The Fears and Failures of Knowledge

Part 2 of a Dialogue on Faith

“Don’t think you can lecture me about what the world does and doesn’t need,” said the skeptic, quite coldly. “As far as I’m concerned, Christians long ago lost whatever credibility they may have gained through their ‘good works’.”

“I would never claim that Christians hold any sort of monopoly on “good works,” whatever you may mean by that. Still, I’m curious when you think we lost our credibility.” asked the Christian with concern.

“There’s no exact moment,” explained the skeptic. “But it certainly happened. I think it happened whenever you—that is, your religion—first became afraid of the world changing. Your religion saw the world threatening to leave you behind; everything was progressing while Christianity was staying the same, clinging desperately to old and outdated ways and beliefs. Your religion began to panic, for they still believed that the church had some relevance in the world; they continued to believe in miracles long after science had proven them wrong!”

“I’m sorry?” asked the Christian with a sort of laugh. “Science did what now?”

“Christians became afraid of science because science actively spoke out against the possibility of miracles, and they acted out of fear. That’s when you lost your credibility.”

“I’m sorry, but that may be the most absurd thing I’ve heard in some time! What does science have to say about miracles? Science can no more prove a miracle impossible than it can prove that there are angels dancing on pinheads! What sort of faith do you have in science, friend? You think that it took some great leap of science to tell men that it was impossible for a man to rise from the dead? Do you really think it took a mind like Newton’s to finally convince the world that, scientifically speaking, death is a very ultimate thing, and, scientifically speaking, one simply cannot rise from the dead? Or do you think the disciples were really more ready to believe in the resurrection because, somewhere in their primitive minds, they thought that maybe science hadn’t quite ruled out the possibility of it happening?”

“No—you don’t understand what I’m trying to say! In the middle ages-”

“I think I do understand it. I really do. I actually don’t think you’re wrong on every point, but you have to be careful not to say something ridiculous like science has disproven miracles.”

“But it has! Every bit of science tells us that there are unbreakable natural laws!”

“That much is more or less true, and yet, one can’t possibly believe in miracles without first believing in science.”

“How is that?” said the skeptic... skeptically.

“Because no one can recognize that a law is being broken if the law does not exist. Because the disciples really did believe that, scientifically speaking, Christ was dead and in a tomb. If they did not believe that, His resurrection may have been seen as an aberration, but it could not possibly have been recognized as a miracle. Only when one accepts natural laws can they possibly notice that they have been turned on their heads.”

“Fine, your point is taken. Now, you said that I wasn’t wrong on every point. Where do you agree with me?”

“You said that Christians have responded to science out of fear.”

“That much is obvious,” the skeptic said, nodding.

“Obvious and regrettable. I can admit that Christians have made many mistakes in their response to science. I deny, however, that this says anything at all about the truth or value of Christianity.”

“Of course it does! It says that yours must be a frail, pitiful religion if it is so afraid that science will prove it wrong.”

“All men have their frailties. Men have, on occasion, been afraid of science. Christianity, on the other hand, has never had reason to fear. That being said, I think we can both be thankful that the regrettable fear of some Christians—who might, indeed, have wished to slow or stop the progress of science—was never successful in slowing science.”

“Now that is absurd,” said the skeptic with some force. “Christians are perhaps more responsible than anything else for slowing science!”

“Really? I must have missed something. When did we do that?”

“You’d probably think it cliché if I brought up the trial of Galileo, but that’s the most obvious example.”

“Of course it is! It’s the most obvious because it’s so very unique! It’s the event that skeptics bring up because it is the only one! The persecution of Galileo is held up as some sort of symbol of a greater epidemic of persecution, when in fact it was, for the most part, a singular incident.”

“Now that is absurd! It is indicative of a certain stubbornness on the part of religion.”

“Yes, it is. Stubborn we certainly are. And I will defend the stubbornness of Christianity to my dying breath. But, really, the persecution of Galileo has really been blown comically out of proportion. It was a singular incident, in which the church wrongly considered heretical a man espousing a view that wasn’t even original, simply because a few of the clergy failed to understand that their scriptures were never intended to say anything about scientific things. Galileo has, ever since, been treated as a martyr, as if he was burned at the stake or fed to lions, when in fact he was asked to recant and placed on house arrest, where he comfortably pursued scientific matters until his death. If only all persecution was so benign!”

“Again, you’re missing my point! It is a matter of principle!”

“Yes, and on principle, the church was certainly wrong.”

“And it has remained wrong ever since! The church was doing everything they could to stop scientific progress.”

“Again, you’re quite wrong. The church, in that one instance, made a meager attempt to put a stop to that one theory—but, of course, they did not even slow it down, for the theory was accurate. It was too easily tested by other scientists, too numerous even for the church. Finally, the church was forced to accept the value of the theory, only to realize that, low and behold, it did absolutely nothing to weaken the faith! That is the real lesson in all of this, I think: from time to time Christians have come to believe that they ought to defend their faith from “progress”, and every time progress has continued unabated, and it turned out their faith had no need for such defense.”

“Then you think Christianity ought to embrace progress at last?”

“It really depends on what you mean by that. If you are asking whether or not Christianity ought to allow and encourage the pursuit of science and the expansion of knowledge, of course it should. If you are asking whether Christianity itself ought to change with the times, then my answer is very much no. The beauty of Christianity is that it has no need to change. It has no need to persecute scientists or philosophers because it stands in no danger from them. The truly interesting thing about the history of science is that it is continually disproving itself; one theory comes along and seems almost perfect, but then it is replaced by a new, even greater theory, sometimes simpler, sometimes more complex. Science is a serpent continually eating its own tail, but no matter how grand its theories grow, they have never said a word about Christianity. So much has come and gone in two thousand years—one really would expect that a book like the Bible would have become irrelevant. It simply hasn’t.”

“That is a very hopeful attitude,” the skeptic said hesitantly. “But it misses the reality of history.”

“And what reality is that?”

“The reality in which Christians have never stopped persecuting scientists!”

“Oh... so an alternate reality, then?”

“What? Of course not! Just look at this past century, where Christians have fought adamantly to destroy the theory of evolution!”

“Yes, of course,” the Christian said, nodding. “Evolution is the great modern example, and it does prove difficult, doesn’t it?”

“Hardly! The only things Christians hate more than evolution are evolutionists!”

