Belief in God

by The Editor

Contents List:

Logic
Atheism
Psychology
Religion

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It seems obvious to me that the Universe in which we "live and move and have our being" is, as the word implies, one inter-connected whole, even though the totality of its implicit connections may be intricate beyond the grasp of limited human intelligence. Everywhere we look, we find some sort of order which, for ease of understanding, we may codify into sets of rules which together make up what used to be called "Natural Law" and which are the basis of everything that has significance for us.

Scientists, particularly physicists, have long sought a Great Unifying Theory (GUT) or Theory of Everything (TOE) to "make sense" of the apparent discontinuities which seem to exist between "classical" physics — which deals with large objects and electrical forces, and "quantum" physics — which deals with very small or "virtual" objects and gravitational forces. They are confident that such a theory is possible, but they have not yet found a secure physical basis for it. Perhaps they will have to be satisfied with a theory which transcends the physical.

The marvellously complex unity that we experience seems to me to point to a Single Directing Intelligence (SDI) from, in, and upon Which everything of which we can be conscious has its being and existence. I shall henceforth refer to this SDI as "God". You are free to translate this into any other name you prefer, ranging from Allah to Zeus. Any further description, explanation, or elaboration is superfluous and inadvisable, because the ideas one individual may form about God may conflict with those of another individual, and so tend to make the Universe seem less of a Unity than it really is.

Provisional adoption of the hypothesis of God as the GUT and TOE of the Universe is a thoroughly scientific, as well as a philosophic and religious, strategy which leaves all options open. If and when some discovery or other in whatever field renders the hypothesis untenable, it will have to be abandoned or modified. But in the absence of such an event, we are free to believe in God, act on the basis of that belief and, as long as it proves reliable, continue to place ever-increasing trust and confidence in it.

Whether or not the Universe was "created" in any conventionally accepted sense, it can hardly have arisen "accidentally", there can be little harm in crediting the Unifying Principle, God, with having designed it to work as it does, and to have implemented His design. We may therefore be justified in referring to God as the "Grand Architect" and "Creator" of the Universe, terms which are easily understood by the man on the Clapham omnibus — even if we admit to ourselves that we may never know precisely how the Universe came to be what it is.

I shall also adhere to the traditional convention of using the masculine singular personal and possessive pronouns when referring to God. The Inventor of personality cannot Himself be less than personal, and attributing to God the infinite power of unaided creativity ex nihilo seems not inconsistent with masculinity. As I have a feeling that neither is it inconsistent with femininity, I am happy to assume that gender is a fundamental principle of creation.

Atheism

When you hear someone say, "I don't believe in God", ask him or her to describe the sort of God not believed in. Whatever description you get, you will be able to agree that you don't believe in that "God" either. Any description implies limitation: and though the Creator can delimit the creature, He cannot give the creature the power to limit the Creator without destroying the order that makes the system hang together. So there can be as many different descriptions of God as there are people in the Universe, but none of them can amount to more than limited human ideas about attributes that God is assumed to possess. I cannot myself put much faith in "the brain" or "genes" as affording complete explanations for all my experience of life in the world.

Please examine some of the things you probably take for granted, but which are not amenable to logical proof. Consider the following questions:

When you cut your finger, do you believe that it will heal?
Do you believe that the Sun will "rise" tomorrow, whether or not you are able to see it?
Do you believe that the seeds you sow in your garden will grow into the kinds of vegetables, flowers, or fruits described on the packet?
Do you believe that over-indulgence in drink or drugs will result in a "hang-over"?

If you answer "Yes" to any of the above, you believe in God: because there can be no foundation for your belief except your past experience which makes you confident that there is some system of natural law that underpins the operation of the Universe and can be relied upon to operate tomorrow as it did yesterday and does today. If you like, you can interpret "God" to be short-hand for the Universal System which I like to think of as The Holy Spirit.

Whenever you form an intention and work logically to realise it, you are placing your trust in God and His Natural Law whether or not you are aware of doing so. If things don't work out as you expected, you are liable to think that "something has gone wrong". In such a case, you may find that your understanding of Natural Law may have been at fault in some way or that some human or animal agency has interfered with your plans by changing the conditions under which the generic law operates. Thus we can sometimes see pears growing on a branch of an apple tree.

You will probably read and hear much about "God" that you believe to be nonsense. I do too. But that does not make me throw away the whole of an idea which I have found so helpful in making my existence in the world mean something.

Psychology

There are two characteristics that become prominent in nearly all children as soon as they have acquired a useable vocabulary. They enjoy listening to stories — narratives about characters to whom they can relate in some way; and they keep asking "Why?". As an old man, these characteristics still form an essential part of my own psychological make-up. The significance of anything arises from its connectedness with other things and events. Neither children nor myself can make sense of "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing". We like to discern some purpose to which the train of events in a story seems to be leading. It is purpose that explains both the actions of the characters and the vicarious frustration we feel when their intentions are foiled.

Hence I am inclined to look for God's purpose in creating a Universe which includes human beings, like myself, who have apparently been naturally endowed with a psychological disposition to seek for connectedness and purpose in their lifetime experience despite all the difficulties and frustrations they may encounter.

Religion

This search for a unifying purpose is the essence of philosophy (love of wisdom) and an apparently successful philosophy tends to become a religion. The word is derived from the Latin religare, meaning to bind, i.e. to put fragmented ideas together to form a coherent, consistent whole. From this root also, we get the word rely, meaning to depend on, to have confidence in, somebody or something. When we depend on and have confidence in God, we are placing our faith in the essential unity of all that exists.

Taking this as our simple religion, we shall use it as the starting hypothesis for our study of the Universe, seeking to understand why our experience of it sometimes seems fragmented. Our philosophical religion will then be a means of reconciling the apparent contradictions we encounter in all aspects of human life, and thus help to eliminate causes of conflict among ourselves.