What is Faith?

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What is faith?.. you know aside from “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

I consider myself through the lenses of Thomas when he doubted the others word on seeing a resurrected Jesus. Jesus did not say how dare you you insolent boob, he invited him to explore and find belief through his senses and then called him to a higher calling of faith.

We have senses to experience the natural world, but we have faith for the supernatural. Let’s call it a spiritense instead of sense.

How do know if I’m spritensing something with faith? By what means do I verify/discern?

Also how did the authors of scripture know the were spiritensing the Holy Spirit? Or the Popes and counsels when they were defining dogma or canonizing saints?

Well, apart from some apparitions, some of which have probably been debunked and scriptures (like burning bushes and doves from the clouds), many of which are filled with things that do not meet up with archeological studies (I’m thinking here largely about ancient Israel, but somewhat also mean the New Testament too), we don’t exactly here of voices out of the sky or a red phone in the Vatican. So how do we get our knowledge of/and/or/from God.

I can be blind or deaf, but can the spiritense of Faith go bad too?

Without faith I can’t see how original sin gets transfered vicariously to me or how vicarious redemption works or what God gets from the sacrifice of his Son anyway, or out of sending people who don’t believe in him and hurt his ego or who commit mortal sins (he designed Adam and Eve knowing they would malfunction) to hell?

Without my faith working I cannot perceive these things

Thanks

Summa8447
 
Well, not sure if you want my opinion or not, but here it is.

I view faith as two things really:
  1. The acceptance of something as truth regardless of all else (i.e. the bible)
  2. Putting trust in something (i.e. faith in a doctor, God, whatever)
Both can be good things or bad things, you think God gave you a brain, so use it and make sure you decide when faith is appropriate and when it’s not.
 
Well, not sure if you want my opinion or not, but here it is.

I view faith as two things really:
  1. The acceptance of something as truth regardless of all else (i.e. the bible)
  2. Putting trust in something (i.e. faith in a doctor, God, whatever)
Both can be good things or bad things, you think God gave you a brain, so use it and make sure you decide when faith is appropriate and when it’s not.
Thanks, but I’m wondering about faith as something analogous in a spiritual (supernatural) manner as the senses are with the physical (natural) world.

I like your posts as well as some of the others in the forum.

Summa8447
 
Without faith I can’t see how original sin gets transferred vicariously to me or how vicarious redemption works or what God gets from the sacrifice of his Son anyway, or out of sending people who don’t believe in him and hurt his ego or who commit mortal sins (he designed Adam and Eve knowing they would malfunction) to hell?
For the Christian to have faith is to accept and follow the teaching of Jesus. It is not necessary to know or understand the theological answers to the questions you mention. All that matters is to keep His commandments and live with love…
 
For the Christian to have faith is to accept and follow the teaching of Jesus. It is not necessary to know or understand the theological answers to the questions you mention. All that matters is to keep His commandments and live with love…
Well that’s not a very good answer for a philosophy section!
 
Thanks, but I’m wondering about faith as something analogous in a spiritual (supernatural) manner as the senses are with the physical (natural) world.

I like your posts as well as some of the others in the forum.

Summa8447
Well, I’ve yet to see anything in my life that I would deem supernatural (in the typical sense of the word), so I’d be one to say that faith is just an extension of our free will. Others may disagree of course 🙂
 
For the Christian to have faith is to accept and follow the teaching of Jesus. It is not necessary to know or understand the theological answers to the questions you mention. All that matters is to keep His commandments and live with love…
Then how do I know they are true and worthy of my assent?
 
Well, I’ve yet to see anything in my life that I would deem supernatural (in the typical sense of the word), so I’d be one to say that faith is just an extension of our free will. Others may disagree of course 🙂
Yes, perhaps faith is a free choice. Not too empirical either is it? Many very intelligent people throughout history and today have had faith in many different gods and faith systems, so I just have to think they are smarter than blind belief in something. Maybe the God is just a primitive region of our brains. Maybe it’s that old God-Spot thing. atheistempire.com/reference/brain/main.html

Summa8447
 
Then how do I know they are true and worthy of my assent?
You don’t! But most people can’t afford the luxury of time and effort involved in pursuing these questions. I’ve specialised in them for many years but I’ve met many humble, ordinary people who live good lives without ever thinking about them. I know you can be intellectually dissatisfied - that’s why I investigated - but our priority has to be how we live and treat others. I am now intellectually satisfied but at what cost? My mistake has probably been to neglect people in order to do unnecessary research…
 
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