“Hate is a very strong word,” the Christian offered, “but your point is well-taken. It could hardly be argued that Christians have embraced the theory of evolution, but, aside from some minor incidents, their opposition could hardly be considered contribution. Is science really so weak that it cannot bear scrutiny? Has the theory really suffered so terribly because of Christianity?”

“But the scrutiny is not based on evidence? It’s based on ideology! That makes all the difference!”

“As much as I think your very premise is wrong—Christians have argued time and again based on evidence—couldn’t the same accusation be made in reverse? This is the strange phenomenon of our modern times—and the reason one must absolutely stop talking about the persecution of science by the church: science has, in this age, become the source of persecution rather than the subject.”

“What do you mean by that?” said the skeptic defensively.

“I mean that it is the church that is being attacked today, not science. Galileo, for all that is said about his row with the church, considered himself a Christian, as did the majority of European scientists up until very recently. He may have run afoul of the church, but he never would have considered himself an opponent of it—even after his “persecution” he never stopped being a Christian. Most scientific training throughout the middle ages took place in universities founded by the church. Newton and Pascal would be considered religious extremists today. Things have quite obviously changed. The reason it seems that Christians attack evolution is that they feel forced to react to the attack from evolution. I still hold that we have nothing to fear from any such theory, but it is difficult to convince others to simply accept such persecution.”

“You would really call it persecution, just because science has discovered something that opposes the Bible?”

“Not because it opposes the Bible, no. Evolution is different, not because it stands as a threat to Christianity, but because many of its proponents see it as a tool that might be used to destroy religion, and the scientific method is forsaken in lieu of bitterness. The subject of the persecution really has been reversed—though I would hardly begin to complain about it, as I think the truth will inevitably win out. I can only hope that Christians today will soon come to realize that, as always, the foundation of their faith is strong enough to weather any storm. We need not stand in the way of science, but we need not be swept away by it, either. One of the beautiful things about Christianity it has remained solid and steadfast while the thoughts and opinions of the world ebb and flow like the tide. Science may appear to run afoul of our beliefs from time to time, but that is only the product of fallible minds stumbling over themselves trying to obtain a firm grasp on the complexities of the universe. So they observe and theorize and retheorize, hoping that their ideas will have some lasting value. The ideas of the Christian, however, have remained true and consistent far longer than any scientific theory. We need only stand firm and wait for science to float back to the truth.”  

On Atrocities and the Survival of the Faith

Part 1 of a Dialogue on Faith

“Do you really suppose Christianity is worth saving?” asked the Skeptic in perfect sincerity.                                “I certainly would,” the Christian returned casually, "if I thought it was in any danger."

“Any danger? But surely you can see that your faith is already dying!”

“Is it? I hadn't noticed.”

“Of course! How could it not be dying? Christianity is an ancient, ignorant myth, after all, and the only reason it has survived as long as it has is because it has been forced on children by parents and on people by their governments.”

“Well, that does sound pretty awful,” the Christian admitted. "When was the last time you visited a church?”

“Not since my childhood. Why would I?”

“Only to see if the situation was really as dire as you've come to believe. I find it funny that the people who are so adament about God dying and Christianity becoming obsolete are the people with the absolute least knowledge of what the church is doing.”

“I don't need to step into a church to know that your beliefs are outdated. Even if it is not happening already, it's only a matter of time.”

“I would agree with that,” the Christian said with a smile. “Only a matter of time before the world comes to realize that Christianity is not as vulnerable as it may seem. Only a matter of time before you all learn that God is not a being who can be killed.”

“But that’s absurd! What could possibly save your faith from human progress?”

“Only the knowledge that human progress is not always what it seems. No, that’s not a satisfactory answer, is it? Fine. Christianity will survive any attack simply because it is founded on truth, and it is more absolute than any truth to be found on the Earth.”

“Science is based on truth."

“Hardly! Science is based on a truth that changes with every new observation. It is a worthwhile pursuit, to be sure, but it is foolish to mistake it for anything absolute.”

“Be that as it may, it takes some arrogance to believe believe that your truth is somehow greater than every other truth. There are plenty of things that people have believed to be true that turned out to be wrong, you know.”

“Oh, sure. And there are plenty of other things outside of Christianity that seem perfectly true, but the truth of Christianity is unique in that it is one of the few truths that is really worth living and dying for.”

“All truth is important.”

“Truth is not some holy thing in and of itself. A thing may be true and still not matter in the least. A clod of dirt is perfectly true, but a person would hardly fight for it. There are some perfectly valid beliefs found through science, as well, but if I was ordered to denounce my understanding of the force of gravity or risk death, do you think I would hesitate for even a moment? Do you think that I would think twice about renouncing any scientific principle if my life depended on it? It may be a logical mistake to refuse to believe in electricity, but it there would be nothing fundamentally wrong with it. There are many things that are true but are not worth any great sacrifice, but in Christianity there is a truth that is so profound and so mysterious that men find the idea of sacrifice for its sake absolutely joyful! No, I can’t explain it, because it really is a profound mystery—and recognizing the mystery only draws me yet closer to those truths. That is why Christianity can’t be destroyed.”

“Anything can be destroyed.”

“It may seem like it, but Christianity truly can't, unless it is destroyed from within. What you don’t understand is that Christianity is a self-healing faith. It can recover from any wounds inflicted upon it because its wounds make it stronger. The world can do its best to create conditions that make it more difficult to be a Christian, but as soon as the world realizes that Christians continue to hold fast and remain joyful, all the work will be undone. We could be burnt at the stake or fed to lions and the world would have no choice but to ask why we were so willing to suffer. Blessed are ye who suffer trials of many kind for the testing of your faith produces perseverance. This truth was demonstrated explicitly time and again in the early church, and it has proven itself resoundingly true for two thousand years.”

“And what a two thousand years it has been!” the skeptic scoffed. “Two thousand years of bloody crusades and inquisitions! Two thousand years of putting men of science and philosophy on trial simply for asking questions—and more often than not for being correct! You say that you cannot be destroyed, but I say that no one has yet had the courage to truly try.”

“I thought you might bring up those things,” the Christian admitted.

“Of course you did. Why wouldn’t I bring them up? They’re proof that there is nothing particularly moral in Christianity.”

“Well, in that we certainly disagree.”

“You think there was something noble in the crusades?”

