PART 1: Dimensions of the God-Question
“God” as a “Symbol” of the Human Effort
to Wrestle with Life
As
humans, we wrestle with life and its many apparent absurdities. I have come to
conclude after many years of studying religion that, seen from a humanistic
standpoint, “god” is primarily a symbol of the human effort to wrestle
with life’s difficult questions … such as the “why” of natural calamities
or epidemics (very relevant to us in now 2020-21 as I write!). In other words,
when humans try to make sense especially of great suffering (such as the one
caused by the COVID-19 pandemic), many of them have and continue to invoke
“god,” imagining a supernatural and powerful Being with the ability to stop
disasters from happening or to turn things around when the situation becomes
quite bad. Again, analyzed from a humanistic standpoint, a god who might
directly intervene to alleviate the world’s suffering primarily seems to be a
symbol of the trust and hope that continue to live on in our hearts, which
in turn give us the strength and courage to go on with the struggle as we face
the different painful challenges that beset us in life. I understand and
respect that. However, I also want to acknowledge its severe limitations.
On
the positive side, “god” is also a symbol of the human effort to dance with the
glorious aspects of life. This has to be kept in mind too although here we will
deal with the connection between “god” and dealing with suffering.
Now,
as we have seen, Christianity (and, as far as I know, any other religious
tradition) has no easy and conclusive answers to the question of <why do life’s
sufferings happen?>. To expand on that by rephrasing it, let me say
unambiguously that the “God” invoked by Christianity usually does not have
answers to the big “Why” question of calamities such as chaos-generating and
deadly epidemics. It’s enough to look at God’s answer to the fabled Old
Testament character Job when he requests some answers to the question of his
undeserved suffering. God in the book (Job 38-39) proclaims that human wisdom
just cannot plumb the mysteriousness of God’s ways (recall “limit experiences”)
and so it (human knowledge-wisdom) amounts to nothing before God. That is
another way to say that all our human efforts to understand the wherefore and
whither, the why and the <to what end?> of suffering are practically pointless
in a sense, because we will never get any satisfactory answers.
Even
Jesus in the New Testament gospels does not make an effort to answer these
questions. Rather, what the Christian tradition (embodied especially in
Jesus) presents is an invitation and a summons (and this is very important),
first, to refrain from judging, because we really do not know everything;
second, to be compassionate for the sufferings that all of us have to endure;
and, third, to act resolutely and lovingly to alleviate suffering.
But
the plot thickens with regard to the god-question. If that is so, what use
is there for “god” then? Is it any good to have faith in a god who
seemingly cannot even supply us with adequate answers to our questions about
the apparent random suffering that is visited upon us in life (such as COVID-19)?
I
think that this question is crucially important especially for people who consider
themselves religious believers. Some will simply choose to ignore it for fear
of rocking the boat too much and losing their “simple, childhood” faith. As a
scholar of religion and theology, I have wrestled with this question through
the years and I’ve realized that unless one faces this gnawing question
squarely in the face and attempts to give some response to it, I’m afraid one
will never shed a childish faith and advance to a more mature stage of being a
believer. So let me share my two cents’ worth coming from some of my efforts
over a long time to make sense of the God-question.
“God” as a
Hypothesis about Reality
God’s existence and nature that I’ve come upon thus far has been the Catholic theologian Hans Küng’s Does God Exist? An Answer for Today [1980]. There Küng uses a good amount of space to survey and analyze the many efforts to prove, be agnostic about, or deny the existence of God through the centuries. When he comes at last to stating his major conclusions about God’s existence and nature, he starts by positing God as a human hypothesis. God as a hypothesis, Küng proposes, would be the answer to humanity’s most ultimate questions. Apropos that, we can say that these three following questions are probably the most important and consistent “ultimate” questions that human beings have asked: Who are we? Where do we come from? Where are we going?
Küng points out that if God does
exist (hypothetically!) there would be meaningful answers to those
questions. Therefore, in answer to ‘Who are we?’, God would be the ultimate
ground of being that defines our identity: We (and all of reality) are all
grounded in God; we carry in ourselves—as the Bible says—the divine image (Imago
Dei). Thus, God is the “primal ground” for all life and reality.
