Why, then, do we as people of faith put our trust in revelation as well as empirical investigation? Why do we reject Shaun McGonigal's argument in his 2009 posting, "Truthiness of religion," that only physical reality is real and that only science gives us the truth about that reality?At the end of the day, we can only say that it makes sense for us to do so. There are a number of reasons this is so. We find the biblical witness persuasive especially in its account of Christ. We have transcendental, spiritual experiences that open new realities for us. Even suffering at times leads us to deeper spiritual insights as we discover that we can put our trust in God. We find the shared life of the church significant in our lives and a witness in itself to larger truths. We look at the natural world, and it just does not make sense to us that it could all happen of itself. There is Something behind it all. We see that the human race has a virtually universal capacity for religion. If there's nothing to religion why has it been such an integral part of the human experience going as far back in history as we know? Sociological research tells us that religious people tend to be happier than the non-religious. How could that be if there is nothing at all behind faith? Science itself points in the direction of God—for us at least. How else can we account for the fact that the universe is evolving and life on our planet is evolving in directions of higher complexity and greater intelligence? What about the anthropic principle, which suggests that the fundamental physical constants of the universe are uniquely geared to allowing life to exist on Earth? And then there is the whole emerging field of quantum mechanics, which demonstrates that the universe is much different, much more dynamic than scientists realized until fairly recently. There is more to reality than meets the eye. We find truth in an inspired piece of music, in an insightful sermon, and in shared moments with another; and we realize that none of these things can be explained by science. It simply makes sense to us that there is Something going on in the universe and in our lives that is much greater than the supposedly cold hard factuality of reality as discovered by science. We believe there is more to a sunset than chemistry and physics, and that something more has to do with truth.
We understand that we can't prove we are right in all of this. The whole point of faith is that it is faith, which is trust. Where McGonigal puts his trust solely in the existence of physical realities, we put ours in meta-physical realities as well. And just as McGonigal cannot prove that the physical world is all that is real so we cannot prove that the metaphysical realities we perceive are in fact true. At the end of the day we cannot answer radical skepticism, which asserts that our senses (and our sensibilities) are not trustworthy. All forms of human knowing, including science, ultimately rest on faith in something. For the reasons briefly outlined above, we place our faith in meta-physical as well as physical realities, which for us as Christians means that Christ makes a whole lot of sense to us; he puts everything else into perspective. In him we see ultimate truth. In him we see God. Amen.