“Not in the killing, of course, but in that there was a time when man believed in something enough to cross a continent on foot; to leave their families and their lands and to accomplish something for God. That being said, the moment the first innocent blood was shed on the battlefield, whatever nobility was forsaken. The crusades, at least at first, represented something good, but resulted in something tragic—a stain against our own faith--a stain that will be remembered for as long as man cares about his own history.”

“A stain well-deserved. So you admit that religion has a tendency to kill.”

“I can’t speak for religion.”

“Then why are we having this conversation?”

“So I can speak for Christianity.”

“Then speak for it.”

“Christianity has murdered no one.”

“You’ve already admitted to the atrocities of the Crusades! Millions died!”

“I agree that it is atrocious whenever one man murders other, certainly.”

“And what of when Christians murder?”

“Then they have only proven themselves to not understand Christianity.”

“Nevertheless, it certainly happens.”

“No, I really don’t think it does. Don’t you see the fallacy of your argument?”

The skeptic tilted his head in curiosity.

“What fallacy is that? The fallacy of observation? Of historical research?”

“No, the fallacy of believing everything that a person says about himself. You’ve fallen prey to the fallacy of believing that every man who claimed to be a Christian is a Christian, and it is just as clear a fallacy as any. You believe that if a knight announces his intention to fight for God, and prays for God’s help in killing Muslims, then the blood ought to be on God’s hands rather than the knight’s. You believe that if Hitler offered some perversion of Biblical quotations before condemning Jews to the gas chambers then the Bible itself is somehow guilty of the crime, or if some nights claim to be on an errand from God then God is culpable for their actions. You believe these things even though a child could tell you that these actions are explicitly forbidden in the same book they claim as their guide! If a man wanders into your home claiming to be a plumber and, instead of fixing your pipes, robs you blind, would you forever blame all plumbers for the theft? If a man wanders into the Himalayas and dies because he is carrying a guidebook to the Swiss Alps and loses his way, would you condemn the publisher of that book, or would you rightly blame the man who believed that it would guide him? When you open up the Bible—when you look to the words of Christ and his Apostles—do you see anything that would suggest that the actions of the crusades are justified? Do you find that any murder is justified? Doesn’t the Bible clearly tell its readers that when we are acted against we ought to endure rather than retaliate? Aren’t you appealing to some baser instinct when you issue such condemnation? Aren’t you appealing to your own flight from the hound of heaven? In my experience, those who strive the hardest against Christianity are those who are at the same time fleeing from it in fear—fear of being transformed to some uncomfortable newness.”

“I’m not fleeing from Christianity,” said the skeptic, taking offense at the accusation. “People who run from things are willing to just leave them alone. I’m not leaving Christianity alone—I’m trying to destroy it.”

“A hopeless pursuit,” said the Christian confidently.

The skeptic shook his head.

“I think Nietzsche was right. God is already dead. Some are just forever lost in the past and haven’t realized it yet.”

“Or, on the other hand, maybe Nietzsche was wrong and you just haven’t realized it yet. After all, it’s been well over a century since he made that claim—you would think that we would see some signs of God’s demise, wouldn’t we?”

“More nations were progressive enough to rid themselves of faith in the twentieth century than ever before! I call that progress.”

“And you would dare accuse the Christian of atrocities?” the Christian allowed some emotion into his voice. “You thought the crusades and the Inquisition too bloody for your taste, and yet you hold the atheist regimes of the twentieth century up as pillars of progress? Don’t you know that the nations that ‘progressively’ sought to kill God are the nations that saw the most bloodshed?”

“Atheism can hardly be blamed for genocide. I’m an atheist and I’ve got no patience for murder. Denying the supernatural doesn’t make one evil.”

“But the atheist has no doctrines explicitly forbidding it, apart from those drafted by men—but men can be wrong.”

“Maybe so, but that is the benefit of civilization—the same progress that Christianity seeks to put a stop to.”

“Surely I don’t need to tell you that western civilization is a direct product of Christianity, but never mind that, I’ll let the ignorance of that accusation go for a moment in order to address the more important question: Civilization didn’t teach us not to kill, it just codified what we already knew. We all know that it’s wrong to kill. God’s given enough grace even to the atheist to know that much. And you’ve helped make my point. Horrors may have been committed alike by those who profess Christianity and those who profess atheism, but if a Christian commits an offense it is entirely opposed to the nature of his belief—it is a sign that he does not understand the faith he identifies with. If an atheist commits an offense… well… then it is really just that. He has only broken the laws of men; so he really has broken no law higher than himself.”

“I really don’t see your point.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to. My point is only that one cannot possibly commit an atrocity while actively pursuing Christianity; one cannot be simultaneously filled with both hate of another and love of God. Evil is precisely the opposite of what Christianity stands for. While I don’t deny that there are bad men who claim to be Christians, I can very confidently say that their evil is an aberration, and not the result of their allegiance. My point is that the same cannot be said of the humanist.”

“I can’t say that I’m entirely comfortable with your conclusion,” said the Skeptic uneasily.

“You really shouldn’t be. But that is both why Christianity will never die and why it will always be worth saving.” 

Human Nature and the Beatitudes

“And He lifted up His eyes on His disciples, and said:

‘Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied.

Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.

Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil on account of the Son of Man! Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven...’”

                                                            Luke 6:20-23

Rejoice when hated? Take pride in poverty, hunger, and sadness? Of the many teachings of Jesus, the “beatitudes” are some of the most beloved, but, quite frankly, also the least understood.

The entire Sermon on the Mount stand as one of the few philosophical statements from Jesus that receives almost universal acclaim as being “good”, even to those who think very little of the man who gave it. Critics who cast endless dispersions upon those who follow Christ, regularly concede that there is some value to be gained from these particular teachings. And yet, unless one believes that Jesus was the Son of God, the Beatitudes amount to nothing.

How can any of these statements possibly be accepted by those who do not also accept Christ? How can anyone holding fast to a humanist worldview, believing in humanist philosophy, hold any regard for a sermon that makes an absolute mockery of all human ideals and utterly disregards the observations of human philosophy? The stream of seeming contradictions that make up the Sermon on the Mount absolutely cannot be appreciated by any true philosopher of man, and it should prove positively idiotic to the social Darwinist.

