C S Lewis on thinking and atheism

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“Supposing there was no intelligence behind the universe, no creative mind. In that case, nobody designed my brain for the purpose of thinking. It is merely that when the atoms inside my skull happen, for physical or chemical reasons, to arrange themselves in a certain way, this gives me, as a by-product, the sensation I call thought. But, if so, how can I trust my own thinking to be true? It’s like upsetting a milk jug and hoping that the way it splashes itself will give you a map of London. But if I can’t trust my own thinking, of course I can’t trust the arguments leading to Atheism, and therefore have no reason to be an Atheist, or anything else. Uniess I belleve in God, I cannot belleve in thought. So I can never use thought to disbelieve in God.” 
– C.S. Lewis, The Case for Christianity, p. 32. 

Who’s allowed to get married?

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In New Zealand currently there is a debate about whether gay people should be allowed to be married.

The Christian community is all up in arms about it, saying effectively “Marriage is Christian and gay people are not allowed to get married, because being gay is sinful!” Or some such thing.. I’m sure you know the arguments and stuff that get thrown about.

We should get a few things clear for a start. 

1. Most cultures in the world have some form of marriage – look here for example: http://www.worldweddingtraditions.com/

2. Marriage is by and large, just a legal and/or cultural tradition

3. Marriage is NOT a Christian institution, except when Christian’s are getting married (and even then its doubtful!)

The word “wed” is derived from the Greek word “pledge” – it is a pledge between 2 persons whom want to live together in a long term (life long?) relationship. It only becomes Christian when the pledge includes God. 

One thing I cant understand is why people who do not believe in God want to get married in a Church, with a Minister, and say “Christian” vows.. seems insane to me.

 

So.. well.. should gay people be allowed to marry? Yes. Why should they not? If a homosexual couple want to live together they should be afforded the same legal protection as anyone else. As long as.. and I mean.. AS LONG AS…

Churches and Christians who perform ceremonies are not LEGALLY OBLIGATED to perform ceremonies. If some gay couple comes to a minister in a church and says we’d like to be married, and we want you to do it.. and he says no, because it is against my religious beliefs. Then they complain to the civil rights organisations or what ever about being persecuted.

In England a Christian lady working in a government agency who refused to issue a marriage license to a gay couple because it was against her religious beliefs, (technically she shouldnt be allowed to do that as it is the legal right for them to get a license and she was not doing her job.. but the sentiment is the same) was fired for “persecuting homosexuals”. If this occurred in the context of the church, it would be terrible.

So, who should be legally allowed to get married? Anyone who is committed to their partner for a long term relationship. They should be afforded all the protections of marriage. 

If Christians want to ban gay marriage because it is a sin, they should also ban marriage between people who have told lies, lusted, got greedy, got jealous, stole something, murdered someone, got angry, had an adulterous thought… etc.. its just hypocrytical.

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The keep religion out of schools (NZ) facebook page

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I have posted on this page a few times, but they keep removing them for some unknown reason. Their main goal, according to the page, is to “keep religious indoctrination out of public schools”.

I decided I would post here so my posts can not be deleted by them, and perhaps someone will even read them.

I have several problems here, not the least being keeping religious education out of schools;

1. There is no program of religious indoctrination in NZ schools. There is a totally optional extra curricular class called “bible in schools”, in SOME schools.

2. When they say “religious indoctrination” I am assuming they mean “christianity” – however the word encompasses Islam, Bhuddism, naturalism, evolutionism (as opposed to the science of evolution), atheism, etc. So, they can also rule out “keeping religious indoctrination out of schools” being taught in schools.

3. By removing any religious study/education, you are denying children a proper education of the world about them. Religion in all its forms is part of life and culture. Removing it is to force their particular world view (not sure, but I suspect atheists or at least agnostics in charge here), which is in itself a form of indoctrination.

 

Teaching children about the world about them, all the different perspectives, the pros and cons of the majors should be ESSENTIAL to our education system. What’s the worse than can happen? A child might learn to put others first? That humility and love are desirable traits to have in their lives instead of anger and arrogance? That they might choose to serve their community because they believe in a god of some kind?

What kind of arrogant egotistical selfish person would want to prevent their children, and other peoples children (many of whom have no objection to religious education which is not forced on people) from learning about what other people believe and why, and how this may or may not enrich the world we live in…

honestly.. some people should be banned from the internet (and schools.. and radios..).

replacement theology…

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So, recently in NZ a well known (supposedly) replacement theologian, Stephen Sizer came and spoke at Laidlaw College (http://www.laidlaw.ac.nz). The video of the event is available here:

http://www.laidlaw.ac.nz/latest-news/israel-and-the-last-days-what-does-the-bible-say-video-now-available

 

Now, I havent seen the videos nor do I know (or really care) what Sizer actually says, but what I do care about is the response that people have to it. Some people have an immediate and panicy response to whether Israel is destined to inherit certain thing they believe the bible says they are meant to, such as the land they currently inhabit.

