. Clifford Williams, Existential Reasons for Belief in God: A Defense of Desires and Emotions for Faith (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2011) 27-28. xi. Williams, 21-27. xii. Genesis 1:31. xiii. Romans 2:12. xiv. C.S. Lewis, The Complete C.S. Lewis Signature Classics (New York: HarperCollins, 2002) 471. xv. Jerram Barrs, Echoes of Eden: Reflections on Christianity, Literature, and the Arts (Wheaton: Crossway, 2013) 29.
i.
ii.
Jake Casale ’17 is from Redmond, WA. He is a Neuroscience major, with minors in Theater and International Studies.
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Justice& Mercy Does Divine Mercy Contradict Divine Justice?
by Danielle D’Souza
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Problem At Hand A few years ago, I went to a debate at San Diego State between the prominent atheist Dan Barker and a Christian scholar. The topic of the debate was, “God and Suffering: How Can a Good God Allow So Much Suffering?” I found it extremely interesting, especially one argument among the many Dan Barker made—an argument that I have never forgotten. He argued against the Christian idea that God is all merciful and all just at the same time, for he held that it is impossible for complete justice and mercy to coexist because the terms “justice” and “mercy” are inherently contradictory. I approached him after the debate and posed the question, “If humans can be just and merciful, why can’t God be?” He answered, “Humans can be merciful in a moment and just in another but not at the same time. Similarly, God can be merciful in a moment and just in another. But even God, if he did exist, could not be all just and all merciful at the same time. That is inherently impossible.” I was flummoxed. I went home and thought hard about this. I still think about this problem. The idea of God being all just and all merciful is a stumbling block for a lot of people, Christians and non-Christians alike. So how is it that God can be all just and all merciful at the same time? he
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Definitions of Justice and Mercy—Dictionary, Plato, and Aristotle When discussing, debating, and using broad terms like “justice” and “mercy” it is important to know what these terms mean. Today, justice can be defined as doing what is right and mercy as doing what is kind. The Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary defines justice as, “the process or result of using laws to fairly judge and punish crimes and criminals,” and mercy as, “kind or forgiving treatment of someone who could be treated harshly.”i Justice has traditionally been defined in many different ways. In Plato’s Republic for example, Socrates explored multiple definitions of justice. Some of Plato’s philosophers think justice is paying one’s debts. One person thinks justice is giving everyone the same amount. Another thinks justice is helping one’s own, and so on. In every case, Socrates exposes these definitions as inadequate. What emerges through Socrates’ conversations is that justice is “just deserts,” that is, paying people according to their merits or giving people their due.ii Aristotle puts the same point differently. “Justice is equality, but only for equals; and justice is inequality, but only for those who are unequal.”iii In other words, he is saying that people who are equal should
The School of Athens by Raffaello Sanzio, c. 1509
be treated equally and people who are unequal should be treated unequally. It is like saying that people who play basketball well should be on the varsity team and people who do not should not be on the team. Why Is Not God Only Just—Why Merciful? If justice is giving what is due and mercy is overlooking what is due then it appears that justice and mercy really are contradictory. In addition, we have an even deeper problem. Not only does God not appear to be all just and all merciful at the same time, but one
in Islam, your good deeds have to outweigh your bad ones in order to go to Heaven. So if I were to do something very morally bad today, I would simply have to make sure that I do a few good things to outweigh that bad thing I did and then I will be okay. The Christian understanding is different. God does not reward based on people’s virtue and vice but based on the genuineness of their repentance. It is clear in Christianity that great sinners can make it to Heaven if they repent genuinely. For example, even the Apostle Paul, who was a persecutor of Christians, was able through repentance to change and be completely forgiven. He became not merely a follower of Christ but a leader and excellent, though not perfect, moral exemplar. It seems strange for God to give mercy at all but he does because that is the nature of God. Moreover, God understands the moral fragility of humans, so, he is not surprised when humans sin. Still, it seems unfair for God to give an equal dealing, in other words, mercy, both to a man who lied and also to Hitler, for example. Just as it seems unfair for God to give out an equal dealing to two people where one is an exceptionally kind person while the other does nice things for others every once in a while. One might think the reward and punishment for these people should match the amount of good and evil they bring to the world, but this is not the Christian understanding. Although treating these people the same might appear unfair because to us there seems to be a vast gap between the merits of the lying man and the merits of Hitler, perhaps as large as the gap between the person and the occasional giver, the gap is actually quite small. Both of these people, and all of us, fall so far short of the standard set. For us to see this we have to think
In many religions…God is perceived to treat people according to their virtue and vice. could also argue that he should be an all just God and not be merciful at all, let alone be all merciful. You could also say that some people are better people and kinder than others, while some are more wicked; so, it might seem natural that God should treat people according to their merits. Indeed, in many religions such as Judaism, Islam, and Hinduism, God is perceived to treat people according to their virtue and vice. In Hinduism, for example, the merits of one’s actions in this life determine in what form he or she is reincarnated in the next life. For example, those who are bad may be cockroaches, but those who are good may be a man or even a rich man. Nabeel Qureshi, an assistant to the apologist, Ravi Zacharias, visited Dartmouth in 2013 and gave a short talk. He used to be a Muslim and explained that
about the nature of God and Heaven. God is perfect, as is Heaven. Heaven is not a nice place where nice people can go. It is perfect, and in Heaven people are completely surrounded by God in their presence, so, in order to go there, a person cannot merely be nice but must be pure, unstained, and absent of all sin, which is only possible through God’s mercy and, ultimately, God’s grace. A sin is any offense against God, and a sinner is anyone who has ever sinned. Thus both the lying man and Hitler are similar in that they are sinners. And nothing they or we do could ever be enough to outweigh, undo, or take back any sin. Scripture explains it like this: “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”iv God knows this and this is why as imperfect, sinful humans we need Jesus if we have any hope of getting to Heaven.
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God As All Merciful and All Just Let us return to our original question: “How can God be all merciful and all just at the same time?” Remember, first, that mercy is the prerogative of the injured party. The injured party gets to decide whether and to what degree he will overlook the offense. Since our offense of sin is against God, he therefore gets to decide the penalty of that sin. It is within his right to decide to accept a lower penalty. The party in debt cannot pay less than what he owes if the other party does not agree, and similarly, the person who is wronged cannot extract more from the party in debt but can extract less, since that is his prerogative. Moreover, Christianity teaches that God did not merely choose to accept a lesser punishment or to exact no punishment at all, but rather than ignoring our sin, he exacted the penalty in an unexpected way.
Thus it happened that two opposite marvels took place at once: the death of all was consummated in the Lord’s body; yet, because the Word was in it, death and corruption were in the same act utterly abolished. Death there had to be, and death for all, so that the due of all might be paid. vi
In this way God remains just and merciful at the same time. Human sin requires punishment. Yet, Jesus in his death relieves us of that punishment, extending us forgiveness, or mercy. Not only that, but Jesus in his resurrection not only forgives us but invites us to be transformed. God does not merely allow Jesus to relieve us of the punishment for our sins while we go on sinning, hurting others, and ourselves, living miserable lives. Rather, God invites us to let Him change us so that instead of sinning we might be able to love Him, others, and ourselves as He has loved us. As II
In this way God remains just and merciful at the same time. Christians hold that, rather than punish us for our sins, God allowed Jesus to die for our sins. In other words, God paid the penalty for himself. He did not allow the payment to disappear as if sin never happened. Jesus came down to Earth to repay it with his own flesh and blood. So, how can Jesus in his death “pay” for somebody else? How can substitutionary atonement be allowed? On one level, the answer to this question is a mystery at the heart of the Christian faith. Nevertheless, we do have some tools to understand it. Perhaps because sin is such an offense against God, it requires a God-sized atonement and there is no other atonement that will work. For clearly our repentance without Jesus could never be enough. Yes, in theory we could stop committing a sin but we cannot take back what we have already done. There is no way to reverse the act. So, to say, as we said above, that God rewards people based on the genuineness of our repentance, should sound strange, because it is not actually the whole story. We need a God-sized remedy. It is like paying off the national debt. The debt is so huge that we need something drastically bigger than what we might initially imagine to pay it off (although I have no solutions for that one right now). The difference with sin, however, is that the debt that we owe to God is so much bigger than the national debt that all the good works in the world could not be enough to right our former wrongs. We needed Jesus to do this for us. This makes sense because Jesus did not deserve to die at all. Unlike us, Jesus never sinned, and so his death serves a greater purpose. As Isaiah 53:5 says, “He was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities.”v As fifth century theologian Athanasius says:
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Corinthians 5:21 says, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”vii What Do We Do Now? Since God is being all merciful and all just by providing a God-sized remedy for sin that we are not able to provide, we must do only what we can do—accept His payment on our behalf and be grateful and rejoice not only in being forgiven but in being given the chance to be transformed. Salvation is a gift, and the one thing God asks of us in response to that gift is to allow Jesus to be our Lord. “Justice,” Merriam-Webster’s Online Dictionary, 2 March 2014 <www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ justice>; “Mercy,” Merriam-Webster. ii. Plato, Republic, trans. G.M.A. Grube (Indiana: Hackett, 1992). iii. “Plato and Aristotle on Equality,” Conceptions of Equality, 2 March 2014 <pegasus.cc.ucf. edu/~stanlick/equality1.html>. iv. Romans 3:23 (ESV). v. Isaiah 53:5 (ESV). vi. Athanasius, On the Incarnation, trans. Sister Penelope Lawson, 6 March 2014 < www.spurgeon. org/~phil/history/ath-inc.htm#ch_4>, 20. vii. II Corinthians 5:21 (ESV). i.