The poor humanist cannot possibly believe that there is anything “blessed” about their poverty, and they certainly cannot believe in the foolish promise of, not just financial security, but an entire kingdom! The hungry humanist demands bread now, not some casual promise of future sustenance! The mourning humanist cannot imagine how anyone could possibly offer the promise of future laughter!

And, worse, Matthew’s gospel adds something even more profoundly foolish to this list of blessings: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God,” and, “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” Humanist like these words; they repeat it to themselves over and over, reveling in the gentle warmth of their sentiment; they might even quote them from time to time to support their own arguments. But make no mistake—these statements are absolutely absurd! The meek may be praised, but no rational human could believe that the destiny of the meek is that of conqueror! Not even the greatest writer of fiction could make believable the image of a meek, passive monk conquering the throne of the earth by the force of his gentleness. That the meek might inherit the earth is something that everyone would like to hope for, but which only the Christian can truly believe.

Human nature, as the honest philosophers point out, does not lead toward meekness. It is not to glorify poverty or hunger. It is certainly not to rejoice in persecution or hatred. The honest philosophers of man—Friedrich Nietzsche, Ayn Rand, Jean Paul Sartre are among the few—admit the truth: without God there is no real value in meekness. The destiny of the peacemaker is destruction at the hands of the warmonger; the poor and hungry must necessarily die to make way for those more fit to live. Peacemakers will inherit nothing but the right to be trampled underfoot by the warmongers. This is how things have existed for thousands of years, and the truth shows no signs of changing any time soon.

Christ alone knew that the path to human happiness was for men to behave contrary to our nature; thus, in Christianity, the poor (Matthew adds “poor in spirit”) and hungry truly are blessed, even though the rich might have the power; the peacemakers truly are blessed, even though the warmongers trample them under foot; the meek truly are blessed because of the promise to inherit the earth, even though today it is without question that the proud and the haughty that rule our nations and command our armies. The humanist may like to preach only peace and love, but the reality of the world is that peace and love are weaknesses; the will to achieve power and the willingness to ignore the plight of our fellow men is what allows for success in the world. It is impossible to deny the truth that survival does, in fact, belong to the fittest—and there is really no context in which the poor, the peacemakers, or the meek could be seen as the fittest.

The beatitudes do not amount to “good ideas by a good man.” How can one possibly find value in the promise of inheriting the Kingdom of God without first believing in God? How can one believe in the promise that the mourning shall be comforted when they can simply open their eyes to the reality of this world and see the countless despairing, uncomforted individuals dying each day? I do not believe that the evils of the world ought to lead anyone to reject God; but I strongly believe that they ought to be enough to convince us to reject the foolish notion that Jesus, if nothing more than a human philosopher, had good ideas.

As a human philosopher, Jesus Christ demonstrated an absolute inability to understand humanity; he was no better than any seminar prophet or self-help guru of the 21^st century. As the Son of God, however, Jesus Christ offered humanity the only real hope it will ever know. The beatitudes amount to either terrible, delusional ideas of a man who never understood his own species or they amount to the true words of a God who alone offered the miracle of saving men from themselves.

The Evolution of Fallen Man

The Literature of the Heretics, pt. 6

“The human brain runs first-class simulation software. Our eyes don’t present to our brains a faithful photograph of what is out there, or an accurate movie of what is going on through time...I say all this just to demonstrate the formidable power of the brain’s simulation software. It is well capable of constructing ‘visions’ and ‘visitations’ of the most utmost veridical power. To simulate a ghost or an angel or a Virgin Mary would be child’s play to software of this sophistication.” – Richard Dawkins

“Religion is not provided to us by revelation, it doesn't come from the heavens, it doesn't come from the beyond, it doesn't come from the divine. It's man-made. And it shows. It shows very well - that religion is created, invented, imposed by a species half a chromosome away from the chimpanzee.” – Christopher Hitchens

First, I should mention a source of agreement I have with both Hitchens and Dawkins: we share at least one foundational premise when discussing humanity. We can all agree that humanity falls short of perfection, and that any human claiming otherwise has not thought to look at the world around him before making his claim. I, like the world I live on, am far from perfect; I sometimes mistakenly believe things that are lies, I sometimes tell lies myself, I am selfish, proud, angry, arrogant, etc. The one thing that allows me to live with these truths is the knowledge that everyone else is in the same boat.

Now, the difference (which is of immeasurably greater consequence than the agreement): I see these imperfections as a consequence of sin, while the heretics as genetic malformations brought on by incomplete evolutionary processes. Furthermore, they tend to believe the very idea of sin to be depraved (“What kind of ethical philosophy is it that condemns every child, even before it is born, to inherit the sin of a remote ancestor?”-Dawkins), while I would only go so far as to say that their evolutionary answer to be fundamentally wrong-headed.

I understand that these authors believe the evolutionary imperfections of man have led to all of the great evils of the world (in my last post I gave an example of Hitchens relating wars with the fact that we have not yet “evolved” into fully rational beings), and that religion is a mere symptom of our mind’s ability to play tricks on us (as Dawkins implies in the quote at the beginning of this post). That much is easy enough to understand, but it leads me to a bit of an impasse: I have reason to say that man is imperfect because I am aware of a standard of perfection. God. I am aware that I am fallen because I am aware of the heights to which I am called. The other side is not afforded such perspective. The heretic, though blessed with a common grace he may never understand, is aware that there is something wrong, yet he cannot possibly define it, as he believes in nothing that can be used in comparison. He thinks war and murder are wrong because he knows in his heart that life is valuable, but he cannot offer a convincing argument as to why. He believes we just need to evolve further, but evolve into what? Into Nietzsche’s “Übermensch”? A genetically pure, physically perfect superman? I know it is in bad taste to do so, but how can one avoid making comparisons here with Naziism when one speaks of the evolution of man? After all, would humanity really sit idly by and allow itself to progress naturally when we have the means to help nature along? Hitchens even comes dangerously close to a wholesale endorsement of Eugenics: “Sad though (abortion) is, it is probably less miserable an outcome than the vast number of deformed or idiot children who would otherwise have been born, or stillborn, or whose brief lives would have been a torment to themselves and others.” I have tried hard (and done a good job, I think) of keeping civil in my discourse so far, but how can one not be driven to anger at such a sentiment? It is a statement of pure evil. Evil in the truest, most objective sense of the word. And yet, that is how the heretic believes that the human species might one day evolve itself free from sin.