Couple of things, one is, these “promises” to Israel are promises to ALL believers, and they were meant to be revealed to us through the nation of Israel. Well, I have got bad news for you, the bible says that Israel did NOT fulfil their part of the bargin, to be a light to the world, for example, Acts 13:

13:46 Both Paul andBarnabas replied courageously, “It was necessary to speak the word of God to you first. Since you reject it and do not consideryourselves worthy of eternal life, we are turning to the Gentiles. 13:47 For this is what the Lord has commanded us: ‘I have appointed  you to be a light  for the Gentiles, to bring salvation to the ends of the earth.’ ” 

Israel was NEVER meant to be the sole inheritor of the promises of God, all humanity is. Israel is the method in history by whom God reveals his nature and his requirements, and now, it is Christians who are responsible to be a “light to the gentiles” – gentiles meaning those whom are not in the family of God – believers. Therefore the whole premise for “the bible says the land is Israel’s therefore they must have it for the end times prophecies to be fulfilled” is totally and utterly incorrect.

Whether Israel is entitled to live in the land they were given in the 40’s is a totally political, legal thing, and not a theological/escatalogical one. EVEN IF… they were given the land because of a faulty theological premise, it is still a political thing, and people should not be upset at all about the fact that the nation of Israel is “replaced” with ‘those whom believe”. The promises of God are, and have only ever been for those who believe.

A perspective on Abortion

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“A worried woman went to her gynecologist and said: 

‘Doctor, I have a serious p…roblem and desperately need your help! My baby is not even 1 year old and I’m pregnant again. I don’t want kids so close together.’ 

So the doctor said: ‘Ok and what do you want me to do?’ 

She said: ‘I want you to end my pregnancy, and I’m counting on your help with this.’

The doctor thought for a little, and after some silence he said to the lady: ‘I think I have a better solution for your problem. It’s less dangerous for you too.’

She smiled, thinking that the doctor was going to accept her request. 

Then he continued: ‘You see, in order for you not to have to take care of 2 babies at the same time, let’s kill the one in your arms. This way, you could rest some before the other one is born. If we’re going to kill one of them, it doesn’t matter which one it is. There would be no risk for your body if you chose the one in your arms.’ 

The lady was horrified and said: ‘No doctor! How terrible! It’s a crime to kill a child!’ 

‘I agree’, the doctor replied. ‘But you seemed to be OK with it, so I thought maybe that was the best solution.’ 

The doctor smiled, realizing that he had made his point.”

How it happened – Isaac Aasimov

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( ht http://www.patheos.com/blogs/exploringourmatrix/2011/12/how-it-happened.html)

 

“How It Happened” by Isaac Asimov

My brother began to dictate in his best oratorical style, the one which has the tribes hanging on his words.

“In the beginning,” he said, “exactly fifteen point two billion years ago, there was a big bang and the Universe–”

But I had stopped writing. “Fifteen billion years ago?” I said incredulously.

“Absolutely,” he said. “I’m inspired.”

“I don’t question your inspiration,” I said. (I had better not. He’s three years younger than I am, but I don’t try questioning his inspiration. Neither does anyone else or there’s hell to pay.) “But are you going to tell the story of the Creation over a period of fifteen billion years?”

“I have to,” said my brother. “That’s how long it took. I have it all in here,” he tapped his forehead, “and it’s on the very highest authority.”

By now I had put down my stylus. “Do you know the price of papyrus?” I said.

“What?” (He may be inspired but I frequently noticed that the inspiration didn’t include such sordid matters as the price of papyrus.)

I said, “Suppose you describe one million years of events to each roll of papyrus. That means you’ll have to fill fifteen thousand rolls. You’ll have to talk long enough to fill them and you know that you begin to stammer after a while. I’ll have to write enough to fill them and my fingers will fall off. And even if we can afford all that papyrus and you have the voice and I have the strength, who’s going to copy it? We’ve got to have a guarantee of a hundred copies before we can publish and without that where will we get royalties from?”

My brother thought awhile. He said, “You think I ought to cut it down?”

“Way down,” I said, “if you expect to reach the public.”

“How about a hundred years?” he said.

“How about six days?” I said.

He said horrified, “You can’t squeeze Creation into six days.”

I said, “This is all the papyrus I have. What do you think?”

“Oh, well,” he said, and began to dictate again, “In the beginning– Does it have to be six days, Aaron?”

