The Fifth Book of Christmas: Pain, the Gift No One Wants

Twelve Books that show how Christmas changed the world.

On the fifth day of Christmas, our True Love gave the world: physical healing.

"The Gift of Pain," by Dr. Paul Brand and Philip Yancey.

This books feels like several books combined, but the constituent elements are woven together into a coherent and fascinating whole. 

The book begins with a forward by C. Everett Koop, who pays Dr. Brand the extravagent compliment of saying that when Koop thinks whose life he would like to live, were he to be someone else, the first name on his list is that of Paul Brand. 

The first thread in the tapestry is Dr. Brand's autobiography.  Brand was born in the "Hills of Death" in southern India, to missionary parents.  These old-style missionaries were often headstrong, enormously courageous, and a  bit eccentric, and Paul paints a loving portrait of parents who lived life in full.  Apparently he derived his interest in Nature and Science from his father, who was always poking into ant hills and peering at plants, when he wasn't improving his corner of the world with new crops and healing sometimes hostile villagers.  But tragically, his father died while Paul was being schooled in England.  Having gotten his baptism of fire in surgery during the Blitz, Paul returned to India with his wife Margaret, an eye surgeon, where they worked for almost two decades in healing lepers and the blind of India.  Paul then headed America's only center for the study and rehabilitation of Hansen's disease in Lousianna, where he broadened his study to the effects of pain loss from diabetes, which afflicts millions of people. 

Pain then becomes a scientific adventure story.  It tells how Paul and his staff in India discovered the means by which the lepresy virus ruins bodies, starting with the extremities, and therefore began to develop a lifestyle program for preverving quality of life for those afflicted.

One can also find elements of a love story, a spiritual biography, a bit of philosophy and some thoughts about ecology, in the book. 

So why do I include it as one of the Twelve Books of Christmas?  It represents the work of men and women called to heal, as followers of Jesus.  Missionary doctors started thousands of hospitals on every inhabited continent, often reaching out to the poorest of the poor.  (Though, as Brand points out in an interview in the upcoming Faith Seeking Understanding, some of these healing centers succomb to a "missions creep" similiar to what eventually afflicted Harvard.)  Work with lepers was part of the Christian tradition already in the Middle Ages.  And even in Greco-Roman times, Stark argues, care for the sick was one reason why the Church grew, both through higher survival rates, and because kindness attracted newcomers.   

Billions of the sick have been treated, healed or had babies delivered, by those who follow in the steps of Jesus, the healer.  Dr. Brand shows the connection between model (Jesus) and those who follow him, particularly clearly, because like Jesus, he "touched the untouchable," lepers who were stigmatized in India as they were in ancient Israel.  And as with Jesus, he recognzed that human touch was important in the healing process, because we are more than our bodies: full healing is healing of the spirit.

Other good books: George MacKay, From Far Formosa, tells the "typical" story of a missionary in Taiwan, who did medicine (on thousands of patients!) in his "spare time."  Perhaps the most prominent hospital in modern Taiwan is called the MacKay Memorial Hospital, in the center of Taipei: it's a landmark everyone knows.  Many other missionaries, whether Hudson Taylor or Gladys Aylward in China, Mary Slessor in Nigeria,  or the missionaries I've met in Asia today, include healing as a part of their ministry. 

Hannam's book also shows how medical science also advanced in tandem with the healing arts. 

Day Six. 

The Fourth Book of Christmas: "Genesis of Science."

Twelve Books that show how Christmas changed the world.

On the fourth day of Christmas, our True Love gave the world: modern science.

"The Genesis of Science: How the Christian Middle Ages Launched the Scientific Revolution," by James Hannam.

You might read the subtitle of this book and fear or hope for a sharp polemical argument. The Genesis of Science is, in fact, an informed, pretty mellow, and easily read explanation of "how the Christian Middle Ages launched the Scientific Revolution." There is some stress on the word "Christian." But while Hannam does argue that Christianity played an important role in the birth of modern science, he recognizes that the story is complex, with many actors, and most actors playing ambivalent roles. Hannam brings this complexity to life well, while his rehabilitation of Medieval civilization lends the story continuity.

In some ways, Hannam's thesis might be defined by half a sentence in the second-to-last paragraph of the book:

"You could call any century from the twelfth to the twentieth a revolution in science . . . "

Actually, Hannam begins in earnest with the 11th Century, which he shows set the intellectual stage for what was to come. This was as soon as one could hope for: Europe had spend half a millennia fitfully recovering from a long series of invasions, and had never been the economic heart of Western civilization, anyway.  Hannam mostly ends with Galileo and the first half of the 17th Century. But each century between these bookends gets a fair amount of attention, with many unknown characters, and stars, traipsing across the book's pages.

Among other things, I found Hannam's discussion of Humanism interesting. He argues that "humanism almost managed to destroy 300 years of progress in natural philosophy," by encouraging intellectuals to scoff at Medieval attainments. C. S. Lewis makes the same point about literature in his magisterial English Literature in the 16th Century: he shows that the humanists also scorned, and largely lost, the literary attainments of the Middle Ages. Many modern skeptics delude themselves into thinking the Enlightenment gave Western culture everything of value, even (I have heard them!) modern science. I appreciate those like Hannam and Lewis (Confucius is another) who help us remember and better appreciate our roots.

Another topic Hannam does not much touch on, but that came to mind when I interviewed Allan Chapman, historian of science at Oxford's Wadham College, where the Royal Society partly began, was the fact that Europe, while one civilization, was divided into many competing states. As it happens, so was ancient Greece, and the almost equally creative "Spring and Autumn / Warring States" period in Chinese history. (All of which, in addition, were theistic.) This E Pluribus Unum thing seems to work well, along with this "one civilization under God" idea

Other good sources: Please do listen to my interview of Allan Chapman at christthetao.com.  He's quite a character, with a sweeping and enthusiastic knowledge of the subject.  And as the interview takes place at his home, his clock collection chimes in, as well.  Also interesting: Charles Thaxton and Nancy Pearson, The Soul of Science; Stephen Barr, Modern Physics and Ancient Faith; and for different perspectives, David Landes, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations; and, for an opposing explanation that is depressing but formidably argued, Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel.

Back to Book 1. 

Forward to Book 5. 

The Third Book of Christmas: "Atheist Delusions"

Twelve Books that show how Christmas changed the world.

On the third day of Christmas, our True Love gave the world: revitalized Greco-Roman thought and morals.

David Hart is as urbane, pugnatious, witty, combatative, meandering, and dangerously informed as a writer as you want to enjoy on a long Sunday afternoon, with lazy dragonflies flitting past in the sunshine. In some ways this works best for an essay: one wants to come to a conclusion, and digest the ideas for a while before you take another bite.
3

This book is NOT a response (in a very recognizable form) to the New Atheists.  It is a book about how Christianity shaped and shaped up western civilization, especially in the Greek and Roman world of late Antiquity, with a few words about Dawkins & Co added at the beginning and end after Hart got jabbed in the ribs by his editor.

