{"id":14207,"date":"2011-02-23T11:58:21","date_gmt":"2011-02-23T17:58:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/community\/jesuscreed\/?p=14207"},"modified":"2011-02-22T09:26:26","modified_gmt":"2011-02-22T15:26:26","slug":"on-suffering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2011\/02\/23\/on-suffering\/","title":{"rendered":"On Suffering"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Tim Dalrymple<\/strong><\/a>, a world class gymnast who broke his neck at Stanford and lost a career, recently wrote a post about suffering and connected his experience with that of acerbic atheist Christopher Hitchens. I like his perception of the instrumental element of suffering as much as the absence of seeking to know the mind of God in our suffering. Good serious piece.<\/p>\n

At a\u00a0recent event<\/a> at the Pew Forum, I asked Hitchens whether he ever doubted his views on God and faith. Immaculate certainty is an essential part of his public persona, but was he ever troubled in the dark of night by the possibility that there is a God who loves him? Hitchens answered (as he did in\u00a0God is Not Great<\/em>) that he is one of those, referenced by Pascal, who is so constituted that he simply cannot believe. (He is misusing Pascal here, but that\u2019s another matter.)\u00a0 Like any skilled debater, Hitchens prides himself on his ability to argue both sides of an argument. In the case of Christianity, he said, he could not even begin to make it seem credible.<\/p>\n

Yet I did not ask whether he could begin to believe the Christian gospel. I asked whether he could begin to doubt his own standpoint. Hitchens, asked whether he ever doubted himself, spoke instead of the doubtfulness of a view that was not his own. The nineteenth-century Danish writer S\u00f8ren Kierkegaard once wrote that false doubt is boastful and delights in pointing out the doubtfulness of other things. True doubt, the doubt that saves, doubts itself over all else. This is what suffering can teach. Suffering shows us our own horizon; it lays bare our weaknesses; it reveals that we, even in those seasons when we felt self-sufficient and invincible, have always been utterly dependent upon God for all things.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tim Dalrymple, a world class gymnast who broke his neck at Stanford and lost a career, recently wrote a post about suffering and connected his experience with that of acerbic atheist Christopher Hitchens. I like his perception of the instrumental element of suffering as much as the absence of seeking to know the mind of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1733,1774],"tags":[2599],"class_list":["post-14207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prayer-and-formation","category-problems-for-faith","tag-timothy-dalrymple"],"yoast_head":"\nOn Suffering<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Tim Dalrymple, a world class gymnast who broke his neck at Stanford and lost a career, recently wrote a post about suffering and connected his experience\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2011\/02\/23\/on-suffering\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"On Suffering\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Tim Dalrymple, a world class gymnast who broke his neck at Stanford and lost a career, recently wrote a post about suffering and connected his experience\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2011\/02\/23\/on-suffering\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Jesus Creed\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-02-23T17:58:21+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2011-02-22T15:26:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Scot McKnight\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Scot McKnight\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2011\/02\/23\/on-suffering\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2011\/02\/23\/on-suffering\/\",\"name\":\"On Suffering\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2011-02-23T17:58:21+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2011-02-22T15:26:26+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#\/schema\/person\/5919e847c58ffe6efb5899fb61797252\"},\"description\":\"Tim Dalrymple, a world class gymnast who broke his neck at Stanford and lost a career, recently wrote a post about suffering and connected his experience\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2011\/02\/23\/on-suffering\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2011\/02\/23\/on-suffering\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2011\/02\/23\/on-suffering\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"On Suffering\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/\",\"name\":\"Jesus Creed\",\"description\":\"Scot McKnight on Jesus and orthodox faith in the 21st century\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/#\/schema\/person\/5919e847c58ffe6efb5899fb61797252\",\"name\":\"Scot McKnight\",\"description\":\"Scot McKnight is a recognized authority on the New Testament, early Christianity, and the historical Jesus. 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