Category Archives: truth-for-me

More than April’s fools? (aka, Descartes’ unwitting disciples)

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Confession time:

I began this blog intending to show how Christianity is viable, and how the co-centrality of love and truth is instrumental therein.  But I have certainly not done so.

Why?

Because much about Christianity is bad or broken, and this must first be cleared away.  For example, I cannot hope for the notion of truth-for-me to seem meaningful so long as readers continue to believe in such false ideas as being able to read the Bible without interpreting it, or to access the Bible’s (absolute) truth absolutely.

Thus my last 9 posts have aimed to debunk false views about how we relate to the Bible.  Particularly, false views about how (and how well) we can know the Bible’s content.  Among them, the concepts of certainty, neutrality, and historical independence.

So where does our desire for certainty come from?  Why do we think that we should (or even could) be neutral rather than having biases and prejudgements ?  And why do we want to read the Bible “free” from the views of the past?

As I’ve shown in past posts, the Bible stands against human certainty and nowhere espouses neutrality or historical independence.  More importantly, the above are all questions about knowledge: how reliable it is and how we get it.  And knowledge is the domain of philosophy.

Strikingly then our fascination with knowing, or accessing things, absolutely finds its origins in the philosophical movement known as Modernism.

The poster boy for modernist thinking is René Descartes.  French mathematician and philosopher, Descartes is famous for the conclusion “I think, therefore I am.”  But the problem that precedes this conclusion—and the method he used to solve it—are what interest us most.

Through his studies and travels Descartes found that people held all manner of contradictory beliefs.  Nor did the number or education of people who believed something guarantee the truth of it.  In contrast, Descartes observed that in mathematics the proper use of reason guarantees certainty about our conclusions, and so decided that reason properly applied could grant certainty in other areas of life.

Now he had already deduced that all human have reason and that each person is equally able to apply his or her reason.  So with the right method and enough practice, human beings could not only know things truly but could even master the natural world, living happier (and even longer) lives.

So what was his “method”?

He started with reason, which is not simply thinking but is specifically the ability to determine truth from falsehood.  Next, Descartes held that “properly applying” one’s reason meant only accepting things as true that were accessible to the mind in a clear and distinct fashion—things that could not be doubted.

But in order for something to be undoubtedly true it must be true despite one’s best efforts to doubt it.  And this is just what Descartes did.  He went through a process of doubting everything that he believed up to that point.

Having already observed how people typically establish their views on inherited practices and customs rather than reason, his method rejects all past opinions as false until proven (by reason) to be true.  Sense perceptions (what we see, hear, and experience) are likewise false until proven true.

The only thing that Descartes could not doubt was that he was thinking, and this gave him absolute certainty of his own existence, upon which he founded his entire philosophy: I think, therefore I am.

But is this important?

You bet.

For in showing us where these “bad and broken” views about the Bible come from (and what they are based on), we are more able to replace them with better, more functional views.  Specifically, it seems Christians need a better philosophical orientation than Descartes’ Modernism if they are to do justice both to the real world  and to the Bible itself.  More next post.

Interpretation and love?

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In my last post I argued that, for both Christians and non-Christians, we neither have—nor can have—certainty about the Bible’s claims nor about the validity of its claims.  In place of certainty we have interpretation.

Before rushing into a technical discussion about interpretation, however, it is important to situate such a discussion within its practical, real-life context.  Why?  Because this seemingly dry topic is important—important enough even to get “picky” about what interpretation is and how to do it—for a very practical and personal reason: people matter.

Typically we think of interpretation as focusing on ideas: techniques to help us know things better.  Certainly ideas are important and interpretation both requires that we think about ideas and helps us better to understand them. 

But ideas are not the point.  People are the point.

So this discussion of interpretation was actually borne from my earlier challenge that absolute truth (or Truth) is only meaningful if it is true “for me.”  This challenge itself resulted from my claim that love and truth are essential to human existence, where I noted that the greatest truth-for-me is to be deeply beloved of one whom I deeply love.

