In J.P. Moreland’s, Christianity and the Nature of Science, he discusses some of the basic presuppositions of science and points out how science alone is unable to explain the universe. 3 Therefor, nonbelievers contradict themselves by believing the universe has a natural cause despite the lack of observational evidence to support their theory. Moreland seems to wish for a world in which religion and science can completely understand each other, however it might be a detriment to Christian faith if such were true. The majority of the Bible depicts natural occurring events, however the Christian God is capable of miracles and phenomena that should not be understood further than His all-knowing wisdom and power. Therefor, the Christian response to scientific investigation should be to examine and understand to the extent of
So, Augustine emphasized the grace of God in his theological writings. For example, Augustine says in his book, Answer to the Pelagians, “ Conversion Proves the Gratuity of Grace—For, if faith comes only from free choice and is not given by God, why do we pray that those who do not want to believe may come to believe? We would surely do this to no purpose if we were not perfectly correct in believing that almighty God can convert to the faith even perverse wills which are opposed to the faith.” [2] Augustine's path to conversion was long. He had sought about the wisdom for the salvation but he found finally grace in the only way to be saved. He found his salvation in one miraculous moment of divine intervention.
Ward believes religion to be existential. However, not everyone shares my opinion. Richard Swinburne used the principle of Occam’s razor to illustrate that Aquinas’ Cosmological Argument has value for religious faith. Occam’s razor says that the simplest answer is the best one, and as God is the simplest answer for the first cause, it is the best one. Denys Turner makes the point that Aquinas is misread, he says that Aquinas is just clarifying the existence of God for people who already believe rather than in an attempt to persuade non-believers.
However, an atheist does not have much proof of a non-existence God because they only see it in a scientific perspective. If an agnostic enters the argument, it would question both of the theories about the existence of God because in an agnostic view, they want to proof of everything. But in the end, I feel that an agnostic would support more of the atheist argument. This being because a monotheist is very sure of their belief and on an atheist side, they do not believe in a God but is sure that there is a scientific meaning behind it. 4) The importance of cultural relativism is that it brings the society to pursue their own desires toward their beliefs, values, and behaviors.
With god/s grounding the moral the foundation of the moral becomes arbitrary because it would only be good because god says its so. Also calling god good would not make any sense since he decided what good is or isn't, so how could he be good unless the moral was grounding him? If piety was a certain care of the god’s we could look to do always what is Pious and in return we would be worshiping/caring for the god/s if they exists. If the God’s are looking to something the “moral,piety” then if you act pious in your actions through life you will be in a way worshiping the god’s, because you are honoring what they already honer. The problem with this idea is when people think god grounds the moral
There is nothing wrong with this, except when it comes to the issue of believing in God. Zagzebski makes a compelling point by discussing how people who are given Pascal’s wager would be motivated to believe in God due to the infinite gain, which is basically an appeal to one’s self-interest. This brings up the fundamental issue I have with Pascal’s wager: if God were to appear before every non-believer’s eyes and tell them to believe in Him or suffer eternal damnation, would these people believe in God just to avoid going
To them, if there is a good side to the world and a bad side to the world, then there must be two gods to keep track of it all. Gnostic believers even present “evidence” defending their position through information found in the secret books of the gnostic gospels (29). Though this argument seems sound, orthodox Christianity is the more popular belief on this subject because the Gnostics were considered ignorantly dualistic; God clearly sent his word through the Bible stating that he is the one and only God that ever was and ever will
The counter argument to this though, is that animals do not fall under his jurisdiction and so the brutality that is nature is out of his control. God can only then make humans all good; which is apparent to be untrue (war, rape, murder.) In effect, Gould has showed that there could very validly be no active god. Whichever way a person’s belief systems lean, this paper by Stephen Jay Gould is a very insightful read into one way of thinking. Whether that means it solely educates those who firmly believe in god that there are other views, or it converts a person to non religious views, it is a worthwhile read.
He suggests that evil has an instrumental value in developing human virtues, he believes that sins are necessary many good things would be taken away if God permitted no evil to exist, ‘for fire would not be generated if air was corrupted’ therefore evil has some sort of good. For Aquinas God is good and knows about evil in the world however does not predetermine it. The world is not perfect but it is the best it can possibly be, God can still be omnipotent, omnibenevolent and omniscient and still
R.S “Science has fully explained religious experience”. To what extent do you agree? I agree to a certain extent however they are some problems are present in sciences argument for why religious experiences occur. Freud argued that religious experiences are nothing but a psychological conflict within the mind. He came up with the idea that religious experiences are nothing but wishful thinking that cause the illusion of the oldest and most profound idea one has.