In answer to ‘Where do we come from?’, God
would be the source, the creator and sustainer of all human and natural
existence. God is then the “primal support” of everything. Finally, in answer to ‘Where are we going?’,
God would be the (primal) goal in whom everyone and everything will ultimately
find their fulfillment.
Therefore, the ideal hypothetical situation
is that all human and natural life takes on a deeper meaning with this awesome “God”
as the ground, support, and goal of everything that is. And that would make life
definitely worth living to the full, despite the acute menace of fate and
death, apparent emptiness and meaninglessness, sin and suffering. This, I can
say, is a rather sophisticated way of expressing the traditional God-believer’s
ultimate reasons for having belief in God.
The
Unprovability of God - Revelation
Let me underline that in the reflections
above, God, we can say, is a hypothesis that humans have and continue to put
forward in order to make sense of life. However, there is one big
problem that is seldom stated in a straightforward way: It is commonly
acknowledged in the discipline called the philosophy of religion that, despite
the best efforts of many brilliant minds throughout history, there is
actually no definitive way to prove conclusively this hypothesis that God
exists. What Küng has stated above is merely that, if the hypothesis
of God were true, then all life and existence would take on a deeper and fuller
meaning.
Meanwhile, religious traditions (such as Judaism,
Christianity, and Islam) have emphasized the notion of divine revelation: that
God has—it is believed—revealed to some chosen humans the very nature of the
Divine and also certain firm truths about God and about life which are trustworthy
and reliable.
Well, I don’t like to enter too deeply into this line of discussion here. Let me just state my personal and very honest opinion on the notion of revelation. I may sound like an agnostic here but bear with me: I honestly think that the concept of revelation just does not speak anymore to many people in our contemporary world—especially people who have not been raised to believe that there is a God. Moreover, a detailed historical study of, say, Christianity and of its different supposedly firm and solid revelations (as I have done professionally for practically my whole life as a scholar of religion) will reveal instead that these grandiose claims about “revealed truths” should always be taken more modestly because all so-called “truths” (that not only Christianity but practically any religion proclaims) actually bear the tell-tale marks that they are all too human (more than divine!)—that is, these “truths” are anthropologically, historically, and culturally conditioned in a radical way.
It is seldom acknowledged that these
very “human” truths have been imbued with an aura of sacredness and
infallibility by some authority in the tradition’s history more than anything
else for the purpose of forging a given community’s identity through a common
belief in supposedly “revealed truths” rather than as a witness to conclusively
demonstrable truths. Despite that, I continue to be a person of faith-trust for
reasons I cannot explain sufficiently here but let me just say now that I am a
very, very “modest” believer (hoping that I will have to explain my reasons for
being so on another occasion). For these reasons, I do not usually like to take
the path of “divine revelation” when attempting to speak about “God” to
present-day people (to myself first and foremost!) who are on the whole
historically conscious and are trained to think critically through things.
The more fruitful path to take for me when
we attempt to study religion and the idea of God (or gods) nowadays, especially
when it is done in the context of a growing number of people in my (Western)
context who consider themselves SBNR (Spiritual but not Religious), “Dones”
(We’re “done” with religion!), or “Nones” (We have NO religion!), is rather to
understand religion and the idea that there might be a God as first and
foremost a human endeavour to search for meaning. “God” functions then as a
way that humans have made use of in order to add meaning to life or to make
some sense of life—life which many times can be very mysterious indeed.
Can there be other ways of making life
meaningful other than positing the God hypothesis? Of course there are! This is
by no means the only way to “create meaning.” But it is probably the way by
which most people have tried to make sense of life and reality throughout human
history. That is why it is still important that we study the God-question if we
are to understand humans and everything connected with them.
Agnosticism and Atheism Compared with Faith in God
But let’s get back to Hans Küng. Toward the
end of his tome on God, Küng, who at this point has already surveyed and
analyzed the many efforts to prove, be agnostic about, or deny the existence of
God through the centuries, draws a stark conclusion. He states bluntly that, in
front of life and its utter mysteriousness (recall again “limit experiences”), both
a denial and an affirmation of God are actually rationally possible as
choices that humans could make (p. 568).
