Category: Philosophy/Religion

0 A La Carte Christianity: Family Planning

February 17, 2020
by Connie Morgan
· Philosophy/Religion · Thought Box

This piece is the first in a series of essays on how Christians now more than ever, avoid Biblical truth. These topics are examples of how Christians degrade their own spirituality while simultaneously harming the reputation of Christianity as a whole. Interest in religion is in steep decline amongst Millennials and Generation Z. It should be no surprise the decline is accompanied by a trend of a la carte Christianity where Christians/Churches pick and choose what they like about the Bible and what they will ignore. These appear to be attempts by the Church to mirror popular culture in lieu of attempting to drive the culture.

Ask a Christian if they want to glorify God and they’ll say yes. Ask a Christian if they trust in God’s plan and they’ll say yes. Ask a Christian if they want to or have given their life to Christ and they’ll say yes…but over and over again I run into a subject where modern day Christians are not willing to “give their lives to Christ” and that is with family planning.

The Bible is very clear when it comes to children. Other than Jesus himself, children may be the greatest gift the Lord bestowed upon us. “Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.” – Psalm 127:3 – 5. God expects us to have and want children. His first command about having children is found in Genesis. John, Ecclesiastes and Proverbs all explain that children will bring you joy. Philippians teaches that having children will make you a better person. Children are referred to as gifts and blessings in the Bible. “Be fruitful and multiply” means at a minimum having three children.

I don’t see how any honest person can read the Bible and not conclude children in abundance is something pleasing to the Lord.

This appears to be an uncomfortable truth with the majority of young Christians. It is rare to hear a Christian say they will have “as many children as the Lord blesses me with.” Instead Christians want to have as many children as they are comfortable with. Christians want children based on their timing not God’s. Many Christians are not interested in God’s plan when it comes to family planning. “I want to hit xyz career milestone first,” “We’re waiting until we have xyz amount of money,” “We’re going to stop at 2” are potential rejections of God’s plan for you.

Christians will use their careers or current financial situation as a reason to hold off on children. This concern doesn’t hold a lot of merit as research shows being married and any kind of employment is all it takes to make sure your family’s needs are met. Even “needs” have been drastically redefined by society at large. Families don’t want more children if it means no more trips to Hawaii, buying secondhand and/or much less personal freedom. Raising children requires sacrifice no doubt, but God doesn’t call us to be comfortable. If His plan for us is five children, as Christians we should praise his generosity, not actively avoid it. Christians conveniently seem to lose faith in God’s ability to provide if it involves children.

Contraception is a means by which Christians reject God’s will. I have heard some argue that as long as one is “open” to the idea of children at any time, birth control is ok. The argument here is that God can do all things and if he wants you to have children he’ll make it happen whether you’re using protection or not. While it’s true God can make anything happen, this premise is intellectually dishonest. God also gives us free will. He let’s us decide the course of our lives instead of forcing us to love and obey Him.

Let’s say you have a friend who wants to be married. For years this person hasn’t found their match. At the same time this friend doesn’t try to meet people and is a homebody. You probably wouldn’t blame this person’s loneliness on God’s unwillingness to provide, you’d rightfully tell this friend they need to get out of the house more if they want to find someone! While yes, God could make the pizza delivery guy their soulmate (helluva meet-cute) human effort is frequently part of putting God’s plan into action. The same goes with contraception, you cannot make the claim that you are open to the idea of children while literally and figuratively taking efforts to prevent said children.

Now there is one form of birth control I do believe gets the theological ok and that is natural family planning or NFP. I have to give Catholics credit here because I believe they get this one right. No, natural family planning is not “the rhythm method,” it is much more scientific and exact. Women measure their temperature, pay attention to their vaginal discharge and track their period in order to pinpoint when they’re ovulating and avoid intercourse during that time. This method is up to 99% effective when done correctly, the same as other popular forms of birth control.

The difference is, NFP leaves the invitation open for God’s intervention, both symbolically and literally. Not only that, but NFP requires effort and constant communication with your partner. Popping pills, condoms or an insertion method are easy, mindless and habitual. A couple will only go through with NFP if they have legitimate, serious concerns about having children.

