Is it time for change? Few of us need to be persuaded that our culture is due for significant social and spiritual renewal. It seems to me, though, that we have not taken seriously enough the magnitude of the challenge. We have especially not reckoned properly with the need for change among ourselves, we who are followers of Jesus Christ. Our credibility is low outside our own communities, and is it any wonder? We have failed to fully express and employ our real power: the power of God, the power of lives lived well, and the power of transformed minds.
I suggest four priorities for deep social change. For those who are wary of simple four-point solutions for any major change, I’m with you. None of these are simple. I’m a beginner in all of them. They are broad categories, so they may coincide with existing church or parachurch priorities—or possibly not, in which case I hope this sparks some thinking.
In part, these priorities echo those J.P. Moreland spoke about in Kingdom Triangle (2007, pp. 111-112). He refers to conclusions drawn by Michael Green, who wrote that the church’s explosive growth in its first four centuries came from (1) her ability to “outthink her critics, (2) “the transformed character and biblical compassion of believers,” and (3) “the manifest power of the Kingdom of God by the Spirit…”
1. Recover a true understanding of God.
It is not just the non-Christian but the follower of Jesus Christ who needs to discover afresh who God is. We’ve domesticated God, made him a member of our own parties, and forgotten his sovereign majesty. At the risk of being overly obvious: God is God! He is the perfectly good and powerful Creator, Sustainer, Ruler, Judge, Teacher, Shepherd, and Lover of the entire universe! We are fools if we proceed without taking him into account, and greater fools yet if we believe we already know and understand him well enough, cognitively, relationally, or volitionally.
Brad Bright is undertaking an initiative to help believers and non-believers discover God. He’s onto something crucial there. A growing understanding of the true God is essential for the other priorities I will propose here.
2. Call on God through extraordinary prayer.
Deep social change is not ultimately the product of votes or organizing or rallies or letters to Congress or editorials in newspapers. It comes from the hand of God. From the human side, this is a matter of prayer. The time is urgent for us to step up to extraordinary prayer, meaning just what the word suggests: more than ordinary, more than we have been doing; with a clearer focus on God and on our country’s needs, and greater intensity. Extraordinary prayer for many will include regular fasting, possibly for a meal or even a full day every week.
We cannot hope for real impact on society without God producing it, and we cannot expect God to produce it unless we call on him urgently to do so. We must pray for the church. Christians that God must show himself first, and it is the Church that must lead the way in deep change. And we must pray for our neighbors. Who knows what God might do in response? The top two reasons Muslims come to Christ in Muslim homelands are Christians’ lifestyles (for which see point 3) and the power of God displayed through answered prayers and healings.
3. Expand our acts of sacrificial love.
Jesus said (Matthew 5:16): “In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” God is glorified in his people shining his light, and there is no light brighter than that of one who gives sacrificially for another. This is particularly incumbent on political conservatives who distrust government’s effectiveness and efficiency in meeting human need. To say that government should not be so involved is to say that individual Christians and churches must be, and on an even greater scale than we have been; for the need is real. Otherwise conservatism is seen (to a great extent rightly so) as thinly disguised selfishness.
I say that not in order to develop an apologetic for conservatism, but to express a correction to some forms of it. Much more than that, though, this is about letting God be seen in action through his people.
4. Strengthen our mental awareness and engagement.
Western Christianity—especially Protestant Christianity—has been plagued for some 150 years or so with anti-intellectualism. It is as if we thought we had no case to make for our faith and its importance in the world, when in fact nothing could be further from the truth. For many centuries our intellectual presence was strong, but then it’s as if we walked off the playing field. Since then we’ve pretty much lost the universities, the media, and the centers of decision-making.
There is encouraging news on this front. Christian scholarship is surging where it has not done so in recent years. Christianity remains hobbled, however, by a simple Sunday School mentality that expects little actual study. Could any of us have prepared for college courses by reading over a few pages lightly with our morning donut or Instant Breakfast, the way we do for church? (It’s the ambitious ones who do even that much, I’m afraid.) What if there were quizzes and final exams in Sunday School—or in other words, what if we expected ourselves to learn something new and challenging at church? Why don’t we value that as much as chemistry or computer science?
