Faith vs. Apologetics
by Luke Nix
Last week I read an article that I found to be quite disturbing. The title is “Christianity’s New F-Word“. In short the author takes issue with the current revival of Christian philosophy and apologetics- saying that Christians are so scared of being associated with “faith” that they succumb to the world’s reason and methods. The author believes that instead of testing the truth of Christianity or historical reliability of the Bible, we should simply assume that they are true, and our faith will be more rewarding. I have many concerns with this article; however, I want to address just three of them today.
“Secular” Reason?
I have written many times about the coexistence of faith and reason (the most recent is “Is Faith Logical or Emotional?“), so I’m not going to rehash that information here. However, I would like to point out that the author undermines their own argument by implying that “secular” reason and methods can’t be trusted. If we are to follow and understand the author’s argument, we must first accept the basic laws of logic. If those are not reliable, then neither is any argument made that follows the rules of logical reasoning reliable.
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Donate to TPE! Most apologists (specifically named by the author: William Lane Craig and Alvin Plantinga) use the laws of logic when they reason as they defend the truth of Christianity. If the laws of logic are not reliable, then not only does any rational argument for Christianity’s truth fail (1 Corinthians 15 comes to mind), but no argument for the truth of anything is reliable- everything is believed by 100% blind faith. If everything is believed by blind faith (and by “everything”, I mean all truth claims- including conflicting ones such as that “Islam is true” and “Christianity is true”), then all we have are mere opinions (see Opinion vs. Truth-Claim).
If all that we have are merely opinions, then we have effectively placed Christianity is the same epistemic vacuum that atheism is in- reason is gone, knowledge is gone, value is gone, morality is gone, purpose is gone.
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Faithful Thinkers: Faith vs. Apologetics
RECOMMENDED APOLOGETICS RESOURCES FOR FURTHER READING:
Christian Confidence: An Introduction to Defending the Faith
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I completely agree with you Greg. In my first in a three-book series entitled “Examine Your Faith! Finding Truth in a World of Lies,” endorsed by Josh McDowell, Dr. Craig Hazen and Dan Story, I use apologetics to reveal we need logic and reason and objective, verifiable evidence to have sound faith. Blind faith has nothing. Sound faith has enough objective, verifiable evidence to allow a person to believe for what is yet proven. Only a person willing to be foolish would operate on blind faith.