Faith and Rationality

[wasmit]

I used to think that faith was simply “Mental acceptance of and confidence in a claim as truth without proof supporting the claim.”. (Which is clearly irrational). Since coming on this forum, I have realised that Catholics use a different definition. The Catholic definition might be related to this, from the CCC article 155

In faith, the human intellect and will cooperate with divine grace: "Believing is an act of the intellect assenting to the divine truth by command of the will moved by God through grace.

so, my questions are, when a Catholic person says the word “faith”, what do they mean? Do they mean different things at different times, or is there only one definition? What about other Christian sects (e.g. protestants, baptists, etc)? Do they have a different meaning?

Is it rational to have faith? (by the catholic definition)

Cheers,

 

[Eucharisted]

Faith means several things, not just belief. But as to belief, in simplest terms, it means to willingly rise to truth by God’s grace. Nothing can be done without God’s grace - not even accepting of His graces - and belief is in itself a grace. To willinly rise to truth means several things: to meditate, to go from ignorance to knowledge, to accept a truth as truth, and to be illumiated (to deepen in the faith). Faith is the substace of hope and the proof of unseen things.

 

[wasmit]

Faith means several things, not just belief.

what are these several things? does saying the word faith mean different things at different times, or many things at the same time?

But as to belief, in simplest terms, it means to willingly rise to truth by God’s grace.

How do you rise to truth? What does that even mean?
What is grace?

Nothing can be done without God’s grace - not even accepting of His graces - and belief is in itself a grace. To willinly rise to truth means several things: to meditate, to go from ignorance to knowledge, to accept a truth as truth, and to be illumiated (to deepen in the faith). Faith is the substace of hope and the proof of unseen things.

I really have no idea what any of this means.
How can there be a physical substance of an intangible emotion (hope) ?

Can you explain it more simply?

 

[Verbum]

Hi wasmit,

Here is a prayer that affirms faith :

An Act of Faith

O my God, I firmly believe that Thou art one God in three Divine Person, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; I believe that Thy Divine Son became man, and died for our sins, and that He will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe these and all the truths which the Holy Catholic Church teaches, because Thou hast revealed them, who canst neither deceive nor be deceived. Amen."

So you can see that Christian faith is believing in the truths that God has revealed, not because we have proof of them (which can also happen), but because they come from God. You will remember that Thomas believed in Jesus’ resurrection after seeing Him, but that Jesus said to him, " Because you see me, you believe. Blessed are those who believe without having seen." This is faith.

Faith is not irrational since it rests on the very source of all truth, God. Philosophy, which rests entirely on reason, has been called the handmaid of theology, which means that reason helps us understand our faith better.

Does this answer your question ?

Verbum

 

[Cbailey2]

I used to think that faith was simply “Mental acceptance of and confidence in a claim as truth without proof supporting the claim.”. (Which is clearly irrational).

I take issue with labeling this definition as irrational. Faith is by definition the belief in things unseen (which is similar to your definition). It is supremely rational and absolutely necessary to human thought! We are limited in our intelligence and ability to perceive and must seek to fill in these gaps with explanations that seem reliable. We do not always have proof supporting a great many of our claims and in fact base most of our lives on faith.

When you invest in the stock market, you have faith that your stocks will go up, not down: sure, you’ve made a rational decision to invest in a company based on its strength or potential, but when it comes down to it, you can’t see the future, your knowledge is limited, and you invested on faith in that company. The same can be said of the mortgage default problems in the U.S.: people purchased houses with faith that home values would continue to rise. They didn’t. Many looked to historical precedents for “proof” of an upward trajectory in markets - except that it wasn’t proof at all. Looking to the future is always
a blind guess.

Similarly, scientists base their entire career espousing viewpoints for which they don’t have proof (of course, they are looking for proof and so are those who have faith in Christ). Many physicists have dedicated their whole lives to proving string theory, but it is, in no way, actually proven (i.e., there is a dearth of proof). Is that somehow irrational? I fail to see how.

Finally, when you get married, you will be making the “mental acceptance of and confidence in a claim as truth without proof supporting the claim.” How can you prove that your love for someone will last an entire lifetime? How can you be sure of someone else’s love, if not by faith?

Faith is the vanguard of all of our lives, leading the way and allowing us to act and think where information and proof is lacking (which given our knowledge of the universe is pretty much all of the time).

In faith, the human intellect and will cooperate with divine grace: “Believing is an act of the intellect assenting to the divine truth by command of the will moved by God through grace.”

