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<\/a>(Public domain photograph by Shane Pope via Wikimedia Commons)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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\u201cIn all areas except religion,\u201d Richard Dawkins claimed in a blogged panel discussion back in 2010, \u201cwe believe what we believe as a result of evidence.\u201d\u00a0 By contrast, he went on to say, religion is \u201ca nonsensical enterprise\u201d that \u201cpoisons everything.\u201d\u00a0 It is a \u201cdelusion,\u201d he wrote in, well, The God Delusion<\/em> ([New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2008], 28), a \u201cpersistent false belief held in the face of strong contradictory evidence.\u201d\u00a0 According to his fellow New Atheist Sam Harris (Letter to a Christian Nation<\/em> [New York: Vantage Books, 2008], 230-231), \u201cFaith is generally nothing more than the permission religious people give one another to believe things strongly without evidence.\u201d\u00a0 In his bestselling book The End of Faith<\/em>, Harris writes<\/p>\n Tell a devout Christian that his wife is cheating on him, or that frozen yogurt can make a man invisible, and he is likely to require as much evidence as anyone else, and to be persuaded only to the extent that you give it.\u00a0 Tell him that the book he keeps by his bed was written by an invisible deity who will punish him with fire for eternity if he fails to accept every incredible claim about the universe, and he seems to require no evidence whatsoever.\u00a0 (Sam Harris, The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason<\/em> [New York: W. W. Norton, 2004], 15)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n But is this true?\u00a0 Do Harris and Dawkins themselves supply any evidence to justify their claims?\u00a0 Do Christians, and theists generally, really have no reason at all for what they believe?\u00a0 Are there no theistic philosophers or scientists, for instance, who seriously reflect on their faith and who advance evidence and arguments in support of it?\u00a0 (I won\u2019t keep you in suspense:\u00a0 There are<\/em>.\u00a0 And more than a few of them.\u00a0 One needn\u2019t accept their arguments<\/em> in order to acknowledge that they exist<\/em>.)<\/p>\n In his book The Selfish Gene<\/em>, Dawkins cites the story of the apostle Thomas \u2013 \u201cdoubting Thomas,\u201d as he\u2019s often called \u2013 to illustrate his assertion that Christianity requires \u201cblind faith.\u201d<\/p>\n You will recall the story:\u00a0 Jesus appears to the disciples after his resurrection, but Thomas is not present on that occasion.\u00a0 Afterwards, he refuses to believe the disciples\u2019 report until, he says, he has seen for himself, and even touched, the risen Lord.<\/p>\n Not long thereafter, Thomas does in fact see, hear, and touch the resurrected Savior, and he believes:<\/p>\n And Thomas answered and said unto him, My\u00a0Lord\u00a0and my God.<\/p>\n Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.\u00a0 (John 20:28-29)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Jesus rebukes Thomas for not believing without seeing.\u00a0 And isn\u2019t that the very definition of \u201cblind faith\u201d?<\/p>\n But there were strong reasons why Thomas should<\/em> already have believed.<\/p>\n Immediately after the story of \u201cdoubting Thomas\u201d \u2013 not separated from it by even so much as a single verse \u2014 the gospel of John continues, saying,<\/p>\n And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book:<\/p>\n But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.\u00a0 (John 20:30-31)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Plainly, John presumes that faith can be legitimately based upon written accounts of eyewitness testimony.\u00a0 Richard Dawkins is free to dispute such faith, of course, and to reject those accounts, but his insistence that a faith that is based upon confidence in such ancient reports is flatly blind or ungrounded seems, well, groundless.<\/p>\n Curiously, though, while some atheists deny that there is any evidence for belief in God and that there are no arguments to justify it, there are a few Latter-day Saints (probably not a large number) who profess to believe that no evidence or arguments should<\/em> be adduced in support of faith. \u00a0They say \u2013 and I promise that I\u2019m not making this up; it\u2019s been said directly to me, both orally and in writing \u2014 that faith is not really faith if it\u2019s supported by logic or evidence, and accordingly, that efforts to set forth evidence or to adduce reasoned arguments in support or defense of faith are actually anti<\/em>-faith.<\/p>\n This seems to me completely wrong-headed.<\/p>\n For one thing, Jesus himself cited this-worldly evidence and used reasoned argument to support a theological claim that is, otherwise, beyond temporal verification:<\/p>\n Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?<\/p>\n If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not.<\/p>\n But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works: that ye may know, and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him.\u00a0 (John 10:36-38)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n So did the apostle Peter, addressing unbelievers in Jerusalem according to Acts 2:22:<\/p>\n Ye men of Israel, hear these words; Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know.\u00a0 (King James Version)<\/p>\n Fellow Israelites, listen to these words! Jesus the Nazarene was a man whose credentials God proved to you through miracles, wonders, and signs, which God performed through him among you. You yourselves know this.\u00a0 (Common English Bible)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n At Acts 2:20, the apostle Paul points to the natural world itself as a place where evidence about God can be discerned:<\/p>\n For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.\u00a0 (King James Version)<\/p>\n Ever since the creation of the world, God\u2019s invisible qualities\u2014God\u2019s eternal power and divine nature\u2014have been clearly seen, because they are understood through the things God has made. So humans are without excuse.\u00a0 (Common English Bible)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n And, of course, at 1 Corinthians 15:1-9 Paul famously cites a list of human witnesses to the resurrection of Christ in a bid to convince his audience that the event literally occurred.<\/p>\n And such arguments are scarcely limited to the Bible.\u00a0 Consider the Book of Mormon prophet Alma, confronting the anti-Christ Korihor:<\/p>\n And now what evidence have ye that there is no God, or that Christ cometh not? I say unto you that ye have none, save it be your word only.<\/p>\n But, behold, I have all things as a testimony\u00a0that these things are true; and ye also have all things as a testimony unto you that they are true; and will ye deny them? Believest thou that these things are true?<\/p>\n Behold, I know that thou believest, but thou art possessed with a lying\u00a0spirit, and ye have put off\u00a0the Spirit of God that it may have no place in you; but the devil has power over you, and he doth carry you about, working devices that he may destroy the children of God.<\/p>\n And now Korihor said unto Alma: If thou wilt show me a sign, that I may be convinced that there is a God, yea, show unto me that he hath power, and then will I be convinced of the truth of thy words.<\/p>\n But Alma said unto him: Thou hast had signs enough; will ye tempt your God? Will ye say, Show unto me a sign, when ye have the testimony of all these thy brethren, and also all the holy prophets? The scriptures are laid before thee, yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator.\u00a0 (Alma 30:40-44)<\/p>\n \n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n This blog entry was inspired by, and draws on, Sean McDowell and Jonathan Morrow, Is God Just a Human Invention? And Seventeen Other Questions Raised by the New Atheists<\/em> (Grand Rapids: Kregel, 2010), 19-31.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Posted from Park City, Utah<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0 \u00a0 \u201cIn all areas except religion,\u201d Richard Dawkins claimed in a blogged panel discussion back in 2010, \u201cwe believe what we believe as a result of evidence.\u201d\u00a0 By contrast, he went on to say, religion is \u201ca nonsensical enterprise\u201d that \u201cpoisons everything.\u201d\u00a0 It is a \u201cdelusion,\u201d he wrote in, well, The God Delusion ([New […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":28919,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[68,5168,909,837,177,17159],"class_list":["post-99840","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-apologetics","tag-evidence","tag-faith","tag-new-atheism","tag-richard-dawkins","tag-sam-harris"],"yoast_head":"\n\n