Skeptical Faith

Google Image I recently happened across clips of the 1997 movie “Life is Beautiful” on YouTube and was reminded that the movie itself is beautiful, and meaningful. The winner of three academy awards, it tells the story of Guido Orefice, a Jewish Italian bookshop owner, who in 1944 - when northern Italy was occupied by the Nazis - was arrested with other family members and taken to a concentration camp. In the camp, Guido tries to hide the horror of their situation from his five-year-old son, Giosue. He tells Giosue that the camp is a complicated game in which “the players” must perform certain tasks, each of which will earn them points. Whoever gets a thousand points first wins a tank. If he cries, complains or says he’s hungry, he will lose points, while quiet boys who hide from the camp guards earn extra points. The Final Task Guido continues with this ruse until the camp begins to shut down as the Allied forces approach. He tells Giosue to stay in a sweat-box until everybo...

Google Image Back when I was writing about medicine and health for The Des Moines Register, I was surprised to learn that people in scientific fields often don’t act rationally. I recall seeing surveys, for instance, showing that a majority of health care workers – doctors, nurses, therapists, etc. – ignore the evidence when it comes to over-the-counter drugs. Namely, a high proportion of them routinely bought brand-named pain killers - like Tylenol instead of generic acetaminophen - which usually carry the name of a retailer. That was the case even though labels show each has exactly the same, and the same amount of, active ingredients. Other studies showed that many doctors and nurses who work in hospitals,  even those who work in surgery,  fail to wash their hands often or adequately enough.  I shouldn’t have been surprised, of course, any more than I am surprised that many who profess a religion, including religious “professionals,” don’t follow the religion’s tea...

Google Image Some years ago, a friend of New York Times opinion columnist Ross Douthat told Douthat that, “If appreciating some of the ideas in St. Augustine’s ‘Confessions’ was enough to make you a Christian, then I’d be a Christian. But a personal God? The miracles? I can’t get there yet.” That’s how Douthat begins his recent, lengthy article in the Times, titled “A Guide to Finding Faith.” Its subtitle: “In the modern era, there are reasons to find the idea of God more plausible than ever.” Douthat, 42, is described by Wikipedia as “ an American conservative political analyst, blogger, author and New York Times columnist. He was a senior editor of The Atlantic. In “A Guide to Finding Faith,” Douthat says that much of his mail about his views is some version of the sentiment expressed by his friend. Sometimes, he writes, “it’s couched in the form of regretful unbelief: ‘ I’d happily go back to church, except for one small detail — we all know there is no Go...

Google Image Are we made in God’s image and likeness or is God made in our image and likeness? The first notion is in Genesis, the first book of the Bible, where it says, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness,” then proceeds to say that humans would have dominion over the earth and its creatures. The second idea, that humans make God in their image and likeness, is a common refrain of critics of religion. In my opinion, both are right, but maybe not in the way the critics would have it. Good Reasons The idea that humans make God in their image is not right in the sense that humans have invented the idea of God. In my view, as I’ve written often in these blogs, there are good reasons to believe in God. But it is correct in the sense that we humans often imagine God the way we want, not how the biblical and theological evidence portrays God, who in the last analysis is unknowable. This is true, especially, of many Christians who ignore biblical and doctrinal descr...

Google Image Every week after publishing these blogs I post a brief summary of the blog’s contents and its accompanying image on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram and email the same to over 100 friends and family members. I regularly hear from a couple of email recipients and get an occasional “like” on Facebook. Otherwise, I get little feedback. I’m unsure what to make of that. Blogger, the blog service I use, provides a daily count of “page views,” and I average a couple hundred views a week. But that doesn’t tell you how many people are actually reading the blog and whether or not they find it useful. It may be that the blog is poorly written or the material boring. I believe it’s also true that many people nowadays have little patience for anything written and not on video. But I think there may be another explanation for the lack of “likes” or shares on Facebook and Instagram, and that is that talking or writing about God or religion is taboo and many would be embarras...