Tag Archives: Christianity

News

Can atheists distinguish between right and wrong actions?

8 Comments

Take a look at two atheists who try to affirm that morality is simultaneously objective and subjective.

Atheists deny that there is any design for the universe – they think there is no Designer. That means there is no way that the universe ought to be, objectively speaking. I.e. – when there were no humans around, there was no way the universe ought to have been. When humans appear, they evolve arbitrary customs and conventions in order to live together more peaceably. These are not real in any sense – they are just aids to survival and group cohesion. Different groups in different times and places evolve different rules, and no set of rules is any better than any other, because there is no way we ought to be. We call this atheistic/evolutionary form of morality “moral relativism”. It stands in contrast with the theistic view of morality, which is called “moral objectivism”.

In their view, slavery is not really right or wrong, it’s just a matter of opinion decided by majority rule in different social groups living in different places and times. Some groups in certain places and times think it’s right, and some groups in some places and times think it’s wrong. In our view (theism), God creates the universe, and he designs it to be a certain way. There is a certain way we ought to be. So if God thinks slavery is wrong, then it really is wrong, and his opinion of right and wrong becomes a duty for us.

What’s wrong with moral relativism?

I found this list of the seven flaws of moral relativism at the Australian site Faith Interface.

Here’s the summary:

  1. Moral relativists can’t accuse others of wrongdoing.
  2. Relativists can’t complain about the problem of evil.
  3. Relativists can’t place blame or accept praise.
  4. Relativists can’t make charges of unfairness or injustice.
  5. Relativists can’t improve their morality.
  6. Relativists can’t hold meaningful moral discussions.
  7. Relativists can’t promote the obligation of tolerance.

Here’s my favorite flaw of relativism (#6):

Relativists can’t hold meaningful moral discussions. What’s there to talk about? If morals are entirely relative and all views are equal, then no way of thinking is better than another. No moral position can be judged as adequate or deficient, unreasonable, acceptable, or even barbaric. If ethical disputes make sense only when morals are objective, then relativism can only be consistently lived out in silence. For this reason, it is rare to meet a rational and consistent relativist, as most are quick to impose their own moral rules like “It’s wrong to push your own morality on others”. This puts relativists in an untenable position – if they speak up about moral issues, they surrender their relativism; if they do not speak up, they surrender their humanity. If the notion of moral discourse makes sense intuitively, then moral relativism is false.

I sometimes get a lot of flack from atheists who complain that I don’t let them make any moral statements without asking first them to ground morality on their worldview. And that’s because on atheism morality IS NOT rationally grounded, so they can’t answer. In an accidental universe, you can only describe people’s personal preferences or social customs, that vary by time and place. It’s all arbitrary – like having discussions about what food is best or what clothing is best. The answer is always going to be “it depends”. It depends on the person who is speaking because it’s a subjective claim, not an objective claim. There is no objective way we ought to behave, on atheism. What atheists are really talking about when they say that something is right or that something is wrong is that in our group, we have evolved these beliefs that this behavior is good or this behavior is bad – we have these group preferences.

The horror of atheism, then, is that they reduce murder and slaver to being matters of opinion. And these majority opinions are arbitrary and can be different in different times and places. When you are talking to an atheist, you are talking to a person who literally thinks that the decision to rape or not rape is the same as the decision to drive on the left side of the road or the right side of the road. In both cases, it’s just something that groups decide one way or another arbitrarily, depending on how they evolved in different places and at different times.

All Christians should be able to draw out the moral relativism of atheists and challenge them on it, because once they are forced to affirm objective morality, they have to affirm God as the moral lawgiver. Take some time and read the linked article, then ask your atheistic friends to justify their talk about right and wrong. What do they mean by right and wrong? Why would they sacrifice their own self-interest in order to do “right”? Is the only reason that atheists have to be “good” far of being caught and punished by their group for breaking these arbitrary rules that vary by place and time? Do atheists only do the “right” thing when others are watching?

News

Physicist Michael Strauss discusses Christianity and science at Stanford university

Leave a comment

This is one of my favorite lectures, by one of the people I admire the most for his scientific work and robust, evangelical Christian faith.

About Michael Strauss:

His full biography is here. (I removed his links from my excerpt text below)

Excerpt:

I had an interest in science and theology, so in 1977 I chose to go to Biola University where I could study both subjects in detail. I thoroughly enjoyed college and participated in intramural sports, was elected to student government, served as a resident assistant, competed in forensics, and studied a lot. As I neared college graduation my dual interest continued so I applied to seminary and to graduate school. After graduating summa cum laude from Biola, I decided to pursue a graduate degree in physics at UCLA.