One thing Hart attempts is to set a context for what Christianity accomplished in the ancient world:
 :
"Pagan cult was never more tolerant than it is tolerance -- without any qualms of conscience -- of poverty, disease, starvation, and homelessness; of gladiatorial spectacle, crucifixion, the exposure of unwanted infants, or the public slaughter of war captives or criminals on festive occasions; of, indeed, almost every imaginable form of tyranny, injustice, depravity, or cruelty."

How long would it take to properly digest those two sentences -- or even to spit them out?  One does slowly develop the feeling, though, that Hart knows what he's talking about, and that the picture he paints of the ancient world, and how the Gospel began (sometimes quickly, but often over long centuries) to transform it, may be the central story of human history.  This is one literary, pugnatious, and dogmatic bookend to that story. 

Related books:

The Durants' Christ and Caesar confirms many of the points Hart makes, though in fairly brief clips.  Charles Williams' Descent of the Dove offers a very different kind of overview.  Stark helps with concrete data from antiquity.  

Book 1.

Book 2. 

Forward to Book 4. 

A Christmas List from John Loftus

The atheist writer John Loftus has just posted a list of intellectual demands from God.  These are six things he think God should do, or should have done, to prove His reality to John, and by implication perhaps to other skeptics. 

When I saw John's list, I immediately thought of the door to our boy's bedroom. 

My boys write something very like this list at Christmas, only they’re more modest. They tape six or seven “demands” to the door. Things like joysticks for a flight simulator, airsoft guns, books on subjects that interest them, even foods they like. Only not only do they ask for smaller presents, they give their parents an “opt-out” on less urgent requests. They might write something like "non-essential" next to one or more item.  And they don’t really seem to think fulfilling their requests is absolutely obligatory.

As a matter of fact, I think God has given us at least two of the items on John's Christmas list.  (My kids don't usually expect more than that!)

But more to the point, my kids recognize that gift's come at the gift-giver's discretion.  They seem to understand that their parents love them, but that gift-giving decisions are also subject to constraints of which we might still have, in some ways, a better understanding than they do. 

They also know to expect the unexpected.  We are human, and limited in imagination, but what would Christmas be without happy surprises!  

Personally, I think the intellectual presents God has actually given, are more interesting than the ones John is asking for.  (Many of which I've touched on in various blogs over the past year, including "The Twelve Books of Christmas" series, which I interrupt to post this gut response to John . . . ) 

Reading over Philip Yancey's contribution to our new book yesterday, it also occurs to me that (as Dr. Brand explained) the very nature of a fixed reality forces constraints even on God. 

Isn't that the way it would be, if God is God, which is something more than a parent?  Wouldn't God's understanding of what we really need, in the way of "reasons to believe," be more than we kids can think up to tape on our bedroom door? 

For example, there's this item:

“There would not be so much religious diversity around the globe if there is a God who wants us to believe in him. The probability that the Christian God exists is reduced in direct proportion by the amount of religious diversity that exists, and there is way too much of it to suppose that he does.”

I’ve answered this argument two or three times, in response to John's “Outsider Test.” I maintain, on the contrary, that the actual data of world religions tremendously confirms the Christian faith, often in fantastic and undreamed of ways. And unlike John (we all have our life journeys), I've in non-Christian cultures, and studying non-Christian religions, for many decades.  World religions is my primary area of academic expertise. 

John has read those posts.  His “response” so far has been along the lines of, “That’s interesting, maybe I should respond some time.”

Until he does, maybe he should past another request on the bedroom door.  Last Christmas he asked for a tricycle, and got a mountain bike, instead. 

Which brings up that age-old, Willy Wonka question: "Can a child enjoy Christmas, with the wrong attitude?"

The Second Book of Christmas: "Jesus Through the Centuries"

Twelve Books that show how Christmas changed the world.

On the second day of Christmas, our True Love gave the world: a new and transformative human model.

"Jesus Through the Centuries," Jaroslav Pelikan (For book 1, click here.) 

This is not a devotional work, it is an insightful and valuable slice of intellectual history. Pelikan is a Christian, but distances himself from his subjects. The combination of sympathy and critical distance may help the reader begin his own conversation with the persons described. Of course, Pelikan bites off more than he can chew. How can there be room in one readable, coherent and reasonably short book for Augustine and Blake, Renan and Ricci, Constantine and Gandhi? But Pelikan pulls it off pretty well, summarizing the history with interesting anecdotes, and making reasonable comments. Not all of which I think are correct, though.

"It is not sameness but kaleidescope variety that is its most conspicuous feature." Pelikan includes a great deal of evidence for both. Early Christians attempted to translate Jesus as "logos" to relate to Greek thinking. Modern Christians in India and China undertook a similar task of describing Jesus as the fulfillment of the deepest truths in those great cultures. (Work I have studied for many years.)
I gave the book five stars on Amazon, because it is brilliant, fascinating and informative. Nevertheless, Pelikan's position sometimes seems to soak up a bit of the subjectivm he chronicles.

It is important to distinguish between images that are arbitrary, and those that depend on a reality that can be referred to. One could write a book called "The Moon through the Centuries." But that would be a different kind of book from "Martians through the Centuries," because in the first case, we just need to look up to correct our impressions. Pelikan does not take sufficient account of the fact that getting to know Jesus is more like looking at the moon than speculating about Martians. Kaleidescope is a mosaic of splintered reflections. But the image whom these reflections reflected, like the moon, is still before us, in the gospels. Pelikan tells us we are "dependant" on "oral tradition" that was "eventually deposited" in the gospels, but in fact they were written within the lifetimes of the first Christians. Rather than "tradition," they could have relied on memory.

Pelikan does not distinguish between birds that settle in the nest as they find it, and birds that steal twigs to built their own. He weakly justifies the fantastic subjectivism that goes into revisionist historical Jesus studies. Pelikan is a conscientious objector from the argument over what really happened. In a preface to a recent edition he admits, a bit coyly, that he doesn't buy the arguments of the "historical Jesus" crowd. Well and good: but this excellent book might be even better if the fascinating and fruitful subjectivism he chronicles were balanced with an occasional reminder that in the end, portraits are not about those who take the picture, but him whose portrait is taken.

Still, a deserved classic, and a wonderful way to begin looking at the influence Jesus has had from Antiquity on. I recommend this book not because it makes the full argument that the series as a whole will give, but because in it, one may catch a overall outline of Jesus in his variagated reflections in human culture, and grasp the general significance of Christmas for the world. 

Other books in the series will focus on the influence Jesus has had on particular peoples, and that take a less subjective approach, so I'll leave more book recommendations for later. 

Book 3.  

The First Book of Christmas: "Rise of Christianity"

Twelve Books that show how Christmas changed the world. 

On the first day of Christmas, our True Love gave the world: a transformative social vision. 

Day 1:  Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity

How did Christianity spread in the Roman Empire?  By force?  By burning down libraries and blowing up pagan temples?  By oppressing women? 

Hardly.  As Dr. Stark, one of the world's leading sociologists of religion, shows in this landmark study, the Gospel spread because Greeks and Romans found it attractive for good reasons.  Christians aided the poor and sick, even at the risk of their own lives -- leading to higher survival rates, overall.  Women were given a higher status in the early church than in society as a whole. 

