Month: March 2023

Here’s the link to this article by Merle Hertzler.

I learned early that I was not to question my religion. I was to simply have faith. And yet somehow the questions would still come. I would sometimes question the Bible. How did we know it was God’s Word? I would sometimes question Jesus. How did we know he was God? I never dared to ask these questions out loud, but in my own mind, yes, I asked these questions often.

The questions demanded attention. But simultaneously, there was always the nagging fear of what would happen if I died while I was in a state that questioned the faith. I simply could not take that chance. The consequences of dying in doubt could well be unimaginable.

So, I asked questions, yes, but I always knew what the answer needed to be. The side of my mind that argued for Christ had to beat out the side that argued against.

It is as if my mind included an advocate for the faith, an advocate against the faith, and a referee. The referee always sided with the advocate for the faith. And so, the advocate for the faith always won, two to one.

Those times were never fun. I longed to be free from doubts. And so, by sheer willpower, I pushed those questions aside.

But my mind was not really free.

Many years later, the dam would break. The questions would come out–gradually at first, then with a rush. And when it was all over, my mind was free.

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I grew up in a conservative Mennonite home. We didn’t listen to secular music, watched only a select few TV shows, and centered our lives on conservative religion.

When I was 14 years old, my family and I joined a fundamentalist church, one that did not question the Bible. Fundamentalism became a way of life for me. Everything that entered my mind had to come through its filter. I soaked it all in.

I was terrified of hell and would often lie awake at night worrying about it. Even in social settings, I would be sitting there thinking about hell. Fundamentalism offered a solution. It said that all one had to do was accept Jesus. So, I did it. Did I do it right? I didn’t know. So, I did it again. I still wasn’t sure that I had done it right. And so, I did it again and again in my mind. I prayed that God would be merciful to me a sinner. I invited Jesus into my heart. Over and over, I accepted him in any way I could think to accept Christ.

One day I read the tract, What Must I Do to Be Saved, by John R Rice. It told me I did not need to concentrate on getting the act of believing right or saying the right words. I just needed to choose to believe. That’s it? All I needed to do was choose to believe? Fine. I chose to believe. Case closed. Let’s move on.

And so, I proceeded in life as though the case was closed. What a relief! I thought that everybody else surely had similar worries and needed to know this news of deliverance from hell.

“Grace, my fears relieved”, the old song says, but before that, “It was grace that taught my heart to fear.” Religion offered a cure for my fears. But what had caused the fears? Religion. Does Christianity invent the fears it then relieves? Is it solving a problem that it created?

I found relief from my fears. But to tell you the truth, faith did not do a really good job of it. The fear of hell had finally become manageable, yes, but it was always in the background.

As a Fundamentalist Baptist

In college, I joined an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist church, which then controlled every aspect of my life. I went door to door on the streets of the Bible belt, witnessing to those who may have missed God’s plan of salvation. Everybody at this church was told to be a soul winner. The pastor boomed his message from the pulpit, yelling at those who stayed home on visitation night. We had to be out there winning souls.

We didn’t want anybody to die and go to hell without knowing the way of salvation. If somebody didn’t know, then we needed to tell them. I wonder now, why did God need us to tell that story? Didn’t he have all the resources he needed? If we failed to tell somebody, and as a result that person suffered for eternity without ever having known the escape plan, how could a loving God let that happen? I never asked those questions back then. I was winning souls.

The pastor also yelled at those that listened to rock music, gave less than 10% of their income to the church, had the wrong haircut, or attended a movie theater. We were told exactly how to live our lives, and we obediently followed. It was the only life we knew.

In my senior year of college (1978) the pastor [1] moved to another church, and the church [2] deteriorated into disarray. I was confused. This was all I had to live for, and it had fallen apart. I saw the dark side of the church. There was chaos at some church functions. Once when we were singing Just as I Am over and over as an alter call, people became so bored that the song died in the middle and we never finished it. I had thought that we were saving the world. Now I looked at the lives that had been saved and wondered if it had meant anything.

Meanwhile, I watched as the story of Jim Jones and the mass suicide in Guyana appeared on TV. The story of those poor people following every command of their leader seemed all too real to me. I had been living my life much like they had. I could understand why they followed so obediently. Religion can do that to a person. Had I been deluded also?

