A Divided Culture

These exerpts are from a book called The Reason For God by Timothy Keller.

"Because doubt and belief are each on the rise, our political and public discourse on matters of faith and morality has become deadlocked and deeply divided. The culture wars are taking a toll. Emotions and rhetoric are intense, even hysterical. Those who believe in God and Christianity are out to "impose their beliefs on the rest of us" and "turn back the clock" to a less enlightened time. Those who don't believe are "enemies of truth" and purveyors of relativism and permissiveness". We don't reason with the other side; we only denounce.

This part is striking to me because I feel like ALL debate and serious discussion on religion and politics are often heated with much discontent with the other side. It is our job as Christians to display the love of Jesus while assertively testifying to his divinity and humanity. Christians are no less intellectual because of belief and the ability to defend it.

"A faith without some doubts is like a human body without any antibodies in it. People who blithely go through life too busy or indifferent to ask hard questions about why they believe as they do will find themselves defenseless against either the experience of tragedy or the probing questions of a smart skeptic. A person's faith can collapse almost overnight if she has failed over the years to listen patiently to her own doubts, which should only be discarded after long reflection".

Doubt is something I've been plagued with. I hate doubting because I desperately want to believe in Christ 100% but a lot of the time, the doubt is not with Him but with me. I doubt my ability to believe and I doubt my willingness to surrender to Him. I doubt my willingness to actually take up that cross and follow Him (thanks DV). I guess with Keller's words, it's ok to just accept that fact that as human beings, it is in our fallen nature to doubt truth even when the evidence for it is as close to us as our own skin.

"All doubts, however skeptical and cynical they may seem, are really a set of alternate beliefs. You cannot doubt Belief A except from a position of faith in Belief B. For example, if you doubt Christianity because "there can't be just one true religion", you must recognize that this statement is itself an act of faith. No one can prove it empirically and it is not a universal truth that everyone accepts. If you went to the Middle East and said, "There can't be just one true religion", nearly everyone would say, "Why not?" The reason you doubt Christianity's Belief A is because you hold unprovable Belief B. Every doubt, therefore, is based on a leap of faith".

FINALLY, my initial point on this is backed up. I've been saying for a couple years now that I believe Atheism to be a standpoint of faith, despite it's standard of disbelief in any theistic religion. It is a BELIEF that there are no religions that are true and that there is no God. Atheism cannot prove these beliefs while Christianity can just by the Resurrection of Christ and the words of the Bible. Keller expands a bit:

"Some people say, "I don't believe in Christianity because I can't accept the existence of moral absolutes. Everyone should determine moral truth for him or herself". Is that a statement they can prove to someone who doesn't share it? No, it is a leap of faith, a deep belief that individual rights operate not only in the political sphere but also in the moral. There is no empirical proof for such a position. So the doubt of moral absolutes is a leap.

Moral absolutes come from God's law because he alone determines what is holy and what is not. How can we in our finite knowledge judge what morals are uplifting to human spirits when we deny the very Creator of the capacity for these morals to stand on? Mankind is not spiritually inclined to determine what moral absolutes truly are until we achieve a relationship with God.

"Some with respond to all this, "My doubts are not based on a leap of faith. I have no beliefs about God one way or another. I simply feel no need for God and I am not interested in thinking about it". But hidden beneath this feeling is the very modern American belief that the existence of God is a matter of indifference unless it intersects with my emotional needs. The speaker is betting his or her life that no God exists who would hold you accountable for your beliefs and behavior if you didn't feel the need for him. That may be true or it may not be true, but, again, it is quite a leap of faith".

This pretty much speaks for itself.

"The only way to doubt Christianity rightly and fairly is to discern the alternate belief under each of your doubts and then to ask yourself what reasons you have for believing it. How do you know your belief is true? It would be inconsistent to require more justification for Christian belief than you do for your own, but that is frequently what happens. In fairness you must doubts your doubts. My thesis is that if you come to recognize the beliefs on which your doubts about Christianity are based and if you seek as much proof for those beliefs as you seek from Christians for theirs- you will discover that your doubts are not as solid as they first appeared".

Both sides of the spectrum should be able to be objective when it comes to belief and doubt. If you doubt, research the things that make you doubt. If you believe, make sure the things you believe are true. It's only fair that skeptics know what they're doubting before making assumptions.


I hope these words were encouraging. As a Christian, I am constantly plagued by the doubts and questions of others as well as my own. Sometimes it is difficult to remain faithful when you're at it alone but God is faithful and loving. I don't feel like I'm fighting a pointless battle. Our war is not against the flesh but of the principalities and powers of this world that seek to destroy the children of God. The words of skeptics will never break me of my faith.