When I first read this book, I found myself agreeing with the points both those who liked the book and those who didn't like it made.  (This was the first of Stark's volume's I'd read; I've since read many more.) The man clearly made many good ideas. His discussion of how the Gospel transformed the role of women is itself worth the price of the book, debunking errors about Christianity and women that are ubiquitous among American intellectuals.  His insights about the courage believers showed during epidemics and martyrdom is also helpful. But, at the same time, the hubris of social science, a reliance on theories which are most persuasive within the framework in which most of Stark's direct research appeared to have been conducted, sometimes, I thought, caused him to overreach.

He argues, for example, that we do not "need" miracles or mass conversions to explain the growth of the church. Finding a growth rate over three centuries close to the 43% that Mormonism has maintained for the last century, he seemed to suppose he had discovered a scientific principle, which negates the need for "exceptional explanations."

Those who do not with to believe in miracles may find comfort in this explanation, and it is often cited by skeptics.  For example, in The End of Christianity, Richard Carrier ham-handedly borrows the argument (without citing Stark, whom he has dismissed elsewhere as an historian), in a chapter pointedly called "Christianity's Success was not Incredible:"

"A full analysis of all the reliable evidence available indicates the rate of growth of Christianity as a whole, from its very beginning and throughout its entire history, was less than 4 percent a year, the same as that of any other aggressively evengalistic religion (such as the Mormon Church) . . . Its rate of development and success was entirely natural/  Since that rate was natural, we should expect its cause was natural, which alone closes the book on Christianity having any supernatural evidence or guidance."

This is, of course, an absurd argument, as Stark himself (in effect) admitted in an interview I conducted a year or so ago.  The fact that Christianity grew no more quickly than Mormonism, under entirely different circumstances (persecution, higher overall death rate, no requirement that all young men serve in missions), does nothing at all to undermine reports that that growth included miracles. 

When I first read the book, furthermore, I had just returned from a small town in China which, before the revolution, had about 20 Christians, but now had over a thousand. This is a 110% growth rate per decade. For most of that time, preaching was dangerous, and martyrs were seldom allowed to be treated as public heros as Stark described them. Yet this growth rate has been typical in many parts of China. In Anhui province, the church grew about a hundred times (not percent) in just two decades!  In practice miracles, mass conversions, and the supernatural preparation of Chinese culture for the Gospel (as Paul and Augustine found in Greco-Roman culture) seem to be playing a tremendous role in these events. I have met people involved in mass conversions and miracles myself.

But as Stark shows, the message of Christmas spread mainly because early Christians did good works, and people found the Gospel attractive. 

When I first took a social science course at the University of Washington where Stark teaches 30+ years ago, my immediate reaction was, "What this man is teaching, when translated into ordinary English, seems to reduce to either to common sense or to nonsense." Stark's ideas do not need translating, his style is lively and his thoughts clear. Better yet, his "discoveries" are much more of the first than the second. But most of them are not really surprising, on careful reading of the Bible. And a few may be mistaken.

As Stark told me, this and other books ultimately proved to be stepping stones on his own journey to Christian faith.  "It all came to make sense." 

Walking that journey with Dr. Stark will change how you see history.  His works have immeasurably deepened my own appreciation of how the birth of Jesus has changed the world: how the Gospel improved the status of women, taught people to care for the sick and dying more deeply, and (in later books) invented science and liberated slaves. 

Other books by Stark:  For the Glory of God is indispensable, as is The Discovery of God.  One True God, God's Battalions, and his book on Roman cities are all very worth reading.  The gist of his sociological theories, which are very enlightening, can be found in these historical books, or read directly in Acts of Faith.  Also look for Stark's article in Sociology of Religion, "Secularization, RIP."  It will change how you see the Middle Ages.

Link to Second Day. 

(Note: most reviews in this series will be partially adapted from those I posted on Amazon.com, with many corrections and additions, as in this case, and book suggestions at the end.)

What is a Miracle?

Why believe in God?  Maybe the best reason is miracles.  Debates about the truth of Christianity often revolve around the reality of the most famous miracle in human history, the resurrection of Jesus.  In this era in which Christianity has spread rapidly beyond its old borders, Christians around the world also often explain their conversion by some event in which God seemed to step into their lives in an amazing way.  Two chapters of my new book, Faith Seeking Understanding, tell such stories. 

But this brings up a lot of questions.  Wwhat is a miracle?  Are miracles possible?  Does science disprove them?  If Christians believe the resurrection, does that oblige us to admit Joseph Smith really received the Book of Mormon from the angel Moroni, or that Mohammed rode a white horse to heaven?  Do miracles provide good evidence for Christianity? 

I think they do.  But we can't tackle all these questions in one post, so let's start with the first, which is foundational to all the others. 

The word "miracle" is given at least three different meanings:

(1) People often use the word to refer to "an amazing event."  "We have all benefited from the miracle of science."  "We'll be telling our grandkids about that miraculous fourth-quarter comback!" "I held her hand as the baby emerged, and witnessed the miracle of new life."

Language is a set of mostly arbitrary signs that we use to communicate.  So there is nothing "wrong" about using the word miracle this, or any other, way.  If you like, you define "rose" as "a large mammal that lives in the swamps on Yoda's home planet."  You can write a science-fiction novel using the word that way, and your readers will get used to the term quickly enough.  But then if your neighbor tells you, "I'm putting in roses in my yard next spring," don't criticize him for harboring dangerous animals: his use of the word is more in agreement with convention, than your own.   

So there is nothing "wrong" with using "miracle" to mean "an amazing event."  But it is irrelevant to the debate between skeptics and theists, and its frequent use tends to confuse that issue.  An atheist can see miracles around him all day long, in this sense, without upsetting his atheism.  So let us bracket this common meaning of the word "miracle." 

(2) Miracle is also commonly taken to mean, "An event in the material world that violates the laws of Nature."  In a post article at The Secular Outpost, the philosopher  Brad Owen argued, "In order for an event to be a miracle, it must satisfy at least the following two conditions:  1. The event must involve the violation of a law of nature. 2. The event must be brought about by God."

The first part of this definition seems to have been popularized by 17th Century Scottish philosopher, David Hume:

"A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature." 

Hume went on to explain:

"Sometimes an event may not, in itself, seem to be contrary to the laws of nature, and yet, if it were real, it might, by reason of some circumstances, be denominated a miracle; because, in fact, it is contrary to these laws.  Thus if a person, claiming a divine authority, should command a sick person to be well, a healthful man to fall down dead, the clouds to pour rain, the winds to follow upon his command; these may justly be esteemed miracles . . . " 

I responded to the word "violation" that both Owen and Hume use, as follows:

"One reason I object to the word 'violation,' is that it seems to imply a discontinuity between the 'laws' of nature and miracles. But there is actually a deeper continuity. Miracles are not like random street noise that interrupts a concert (magic). They are like the symbols that dramatically break up the horn soliquy with a sudden 'crash,' but were written into the music by the composer to climax the piece."

C. S. Lewis offers a similar explanation in his book, Miracles. 
Brad responded by citing the Christian historian Gary Habermas, and softening his language, to say miracles must involve a "suspension" of natural law. 

That helps, but I also see two larger problems with this assumption. 
First, what are miracles like, in the Bible, or as people experience them today?