Let’s expand on that. First, atheism then
is definitely a possible and, in many ways, a rational option in front of
life’s mysteries. There is no way to refute or eliminate it rationally. For
some people, the dominant experience of reality is that it is radically
uncertain and even absurd. There is simply no way to “be certain” that there
exists a primal source and a primal support of, let alone a primal goal for
everything. Hence, for them, an agnosticism (“I just don’t know about ultimate
realities and I prefer not to discuss them” attitude) that often tends toward
atheism is the option that makes the most sense. This is very common nowadays
and it is not always bad despite what religious people usually say. In fact,
agnosticism could be a sign of a healthy humility and that the agnostic person
has transcended some simplistic, naïve, and childish images of God.
For some others, the dominant factors in
their experience of reality are darker: radical chaos, irreparable hurt and
damage, illusion, meaningless suffering, absurdity, and nonbeing. For them then
an atheism that tends toward nihilism is the position that makes the most sense
(p. 569).
Küng asserts however that there is another
possible choice that is not irrational by any means and hence also
deserves respect and legitimacy even in our secular age. This position is
perfectly justifiable even in a rational way – it is the position of the person
of faith-trust (note that “faith-trust” might be the best description of
“religious belief”) who, despite the radical uncertainty and even the seemingly
meaningless suffering and absurdity that characterize reality (life), still
decides to have faith and trust in a primal ground, support, and goal of life
and all reality – a Being commonly known as “God.”
Of course, this rationally justifiable
“God” should be nuanced well and explained more at length. (And that is not my
aim here. I will save it for another occasion.) What we can say is that it is
definitely not the “god” of earlier and more naïve stages of faith that could
not hold up against the deconstructive critiques of contemporary agnosticism
and atheism (such as from the “New Atheists”). Many crude and heavily
anthropomorphic ideas of god espoused by a great many religious believers are
what modern skepticism about God can arguably attack and refute, and perhaps
rightly so. This, we can say, is the “god” that the philosopher Nietzsche
proclaimed as dead and, again, perhaps rightly so. The rationally justifiable
God is a more robust and mature idea of what Küng refers to as faith-trust
in a primal source, support and goal of all life and reality.
PART 2: What is it
to have “Faith in God”?
Faith-Trust
in God is a Decision to Trust Reality & Life
What I would most like to highlight here
though is an aspect of faith-trust in God (which Hans Küng emphasizes above
all else in his book Does God Exist?). Küng points out that both belief
or unbelief in God has actually to do mostly with a decision on
the part of humans (individually or collectively) to adopt either a
fundamental attitude of trust in reality (or life) or its opposite – a
fundamental attitude of skepticism and/or pessimism about reality. In
light of that, having faith in God is—I would like to propose—a
matter of having an attitude of “trust in the fundamental goodness of reality.”
Let me further qualify that description to the
following: What is called “faith in God” (in the monotheistic religions) is
actually the decision to trust that reality (or life) is fundamentally good
despite all the uncertainty, suffering, absurdity that are part of it. You
can call this by whatever name you want. But this is what FAITH-TRUST in God
actually means. Moreover, this trust in the fundamental goodness of life should
necessarily translate into an active commitment to action, that is, to respect
and honour and, if needed, to fight for LIFE (taken in a holistic sense that
involves positively struggling for justice, peace, equality, freedom, etc.; or
[in the negative sense] struggling against injustice, oppression, destruction,
calamities, etc.).
Atheism/Agnosticism
as “Unexamined” Trust in Life?
Many people continue to live life believing
it is worth living and they even do heroic things in order to uphold life (such
as healthcare workers in the frontlines of the fight against a pandemic). Although
living with such a “fundamental trust in reality,” many of them do not
explicitly believe in an Ultimate Reality such as God. They just believe that
all life is good and sacred and has to be upheld. However, if one were to dig
deeper and ask “what is the deeper or ultimate reason why life is sacred?”, many
people would not be able to answer that. They would simply stop at level of “the
goodness & sacredness of life itself” as the reason why they
continue to uphold, defend, and honour life.
For Hans Küng, if one does not believe or
one actively rejects a belief in—what he calls—“a primal ground, source, and
goal” of life and reality (in short, “God”), then one does not really know
the deeper reason why one believes and trusts in the fundamental goodness of
life—the reason that makes it worth struggling and even dying for. It is as
if your trust in reality is “unexamined” (to use the philosopher Socrates’ words:
“The unexamined life is not worthy living”). Küng suggests, as it were, that if
you are going to trust that life is worth living and even worthy of struggling
and dying for, then, it’s better for you to know the deeper reason why you
believe … And that reason lies with the Ultimate Ground, Source, and Goal of
everything (in short, “God”). Therefore, it would be better if you can properly
“label” the source of your belief in the fundamental goodness of reality. Of
course, he means that the proper label is “God.”