NFP forces the couple to ask themselves every month if avoiding children is really worth the effort. Couples must constantly check-in on their marriage. A simple question like “Why shouldn’t we have a child right now?” opens the floodgates to all kinds of follow-ups that could reveal problems one half of the couple didn’t realize. “I don’t feel financially secure,” “I’m still struggling from the last pregnancy,” “I don’t feel close to you right now,” “I want to move” etc are all important discussions that a couple engaging in NFP must address head-on every month. Commitment, communication, consideration, and self-control are all key to NFP. This is why NFP has a bonus side effect. The reported divorce rate of couples that use NFP range as low as 0% but even the most conservative estimates place divorce amongst NFP couples as 9.6% compared to 14.4% amongst those who never used NFP.

Now someone always brings this up in the comments, none of this is to say that married couples who are unable to conceive somehow have a less Holy union. Children are not the only way the Lord blesses us and the number of children a couple has is not indicative of their faithfulness to God. Likewise, if a woman has a condition that makes pregnancy life threatening then contraception may become an appropriate choice. In both of these cases, adoption is still an option I would encourage Christians in these positions to explore – this may be God’s calling to you. I also admit it is likely that children simply aren’t part of God’s plan for every married couple.

Worth noting is even secular women are becoming more and more interested in NFP for the health and relationship benefits. It’s funny how often scripture based lifestyle advice often turns out to be good for humans, religious or not. Dr Jolene Brighten has been a champion for NFP or the fertility awareness method as she calls it. Her book “Beyond the Pill” is a best seller.

Regardless of any earthly benefit, the question for Christians should always be – are my actions glorifying God? This means an openness to following God’s plan and celebrating the gifts He gives you whether it was the plan you were hoping for or not. Christians are unBiblical when they try to restrict or perfectly time the number of blessings (children) God gives them. Planning children according to their will instead of God’s. Wishing for a life according to God’s will while using birth control is like saying “God let me live according to your plan…unless your plan is for me to have children right now, then I am not interested.”

3 Questions from an Atheist: From Believer to Skeptic

April 3, 2018
by Connie Morgan
· Philosophy/Religion · Thought Box

As an atheist or agnostic thinking about whether or not God exists, most of us have the same questions or hang ups. Any apologetic will tell you it’s rare they hear a question they’ve never heard before. Despite humans having contemplated faith for thousands of years, many of which determining yes, God does indeed exist, non-believers often believe they have the “Gotcha” question no believer can logically answer. Like I said when I wrote about my literal coming to Jesus, it’s kind of arrogant. I was one of the arrogant, with science and faith being my biggest hangup, which is probably the most common argument I come across.

Having the science vs Christianity debate actually gets kind of boring. Talking with people who think they’re so smart and you’re just a dumb Christian is fun at first, but I find there are actually bigger questions to be answered once you dig a little deeper. Skimming the surface of Christian doctrine gives evidence of compatibility with faith.

Recently I had a fun and different conversation with someone who was once a believer and now isn’t. He had a list of reasons why he had left God, some science related, others not. I am new to “apologetics” but I had a good time testing my own faith and knowledge by addressing his qualms. This will probably be a recurring piece on my blog as I believe it is good for everyone involved.

Is your version of the Bible correct?
I have various versions of the Bible. By various I mean slightly different translations. That being said, all Bibles say virtually the same thing. They have the same message. Just like the various adaptations of the Cinderella story told in virtually every culture across the globe: they’re all slightly different, but the moral remains the same. However, it is a distant goal of mine to learn Hebrew or ancient Greek so I can read the Bible in its original form and hence its most accurate one.

How are God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit one yet separate? I.e. why would Jesus pray to himself?
First we must unpack why there is even a trinity to begin with. I think C.S. Lewis has some wise words on this.

On a one-dimensional level, you can have a straight line. On a two-dimensional level, those lines can be combined in ways they couldn’t conceive in a one-dimensional world, and they could form a square. Moving on, on a three-dimensional level, those squares can be combined in yet more inconceivable ways for anyone living in a one-or-two-dimensional world, and could form a cube.

This trinity is a deeper or more complex level of living/existence. On Earth we are one dimensional. What I mean is one person is one being. You shoot me and only I die, I eat food and only I get full. Perhaps we get close to a two-dimensional existence when we marry someone and two become one; Evidence of this is when one’s spouse dies and a day later they die as well.

Lewis suggests the doctrine of the Trinity describes a “higher kind of life,” where you can have “a being who is three persons while remaining one being, just as a cube is six squares while remaining one cube.”

