So What?

Puppets and Projections

I thought I'd have another go at saying what I was trying to say last night.  When we see a puppet show we suspend our belief that the puppets are simulacre.  We can see they are puppets and yet we are disposed to see them as somehow real.  It is interesting to consider the conditions under which we are willing to do this.

So, I think with today's Dr Who we would be less tolerant of a visible puppet than we were with the classical series.  Even the famous Myrka "pantomime horse" in Warriors from the Deep (below) was somehow tolerable in a way even a subtle lapse would not be today.

Yesterday, I compared our relationship with puppets with the quantum mechanics idea of super-position.  Here something can be both a particle and a wave at the same time, for example.  We project onto the puppet our imaginary rendtition of the thing it represents and so see the (real) puppet and the (pretend) creature at the same time.

But of course, puppets are simply one clear example of what is a much more common experience.  Indeed we project our interpretations all the time.  The goal of any spiritual discipline is to see through our projections to the reality beneath.  How do we know we're seeing the reality beneath?  Well, that is of course what we have to learn. 

This is where the atheists get it wrong of course.  The goal of good religion is to see clearly.  It is not about believing loads of things that are self-evidently not true but seeing the truth behind what is delusional but appears true.

   

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What Does it Mean to Prove God Exists?

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I wonder whether tacit knowledge might help with the perennial debate about the existence of God?  Although atheists sometimes concede God's existence is not in principle provable, my usual experience, especially online, is a demand for proof.

Crawford, in his book The case for working with your hands, tells the story of his father, who was a physicist, making the claim that it is possible to untie a double knotted shoelace by pulling on one end.  Mathematically this is true, or so Crawford claims.  The point is though in real life, you cannot untie a double knotted shoelace in this way.  The problem is the physical properties of the lace have a bearing on what can be done with it.  Whilst mathematically it might be possible, physically it is impossible because shoelaces are made of something.

So, let us assume I have a proof of God's existence.  How do I know it is in fact a proof?  The rules that determine a scientific proof demand we strip a problem down to its basics, ignoring the realities we encounter when things are apprehended in our lives rather than through our heads.

This claim that only formal proofs are valid, gives away the reality of the radical atheist's position.  It is in essence a requirement for control.  It is not a free encounter with reality but one that is determined by prior ideological constraints.  It is an assertion of imperialism over and against the radical call to freedom.  We are told to sacrifice what we experience as true, to a particular partial understanding of our world.  The point is formal knowledge alone is not sufficient to make a chair or mend a motorbike, lat alone encounter God.

But there is a sense in which radical atheists are right.  if you really want proof of God, you need to do what the scientist does.  Scientific proof requires many hours in the lab, applied to getting experiments to work, in the sense of providing reliable results.  Usually this requires the application of significant technical expertise.  Without this dedication we would have no science whatsoever.

What I find difficult to understand is that anyone who wants proof of God, needs to apply themselves to it, in just the same way as the scientist applies herself in the lab.  It's all very well demanding proof but a little odd to condemn those who claim to be believers as having no proof, when you are unwilling to do what is necessary to find out for yourself.

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The Devil as Fundamentalist

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Ok, I can't resist commenting on de Mello's quote in my last post. Two points:

The obvious application is to fundamentalist interpretations of scripture. I'm not saying all fundamentalists make this error but it must be difficult to avoid it.  If you believe in the truth of something sight unseen then it follows you cannot possibly understand it.  However, I think this cuts both ways and also undermines the position of those atheists who insist on proving the existence of God.  Faith is something that is lived and their absolute dependence upon proof substitutes proof for life.  It is of a piece with the insistence on the priority of method over people, I mentioned only yesterday.

Second, I had a phone call the other day.  Would I be able to prepare a topic for our local interfaith group on the theme of spirituality?  Yes, I said warming to the idea of an in-depth exploration of John Wesley's spirituality.  So, you'll do the spirituality of Jesus, then?

Ahhhh ...  My first thought was I didn't think Jesus had a spirituality.  My second thought was to revisit my dissertation study of Matthew's account of the temptations, 4:1 - 11.

As I considered this, I noticed something I hadn't noticed before, after many years of reflection on that text.  Isn't it fascinating that the first story of the adult Jesus in the first book of the New Testament totally debunks a fundamentalist approach to scripture?