Danielle D’Souza ’17 is from San Diego, CA. She is a prospective double major in Classical Studies and History.
in defense of Miracles
by Rachel McKee
O
f the almost four thousand religions around the world, none can boast more than thirty-two percent of the world’s population.i The lack of consensus does not always come from disagreement over morals or distaste for the main message of the religion. Oftentimes people reject religions because they do not believe certain claims those religions make. These claims are most often miraculous claims, and they are the heart and center of many religions. If they are true, the religion they belong to must be considered. If they are false, then the core of a religion is based on lies. Everyday usage of the term ‘miracle’ varies, so let us begin with the working definition of a miracle—an event that is an exception to the ordinary course of nature. Note that this definition excludes the use of the term ‘miracle’ in circumstances that are extraordinary but completely possible within the laws of nature. If, for example, a person were dealt a royal flush (the odds of which are 1 in 649,739), the hand would be a happy coincidence, not a miracle. A miracle would be a phenomenon such as the sun stopping in the sky or water transforming into wine. Miracles such as these can be considered impossible or possible. If they are considered possible, this does not validate all miraculous claims ever made for
any religion; the evidence for and against each individual supernatural event must be weighed. In this article, I will argue that miracles are possible, but I will not discuss which specific miracles are in fact probable. I will begin by looking at some foundational arguments against miracles. I will then reject these arguments using the defense of several apologists. Finally, I will address additional common problems with the way individuals look at miracles. In his 1748 essay, “Of Miracles,” David Hume provided the foundation for the vast majority of modern anti-miracle arguments that he claimed would “be an everlasting check to all kinds of superstitious delusion.”ii Hume’s argument was threefold. He first said, “A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature; and as firm and unalterable experience has established these laws, the proof against a miracle, from the very nature of the fact, is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined.”iii According to this statement, the proof for a miracle can never overcome the proof against it. Second, Hume discussed the tendency of miracles to occur in developing nations and in ancient times. The reason for this, according to Hume, was the difference in people’s tendency to believe miracles. People from earlier times were more prone to accept miracles without much disbelief or resistance.
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World religions by percentage, c. 2010
Finally, Hume used an analogy of testimony in court. When one testimony conflicts another, they are both invalidated. In Hume’s words:
miracles, ascribed to the particular Peter, James, and John” and that the question to consider is if miracles are:
Every miracle, therefore, pretended to have been wrought in any of these religions (and all of them abound in miracles), as its direct scope is to establish the particular system to which it is attributed; so has it the same force, though more indirectly, to overthrow every other system. In destroying a rival system, it likewise destroys the credit of those miracles, on which that system was established; so that all the prodigies of different religions are to be regarded as contrary facts, and the evidences of these prodigies, whether weak or strong, as opposite to each other.iv
unlikely supposing there is a power, external to the world, who can bring them about, supposing they are the only means by which He can reveal himself to those who need a revelation; supposing that He is likely to reveal himself, that He has a great end in doing so.vi
Hume concluded that the Christian religion is based upon miracles and cannot be believed rationally or scientifically. Antony Flew, a British philosopher of the twentieth century, praised the ideas behind Hume’s arguments but criticized its details, fine tuning it to solidify what Hume argued. He first defined miracles as anything that occurs outside the laws of nature. Flew then examined the possibility of many Christians’ claim that miracles do not have to defy natural laws. He argued that miracles that are within the natural order of things do not serve as any proof for the existence of a higher being, and so the miracles are essentially meaningless. To develop his argument, Flew quoted Cardinal Newman, an apologist whom he called “Hume’s most worthy opponent.”v Cardinal Newman challenged the application of Hume’s argument to “these particular
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Flew responded that even if God exists, we do not have the capability of grasping his intentions and it is therefore not possible to assume things about God. Before turning to various Christian apologists’ responses to these arguments, let us define ‘miracle’ in a more precise way. Richard Purtill, a professor of philosophy at Western Washington University, defines a miracle as “an event brought about by the power of God that is a temporary exception to the ordinary course of nature for the purpose of showing that God has acted in history.”vii Purtill notes that this does not create any conflict between science and religion, stating that, “Of course, by defining miracles as exceptions to the natural order of things, we deprive miracles of any scientific interest only if science is essentially concerned with what happens as part of the natural order of things…since exceptions brought about by personal agency cannot be predicted from a study of what normally happens.”viii There are several problems with Hume and Flew’s arguments, as addressed directly by acclaimed apologist Norman Geisler. First, let us consider Hume’s first argument in his own words. Geisler summarized:
1. “A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature.” 2. “Firm and unalterable experience has established these laws.” 3. “A wise man…proportions his belief to the evidence.” 4. Therefore, “the proof against a miracle… is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined.”ix The problem with this argument lies in the second premise. By saying that “unalterable experience has established these laws,” Hume begged the question by already assuming that miracles have never occurred. If they had, then the evidence against them would not be “firm and unalterable.” If Hume meant to say that most of the evidence lies against miracles, then he would have avoided this question-begging. The problem with this, however, is that it sums evidence rather than weighing evidence. Because miracles are in themselves a rare occurrence, they will always have a smaller amount of evidence, but each piece of evidence has differing value. It makes sense, then, to at least first consider the value of the evidence for miracles, and then to consider the value of the evidence against them. Contemplate this non-miraculous example quoted by Francis Beckwith:
Life magazine once reported that all 15 people scheduled to attend a rehearsal of a church choir in Beatrice Neb., were late for practice on March 1, 1950, and each had a difference reason: a car wouldn’t start, a radio program wasn’t over, ironing wasn’t finished, a conversation dragged on. It was fortunate that none arrived on schedule at 7:15 pm – the church was destroyed by an explosion at 7:25. The choir members wondered whether their mutual delays were an act of God…[It was] estimated there was a one-in-a-million chance that all 15 would be late the same evening.x
Although this (non-miraculous) circumstance has an obvious amount of odds against it, it actually occurred.