Our mental life involves creativity as well as scholarship, by the way: it is about the arts as well as the academy. If we were to step up to the table with great ideas and imagination, I think even James Davison Hunter might think we could have a more effective voice.
These, then, are proposed four priorities for those who desire deep social change: Grow in understanding God, Call on him through extraordinary prayer, Increase our acts of sacrificial love, and Strengthen mental awareness and engagement.
Reposted from Thinking Christian
July 2nd, 2010 | 3:02 am | #1
This sounds like a difficult problem for Christians to try to confront. It’s a fact, I think, that a lot of Christians lose their faith in a university setting. If I were a Christian parent observing this fact, I might think that a university education isn’t worth the risk of my children losing their faith, and therefore their souls, in pursuit of learning.
The same goes for simply trying to educate oneself regarding science or secular philosophy. It just seems a bit too dangerous if what is at stake is my eternal soul. In trying to really understand Hume, Quine, or Dawkins, mustn’t one always be prepared for the possibility that one of their arguments will seem convincing–and that this argument might also lead to a conclusion that doesn’t so easily fit with one’s faith?
July 2nd, 2010 | 12:58 pm | #2
Janice, the same applies for anyone who thinks that truth matters for life, not just Christians. Atheists who believe religion leads to irrational violence would also find it a bit too dangerous to engage Christian thinkers. Same goes for anyone who studies nihilists who ended up killing themselves because life is meaningless. There’s a lot at stake in finding the truth, for anyone.
That said, such a truism has little to do with how to responsibly raise children. Would you have your kids only or mostly read things you regard as false and destructive? Of course not. So why not use yourself as an example of a parent becoming hesitant after observing what happens when their kids are taught junk? Unless this is a not-so-subtle and, as I’ve shown above, invalid singling out of Christians.
July 2nd, 2010 | 1:13 pm | #3
Tom, this is all very good and there’s nothing here I disagree with. But, what’s missing is a focus on economics, a fancy modern way of talking about how we produce resources for life and how we use our money, which is something the Bible is concerned about as much as if not more than sexuality, which is why the early Church thought about and used their money and labored not merely morally within the system, but with a completely different paradigm of what money and production is for.
Today, the American church is stuck with a false choice between the specter of Marxist socialism and late-modern State capitalism which are both functionally atheist in their understanding of human beings as disembodied and atomized wills and history as materialism. Having accepted functional atheism and disobeyed God in so much of our life, our economic life, we shouldn’t be surprised that the Church is seen to talk big but do little.
July 2nd, 2010 | 6:34 pm | #4
Seriously Albert?
Are you seriously suggesting that an atheist should avoid studying Aquinas for fear that losing her faith in atheism might dispose her to irrational violence? Are you serious comparing this fear to a Christian’s fear of burning in hell for all eternity for losing faith in Christianity?
As a case of grasping at straws, your reply is telling.
July 2nd, 2010 | 8:37 pm | #5
In all my years of online debating, this is the first time I’ve seen any non-believer speak of “faith in atheism.”
It’s been a long time coming, and it is most apt.
July 2nd, 2010 | 8:43 pm | #6
If you’d prefer: “belief that atheism is true.”
July 3rd, 2010 | 5:07 am | #7
Prefer? No, I was happy with it the way it was. Atheism is a faith.
July 3rd, 2010 | 12:12 pm | #8
Have it your way. Any thoughts on the substance of comment #1?
July 3rd, 2010 | 5:10 pm | #9
Janice, I have so many thoughts about it it’s filling half of a book. I wouldn’t know where to start here, except to say that it’s more dangerous for believers not to learn and study than it is for them to do it. And that I’m convinced that a good education in the relevant topics will strengthen faith for most people.