The catholic definition of faith is not very far removed from the secular one you quoted above, save that it credits God with calling man to himself, both in our creation and in and through the world (His creation), and giving him the tools to respond to that call. It credits the role of the intellect in coming to faith (i.e., faith is not simply an emotional response, there is a deep rationality and philosophy to faith…read: don’t shut off your brain) and that faith is inherently a function of our will. It shows faith to be a function of free will (we are free to believe or not to believe - atheism is as much of a faith as Catholicism) and, most importantly, that it is something we do (an act…it is not passive).

 

[neophyte]

I used to think that faith was simply “Mental acceptance of and confidence in a claim as truth without proof supporting the claim.”. (Which is clearly irrational).

That’s not faith, that’s called “credulity”.

Since coming on this forum, I have realised that Catholics use a different definition. The Catholic definition might be related to this, from the CCC article 155

In faith, the human intellect and will cooperate with divine grace: "Believing is an act of the intellect assenting to the divine truth by command of the will moved by God through grace.

so, my questions are, when a Catholic person says the word “faith”, what do they mean? Do they mean different things at different times, or is there only one definition? What about other Christian sects (e.g. protestants, baptists, etc)? Do they have a different meaning?

Is it rational to have faith? (by the catholic definition)

Cheers,

Since Jesus was a Jew, the Apostles were Jews, and our faith is the flowering of Judaism, then we need to understand faith as a Jew would, not as a Greek.

The Hebrew word aman is translated as “believe”, “trust”, “have faith”, and also “support”, “nourish”, and “make lasting”. A derivative word is omenat, meaning “pillars” or “supports of the door” as in 2 Kings 18:16. Another cognate is emunah, which is “faithfulness” or “trust”, as in Exodus 17:12 where God brought victory to Israel as long as Moses would hold his hands up. Aaron and Hur held up his hands so that they “remained emunah until sundown”. All of these illustrate that faith is an action that we take, which is exactly what the Catholic church teaches. Faith is a work, it’s about what you DO and not merely about what you believe.

We are not able to do this work by our own effort because of the effects of original sin. Each and every time we turn toward God and away from sin it is because God gave us at that moment the grace to be able to do it. It is completely and totally due to the grace of God, who enables all of us at some point in our lives to perform the work of freely responding to Him by performing the “obedience of faith”. At that moment we truly have the choice that Adam had, to submit to God or submit to ourselves, and we only have that choice because of God’s grace.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church expresses this by saying that faith is an act of the will in which one turns toward God and away from sin; in which we decide that we will cooperate, with our intellect and will, with the divine grace that God gives us to enable us to comply with the moral law; it is a free response of the human person to the initiative of God; it is a personal adherence of the whole man to the God who reveals himself. It is the theological virtue by which we believe in God and believe all that he has said and revealed to us, and that Holy Church proposes for our belief, because he is truth itself. By faith “man freely commits his entire self to God.” For this reason the believer seeks to know and do God’s will. “The righteous shall live by faith.” Living faith “work through charity.”

These are all actions, things we do in obedience to God. Thus the Apostle Paul says in Romans 1:5 "Through Him we have received the grace of apostleship, to bring about the obedience of faith…” This obedience is the essence of Christianity: submission to the Eternal One who was enfleshed, and through that submission being brought into union with Him so that we may participate in His divine life.

My personal working definition of faith is “an act of the will in which one aheres to another who is known”. As in the example of making a decision to rely on the peer-review process of an acadamy of science because you know that that process has proven to be reliable in the past. Or else, as in making a decision to rely on the data reported by another, because that person has proven to be a reliable collector of data in the past. Or most significantly, as in the mutual adherence of spouses to each other.

Without faith, we cannot truly believe in anything that we did not personally observe. In fact, most of what we believe, be it scientific or not, we believe because we have faith in others. Faith is possible only with a rational mind, thus it is perfectly rational to have faith. In fact, it’s impossible to live as a human being without exercising faith.

 

[phoenix3212]

so, my questions are, when a Catholic person says the word “faith”, what do they mean? Do they mean different things at different times, or is there only one definition? What about other Christian sects (e.g. protestants, baptists, etc)? Do they have a different meaning?

Is it rational to have faith? (by the catholic definition)

Cheers,

Faith is an act of the will, performed by a person inspired by the grace of God. It can’t be a feeling, because God can’t (or wouldn’t) command you to have something that is so transient and fleeting. I guess you could say that faith is a submission to divinely revealed truth, and faith in the Catholic Church would be compatible with reason and with philosophy.