During my first few years of graduate school, I developed an increased interest in quantum mechanics and subatomic physics and decided to do research in a field that dealt with these subjects. I joined a High Energy Physics experimental group doing research at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) and moved to the San Francisco Bay Area to actively participate in research at SLAC. I graduated in 1988 with my Ph.D in High Energy Physics (a.k.a. Elementary Particle Physics). If you would like to know more about High Energy Physics, the Particle Data Group at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory has a very nice interactive adventure that teaches you all about the subject. My research advisor was professor Charles Buchanan and my disertation was titled “A Study of Lambda Polarization and Phi Spin Alignment in Electron-Positron Annihilation at 29 GeV as a Probe of Color Field Behavior.”

After graduation, I accepted a post-doctoral research position with the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. I continued to do research at SLAC where I joined the SLD experiment. My research interests centered on the SLD silicon pixel vertex detector. I wrote most of the offline software for this device, and did physics analysis which used the vertex detector, including tagging b quark events for flavor specific QCD (Quantum Chromodynamics) analysis. In the seven years I was employed by UMASS, I only spent 3 days on the Amherst campus. The rest of the time was spent in California.

[…]In August 1995, I accepted a job as an Assistant Professor of Physics at the University of Oklahoma (OU) in Norman, Oklahoma. The University of Oklahoma has a vibrant high energy physics research group involved in experiments at the Fermi National Accelerator Center (Fermilab), and CERN. I joined the DØ experiment at Fermilab where I continue to do research in elementary particle physics. As a member of the DØ collaboration I have made contributions to the testing of silicon sensors for the upgraded vertex detector, to the track finding algorithms, to a measurement of the photon production cross section which probes the gluon content of protons, and to other QCD measurements. I am currently studying properties of B mesons that contain a b-quark, the production cross section of jets coming from quarks and gluons, and other QCD analyses. At CERN, I am a collaborator on the ATLAS detector.

I received tenure in 2001 and was promoted to the rank of Professor in the summer of 2010. Most of the time at OU I have taught introductory physics classes to physics majors, engineers, and life science majors. In these classes I have used a number of interactive techniques to facilitate student participation and learning. I have been privileged to win a few awards for my teaching. In 1999, the Associated Students selected me as the Outstanding Professor in the College of Arts and Science, and in 2000 I was awarded the BP AMOCO Foundation Good Teaching Award. In 2002, I was given the Regents Award for Superior Teaching. I received the Carlisle Mabrey and Lurine Mabrey Presidential Professorship in 2006 which is given to “faculty members who excel in all their professional activities and who relate those activities to the students they teach and mentor.”

He seems to have done a fine job of integrating his faith with a solid career in physics research. It would be nice if we were churning out more like him, but that would require the church to get serious about the integration between science and faith.

The lecture:

Dr. Strauss delivered this lecture at Stanford University in 1999. It is fairly easy to understand, and it even includes useful dating tips, one of which I was able to try out recently at IHOP, and it worked.

You can also listen to the audio here. (MP3)

Summary:

What does science tell us about God?
– the discoveries of Copernicus made humans less significant in the universe
– the discoveries of Darwin should that humans are an accident
– but this all pre-modern science
– what do the latest findings of science say about God?

Evidence #1: the origin of the universe
– the steady state model supports atheism, but was disproved by the latest discoveries
– the oscillating model supports atheism, but was disproved by the latest discoveries
– the big bang model supports theism, and it is supported by multiple recent discoveries
– the quantum gravity model supports atheism, but it pure theory and has never been tested or confirmed by experiment and observation

Evidence #2: the fine-tuning of physical constants for life
– there are over 100 examples of constants that must be selected within a narrow range in order for the universe to support the minimal requirements for life
– example: mass density
– example: strong nuclear force (what he studies)
– example: carbon formation

Evidence #3: the fine-tuning of our planet for habitability
– the type of galaxy and our location in it
– our solar system and our star
– our planet
– our moon

Positive arguments for Christian theism

Commentary

A closer look at the Christian doctrines of guilt and forgiveness

3 Comments

This is from Randy Alcorn’s Eternal Perspectives web site.

Excerpt:

It is a critical mistake to try to eliminate feelings of guilt without dealing with the root cause of guilt. No matter how often someone says “you have nothing to feel guilty about” to someone who has sinned against God and others, his guilt feelings will remain. Why? Because he knows better. Only by a denial of reality can he avoid guilt feelings. But such a denial is inherently unhealthy. It sets him up for emotional collapse whenever something reminds him of the sin. People need a permanent solution to their guilt problem, a solution based on reality, not denial or pretense.

Because it offers a solution to the guilt problem found nowhere else, I will quote from the Bible and cite references to specific biblical books, chapters and verses. This way you may look up these verses in a Bible yourself and think about them on your own.