It’s difficult to wrap our heads around it, but the trinity is something for us to experience. Keep in mind that when we envision one, two and three we do so in terms of objects because we are physical beings but God is not physical, he is spiritual. God (the Father) is the one we pray to, God (the Holy Spirit) is the thing inside us urging us to pray, and God (the Son) is a bridge or road along which we are pushed to that goal. Humans are one being and one person. God is one being but three persons.

Click here for a good explanation of the trinity.

How do you know if something is true? Through prayer? Through faith?
This is a weird question to me cause it seems obvious. I know something is true if I have solid evidence that said thing is true, beyond a reasonable doubt. I have researched Christianity and have been convinced because of the evidence and compelling arguments apologetics make.

Prayer may help with truth seeking, but praying something doesn’t make it true. Faith doesn’t define truth either, it is sort of a side effect of truth.

Where and how do you gain knowledge of God’s existence?
For me it’s through research and a little bit of feeling. Although the further I grow in my relationship with God the more feeling based it becomes and I think that’s normal. I constantly have questions about God’s existence. I read books, look up blogs and listen to podcasts. I pray about my questions, literally something like “Heavenly Father I am having some issues understanding why the old testament was so violent. Can you help me find the resources to better understand you?” Every time I have found answers.

How can all religions be right? It must be then that they’re all wrong. There are hundreds of different Christian faiths all proclaiming to be the one.
This is a weird paradox, if you’re not always right are you always wrong? Yes there are many religions and of course some of them are wrong. Hinduism and Christianity are wildly different so one of them must be wrong.

When it comes to Christianity, sure there are many different sects but, just like different translations of the Bible they still say the same thing: “Jesus is the good news. He came, he died and now we are all saved.” Walk into any Christian church and that’s the message. The differences between churches are questions like, when should we baptize children? Should worship stay traditional or evolve? Even Catholicism which is its own genre of Christianity isn’t greatly different from protestant messaging. Jesus came, he saw, he died, hallelujah. Unity does not necessarily mean uniformity.

Humans aren’t perfect so of course the messages in the Bible are interpreted imperfectly. Who has it perfect? I am not sure, I can only make my best guess. But there are many aspects of Christianity that almost every church agrees on.

Now there are groups like Mormons who add their own layers to Christianity, leading some to claim Mormons aren’t even Christians. The thing about the Book of Mormon is that it doesn’t even come close to the level of verification that the Bible has been found to have over centuries. Potential books of the Bible have been left out because they weren’t found to be historically sound enough. Most notably is the Book of Thomas. Scholars regularly debate whether it should be added but it has continually failed to meet the levels of scrutiny needed to be included in the good book. Likewise, the Book of Mormon fails these tests.

Why do you believe the Bible to be the basis of morality? It condemns homosexuality, God hates sinners Psalms, Romans 1:18, John 3:36 etc
This is the biggest part of my faith that is feelings based. As you have heard me say, without God there is no objective standard of good. I believe in an objective standard of good.

Without an objective standard for good we get slavery, the holocaust, abortions on demand etc. Nations sat by and watched these things happen. Literally millions of people have been convinced that all these things are a good idea. Judeo/Christian thought is what brought down all of these travesties. (It hasn’t succeeding in bringing down mass abortion yet but I believe it will and one day we’ll look back on these days with shame.)

People say morality is subjective but don’t think hard about what that means; subjective morality means evil is subjective too.

If you have specific issues with things God doesn’t like such as homosexuality I’ll have to address those individually. But here’s what a lot of Christians get wrong in my opinion; They “power rank” sin when all sin is the same in God’s eyes. It’s important to make the distinction between God’s court and ours. We humans punish murder more harshly than petty theft as we should. It’s what our society needs in order to function. But God can forgive a murderer the same as a glutton.

Therefore homosexuality is the same as theft or having sex before marriage, or even having sex with a condom. Why do some Christians focus on homosexuality? I think because it’s “abnormal” sin. A small percentage of the population has homosexual desires but we can all relate to jealousy, glutton, and general lust. Homosexuality is also a very public sin, it’s harder to hide. There are also certain traits common among gay men especially, that are easy to see. Oftentimes other people know a young guy is gay before he even realizes it. On the flip side, no one knows the jealousy I feel or what decisions I make based on selfishness. My sin is not as obvious.

Religion is a relationship. I don’t know your relationship with God, I don’t know your conversations with God, I don’t know your struggles or what’s in your heart; that’s the same whether you’re gay or straight. I also don’t know what God does with gay people but I find it hard to believe we won’t see any in heaven. Jesus never talks about homosexuality. While I think it is sinful, I think a lot of things are sinful and I don’t think homosexuality is one of God’s greatest concerns. I also don’t think as a straight person I automatically have a leg up on a gay person. There are certainly gay Christians less sinful than I.