Some do seem to involve suspension of natural law.  For example, the first "sign" John reports, is when Jesus changes water into wine at a wedding feast in the lakeside village of Cana.  This is a chemically impossible reaction: alcohol contains carbon, for instance, while water does not. Nor does Jesus appear to have acted on the water to stimulate any kind of reaction. 

On the other hand, a few chapters later, mere words at a well in Samaria, and then in a village nearby, convince some Samaritans that Jesus is "the Savior of the world."  No laws of physics or chemistry are obviously "suspended" in the process.  But the people are convinced, and the reasons are good.  

The same is often true of "miracles," today.  I have never seen the laws of physics suspended or violated.  But several times, I have seen what looked like "miraculous" answers to prayer.

Once when I was working as a missionary in Taiwan, I ran out of money.  I went to a park in Taipei and prayed, "God, why don't I just go home!  I don't even have enough money to buy a hamburger!  The hymn says, 'Great is thy faithfulness,' but I just don't see that faithfulness!"

On my way out of the park, I stopped to talk with a Chinese girl reading an English newspaper.  (The paper was an excuse.  "At least she answers!"  I told God.)  As I was getting up to leave, the girl asked me my name.  "Ma De Wei," I said.  "Ma Dewei?  You're Ma Dewei!  Really?"

I soon learned why she was so surprised.  Years before, I had found a wallet some miles away, and taken it to the Taiwan University Lost and Found.  I put my Chinese name in the wallet, and wrote, "God loves you."  In a city of four million, this girl turned out to be the owner of that wallet.

She took me to McDonalds for lunch.  Eating a cheeseburger, I remembered the jibe about money for hamburgers.  

My other needs were met in almost equally surprising ways.

None, however, involved the suspension of any natural laws.  But they did give me reason to think God had not forgotten me. 

An opposite phenomena from the one Hume mentioned is often cited by modern skeptics: when a natural explanation (either "folk" or "scientific") is later found for events that at first seem supernatural.  Maybe Jesus was a "psychic," in other words exploited some little-known physical powers to read the Samaritan woman's mind.  Maybe his disciples did good research on her.  Either way, the "sign," while compelling to those who converted, need not involve God (skeptics may reply), nor need it clearly violate known laws of science. 

Some miracles in the gospels are like that: Peter's catch of the fish with the gold coin in its mouth, the disciples' big catches of fish under Jesus' instruction, occasions when Jesus seemed to know things without being told.  Some of his healing might be explained away as psychosomatic. 

Even the toughest miracles might, in theory, be explained in terms of quantum physics.  The philosopher Michael Martin, for example, suggests that even the resurrection might theoretically be explained by a random quantum fluctuation.  So might Jesus walking on water, or multiplying the loaves and fishes, or healing anyone of anything. 

So there are two problems with the definition Brad Owen and David Hume (among others, both skeptics and Christians) use. 

First, the Bible uses another term, "sign," which seems to put the stress on the probative value of the event in persuading those who experience it to trust God, and act on that trust.  Some "signs" seem to involve what we would ordinarily call "violations of natural law," others do not.

Second, given quantum physics and modern technology, it is increasingly difficult to absolutely differentiate between what physical laws do or do not allow.  One might also explain Jesus' healings, for instance, as those of a medical doctor from an advanced extraterrestrial civilization, Dr. McCoy in Palestine. 

Of course there are all kinds of problems with these counter-claims.  The odds such an enormous quantum flux, for example, are greater than the number of fundamental particles in a universe the size ours would be, if every particle in it became a universe of its own.  But it has become more difficult, now, to draw a clear line between the "improbable" and what is genuinely impossible in the course of nature. 

It seems, then, that we need a definition of "miracle" that includes both how the Bible actually uses the word, the root meaning of the word, and in terms of probilities rather than mere possibilities. 

So here's the definition I prefer:

(3)  "A miracle is an event in the natural world that points probatively to God's work, and gives us compelling reasons to trust Him." 

The most common Greek word is σημειoν, or sign, the root for semiotics. A miracle does not need to violate a law of nature, but should give good reasons for faith.

In Jesus and the Religions of Man, chapter 10 and 11, I give an in-depth description of what a miracle in this sense involves, and compare miracles to magic.  Briefly, miracles in the biblical sense tend to share five characteristics (one of which Brad Owen has already mentioned):

(1) "Miracles ask to be verified; magic insults the intelligence."  This is related to their root meaning of "signs," and to their purpose in guiding us to God.   

(2) "Miracles tend to be practical; magic is often showy." 

(3) "Miracles enhance human dignity; magic makes us more or less than human."

(4) "Miracles point to God; magic points elsewhere." 

(5) "Miracles come in response to requests; magic to demands."  One consequence of this quality is that it is often difficult to test miracles scientifically, but may be possible to check them historically.  God, being our Lord, not our servant, will act when and where, and in whatever way, He chooses.  Therefore miracles are not "repeatable," but they can be rationally deduced.

These five qualities not only help define Christian miracles, they also help differentiate true miracles from faked or even demonic supernatural acts.  That's what I'm doing in Jesus and the Religions of Man. 

Alaskans on Mars!

Comet West apparently
broke into four fragments
in 1976.

My aim in this blog is to "map the universe, one blog at a time."  But so far, my blogs have been a tad parochial -- about events on that one planet that most of my readers seem to inhabit.  (And yes, there are readers, and their numbers appear to be increasing.) 

So let me take a first, tentative, if nascently imperial, step beyond our world. 

How about turning Mars into a summer home for Alaskans?

Here is how we would do it.  First, develop one of the larger spacecraft considered for "Project Orion," which use nuclear bombs as propulsion.

Second, capture several dozen large comets with a lot of ice, and force them to crash on the surface of Mars.  (The mass of Earth's oceans is about 5 million times the mass of Halley's comet, which is a small comet.  We would need at least 1/500th as much water to make a viable ocean on Mars, whose surface area is one third that of Earth -- a thousand feet deep might be a good start.)

Third, if needed, add a smaller, more salt-rich comet or two.  Shake well to mix. 

Fourth, wait for the energy of the crash to melt the ice -- this might take some careful calibration, we'll put our best Chinese and Indian engineers on the job.  Before the oceans evaporate into space, they should provide an atmosphere for a few thousand years, which we can tweak, once we have enough practice with our own.  (Perhaps tax credits for Humvees on the Red Planet?) 

Fifth, stock the new oceans with halibut, king crab and the better species of salmon. 

Then open Mars up as a winter resort for Alaskans who can't book a flight to Hawaii, or in case we have to sell Hawaii to China to pay off our debt.

The sun does not shine very brightly on Mars, admittedly.  But Alaskans are used to that.  And it's sunny every day.  We could, perhaps, also import a few seals, polar bears, and other animals that enjoy that sort of weather, once we've got the planetary thermostat down.  There's a fair amount of CO2 in the Martian atmosphere already, so that should warm things up. 

If Sarah Palin buys a summer home on Mars, she can reign as governor, if not goddess of the sea (a position that may not tax her powers of patience for too long.)  Then, as Earth increasingly resembles its greenhouse-gas befogged sunward neighbor, the saying will come true, "Republicans are from Mars, Democrats are from Venus."