Because of Christ’s death on our behalf, forgiveness is available to all.

The word “gospel” means “good news.” The good news is that God loves you, and desires to freely forgive you for all your sins, no matter how ugly or destructive. But before the good news can be appreciated we must know the bad news. The bad news is that there is true moral guilt, that all of us are guilty of many moral offenses against God. “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).

The Hebrew word for sin means literally “to miss the mark.” Sin is falling short of God’s holy standards. Sin separates us from a relationship with God (Isaiah 59:2). Sin deceives us and makes us think that wrong is right and right is wrong (Proverbs 14:12). The Bible says, “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:23).

Jesus Christ is the Son of God who loved us so much that he became a member of the human race to deliver us from our sin problem (John 3:16). He came to identify with us in our humanity and our weakness, but did so without being tainted by our own sin, self-deception and moral failings (Hebrews 2:17-18; 4:15-16). Jesus died on the cross as the only one worthy to pay the penalty for our sins that was demanded by the holiness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21). Being God, and being all-powerful, he rose from the grave, defeating sin and conquering death (1 Corinthians 15:3-4, 54-57).

When Christ died on the cross for us, he said, “It is finished” (John 19:30). The Greek word (teleo) translated “it is finished” was commonly written across certificates of debt when they were canceled. It meant “Paid in Full.” Christ died so that the certificate of debt consisting of all our sins could once and for all be marked, “Paid in Full.”

Here’s an article from CARM that talks about feeling guilty after getting forgiveness.

Excerpt:

There is an important lesson you need to learn about forgiveness that begins with understanding two things:  justification and sanctification.  Justification is God’s legal declaration upon a sinner in which the sinner is declared righteous in God’s sight; this is also known as salvation.  Sanctification is God working in the Christian, through the Holy Spirit, to make the Christian more like Christ.  Justification is instantaneous; sanctification lasts a lifetime.  Justification is easy because we receive it by faith (Rom. 5:1; Eph. 2:8).  Sanctification is difficult because it is something we do in cooperation with God as He works in our hearts daily.  If we are not very sanctified in our actions, thoughts, and words, we are still justified; we are still saved because of Jesus.  Justification does not depend upon our sanctification.  In other words, our salvation is not dependent on our works in any way.  Justification (salvation) is based upon what Jesus did.  Jesus bore our sins in His body on the cross (1 Pet. 2:24).  Jesus paid for our sins, all of them.  They are gone because He removed them.  It is all because of Jesus and what He did, and not because of what we have done.  Praise be to Him.

Now, I have a question for you.  Can you earn your salvation or do anything at all to merit forgiveness from God?  No, of course not.  That is why salvation is by faith, and not by works or faith and works.  If you did not get your salvation by your works, then you do not keep it by your works, either.  In other words, you do not keep your salvation by doing good or by suffering for your sins so that you might, somehow, be made good enough to be with God.  It can never happen!

Finally, here is the point.  Some Christians, after they have committed a sin, punish themselves by retaining the guilt of their sin and do not receive the full forgiveness of Christ until they have put themselves through enough suffering that they have then “earned” the right to be forgiven.  Of course, this isn’t the intention of holding on to guilt, but sometimes it’s the underlying reason.  It is a danger because it is nothing more than trying to earn the forgiveness of God through our works; in this case, through suffering.  This is an insult to the cross of Christ.

Now, I am not saying that we should never feel guilty for doing something wrong.  I am saying that you should confess your sins and be forgiven (1 John 1:9).  Once confessed and forgiven, it is wrong to harbor the feelings of guilt as a way to punish yourself so that afterwards you might feel you’ve done enough to “feel” good enough to have fellowship with God.  That is what’s wrong, and it is sin.  If that is what you are doing, then you need to realize that God does not require you to pay for your sins through feeling guilty.  He has already paid the full price.  Your part is to humbly and truly confess your sin to the Lord, turn from it, and leave it.  By looking to Jesus and what He has done, you can let the guilt and the guilty feelings fall away from you.  Put your eyes on Jesus.  Praise Him for His great love and forgiveness, and continue in your walk of sanctification.  Lay it all before the cross.

I think the key thing to look for when you are asking for forgiveness is that you have to be sure that what you did really was wrong, based on the Scripture, whether it worked out for you or not. If you do something that the Bible forbids, then there is no excuse for what you did. No desire that you have allows you to sin. No noble purpose you have allows you to sin. No unfair condition allows you to sin. No imagined success or hope of victory allows you to sin. No failure of anyone else allows you to sin. Either you sinned or you didn’t. If you think you didn’t sin then you’re not needing forgiveness, and you don’t have it. If you think you did sin, then you can get forgiveness if you ask Jesus for it, and if you know that he is able to give forgiveness to you.