not the amount, but the weight of evidence for the testimony. The report from Life magazine was affirmed by reliable testimonies, and so even though its likelihood was slim, a reasonable person should conclude the report’s truth. Additionally, there are plenty of events the truth of which occurrences we do not challenge despite the fact that they are naturalistically unrepeatable and thus have a large summed total of evidence against them. For example, the fact that the Big Bang has never been repeated cannot and should not be used as an argument against its likelihood. It is therefore better to weigh evidence rather than add evidence, or else we would have no belief in even the origin of life being an actual event. Stephen Davis, a prominent writer on Christian philosophy, addressed Hume’s second argument that miracles occurred in places and time periods where they could not easily be proven wrong. While intuitively attractive, this idea is factually incorrect. Spirits, miracles, demons, and angels were not commonplace in history; they were always extraordinary and recounted in detail with disbelief. The way miracles were received throughout history is actually not very different than the responses to miraculous claims nowadays; they resulted in numerous writings and responses, varying from disbelief to radical life transformations.xi Hume’s third argument concluded that miraculous claims from opposing religions conflict and therefore negate each other. As said previously, if miracles are possible, this does not mean that all miracles are probable. If every miracle ever recorded for any religion were true, then these miracles would directly contradict each other because the religions in themselves contradict (and this was Hume’s point). His fault was that he assumed that if miracles were possible, all miracles become probable. In reality, when the evidence for certain miracles far outweighs others, these miracles are deemed false. Let us now return to Flew’s point that no one can guess the motivations and desires of God. David Beck, a professor of philosophy at Liberty University, con-
Miraculous claims are the heart and center of many religions. If they are true, the religion they belong to must be considered. If they are false, then the core of a religion is based on lies. By the arguments of Hume and Flew, it should be discounted because the amount of evidence against this sort of event is numerous due to its high improbability, and the evidence for it can never outnumber the evidence against. The relevant comparison, however, is
cluded that we can know a little about God using three arguments that are adequate to prove the likelihood of God acting directly in history through miracles. Oftentimes, miracles are used to argue for the existence of God. Many people have a problem with this,
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seeing miracles as impossible or not completely proven. Although Beck personally believes there is plentiful evidence behind miracles, he argued that one can arrive at God’s existence without referring to miracles. Then, assuming the existence of God, Beck argued that one can prove the possibility of miracles if this God is: 1. Powerful enough to produce events in space/time 2. An intelligence with a capacity to frame the convergence of events in space/time 3. A personality with a moral concern to act in history.xii David Beck used the cosmological argument to support premise one, the teleological argument to support premise two, and the moral argument to support premise three.xiii While a thorough explanation of these specific arguments is outside the scope of this paper, one can certainly see how the truth of the three premises allows for the possibility of miracles; a God with a moral concern to act in history who has the power and intelligence to do so is certainly capable of performing miracles, making them possible. No matter how powerfully presented the argument is for miracles, it cannot stand against a solidified worldview that denies their possibility. Every human being has a conceptual framework, which is the lens through which they see the world. This worldview can distort truth and create biases, so we must address the paradigms to see the effects they have on one’s view of miracles. “A conceptual framework is the pattern or arrangement of our concepts (ideas) that enables us to make sense of the world by organizing all that we believe.”xiv Purtill made the case that these conceptions of natural laws can change the possibility of miracles. If one assumes a theistic position, miracles are entirely
The theistic scientist has a philosophical reason for expecting laws to be discovered in nature: he thinks that such laws are the product of a mind, namely, the mind of God. The non-theistic scientist, however, can have no such assurances. For him the fact that nature functions in lawlike fashion is ultimately a ‘brute fact,’ completely unexplainable on his own views.xv
So, perhaps it is a bit more advantageous to a complete understanding of these natural laws if a higher power is assumed. Richard Taylor, a philosopher concerned with metaphysics, added to this argument by showing that if natural laws were simply “brute facts,” they could not be trusted to give factual information. He used an analogy: Suppose you are on a railway and look out the window. There are rocks on the hillside that spell out “the British Railways Welcome You to Wales.” Seeing this, you deduct two possible ways these rocks could have come to this arrangement. Either someone put them there, or the rocks randomly fell into place. If someone put them there, it is logical to suppose you are actually headed into Wales. If the rocks randomly fell into place, however, it is illogical to assume that you are actually headed into Wales; therefore you cannot extract any meaning out of them.xvi A premeditated arrangement of rocks is analogous to the theistic worldview. Because theism believes the world was created, it can deduce meaning out of this world. However, metaphysical naturalism illustrates the world coming about by chance alone, and then tries to ascertain meaning within the world. Take human senses. Is it not illogical to believe these came about by chance, but that they somehow offer valuable information that is true and reasonable? Believing this is the same as believing the rocks on the hillside were a chance event yet still offering true information.
No matter how powerfully presented the argument is for miracles, it cannot stand against a solidified worldview that denies their possibility. possible. This view contains the ideas that natural laws were set into place by a creator to order the world, and so it follows that this creator is the only one who can violate these laws. On the other hand, the metaphysical naturalist conception assures that everything exists within natural laws. This view makes miracles impossible by the very idea that nothing can violate these natural laws. While a thorough defense of theism is outside of the scope of this article, let us quickly consider some of the arguments for theism and against naturalism. Arguing for theism, Richard Purtil stated:
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Ronald Nash, a professor for over forty years of theology, apologetics, and ethics, introduced one of the fundamental problems with metaphysical naturalism. It assumes that the universe began randomly without a purpose or has always been existent because a “creation” would necessitate a higher power or something larger than or outside of the universe. Human reasoning, however, poses a problem for this conception of a self-explanatory universe. For example, we can use reasoning to deduce that “if it is true that all man are mortal and if it is true that Socrates is a man, then it must be true that Socrates is mortal.”xvii So “by
The Marriage at Cana by Gaetano Gandolfi, c. 1766
definition, metaphysical naturalism excludes the possible existence of anything beyond nature, anything outside the box. But, the process of reasoning requires something that exceeds the bounds of nature, namely, the laws of logical inference.”xviii Thus, the opposing view to theistic science has its setbacks, and so theistic science should not be so easily discarded. Theism, unlike methodological naturalism and the complementary view, can fully account for the ultimate beginning of the universe. A person’s metaphysical perspective plays an influential role in determining whether miracles are possible. A theistic worldview has many advantages over metaphysical naturalism. With the theistic mindset, miracles are possible. The arguments proposed by Hume and Flew, while well thought out and worthy of consideration, should not be blindly accepted in light of viable counterarguments. Without certain evidence against miracles, and with a valid theistic mindset, miracles are possible in our history, in our present, and in our future.
“The Global Religious Landscape,” Pew Research Centers Religion Public Life Project RSS. 2012. ii. David Hume, Of Miracles, ed. Antony Flew (La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1985) 18. iii. Hume, 36. iv. Hume, 38. v. Antony Flew, David Hume: Philosopher of Moral Science (Oxford: Blackwell, 1986) 54.
Flew, 54. R. Douglas Geivett and Gary R. Habermas, In Defense of Miracles: A Comprehensive Case for God’s Action in History (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1997) 72. viii. Geivett, 69. ix. Geivett, 75. x. Richard Blodgett, “Our Wild, Weird World of Coincidence,” Reader’s Digest 131 (1987): 127. xi. Geivett, 164. xii. Geivett, 149. xiii. Geivett, 150. xiv. Geivett, 115. xv. Geivett, 71. xvi. Richard Taylor, Metaphysics, 2d ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1974) 115. xvii. Geivett, 125. xvii. Geivett, 127. vi.
vii.
i.
Rachel McKee ’17 is from Laguna Hills, CA. She is a double major in Physics and Economics.
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Conflicting Interpretations debunking galileo’s science v. faith controversy by Macy Ferguson
T
he dispute between Galileo Galilei and the Roman Catholic Church in the early seventeenth century is often mistakenly framed as a case of science versus faith. The truth is that the dispute was the result of conflicting scriptural interpretations and scientific methodologies rather than a standoff between science and religion. The two main reasons the Catholic Church was opposed to Galileo and his theory of the Earth’s motion were, first, that the introduction of a new interpretation of the Bible threatened the authority of the Church and, second, that Galileo lacked a factual, demonstrable proof of his theory. When Galileo originally approached the Church with his plans for scientific study, he said he wanted only to discuss the hypothetical nature of Copernican astronomy. Despite his stated intentions, Galileo went further and pursued evidence for the motion of the earth and the immobility of the sun. This was problematic for the Church because not only was Galileo acting contrary to his original intentions, but he was also asserting that the sun was immobile, introducing uncertainty with regards to a biblical passage in Joshua, which states: On the day the Lord gave the Amorites over to Israel, Joshua said to the Lord in the presence of Israel: “Sun, stand still over Gibeon, and you, moon, over the Valley of Aijalon.” So the
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sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged itself on its enemies, as it is written in the Book of Jashar. The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day.i
Portrait of Galileo Galilei by Justus Sustermans, c. 1936
Galileo was in dialogue with various priests and religious figures in Rome, and the conflict started to bloom in the years 1615 and 1616, when Galileo became aware that authoritative religious figures were discussing the compatibility of his research with Scripture. Before the Church took any steps or voiced its thoughts on the issue, Galileo began to fear that the Church would declare his research inconsistent with the Bible and punish him for it. Therefore, afraid that he was running out of time, he began to act in ways that would attract attention to his cause. This behavior caused the Church to scrutinize him and his findings
question was which one of them would be primary in influencing the public’s way of thinking about the Church’s authority. Galileo’s theories about the motion of the earth emerged as the Protestant Reformation was getting underway, so his new theories and way of interpreting the Bible seemed to the Catholic Church to be just another attempt to undermine the Church’s influence and position in society. Galileo’s initial discussions with Church affiliates about his research were affable. He visited Rome on several occasions between 1610 and 1615 to discuss his telescopic observations with Jesuit professors and
