Sorry for taking so long to respond. I get busy from time to time
Polycarp:
But that was a honest warning that I recognize that confab. happens, and saw elements of it occurring – particularly in the memories of the theophany at the LTEE class. I intend to be as ruthlessly honest with myself as possible – but it’s in the nature of confab. that memories are not always totally reliable.
It seems we agree on the last sentence. We’ll have to see about the ruthlessly honest part.
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I was raised to respect the ability of the sciences to describe and interpret natural phenomena and enable us to learn new ways to do things. My parents were firm rationalists. My aunt early encouraged my enjoyment of science fiction and its ability to evoke a sense of wonder while remaining within the realm of possibility under natural law. I was baptized and raised a Methodist with the idea that God works through the world He made and the laws He laid down for its operation.
Sounds as though you were destined to be face internal conflict when science and religion give different answers.
Honestly, I don’t see it that way. Because IMHO they’re addressing quite separate aspects of the human experience.
Stephen Jay Gould’s essay on “non-overlapping magisteria” might help explain that a bit more clearly than I can.
You may not see it that way but that’s the way it is. The creation story overlaps with evolution, walking on water overlaps with physics, healing the sick and rising from the dead overlaps with biology, as does a lot of other stuff. Science and religion often give different answers to the same questions. You can call that miracle stuff allegorical if you want to keep it from overlapping science (I’ve noted this is often your preferred technique), but a fellow named Jesus walking around and not performing any miracles sure does not distinguish himself as the true creator of the universe. Can we agree on that?
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When I was about 15, I began having doubts about the sorts of stuff I was being fed in church. So, alone in the balcony area at church, I prayed what I call the Skeptic’s Prayer, essentially, “O God, if there is a God, give me some sort of sign that you’re real.” And I immediately got a sense of inner assurance , and within a few moments, the congregation began singing “My Faith Looks Up to Thee.”
Not exactly a bolt of lightning is it? I would suggest that church perhaps isn’t the best place for your “skeptics prayer” as the odds of the congregation singing your song or something with words you would have attributed as equally meaningful is probably 1 in perhaps 2? If we allow for the likelihood that you made your prayer more than once, then a meaningful song following shortly after one of them becomes an almost certainty. As for the inner assurance, maybe you felt it, and it is about as meaningful as the inner assurance a compulsive gambler feels after he places a bet on a pony. Maybe you didn’t even feel it but subconsously inserted it into your memory at a later date as you didn’t think the song part was strong enough evidence on it’s own. Would you agree that it is widely known that memories are fuzzy things and often subjective?
It was the inner assurance, not the song, which validated the experience to me – the song was just "reinforcement.
But I think I effectively established that a non-specific religious song follows within a few minutes of every event that ever takes place at church and as such does not even qualify as reinforcement.
While I agree with your final question (see first response above), and with your point that the inner assurance was hardly objective evidence – I am, after all, reporting my own experience, not a carefully crafted objective proof of God’s existence – I do disagre with your next to last sentence, on the basis of (a) the clarity of my recollection of the event and (b) its rather subjective mundanity.
So now we are admitting that the “inner assurance” was subjectively mundane. I would expect a lot more if it were genuine divine intervention. Regarding the clarity of your recollection and subjective fuzzy memories, would you admit that people will at least sometimes report clarity in their recollection and are yet still mistaken?
It’s not as though I prayed and an angel appeared bearing golden dinnerware ( – kid prays, gets inner sense of assurance. Kind of bland as miracles go, right?
Considering the outstanding claims that you wanted to have supported I think the angel and golden dinnerware would have been more appropriate than a mundane feeling of assurance. We do agree that outstanding claims require outstanding evidence don’t we?
No argument at all – I fully admit to a Jamesian “will to believe.” Rod Stewart’s song strikes a chord in me.
As it is known that people have a tendency to believe what they prefer to be true, this admission significantly weakens your personal testimony. Agreed?
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I married and my wife and I, seeking a more liturgical and Eucharistically oriented expression of faith, joined the Episcopal Church. One key element in this decision was that the first time we entered the particular parish church we converted at, she had a classic deja vu experience – the building’s layout and ritual matched a dream she had had.