To put it bluntly: The facts show otherwise. History has capably demonstrated that we cannot simply “evolve” into perfection (not that such a being, to the heretics, can objectively exist). Even if we were to systematically abort all of the potentially weaker members of our species (something that I am not sure is not already happening to some extent), survival of the fittest will never successfully weed out the things that make us human, either for better or for worse. It will never rid us of our pride or selfishness just as it will never rid us of our love or our need to worship. We simply cannot transform ourselves into anything either more or less than human.

At least the heretics admit that we are not perfect; that our minds play tricks on us; that reason and logic cannot always be trusted.

...and yet, they seem perfectly willing to do just that.

Both Hitchens and Dawkins demonstrate an exceptional willingness to believe in their own exceptional logic, while simultaneously admitting that mankind has been “hoodwinked” for thousands of years and tricked into believing in religions. They do not seem to understand that they are, as we all are, looking at the world and seeing only those things that support what they hope to be true. It does not mean that their words are all lies (though they are not immune to lying, as I could easily point out); it means that they are selective and they apply the reasoning that best confirms previously-held beliefs. This is the fundamental undercurrent of all human thought that ever was or ever will be (including my own)—and it really ought to be stated aloud every now and then. None of us are free of bias; no author of an historical work can fully remove himself from his text; no debater can avoid making the evidence support him.

It is easy for the undiscerning reader to be puzzled by reviews of Biblical history by historians claiming to be either impartial or merely skeptical. We place far too much weight in the words of those who declare themselves experts, who comb the scriptures for any apparent anachronism; who scour the linguist anomalies of the authors, seeking some slight oddity to which they can grab hold. It is easy to forget that when we are reading commentaries and criticism we are only reading the words of men just as error-prone and biased as we are, and they need to be accepted as such.

It is even easier, perhaps, to accept the word of the scientist, who is merely trying to pull back the veil of nature—what could be more objective than that? But the truth is very different. Science is not immune from bias; in fact, one could argue that science is more blatantly prone to bias than most professions, as a great portion of modern science lies in interpretation rather than empiricism, and a great majority of scientists believe that one of their tasks is to throw God (and believers in God) for a loop.

My point is simply this: Both Hitchens and Dawkins spend a tremendous amount of time and effort in assuring their readers that much of religion can be reduced to “trickery” of the brain, and yet both men admittedly worship at the altar (a phrase chosen particularly because both men would find it distasteful) of human reason, a thing (as I previously explained) that is very nearly a myth itself.

Now, what are we to do with these imperfections if we cannot simply breed it out of our species? What are we to do with sin if we cannot simply make ourselves into better people? The short answer is that we can do nothing at all, which makes it all the more fortunate that there is a God who can. Humanity is at its best when it is seeking after the God of the Bible (note that I did not write, “when it is seeking after religion”—the difference is crucial); sin is at its least when we are attempting to imitate Christ. The point of Christianity, no matter what the heretics might claim (over and over and over) is not to belittle us by pointing continually to our sin, but to free us of sin. The book of Romans states very explicitly that we were once slaves to sin but now we are free. We are already free; we do not have to wait to advance to our next evolutionary state; we do not have to wait until the universities learn how to better indoctrinate us or the government learns how to better control us. If we are in Christ we are free from sin.

That is my point.

The Myth of Pure Reason

The Literature of the Heretics, pt. 5

“Reason has built the modern world. It is a precious but also a fragile thing, which can be corroded by apparently harmless irrationality. We must favor verifiable evidence over private feeling. Otherwise we leave ourselves vulnerable to those who would obscure the truth.” – Richard Dawkins

“Past and present religious atrocities have occurred not because we are evil, but because it is a fact of nature that the human species is, biologically, only partly rational.” – Christopher Hitchens

Our (biological) inability to be entirely rational prevents humans from achieving perfect peace with one another. It is this irrationality, surely a vestigial trait not (yet) weeded out by the process of evolution, that causes strife and chaos and, perhaps most importantly, blindly guides us toward religion.

But for the general tone of negativity, I can almost agree with that sentiment. We are, in fact, only partly rational; and our utter inability to act entirely according to reason is, indeed, a defining factor in who we are as humans. It is the thing that carries us toward religion; the thing that makes us quarrel and either agree or disagree. But my disagreement is in this: I strongly believe that our not-all-there rationality is perhaps the single most beautiful element of humanity. It is our most defining characteristic and the one we should be the most grateful for. It is not erroneous or vestigial—it is purposeful and beneficial.

As for the two quotations above, therefore, I partially agree with the latter, but disagree almost entirely with the former. Reason, no matter what Dawkins may believe, has hindered as much as it has helped in building the modern world; and those who have chosen to look beyond reason have brought us the invaluable spark that makes us human in the first place. As for Hitchens, I agree with his statement, but for the implication that our inability to reason fully is a hurdle over which we must jump. In fact, pure reason is perhaps the one thing that, when obtained, can actually steal the humanity from a human.

Pure reason is no more an evolutionary leap than would be growing a second appendix. To become creatures of pure reason we would become mere creatures; our great leap would actually prove a tremendous and tragic fall.

This is a significant truth missed almost entirely by the heretics, and only rarely considered by those of us to whom it should be the most important: reason is absolutely not the thing that makes us human. It is not the thing that turns a civilization into an advanced civilization, or a world into a modern world. The truth is exactly the opposite: what makes us human is that we are not saddled with the burden of pure reason.

The man of pure reason, by definition, thinks that all men must strive toward reason as the next step in his advancement, but they forget that it is only by transcending reason that we are human in the first place. It is not our scientific achievement that brings us beyond the apes, nor our understanding of mathematics, but our ability to see that reason is not a thing to be worshipped, but to be transcended.

Want to see a creature of pure reason? Observe an earthworm. Pure reason means nothing more than survival; it cannot, by definition, mean anything more than that. It means responding instinctively to stimuli and nothing more; the earthworm is hungry, so it eats dirt; it is full, so it excretes; it has an instinct to reproduce, so it finds a lady earthworm.

This is, of course, the sort of creature that Richard Dawkins takes great pains in proving man to be—a creature of pure instinct; exactly the sort of creature evolution has produced. Religion? It is a biological necessity. Love and charity? Genetic modifications evolved to create more stable colonies, like so many ants on a hill.