Church leaders believed faith and science contained non-contradictory truths, the result of which made the two disciplines compatible. more closely. In the latter part of the 1610s, it became clear to the Church that Galileo did not have a proper demonstration to validate his findings, and it thus took action against him to keep him from spreading his apparently unproven theory. Galileo was eventually ordered to trial in Rome before the Papal Inquisition in 1633. The cardinals of the Inquisition concluded that he was “vehemently suspected of heresy,” a verdict slightly less serious than being guilty of heresy, which would have indicated willful perseverance in a false doctrine.ii Galileo was subsequently put under house arrest and was made to publicly rescind his views on the motion of the earth and immobility of the sun. Though the events alone do not offer much insight into the scientific debates at hand, this dispute contains lessons on the broader conceptions of Scripture and scientific truth. It shows that Church leaders believed faith and science contained noncontradictory truths, the result of which made the two disciplines compatible. The Church leaders held that a statement could not be true in one sphere if it is false in the other. Furthermore, this dispute suggests to us that when we encounter individual scientific and spiritual truths that seem to be contradictory, rather than immediately assuming the two are incompatible, we should follow the church’s example and further analyze our interpretations and address any misunderstandings we might have about the two individually. Despite the end result of unresolved dispute, both the Church and Galileo approached every stage of the conflict with an understanding that both science and faith contained indisputable truths. At no point in their dispute did the Church frame the issue as Galileo choosing science over faith or the Church choosing faith over science; the Church and Galileo were assured of the authority of both the Bible and of science. The
members of the Church hierarchy. In 1615, when the discussion of the biblical legitimacy of Copernican astronomy was well under way, a Carmelite priest in Naples, Paolo Foscarini, published an essay in which he argued that the Bible could be interpreted consistently with Copernican astronomy.iii This essay prompted a significant and resonant response from Cardinal Roberto Bellarmino, an educated Jesuit and member of the Papal Inquisition in Rome. The cardinal was well known for his skill in biblical interpretations and also for his proficiency in dealing with challenges to the authority of the Church. Bellarmino sent a copy of his response to Galileo as well. His knowledge of scientific methodology and protocol was evident in his response, as he drew a distinction between speaking “hypothetically” and “absolutely.” This distinction served as prudent advice
Image of heliocentric model from Nicolaus Copernicus’ “De revolutionibus orbium coelestium” by Copernicus, c. 1543
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for Foscarini and Galileo, that they be explicit about what type of scientific claims they aimed to make. For, to speak “hypothetically” in astronomy was to imply
silence Galileo and Foscarini, rather than the Bible itself. Bellarmino found that there was no direct contradiction between the Scriptures and Galileo but
By admitting that a reevaluation of the Scriptures would be necessary…the cardinal was demonstrating the Church’s comprehensive understanding of the compatibility of science and faith. the possession of a consistent mathematical description for the observed phenomena. To speak “absolutely,” on the other hand, meant to clarify the movements of the universe.iv Mathematical astronomy only aimed to provide a model, while physical astronomy aimed to give a factual account of the nature of the universe. The approach that Foscarini or Galileo chose to take out of these two would have great implications for the validity and religious effects of their claims. The next key aspect of Bellarmino’s letter was his reference to the Council of Trent, which decreed “that with respect to ‘matters of faith and morals’ no one is permitted to interpret the Bible contrary to ‘that sense which Holy Mother Church, to whom it belongs to judge their true sense and meaning, has held and does hold.’”v By citing this Council, Bellarmino emphasized the true sensitivities regarding Galileo and Foscarini’s ideas: their potential to undermine the authority of Church leaders. It is telling that Bellarmino used this official, hierarchical statement to attempt to
Saint Robert Bellarmine by anonymous, c. 16th century
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rather that the source of the conflict lay in Galileo’s attitude toward the authority of the Church leaders. The Catholic Church had been hesitant to endorse Galileo’s findings because the findings had yet to reach the Church’s standards of evidence; the dispute was between standards of evidence and the implications they had for the public’s perception of the Church’s authority. Lastly, Bellarmino, despite his cautions, admitted that a demonstration of the earth’s motion may be possible. If there were a true demonstration that the Sun is in the center of the universe…then one would have to proceed with great care in explaining the Scriptures that appear contrary, and say rather that we do not understand them than that what is demonstrated is false.vi Again, his statement indicated that it is not a matter of faith but of appearance and interpretation. For a cardinal of the Papal Inquisition that regularly refuted statements made contradictory to the Church to take this stance suggests that few informed Christians or theologians would have dismissed Galileo and Foscarini’s proposals simply because they incorporated modern science with scriptural understanding. The cardinal was implicitly saying that there could be no contradiction between scientific fact and Christian truth. By admitting that a reevaluation of the Scriptures would be necessary were Galileo’s demonstration proven to be true, the Cardinal was demonstrating the Church’s comprehensive understanding of the compatibility of science and faith. Despite the presence of cardinals like Bellarmino, Galileo came to feel intimidated and pressured by the Church for proof of his research. 1615 was a momentous year, as it became apparent that Galileo did not yet have proof or a demonstration, and as he feared that the Church would condemn him before he could provide it. This fear prompted Galileo to write a letter to the Duchess of Tuscany explaining his stance and the
in a highly believable way than on presenting them in a logically and scientifically sound way. Discussing the significance of Galileo’s letter to the duchess, Dr. Carroll notes:
Cover of Galileo’s Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina, author Theresa LaBrecque, c. 16th century
We must remember when we read his account [the letter to the Duchess] that, first of all it is his interpretation of the events, and, second, that he has chosen his facts carefully in order to achieve his end: to persuade the authorities of the Catholic Church not to act foolishly and condemn Copernican astronomy.vii Galileo had to use his rhetorical skills and rest his argument on the authority of Copernican astronomy when confronting the Catholic Church; the facts were unable to speak for themselves, since Galileo had yet to produce factual proof. His letter to the duchess was written with the purpose of buying Galileo time to produce his demonstration before the Church could condemn him.
backlash that he had suffered for it. Galileo needed to garner support. He chose to write to the duchess, rather than to the clergy directly, because he knew he would gain more attention from an educated lay audience and, therefore, would be in a better position to defend his stance to the greater public. He would gain more attention this way because the Church was very concerned about public opinion. If Galileo could influence the people, he could buy time with the Church. Galileo was aware that he wrote during a time of deep clerical anxiety, wherein many members
Remember, in addition, that both Galileo and the officers of the Inquisition share the same Aristotelian ideal of scientific knowledge; both sides understand what a demonstration is. If Galileo, in fact, had a demonstration for the motion of the Earth, he surely would have presented it, for he knew that demonstration would prevent the Church’s condemnation of Copernican astronomy.viii Galileo and the Catholic Church were both aware that he could not meet these standards. Because there was no scientific proof of Copernican astronomy or Galileo’s propositions concerning the motion of the earth, the cardinals of the Inquisition
The Church’s decision to take Galileo to trial was rather based on a sophisticated understanding of Scripture, the desire to protect the Church’s authority, and a desire to uphold a high standard for scientific evidence. of the clerical hierarchy were wary of attacks against the Church’s authority. He knew such attentiongrabbing behavior would make the Church even more nervous. He planned to manipulate this knowledge by presenting himself to the public as so obviously correct that the Church would appear degenerate if it were to dismiss Galileo’s findings. Galileo was a biased source when it came to the discussion of his findings because he placed greater emphasis on presenting his findings
proceeded to declare them “foolish and absurd.”ix It is clear that the cardinals were not acting solely out of reverence for Scripture, but also out of respect for thorough science. Their response may seem harsh, but the Church had to think critically about how their reaction would affect the perception of their authority and how it would align with their standards of evidence and interpretation. They did not reject Galileo simply because he did not conform to their standards, but,
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rather, they took him to trial to communicate a message that the Church was steadfast and authoritative. Being steadfast meant that the Church did not budge when it came to quality of scientific proof. For the Church to not harshly cast out Galileo would make it seem that the Church was satisfied with incomplete evidence. The Church’s honoring of scientific quality and integrity in regards to proofs has a direct effect on its authority. The decision to denounce Galileo was done in protection and honor of these two concepts. Therefore, it would have been irrational for the Church to recognize Galileo’s findings when he had no demonstration or factual proof to offer. Another important piece of contextual evidence is the academic approach to biblical interpretation at the time. The Church, and anyone who was educated, utilized a four-fold method of interpreting the Bible and recognized that the Scriptures involve multiple literary registers. As Peter Blair points out in “Epistemic Pluralism and the Christian Tradition:” In the Middle Ages, this dual sense of Scripture—literal and allegorical—was hardened into a four-fold exegetical system. Scripture was understood by all Biblical scholars to have four senses: literal, moral, allegorical, and mystical. This four-fold hermeneutic does not deny the truth of the Bible, but rather it assumes that the kind of truth being conveyed varies throughout the Bible according to the genre or mode of expression being used in different passages.x Galileo’s incident took place in the early 1600s, a time when the Catholic Church still carried the tradition of a four-fold system of biblical interpretation. So, therefore, not only did the Church value science and scientific methodology for their own sakes, but the Catholic Church also kept science in mind when reading the Bible. Biblical scholars would not have taken the literal meaning of a passage without also considering the allegorical, moral, and mystical meaning of the Scripture. Though Galileo framed it as though he were the only rational interpreter who knew how to reconcile the teachings of the Bible with modern life, that was not the case. He removed the context of the cardinals’ teachings and education in the “four-fold exegetical system” when presenting their criticisms of his theories. Thus, the Church’s condemnation of Galileo was based not solely on the fact that Galileo’s findings contradicted Scripture. The Church’s decision to take Galileo to trial was rather based on a sophisticated understanding of Scripture, the desire to protect the
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Church’s authority, and a desire to uphold a high standard for scientific evidence. Though interpretation is still a sensitive subject that invites much disagreement, it is important to discuss. If biblical scholars of the Middle Ages thought there was merit to looking at Scripture through different lenses, then it is likely worth our time as well to experiment and investigate various readings of Scripture. Additionally, when reading Scripture and investigating scientific truths, we should follow the example of Galileo and the church and be intellectually honest by analyzing the two until they are reconciled rather than blindly accept that they sit in contradiction. Another important lesson from the clarified version of Galileo’s conflict with the Church is that biblical scholarship and science can have relevant implications for one another. Both disciplines make observations on past accounts and environments that they use to inform the way they look at the present world. In many ways, biblical scholars catalogue and hypothesize in the same way that scientists do.