Here comes the devil (who is not the hammer horror character of some overwrought imaginations but an angel who is a stickler for doing things right).  His job is to help Jesus face up to his responsibilities as the Messiah.  He does this by reference to Scripture.  Each time Jesus has to fend off his fundamentalist interpretation (based on Israel's contemporary expectations) with his own radical interpretation. 

Jesus does not walk away from that encounter with a scripture based plan - he has rejected all the standard messianic expectations and trusts to what happens on the road.  He trusts as it were to living his life.

If we have to believe in a devil, the devil as fundamentalist fits the bill nicely.

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Conversations with Atheists: A Fundamental Problem

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It should come as no surprise, when theists and atheists enter conversation, there is mutual incomprehension.  I view the world from a theistic perspective.  It would make little sense to call myself a theist if I did not.  The first problem I encounter in conversation with atheists is their expectation I will respond to questions the way they want me to.  This led me into certain difficulties.

The main difficulty I encountered in my recent conversation, was projection.  These atheists appeared to have a particular image of God.  This was projected onto me and other Christians, theists and religious people.  This atheist God is violent, favours the powerful and deludes people.  In short, the opposite of my own experience.

When I pointed this out, I was told to stop messing about.  They're atheists remember.  They have no image of God by definition.  As the conversation progressed it felt as if we swopped places.  I was arguing all images of God are false.  They were trying to show me my view of God was flawed on the grounds that if all images of God are false, it is impossible to say anything of God.  (It didn't stop them!)

I have written at some length about idolatry and projection is an excellent example of its power.  Most religious mystics are true atheists.  They reject all images of God. 

Take for example, the use of the word 'probably'.  I pointed out this doesn't sound very atheistic.  Apparently, the idea is that in the atheist universe God could in theory be proved.  So, it is scientifically accurate to put probably on the front of the sentence, 'God does not exist'.  What this shows of course is a massive mistake of logical typing.  It assumes that God is something that can be proven through scientific methodology.  This places God in a place that makes God an idol.

Now consider the content of their image.  What we have is a group of people who cannot imagine a God who loves people.  This negative image is the only image they have.  Thank goodness they don't believe in it.

Up to a point it is good they claim not to but I think we need to take care here.  What they are doing is projecting their false God onto religious people, much as George W Bush projected his demons onto Muslims.  This is dangerous because I suspect some atheists believe religious people are evil, because of their perceived god of religious people.

Paradoxically, therefore our problem is not their atheism but their theism.  To be a proper atheist,  requires the same spiritual preparation as it would to speak of God from a theistic perspective.  This is why Christians can find common cause with Buddhists, for example, despite their atheism.  Their atheism has more in common with our theism than it has with modern atheism.

I will explore this in more depth later.

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Ten Features of Conversations with Atheists

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I've recently been in conversation with atheists on a discussion board around the theme of 'the fundamental flaw of religion'.  This is the first of a series of posts reflecting upon this exchange in various ways.  It has been an interesting experience and also rather frustrating, doubtless for the atheists as well as for me.  So, this first post is a superficial review of my experiences.  More depth later.

1. There is a profound lack of humour (say what you like about atheism, Flastaffian it ain't).  The last time I encountered something like this was the Christian Socialist Movement.  I was used to the light hearted meetings of the late lamented Alliance of Radical Methodists.  I found the Christian Socialist Movement far too serious and so never really got on with them. 
2. There's also a lot of anger.
3. There is a constant demand for evidence for the existence of God.  What would constitute satisfactory evidence for the existence of God remains a mystery.
4. Contrariwise, many claims are made about the Christian God that are rarely supported with so much as a Bible reference. 
5. There is little appreciation that Christians actually hold a variety of views.  It is frustrating being told that views I have held for many years, alongside many other people, are not Christian. 
6. Indeed I suspect I disappoint because I'm not fundamentalist.
7. I had no sense of being part of a mutual attempt to make sense of human existence.  When I dialogue with Christians from other traditions or people of other faiths, the tendency is to share.  Here I have been unable to find any common ground at all.
8. It feels like the culture is one of suspicion and fear.
9. Overall, the atmosphere is aggressive and dogmatic.
10. Even if we allow the premise that religion is fundamentally flawed, there is little discussion about what practically can be done about it.

These are fairly arbitrary and are very much first impressions.  I'd certainly like to hear of others you would add or refinements.  In my next post I will explain what I see as the main problem with these conversations.

On Imagination: Christianity

One of the debates I've had, with Christians and atheists, is whether Christianity is a materialist faith.