When I say, therefore, that stepping beyond reason is the thing that separates us from the animals, Dawkins and Hitchens might, in fact, agree; because to them we are no different. Dawkins makes this point while offering the evolutionary argument in favor of abortion-on-demand: “The humanness of an embryo’s cells cannot confer upon it any absolutely discontinuous moral status. It cannot, because of our evolutionary continuity with chimpanzees and, more distantly, with every species on the planet.” A human life, he therefore argues, cannot be differentiated from the life of any other creature. This is the danger (one of many) of a pure reason; it demands that we refuse to honor thoughts of human uniqueness; it bogs us down into an ethical mire necessitated by utter dependence on evolutionary explanations; it opens the door for social darwinism and every evil associated with it.

Those are the negative arguments; the arguments against pure reason. But the negative should never be the most important argument. The most important must always be the positive; the argument in favor of transcending reason. This is the most important argument, and it is merely this: man’s ability to glance, even if only partially, beyond the veil of reason, is the first step in the direction of worship. I have argued before—and I think that it is one of the most perfect arguments in favor of God if rightly understood—that man is a creature made to worship, and we are only enabled to do so because we are not dominated by the burden of pure reason. This is not a flaw, it is a magnificent element of perfectly executed design. If we were creatures of pure reason we would certainly be able to create shelters, but never architecture. We might draw pictograms, but we could never create art. We might write rational correspondence, but never literature. We might make use of tools, but we would never use those tools to satisfy our wholly irrational curiosity; we would never build particle accelerators or blast rockets into space.

Indeed—the very same irrationality that leads us to worship is the irrationality that makes us curious about our world; the irrationality that enables our species to become scientists in the first place is the drive that pagan scientists hope to root out and destroy. When Hitchens says that, “We are not immune to the lure of wonder and mystery and awe: 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...” he is only saying that he himself has not yet succumbed to pure reason. To sit in awe of the universe is to feel the throbbing, pulsing need to worship. To appreciate the artistic qualities of literature is to throw off the shackles of reason and exist, for at least a moment, as a transcendent being. Hitchens may openly deride the Christian’s “resistance of the rational,” but he is just as prone to this resistance as I am; he simply has not learned to enjoy it as I have.

One needn’t worry about those who would seek to destroy the imagination in favor of pure reason. I am confident that such a thing is impossible; it is chasing after the wind. Man can suppress himself all he likes, but he can never truly steal his own humanity.

One final note on this subject: Reason, it must be remembered, is not a bad thing. Reason is what keeps us alive while our ability to transcend reason makes life worth living. What makes us human is that we have transcended reason while not doing away with it altogether. And what makes Christians unique is that we, alone, seem to have understood this. As Chesterton explained, “The substance of all paganism is that it is an attempt to reach the divine reality through the imagination alone; in its own field reason does not restrain it at all... But in reality the rivers of mythology and philosophy run parallel and do not mingle till they meet in the sea of Christendom. Simple secularists still talk as if the Church had introduced a sort of schism between reason and religion. The truth is that the Church was actually the first thing that ever tried to combine reason and religion.”

To the heretics, the ideal is a man of pure reason, which robs him of his humanity. To the pagan, the ideal is a man entirely divorced from reason; who lives only in the heights of heaven and never lets his feet down to earth. To the Christian, the ideal is a man to whom reason is a gift, but the ability to see beyond reason a far greater gift; a man who at once seeks rational truth about the world created for him and who falls to his knees in worship of He who created it.

Man Seeks God

The Literature of the Heretics, pt. 3

This might be considered a bit of a sidebar in relation to this present series, which has focused on my rebuttals regarding two very specific books by two very specific heretics: The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, and God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens. I do have every intention of getting back to those books, but I want to use this one post to address another work that I have just read, by another heretic I have learned to pity.

The book is Man Seeks God: My Flirtations with the Divine, and the heretic is a talented writer (but terrible theologian) named Eric Weiner. Weiner is, for all intents and purposes, an agnostic, which may seem odd, considering I have already labeled him a heretic. I stand by the label; however, as I believe that this particular brand of agnosticism may amount to one of the most powerful, dangerous, and prevalent forms of heresy.

Reading the book wasn’t my idea. I was far more focused on the literature of the “true” heretics—the well known God-haters, who have provided me no lack of material. But the book presented itself before me in the form of a Christmas gift from my grandmother this year, and I couldn’t help but read it when she gave me her reason for the purchase: “I thought you might like to argue with it,” she said. Who can deny that this is one of the most perfect reasons a grandmother has ever thought to give her grandchild anything—a devout Christian grandmother gives her devout Christian grandchild a book, not for edification or entertainment, but that he might have the glorious challenge of argument. If only all 86 year old women were as enlightened.

So I read it, happily seeking the aforementioned argument, but I admit that from the very beginning I was disappointed. I found in the pages of this book, much to the dismay of the inveterate iconoclast within, that there is nothing here to argue with; nothing tangible enough to fight. Even thinking of taking up arms against the whimsical search for religion in this book is as futile as taking a sword to the body of a ghost; no matter how perfect or true the strikes, one is really only ever swinging at the air.

For the record, the book is the account of a young agnostic who, faced with a medical emergency, is confronted with the question, “Have you found your god yet?” The question intrigues him and inspires him to travel the globe, investigating the pros and cons of some of the world’s most popular and intriguing religions. Every priest, rabbi, shaman and monk is given fair treatment; every faith is treated as equally valuable; every religion seems to have an even weight of pros and cons. In the end (at the risk of ruining it), the conclusion is just as non-committal as the search: “So, instead of looking for my God, I must invent Him. Not exactly invent. Construct. Assemble. His foundation is Jewish, but His support beams are Buddhist. He has the heart of Sufism, the simplicity of Taoism, the generosity of the Franciscans, the hedonistic streak of the Raelians...” and so on. Hopefully you get the picture.