Again we have the subjective memory which could easily fit the dream to the church combined with the fact that many churches look alike and many services are similar; stand, sit, sing, pray, light candles, listen to sermon, etc. Visit enough churches and you will likely find one resembling the generic one your wife had in a dream.
Again no argument. I find deja vu experiences intriguing but would hesitate to hang a theory on them – there have been threads discussing the psychology behind them, if you care to search them out. Again, I’m reporting an incident. Do Barb and I think that was a sign that God led us there? Yes. Do I expect anybody else to buy that? Not in the slightest.
If you agree with my line of argument why do you believe it was god who led you there? You have made the point that you have good reason to believe in god but it seems that you “just believe” and don’t need much reason.
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In the course of this, in a session dealing with the bizarreries Paul addresses in his letters to the Corinthians, I encountered God in a Person-to-person way, and found my belief changed from intellectual credence that to placing one’s trust in.
Well, I’ll leave alone the fact that you stated you don’t really put your trust what Paul wrote in the bible. However this person-to-person encounter with god; how did he introduce himself, what did he say, what did he look like?
It was a sense of a Presence, one of immense power and a feeling of unquestioning, unconditional love. I got the distinct sense that this was the God of Christianity, but how much of that was from Him and how much of it was me interpreting it is highly debatable (even adopting the presumption that this was “real” as opposed to merely my own delusional imaginings). There was no visual, Apparition sort of event, nor did I “hear” anything – but I came away from it convinced that He wanted a personal relationship with me and that I was supposed to be following His will. That seemed to be impressed on me, but may well be my impressions of “what you’re supposed to have happen in a conversion experience.” That, in other words, may well be confabulated – but it was a relatively immediate result.
It seems your strongest claim while very subjective is where you most admit confabulation interfering with your memories. IMO pretty weak considering you described the meeting as person to person with god.
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Sheer honesty has caused me to examine that experience skeptically. But it was certainly nothing I had expected, hoped for, or even would have desired.
Are you sure that you wouldn’t have desired the above? Don’t you feel at least a little special knowing that god would take time out of running the universe to have a person-to-person encounter with you? I just can’t imagine that there would be no selfish component to this experience.
Traditional theology suggests that omniscience has time to notice everything – even what’s going through the minds of the folks reading this little exchange between you and me. And yeah, my ego was boosted by having a one-on-one with Him, no doubt.
Now why would god knowingly boost your ego, when he wants you humble.
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And that led to some serious changes in our lives, the seeking out for more vibrant faith experiences, and an awakening to the underlying message of the Bible, to which I had been quite blind.
That message being, praise me or suffer the consequences.
No, that’s the Svt4Him take on it, and misreprsented at that.
No that’s the bible and that’s Jesus, regardless of how much you want it not to be true. I’ve already provided many cites.
(This would be a good place to apologize for not yet having fulfilled my end of the bargain – I fully intend to, but have not figured out how to address the disjunct between your conceptions of my apparent (to you) inconsistencies, and my clear grasp of what it is God expects of me as regards the issues you’ve challenged.)
Those inconsistencies have to be apparent to anyone who takes an objective look at what you write. I think you are having difficulties coming up with a response not for a lack of vocabulary but rather for it being impossible to make genuine inconsistencies no longer inconsistent without admitting your are in error with your premises. Still I await your response. How long till I can assume you have blown me off?
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Seven years after that I had a heart attack and cardiac bypass surgery. And the reading that I had been scheduled to do the day I had the surgery, which my wife read aloud in my place, was Ezekiel 36:24-28: “I will give you a new heart and a new spirit. I will take away your heart of stone, and give you a heart of flesh, and I will put my spirit within you.” I was supposed to read it; instead, I experienced it.
See but this isn’t really that great of a fit either though is it. Prior to the surgery did you really have a heart of stone? After all you had met person to person with god before that and had already been awakened to the underlying message to the bible right? Plus you didn’t get a new heart, (perhaps if it were a transplant it would be a better fit) but rather got some additional plumbing added to it to help the circulation. The myocardial cells killed in the infarction are still dead are they not? Also my concordance of the bible has shows the word “heart” listed over 800 times making the chances of reading a passage containing it less than astronomically against.