Is “Labelling”
<Our Fundamental Trust in Life> as “God” the Best Thing?
Truth be told, I do not entirely agree with Küng here. In other words, I DO NOT think that <“labelling” our ultimate reason for believing and trusting in the fundamental goodness of life and reality as “God”> is always the best thing to do. My reasons for that can be summarized as follows: Many meanings that the word “God” has acquired over the centuries and now prevalent in the popular imagination are just unhelpful and even dysfunctional because they are naïve, childish, too anthropomorphic, and, most importantly, too simplistic. These popular images of "God" do not respect the fundamental fact that “God” is first and foremost an unfathomable mystery and that “God” should be treated more as a summons to action, i.e., a verb rather than a static noun. A summons to do what?, one may ask. "God" is an action word to summon us to help realize the kingdom of justice and peace that God, we trust, dreams of. I therefore generally agree with theologians who have proposed that the word (and many popular ideas about) “God” might need a kind of moratorium until we can truly learn what the proper, more grown-up meaning of “God” is.
It is obvious that, unfortunately, “God”
and “religion” have been associated with many negative things throughout
history in western societies. Much of it, again unfortunately, is
institutionalized religion’s own fault. When many come in contact with those
notions in the West today, they cannot help but link religious believers and
religion itself with awful things such as irrationality, bigotry,
narrow-mindedness, arrogance, self-righteousness, racism, elitism, lust for
power, abuse of many kinds, and so on and so forth. Even if people as
individuals have not experienced personally the dark sides of religion, it is quite
possible and arguable that society as a whole (in western contexts) has just
become so sick and tired of “religion,” “God,” or “religious believers” that many
quarters of the society as a whole have just explicitly or implicitly (such as
Quebec’s “quiet revolution”) rejected or walked away from religion.
This distancing from religion on the part
of many westerners is not necessarily a bad thing. (If I sound like a
hopeless optimist, I am guilty as charged!) It does not necessarily mean that
non-religious people are immoral and depraved, as some religious people are
wont to believe. Philosopher of religion Don Cupitt has proposed constructively
that “we should learn to see our belieflessness not as a state of being
derelict and damned but as a clean sheet and a challenge to be creative”
(Cupitt, 2015, 48-49). Creative about what? It is remarkable that for all the massive
loss of interest in religion in Western societies, interest in “spirituality”
remains at an all-time high. So, this contemporary context of disillusionment
in religion but heightened thirst for spirituality could be an excellent
opportunity to be creative about paths that could lead people into a deeper
spirituality, which is, after all, the heart of all religion.
Because of that, the attitude of <trust
in life and reality as good and worthy to be struggled for> without
explicit reference to God can still be a very good thing. It might be called
the “religion of life” which, I would say, is a spirituality that is dominant
now in the West (as proposed for example by the same Don Cupitt [Cupitt 1999]).
If some people can still label that trust in the goodness of life with the term
“God” in a wholesome way, then, well and good. If not (as in many cases
nowadays in the West), it’s still good and wholesome. If I may speak as
a theologian, I have this firm belief that God (as I believe God to be) is definitely
not a narcissist and does not mind at all not being explicitly acknowledged as
long the “order” that God is passionate about (Jesus called it “the Kingdom of
God”) is more firmly established on earth.
God is “Secondary”
The God-question can be divisive. If we
insist, like I think Küng is doing, that the best way to label our fundamental
trust in the goodness of reality is “God,” that could alienate a lot of people
who do not think so or may have severe reservations about God and religion that
are justified. I think that the best way forward is to prioritize instead “the
religion of life” or, to borrow Küng’s term, the “fundamental trust in [the
goodness of] reality.” This is something that could be common among all humans
living in a fragile world. Küng has rightly (I think) identified this as the
essence of faith (including religious faith). “Faith in God” is just one way of
labelling it. As long as that fundamental trust is there, it need not be
explicitly linked to God. And, if there is indeed a God, I don’t think this
Gracious Being will even mind.
This is why I think that “God” as a theme
is actually secondary in importance; in other words, “God” is too often overrated.