Thus where the desire to love and be loved is a central human aspiration, the pursuit of truth is integral to meaningful, human existence.  We may take this a step further and note that ours is not only a desire to be loved, but to be loved in and as who we are.  In other words, it is a desire not to be treated as an object but known profoundly—and being so known, to be cherished—as the self that we are.

Reframed, we desire to be known truly and loved profoundly by one / those whom we likewise know genuinely and love deeply.

So truth is integral to love in several ways.  First, I want the knowledge that others have about me to be true, so that their love is really for me: they don’t idolize me for isolated qualities nor value me mistakenly (as someone or something that I am not).  Rather they know my authentic self, and in so knowing me they love me. 

Second, in order for another to know me truly I must know and understand myself—as Socrates would say, I must know who I truly am.

Third, I likewise want to know my beloved truly.  So my beloved’s identity (as someone who claims to respect, be loyal to, and love me) must not be based on incomplete or false information (as an unconfessed affair, or a hidden need to marry in order to retain citizenship, etc.)

Thus my interest in interpretation is neither to dethrone notions of absolute t/Truth nor merely to supplant one view with another.  Rather, interpretation (of texts, experiences, situations, etc.) is a skill that matters because it allows us to gain some of our most meaningful connection to ourselves, to other people, and to evaluate how and how authentically they connect with us.

My point, then, is that truth remains connected with love, through and through.  And just as truth-seeking and truth-finding are integral to loving and being loved, so accurately assessing truth claims and truth values by way of interpretation is among the most meaningful of tasks.

In subsequent posts I reframe interpretation.  It is not an all-or-nothing hedge against relativism but is a skill that all possess and that can be improved with practice and knowledge.

In the end, interpretation helps keep us honest: it insists that we remain amongst the ambiguities and tensions inherent to our finite situation.  But it also gives gifts: we can have strong confidence in knowing (and so understanding) some things, even in knowing the that we love and, perhaps, are loved.

People, not souls / Selves, not objects

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In my last posts I explained why I think evangelical Christianity is a worthwhile subject and how I want to navigate it.  My current concern is to clarify that while this project focuses on ideas, my interest is in people.

Please do not misconstrue this point.  As per my last post, my guiding presupposition is the co-centrality of love and truth to human existence and Christianity.  As such, I am NOT interested in “souls.”  I do not really know what a soul is.  I have never met a soul.  Rather, if Christianity is real, it is real ‘here and now’ in my present with tangible indicators that I can both relate to and that bear upon my lived reality.  It must be true “for me.”  So this is not about saving souls or converting people—it is about love and truth in our current existence.  Enough said.

Two points contextualize the subject at hand.  First, how we think about and understand a topic has a significant impact on how we situate ourselves relative to that topic.  Further, it is not only the ideas but their formulation that makes the difference.  In much of what follows I take issue with the formulations that have been handed to us.

On the one hand, I dispute the traditional Christian formulations of certain doctrines and perspectives on how Christianity does—and particularly does not—interact with other areas of human existence (i.e., science, popular literature, economics, etc.).  On the other hand, I take issue with various cultural formulations (or more accurately, the absence of any formulation) regarding personhood, relationships, etc.

Second, who we are thinking about, and what motivates them to think as they do, is equally important.  I am not assuming that I can put myself in the “shoes” of all parties.  But through personal and interpersonal analogy I think we can highlight several prominent motivators.  And by better sensitizing ourselves to the poignancy that these ideas hold I believe we may better understand why they have been formulated as they have (and consequently, why evangelical Christianity engenders such polarized responses).

Concerning Christians, what is often at stake is fear: fear of the possibility that one’s beliefs may not be valid (or that one may not be able to express one’s sense of their validity), or intimidation in the face of navigating the many choices that accompany a belief system.