Why are there contradictions in the Bible? I thought it was the word of God, isn’t that perfect?
The Bible is the word of God and his word is perfect, however, humans are not. When it comes to the Bible, context, interpretation and translation are huge. Sometimes things people throw out as contradictions actually aren’t. There are also different “genres” in the Bible to be interpreted and understood in different ways. Sometimes folks miss that. There are language conventions we have now that didn’t exist when the Bible was written. Regardless, there are no contradictions that I have ever found in the Bible that are irreconcilable. When you see two verses that are next to each other that don’t seem like they fit, well, someone thought they did belong next to each other so perhaps some further thought on why that is is worthwhile.

People also mistake something taking place in the Bible with meaning it’s condoned by God. For example, in the old testament, Isaac, Abraham and Jacob, the heroes, have multiple wives. You may look at that and say what a contradiction! God condones polygamy in the old testament. But all those dudes are not exactly having a good time. Make sure when you’re reading the Bible you are understanding the narrative.

Another example. People like to point out the difference between the gospels. This is probably the most common “contradiction” I hear about. Each gospel reports a different amount of women running to the tomb, a different number of angels, some include details some leave them out. Because of these “contradictions,” people say, aha! See this is all false. I read the differences and I think, wow this is probably true. Eye witness accounts never turn out the exact same, even if the event happened five minutes ago. This has been tested over and over again. If four people had the exact same memory of such a long, detailed event, that would be more suspicious to me.

I try to figure out why one witness says it one way and another says it a different way. And there are lots of good theories backed by solid reasoning as to why the differences in the gospels exist. Again, look for narrative, not identical recounts.

Why can’t people perform miracles anymore? Are modern miracles dead?
I think you’ll have to define what miracle means to you in order for me to answer this the way you want me to. But no, they aren’t.

Why does God kill people in the old testament?
First, my theory: When we raise children, at first we’re extremely hands on. We are constantly correcting them. Usually through constant praise and constant punishment. Most well behaved children are raised this way. For me the punishment was physical in the form of spanking, but maybe it’s time out, getting toys taken away etc. As your children get older you stay involved but you back off. Rare to see a 12 year old get spanked or a 15 year old put in timeout.

Humanity is all of God’s children. In the old testament he was laying the foundation for all of mankind. He had to teach us what is wrong and right and He did that through punishment and reward. Very obvious, in your face punishment and reward. He had to in order to teach us how to be human. It seems obvious now that the Ten Commandments are a good thing but back in the day humans were a little more, for a lack of better words, savage. Early humans didn’t have thousands of years worth of philosophy and thought experiments like we do. But God didn’t like the punishment, that’s why Jesus came.

But to put things more bluntly, God can kill whenever he wants. In fact, the only reason any of us die is because God wills it. God owes us nothing. But it’s also worth asking, why is God so merciful in the Old Testament.

Where are the prophets today?
You aren’t going to like my first answer to this question but the Bible calls all believers in Christ prophets. In Acts 2:16-21, Peter declares that in the church this prophecy is now fulfilled. Every believer is led by the Holy Spirit to discern the truth (1 John 2:20, 27). Each believer is directed to admonish with the word of Christ (Col. 3:16), as well as to instruct (Rom. 15:14) and encourage other believers (Heb. 3:13).

Prophecy in the New Covenant is defined as ideas, thoughts or understandings put into your head by God. So Christians might also pray for prophecy. Say I was going to debate you in front of a crowd on the likelihood of God. Before our debate started I might pray to God for prophecy, meaning profound understanding of the word and the means to accurately communicate it. So perhaps prophecy is revealed in that I give an example that relates directly to a thought you had that morning that I had no idea about. That’s modern prophecy.

Like so many other things, the arrival of Jesus changed the role of prophets, rather it got rid of the need. You’ll notice in the New Testament Jesus’s followers are called apostles, not prophets. I believe this is because Jesus was the ultimate prophet. He gave us the word of God, straight from Him so what more do we really need at this point? There is no more “thus saith the lord” in the new testament. Perhaps there will be another prophet one day but there honestly isn’t a need for one in the traditional sense. We have all the instructions and guidance we need from God and that is mostly because of Jesus.