July 3rd, 2010 | 6:47 pm | #10
@Janice,
The substance of #1 is mistaken. First, as the quote indicates, anti-intellectualism has only been a problem in Christianity for the past 150 years.
Second, Hume and Quine might present a challenge for the believer, but when it comes to philosophy Dawkins is a joke; and his “scientific” arguments against faith are nothing new.
Third, education is only perceived as a threat to Christianity by non-Christians; this is due to contemporary myths about the big bad medieval Christians trying to snuff out the Enlightenment.
Fourth, while some certainly do lose their faith in college, others come to faith while in college. And of those who lose their faith in college, some of them get it back as they grow older. Any believer who loses his/her faith as a result of higher education needs to ask some hard questions about what his/her faith was built on to begin with.
Finally, of the Christians that I know who didn’t go to college, I don’t know a single one who didn’t go because of fear. Either they didn’t have the money or entered a trade that didn’t require a college education, or both.
July 4th, 2010 | 3:12 am | #11
Odgie,
While I appreciate the time you’ve put into this, it doesn’t appear to adequately address the essential dilemma.
Consider the devout Christian considering whether to make a sincere effort to understand the central figures of 20th-century philosophy. Does she play it safe and restrict her readings to Christian philosophers, or does she also study the others? In asking herself this question, she must face the fact that whenever she does carefully study the theories of non-Christian philosophers, there will be a higher probability that she will encounter arguments which, while seemingly sound, also lead to conclusions that are in some way unsettling to her faith. The more she explores beyond the gated community, the more such arguments she is likely to encounter.
Now, while it is always possible that she will prove to be one of those heroic Christian intellects who can ultimately find flaws in most of those non-Christian arguments, even thereby using this experience to bolster her own faith and that of others, she must also face the reality that there are a lot of believers who have come to an end not nearly so glorious. Philosophy creates apostates as well as apologists.
Faced with this grave reality, our Christian has to consider whether the prize of understanding secular philosophy is worth the risk of losing her faith. And it is here rational for her to consider what she regards to be the cost of losing her faith: that her soul will be eternally condemned to hell. It won’t be strange for the following question to cross her mind: how can understanding secular philosophy possibly be worth the risk of losing my eternal soul in hell?
You can see how this question might put the damper on attempts to escape that gated community of Christian thought–despite the strong and healthy desires to explore beyond those gates.
July 4th, 2010 | 6:38 am | #12
Janice, (and Odgie),
I’ll grant you this: the picture you have painted here is an accurate portrayal of a misconception of Christian discipleship that has been way too prevalent even among Christians.
It’s time for me to go run sound at church so I do not have time to develop that thought further. But I thought it would be helpful to inject that much into your conversation. I don’t agree with what you wrote, but nevertheless I think it’s possible you got it by way of misunderstandings for which the church itself has been responsible.
July 4th, 2010 | 7:06 am | #13
Janice,
I happen to be one of the 1% or so of the population with some interest in philosophy. Why should I insist that any of the other 99% attend to figures such as Quine or Strawson or Rorty? I would be thrilled to create moderate interest in figures like Plato and Kant (as I sometimes attempt to do); most people, after all, have jobs at which to work and children for whom to care.
Your ideal of Christians as philosophers is enticing and was shared by figures such as Origen and Clement of Alexandria, but I’m not sure that there is a lesser percentage of philosophically-literate Christians than non-Christians (and, yes, even some prominent atheists are, as some here have pointed out, beyond ignorant of modes of discourse beyond the natural sciences). So why the rush toward philosophy in particular among Christians in particular?
July 5th, 2010 | 12:46 am | #14
Steve W., I picked philosophy because I’m more familiar with it than with other disciplines. But perhaps similar things can be said about other areas of study, or even of higher education in general. From what I gather, philosophy departments are actually relatively hospitable to Christians.
The general point, remember, is that Mr. Gilson’s goal of a stronger Christian intellectual presence will be difficult to approach, given the perceived risk of eternal damnation intrinsic to what would otherwise be very ordinary intellectual aspirations.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:29 am | #15
Tom, what’s the conception of Christian discipleship I’ve painted? Are we to understand that Christian discipleship is incompatible with studying secular philosophy on one’s own (or, when not under the direct tutelage of another Christian)?