It seems some American Christians are rather touchy about this.  Communism is materialist and they're very scared of communism.  Such debates can be difficult!

One American Christian explained the Old Testament is dualist (matter / spirit) and not monist (matter), as he thought I was claiming.  It seems I had said matter has a spiritual dimension and he was quite certain I had it the wrong way round, spirit has a material dimension.  We also disagreed about dialectical materialism.  Where, he asked, is the thesis, antithesis, synthesis in Christianity?

Whichever way you look at it, matter has a spiritual dimension or spirit has a material dimension, you have a dualism.  The two are set at contradiction with each other.  The Christian writer was correct in saying spirit gives rise to matter, at least insofar as it is easier to see how spirit or consciousness, the perceiver, gives rise to the perceived. 

However, this contradiction between spirit and matter is not resolved by saying one gives rise to the other.  Whichever way round, it implies one is superior to the other.  The Christian faith has been plagued by this false dichotomy that seems to reduce to: spirit good, matter bad.

But what we easily forget is Christianity is neither monist not dualist.  It is Trinitarian and this is why I reject the view that Christianity is not materialist.

The synthesis that transcends the opposition between spirit and matter is implied in the Trinity, where God does not remain spirit but becomes flesh.  Spirit and matter are placed into a new relationship and this is something taking place in our imaginations.

That's the problem for many moderns, we're not prepared to make the effort to imagine how spirit and matter might be married. 

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On Imagination: Religion

One of the most condescending things atheists say about Christians, is Jesus is our imaginary friend.  Our faith is in our imagination, it has no reality in the material world.

Well, yes of course it is.  Where else can we encounter God other than in our imagination?  We create works of art, find our way around our neighbourhood, study the structure of chemical molecules in our imagination.  Why should we not encounter God there too?

I'm not saying God has no reality outside the imagination, just that our imagination is where we encounter God.  Are atheists really saying the imagination is in some sense not valid?  If so, they have a problem.  If imagination is not valid, what are the implications for science?

Christians have a problem too.  It is hard to claim God has an objective reality outside of the imagination because it is not possible to point to any evidence of God's actions outside of the impact imagining God has on human behaviour.

And that in itself is a big problem.  Human imagination is not terribly disciplined - how do we know what we imagine is real, is right, is ethical?

Where the scientist has reality to check results of experiments, the Christian has few things to validate their position.  Methodists identify scripture, tradition, reason and experience.  Most traditions look to a similar list.  But it is hardly surprising traditions cannot agree about everything.

Also our imagination is prone to run away with us.  We project our repressed negative thoughts onto others and onto God.  We project what we know, kings and dictators, onto God and turn God into a monster.  How can we possibly know whether we are imagining the right things?

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On Imagination: Science

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Sometimes debates between atheists and Christians can become rather tedious.  The question of whether or not God exists seems to be endlessly fascinating to some.  However, once you clock there's no possibility of proving either way, the argument seems rather pointless.

One argument is science is materialist and doesn't allow for a spiritual dimension to life.  This assertion, often accepted by both sides, has always seemed dubious to me.

Science like all human activity is an act of imagination.  In an earlier post I explained how all our experiences are subjective.  Science helps us agree about what we perceive.  Its bedrock is replicable experiments.  We can take our local experiences and if they are replicable elsewhere we can add them to a resource of objective observations.  It is that they are replicable that makes them objective.

So, when we say science is materialist, what do we mean?  Do we mean we have found a means to accumulate tried and tested observations, hypotheses, theories about the universe?  A method that is extremely successful.  Or do we mean that in some sense science reflects the universe as it really is?  It is worth asking whether the success of science, as a materialist approach, reflects the universe as it is.

Whilst the universe may be material, the means by which we wrestle with our observations and interpret them is through the imagination.  This is the same means by which we write novels and compose symphonies.  

Think of Kerkule, who discovered the benzene ring after dreaming of the Ouroboros, the serpent holding its tail in its mouth.  Or the many interpretations of quantum mechanics.  The first is an example of a feat of imagination leading to a convergent solution on the specific structure of a specific molecule (although we can't see atoms and so any structure is in some sense imaginary).  The second is an example of a divergent system, where speculations about its meaning are unlikely to lead to consensus.

I'm not denying the effectiveness of scientific method.  I am asking us to be careful when we assume a materialist approach reflects all we can know of the universe.

