Faith

"There’s no test for the theist that can displace his faith in God. If God fails there must be something wrong with the test or else with the theist’s interpretation of the results. It’s the same with a political ideologue too, a communist or an evangelical free marketer. It’s not ever possible to displace an article of faith." -Elliot Perlman


I recall a story from the series Firefly. For clarity's sake, I'll simplify the story to its' main essence. In the story, a two thieves stole millions of dollars from the safe of the King of country where the people were bound by slavery. As the thieves made his escape on a plane, the plane's wing was shot and was only able to carry the weight of one passenger. In order to survive, one unscrupulous thief (Jack) tossed out his accomplice friend and all of the stolen money out of the plane.

10 years later, Jack returned to the country and to his surprise, he realized that the slave people had enacted a statue modelled to his looks and began worshipping him as a god. He later discovered that, the slaves regarded him as their "Saviour" because according to them, he had stolen the money from their tyrant king and distributed it to them akin to the modern Robin Hood. He accepted their gratitude until he later discovered by his accomplice thief (who had miraculously survived). His accomplice, enraged at the injustice, destroyed his statue and attempted to expose Jack's facade to the slave people. However, the slaves refused to accept any reasonable explanation provided, and accused Jack's accomplice of "blasphemy." To punish Jack's accomplish, they decided to put him to death.

At this point of time, Jack's conscience pricked and felt guilty. Just before Jack's accomplice was killed, Jack admitted that what his accomplice said was true. The slaves were dumbfounded. How could their god be so imperfect, and how could their salvation have been purely a mistake committed by a petty thief? Surely there must have been a mistake somewhere?

I don't want to drag this story any further. However, I find it particularly interesting that a few days later after this incident, these slaves rebuilt the statue of Jack, even while after knowing that their god was not a real one.

Now, extrapolate, this story to the reality of our religious world and the number of people who believes in their religion blindly through the use of faith. It makes a lot of sense. I pondering, what is it that makes these slaves, rebuild the statue of Jack? When I posed this question to a number of my peers, many of them said along these lines that "everyone needs a hero" or "to live, the slaves needed hope. Jack was their hope. To stop hoping is to die."

In the book, The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, it narrates the reaction of Albert Einstein's famous article advocating his stand on: "I do not believe in a personal God". The president of a historical society in New Jersey responded to Albert Einsteins' letter:

"We respect your learning, Dr Einstein; but there is one thing you do not seem to have learned: that God is a spirit and cannot be found through the telescope or microscope, no more than a human thought or emotion can be found by analyzing the brain. As everyone knows, religion is based on Faith, not knowledge. Every thinking person, perhaps, is assailed at times with religious doubt. My own faith has wavered many a time. But I never told anyone of my spiritual abberations for two reasons: (1) I feared that I might, by mere suggestion, disturb and damage the life and hopes of some fellow being; (2) because I agree with the writer who said. "There is a mean streak in anyone who will destroy another's faith." . . . I hope, Dr Einstein, that you were misquoted and that you will yet say something more pleasing to the vast number of the American people who delight to do you honor."

When I read this verbatim, I can come a little closer to understanding why Jack's accomplice was attacked- he had damaged the life and hopes of many people.

Throughout history, hundreds of thousands of people have died in the name of religious wars or other forms of bloodshed in the name of their personal god or gods. Because of this, I find it worth doing a little reading up on the reasons of why I should continue being a Christian. It's like opening Pandora's box. Research has proven that conservatism, which includes religious people are statistically happier than liberalism (which includes people who do not believe in a supernatural interventionist). Being a person who cannot be satisfied with blind faith anymore, I have decided to open my personal Pandora's box.

What I have discovered is on the basis of science and reason, there is no rational justification that provides evidence that God does indeed exist. In fact, after reading Richard Dawkin's book, I find it an aberration that many people often have misquoted Albert Einstein's works. I can take one example from a website that I've found:

http://www.heaven.net.nz/answers/answer02.htm

The author tries to prove that the Christian God exists by saying:
"Galileo, Leonardo DaVinci, Albert Einstein and even Stephen Hawking believe in God and many other thinking people."

In any case, even if 2 Billion people believes something is true, it does not necessarily mean it is so. Think. Matrix. There is such a thing as a Jonas Effect.

Another misquoted example is "Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind."

If you however, read Albert Einstein's works, you will realize that he also said this:

"I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings."

Misleading don't you think? It just isn't right to use Albert Einstein's God to prove the existence of the Christian God since both entities are mutually exclusive.

Well in any case, my religious faith is shaken entirely. And I'm only on Chapter three of Dawkin's book. If I am to remain a Christian, my sole motivation will be on the grounds of "blind faith".