An Atheist's Creed?

   

 

On page 5 of God is Not Great we find the following which almost flows like a creed for atheists:

 

Our belief is not a belief. Our principles are not a faith. / We do not rely solely upon sci­ence and reason, because these are necessary rather than sufficient factors, but we distrust anything that contradicts science or outrages reason. / We may differ on many things, but what we respect is free inquiry, open mindedness, and the pursuit of ideas for their own sake. / We do not hold our convictions dogmatically….. / we have music and art and literature, and find that the seri­ous ethical dilemmas are better handled by Shakespeare and Tolstoy and Schiller and Dostoyevsky and George Eliot than in the mythical morality tales of the holy books….. / We do not believe in heaven or hell, yet no statistic will ever find that without these blandishments and threats we commit more crimes of greed or violence than the faithful. (In fact, if a proper statistical inquiry could ever be made, I am sure the evidence would be the other way.)

 

Again, this flows like a river in full flood and so much pours by you so quickly that it is almost impossible to take in, and instead you are simply left wondering, is this true? So let's examine it piece by piece. This is a serious exercise so if it beyond you, please return to the main page.

 

Quote 1: “Our belief is not a belief. Our principles are not a faith.”

 

Response 1: Is that right? Is that true?

 

Listen to these quotes:

 

D.M.S.Watson : “The theory of evolution itself [is] a theory universally accepted, not because it can be proved by logically coherent evidence to be true, but because the only alternative is special creation, which is clearly incredible.”

 

L.T.Moore, of the university of Chicago : “Our faith in the idea of evolution depends upon our reluctance to accept the antagonistic doctrine of special creation.”

 

British anthropologist Sir Arthur Keith: “Evolution is unproved and unprovable. We believe it only because the alternative is special creation, which is unthinkable.”

 

Richard Dawkins: “Even if there were no actual evidence in favour of the Darwinian theory….. we should still be justified in preferring it over all rival theories.”

 

And finally a comment from Nancy Pearcey in her book, Total Truth:

 

A Kansas State University professor published a letter in the prestigious journal Nature , stating: “ Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such an hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic.” Pause for a moment and let that sink in: Even if there is no evidence in favour of Darwinism, and if all the evidence favours Intelligent Design, still we are not allowed to consider it in science. Clearly the issue is not fundamentally a matter of evidence at all, but of prior philosophical commitment .

 

What each of these atheists are saying is that we will believe (have “faith in” according to Moore ) a theory full of holes because we dare not believe in God. This IS all about a belief and faith!

 

 

Quote 2: “We do not rely solely upon sci­ence and reason, because these are necessary rather than sufficient factors, but we distrust anything that contradicts science or outrages reason.”

 

Response 2: There is a difficult phrase at the end of this quote: “we distrust anything that…. outrages reason.” A study of philosophy clearly reveals that reason is not the ultimate answer. It IS a tool that we can use but if we make it a crutch upon which to lean, we find it is untrustworthy.

 

Our governments govern by reason. They draw together all the facts, consider them and then reason how to act. Unfortunately their conclusions clearly don't work. This writer observed in the years 2006 and 2007 a number of policies that the British government was going to pursue. Within months of each of these policy declarations they were each withdrawn. The initial reasoning proved false.

 

To say that we trust science is also an unknowing statement.

 

On our ‘Science and Religion' apologetics page you will find the following:

 

Alister McGrath in his book The Twilight of Atheism, commenting on Richard Dawkins' assertion that faith is an evil not found in science, noted:

“As Michael Polanyi (1891—1976), a chemist and noted philosopher of science, pointed out, natural scientists find themselves having to believe some things that they know will later be shown to be wrong—but not being sure which of their present beliefs will turn out to be erroneous. How can Dawkins be so sure that his current beliefs are true, when history shows a persistent pattern of the abandonment of scientific theories as better approaches emerge? What historian of science can fail to note that what was once regarded as secure knowledge was eroded through the passage of time?”

 

Note, in the light of Quote 1, the language – ‘beliefs' NOT facts. So much of modern science has to be about beliefs because the nature of investigation is often open to some measure of speculation.

 

We could quote many similar quotes as above. If you want to go to that Apologetics page please CLICK HERE.

 

To parade a belief in science and reason as against revelation and faith , fails to understand that all of those four words are open to misunderstanding and error.

 

 

Quote 3: “We may differ on many things, but what we respect is free inquiry, open mindedness, and the pursuit of ideas for their own sake.”

 

Response 3: The way this is said it supposes that belief in God is not open to free inquiry and open mindedness. What the writer appears not to understand is that every Christian believer arrives where they are after a period of inquiry.

 

Yes, there may be those taught from childhood, but I speak above of those who come to faith in Christ in adulthood, and even children who have made a profession of faith in childhood have to come to a place of fresh inquiry and fresh commitment in their teens or adult years.

 

That inquiry takes them to hear the good news of Jesus Christ. Now most, I suspect, don't go through a long period of enquiry but simply come to faith with a little knowledge. There are some who do go through great enquiry though. I have a friend who maintains he argued himself into a corner where the truth became obvious to him.