Quite true. But “one time is chance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action.” The 95% plaque buildup will do for “heart of stone,” IMHO. And the sense that it was a clear message to me was there. This one is, quite frankly, me reading into the coincidental events a sense of God’s hand at work – without the other events working out a pattern, it’s one of those “you can make it read whatever you want it to read” events. The “new spirit” part gets worked out in the ensuing unlocking of my emotions.
In a lifetime of experiences I would expect thousands of coincidences and three is easily just chance. Have you ever looked into astrology and/or Tarot cards, it’s the same type of thing and you can work the words and pictures into your life as being a darn good fit on a regular basis, yet there is no reason to think there is any more supernatural stuff going on with them than with your example. Still with the way the human mind pieces things together it all still seems kind of creepy. Try it and see.
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Lots of people have friends, even really good friends and I still don’t see this as evidence for the supernatural. Rather that people tend to like those who can help them with their selfish needs and if it is a mutual benefit then all the better. Richard Dawkins could explain this quite well without having to resort to the supernatural.
That’s Richard Dawkins’ problem. I see it as God having put me and the kid in each others’ paths, having run us each through a bunch of changes, life experiences, that equipped us to minister to the other for the healing of our spirits. You’re more than welcome not to.
Your way of seeing it is a lot less Ockhamic than Dawkins’ explanation. In the two of your lifetimes you have probably met up with thousand of people. Those that you perceived as beneficial to you were people you would likely try to spend more time with. Same goes for your friend. As I noted if the benefits were mutual then you would both try to spend more time with each other and both think the relationship was great. The majority of your acquaintances may think you’re a total jackass but that in no way would impede the few relationships where things click. God’s influence in this process is superfluous.
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This in turn led to a healing of my own marriage, an ability to show and be shown love between me and my wife that had not been there before (she’d had much the same hide-your-feelings upbringing). And together we were able to help that boy and his wife through the inevitable rocky road that the first few years of marriage often bring
So then you guys are now living your lives all happily ever after? No more rocks in the road?
No, everybody has issues to work through, and we’re no excptions. But for both couples there’s an emotional bond there that’s solid. Draw the difference between progress towards a goal and finally reaching it, if you will, that something may not quite achieve the latter doesn’t mean it’s not the former.
Or one could say that such and you guys had issues in the past, have them now, and will continue to have them in the future but saying it that way does not have same storytelling zing does it?
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Now, it is quite possible to see all of the above as a series of chance events, to interpret it phenomenologically without reference to God. But I consider that He has demonstrated His existence and goodwill adequately to me to take my experiences of Him at face value, as really what they purport to be, and not as self-delusional wish-fulfillment – particularly since insofar as I can tell, I had absolutely no desire, either consciously or subconsciously, to be drawn out of the comfortable barriacades where I dealt with the world intellectually and did not have to risk emotional bruising.
How could you know what your subconscious desires are? I don’t know you personally but from what I gather from your postings is that you are on the far side of middle age, of less than ideal health, and reported having financial troubles suggesting a less than ideal retirement. Can you honestly say that accepting the scenario I listed excluding the supernatural would be less comfortable and desirable than believing that you were personally contacted by god to spread his word and that regardless of your past and future earthly troubles, eternal paradise awaits?
1. Self-examination.
I don’t think your looking very hard. Try reading some Nietzsche.
2. I’m doing what all Christians are called to do.
Post hoc rationalization.
*3. Eternal paradize is not somthing I’m concerned about *
Yeah sure.
4. “'Twas grace hath kept us safe thus far…”
That’s what everybody says before their number is up. Then the slogan becomes “he’s in a better place now.” Notice how god doesn’t need to exist for either of these slogans to work.
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But I am addressing the world on the basis of Ockhamic methodology – accepting that as accurate description which most simply explains the phenomena under consideration and does not require assumptions beyond those necessary to explain them.
Are you sure about that?
Yes.
You should have put a smiley behind that answer. It seems you admitted all the way through that you were putting assumptions beyond what is necessary.