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Rocking the Foundations of Authority

I found an article by Slavoj Zizek in the New Statesman, dated 5 April 2010 (I'm somewhat behind in my reading).  Incidentally this is the annual God issue; according to the editor, sales always increase for the God issue.  Make of that what you will!

Zizek's article is called Soul of the Party.  He aims to show how Paul (shown preaching in Athens from a cartoon by Raphael in the Sistine Chapel, and used to illustrate the article) used religion to rock the foundations of society.  I have referred to some of the new takes on Radical Paul, particularly the works of John Dominic Crossan and Timothy Ashworth.  Zizek is a communist and so in the eyes of some he cannot be a real Christian.  I addressed this in a recent post. I intend to read his book The Fragile Absolute: Or, Why is the Christian Legacy Worth Fighting For?

Here are a few quotes from the article.  I hope Zizek won't mind me quoting him, he phrases things so well and it would be a pity to lose what he says.

Fyodor Dostoevsky was aware of how God gives us freedom and responsibility - he is not a benevolent master steering us to safety, but one who reminds us that we are wholly unto ourselves.

We are freed in Christ to become more truly ourselves.  Too often the churches insist on moral rectitude, close to the law that Paul argues has been superseded.   Our faith should free us to become perfect, it does not force us into a mould determined by the authorities (religious or secular). Of course, they are threatened by this and so the Christian is anything but steered to safety.

... a God who wholly "became man" ... and who not only "doesn't exist" but also himself knows this, accepting his erasure, entirely passing over into the love that binds members of the Holy Ghost ...

I suppose the atheists will object to this; obviously it is a logical contradiction.  To me it is a re-statement of the incarnation - we cannot know God, except through Jesus.  There is a sense in which God does not exist because God cannot be known to us except through Jesus.  What can a God who does not exist do but send his Son?

For this reason Christianity is anti-wisdom: wisdom tells us that our efforts are in vain, that everything ends in chaos, while Christianity madly insists on the impossible.  ...  This is why Paul said, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise" ...  We should take the term "wisdom" literally here: it is wisdom (in the sense of "realistic" acceptance of the way things are) that Paul is challenging, not knowledge as such.

I think this touches the root problem with atheism.  It is close to the truth, as it rejects false images of God.  But it ends up saying that what is given is all there is.  For many people this is unacceptable - it is the argument of the Lord of the Manor and the wealthy in all times and cultures.  We cannot change things?  Oh, yes?  When Christians buy into the way things are, in effect we are atheists.

"For struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against leaders, against authorities, against the world rulers ... of this darkness, against the spiritual wickedness in the heavens" (Ephesians 6:12) Or translated into todays language: "Our struggle is not against concrete, corrupted individuals, but against those in power in general, against their authority, against the global order and the ideological mystification that sustains it".

I'm sure this is right.  It is our faith in human institutions, including the church, which undermines faith.  This is why violence is not appropriate for Christians, violence identifies the wrong enemies.

Theology and Science: On the Nature of Spirit

Dark matter and dark energy make up 96% of the universe.  So, is God in the dark matter or dark energy?  Well, whatever the truth, it is not true to say there is nowhere in the universe for God to be found.

The problem is, of course, theologians will tell you God the creator is not in the universe; that would be to confuse the creator with the created. 

Perhaps we can search outside the universe?  String theory has 10 dimensions.  Plenty of room for God there, outside the universe as we perceive it.  I'm simply showing it is not illogical to believe in God, there is no evidence for God in any of these places.

For the atheist there is only matter, no spirit.  For the theologian too often matter is inferior to spirit.  This is the old gnostic heresy and is still prevalent amongst many Christians.  Let's look at the theology.

God loves matter.  God is the creator and holds matter in existence - this is part of our foundational belief.  Furthermore, the Christian believes God became incarnate in human flesh. 

This means, whilst the scientist might look for God in dark matter or other dimensions, the Christian seeks God in the stories of Jesus and his followers.  God is not out there somewhere but close by, albeit hidden.

Maybe God is out there somewhere but essentially the God out there is unknowable.  If we want to know God, we must look to the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.  This is the only way we can know anything of the nature of God.

Why is God hidden?  Because God is in the here and now.  God inhabits the world of our senses but is found only by accident, by glimpses or revelations.  No-one can produce proof or be categorical; God is revealed now and then, here and there.  All stories are part of a greater story, all words part of a greater conversation.