July 5th, 2010 | 8:58 am | #16
The misconception to which I’m referring is that exposure to secular philosophy is generally dangerous for Christians and for Christianity. I most assuredly did not say that discipleship is incompatible with studying secular philosophy.
July 5th, 2010 | 11:20 am | #17
Janice, are you debating a stereotype? Did I miss the condemnation of secular philosophy that happened in this post or in this thread?
July 5th, 2010 | 2:16 pm | #18
Tom Gilson,
My suggestions is that studying secular philosophy (using philosophy as an example) can be “dangerous” to a person’s faith. It’s for the same reason that, for example, studying a strong defense of theism can be “dangerous” to one’s belief that atheism is true; or that studying a strong defense of Armenianism can be “dangerous” to a person’s conviction that Calvinism is true; etc. By “dangerous,” I simply mean that it increases the likelihood that the student’s core beliefs (regarding Christianity, atheism, or Armenianism) will thereby change. This is what you deny?
Steve W.,
Perhaps you could explain your questions. I have no idea what you’re asking about. I am assuming, for example, that many Christians believe that people go to hell if they lack faith in certain central tenets of Christianity. Is that what you had in mind as a “stereotype”? Also, I don’t see where anyone has issued a “condemnation of secular philosophy”.
July 5th, 2010 | 3:22 pm | #19
Deny that it could be dangerous? No, anything’s possible. It’s dangerous that I let my teenage son learn to drive.
July 5th, 2010 | 3:28 pm | #20
I must add this, though: there is no such thing as safe, sheltered belief or unbelief. Better to study and engage various ways of thinking directly than just to absorb them without thoughtful reflection. My experience confirms for me that Christianity can stand up to a direct challenge.
July 5th, 2010 | 4:21 pm | #21
Janice,
What is your conception of Christian belief motivating your questions here? I think I can fairly paraphrase it this way. You think the Christian may say,
“I believe in God and in the future state of heaven and hell: heaven for those who die believing, and hell for those who die disbelieving. Because hell is such a fearsome possibility I will avoid learning anything that might persuade me that God does not exists—and that hell doesn’t either.”
You mocked Albert in your comment #4, but I think you were not only uncharitable in that but also plainly wrong. The atheist cannot be too careful:
“I disbelieve in God and the future state of heaven and hell: heaven for those who die believing, and hell for those who die disbelieving. Because the existence of God and hell is such a fearsome possibility I will avoid learning anything that might persuade me God exists—and hell does, too.”
Both attitudes of mind are obviously flawed. Maybe some people adopt them anyway. You suggest that some Christians actively avoid learning about life and reality because it might be too dangerous to their faith. I do not deny that this happens; I deny rather that this represents real Christian discipleship. Words relating to knowledge, study, and learning occur an average of twice in every chapter in the New Testament. Jesus and Paul both modeled direct encounter with contrary beliefs. In 2 Corinthians 10 we are instructed to meet opposing opinions head-on. Christianity (Judaism too) has an exceptionally strong heritage of intellectual prowess, recent anti-intellectualism notwithstanding.
So I caution you against erecting a straw man version (or a stereotype, as Steve suggested) of Christianity.
What you have suggested as a possible attitude of Christians may in fact obtain in some cases. But it is not genuine Christian discipleship by any means. Let me ask you this: are you really seeking deeper understanding of Christianity and its issues with your questions? Or are you trying with your questions to make a statement: to paint Christianity as a religion of timid, fearful, ignorance and stupidity?
July 5th, 2010 | 5:46 pm | #22
Tom, there is an obvious and important disanalogy here. Compare what the typical atheist thinks that she’ll lose if she loses her atheistic beliefs with what the typical Christian thinks that he’ll lose if he loses his Christian beliefs. Hint: think eternal lake of fire. It seems you’ve just repeated Albert’s fallacy.