Why do you believe the Bible is the only book you need or that it has all the answers in life? That’s like saying everything you need to know in life you’ll learn in school.
I believe the Bible is the only book you need in order to know your core purpose as a human and child of God. If you know your purpose then everything else follows. Because of what the Bible tells me I feel it is important for me to attend school and treat people well and do things that generally glorify God. So yes, the Bible is all I need.

4 Where We Really Need Feminism

March 5, 2018
by Connie Morgan
· Culture · In the News · Philosophy/Religion · Thought Box

I’m a feminist. But according to women leading the feminist movement I am the enemy. Do I believe that women should have equal opportunity? Yes. Do I think women deserve equal pay for equal work? Absolutely. Do I think women should be able to sleep with whomever they want whenever they want? As long as it’s consensual, yes. Do I think rape is horrible? I think rapists should be put to death. Yet, I would not be welcome at the Women’s March and other Feminist Organizations for many reasons. The third wave of feminism – the one that promotes pu**y hats, claims there’s an unfair gender gap, and teaches women that masculinity is inherently evil – doesn’t include me and, furthermore, I think it’s much more damaging to women than helpful. The sad thing is that the world does desperately needs feminism but not in the places feminists usually are marching. Below is a list of where feminists should be focusing their energies.

Where we should be fighting for basic privileges

Women hold powerful positions in America. We can wear whatever we want, buy whatever we want, marry whoever we want, and divorce whoever we want. This is not the case in many other parts of the world. Saudi Arabia recently announced it would lift its ban on women driving in June of this year. Women in Saudi Arabia are still expected to have a male “wali” – an official guardian, typically a father, brother, uncle or husband. In practice, women need their guardian’s consent for any major activity, including travelling, obtaining a passport, getting married or divorced, and signing contracts. They also can’t “wear clothes that show off their beauty,” interact with men, compete in sports, go swimming, or try on clothes.

There was a protest in Iran just last month because women are forced to wear hijabs. Women in Iran can also be banned from traveling or even going to work by their husbands.

Where we should be fighting for sexual freedom

Young girls in Mali and Somalia are still subject to genital mutilation. In Mali and Nepal child marriages are the norm. In Mali, one in 10 young women die in childbirth. 37% of girls in Nepal are married before 18. The rape of women in the Democratic Republic of Congo is so widespread that United Nation’s investigators called it “unprecedented.” Systemic rape is a huge problem in Pakistan and Sudan as well. Things are so bad for women in Afghanistan in terms of domestic abuse and forced marriages that women turning to suicide as an escape has become the norm.

Sex trafficking exists all over the world, including the United States. But compared to other countries, the United States is doing fine in this area. The following countries are the biggest violators of human rights via sex trafficking: Algeria, Libya, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Congo, Kuwait, Iran, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, North Korea, (but hey, Kim Jong Un’s sister is cool right?) Belarus, and Russia.

Where anti-domestic abuse efforts should be focused

In Guatemala domestic violence is abound. Honor killings still take place in Pakistan where they are so prevalent women are frequently executed for adultery. Honor killings are commonplace in India as well. Both countries have informal court systems which almost always side with men.

Where we should be concerned about “women to work” and education rights

In Afghanistan and the Central African Republic, only 24% of women can read, in Benin 27%, in Chad 14%, in Mali 22%, in Niger 11%, in South Sudan 16%. It’s no coincidence that many of the most violent-towards-women countries are the ones where women are least educated. In Afghanistan, Papua New Guinea, Haiti, Egypt, Pakistan and at least 15 other prominent countries, girls go to school at much lower rates than their male counter-parts. Usually because they are not allowed to or the risk of rape is too high if they do attend. 85% of women in Afghanistan receive no education. More than three-quarters of the world’s illiterate adults are found in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa; of all the illiterate adults in the world, almost two-thirds are women

Education obviously effects work opportunities. In every country with low female education rates you can expect work prospects to also be low for women. But to take it one step further, in 18 countries, married women cannot get a job without their husband’s permission: Bahrain, Bolivia, Cameroon, Chad, Congo, Gabon, Guinea, Iran, Jordan, Kuwait, Mauritania, Niger, Qatar, Sudan, Syria, United Arab Emirates, West Bank and Gaza and Yemen.

What should alarm feminists about abortion and gender bias

Abortion is not an equal opportunity experience. By that I mean female fetuses are aborted at a much higher rate than male fetuses. Before we leave the womb, we’re already being discriminated against. Gender-based abortion happens in third world and first world countries alike due to cultural preferences and a desire to “keep the family name alive.” Official figures suggest as many as 4,700 females have disappeared from the latest national census records of England and Wales, raising fears that indicate the illegal practice of sex-selection abortion has become prevalent in the UK.