 

[wasmit]

Hi wasmit,

Here is a prayer that affirms faith :

An Act of Faith

So you can see that Christian faith is believing in the truths that God has revealed, not because we have proof of them (which can also happen), but because they come from God. You will remember that Thomas believed in Jesus’ resurrection after seeing Him, but that Jesus said to him, " Because you see me, you believe. Blessed are those who believe without having seen." This is faith.

Faith is not irrational since it rests on the very source of all truth, God. Philosophy, which rests entirely on reason, has been called the handmaid of theology, which means that reason helps us understand our faith better.

Does this answer your question ?

Verbum

What I have gathered from this post is that the definition of faith is “belief that something is true because God said it is true”

Is this an accurate definition?

 

[buffalo]

wasmit, this may help: Faith

 

[wasmit]

I used to think that faith was simply “Mental acceptance of and confidence in a claim as truth without proof supporting the claim.”. (Which is clearly irrational).

I think we might be talking about different degrees of belief.

If a person said “I have faith[secular definition] that the share price of X company will increase within one week”, I take that to mean that they are 100% absolutely certain that the price will rise. This is irrational because prices fluctuate, so he may be wrong. It he said “It is probable that the price of X company will rise within one week because of reasons Y and Z”, that is not inherently irrational. However the second quote (probable) does not involve faith[secular definition].

Using your stock market example, You said “you have faith that your stocks will go up”. Inserting the definition, you said “you have Mental acceptance of and confidence in a claim as truth without proof supporting the claim that your stocks will go up”

Similarly for the other examples, string theory and love for/from a partner, 100% certainty is irrational, but less than 100% certainty is not.

This is why I say it is irrational, because it is 100% certainty without proof.

The catholic definition of faith is not very far removed from the secular one you quoted above, save that it credits God with calling man to himself, both in our creation and in and through the world (His creation), and giving him the tools to respond to that call.

What does this mean? Surely if God was calling for something, he would just make it happen.

It credits the role of the intellect in coming to faith (i.e., faith is not simply an emotional response, there is a deep rationality and philosophy to faith…read: don’t shut off your brain) and that faith is inherently a function of our will. It shows faith to be a function of free will (we are free to believe or not to believe - atheism is as much of a faith as Catholicism) and, most importantly, that it is something we do (an act…it is not passive).

I got lost here. You seem to be adding 3-4 different things into the definition, that don’t really mean anything to me.

 

[wasmit]

I used to think that faith was simply “Mental acceptance of and confidence in a claim as truth without proof supporting the claim.”. (Which is clearly irrational)

The macquarie dictionary I have here has credulity as “a disposition, arising from weakness or ignorance, to believe too readily”, which is similar to gullible: “easily deceived or cheated”.

Credulity is a personal trait; a person can be described as credulous. While faith relates to a specific claim: “I have faith that the muhammad split the moon in two”.

So, they are different things.

Since Jesus was a Jew, the Apostles were Jews, and our faith is the flowering of Judaism, then we need to understand faith as a Jew would, not as a Greek.

The Hebrew word aman is translated as “believe”, “trust”, “have faith”, and also “support”, “nourish”, and “make lasting”. A derivative word is omenat, meaning “pillars” or “supports of the door” as in 2 Kings 18:16. Another cognate is emunah, which is “faithfulness” or “trust”, as in Exodus 17:12 where God brought victory to Israel as long as Moses would hold his hands up. Aaron and Hur held up his hands so that they “remained emunah until sundown”. All of these illustrate that faith is an action that we take, which is exactly what the Catholic church teaches. Faith is a work, it’s about what you DO and not merely about what you believe.

How can faith[catholic version] be a physical action, while catholics say “I have faith that this miracle occured”, which is mental acceptance of the truth of a claim, and no physical action is involved?

Are there multiple meanings of the word faith [catholic version] ?

We are not able to do this work by our own effort because of the effects of original sin. Each and every time we turn toward God and away from sin it is because God gave us at that moment the grace to be able to do it. It is completely and totally due to the grace of God, who enables all of us at some point in our lives to perform the work of freely responding to Him by performing the “obedience of faith”. At that moment we truly have the choice that Adam had, to submit to God or submit to ourselves, and we only have that choice because of God’s grace.

I have no idea what you are talking about here. What is grace?