Joshua 10:12-13 (NIV). William Carroll, Galileo: Science & Faith (London: Catholic Truth Society, 2009) 56. iii. Carroll,16. iv. Carroll, 20. v. Carroll, 22. vi. Carroll, 22-23. vii. Carroll, 30. viii. Carroll, 32. ix. Carroll, 38. x. Peter Blair, “Epistemic Pluralism and the Christian Faith,” The Dartmouth Apologia 5.2 (2011): 33-34. i.
ii.
Macy Ferguson ’16 is from Stoneville, NC. She is a double major in Government and Native American Studies.
HURRICANES
& ANIMAL SUFFERING: Law, Craig, and Lewis on the Problem of Evil by Josh Tseng-Tham
O
ne common reason people question the existence of God is the presence of evil in this world. For many people, this is an emotional issue, rather than an intellectual one. Suffering intense pain and loss can shake the faith of even the strongest Christian, and in such cases an intellectual answer can be inadequate. A listening ear, a loving gesture of kindness, and an empathetic presence will often speak louder than words. As the patriarch Job discovered, even though God did not directly answer all his intellectual questions, God’s appearance to Job at the end of the book allowed Job to say, “My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you,” and that was sufficient.i For other people, however, the presence of evil in this world is an intellectual stumbling block that hinders them from believing in God’s existence. This stumbling block is commonly called the Problem of Evil, and it is usually phrased this way: “If an allpowerful, all-knowing, and all-good God exists, why does evil exist in the world?”ii Non-Christians can find this conundrum a genuine obstacle to faith, and even Christians may find that this problem presents them with a mystery to which they are unable to respond. Many will either suggest inadequate answers to this problem or profess ignorance of the subject. This is not acceptable for those who value deep philosophical inquiry and who are courageous enough to tackle
tough questions in more than a superficial way. Left unattended, the Problem of Evil can prove to be an insurmountable wall or a mental off-limits area that hinders intellectual and philosophical growth. On October 17, 2011, the philosophers William Craig (a theist) and Stephen Law (an atheist) met in Westminster Central Hall to debate the existence of God. Within the discussion was an exchange on the Problem of Natural Evil. Philosophers generally agree that two forms of evil exist. The first category is moral evil, which consists of evils such as murder, theft, and lying committed by moral agents against others. The second form of evil is that of natural evil. Natural evil does not involve moral agents and is often referred to generally as the pain and suffering associated with natural disasters such as earthquakes, tsunamis, and hurricanes. The Problem of Natural Evil is fundamentally different from that of moral evil, and theists address it less frequently. Law’s primary argument was that the existence of natural evil made the existence of God improbable. Law argued that in a world where God exists, natural evil would not exist. He reasoned that if God were allknowing, all-good, and all-powerful, he would have the power and interest to remove this evil. Since natural evil exists however, he postulated that it is improbable that God exists.iii Law gave two primary examples of natural evil that formed the backbone of his argument.
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The first example was human suffering due to natural disasters, and the second was animal suffering due to the painful interactions between predators and prey. To Law, it seemed improbable that an omnipresent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, and omnipotent God would subject his creation to such suffering.iv Law’s version of the Problem of Evil differs slightly from the classical statement of the problem. Past philosophers typically stated that the existence of evil was a logical contradiction to the existence of God, and therefore it is impossible for both to co-
Effect is a phenomenon where small actions can result in large consequences elsewhere.vii In the same way, natural evil may not be what we think it is, for God may have morally sufficient reasons for allowing this evil. Humans lack the foresight and knowledge to know this. It is possible then, that this world is the world that maximizes good in the long run, where maximum good is the greatest amount of good that can be realized by God. According to Craig, if the maximum good is to have a world where free agents are able to participate in moral actions such as freely
Today’s atheist philosophers…have reformulated the Problem of Evil as a probabilistic argument. exist.v Modern philosophers such as Alvin Plantinga, however, have argued that God may have morally sufficient reasons for permitting evil in the universe.vi In response, today’s atheist philosophers like Law have reformulated the Problem of Evil as a probabilistic argument; that is, that although God may have morally sufficient reasons to permit evil, it seems improbable given the overwhelming amount of evil we observe. Craig answered Law’s argument by asserting that it is impossible for someone to determine and weigh the ultimate effects of natural evil because of our limited scope and perspective. In chaos theory, the Butterfly
Sattelite Image of Hurricane Katrina, author Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSF, c. 28 August 2005
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loving God, this may necessitate a world with natural evil. The atheist must prove that God has no morally sufficient reasons for permitting natural evil, but this is impossible to do.viii Furthermore, Craig argued that the Christian perspective on the purpose of life allows for the existence of natural evil. Contrary to popular secular opinion, which sees the purpose of life as the pursuit of happiness, Christianity teaches that “the purpose of life is not happiness in this world, but rather coming to know God personally and so to find eternal life.”ix If that is the case, suffering from natural evil may be vital to fostering a relationship with God, for it may serve as an impetus for introspection and belief. As C.S. Lewis famously noted, “We can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”x Christians view suffering from natural evil as an expected reality of life that is meant to strengthen reliance on God rather than oneself. Natural evil may not be an “evil” at all, but a learning experience used to promote a greater good. Christian doctrine points out that there can be a sufficient reason for permitting evil, which means suffering does not make God any less of a reality or impossibility. Craig’s response to Law’s arguments about animal suffering posited that suffering is a natural part of the animal ecosystem. Predation is a vital component of any ecosystem if it is to function. Without predators, an ecosystem will be overpopulated with prey. Any population increasing exponentially will eventually overtax its available resources, with the result that many animals would later die of starvation.xi Craig said that the existence of predators in an ecosystem enhances the survivability and health of the rest of the prey because it keeps their population at manageable levels. A balanced ecosystem benefits all of humanity
Tiger greift ein Pferd an, Source: The Yorck Project, c. 1825-1828
and animals as a whole, and is a greater good that is made possible through the mechanism of predators and prey. Craig also raised questions about the nature of animal suffering itself. Quoting from Michael Murray’s book Nature Red in Tooth and Claw, he stated that there is a three-level hierarchy to pain awareness. The first level is a mere reaction to stimuli, which is present in nearly all organisms. The second level coincides
Much of Craig’s response to Law is logical, persuasive, and to be commended, but some of his claims may be reasonably questioned and warrant further explanation. Regarding Craig’s response to natural disasters, his reasoning that the current world may be the world that maximizes goodness may not adequately refute Law’s evidential argument of evil. Law stated that all the natural evil in the world makes God’s existence an improbability. Craig’s argument addresses the logical problem of evil, but it does not address Law’s probabilistic questions about God’s existence. While Craig was correct in his assertion that we cannot know the full extent of God’s purpose, he provides no reasoning to shift the burden of proof to the atheist. By relegating his theodicy to an ignorance of God’s overall design, Craig fails to present a strong case for the plausibility of God’s existence. As Craig pointed out “Maybe only in a world suffused with natural and moral evil would the maximum number of people come to freely know God and find eternal life.”xiii Since it is all pure speculation, Craig gave an opening for Law to assert that although God may have a reason for suffering; given the sheer volume of evidence for natural evil and its worldwide impact, it is more probable and rational to infer that he does not. Craig’s contention that the majority of animals do not have the self-consciousness necessary to suffer like humans neglected the fate of higher primates that have this self-consciousness. If even one species other than the human race has self-consciousness, it would still raise the question of why God would allow its suffering over millennia. In addition, there is evidence that Craig was mistaken in his argument that only humans and higher primates are aware of their own pain. As recently as last year an international group of prominent neuropharmacologists, neurophysiologists,
A world that facilitates communication would have to be a “neutral ground”—one that is generally unchangeable in its nature and independent of the agents themselves. with sentience, which is the actual experience of pain itself. The third level applies to conscious beings that are self-aware that they are in pain. Craig claimed that most animals do not attain to this third level of selfawareness, and without it most animals do not suffer in the same way that humans do. This third-order pain awareness is centered on the pre-frontal cortex of the brain, which is only present in humans and some high-order primates.xii If most animals are not truly self-conscious as humans are, then it follows that they do not suffer as humans do. The problem of animal suffering, therefore, becomes insignificant.