Fish the Red Planet!



And if we mess up our own planet badly enough, we'll have some off-world relatives to get things going, again.  (Since chat lines will take at least 16 minutes for communication at the speed of light, this may also bring back some of the old romance of letter-writing.  Imagine what it will do for stories of tragic lost love, as well.)

A Lao Zi impersonator turns up.

Lao Zi literally means "old master," a name or title usually applied to the author of the great Chinese classic, Dao Dejing.  Our new book (see last blog) is a tribute to two "old masters" whom I have had the privilege of knowing a little, Dr. Paul Brand and Dr. Ralph Winter.  I'm also a big fan of THE Lao Zi.

So imagine my curiosity to find someone on Amazon.com who calls himself "Lao Tzu" (using the old Wade-Giles spelling; I use the newer pinyin -- either way the second part is pronounced something like "zeh.")

This copy-cat Lao Zi invited Christians to dialogue, respectfully and rationally (he said), about the effectiveness of what he called "standard Christian arguments:"

"Christians get so excited when they read 'The Case for Christ' or 'Mere Christianity' and think they have the slam dunk argument to beat the infidels. Not only have these arguments been thoroughly refuted, it was done LONG AGO. The Christians need to become more aware of these arguments that have been made. The reason they are not, is because they always read books 'in the fold' never from someone outside the faith, so they are helpless in the face of those arguments. I want to list the standard Christian arguments and answer them briefly."

The list Lao Zi then provided was standard, alright -- as a caricature. Lao Zi put their titles in block letters:

ATHEISM IS A RELIGION


THE UNIVERSE IS MYSTERIOUS, GOD IS MYSTERIOUS, THEREFORE GOD EXISTS


THE PROBLEM OF EVIL

PASCALS WAGER


He then gave what he saw as the gist of each argument. 

Lao Zi stressed that he wanted fair and rational discussion -- sure that a little clear reasoning would put Christians right.  He didn't mind "poisoning the well" a bit, though, tossing off such claims as, "Christians make a fetish of ignorance," want to "shut down rational inquiry," and are "helpless" dealing with rational argument.  He also defined the Christian understanding of "faith" typical of skeptics, but in a way almost  no Christian historian or theologian would agree with:

"Faith is the belief in something in the absense of evidence."

I proceeded to explain why these assumptions were wrong.  I concentrated on Lao Zi's assumptions about what Christians mean by "faith," pointing him to historical research I've done on the topic, and to defending Lewis and Pascal. 

But Lao Zi turned out to be one of those disputants who ask for calm reason, then when contradicted, call down fire and brimstone, and paint cartoon devil's horns on the top of your head.

Why am I reporting my conversation with this "old master?"  I'm engaged in a debate on another forum with an atheist philosopher who seems thoughtful, careful, and critical towards his own arguments.  Perhaps it would be kinder to the atheist cause to report that conversation, instead.  I also plan soon to post a dialogue with a famous, and more sympathetic, writer (still a theist and a fan of Jesus) who has recently turned angrily against the Christian faith. 

But Lao Zi represents a more common variety of Internet atheist.  Perhaps you've met a few, yourself. And I have to admit I rather enjoyed Lao Zi's climactic tirade against myself, and against American Christians, generally.  People often reveal interesting things when they get angry.  Another reason I share his claims is, of course, is to answer them (which he claims I've never done).  Also, this is the first time I've "met" a Lao Zi impersonator. 


* * * * * * * *  * * * * * *  *

Lao Zi: I had a bit of a revelation, if you will forgive the word, given recent discussions.


The only way to influence the thoughts and actions of others are through reason and violence. Consider lying to someone as an indirect form of violence.

Hmmn.  Is it true that "reason" and "violence" are the "only way to influence the thoughts and actions of others?" 

Can't one also influence someone by bribing him?  (Witness Blagoyavich's sentencing a few days ago.)  How about kissing her on the cheek?  Wagging your tail?  Offering your yellow lab a doggy snack?    

Second, it is true that lying is a "form of violence?"  Lying means to consciously tell someone what is not true in order to deceive them.  (If one tells falsehoods as a joke, that is not a lie, because you want your audience to recognize the incongruity and laugh.) 

Violence means using physical force, to compel someone to do something against their will.  (Or just to get them out of the way.) 

Obviously, lying is not a "form of violence."  Both lying and violence may be forms of some larger category, say, "immoral means to ends."   

Why does Lao Zi confuse these categories?  (Especially since the target of his criticism, myself, has neither told lies nor committed violence?)  This seems to be another indirect way of "poisoning the well:" the allegations are in the water, like bate for a fish to bite on, yet are deniable, since Lao Zi does not specify who is committing what alleged lies or violence. 

"SOME Christian posters have shunned reason through evasion of the points made by others. I always thought some would yield to some facts if they were spoken in a non-aggravating fashion, but I have a clear experience here that this does not hold true."

The key word here seems to be "yield."  Lao Zi began the thread with great bombast but (I argued) a poor grasp of key facts.  He seemed to think if he repeated the word "reason" several times, even while accusing his opponents of thought crimes (see below), they were morally bound to "yield" to his powerful arguments.  If they did not, that demonstrated their moral culpability, and they therefore deserved, not violence, but harsher methods of persuasion.   

"The Enlightenment brought us values not held in the bible - individual rights, free speech, the right to property, democracy, the right to be tried by a jury of your peers, no unreasonable search and seizure, the right to face your accuser, and many others. "

Again, we must ask, are these claims true? 

In Freedom, a History, Donald Treadgold, head of the History Department at the University of Washington, argued that Israel was the ONLY nation in the ancient Near East that "avoided the institutions and practices of despotism." 

Of course Israel was not a modern, secular democracy.  But it clearly was a state in which the "right to property" was held important:

Commandment 8: "Thou shalt not steal."


Commandment 10: "Thou shalt not covet your neighbor's house . . . wife . . . servant . . . ox . . . donkey . . . or anything that belongs to your neighbor." 

Be that as it may, Lao Zi's logic seems to be as follows.  The Bible does not delineate rights recognized in modern society as clearly as, say, the US Constitution does.  Christians believe the Bible.  Therefore, no Christian can possibly believe in modern rights, which are not given in the Bible.  Therefore David, being a Christian, cannot really believe in modern rights.  Therefore any affectation on his part to do so, should he make such a pretense, must be false.  Therefore, we are all in danger. 

If you're an atheist of a certain kind, I guess you may find this argument persuasive.  It would be an understatement to say I see a few holes in it -- were Robinson Crusoe so holy, he could have walked off his island on top of the water. 

First, the Bible does assume and assure at least some of the rights Lao Zi denies in it, as explained briefly above.  (Of course we could give more detail.) 

Second, yes Christians believe "the Bible," but few of us read it so simply as Lao Zi seems to think we should.  For one thing, the second half of the Bible is about a person named Jesus, who, Paul tells us (in that same Bible) radically changed how the Law applies -- especially to Gentiles, which most modern Christians are.  

Third, as an empirical fact, most modern Christians do believe in democracy, free speech, jury trial, and the rest.  In fact, most successful modern democracies happen to thrive in territory where the Bible has been especially influential.  Not every historian sees that as a coincidence. 