Well they certainly wouldn’t put it this way, in terms of “life and reality.” Do you really affirm that no Christians hesitate to seriously study potentially challenging non-Christians views, which hesitation is motivated by a desire to maintain their confidence in Christianity’s “truths”?
It’s one thing to deny that there is such a thing as a perfectly “safe, sheltered belief” that, for example, God became a man and died for our sins; it’s another thing to deny that the endeavor to understand, for example, secular philosophy doesn’t as a general rule pose a greater threat to that belief than, for example, the endeavor to devote more of one’s time to prayer and the teaching of Sunday school. Do you deny that latter?
Therefore, I spoke of “the strong and healthy desires to explore beyond” that gated community of the Christian faith. The motivations for studying and engaging these “various ways of thinking” only exacerbates the dilemma.
I rather view myself as enticing and pressuring Christians to reflect on the puzzling aspects of their own faith, whether these aspects involve the core tenets faith or its cultural accretions.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:00 pm | #23
Janice, you wrote,
and
You are desperately diving for trivial wins. Tell you what. I’ll give them to you. Maybe you missed that I already gave you the first one in my comment #21; but if winning the same point twice feels better to you than winning it once, who am I to deny you the pleasure?
I do not affirm that no Christians hesitate to seriously study potentially challenging non-Christians views, which hesitation is motivated by a desire to maintain their confidence in Christianity’s truths.
I do not deny that there is a greater risk to faith in studying secular philosophy than there is in praying and going to Sunday School.
You can add those victories to the point I conceded to you in my comment number 19. They’re all yours. Enjoy them for all they’re worth!
July 5th, 2010 | 7:02 pm | #24
Good. Now perhaps you can restate your position/objection in a way that doesn’t deny these obvious facts.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:12 pm | #25
And you call this enticing? (End of comment #22, for readers who may not have read it.)
Janice, you have been, as I said, desperately diving for wins. You call them obvious; I have called them trivial—just because they are so obvious, and because you have won nothing. You have only fought to secure my agreement with what I have agreed with all along. (Did you not notice that your first “win” I gave you here was one I gave you previously in comment #21? Congratulations to you for convincing me to agree with my own earlier statement.)
You now call on my to restate my position so that I will not deny what I did not deny when I first stated my position. You haven’t shown me anything I’ve said or done that denied that original statement. Apparently you think you have done so, but you have not.
Your “enticing” and “pressuring” here is just chasing the wind.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:15 pm | #26
See also comments #89 and #90 in the Bird, Bird, Bird thread. I will think very carefully before entering into another chasing of the wind with you again.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:17 pm | #27
Well, if you’d prefer:
Now perhaps you can restate your position/objection in a way that more clearly avoids denying these trivially true facts you’ve just conceded.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:20 pm | #28
Tom, by “chasing of the wind” you should probably rather say “attempt to substantiate my claims.”
July 5th, 2010 | 7:23 pm | #29
Thank you for the conversation. I will now take the risk that I have missed something important you might have said, and that you might think I have failed to respond appropriately. I will also take the risk that other readers might draw the same conclusion. I will not take the risk of continuing to spend my time chasing the wind, as exemplified by your intimating just now I have “just conceded” what I never denied.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:29 pm | #30
Tom, were you hoping this whole time to convert me? As a goal, that wouldn’t have be any more a “chasing of the wind” than your attempts to substantiate your own dubious claims, such as they are. The latter goal would probably be more in vain.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:31 pm | #31
I was hoping to carry on a fruitful conversation.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:35 pm | #32
But Tom, if in your conception of “fruitful” you had included the possibility that you might learn something about rigorous argumentation, or about the puzzles of your own beliefs, you might not have viewed our discussions as a “chasing of the wind.”
July 5th, 2010 | 7:39 pm | #33
I’ll let you have the last word (depending on what it is, of course).
I’ll take the risk that you or others may think it was I who was missing out on rigorous argumentation or the opportunity to learn.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:41 pm | #34
Let me just register, though, that being forced (as it were) to admit what I previously freely admitted did not strike me as learning, either of rigorous argumentation or of my own faith. The last word now is yours if you desire it.