The Catechism of the Catholic Church expresses this by saying that faith is an act of the will in which one turns toward God and away from sin; in which we decide that we will cooperate, with our intellect and will, with the divine grace that God gives us to enable us to comply with the moral law; it is a free response of the human person to the initiative of God; it is a personal adherence of the whole man to the God who reveals himself. It is the theological virtue by which we believe in God and believe all that he has said and revealed to us, and that Holy Church proposes for our belief, because he is truth itself. By faith “man freely commits his entire self to God.” For this reason the believer seeks to know and do God’s will. “The righteous shall live by faith.” Living faith "work through charity

These are all actions, things we do in obedience to God. Thus the Apostle Paul says in Romans 1:5 “Through Him we have received the grace of apostleship, to bring about the obedience of faith…” This obedience is the essence of Christianity: submission to the Eternal One who was enfleshed, and through that submission being brought into union with Him so that we may participate in His divine life..”

This all went over my head as well.

My personal working definition of faith is “an act of the will in which one aheres to another who is known”. As in the example of making a decision to rely on the peer-review process of an acadamy of science because you know that that process has proven to be reliable in the past. Or else, as in making a decision to rely on the data reported by another, because that person has proven to be a reliable collector of data in the past. Or most significantly, as in the mutual adherence of spouses to each other.

Can you please explain this: “an act of the will in which one aheres to another who is known” further? What do you mean by adhere? What do you mean by another?

In your collecting data example, how can you be 100% certain that the collector did not make a mistake? (I don’t think you can). If you have faith (100% certainty) that the data has been collected accurately, you may be wrong, and that is irrational. If you are “almost certain” (99.9% sure), that is not faith. This is why I think that faith is irrational, because it involves 100% certainty about the particular issue in question.

Without faith, we cannot truly believe in anything that we did not personally observe. In fact, most of what we believe, be it scientific or not, we believe because we have faith in others.

I agree.

Faith is possible only with a rational mind, thus it is perfectly rational to have faith.

You’ve lost me here. how did you get from the previous quote to this one?

In fact, it’s impossible to live as a human being without exercising faith.

Why is this the case? Take for example a person that only ever accepts a claim to a maximum of 99.99% certainty. He never exercises faith, but lives a normal life just like any other person.

 

[wasmit]

Faith is an act of the will, performed by a person inspired by the grace of God. It can’t be a feeling, because God can’t (or wouldn’t) command you to have something that is so transient and fleeting. I guess you could say that faith is a submission to divinely revealed truth, and faith in the Catholic Church would be compatible with reason and with philosophy.

What is grace?

From this post so far, I have:

Faith[catholic version] is defined as “A free-willed decision to absolutely believe that a claim is true, … … something something God and grace … something”

 

[djeter]

I posted an essay by Fr. Robert Barron the other day on the false opposition between Faith and Rationality:

“The true wisdom of eternal life is the contemplation of the profundities of God, which the Spirit of God alone knows and of which, through faith and in faith, God causes a mysterious knowledge to come down upon us when we have reached the perfect age of the Christian.
We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we speak of God’s secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. However, as it is written:

‘No eye has seen,
no ear has heard,
no mind has conceived
what God has prepared for those who love him’
But God has revealed it to us by his Spirit.”

We glean from this description that faith is a straining ahead toward realities which are, at best, only dimly glimpsed. It is, necessarily, a walk in the darkness. But we also notice that faith is anything but a craven, hand-wringing, unsure business, for it is “confident” and marked by “conviction” and “assurance.”

Consider for a moment great figures of faith from Jacob and Joseph to Mother Teresa and John Paul II: these are hardly people that you’d be tempted to characterize as vacillating and unclear in their motivations. For faith, there is always a paradox of obscurity of vision and strength of purpose.

It is this paradox that the philosophers of modernity couldn’t bear. They tended to see reason alone as the legitimate ground for confidence, and so they saw a resolute faith as a species of foolishness or irrationality. The English philosopher John Locke gave pithy expression to this typically modern sense when he said that there should be a tight relationship between inference (cogent argument) and assent (acknowledging something to be true). If these two moves of the mind are separated — as they seem to be in people of faith — obscurantism and fanaticism follow.

It is fascinating to note how often, in the wake of the events of September 11, this Lockcan argument has been reproposed. In the face of the dangers of religious extremism, many commentators are saying, give us cautious and skeptical people of reason rather than superstitious people of faith, willing to act with utter conviction despite the lack of any compelling evidence.

Faith is this “mysterious knowledge” that Paul refers to above that God “causes to come down upon us when we have reached the perfect age of the Christian.” Could anything be in any greater opposition to the Lockean proposition above?"

He goes on to demonstrate that the opposition is false. There is no “opposition.”