I said, firmly, “Six days, Moses.”

thoughts about the rapture

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Right, please excuse this, its bound to be a bit rambling as I process my thoughts.

Firstly, I should like to point out that I dont believe in the eternity of the Soul. Like many of the Church Fathers I believe that the Platonistic concept of an eternal soul is a false manmade concept. For example, Justin Martyr, who said that the soul is by (fallen) nature mortal, and the hope of Christianity is not a universal immortality (to hell or heaven), but a resurrection of the person to eternal life, or destruction.

Secondly, resurrection for Christians, is the bringing to life of the person who once was. Just as when Christ died, the resurrected Christ was not a ghost, or a spirit, but a physical being that could be touched, and could eat.

In a recent discussion about Paul being snatched up to the “third heaven” I was doing some research on what the third heaven was in the ancient Hebrew mind. Whilst doing that I discovered a writing by Thomas Aquinas which seemed to explain what I was thinking more clearly. Here is the substance of what I wrote:

Thomas Aquinas describes this is as elevation to an understanding beyond what would normally be known – as opposed to a physical place. He describes 3 kinds of sight as an example:
1.Bodily: by which we can see and know bodies
2.Spiritual: by which we see likenesses of bodies
3.Intellectual: by which we understand the nature of things.
e.g. (1)if I see something visible, (2)if I imagine something previously seen, (3)or if I understand through phantasms.
Each of these, he says, is considered “heaven” (or by God’s rule/command/will) if it is outside of the normal human realm.
And I quote:
“For example, if you see something with your bodily eyes above the faculty of nature, then you are rapt into the first heaven. This is the way Belshazzar was rapt, when he saw the handwriting on the wall, as it is stated in Dan. (5:5). But if you are raised up by the imagination or spirit to know something supernaturally, then you are rapt to the second heaven. This is the way Peter was rapt, when he saw the linen sheet descending from heaven (Ac. 10:11). But if a person were to see intelligible things themselves and their nature, not through sense-perceptible things not through phantasms, he would be rapt to the third heaven.”

So, Aquinas is suggesting that to be rapt[ured] into the 3rd heaven is a way of explaining how close one is to God, not a physical place. Because as we know, Heaven does not exist yet, it is a future hope, not a present reality.

So, bearing that in mind lets look at:

1 Thess 4:15 For we tell you this by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will surely not go ahead of those who have fallen asleep. 4:16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven with a shout of command, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 4:17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be suddenly caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will always be with the Lord. 4:18 Therefore encourage one another with these words.

And after having described the worsening condition of the world as Sin runs rife – Matt 24:

24:36 “But as for that day and hour no one knows it – not even the angels in heaven – except the Father alone. 24:37 For just like the days of Noah were, so the coming of the Son of Man will be. 24:38 For in those days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark. 24:39 And they knew nothing until the flood came and took them all away. It will be the same at the coming of the Son of Man. 24:40 Then there will be two men in the field; one will be taken and one left. 24:41 There will be two women grinding grain with a mill; one will be taken and one left.

Ok, let us start with Matthew. “As it was in the days of Noah” I believe not only refers to the “Eating and drinking”, that is, life continuing normally, but the following sentences regarding WHO is taken away I think are important. At the time of the flood, it was the wicked who were washed away in the flood, the righteous were picked up by the water and then deposited back on earth, which is where humans belong.

In 1 Thess its clear also, that those who are righteous who have died will, at the same time as those who are alive, be brought into the presence of God where they will live eternally (in this world, albeit sinless, uncorrupted and perfect).

These passages fairly obviously describe the return of Christ at which time the wicked are taken away, and the children of God inherit the earth.

You see, its not all that complicated in my opinion. There is a rapture, but Christians dont suddenly go missing. On the contrary, all the righteous who have died will reappear, and the wicked will disappear, wailing and gnashing their teeth as they are thrown in a lake of fire and destroyed for all eternity.

We die. Christ comes again in judgement. The righteous inherit the earth. The wicked are destroyed.

Discussion thread is here: http://theology.geek.nz/forums/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=16

E P Sanders on Christian Education

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This was taken from here:

http://www.duke.edu/web/gradreligion/documents/GPRnewsfall2008.pdf

I shall briefly explain two of my efforts to get people actually to learn what is on the pages of the New Testament. Perhaps it should go without saying that this is a difficult task, but I shall nevertheless say something about the problem. The more time students have spent in church the more they think that the text consists of morals that are immediately applicable to themselves and that all the words meant then what they mean now. In fact, the worldviews of the biblical authors are not our worldviews, and it is difficult for people to comprehend things that they cannot fit into their own mental universe. It is in some ways easier for people to learn about an unknown religion than about their own.

Well said!