Some people seem to have the strange idea that God really exists for the people who believe in God, but does not exist for atheists. No side is in error, reality is just what you believe.
This makes no sense to me.
6 comments:
Anonymous
said...
There may be some limited traction gained there depending on what's meant by God. I don't mean that in a fuzzy new-age way so much as "Is God a being that is deserving of worship?"
I imagine that for some people, if the God of the bible really is some existing agent, they'll nevertheless reject Him as God.
This is, indeed, the weirdest thing! But Ihink what is involved is a confusion.
Maybe I am naive, but except for some very out there new age types, I don't think anyone really believes that 'believing x' makes x true (one exception "I believe there are beliefs" )
students say sometimes "well God exists for me" And this just means "I believe that God exists"
This could be true if believers and unbelievers mean something different by "God". For example, St. Thomas says that God exists, meaning by that a simple being, subsistent existence. Richard Dawkins says that God does not exist, meaning something spread over the universe with a "gigantic consciousness," i.e. something very complex and composed of a huge number of parts.
Isn't this basically a variation on the theme "All religions are equally true"? But I'm not surprised at this type of thinking. This is how we get to "Bruce Whatshisname is a woman" just because he says so. It seems to be the dominant spirit of the age.
I remember in a survey of religious beliefs that one respondant told me he thought everyone gets the afterlife (or lack thereof) in which they believed. This was a fellow university student.
Frankly I suspected they just said the first thing that came into their head and that even the briefest of discussions would have led them to disavow their initial profession.
"one respondant told me he thought everyone gets the afterlife (or lack thereof) in which they believed"
This was one of the major premises of the Soviet novel The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, which many consider the greatest Russian novel of the 20th Century. (I do not. I'd give that title to Kataev's Time, Forward!).
6 comments:
There may be some limited traction gained there depending on what's meant by God. I don't mean that in a fuzzy new-age way so much as "Is God a being that is deserving of worship?"
I imagine that for some people, if the God of the bible really is some existing agent, they'll nevertheless reject Him as God.
This is, indeed, the weirdest thing! But Ihink what is involved is a confusion.
Maybe I am naive, but except for some very out there new age types, I don't think anyone really believes that 'believing x' makes x true (one exception "I believe there are beliefs" )
students say sometimes "well God exists for me" And this just means "I believe that God exists"
This could be true if believers and unbelievers mean something different by "God". For example, St. Thomas says that God exists, meaning by that a simple being, subsistent existence. Richard Dawkins says that God does not exist, meaning something spread over the universe with a "gigantic consciousness," i.e. something very complex and composed of a huge number of parts.
Those two statements are logically consistent.
Isn't this basically a variation on the theme "All religions are equally true"? But I'm not surprised at this type of thinking. This is how we get to "Bruce Whatshisname is a woman" just because he says so. It seems to be the dominant spirit of the age.
Jezu ufam tobie!
I remember in a survey of religious beliefs that one respondant told me he thought everyone gets the afterlife (or lack thereof) in which they believed. This was a fellow university student.
Frankly I suspected they just said the first thing that came into their head and that even the briefest of discussions would have led them to disavow their initial profession.
"one respondant told me he thought everyone gets the afterlife (or lack thereof) in which they believed"
This was one of the major premises of the Soviet novel The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, which many consider the greatest Russian novel of the 20th Century. (I do not. I'd give that title to Kataev's Time, Forward!).
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