Moreover, it is my contention (to be fleshed out later) that the evangelical church has inadvertently fuelled this by woefully under-informing and misdirecting Christians as to how to interact with science, culture, and much of the world around them.

Concerning non-Christians, what is often at stake is feeling profoundly disrespected at being treated like objects—being viewed as a soul to be saved, rather than a self to be known.  Worse, such Christians typically claim while so acting that “we love you,” “we value you” or, worse, that “God loves you,” whatever that may mean.  In essence, one feels thoroughly off-put not only by this ‘loving’ objectification but by the apparent obliviousness of Christians its absurd contradiction.

Understanding such experiences may help Christians realize why their best efforts with non-Christians often create little other than disdain (from feeling objectified) or dismissal (from the incomprehension that comes from wondering how anyone can possibly believe something so utterly ridiculous and then, believing that way, think that their perspective is of any relevance to the world around them).

In both cases, my wager is that understanding each other more—through listening more—will amount to better knowledge of oneself and the other, which in turn allows for more authentic interactions and greater acceptance: more truth, more love.

Two roads not to take

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It is difficult at the outset to know which direction to take: to discuss how/why evangelical Christianity has value, or to hold this in abatement and examine how (and how much) evangelical Christianity is broken.  I’ll explain my choice by way of analogy.

After completing my graduate studies I ran across something that I had never experienced or had an interest in: a community dance.  I fell in love.  After so many years of living “in my head” I was suddenly aware of just how much of me simply could not be expressed through my intellect, or even my voice or pen.  Unlike church I attended regularly for several years, finding it a catalyst for catharsis: within my dance I could bring out my pain, my frustration, and loneliness.  I did not dance them away, but let them be.

Before I left Vancouver I had a chat with the founder.  He had started this dance—a family-friendly, no drugs / alcohol, not-for-profit event—because he just wanted to dance.  No club scene, no strings.  I was considering starting a similar community dance in my new town but had no skill as a DJ.  The best tip he gave me was this: play what you like.  You won’t please everyone, so if you can’t into it then it’s not worth doing and really, it won’t work.

As with dancing, so too those who read these entries may have diverging views about what should be said first in a blog making such big claims (i.e., Christianity is real—prove it!  Evangelical Christianity is deeply flawed—prove it!).  Yet in keeping with my favourite DJ’s perspective, I’m going with what’s on my front burner at the moment and will move on from there.

But my story about dancing is more than a long-winded analogy.  Beyond being cathartic for my negative emotions dancing was also the space where I could best express my response to the fullness of the love and truth that I encounter: through my existence, my family, my world, and my experience(s) of a God who actually shows up.  Joy.

And that too is why I’m doing this—why I’m writing.  (As an aside I think it should be odd to us, and evoke some suspicion, that the word joy itself is weird nowadays and that its connotation seems, somehow, deeply awkward).  So if you’re expecting me to start by laying down proofs you’ll be disappointed, or perhaps happily surprised.  Because being intellectually convinced of something, as important as that is, comes second.  Or rather, where any truth claims to be absolute—making a claim on my existence and on all of existence—and also to be supremely about love, it must be as philosopher Søren Kierkegaard notes: truth that is “for me,” and intimately so.

In my own experience the greatest “truth-for-me” is to be deeply beloved on one whom I deeply love.  Thus my view that truth and love are co-central to both human existence and Christianity / the Christian God comes not out of intellectual intuition or theological obligation, but because it has been my experience, and this experience has transformed my life.  Absolute truth may be such, but as I have no absolute access to it, it means nothing to me unless it is true for me.

So which road am I taking?  Neither.  I refuse the view that the binary opposition between proving Christianity or disproving it is the only way to go, nor do I believe that “proving” in any modernist sense even represents a valid option.  Instead the path, full of detours and discursions, will take love and truth as joint polar stars towards a way of being that looks for validation through reason and experience, even the experience of joy.