Fourth, another empirical fact, yes Marshall does believe in democracy, rule of law, etc.  (But wait!  Lao Zi will explain why this does not matter!) 

Fifth, yet another troublesome fact, many of the people who established modern freedoms were pious Christians -- John Bunyan, William Penn, John Locke, Edmund Burke, etc.  Some of them lived before the supposed Enlightenment.  So where did they get their values from?  Or is it possible that some of the influence flowed in the opposite direction? 

Sixth, even if you want to give as little credit as possible to Christianity for modern freedoms, it is way too simple to credit "the Enlightenment" for them.  Most have roots in ancient Greece and Rome; institutions of freedom in Europe also developed over many centuries during the Middle Ages. One good resource on this subject is Brian Tierney's The Crisis of Church and State, 1050-1300. With Selected Documents.


"Now by abandoning reason, David Marshall and others like him have not embraced violence... but what other options are available to them?"

Again, both premises and conclusion are false.  You may dislike my reasoning, but it is reasoning, good or bad. 

And obviously, as above, there are many ways to persuade people besides reason or violence, should I ever tire of the former, and for some reason escew the latter. 

"The decision to not listen and rationally examine the claims of others is the first step on the road to violence. This is why Jefferson realized the Establishment Clause was so important. This is exactly what David Marshall does."

Some readers may, again wonder why I am spending so time doing what Lao Zi claims I do not do -- "rationally examine" such silly claims. 

But for once, Lao Zi is right.  I feel the "first steps of violence" patterning across my diaphram, a deep rumbling.  I shake uncontrollably.  I feel a sudden  urge to lash out with my arms, and pound the desk, stomp my feet, let out a roar, even roll on the carpet and give the floor a mild pounding.  

Shibber me timbers!  I think I'm under control again, now. 

I pick myself up after the outburst of violence, and continue reading. 

"Imagine a whole community of David Marshalls."

Oh, please, God, no.

"Let's say they want to make illegal women 'dressing provocatively' because it is an offense to God, or establish the ten commandments as the basis for law, such that graven images are punishable by death."

I had a hard time making this out at first.  I want to make illegal women -- what, furtive immigrants from Mexico? -- dress provocatively?  All right, I can picture that, especially since the rest of the country now consists only of males named David Marshall.  I picture the girls as looking like the bossomy lead actress in the movie The Three Amigos.  Yes, we will have to do something for fun, and if the ladies are willing to dress like that, we will allow the show to go on.   

But apparently all these David Marshall are exactly like me, except that they want to stone infidels to death.  Whereas I interview infidels, and write books about them.  Well, sometimes debate them. 

Is that the only detail in which the inhabitants of Lao Zi's land of theocratic horror differ from this David Marshall, who happens to be the real David Marshall?  (That's an almost direct quote from The Three Amigos.  I begin to feel like I'm being sucked into movie-land, like Dorothy into Oz.  The rumbling in the diaphram begins again.  Please, no more violence!) 

"Now imagine we lived in a country without any constitutional protections. What options does the non-reasoning person have when the world is not doing as they wish, except to ultimately unleash that angry beast that lurks in the subconcious of us all? They would pseudo-reason that 'killing them would be a much more efficient method of shutting up the atheists.'  Such decisions were make all the time, in pre-enlightenment cultures. All you have to do is use the label 'heretic' and you can do as you will."

Here I spy another historical problem. 

How many atheists were killed for their disbelief before the so-called Enlightenment?  

Some three thousand innocent people were killed by the Spanish Inquisition, but they were mostly Jews or unorthodox Christians.  Others were killed in Goa, also Jews, Christians, and Hindus. 

Maybe atheists were killed en masse some time in Christian history -- it would be nice if Lao Zi or someone could furnish some credible statistics, to accompany such generalizations.   

But how many Christians were murdered after the Enlightenment, by atheists who disliked Christianity, and supposed themselves to be following Enlightenment principles? 

The number is probably in the millions. 

So why does Lao Zi bring up this question?  "The real" David Marshall is not an inquisitor.  He has never asked for an inquisition.  In fact, he objected vocally to the last and greatest inquisition -- run by atheists.  The first thing he voluntarily submitted to be published, at 15 years of age, was a letter to the editor of an Alaskan newspaper objecting to media praise for that killer, Chairman Mao, at his death. 

Why do so many skeptics bring knives to a gun fight?  Why complain about a hose running next door, when the Niagara Falls is flooding your basement? 

"And the only response of the rationalists to irrational violence would be violence in turn. What other choice would they have?"

I am not sure what "rationalists" Lao Zi has in mind, here.  I shudder to think he is speaking of himself. 

"I for one am glad we have the Enlightenment to leash people like David Marshall. I wonder how many rational Christians would yearn for a theocracy, if they found to their dismay, they did not have the 'right' brand of religion, and were persecuted."

What evidence is there that many Christians yearn for theocracy now?  Preparing to write The Truth Behind the New Atheism, I surveyed many conservative Christians, and found almost no trace of a desire for anything that could reasonably be called theocracy.

Also, I wonder what the communists would have done were they not "leashed" by the so-called "Enlightenment?"  Or the Nazis, whom some historians argue were also profoundly influenced by Enlightenment ideas?  One shudders to think how much worse both movements might have been without this restraining influence! 

"BTW - I don't care if David says 'I am for freedom of expression.' That is not a biblical idea. And, it does not address my point that religion is the first step on the road to violence. Watch for him to ignore that point, as he does all the others made here."

Actually, this claim, too, is false.  I did not "ignore" Lao Zi, though maybe I should have.  I did violence against my floor.  I show why his claims were wrong. 

And now, I have responded (no doubt foolishly) to almost his entire, silly attack. 

Finally, what about the claim that "Religion is the first step on the road to violence?" 

再见, old friend.

According to evolutionary biologists, violence occurred on this planet for billions of years before human beings started praying to God. 

How could the first step come billions of years AFTER the last step to which it allegedly leads? 

This is a mystery, which perhaps not even the real Lao Zi (for whom I weep, as he rides his ox off into the western sunset), could have solved. 

Which reminds me of another interesting contradiction between the modern Lao Tzu and his ancient mentor.

The really Old Master claimed to disdain wisdom:

"Those in ancient times who had the Dao, used it not to teach, but to keep people in ignorance."

Even while disdaining wisdom, the historical Lao Zi was one of the wisest and most rational thinkers of ancient times.   

His modern impersonator, by contrast, claims to write on behalf of reason and wisdom -- and in their name, unleashes a long series of skeptical platitudes, slurs, and half-baked historical cliches masquerading as wisdom.

I do hope the Elvis impersonator is better.

Book announcement: Faith Seeking Understanding

Dr. Paul Brand

Looks like our new book, Faith Seeking Understanding: Essays in Memory of Paul Brand and Ralph Winter, will be published towards the end of September, 2012.  (Update: you can order the book here!)

Most the essays have now arrived. and I'm excited about the book.  It will contain a wealth of experience and thought, from people who have lived extraordinary lives, and have delved deeply into fascinating fields of knowledge.