This is, roughly, the content of the book. How does one possibly argue with something so lacking in any real value or weight? Or, a better question, where do I even start? So it is not the content of this book that I am addressing, but the lack thereof; it is not the theology (or even lack of theology) that I find concerning, but the overall sense that theology does not matter. It is not that the author did not find truth; it is that he treated truth as if it does not matter. As far as I’m concerned, it is not orthodoxy or heterodoxy that proves the state of society, but the question of whether or not society understands that things such as orthodoxy and heterodoxy so much as exist in the first place. Chesterton once said that “there are some people—and I am one of them—who think that the most practical and important thing about a man is still his view of the universe. We think that for a landlady considering a lodger, it is important to know his income, but still more important to know his philosophy. We think that for a general about to fight an enemy, it is important to know the enemy’s numbers, but still more important to know the enemy’s philosophy. We think the question is not whether the theory of the cosmos affects matters, but whether, in the long run, anything else affects them.”

What I mean is simply this: what could be more important than the question of God? And why would anyone embark on such an absurd quest as to find “his” god—as if there is some unique deity awaiting him in the heavenly realms, a specially tailored, perhaps genetically altered, cosmic being perfectly suited to his tastes and proclivities. One cannot help but understand the sad truth of this question: though the title of the book may bear the name God, complete with capital “G”, the book only ever sets its sights on the small “g” gods. The author is concerned, not with truth, but with perception. Not with theology, but with personal fulfillment.

The question the author faces is one I hope no one in my audience can relate to. “Have you found your god?” What a difference a word makes! Who would have thought that the inclusion of a little pronoun like “your” could turn a  question of eternal importance into a question of abysmal impotence. A non-question, really. It can turn the most important question in the universe into a question that could almost have no less impact. (The purist, it might be noted, will take the argument a step further, reminding us that, even without the “your” it is an improper question, as it is God who does the finding, but I’m not prepared to entertain those hopeless theologians here)

Suffice it to say, to find one’s own “god” is not to find God. To suggest that one may search the panoply of the gods of the religions of the world in order to find the one deity fitting one’s personal hopes and expectations is to neuter the very concept of deity beyond all recognition. In fact, could there be a more powerful rejection of God then to believe that one could fold him up and carry him around in the neat little box of our expectations? Why would anyone even want to seek such a weak creature?

But this is precisely what happens here. The author strives to create a perfectly-balanced presentation of a number of different faiths, showing mostly sympathetic images of the various “gods” sought by men all over the world, each chapter ending with the same indecisive shrug—a quick “this isn’t quite what I was looking for”, and a “let’s try another one.” It goes without saying that the search is doomed from the start.

So what have I brought out of all of this?

First: I will gladly say that I would rather read Dawkins or Hitchens any day of the week, for those men may be classic heretics, but at least there is some conviction in their heresy. At least they aren’t wandering the globe in a vain, self-centered search for the “-ism” that best matches their personalities. At least they give me something to argue against.

Second: My own faith is reaffirmed, as I am reminded that my hope is placed in the “Word made flesh”, who came to us in Grace and in Truth. I find my spiritual comfort in Christianity’s grace—it’s devotion to a perfect love that is unconditional and unending—and I find my intellectual comfort in Christianity’s truth—it’s assertion that the one who has found the Word has found the truth; a truth that is absolute and unchanging; a truth that frees one from the pursuit of religion and sets him on the path toward true freedom.

The Misunderstood Word

The Literature of the Heretics, pt. 2

“To be fair, much of the Bible is not systematically evil but just plain weird, as you would expect of a chaotically cobbled-together anthology of disjointed documents, composed, revised, translated, distorted and ‘improved’ by hundreds of anonymous authors, editors and copyists, unknown to us and mostly unknown to each other, spanning nine centuries.” – Richard Dawkins

“...just like the Old Testament, the “New” one is also a work of crude carpentry, hammered together long after its purported events, and full of improvised attempts to make things come out right.” –Christopher Hitchens

If Dawkins and Hitchens are to be believed—a presumption that goes without saying for many of my readers—the greatest, most powerful tool to wield against the rising tide of Biblical indoctrination is nothing more complex than the reading of the Bible. The greatest threat to Christianity, so they imply, is that the Bible is actually read. Nothing could be more detrimental to the faith than that it be made to actually experience these poorly “cobbled-together”, poorly planned (Dawkins says of the Gospels that, “(those) that made it into the official canon were chosen, more or less arbitrarily, out of larger sample of at least a dozen including the Gospels of Thomas, Peter, Nicodemus, Philip, Bartholomew and Mary Magdalene,” which tells me that he has both never read any of these “alternative” gospels and that he has never bothered to understand the complexity and drama of canonization) scriptures.

Indeed, surely by reading the scriptures one could not possibly miss the terrible truth discovered by Hitchens: “It would be hard to find an easier proof that religion is man-made. There is, first, the monarchical growling about respect and fear, accompanied by a stern reminder of omnipotence and limitless revenge, of the sort with which a Babylonian or Assyrian emperor might have ordered the scribes to begin a proclamation. There is then a sharp reminder to keep working and only to relax when the absolutist says so. A few crisp legalistic reminders follow, one of which is commonly misrendered because the original Hebrew actually says “thou shalt do no murder.’” While I, personally, have been unable to find the proof of a man-made religion in these rambling points, certainly, by simply picking up the Bible, one could not possibly miss it. Could they?      

To be fair, one of the tragedies of Christian history is that for some centuries the church did at least appear to agree with this sentiment, and kept the scriptures out of the hands of the lay parishioners out of fear that they did not have the appropriate aptitude to understand them. Perhaps, the state of education and literacy being what they were, there was some truth to this, but their extreme dogmatism about it leads one to seriously doubt their faith in the Word of God.

The truth that seemed to escape the early Catholic Church as well as the modern skeptic, however, is that this weapon is more prone to backfiring than a child’s slingshot (personal experience). I do agree with both Dawkins and Hitchens that there is a remarkable (and perhaps even mystifying) diversity to the scriptures—an almost unimaginable roster of authors of every background, a multitude of styles, written over a tremendously long span of time. And yet, no classic of literature or survey of history stands up as perfectly under repeated readings.

The Bible, in fact, seems to be only truly understood and appreciated under thorough investigation—the thorougher the better. Sure, we have all heard stories of the skeptic or the furious God-hater who, in a misguided effort to prove their hatred, took to the scriptures, only to find their faith (or, rather, lack of faith) shattered by sudden revelation. These stories exist (and they are not entirely uncommon), but I think that they prove a noteworthy and beautiful exception rather than the rule. I gladly accept these sudden conversions as works of miracle rather than logic.

But there are always miracles in the scriptures—some obvious and some hidden.