July 5th, 2010 | 7:53 pm | #35
Tom, here is my last word:
I suggest that coming back to one of these threads after the elapse of about one month, with fresh eyes and the sight-promoting benefit of distance from the moment and from all the blinding effects of personal pride. Then, in re-assessing our dialog (any one of them, really), be sure to consider the following possibility: that Janice was, first and foremost, pressing me to make my argument more rigorous.
July 5th, 2010 | 8:02 pm | #36
I said in comment #33 that the last word was yours “depending on what it is.” I find myself wanting (against my better judgment) to find out from you, just what was it you thought it was for which I was arguing, and for which I did not argue rigorously? Please answer by pointing to something I have specifically affirmed or denied; anything else would obviously not be something I could have been arguing for (or against).
July 5th, 2010 | 8:09 pm | #37
I’ll be happy to oblige (later this evening), but how about this for a last word: inveterate.
July 5th, 2010 | 11:53 pm | #38
Janice,
By suggesting that you are arguing against a stereotype, I meant to point out what Tom is rightly frustrated by: You’re not saying anything that people here don’t already agree with, but you’re saying it in a combative manner as if we do in fact disagree. In Tom’s original post and in all of his comments, he offered nothing but encouragement to learn and to question as an aid to faith “seeking understanding.”
If you want to argue with closed-minded fundamentalists, find them; don’t talk in circles trying to convince open-minded people that they don’t hold certain opinions (in favor of philosophical inquiry) that they already do hold.
Why you singled out this particular unassuming post for detailed and incredibly oblique critique (to the point of actually agreeing with Tom’s critique of a “Sunday School mentality” while pretending to somehow disagree) is beyond me. To repeat what has already been said, no one here is the least bit afraid of “secular philosophy,” but you seem to have an interest in encouraging such a fear.
July 6th, 2010 | 2:20 am | #39
Steve W, you write,
It sounds like you’ve been reading a different thread.
You also seem concerned that my critique is “detailed.” I guess I don’t know what to say, other than to observe that after I posted my first comment (#1) (a rather unassuming comment, I would think), you asked questions about it, Albert responded with an obvious fallacy, and Tom and Odgie voiced disagreement. Should my responses have been less detailed?
Steve, I haven’t accused anyone here of being a “close-minded fundamentalist.” What I have assumed is that many Christians (including, perhaps, some of the participants here) believe that the salvation of their eternal souls depend upon faith in Christianity. I have also stood behind the observations I made from the beginning, in comment #1. Why you think that I’m “trying to convince open-minded people that they don’t hold certain opinions” is simply beyond me. I, for one, would actually appreciate a more “detailed” explanation of why you accuse me of “arguing against a stereotype.” After all, when one makes a claim like this, one might expect to be asked to substantiate it.
I suggest that you re-read the thread, paying attention to what has actually been written. If afterwards you still find anything that I’ve written too “oblique,” you would be in a better position to try to more accurately describe the source of your difficulty and frustration. I would then be happy to try to clarify.
July 6th, 2010 | 3:47 am | #40
Tom, you wrote,
Here are two things you have “specifically affirmed”:
Regarding (1): you’ve failed to substantiate the claim that I’ve portrayed any misconception. I’ve suggested that, according to a widely held tenet of the Christian faith (namely, that one’s belief in certain claims of Christianity is necessary for one’s salvation), combined with general facts about belief and how beliefs can be weakened, certain kinds of learning (which are otherwise very ordinary intellectual aspirations) generally pose a threat for Christians. I’d really love for you to provide a rigorous argument about how my actual portrayal of the issue (see esp. #1, #11, and #18) portrays a misconception. For this, it might be helpful for you to think about what, precisely, the suggested dilemma really requires (it does not, e.g., require any denial of Christianity’s intellectually rich history, or any affirmation that Christians actually should avoid studying challenging views, nor does it require the claim that there are never ways for some Christians to understand the potentially challenging views without significantly risking their supposedly essential religious beliefs).