I hope that the book will serve as a fitting memorial to two extraordinary Christian gentlemen -- three, if you count St. Anselm, who furnished the title and guiding theme of the book.  I also hope it will prove a helpful guide, especially to many young people who are looking for ways to integrate their faith and areas of study that they are passionate about.  Among others:

Dr. Ralph Winter

* Philip Yancey will share what he learned from Dr. Brand about pain.

* Allan Chapman, Oxford historian of science, will respond to some popular myths about Christianity and how science arose. 

* Miriam Adeney will describe how she has come to see the world's religions in relation to Christianity. 

* Yuan Zhiming, a philosopher who was involved in the Democracy Movement in China, will tell how he came to faith, and explain how he sees Christianity and China. 

* Biologist Ben McFarland will explain how he understands the origins of the species, the role God plays in that work. 

 Many other wonderful chapters have already come in, and others are expected.  (I am working on my own chapter, and also editing the book as a whole.)  Perhaps the publisher (William Carey) will let me exerpt portions of these chapters, over the coming year, and I can share more of this exciting project with you.

Faith or Insanity? Choose one, please.

Faith gets me to the top
of Mt. Tai.   

Nothing confuses modern skeptics more than the word "faith."  That Weapon of Mass Distraction Richard Dawkins once "explained" that the word means believing "not only in the absense of evidence, but even in the teeth of the evidence."  Almost every skeptic I have talked to about the matter seems to take some such silly definition for granted. 

In our respective rebuttals, Alister McGrath and I went to some lengths to explain that that is not really what Christians mean by "faith."  Dawkins read McGrath's book, but the evidence McGrath offered seemed to go in one ear and out the other.  He continues to hold, "in the teeth of the evidence," like a rottweiler with her favorite chew toy, to his original misunderstanding of what Christians mean by faith. 

In his book, The New Atheism, astronomer Victor Stenger cited ten passages from my chapter on faith in The Truth Behind the New Atheism, and managed to misread almost everything he quoted.   

Recently another skeptic challenged my on-line article, "Faith and Reason," which shows that great Christian thinkers (Augustine, Aquinas, Pascal, Locke, etc) have almost always seen faith as essentially reasonable.  Among other things, he criticized the fact that I cited so many other thinkers, rather than offering my own arguments.  He read this as evidence I can't think for myself, but blindly follow the errors of famous Christians of the past. 

In a follow-up post I plan to delve into some of the errors various skeptics make about faith.  

But first, I'd like to offer a more positive, old explanation of faith, how it relates to reason, that I published long before that article, and several years before the New Atheists blew into town.  These are my "own thoughts" (if that matters) on faith, reason, and the fine art of sanity, from Jesus and the Religions of Man, published in 2000. (23-25.)   

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Four Levels of Faith

One of the most awesome sights I have seen on screen was an IMAX movie simply called Everest.  Avalanches seemed to sweep us from our seats as we watched.  Crevasses opened at our feet.  My four-year old son said, "I'm afraid" and "I want to go home."  But for months afterwards, he lobbied to see the film again.

The movie told the story of the ascent of Mt. Everest in 1996 by Ed Viesturs, two teammates, and their hard-working Sherpa guides, who carried the IMAX camera gear to the summit.  It showed the rigorous, and photogenic, training the team undertook climbing sea stacks and bicycling along the edge of red sandstone cliffs.  It followed the team to base camp, and recorded their tension as they helplessly monitored cell phones when another party was trapped in a storm high on the mountain, and nine climbers, some of them friends, tragically succombed to the elements.  Finally, it showed their awesome ascent of the great mountain, beginning in morning darkness lit by torches.  Even to watch the climbers ascend to the roof of the world one felt something of the "dread, distress and paradox" with which Kierkegaard insisted we must understand faith.

A mountain climb involves a marriage between faith and reason.  Trust is a serious thing on a mountain, not lightly given.  On rock faces, or glacial icefalls, each step must be tested and planned in advance.  Yet without trust, in one's eyes, muscles, partners, equipment, the pilot of the craft that ferries you to the base camp, and the people who have been there and made the maps, no one could approach the roof of the world on foot.  In religion, as in mountain climbing, faith is the most necessary and the most foolish thing.  When divorced from the rules of logic and evidence that rule all other fields of human endevour, we have seen, in the camps of Stalin, Pol Pott, and Jim Jones, that nothing is more dangerous.  Every step is a step of faith, but every step of blind faith may be the last.  When a leap is required, the ground that it will cover should be tested with every faculty at our disposal, with utter concentration and will to know what is there.

"I think, therefore I am," wrote the philosopher Descartes.  Nothing can be thought until the validity of thought in general is taken on faith.  By "taken on faith," I do not mean, "taken without reason," but "taken with reason, and with something else."  Any argument in favor of arguments begins with that which is its goal.  You cannot build the second story of a house until the first floor is framed.  Faith (not blind faith) is always the lower floor on which reasoning must rest.

Most of us would feel insulted if asked to prove the trustworthiness of our minds.  But it was precisely this problem that drove the philosopher David Hume and, later, the logical positivists, to a radical skepticism that in effect closed the door on intellectual endevour.  Hume argued that nothing could be proven from experience -- the fact that A followed B yesterday does not prove that it will again today.  In this regard western existentialists came close to reinventing radical Zen skepticism.  It was out of fear of the implied threat Hume's theories posed to science that Kant wrote a book whose title says it all: Critique of Pure Reason.  Mind by itself is deadly to mind.  As Chesterton poined out, not only is it possible to reason oneself into the asylum, those already there are often, on their own terms, persuasive reasoners.  "There is a thought that stops thought.  That is the only thought that ought to be stopped . . . Descartes said, 'I think, therefore I am.'  The philosophical evolutionist reverses and negates the epigram.  He says, 'I am not, therefore I cannot think.'" The first step of faith is to close our minds to the possibility that our minds are wholly delusional. 

The second step of faith is trust in our senses.  I hear the computer hum as I write.  I see snow blowing in from the hills to the north of campus, which, unfortunately, is not sticking.  The small of my back faintly reminds me that my posture is bad, and I had better change positions.  The linings in my nose, the hairs on the back of my hands, relate data to my brain: I had better open the window before the heater comes on and change the air. 

Liang Kai: "In the
chopping of wood,
and the carrying of
water, there lies the
wonderful Dao."

"How do you know this is not all an illusion?" Ask mystics, the world's most determined logicians.  "Can you prove that which you see, hear, smell, touch and taste exists outside your own mind?"  India has developed lifestyles that cultivate detachment from the material.  By lying on beds of nails or sitting in one spot for years without speaking, the sadhu shows he is drawing close to a world of which the senses know nothing.  In East Asia, on the other hand, Zen used the same logic to come to an opposite conclusion: "In the chopping of wood, there lies the wonderful Tao."  If the world is an illusion, why not simply live a normal life, work at a productive job, and play along?  Just remember, it is all a game.