 

The use of ‘open mindedness' by the author is most inappropriate! Both he and Richard Dawkins appear the most close-minded men I've almost ever come across. The four quotes under response 1 above indicate, as Nancy Pearcey went on to say, “Clearly the issue is not fundamentally a matter of evidence at all, but of prior philosophical commitment.” Put another way these men all have closed minds and are not open to investigate.

 

If you go to Appendix 7 [CLICK HERE] you will see areas that I believe a wise man would investigate, yet it is patently obvious that neither Dawkins nor Hitchens have ever bothered to investigate these areas because they have made up their minds before investigating !

 

“Pursuit of ideas for their own sake”? You can do that if you want. That's what philosophers do, but I suggest you check out the history of philosophy first before you spend a lot of energy covering ground that others have been over already, and you conclude with one of the wisest philosophers of the world: Meaningless! Meaningless! Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless." (Eccles 1:2)

 

Quote 4: “We do not hold our convictions dogmatically”

 

Response 4: This is probably the biggest declaration of untruth in the book. the one thing that will come out above all else as you work through this book is that here is a man who is holding his convictions dogmatically.

 

If you're not sure about ‘dogmatically' my dictionary speaks of dogma being ‘a settled opinion' and dogmatic being ‘asserting a thing as if it were a settled opinion'. The author has well and truly settled his opinions and, as our comments immediately above show, he is not open to investigate the things about which he speaks with little knowledge!

 

Quote 5: “we have music and art and literature, and find that the seri­ous ethical dilemmas are better handled by Shakespeare and Tolstoy and Schiller and Dostoyevsky and George Eliot than in the mythical morality tales of the holy books.”

 

Response 5: This is a funny quote. If you want big stories that tell a tale that conveys some ethical truths then, yes, these writers are worth reading. But where do ethics come from?

 

This takes us back to philosophy and the history of ideas. Any good book on ethics will give range of possibilities for any situation in life and today's ethicists are stuck with the problem of authority. Who is to say which ethics are right? Some that have seemed most obvious have proved tragically wrong. It is the same dilemma the world faces over who will decide on what laws we have. A dictator, a committee of wise men, a democratically elected government? All of them have their faults. This is where religion steps in and says, surely the Creator knows best how we work?

 

Where did so many of these writers get their ethics? From the Christian faith and from the Bible!

 

“mythical morality tales of the holy books”? Well the Bible is the only Holy Book I'm concerned with, so let's check this out.

 

myth – ‘purely fictitious narrative' according to my dictionary again (It really is worth checking out some of these words so casually used!)

 

So where does the author get this staggering idea about the Bible being fictitious? From his enormous stockpile of ignorance. Let me give you very quickly some reasons why I don't believe it is fiction:

 

1. I know how the documentation we now call the Bible came into being. It is credible.

2. I have examined its contents at length and critically. It is credible.

3. It is supported by many extra-biblical documents and archaeology that confirm it in history. It is credible.

4. It has a most staggering unity throughout even though over 40 authors. It is credible.

5. It has the best teaching ever seen in one book anywhere in the world in history. It is credible.

6. It works – it tells of God's dealing with mankind and the way we today may relate to Him, and when I find people going down that path, I see lives transformed for good, again and again! It is credible.

 

Quote 6: “We do not believe in heaven or hell, yet no statistic will ever find that without these blandishments and threats we commit more crimes of greed or violence than the faithful. (In fact, if a proper statistical inquiry could ever be made, I am sure the evidence would be the other way.)”

 

Response 6: The assumption here is that it is only the enticement of heaven or the threat of hell that makes people be good. Now I am certain that this is a completely erroneous belief for the following reasons:

 

1. While the place of heaven and hell might have had a high place in preaching in the past, I'm not sure that it is today. If you want the biblical teaching on heaven and hell please CLICK HERE.

 

2. The absence of knowledge about heaven and hell among non-believers clearly suggests that whatever motivation they may have to do good, it probably isn't that.

 

3. The motivation of genuine Christian believers to ‘do good' emanates from their knowledge and experience of the love of God. In other words it is the response to being loved that produces a tendency to want to do good. (There no doubt is still legalistic teaching that says ‘you ought to do good as believers' and there are no doubt the occasional preacher who still preaches using the fear of hell, but I think they tend to be strictly a minority.)

 

There is a further odd bit of this quote which doesn't stand up to scrutiny: “We do not …. commit more crimes of greed or violence than the faithful.” If by ‘the faithful' we mean genuine Christian believers, then I would hope that this too is completely erroneous in that genuine believers will not commit ANY crimes of greed or violence!!!! So yes, I'm sorry, but your criminals are non-Christians!

 

Please observe that the definition of a genuine Christian is one, not who simply says they believe, but whose life is radically changed by that belief. Genuine believers are not measured by going to church but by transformed lives – yes, there are a lot of imitations!

 

For these reasons the closing sentence within the brackets is completely wrong. The error here is misunderstanding the effects of belief in the Gospel on genuine believers. Unfortunately we do have to emphasise this difficulty, that there are many people who may have a form of Christianity, but it is not the genuine article that produces changed lives. As we said, there always will be imitations, but that should in no way take away from the genuine.

 

 

And So….

 

Here we have another example of fine sounding words but with little truth behind them. There is deception about the integrity of the atheists' stance and misunderstanding about genuine Christianity. Put the two together and we have a completely deceptive paragraph – again!