Regarding (2), you’ve failed to address my response in #22, and the point of my rhetorical questions to Albert in #4.
July 6th, 2010 | 4:50 am | #41
Janice,
I want to make sure that what we’re dealing with is not a simple miscommunication.
The misconception of Christian discipleship of which I spoke is a misconception that Christians sometimes hold. By saying you accurately portrayed it, what I meant was that you had provided a true picture of some Christians’ false view of what it means to be a disciple. That is what I was affirming or at least intending to affirm there. Is that what you understood me to be saying?
I also want you to understand what was going on in our exchanges last evening.
You asked me in #22, “Do you really affirm that p?” ( being, “that no Christians hesitate to seriously study potentially challenging non-Christians views, which hesitation is motivated by a desire to maintain their confidence in Christianity’s “truths’?”). And you asked, “Do you deny that r?” (r having to do with the relative risks of prayer, Sunday School, and secular philosophy.)
I answered that I had never affirmed p, and showed you where I had denied it previously. Regarding r, I had never mentioned prayer and Sunday School, nor had you; and I was willing to agree with r, now that it had been brought up.
So there was nothing new in that; yet you asked me to restate my position without denying what I had agreed to. That put me in a position of having to restate my affirmation of x without affirming p and without denying r; which was puzzling since I had not affirmed p nor denied r in the first place. So why restate x? What would I say differently now? This is what I was saying to you in #25.
I think this is what Steve is also saying, with which you have again disagreed.
After that you informed me that because of my pride I was missing the opportunity to learn something about rigorous argumentation. To be pressured to concede that which I had previously, freely affirmed is not rigorous argumentation. Why would you push someone so hard to agree with himself?
I am off to a breakfast meeting. I’ll let you respond to this before I decide where to go next with it.
July 6th, 2010 | 5:47 am | #42
Tom, in the same comment in which you made the claim that my picture portrayed a prevalent misconception, you also stated, “I don’t agree with what you wrote.” Now put yourself in my shoes. That is, consider if someone added this to their explicit disagreement with you: “your claim expresses a common misunderstanding.” How would you interpret this?
I would take back the second paragraph of my comment #22 (after I quoted you saying, “You suggest that some Christians actively avoid….” ) The single question I put to you there is inappropriate. The other question in #22, as well as my other comments there and elsewhere, were entirely appropriate attempts to get you to clarify what you regard as your disagreement with what I have written. I’m still waiting for that clarification, as well as for your claim that my response to Albert was plainly wrong.
Let’s let Steve address my response to him in #39.
July 6th, 2010 | 7:08 am | #43
Okay then, that’s some clarification. Thank you.
Now I have a choice to make. In my previous comment I addressed the way you have pressured me to agree with myself, and the have implied that there is some fault in me for being unwilling to substantiate my claims in the context of your pressuring me to agree with myself. I’m not at all sure how your doing that was appropriate to the question you wanted answered. You weren’t asking the question you wanted answered. You were asking different questions that I had already answered; or in the case of the Sunday School question, the way you asked the question implied some answer that I had never given nor intimated.
What that boils down to is this: there may be some value here in pushing toward some clarification and substantiation, but to be pressed to agree with myself still does not strike me as being the kind of experience through which I can learn rigorous argumentation. If I was failing to substantiate a claim, as you say, it was because I was busy explaining to you that the questions you were pressing me on were questions I had already answered more than once. It was also not at all plain to see, at that point, just what claim you wanted substantiated. Thus my question to you in comment #36.
In sum: you were calling on me to spin my wheels, saying the same thing over again several times and challenging me as if I hadn’t said it before. That’s a questionable use of my time. (Note that something similar happened in comments 16 and 19.) You took a pedantic and judgmental tone toward me for failing to realize that in calling on me to spin my wheels, you were really trying to get me to respond to your point several comments earlier. That’s another questionable thing for me to want to engage in.
