What is God? And why should we believe?

The question of belief in God first requires a definition of God.  Many of us are familiar with the Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, and other Christian Creeds; these identify God as Father and Creator of all things, seen and unseen.  Beyond this, the Creeds say little of God except through Jesus Christ, and what we might infer about God from these things: the Holy Spirit, the Church, Saints, forgiveness of sins, physical resurrection and personal immortality.

The traditional Christian view is that God is omnipotent; omniscient, omnipresent and infinitely good.  God is believed to be Creator of all things, Sustainer of all things, Redeemer of Souls and Judge of all people.  In the Christian view, God gave inspired words to guide human conduct to a small number of people at a few rare and particular times, and in the written text of the Bible. 

Theologians and others have grappled with the question of whether God plays an active role in the world, (“the Interventionist God) or whether God created all things, but does not intervene (the Great Clockmaker).  Thinkers of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment supported the view that God created the world, gave Man free will, and stood back to watch.  Many of America’s founding fathers believed in this non-interventionist view of God.  In this view, Good and Evil exist in the world as the result of free will on the part of men and angels, but all are subject to God’s judgment after death, or at the end of the world.  The choice to sin or be good is a choice people make during life.  The consequences are not in this world, but in the next.

The Jewish philosopher Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677) framed a special case of the non-interventionist God.  Spinoza viewed all of creation as a sub-set of God.  Spinoza held to a physical sense of reality.  According to commentator Paul So, Spinoza “rejected the existence of Soul, Angels, Demons, Miracles, Divine Creationism, the possibility of Afterlife, Divine Revelation, validity of Prophecy, Biblical literalism, Tradition, Scriptural authority, and last but not least the existence of a personal God.” Spinoza’s view of God is often favored by physicists, including Albert Einstein.  God is not a creator of the world, but rather, reality itself is a part of God.  As such, the question of God seems to be a question of modern physics rather than religion.   Mainstream modern religion has generally reverted to the traditionally interventionist view of God.

To believe in God is to believe that infinite good, infinite power and infinite knowledge exist, and co-exist in a single being.  To believe in God, there must be a basis for belief.  There must be something observable and consistent which supports the existence of God.  If we observe contradictions – if we observe that good is not pervasive in the world, we have to question the original premise, the existence of God. 

Plato believed in Good as an intrinsic quality of reality.  Further, Plato believed that the universe had a natural tendency towards Good, something like the natural tendency for entropy to increase in our modern view of physics.  Plato believed that the power of Good is the fundamental reason for the origin of the universe and of its own accord made the world come into existence.

Personally, I see no reason why reality should have any predisposition toward Good or Evil.  I believe that Good does exist, but that it is not an intrinsic force.  Rather, I believe that it is a property of people and their actions.  Good is not an intrinsic property of reality, but is an abstract quality which can be derived independently by anyone, much like geometry or mathematics.  

One of the essential expressions of Good is the Golden Rule:  "Do unto others, as you would have them do unto you".  Anyone in society, anyone dealing with other people, or even alien races meeting for the first time, can realize the power in this simple statement.  Each of us can independently realize that we can treat others well or badly.  If we are treated badly, we suffer.  If we treat others badly, they suffer.  If we logically deduce that we should treat others well, in order to be treated well ourselves, the result is the reduction of suffering, and increase in happiness.  To treat others well results in Good.

Good requires empathy, sympathy, care and compassion.  It requires that people behave for the well-being of others and the betterment of all.  It requires the understanding that if people behave according to these precepts, life will be better for all.  And if we would require good in the behavior of people, we should expect no less of God, of Religion, and the institutions of Religion.

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 Apostle’s Creed

We believe in God the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth:

And in Jesus Christ, his only begotten Son, our Lord:

Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary:

Suffered under Pontius Pilate; was crucified, dead and buried; He descended into hell.

The third day he rose again from the dead.

He ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty:

From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead:

We believe in the Holy Spirit:

We believe in the holy Catholic Church: the communion of saints:

The forgiveness of sins:

The resurrection of the body:

And the life everlasting.

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The Calvin and Hobbes cartoon shown above is used without permission, and without profit.  This particular cartoon illustrates the theme of this blog post very well.  If necessary, the cartoon will be removed upon request.

Introduction

“When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child.  When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.”   I Corinthians 13:11

Introduction

It seems that I grew up in church.  In my childhood, three generations of my family attended church together every week.  I attended Sunday School in the morning, and youth fellowship and choir practice Sunday evening, and sang for services at least once a month.  Sometimes I sang with the adult choir, which met on Wednesday nights.  My grandparents were missionaries and my great-grandparents were missionaries; my uncles and cousins were ministers.  I worked on a Boy Scout religious award for a year, including service hours at the church every week.  I was an altar boy.  I read the bible cover-to-cover by age fourteen. I performed in church music productions and knew every nook and cranny of our old, cathedral-like church.

Here is a photo I called "Empty Church", taken decades later.  This was my usual view, from the altar boy's chair.  

But questions nagged at me for my entire life.  Sometime in my late 40s, I stopped going to church.  At age 60, when I described myself as an atheist to a friend, he asked me to write down my reasons.  This blog is the result.  I will consider various aspects of religion and Christianity, such as the soul, prayer, the Bible, God as Creator, Sustainer, and Judge, heaven and hell, and Satan.   I have a few thoughts about the politicization of Christianity.  Through all of this, I will be considering how religious beliefs align with other things we know about the world from science, experience, and observation.  I will ask some peculiar questions, such as whether a virus has a soul, and whether the people on the Titanic forgot to pray.  I’ll consider the problem posed by Steve Martin: “Atheists Don’t Have No Songs”.  I’ll be asking whether religion is good according to my standards of right and wrong.  And most of all, I will ask whether religious belief makes any sense.

I know that religious people are often the happiest people I know.  They often have the clearest sense of family and enjoy the fellowship and affirmation of belonging to a church.  They are able to disregard worries, because they believe that no matter what happens, it will be as God decided.  They have faith that God exists, and that God is good.  So if you choose to read these posts, understand that I will be challenging that belief and that comfortable happiness.

To live in happiness under a falsehood seems wrong to me.   My worldview is now less settled, with the realization that the future of mankind does not depend on an invisible power, but depends on us. 

I have no interest in debate.  I am simply sharing my thoughts, as my friend asked.  I will not read nor respond to comments.