Here is one of the smaller, often missed miracles: Repeated readings of scripture yields the very opposite of doubt. Though logic might suggest that to look too closely at a single work of literature would inevitably make its flaws all the more glaring and its imperfections all the more noteworthy, the truth, at least in my experience (despite my background in literary criticism) and in the experience of countless others, is very much the opposite. Reading the Bible makes even the perceived “inaccuracies” melt away as the pieces of the larger narrative and the greater theology fall into place. Though the complexity of the book may, indeed, make a first reading (especially if unguided) somewhat disorienting and, in fact, somewhat strange, only a superficial examination of the scriptures or a severe prejudice could lead one to the conclusion that there is nothing remarkable about the continuity on display.    

Even a strong believer can be negatively stricken by skeptic who provides only lists of the Bible’s most “difficult” moments out of context (as both Hitchens and Dawkins do quite capably, effortlessly weaving their witty commentary with non-contextual passages of scriptures that seem to portray a vicious, selfish God). I readily admit that I cannot read the works of the skeptics without at least faint pangs of... doubt may be too strong a word, but it is something along those lines; maybe something more along the lines of disquiet. It is a feeling that, true to the intent, at first makes me want to recoil from scripture, but I know that this is the wrong reaction. Alas! It is only by looking into scripture—toward the Word of God—that I find the welcome cure.

There is a difference—and not a subtle difference—between the words of the Bible and the WORD of God. The skeptic may freely attack the former but is absolutely powerless over the latter. The first is a collection of letters forming words, words forming phrases, and phrases spelling out ideas, and as such, they may be taken, warped, misunderstood, and bastardized to the heart’s content. The words of the Bible is not the WORD of God that became flesh, that dwelt among us in Grace and Truth.

The WORD is not a mere collection of words. It has little to do with language; it is unaffected by arguments concerning grammar or syntax or morphology or any of the nonsense that I was forced to learn in college. The WORD is not a series of verses held fast by rote memorization and then repeated at Sunday School (though there is inestimable value to this practice, which I genuinely desire to pick up again myself). Knowing the words of the Bible is not knowing the WORD of God. One is tempted to be reminded of Satan himself, who quite ably used scripture to make his own evil point... but that argument seems out of place here—the example of Satan is not worthwhile when directed at those who pointedly do not believe in the existence of such a being. Far more applicable are the arguments of the heretics, who follow firmly in Satan’s footsteps, reading the words but entirely missing the WORD. It is precisely these of whom the Apostle Paul says: “For the WORD of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.’”

I understand that this concept might not be understood by some, and to the skeptic it will seem like nothing more than a logical fallacy. I can only respond by saying that this is how one often sounds when describing a miracle. The fact is that the WORD is not always the thing that a person is looking for. As I said before, there are some who have been reading the words of the Bible in hatred, and yet have suddenly found themselves reading the inexplicable WORD of God. For others, it is only after the words are studied and pored over and held up to the light of scrutiny that it is suddenly transformed into something living and active and sharp—but it is no less a miracle.

But, setting aside that crucial distinction for a moment:

No matter how one looks at scripture, there is power to it. The vehemence with which Hitchens, Dawkins, and the others in their camp attack it is a testament to its strength as well as its continued effects on every facet of our society. This is why I cannot help but feel something when I force myself to read their attacks on the Bible. The truth is, it’s remarkably difficult to read any subjective account of scriptures (whether positive or negative) and not be touched with a pang of something or other—of revelation or anger, hope or doubt. It is impossible, that is, to stand unaffected by scripture, which says something in and of itself. Especially when taken out of context, or given a healthy dose of spin, there is potency to scripture not found in Shakespeare or Dante or Homer, and perhaps it is because it stands as something to be lived by rather than read. Thus we cringe when the Israelites are directed to administer punishment to seemingly harmless minor criminals; thus we are encouraged when told of a God who loves and pursues His chosen ones, even when turned against at every turn; thus we treasure being reminded of God’s faithfulness in providing for His people; thus we treasure the hope of salvation; thus in love we pursue those who are perishing. 

For this reason, I can’t simply ignore the attacks I see continually being made on the scriptures. I must have a response—but I must be careful that it is the right response. If I am touched by pangs of doubt I must respond by facing them head on. I can respond, as the creators of these arguments surely hope, by fleeing from the scripture, allowing the seeds to take root in a purposeful ignorance, willingly living with a deeply-rooted seed of doubt, or (perhaps worse yet), I can retreat to a selective reading of scripture, believing that my faith might be restored by simply acknowledge only those bits and pieces of neutered verse that make me feel good and are easily understood. Or I might, as Thomas Jefferson, quite literally take scissors to the Bible, trimming away those bits and pieces that I find difficult to digest, simply acknowledging that I have not yet learned to chew properly.

But I choose not to take these courses: I choose, instead, the course that feels far less natural; far less intuitive: I accept this subtle pang of doubt and take it into my study of the WORD. It is no accident—and certainly no self-delusion—that those most enthralled with God’s word; those most enamored by its beauty and its divine origins; are those who have most thoroughly familiarized themselves with its intricacies; who have not shied away from those pieces that seem difficult or counter-intuitive. The truly faithful are those who are the least surprised, the least shocked by those who would seek to pit scripture against scripture; who are never fearful of those who have only read the words of the Bible but never known or sought after the WORD of God.

The skeptics have focused the wrath of their reasoning—for they are far too reliant on the unreliable human mind—on an old, stale, unmoving tome of stories and poems—as stagnant in corporeality as Aristotle—and surely find it an odd thing that The Bible should assert itself to be living and active. They cannot understand how anything so ancient and unmoving could be considered as swift or sharp as a sword. They cannot understand that the Word is not a collection of chapters and verses, it is God choosing to speak through such human things as chapters and verses.

One cannot possible expect a humanist to understand that the Bible is a human thing—a collection of chapters and verses—but the WORD is God speaking through this same human thing. Yes, it may seem like a terrible logic trick, to say that there is something hidden and invisible in scripture that only the Christian can see (it is quite circular, isn’t it?), but all I can say is that this is how it appears to be. The Christian sees scripture differently than the humanist; and yet, that is the miracle of the incarnation—that is the mystery of it. Just as God injected Himself directly into human history, so also can He inject Himself into the stubbornness of the human soul. That is certainly one of His greatest miracles.