On a practical level, most people who have not studied Zen koans or the Bhagavad Gita may see the debate as a quaint eccentricity of Eastern mystics and Western philosophers with too much time on their hands.  "No, I can't prove the reality of the world around me," they might admit.  "Maybe I am stuck, like Arnold Schwartzeneggar, in a 'Total Recall' universe that some corporation has implanted in my brain, or like Jim Carey, in a scripted TV series overseen by some god-like producer.  But why do I even think such lunacy?  I have work to do!"  With virtual reality and designer heavens beckoning like a cloud on the technological horizon, and scientists like Richard Dawkins arguing that thought itself is no more than a mechanical byproduct of evolution, however, this question of what we know and how we know it has gained new urgency.  I have on occasion found myself toying with the thought, "How do I know that I am really here?"  And then common sense, perhaps inspired by the voice of Descartes reaching across the centuries, provides half an answer, "Well, I think I am."  Laughing at solipsism, we choose to live by faith in this second sense, and in doing so, touch the world of phenomenal reality.

The third level of faith is confidence in other people. 

It has been suggested that the landing on the moon was staged in a Hollywood studio.  How can we know otherwise, except by faith? 

Faith in our teachers is increasingly open to verification as we grow older.  As a child, I relied on "what people say" for almost every fact I called my own, from where I was born to who my parents were, the existence of leptons (not to say Leprachauns), Labrador, and my own liver.  In high school biology I dissected a turtle and found a purplish object that resembled diagrams of the liver.  After graduation, I flew to Europe over a land of twisted bedrock and hidden lakes that lay where Lapland appeared on my map. I saw the world (a small part of it) for myself, and thus confirmed, and sometimes refuted, what my teachers had told me. 

For a mountain climber, the question of whether faith in other people is reasonable, is far from academic.  Were densely concentrated contour lines that suggested a cliff drawn in the right place?  Did the Nepali colonel who piloted the big Russian helicopter over glaciers and serrated peaks check the mechanics of the craft that morning with adequate care, or had he been drinking the night before? 

Is riding a bus, like,
 totally insane?

Only madmen live without faith, but only fools live by blind faith, faith that cares nothing for external verification.  We cross-examine witnesses, sip before we swallow, cut cards and check phone bills.  Yet even by taking a bus, we entrust our lives to armies of strangers: engineers, factory workers, the driver, the drivers of oncoming vehicles.  As Chesterton said of natural law, we don't count on the mental stability of our neighbors, we bet on it.  The bet doesn't always pay off: ten minutes after I crossed a bridge in North Seattle on a bus, a passenger shot to death the driver of a bus coming the other way, plummetting the bus forty feet to the ground from the same bridge.  I continue to get on buses and cross bridges, not because I have a death wish, nor because I have scientifically proven that my fellow passengers are trustworthy, but because I am sane enough to take a reasonable chance.  (A sanity based, in my case, on an ultimate trust in God.)  Anyone determined to believe only what he had seen for himself would walk to work, walk up the stairs (carefully checking for loose joists), and look for tacts on his seat as he sat down -- or stay home all day and worry about burglars.  Such a complete reliance on reason and the lower levels of faith is the mark not of a scientific genius, but of a mental breakdown.

As Chesterton put it, we say the insane have "lost their minds," but in reality, it is not reason they have lost.  They often have excellent reasons for mistrusting people, often as a result of a stormy childhood.  It is faith they have misplaced. 

Together these three levels of faith constitute the foundations of life: faith in our reason, trust in our senses, and confidence in other people.  They are the grounds on which we stand, the light by which we see the world, and the legs which allow us to walk down the street and live our lives in a dangerous world.

The fourth level of faith, religious faith, is not then a separate form of consciousness or an eccentricity of peculiar people.  Nor should it involve suspension of critical thinking.  It is part of a natural human continuum which we accept every day.  And, like lower forms of faith, religious faith can and must be tested by reason.

Cultures of Corruption

How Broke States Export Failure to Washington

The fifty states of the United States have just been ranked according to how "well-run" they are. 

Guess what?  California now comes in dead last.  The state has an A- credit rating, the lowest in history for any state.  It has the second-highest unemployment rate in the country. 

The "Golden State" is blessed with abundant natural and human resouces: the world's biggest trees, glorious mountains and coast (thus home to the world's leading film industry), oil (lying undeveloped off her coast), Mickey Mouse, Hollywood, vast acreage in some of the planet's prime farmland, the geniuses of Silicon Valley who create and run the planet's information systems.  How did the state blow so many advantages so badly?

And is it coincidence that the woman more responsible for more debt than perhaps any other human being in history, Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House during the Years of Debt, and who epitomizes the Democratic Party that controls the state, comes from San Francisco?

Number two on the list is Illinois.

Yes, the home of Rod Blagojevich, and a long line of other ex-governor convicts.

Also, of course, the home of a Chicago politician who voted for, and now rather passively and petulantly presides over, the massive growth in national debt under Nancy Pelosi's watch: Barack H. Obama.

Another coincidence?

The third worst-run state is Michigan, home of the unions to which the Democratic Party is so deeply indebted.

Arizona is next worst, then Nevada, home of Harry Reid, majority leader of the US Senate.  Again the theme of Vegas-style spending -- it shames Vegas, actually -- housing bubble, then collapse, links local fortunes to what the most powerful politician from Vegas has been doing at the Great Roulette Table in Washington.

Two other Democratic strongholds do better in the standings, but also lustrate this trend by their faults.  Connecticut, home to Chris Dodd, is ranked as 22nd best run state -- but has the 4th highest per capita debt.  Massachusetts, home to Barney Frank, is ranked 20th WORST-run state (all those universities and their economic spin-offs no doubt keep it from sinking lower), but is highest of all in per capita debt. 

Dodd and Frank, of course, just "reformed" the bank regulatory system, after (many say) being largely responsible for the debacle they were supposedly fixing.  (And some say their "fix" is causing far more problems than it will solve.)

This is not mainly a political blog.  I recognize that many people who share my views on religion or philosophy may differ from me on politics. I don't want to offend Democrats who read it for insight on other issues. 

But the world economy is going over Niagara Falls in a barrel right now.  Record floods of government spending are the force dragging us over those falls.  The rocks and shoals below those falls must also be part of any good map of the world. 

Each American is now indebted $45,000 to people they don't know, for services already rendered by a bloated national government.  That's $180, 000 for a family of 4.  You will now pay tens of thousands of dollars in the next ten years, merely for INTEREST on this debt -- for nothing, in other words.  After that, it is only due to get worse.   

The bubble will burst, in Greece, Spain, Italy, and in the US.  Lives will be ruined on a massive scale, because of our unrestrained indulgence.  The next generation, and the generation after that, will have to pay for all of this, and try (even as we compete with a renewed China and India) to pick up the pieces. 

The less money we have to spend, the less good we can do in the world, when we really have the chance to do good. 

Republicans have played a major role in this over-spending, no doubt.   A year ago, the party cleaned house a bit by electing a number of representatives who seem serious about dealing with Entitlements and pork-barrel spending.  They have not been able to accomplish much yet, however, because the opposing party has chosen to obstruct almost every serious reform proposal, even villifying those trying to cut spending as trying to "push Grandma over a cliff." 

So Democrats: please recognize the even larger role your leaders have played in this "generational theft," as John McCain aptly called  it.  This may be the great moral issue of our day.  Please recognize the pattern, the danger, and the spiritual nature of the crisis.  Please call your representatives to account, demand real, even painful cuts in spending, and let's get on the same page and clean up the "culture of corruption" that is destroying the Western world.