Trusting in the goodness of reality and life instead, even without explicit
recourse to God, is PRIMARY! This strategy is to emphasize what can unite us
all as humans in our common humanity. And one of the common traits among us
humans includes the continual effort to go deeper and to transcend ourselves.
That, by the way, is my working definition of spirituality, the heart of
religion. I consider the labelling of that effort (such as seeking for “God”) as
secondary.
When we pursue the journey to go deeper
within ourselves and to grow by transcending ourselves (by different concrete
means and teachings which many religious traditions are so rich in), then along
the way, we will hopefully realize experientially why our ancestors in the past
had to use an all-encompassing term called “God” in order to name the fundamental
goodness of reality. “God” cannot be just thought of in our minds. “God” can
only be experienced as we walk on the path of life.
As we go along and try to do our part for
our personal and for the common good (especially during this Covid pandemic of
2020-21), I hope we can find it in ourselves to continue to decide every
single day to trust in the fundamental goodness of life and reality and commit
ourselves to action in order to realize it in ways possible to us. Let’s
not pursue useless questions that will yield no fruitful answers. Rather, it is
this—the reality in which we are thrown into and immersed in—which counts. We
decide to trust that IT (life) is still fundamentally good and that we can do
something in order to uphold that goodness and to make it flourish more.
In the past, our ancestors (who were almost
never atheists) believed that the whole of reality finds its ground in a Being
they often referred to as God. Many of us (such as myself) still trust that it
is so. But that is not the most important thing. If for some reason,
“God” cannot be linked anymore to the effort to choose to trust that life is
worth living and worth struggling for, then LET IT BE … because, through that,
even without any explicit reference to “God” or “religion,” we are still living
our fundamental and noble human drive to “go deeper and beyond ourselves” which
is, I am getting more and more convinced, lies at the heart of all genuine
humanity, as well as all religion and spirituality.
Conclusion: Encountering
the “Greater Reality” without Meaning to
And, if there is really a God, this
Gracious Being who does not have an ounce of narcissism within, will definitely
not mind at all “being forgotten” in the process. But here comes the strange
thing about this business. When people transcend their narrow and selfish egos
by living concretely the effort to “go deeper and beyond themselves” (the quest
for depth and transcendence), they oftentimes encounter SOMETHING deeper and
bigger than themselves; they then find that in the quest to seek depth and
transcendence, they actually experience that they are not alone, that they are
being inspired, supported, carried, led-on, and even finally progressively
absorbed by this gracious Mystery that they have decided to trust and commit
themselves to. As we know, many of our ancestors labeled that deep and bigger
reality as God. Many of us still do. Many nowadays just prefer to rest in the
Mystery without naming it. As long as the effort to uphold and increase integral
human flourishing in our fragile earthly location continues (and at times at
the cost of great sacrifice), all will be well, I trust.
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Cited Works and Others Works for
Further Study
Cupitt,
Don (2015). Creative Faith: Religion as a Way of Worldmaking. Salem, OR:
Polebridge.
______
(1999). The New Religion of Life in Everyday Speech. London: SCM.
Gregg,
Carl (2012). “Do We Need a Moratorium on ‘God’?” Patheos, Published
October 8, 2012. Accessed April 22, 2010.
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/carlgregg/2012/10/do-we-need-a-moratorium-on-the-word-god/.
Johnson,
Elizabeth (2007). Quest for the Living God: Mapping Frontiers in the
Theology of God. London: Bloombsury.
Küng,
Hans (1981). Does God Exist? An Answer for Today. New York: Vintage.
School
of Life (2020). “Albert Camus – The Plague.” YouTube Video, April 1, 2020. Accessed
April 20, 2020. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSYPwX4NPg4&t=62s.
N.T.
Wright (2020). “Christianity Offers No Answers About the Coronavirus. It's Not
Supposed To.” Time, March 29, 2020. Accessed April 12, 2020. https://time.com/5808495/coronavirus-christianity/.
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So very beautiful and very readable. I was always happily aware of George’s great trust in the Mystery that brought him to the planet. He lived and died without worry about “Godl, and devoted his life to social justice. You clearly point out what a beautiful and freeing choice this was. An emotional and rational choice for valuing the gift of life.
ReplyDeleteSo happy to share this writing of yours, dear JK!