CHAPTER 1: Tough Questions
Everyone needs faith at some point, but a rocket scientist needs to substantiate his faith by building a model of the unknown in terms of the known. If this model makes sense and has not been proven false by observable facts, then it is reasonable for him to "leap in faith the rest of the way". A rocket scientist would lose his credentials if he believed on blind faith alone, without tangible evidence, because that type of faith is unable to sort out truth from error.
For the most part, I find that religions are each based on the doctrines of a particular group of men. They always include a number of theological questions that most of their followers cannot answer, but each group decides what they want to believe for their own reasons. Every group seems to believe something different, even when many of them feel that they are basing their set of beliefs on the same source of information, the Bible. Yet they maintain their differences by accepting their particular code blindly and often with great passion. They don't understand many things that they believe, but they accept them as necessary mysteries. Since all religions have mysteries that they can't understand, it's somehow okay to believe whatever you like. Since the other guy believes a different story just as blindly, who can tell if any are right or wrong? It's easy to see why a logical person would conclude that all religions are illogical. Perhaps religion is the opium of the people after all. Such blind faith quickly leads to, "I'm okay - you're okay"; "Do what feels right to you"; etc. But isn't that what we call, "New Age"?
Here are some theological questions that we really need to answer better:
- Is there a Personal God?
- How does God create?
- Where is God with respect to His creations?
- How did Life arise?
- Where did Thought come from?
- How many Gods are there? How can God the Father, God the Son, and God the
Holy Spirit be the same God?
- Why not have more Gods, eg could Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ, be a God
as well?
- How could Christ be God and die? God cannot die.
- How could Christ be human and work miracles? Humans cannot work miracles.
- Is God outside of time or not?
- Does God only have a "present"? Would everything be happening at
the same time, for God? If He is inside time, then He cannot predict the
future. Does He merely put things in motion and watch?
- If God knows the end from the beginning, then why is this drama on Earth
worth God’s time?
- If God is in total control, then how can we have free will? Are we predestined either to be saved
or to burn in hell?
- Is the Bible any more of a
source of truth than other ancient works? Why?
- Is the Theory of Evolution scientific? Is Creation Theory unscientific?
- How could evil enter God's world? If it is outside of God, then is Satan an
independent God - an alternate force - a Ying and a Yang as proposed by Eastern
religions?
- Is there a power in the Occult? What is happening there?
- Is there other life in this universe?
We'll look at other questions later, but for now, let's answer these.
28 October 2001
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