neuroanatomists, cognitive neuroscientists, and computational neuroscientists met at the University of Cambridge to assess the existence of conscious states in animals. They declared the following: The absence of a neocortex does not appear to preclude an organism from experiencing affective states. Convergent evidence indicates that non-human animals have the neuroanatomical, neurochemical, and neurophysiological substrates of conscious states along with the capacity to exhibit intentional behaviors. Consequently, the weight of evidence
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indicates that humans are not unique in possessing the neurological substrates that generate consciousness. Non-human animals, including all mammals and birds, and many other creatures, including octopuses, also possess these neurological substrates.xiv The question of whether animals suffer consciously is close to being answered in the affirmative. That being the case, the question of animal suffering is still one worthy of consideration. A different response to the Problem of Evil stems from the value of fellowship between human beings. God desires a world wherein multiple free-willed agents have the choice to love Him. But, just as importantly, he wants people to be in fellowship with one another. xv The Bible speaks of the value of fellowship as a way for people to encourage and protect each other in times of misfortune or spiritual crisis, since “if either of them falls down, one can help the other up.”xvi Therefore, God intends for us to be enriched not only by his presence, but also by the presence of others. In doing so, we receive support and guidance, and our fellowship allows us to glorify God and preserve our love for him, just as Christians did in the time of the Apostles.xvii Fellowship, by definition, requires humans to interact with each other. Communication allows us to express thoughts and feelings towards other individuals. We are able to convey information, facilitating discussion and intellectual inquiry. Fundamentally, communication is the only way for us to learn about other people, and, therefore, is the only way for us to relate to others personally. There is no fellowship without communication. C.S. Lewis wrote about the nature of a world where communication exists between free agents. In his work The Problem of Pain, Lewis argued that a world that facilitates communication would have to be a “neutral ground”—one that is generally unchangeable in its
speaking a different language, where each language is understandable to that person and incomprehensible to everybody else. Because God wants fellowship amongst his creation, he created the world to promote this good; this fixed-state ensures that humans have the opportunity for communication, fellowship, and the knowledge of his beautiful creation. While a fixed world is good for the actualization of God’s desires, the nature of an unchanging environment creates the possibility that not all states will be beneficial to everyone. Lewis cites this reality as the main reason for the existence of natural evil. Matter may bring people happiness or it may bring people suffering, just as fire may warm at one distance, but burn at another.xix The natural processes that bring water to drought-ridden regions also cause tornadoes to form in rural prairies. It is misguided to expect nature to be equally pleasurable to every member of society all at the same time. While these circumstances are not ideal, the possibility of these evils occurring under a world with fixed laws is a logical necessity. If God intervened at every moment of suffering, nature would no longer be static, and His acts of power would be delegitimized. During unique periods in history, God occasionally disrupted the laws of nature (often referred to as miracles) to authenticate an important message.xx But if miracles became routine, they would no longer be exceptional, depriving God of the ability to use miracles to convey important messages. Since the laws of nature would continuously be violated, instability in the world would become a rule rather than an exception. Therefore, despite his power, God cannot intervene if his actions are contrary to his will for humanity. In contrast, explanations for human suffering due to natural evil cannot be extended to animal suffering. It is arguable that animals do not have free will and only act according to their nature. Therefore, a different explanation is required to explain why animals have to suffer due to natural evil. In this area, Lewis offers
We can determine animal consciousness and their reaction to stimuli, but we do not know if animal cognition is composed of the same structures as it is in human beings. nature and independent of the agents themselves.xviii For instance, this world would have fixed laws, such as those of gravity, thermodynamics, stable matter, and the conservation of energy. If humans lived in a world where natural laws were arbitrary and changeable to suit individual desires, they would not be able to communicate due to the lack of an objective playing field. This would be akin to every person
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a speculative explanation. He cites an ancient church teaching that when Satan rebelled, one result was the suffering of animals.xxi This idea is not contradictory to Scripture. The Bible speaks of Satan’s fall, and it is clear that he was the one to tempt man in the Garden of Eden.xxii Although Scripture may not explicitly mention the corruption of our world due to Satan’s fall, it is not far-fetched to posit that the corruption
of our universe due to an evil force could be the cause of animal suffering. While the pain that animals experience is not the original state of the world, it is one that they must live with due to the presence of evil. A less speculative answer to animal suffering is that we do not have the ability to judge which animals suffer and why they do. Lewis admits that animal suffering is “outside the range of our knowledge.”xxiiiWe form theodicies regarding human pain because, being humans ourselves, we can communicate human thoughts and ideas and therefore consider how and why we suffer. There is no such mechanism for animals. We can determine animal consciousness and their reaction to stimuli, but we do not know if animal cognition is composed of the same structures as it is in human beings. The problem of animal suffering is important, but, as humans, we do not have the capability to fully understand or solve it. Therefore, it cannot become the focus of the problem of natural evil. Even with the problem of animal suffering remaining unanswered, it is still a far cry to arrive at Law’s conclusion that “it is improbable that God exists.” For Law to make the assertion that God is improbable, he would need to look at the full scope of the evidence for and against theism, rather than focusing on one particular aspect. Indeed, saying that God’s existence is improbable solely on the basis of suffering is no more justified than saying that an ostrich is unlikely to be a bird because it cannot fly. To legitimately say the Problem of Natural Evil makes God’s existence less probable, one must also consider other arguments for the existence of God and then prove that the Problem of Evil weighs heavier than all those other arguments combined. The classic theistic arguments that many consider to make God’s existence vastly more probable, such as the arguments from contingency, the ontological argument, the argument from objective morality, and the evidence of the resurrection need to be discounted before the argument from natural evil can be said to make God’s existence improbable. For some, the intellectual problem of natural evil is a genuine concern and hindrance to belief in God. In response to Law’s referral to human suffering, Craig uses the logical argument that natural evil is the unfortunate but necessary condition for a world that includes morally free agents like humankind. Craig talks about the maximum good and the need to humbly recognize that we do not know the ultimate end and sum of all the actions that happen on earth. However, Craig fails to mention the importance of fellowship, and how God created a fixed world in order to facilitate this good. Lewis offers an intricate explanation as to why this fixed world can result in what many would call Natural Evil. Although the
problem of animal suffering is important, we humans do not have the capability to solve it. Regardless, Law’s claim that natural evil points to the improbability of God’s existence is presumptuous. Eminent and influential philosophers throughout history, like Lewis and Craig, have given reasonable, cogent, and powerful arguments to the contrary. Job 42:5. All Scripture quotations come from the New International Version. ii. Chris Hauser, “The Divine Attributes: Why an Imperfect God Just Won’t Do,” The Dartmouth Apologia 7 (2013): 22. iii. Stephen Law, Does God Exist? William Lane Craig vs. Stephen Law. Westminster Central Hall. Storey’s Gate, London, United Kingdom. 17 October 2011. iv. Law, Does God Exist? v. David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion (Edinburgh: Nelson & Sons, 1947) 174176. vi. William L. Rowe, “The Problem of Evil and Some Varieties of Atheism,” American Philosophical Quarterly 16.4 (1979): 335. vii. Craig, Does God Exist? viii. Craig, Does God Exist? ix. Craig, Does God Exist? x. C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (New York: HarperCollins, 2009) 91. xi. Craig, Does God Exist? xii. Craig, Does God Exist? xiii. Craig, Does God Exist? xiv. Philip Low, et al. The Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness. Francis Crick Memorial Conference on Consciousness in Human and non-Human Animals. Churchill College, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK. 7 July 2012. Conference Presentation. xv. Romans 12:5, Galatians 5:13, I Corinthians 10:24, I John 1:7, II John 5. xvi. Ecclesiastes 4:10. xvii. Acts 2:42-47. xviii. Lewis, 22. xix. Lewis, 23. xx. Hebrews 2:4. xxi. Lewis, 137-138. xxii. I Timothy 3:6. xxiii. Lewis, 133. i.