According to the United Nations Population Fund, around 117 million women are believed to be “missing” in Asia and Eastern Europe – the result of son preference and gender-biased sex selection, a form of discrimination. A problem since the 1990s, in some areas there are reports of up to a 25% difference between male and female births. These gender biases have been linked to increased human trafficking and domestic violence against women.

Writing this made me feel shameful. Shameful that I have done absolutely nothing to help these women around the world. Everything listed above is not commonplace in the United States. I live a pretty kush life. Are there issues for women in the United States? Of course. I have my gripes like everyone else. But they are small potatoes compared to the extremely dire situations for women around the world. Women in America march around in pus** hats whilst college educated, divorced and bruise free. Millions of women in other countries couldn’t even dream of doing such a thing. I mean literally if they told the wrong person they did dream of it there is a good chance they would receive some sort of very unpleasant punishment.

But where are all the Women’s Marchers? Not to say none of them are helping these poor women overseas, I’m sure some of them are, but a great deal of effort, money and time are put into feminist efforts here in the states. I can’t help but wonder what that kind of effort and media attention could accomplish in Nepal or Afghanistan or Cameroon.

Don’t ever accept an injustice just because it’s not as bad as it could be, but do think about how you can best utilize your resources, make the biggest changes and exploit your abilities. In feminism and in every facet of your life.

5 The Logic of Faith

September 6, 2017
by Connie Morgan
· Philosophy/Religion · Thought Box

I’ve wanted to sort out my views on religion for a long time. Whether I was an atheist or believer, I wanted to know exactly why I was either of those things. “I find it hard to believe…” is not a good enough reason not to believe in something so important. If God is real there is actually nothing more important than dedicating your life to serving Him. If God isn’t real then if I care about my Christian friends I should try to convince them they are wasting their lives worshipping an idea that isn’t true.

I wasn’t raised in any sort of religious community but my parents were. They both call themselves agnostic but made an effort to expose my brother and me to religion. I think they did this because they wanted us to make our own decisions about religion and also because they believed it was important for us to have at least a basic understanding of Christianity because we live in a Christian nation. We’d sometimes attend Christian church services of varying denominations. If a friend of the family invited us to church we nearly always went and my parents took no issue with us attending the various Youth Groups we’d get invited to.

I liked attending different church services but always felt like an outsider just passing through for a moment. Church services were fun to observe but felt rather silly to me. None of the churches I attended made me feel any certain way; and I have attended a lot of church services, pretty much every Christian denomination you can think of. I saw the value of religious communities at a very young age and still don’t understand the hatred some have towards Judeo/Christian thought. Of course certain churches or certain Christians have twisted religion in wrong and sometimes downright evil ways but the values generally promoted by Jews and Christians are something I could get on board with.

But to believe there is a magical dude in the sky who created us all? So if evolution is a thing how does that work? Did God allow for evolution? Was Genesis literal or were those metaphorical days? And so then God must’ve created the planets. How does that work? And if we’re all perfect creations why are some of us not? Down syndrome, autism, red hair…why do these things exist then? Although I would sometimes climb a mountain and be so struck by the beauty at the top that I would think “how could this have happened by accident?” or find myself feeling more at ease when someone said they would “pray for me” or I would sometimes cry when listening to a gospel or Christmas song, feelings would never be enough for me when deciding whether or not to find faith. God needed to be scientifically and historically accurate.

It was mainly my inability to reconcile science and faith that held me back. In hindsight, it was pretty arrogant of me to believe no other Christians asked themselves those questions and/or that there weren’t any thoughtful answers to them. Another part of my arrogance was I felt my life needed to be perfect in order for me to find faith. Not because God wanted me to be perfect but because I needed to have a completely clear head in order to make a decision so big. I couldn’t turn to God when I was sad after a breakup, dealing with a death or some other emotional event. Emotions cloud judgment; people who hit rock bottom only to find God may have stumbled on the truth but only out of their own weakness, I would never use God as a crutch. Last Summer I finally felt my life was exactly how I wanted it to be, my conscious felt clear and seriously diving into my investigation was safe mentally and emotionally.