You also took a judgmental tone toward me for failing to learn rigorous argumentation from you. It is my choice whether I consider you the best person to take on as my teacher in these things. So I want to state this quite clearly: I am quite eager to learn, but not so eager to do so while spinning my wheels and being judged in this way. If you think one of my purposes here ought to be to accept your tutelage in these matters, I am choosing otherwise. To the extent I continue in discussion with you, it will be for other purposes.
More to come…
July 6th, 2010 | 8:23 am | #44
This isn’t quite right Tom. Here’s the statement you’re referring to:
This is a perfectly appropriate clarificatory question, especially in the context of your disagreement, which I am endeavoring to locate. The question I asked is prefaced by a distinction, the purpose of which is to help distinguish that which is clearly not a controversial denial, from that which clearly would be. The obvious implication is that you cannot locate your disagreement with me in the former denial, but that we would be in disagreement if you denied the latter. Thus, the simple and straightforward question.
That’s hardly a summary of the dialectic, avoiding as it does the lion’s share of it. As far as I can tell, in the entirety of this thread, there is only one question that I asked which you had already answered. You seem to be making a grand effort at concentrating our attention on this one isolated question. That we might call a spinning of your own wheels.
July 6th, 2010 | 8:41 am | #45
I think then if that is your response there is little point in trying to proceed. I’ve tried, and I’ve gotten as far as I think I’m likely to get.
I will go ahead and accept the above-mentioned risk that you or others will think I’ve failed to carry my load.
July 6th, 2010 | 9:28 am | #46
Janice,
Yes, there were disagreements in this long and circuitous thread. I only wish that you could more succinct, as I don’t have the time to argue semantics over and over again when there doesn’t seem to be a real issue at stake. Do some Christians somewhere avoid studying philosophy out of a fear of eternal damnation? Yes – that is implied by Tom’s admonition to reject this irrational fear.
My disagreement with you (as in #13) is this: It seems that you have way too much time on your hands and are using that time to try to convince people who agree with you that philosophy is worthwhile that there are people out there who, for reasons related to their Christian faith, do not also value philosophy. If that is your point, then I readily concede it. If you mean to imply that that is a serious defect (given the philosophical illiteracy of the vast majority of non-Christians), then I think that you have no case.
By repeatedly going back to previous comments and trying to debate what this entire comment thread has said piece by piece (pointing to different minutiae each time), you’re being pedantic and that disinclines me to continue this attempt at dialogue. (In that vein, the way you have attributed Tom’s understandable frustration with your style of dialogue to ostensible pride on his part is quite uncalled for.) If those with whom you are dialoguing miss something, just do us the favor of succinctly repeating it without being condescending; I don’t have the time or capacity to memorize all 45 comments in this thread.
July 6th, 2010 | 1:29 pm | #47
Tom Gilson,
I suggest coming back to one of these threads after the elapse of about one month, with fresh eyes and the sight-promoting benefit of distance from the moment and from all the blinding effects of personal pride. Then, in re-assessing this dialog (or any one of them, really), be sure to consider the following possibility: that Janice was, first and foremost, pressing me to make my argument more rigorous.
July 6th, 2010 | 1:36 pm | #48
Steve W.,
I suggest that you try applying the same criticisms to Tom Gilson, the person you are eager to defend. I also suggest that you reflect on the coherency of your own criticism as it applies to me. On the one hand, you seem to want to me to be briefer and less concerned with detail; on the other hand, Tom Gilson is making a big issue about one of those details (as it finally turns out, his issue is that I raised a single, isolated question that he had already (gasp!) answered). You would have preferred that I not respond to Tom according to as his questions required. However, it is absolutely absurd for you to ask me to start repeating the very points I’ve repeatedly (and in varied paraphrases and illustrations) made. And it is stupefying that you have apparently failed to understand the very first reply I gave to you–short as it was:
July 9th, 2010 | 11:34 pm | #49
Great advice, that about coming back after some elapsed time and reading with fresh eyes. Do take it, Janice.
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