Josh Tseng-Tham ’17 is from Toronto, Ontario. He is a double major in Economics and Government.
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The Art of
Reconciliation Grappling with the Tragedy and Gravity of Suicide by Jess Tong
O
ur society often equates cynicism with intellectual sophistication and feigns satisfaction in attributing all tragedies to human nature. The natural selfishness of each person appears to reveal how little sacredness life can potentially hold. Yet, it is only after the personal experience of a tragedy, like the loss of a loved one to suicide or cancer, that we are forced to be honest with ourselves. Our natural reaction to mourn and deeply grieve the loss of life contradicts the reasoned conclusion society has already established about the value of a human life. When faced with the daunting task of comforting a friend who was contemplating suicide, I felt utterly helpless in trying to prevent her actions, while she felt utterly hopeless in trying to control her emotions. Only then did I recognize how powerless my words were and how powerful her actions against herself and those who loved her could be. While we subscribe to a “‘throw away’ culture,” as Pope Francis describes it, in which “human beings are themselves considered consumer goods to be used and then discarded,” such a view of human life appears to invalidate the pain we experience when such life is lost.i Tragedies like suicide shake the foundations of this culture. We are consequently forced to re-evaluate the various worldviews that inform our emotions and opinions. One worldview to which many subscribe, especially in cultures that uphold democracy as a political pillar of justice, perceives human freedom to be of utmost importance, so much so that freedom and autonomy
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becomes something for which one might die. As Locke stated in the Second Treatise of Government, humans have both the freedom of “action and [disposal] of their possessions and persons.”ii Similarly, Kant’s autonomy formula of the “Categorical Imperative” that any will of a rational human being is “a will that legislates universal law,” complements this spirit of centering human value on autonomy.iii The source of life’s worth is therefore in itself subjective—both open and limited to personal discretion. Human dignity lies in our status as autonomous agents and value in the mere freedom to choose arbitrarily—according to one’s own will—rather than to choose rightly. This autonomous view of the human person coincides with and informs a libertarian outlook on human rights that justifies suicide as a political right. Suicide, an action that does not directly harm another, is “a morally permissible exercise of individual freedom.”iv A person’s worth lies in his ability to choose and, therefore, requires respect for her choices, even when that choice is suicide or voluntary euthanasia. This particular view, however, does enforce one condition—that all action (and in this action, all harm) must be consensual. Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics insists that suicide, while a “wrong to the state or the community,” cannot be condemned as unjust to the self, “for he suffers voluntarily, but no one is voluntarily treated unjustly.”v The choice to commit suicide for honor or proclaimed moral duty can in fact be praised. Locke’s statement on the state of freedom within humans’ state of nature explicitly gives license to abandoning “bare preservation”
for a “nobler use.”vi While Locke does not specify what this “nobler use” may be, he acknowledges a justification for suicide that is potentially praiseworthy. Hence, this non-tragic view of suicide emanates from the autonomy it elevates. The autonomy itself does coincide with our instinct to praise courage when one’s death represents defiance against political or social injustice. Today, the young martyrs of the Arab Spring are no longer mere “victims of the Arab states’ violence” but the “fuel [for] popular outrage at the Arab regimes.”vii For them, death represented the greatest sacrifice, which they selflessly chose to make
and gene proliferation at the center. This view bases its certainty in evolutionary biology and the capability of science to eventually reduce all human thought and emotion to the physics underlying the chemistry within psychology and neuroscience. The corresponding Darwinian creed of human life deduces that all morality must stem from self-preservation. Hence, while autonomists lament all illness, whether physical or mental, evolutionists cannot comment on the morality of any human action. Such an outlook inevitably implicates suicide as contradictory to the natural love of living organisms,
By the standards of this [autonomous] view of life, suicide is both the ultimate attack and appreciation of human autonomy. for the larger community. Such acts invoke a deep respect that is granted by their personal autonomy. Yet, the elevation of autonomy fails to account for our natural discouragement of suicide. In fact, such a view belittles human dignity and life. Kant himself admits to the contradiction in attacking the very source of autonomy that gives us our moral duty. To commit suicide would be to “annihilate the subject of morality in one’s person” and thus to “[debase] humanity in one person.”viii By the standards of this view of life, suicide is both the ultimate attack on and appreciation of human autonomy. In contrast to this glorification of autonomy, the Darwinian view of human life places self-preservation
Saint Thomas Aquinas by Carlo Crivelli, c. 1450
while simultaneously condoning suicide as an inevitable consequence of a chemical imbalance in the brain. Just as Plato attributes suicide to “cowardice or laziness, undertaken by individuals too delicate to manage life’s vicissitudes,” so Darwinists ultimately see the loss of life as a natural step in the evolutionary process in which the “fittest”—the physically and mentally healthiest—should survive. Depression remains the primary clinical diagnosis for those considering suicide.ix Psychologists have suggested that, within the emotional, cognitive, motivational, and somatic clusters of depressive symptoms, each cluster affects the other, resulting in a “paralysis of the will” that can almost be categorised as a “terminal illness.”x This Darwinian perspective on the human person, however, undermines our deep-seated desire to mourn and grieve death. If love cannot exist except by hormonal reactions producing endorphins, the loss of a loved one only brings emotional pain out of the personal and selfish desire to retain that person for our own happiness. Our personal experiences show that suicide brings a more profound sense of tragedy in recognizing that someone chose to end his existence. Such a reaction causes to emerge the underlying question of whether life is sacred. Neither the autonomous nor the Darwinian view sufficiently captures the profundity of our emotional, moral, and spiritual response to the tragedy of suicide. On the other hand, according to the Christian faith, the value of human life is defined by the initial intention of a human’s coming into existence. Just as children physically bear the image of their parents, Christianity also describes humans to be image-bearers and children of God. The Roman Catholic catechism teaches that, “It is God who remains the sovereign Master of Life,” obliging humans to “preserve it for his honour and the salvation of our souls.”xi Even when we are encouraged to entirely indulge in our own wills or
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animalistic tendencies as Darwinian creatures, we cannot ignore the pre-religious, intuitive appreciation for the sacredness of life, explained by the presence of a divine, intentional creator and a soul that longs to join its maker. The natural tendency to hold onto the essence of someone who has passed away reveals our rejection of the belief that life is purely physical. Christianity attributes this essence to the soul that cannot perish, even when its physical shell has been destroyed. In light of this view, Christianity creates a unique and powerful lens for analysing the moral gravity and tragedy of intentionally rejecting the sacred gift of life. While the Bible does not explicitly condemn suicide,
divine being or not, we instinctually treasure life as a gift, not only for ourselves but also for others, for once it is taken, it cannot be retrieved. Just as suicide does not align with our natural instincts, based on the three grounds Aquinas laid out, it also does not align with the will of God. The great emotional suffering that the depressed endure and the consequent alienation, however, will only be exacerbated when not met with a response of kindness and mercy. Paul insists that, despite our tendency to regard one sin graver than another, “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”xvi The greatest comfort of the Christian view comes from Christ himself,
With the . . . hope of salvation in an afterlife, Christianity promises mercy—not despite the gravity of suicide but precisely because of it. it does claim homicide is a sin (“you shall not murder”).xii The commandment’s omission of an additional conditional phrase (“against your neighbour”)—as seen in “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbour”—implies an overarching inclusion of the murder of one’s self: suicide. Furthermore, if life were indeed a gift that the Lord can give and take away, to kill oneself also involves “play God,” indirectly defying the commandment that “You shall have no other Gods above me.”xiii St. Thomas Aquinas defended St. Augustine, the first to offer a justification of Christianity’s prohibition on suicide, on these grounds: 1. “Suicide is contrary to natural self-love, whose aim is to preserve us.” He further wrote that “in no passage of the holy canonical books there can be found either divine precept or permission to take away our own life” whether for the sake of desiring heaven or of ridding misery and shame. 2. “Suicide injures the community of which an individual is a part.” 3. “Suicide violates our duty to God because God has given us life as a gift.”xiv Our bodies are described as “temple[s] of the Holy Spirit, whom you have from God,” bought at a price.xv These three factors coincide with our own natural feelings of moral revulsion against suicide. In attempting to understand how one might want to destroy what is more valuable than his most valuable possession—his very self—we experience great pain and perhaps even anger. Each person is inextricably linked to a family and a community, from which comes an unspoken responsibility to care for or at least not to hurt the other members. Underlying this responsibility is the understanding that each life deserves to contain happiness. Regardless of whether we believes in a