Can’t post it all here but it you are interested more here: payingattentiontothesky.com/2009/06/15/the-false-opposition-of-faith-and-reason/

god bless

DJ

 

[buffalo]

Speaking of Father Barron:

Father Barron on The New Atheists

 

[neophyte]

The macquarie dictionary I have here has credulity as “a disposition, arising from weakness or ignorance, to believe too readily”, which is similar to gullible: “easily deceived or cheated”.

Credulity is a personal trait; a person can be described as credulous. While faith relates to a specific claim: “I have faith that the muhammad split the moon in two”.

So, they are different things.

Yes, faith and credulity are two different things. And while someone may claim that they “have faith that the muhammad split the moon in two”, to believe that it happened is an act of credulity…

How can faith[catholic version] be a physical action, while catholics say “I have faith that this miracle occured”, which is mental acceptance of the truth of a claim, and no physical action is involved?

I don’t recall having said that faith is a physical action - although physical action can be involved.

Are there multiple meanings of the word faith [catholic version] ?

Certainly there is more than one sense to the word. I gave you several of them already.

I have no idea what you are talking about here. What is grace?

The glossary of the Catechism defines grace as “The free and undeserved gift that God gives us to respond to our vocation to become his adopted children. As sanctifying grace, God shares his divine life and friendship with us in a habitual gift, a stable and supernatural disposition that enables the soul to live with God, to act by his love. As actual grace, God gives us the help to conform our lives to his will. Sacramental grace and special graces (charisms, the grace of one’s state of life) are gifts of the Holy Spirit to help us live out our Christian vocation”

This all went over my head as well.

It’s a definition that’s very new to you, so that’s not surprising.

Can you please explain this: “an act of the will in which one aheres to another who is known” further? What do you mean by adhere? What do you mean by another?

By adhere I mean “bind myself”. And by “another” I mean “someone other than me”.

In your collecting data example, how can you be 100% certain that the collector did not make a mistake?

A better way to ask this would be “how can I be 100% certain that the woman I’m about to marry won’t cheat on me, and how can she be 100% certain that I won’t cheat on her?”.

neophyte:

Faith is possible only with a rational mind, thus it is perfectly rational to have faith.

You’ve lost me here. how did you get from the previous quote to this one?

You asked if it’s rational to have faith. Faith is unique to rational beings, but on second thought that doesn’t prove that it’s rational. It was a stupid thing for me to say - I’m sure that there are other things that are possible only with a rational mind that are very irrational.

neophyte:

In fact, it’s impossible to live as a human being without exercising faith

Why is this the case? Take for example a person that only ever accepts a claim to a maximum of 99.99% certainty. He never exercises faith, but lives a normal life just like any other person.

You lend you friend money, confident that he will pay you back not because you have 100% proof that he will, but rather because you know him and he’s always payed you back in the past.
You give yourself in marriage not because you have 100% proof that your spouse won’t cheat on you. but because you know her and she’s always been faithful (there’s that word again!) in the past. You trust the data a work partner collects not because you have 100% proof that it was good data, but because you know him and he’s always been a reliable collector of data in the past.

Examples can be found over the range of human interactions.

 

[wasmit]

The macquarie dictionary I have here has credulity as “a disposition, arising from weakness or ignorance, to believe too readily”, which is similar to gullible: “easily deceived or cheated”.

How can someone have faith that muhammad split the moon in two, but not believe that it happened? When someone says that they have faith that muhammad split the moon in two, they are saying that they absolutely believe this claim.

How can faith[catholic version] be a physical action, while catholics say “I have faith that this miracle occured”, which is mental acceptance of the truth of a claim, and no physical action is involved?

I don’t recall having said that faith is a physical action - although physical action can be involved.

ok

Are there multiple meanings of the word faith [catholic version] ?

Certainly there is more than one sense to the word. I gave you several of them already.

That’s good to know!

I have no idea what you are talking about here. What is grace?

The glossary of the Catechism defines grace as “The free and undeserved gift that God gives us to respond to our vocation to become his adopted children. As sanctifying grace, God shares his divine life and friendship with us in a habitual gift, a stable and supernatural disposition that enables the soul to live with God, to act by his love. As actual grace, God gives us the help to conform our lives to his will. Sacramental grace and special graces (charisms, the grace of one’s state of life) are gifts of the Holy Spirit to help us live out our Christian vocation”

ok, I think I sort of get what this means. Can you explain “The free and undeserved gift that God gives us to respond to our vocation to become his adopted children” further? It seems vague and wishy-washy to me.

