Thinking Christian

1. JT wrote:

   January 31, 2011 at 10:50 am   Link

   In your recent post Good News About Evangelicalism you quoted many of those typically identified as “unaffiliated” are not only affiliated with congregations but also attend evangelical churches. When I hear the statistic that 57% of evangelical church attenders believe there are multiple ways to God, I wonder about the different ways they recognize are. E.g., might an American non-denominational evangelical say that there are multiple ways to God if they affirm both Protestants and Roman Catholics as Christians? Or that different churches (little “c”) may have different “styles”? I wonder if the Pew Forum poll went into more detail, and whether the “multiple ways to God” conclusion was a summary of something else.
2. BillT wrote:

   January 31, 2011 at 11:29 am   Link

   I really don’t see the “big win” for Dawkins. O’Reilly starts out with the “it takes more faith to be an atheist” which certainly has more to say for it than where Dawkins begins. He begins by trying the utterly untrue and intellectually cowardly “you’re the one with the burden of proof, not me” nonsense. Dawkins does score by getting O’Reilly on the defensive and O’Reilly is weak with his “it’s true for me” reply. O’Reilly does counter though with “I can’t prove Jesus is God but you can’t prove he is not”. Dawkins tries to reply with the “you’re an atheist regarding Zeus” canard. He doesn’t get to finish but it’s a canard nevertheless.

   O’Reilly raises the atheist mass murderers (Stalin, Hitler, etc.). Dawkins first tries to counter that their atheism didn’t have anything to do with their actions and then that Hilter was a Catholic. Neither holds any water. O’Reilly’s basic point that science cannot tell us “how it all began” is a valid one while Dawkins’ answer that “science will be able to explain it all at some point” is a statement of faith not science (ref: O’Reilly’s first point). O’Reilly is right about the basic faith orientation of the founders and Dawkins reply that they were primarily secular is weak as well. There, of course, wasn’t really time for anything like the in-depth answers this subject requires. However, it’s not more than a draw for either one of them.
3. Tom Gilson wrote:

   January 31, 2011 at 11:33 am   Link

   I agree with that. I was trying to point specifically toward the weakness in the 30-second stretch I pointed to. If O’Reilly thinks there are multiple truths, then he’s defending something other than Christianity, and he cannot help but lose on that count.
4. BillT wrote:

   January 31, 2011 at 12:19 pm   Link

   Agree, Tom. He does try to explain himself somewhat with the “I can’t prove Jesus is God but you can’t prove he is not”. However, it’s hard to do the “nature of truth” in a 4 minute segment. (I bet Holopupenko could do it!).

   However, so much of what Dawkins tried was so pitiful. “It’s your burden of proof”, “you’re an atheist regarding Zeus”, “Hitler a Catholic”, ”science will get there, just wait”. BTW, loved O’Reilly’s “I just saw Zeus down on the corner and he’s not looking so good”. Just the kind if dismissive reply that nonsense deserves.
5. BillT wrote:

   January 31, 2011 at 1:03 pm   Link

   And allow me to follow up with one more thought about the segment you highlighted. O’Reilly almost got it right. He knew that the idea the he couldn’t prove that Jesus was God but Dawkins couldn’t prove he wasn’t was the correct explanation. What he got wrong was the proposition which that explains. It isn’t that it’s “just true for me”, it’s that his beliefs are faith based but that so are Dawkins’ beliefs. Had he said that “I admit my belief in Jesus is faith based because I can’t prove that Jesus is God but your belief that Jesus isn’t God is equally as faith based because you can’t prove he isn’t”, he would have pretty much run the table against dear old Richard.
6. Holopupenko wrote:

   January 31, 2011 at 1:26 pm   Link

   BillT:

   I’m with you on the Dawkins really didn’t “win” big, and I’m with you and Tom on the O’Reilly flub-up. (He may have been speaking as a Catholic individual, but he certainly wasn’t speaking either for the Church nor was his statement correct philosophically or theologically.)

   I have a bigger issue with all this. It is in the nature of news organizations to make money and get the message out in fast sound bites. Don’t get me wrong: there’s a very important place for that and I staunchly defend freedom of the press to do their work. The problem is it presupposes a press that’s at least nominally prepared to deal with the subject matter.

   Take this blog as a comparison: how many emotional electrons over the years have been spilled here in complex back-and-forth discussions? Lots. The O’Reilly Factor was trying (effectively) to do it in, what, 3 minutes between two people? Crash and burn is the only possible outcome.

   That’s why the Greek word for school (scola) has its roots in a meaning similar to “free time.” To be in school is to be away from the busyness of life to contemplate deeply with the goal of seeking eternal truths (actually, THE Eternal Truth). Similarly, you’ve got to have a peaceful place that set aside to worship. Both these–faith and reason–need special treatment: a peaceful, quiet setting so that one’s focus is on seeking/knowing the summum bonum. (A little Mozart playing in the background wouldn’t hurt…)

   As far as I’m concerned, the media sound-bite approach to the most fundamental questions is an affront to human nature: one can neither worship nor learn frenetically, chaotically, etc.

   This “proof by science” thing by Dawkins is really dumb. Really. Dumb. All the sciences presuppose an ordered universe. The proofs for God’s existence (e.g., Aquinas) are not concerned with scientific access to God (e.g., his First Way from motion/change) but are concerned about order itself. The proofs are microscopically thin views into the very ordered nature of reality, and hence of God’s Nature. Dawkin’s can play his ignorant and narrow scientistic game regarding motion and cause all he wants, but the First Unmoved Mover and First Uncaused Cause simply is TOO BIG to fit into his little world. (Think back to the wonderful metaphor of the largeness and “hardness” of heaven in C.S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce.)

   Aquinas and others were trying to show that order, perfection, teleonomy, etc. are the witness to God’s Beingness–not the motion of billiard balls, for heaven’s sake! How are the MESs supposed to deal with the order of nature that makes ordered electron motions possible? They can’t. Hence, Dawkins is not merely barking up the wrong tree, he’s digging downward into a grave.
7. Tom Gilson wrote:

   January 31, 2011 at 1:59 pm   Link

   Good thoughts, all. I concede: Dawkins didn’t win big. In that one segment O’Reilly lost, but Dawkins didn’t win anything.
8. Tim wrote:

   January 31, 2011 at 4:48 pm   Link

   The worst of it is, Dawkins scarcely has to lift a finger. O’Reilly does it to himself.

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