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who in the Gospel of Matthew invites those who feel despair—“all you who are weary and burdened”—to “come to him” and receive “rest.”xvii The foundation of the Christian faith rests on Christ’s death for each man to be redeemed in a regenerative hope and for his everlasting dwelling in our lives. God himself promises that those who “seek [him] with all [their] heart” will find him, their final rest and ultimate peace and happiness.xviii The Christian understanding of the sacredness of life that cries out against the moral travesty of suicide is the same wellspring within us from which tears of sorrow and waters of mercy flow. As Pope John Paul II articulated, the “temptation to give up in utter desperation, is above all a request for companionship, sympathy, and support in the time of trial,” rather than a blanket rejection of God and acceptance of eternal damnationxix The aim of Christ’s fulfilment of the promise of hope embedded in the sacred vocation of the human person is not to scare us into obedience but to encourage us to enter a redeeming relationship with Him. With the added, distinctive hope of salvation in an afterlife, Christianity promises mercy—not despite the gravity of suicide but precisely because of it. Just as “God has forgiven the inexcusable in you,” Christianity calls its followers to display the same love and be “imitators of God.”xx While Pope Francis identifies the potential exclusion that is rife in the language of “thou shalt not” to those suffering around us, he also insists that we “have to say ‘thou shalt not’ to an economy of exclusion and inequality.”xxi It is precisely this economy that shames and kills the ones we love. Christianity ultimately preserves what we praise in the autonomous and Darwinian views. God himself has allowed free will to underpin our actions, even though this comes at the risk of us harming ourselves. Furthermore, the Christian faith condones the instinct
to esteem martyrs for both Christianity and political activists. The Christian view of human dignity also aligns with the Darwinian view of psychology; both acknowledge the need to mourn the loss of life and encourage acts of mercy towards those who have taken their own lives. Christianity also manages to reconcile the seemingly contradictory nature of these two views. Rather than degrading the value of autonomy in human life or dismissing human life altogether in the name of physical biology, Christianity brings to the surface the natural instinct to value life as sacred, and it therefore recognizes the moral gravity of destroying one’s own life. While Christianity does not condone the act of suicide itself and indeed cries out against it, Christianity simultaneously separates the sin from the sinner. Christianity consequently focuses love and mercy on the victims of suicide and brings hope to both the sufferer and those around him or her by promising the possibility of salvation. Above all, the Christian view inspires much needed hope amidst the inevitable whirlwind of emotions experienced by those who mourn a neighbour, a friend, or a family member who has taken his own life. The natural desire to honour and keep a lasting relationship with the deceased through remembrance, as well as the moral abhorrence and profound anguish faced, are merged and justified by the Christian vision of human life. The Christian belief elevates human dignity to supreme importance, thereby elevating to the highest importance a mission to love and thrive in community, and a responsibility to care for those who lose sight of the sacred value of their own lives. When someone in the community does follow through with suicide, Christianity allows moral aversion, deep grief, and resilient hope. Hence, while suicide inevitably triggers a profound sense of loss and perhaps even moral confusion, Christianity does not push the victim and the mourners into greater darkness and despair. Instead, the love of Christ from which the entire faith emanates offers an alternative perspective. While autonomy in suicide ignores its underlying moral significance and tragic alienation, Darwinians reduce the emotional causes and consequences of suicide to mere psychological diagnoses, stifling our commitment to human agency. By contrast, the Christian view of life’s sacredness resolves these contradictions, logically marries the emotional tragedy and moral weight of suicide, and even provides a third element of hope for redemption. Christ ultimately brings light to the life and afterlife of the sufferer, and he brings his followers the burden to embody his love in every circumstance.
Francis I, Evangelii Gaudium, (Vatican: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2013) para. 53. ii. John Locke, “Second Treatise of Civil Government,” in Classics of Moral and Political Theory, ed. Michael L. Morgan (Indianapolis: Hackett, 2011) 713. iii. Garrath Williams, “Kant’s Account of Reason,” ed. Edward N. Zalta, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2013 <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/ spr2013/entries/kant-reason/>. iv. Thomas Szasz, Fatal Freedom: The Ethics and Politics of Suicide (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2002) 2. v. Aristotle, “Nicomachean Ethics,” in Classics of Moral and Political Theory, ed. Michael L. Morgan (Indianapolis: Hackett, 2011) 307. vi. Locke, 713. vii. Elizabeth Buckner, “The Martyrs’ Revolutions: The Role of Martyrs in the Arab Spring,” The British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies (2012): 2. viii. Immanuel Kant, Metaphysics of Morals (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996) 423. ix. Vernon J. Geberth, “Practical Homicide Investigation,” LAW and ORDER 44.2 (1996): 9. x. Geberth, 9. xi. Catholic Church, Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (Vatican: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2000) q. 2280. xii. Exodus 20:13 (NKJV). xiii. Exodus 20:16; Job 1:21; Exodus 20:3 (NKJV). xiv. Michael Cholbi, “Suicide,” ed. Edward N. Zalta, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2013 <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2013/entries/ suicide/>. xv. I Corinthians 6:19-20 (NKJV). xvi. Romans 3:23. (NKJV). xvii. Matthew 11:28 (NIV). xviii. Jeremiah 29:13 (NKJV). xix. John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae, 25 March 1995, para 67. xx. C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1942) 135; Ephesians 5:1 (NKJV). xxi. Francis I, para 53-54. i.
Jess Tong ’17 is from Sydney, Australia. She is a prospective Government major.
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Gregg Fairbrothers, Tuck Profess
All of the Bible, indeed all of human history and human experience, is about choice. From Genesis to Revelation, the drama is not of what happens, but what is chosen. All of human experience—all joy, all challenges, all achievement, all suffering—forms but a backdrop, a stage upon which the drama of choice is played out. Albert Einstein, Quoted in Life, 2 May 1955 The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. Never lose a holy curiosity.
I John 1:1-3 (ESV)
Lee Strobe Only in is diffi
C If you look for truth you ma look for comfort you will n onl
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us.
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Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God In the cross and passion of Christ faith sor experiences a quite different love of God, which loves what is quite Proverbs 12:1 (NIV) different. It loves what is sinful, Whoever loves discipline bad, foolish, weak and hateful, loves knowledge but he who in order to make it beautiful hates correction is stupid. and good and wise and righteous. For sinners are el, The Case for Faith beautiful because they are loved; they are not n a world where faith loved because they are fficult can faith exist. beautiful.
C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity ay find comfort in the end; if you not get either comfort or truth— ly soft soap and wishful thinking. II Corinthians 10:4-5 (NET) We tear down arguments and every arrogant obstacle that is raised up against the knowledge of God, and we take every thought captive to make it obey Christ.
C.S. Lewis, Learning in War Time Happy work is best done by the man who takes his long term plans somewhat lightly and works from moment to moment ‘as to The Lord.’ It is only our daily bread that we are encouraged to ask for. The present is the only time in which any duty can be done or any grace received.
gia’s Favorite Quotes [ Spring 2014 • The Dartmouth Apologia • 39
A Prayer for Dartmouth This prayer by professor of religion Lucius Waterman appears on a plaque hanging outside Parkhurst Hall. O Lord God Almighty, well-spring of wisdom, master of power, guide of all growth, giver of all gain. We make our prayer to thee, this day, for Dartmouth College. Earnestly entreating thy favour for its people. For its work, and for all its life. Let thy hand be upon its officers of administration to make them strong and wise, and let thy word make known to them the hiding-place of power. Give to its teachers the gift of teaching, and make them to be men right-minded and high-hearted. Give to its students the spirit of vision, and fill them with a just ambition to be strong and well-furnished, and to have understanding of the times in which they live. Save the men of Dartmouth from
The Nicene Creed We, the members of The Dartmouth Apologia, affirm that the Bible is inspired by God, that faith in Jesus Christ is necessary for salvation, and that God has called us to live by the moral principles of the New Testament. We also affirm the Nicene Creed, with the understanding that views may differ on baptism and the meaning of the word “catholic.”
We [I] believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen. We [I] believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father. Through him all things were made. For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven: by the power of the Holy Spirit he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary, and was made man. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate; he suffered death and was buried. On the third day he rose again in accordance with the Scriptures; he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end. We [I] believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father [and the Son]. With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified. He has spoken through the Prophets. We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church. We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.
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