My personal working definition of faith is “an act of the will in which one aheres to another who is known”.

By adhere I mean “bind myself”. And by “another” I mean “someone other than me”.

How does this definition make sense in the statement “I have faith that I will win the competion”, or “I have faith that mohammad split the moon in two” when there is no adhering or binding occuring, and there is no other person?

In your collecting data example, how can you be 100% certain that the collector did not make a mistake?

A better way to ask this would be “how can I be 100% certain that the woman I’m about to marry won’t cheat on me, and how can she be 100% certain that I won’t cheat on her?”.

It’s the same principle for both examples - one cannot be 100% certain about these two things.

In fact, it’s impossible to live as a human being without exercising faith

Why is this the case? Take for example a person that only ever accepts a claim to a maximum of 99.99% certainty. He never exercises faith, but lives a normal life just like any other person.

You lend you friend money, confident that he will pay you back not because you have 100% proof that he will, but rather because you know him and he’s always payed you back in the past.
You give yourself in marriage not because you have 100% proof that your spouse won’t cheat on you. but because you know her and she’s always been faithful (there’s that word again!) in the past. You trust the data a work partner collects not because you have 100% proof that it was good data, but because you know him and he’s always been a reliable collector of data in the past.

Examples can be found over the range of human interactions.

None of these examples (money lending, marriage, colleague’s work) involve faith, because there is not 100% certainty. So, how do these examples support your claim that it’s impossible to live as a human being without exercising faith ?

 

[wasmit]

“The true wisdom of eternal life is the contemplation of the profundities of God, which the Spirit of God alone knows and of which, through faith and in faith, God causes a mysterious knowledge to come down upon us when we have reached the perfect age of the Christian.
We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we speak of God’s secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. However, as it is written:

‘No eye has seen,
no ear has heard,
no mind has conceived
what God has prepared for those who love him’
But God has revealed it to us by his Spirit.”

We glean from this description that faith is a straining ahead toward realities which are, at best, only dimly glimpsed. It is, necessarily, a walk in the darkness. But we also notice that faith is anything but a craven, hand-wringing, unsure business, for it is “confident” and marked by “conviction” and “assurance.”

Consider for a moment great figures of faith from Jacob and Joseph to Mother Teresa and John Paul II: these are hardly people that you’d be tempted to characterize as vacillating and unclear in their motivations. For faith, there is always a paradox of obscurity of vision and strength of purpose.

It is this paradox that the philosophers of modernity couldn’t bear. They tended to see reason alone as the legitimate ground for confidence, and so they saw a resolute faith as a species of foolishness or irrationality. The English philosopher John Locke gave pithy expression to this typically modern sense when he said that there should be a tight relationship between inference (cogent argument) and assent (acknowledging something to be true). If these two moves of the mind are separated — as they seem to be in people of faith — obscurantism and fanaticism follow.

It is fascinating to note how often, in the wake of the events of September 11, this Lockcan argument has been reproposed. In the face of the dangers of religious extremism, many commentators are saying, give us cautious and skeptical people of reason rather than superstitious people of faith, willing to act with utter conviction despite the lack of any compelling evidence.

Faith is this “mysterious knowledge” that Paul refers to above that God “causes to come down upon us when we have reached the perfect age of the Christian.” Could anything be in any greater opposition to the Lockean proposition above?"

He goes on to demonstrate that the opposition is false. There is no “opposition.”

Can’t post it all here but it you are interested more here: payingattentiontothesky.com/2009/06/15/the-false-opposition-of-faith-and-reason/

god bless

DJ

I have no idea what any of this means. As far as I can tell, it is all vague, meaningless fluff.

Can you define the word faith in a clearer and more succinct way?

We glean from this description that faith is a straining ahead toward realities which are, at best, only dimly glimpsed. It is, necessarily, a walk in the darkness. But we also notice that faith is anything but a craven, hand-wringing, unsure business, for it is “confident” and marked by “conviction” and “assurance.”

Am I right in saying that when faith is brought to bear on an issue, it gives 100% absolute certainty about the issue to the holder of faith?

 

[wasmit]

Speaking of Father Barron:

Father Barron on The New Atheists

I can’t watch videos.

 

[StrawberryJam]

I can’t watch videos.

I don’t know what evangelists did before you tube.

 

[Verbum]

Hi wasmit,

What I have gathered from this post is that the definition of faith is “belief that something is true because God said it is true”

Is this an accurate definition?

Yes. What do you think ?

Verbum