My search for truth last year was largely influenced by a question that I couldn’t answer, rather I couldn’t answer it without there being an objective good. That question being “Why would it be wrong to euthanize severely handicapped people.” Severely handicapped referring to folks who can’t communicate or take care of themselves.

The thought of wiping all of these people off the face of the earth was horrifying to me. I think most people would agree doing this would be wrong. If today, President Trump announced: “we’re rounding up all the severely handicapped and euthanizing them for the good of the country,” we’d all be outraged and rightly so. But why would we be outraged?

Because killing is wrong! You’d say. But why is killing wrong? Why would killing handicapped people be wrong? To make a long philosophical debate short, logically, it’s not wrong to kill. If someone is severely handicapped they’re a burden on society in every way. Monetarily, emotionally, they truly are a resource suck. If we could eliminate them in a painless and efficient manner why shouldn’t we? And this is where an objective good comes in. It’s not ok, to kill humans, no matter their status, health or otherwise because God said so, and God is the objective good.

Honest atheists know there is no objective good without a God. As former “obnoxious atheist” turned Christian, geneticist Francis Collins said, “no law of science could adequately explain the existence of morality.” Jerry Coyne, a staunch atheist writer and biologist admits that morality does not exist for atheists. And unsurprisingly he is an advocate for the euthanasia of babies born with disabilities, calling it “merciful.”

There are atheists who argue that morality is possible without a God, but their arguments are not convincing nor scientifically absolute at all.

As atheist turned most profound Christian thinker of the modern era C.S. Lewis said, “Atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning…”

That blew my mind a little bit.

Without objective good there is no morality and without morality all you have is relativism, and with relativism we are all reduced to objects. It’s easy for people who haven’t really thought about the things they believe and why they believe them to just say “oh I’m a relativist” as most/many atheists do. But relativism doesn’t make sense if you have any sort of moral boundaries at all, and pretty much all humans do.

Relativism is the doctrine that knowledge, truth, and morality exist in relation to culture, society, or historical context, and are not absolute. And it’s all we have without an objective standard for good. Under Relativist doctrine, culture excuses any behavior. Let’s take slavery for example. In almost every early culture, including African culture, slavery was perfectly normal. For hundreds of years no one thought anything of it. Relatively it was moral to have slaves. Did that make slavery right? I’d argue no. But according to relativism slavery then was acceptable. Another example is if Nazis had taken over during WWII and convinced the whole world to get behind them. Let’s say Nazis ruled for 100 years. The masses were convinced that exterminating Jews was a must. Would that make it any less evil? I’d argue no. But a relativist would have to accept that behavior because the culture dictated it was a-ok.

I struggled with the killing question. I sought answers for literally months, turning to religious and atheist people alike though I found the conclusion pretty early on, and both camps for the most part agree. Killing for any reason other than protection is only wrong if there is an objective good, and there is only an objective good if God is real.

This is where I was starting to become convinced God must be real. Jesus was still a myth to me but God might be the real deal. My freshman year I researched Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and was convinced those religions might have some good ideas but their “truths” weren’t actually true. If there is a God, I concluded he is the one Christians or Jews describe.

Ok, so if I believe in objective morals (and I do) then God must be real. But ok, what about all the science stuff? Science and religion aren’t compatible and that’s just known by everyone. Then I had science thrown in my face…by Christians and Jews!

Alex Metaxas makes the case for science and God in “Science Increasingly Makes the Case for God” one of the most shared articles in Wall Street Journal history.

Metaxas makes this point:

Today there are more than 200 known parameters necessary for a planet to support life—every single one of which must be perfectly met, or the whole thing falls apart. Without a massive planet like Jupiter nearby, whose gravity will draw away asteroids, a thousand times as many would hit Earth’s surface. The odds against life in the universe are simply astonishing.

According to the odds, I shouldn’t exist. Hmm, that was interesting, and as I dug deeper into this idea, I found more science to back up the theory of intelligent design.

As former atheist activist turned believer Antony Flew stated, “the integrated complexity of life itself—which is far more complex than the physical Universe—can only be explained in terms of an Intelligent Source.”

Of course, you can always find refuting arguments but I could find no science whatsoever that debunked or even came close to debunking God. And I found no evidence that religion and science could not coexist. Einstein himself said, “Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”

And no, evolution and faith aren’t incompatible.

An objective good is only possible through God and science is compatible with faith. For goodness sake the inventor of the Big Bang Theory was a monsignor in the Catholic church. Whoah! This realization sort of shook me to say the least. Mostly because I had waited so long to ask and answer the obvious questions. I was starting to admit to myself that belief in God might actually be logical. I was explaining to my agnostic mom that I was finding shocking evidence that God is a rational idea.

“Mom! I am not using feelings at all and I am still becoming more convinced there is a God.”

“Feeling is part of religion Connie. You can’t commit unless you feel the spirit.”

I knew she was right. But fortunately I had started praying, the ultimate anecdotal experiment. This would surely affect my feelings.

It was suggested to me that I start praying, literally start acting like I was Christian just to see what would happen so I did. I started attending a Christian non-denominational church when I could and for months I prayed. It felt very weird and ridiculous. I prayed out loud because I heard that was more “sincere” and boy did I not like it at first. I tried to take prayer seriously though and prayed the ways recommended in the Bible. I praised God a lot but I asked for help with things and to my utter shock and amazement my prayers were answered.

One example that sticks out was during a long run while training for a 50K. It was a 22 mile run and I didn’t pack water like the idiot I am. I was so tired, my head pounding from the sun and dehydration that nearing the end of my run with about a mile left, I said to God “please, help me get water,” and I shit you not, I crested the hill I was on and there was a lemonade stand. I had ran this route many times and never before had there been a lemonade stand. The little girls at the stand not only quenched my thirst, but through conversation with the girls’ mom I learned they needed a swim teacher…and I am a swim teacher. The Lord had given me water in two ways. But that was just a coincidence and I still wasn’t convinced.

Then I prayed that a friend get in touch with me or else I feared we would lose contact and the next day that friend, who I hadn’t heard from in months messaged me. Then I prayed for answers to a personal problem I had been dealing with for years, the next day an article came across my Twitter feed addressing the exact unique issue I was facing, and it was written by a Christian. I still wasn’t convinced though. Obviously these things were coincidences.

Then much more recently, I visited my grandfather and was officially convinced of God. My grandpa has cancer riddled throughout his entire body and has been undergoing chemotherapy for some time now. One of, if not my first prayer, I asked the Lord do what he must with my grandfather’s life, but please make it as painless as possible. When I visited my grandfather, months after that first prayer he told me “surprisingly, the chemo hasn’t been painful at all.” My mouth metaphorically dropped as I remembered my first prayer.

An objective good, cohesion with science and my own anecdotal examples. I couldn’t ignore the idea of God any longer, for that would be ignoring the truth. And there’s only one reason to become a Christian, not because it makes you feel good, or because it’s what you’ve always been taught, but because God is the Truth.

After hours and hours of intense research over the last year spent looking at arguments from a long list of Judeo/Christian thinkers and atheists alike I was convinced that God is the Truth and soon after that Jesus was indeed the Son of God sent to save us from our sin. (Reconciling Jesus was a whole nother internal crisis but this blog has already gotten too long.)

The evidence was eventually so overwhelming that I decided to accept Jesus into my heart and was baptized by the pastor of the church I had regularly been attending surrounded by friends and strangers alike. It was a weird feeling and honestly I am still not 100% comfortable in my new life of faith. My insecurities have shown in that I worry people I want to respect my opinion now won’t. (Which is dumb because 100% of my political views can be argued from a secular perspective.) But I follow the truth where it leads and the truth has lead me to Jesus.

If you’re an atheist, agnostic or even religious person I encourage you to really ask yourself why you believe the things you believe. If you believe it is wrong to kill, why do you believe this? If you believe it is wrong to take advantage of people weaker than you why do you believe this? If you believe cheating on your wife or husband is wrong, why? But not just the serious stuff, why do you hold the smaller principles in your life to be true? I think most of us, young and old, religious and not haven’t done this. Ask questions and be honest about the answers you find. Atheists think they are more rational than Christians but atheism requires faith too. Could there really be anything more important in life than figuring out whether faith in God or faith in an accident is correct?

If you’re searching for answers these are some of the Christian and atheist thinkers I found to be helpful: Francis Collins, Jerry Coyne, Antony Flew, Sam Harris, Friedrich Nietzsche, Alex Metaxas, Yaron Brook, C.S. Lewis, Peter Kreeft, Ayn Rand, Richard Dawkins, Lee Strobel, Andrew Klavan, AJ Jacobs, Timothy Keller, Michael Shermer, Jordan Peterson, Bishop Barron, Ravi Zacharias and my former roommate, William Bergman.

Seek out the truth, whether you come to the same conclusion as me or not, there’s really nothing more important.