There was something else that bothered me. I had been reading through the Bible every year since I was in 11th grade–every word of every verse–and was disturbed about what I was reading. Have you ever read the tales of killing, greed, and arrogance that fill the Old Testament? Do you ever question their relevance? I was not sure that I could trust the Bible any longer. As my confidence in the Bible withered, apathy set in.

Despair

I graduated from college with no meaning to life. My Christian hope had gone. I cannot begin to describe the despair that filled my life for the first two years after graduation. There was nothing to live for. I wanted to be happy, but I didn’t know why that would matter. Two hundred years from now, who would ever care if the bones left behind had supported a happy person or a sad person? Probably nobody would ever care.

But somehow, I cared. And I wasn’t sure why. I wanted to be happy. But instead, I knew apathy, bitterness, struggle, frustration, anger and confusion.

When my Christian hope had faded, why didn’t I look for something else? I didn’t know there was another way. I had grown up in Christian schools, Sunday schools, and Bible studies. The Bible was the only hope I knew, and it now seemed so inadequate. I never thought to look elsewhere–such is the grip that religion can have. I wish now that somebody had told me how to live the good life without the Bible. But I would not learn that until many years later.

Digging out

In desperation, I turned to Christian books. I had no intention of going back to my Independent Fundamentalist Baptist days. I thought that perhaps a milder brand of Christianity could help. As I read, I felt encouraged. Was God leading me back to himself? I thought that he was. And so, I made a commitment to walk close to the Lord again. I found that Christianity worked much better for me than apathy.

I would often go to a park and find a forsaken place alone with God where I could pray. I would pour out my heart to God, and I would leave refreshed. I took this as proof that Christianity was true.

I was soon to find the writings of C. S. Lewis. I found them fascinating. He did not just quote Bible verses. He used reason. I liked that. I read his books with enthusiasm and formed a new outlook on life.

I was back to seeing myself and others as rebellious sinners against God. I believed that I had rebelled against God, and that this had brought on the two years of depression. It was all my fault.

I saw others also in the same light as I saw myself. If somebody did something that hurt me, then I figured they must be doing it because they had given in to their evil, sinful nature. I would get bitter at those who had followed their inner sinful self in ways that hurt me. Sometimes I snapped at people and let them know how bad they were. That wasn’t good.

But I also found that religion helped me to keep my mouth shut. If inside I was bad, then I needed to keep that bad anger inside. It came from my fallen nature. I would not want my fallen nature to express itself like this. I wanted only my new positive nature, as produced by the Holy Spirit, to come out. So, the old, angry words were constrained. I set out to surrender my basic wants and desires to God.

I now was turning back to faith, not because I feared hell, but because I needed to avoid the despair associated with depression. I was no longer following the Independent Baptist tradition, but one thing I knew, I had had purpose and hope in those college days. And that was certainly better than the depression that had followed. So even if I was not convinced that my Independent Baptist days were on the right path, I figured that at least my life back then had been better. So I thought I needed faith to have purpose in this life. I just needed to make a few adjustments.

The Problem of Pain

I had a low view of human nature. Such views may look strange in light of what many now say in today’s Evangelical churches. These churches have often adopted a feel good, psychological approach to life that seeks to build our self-esteem and encourages us to accept ourselves and our feelings. Many Evangelicals do this in spite of the doctrine of human depravity that is still in Evangelical theology.

It was not long ago that the view of humanity as totally depraved was dominant, not only in fundamentalist churches, but in mainstream Protestant sources like the writings of C.S. Lewis. Since Lewis’s views were so foundational to me at that time, I will digress here to discuss the view of humanity that appears in his book, The Problem of Pain. He writes:

A recovery of the old sense of sin is essential to Christianity. Christ takes it for granted that men are bad. Until we really feel this assumption of His to be true, though we are part of the world He came to save, we are not part of the audience to whom his words are addressed, [3]

Lewis thought that we are bad people, and that God was angry with us for being bad. Lewis thought that Christianity offered no hope to those who did not share this view.

He went on to say that some Christians might ask, “What call has God, of all beings, to be angry with us?” Lewis responded to his own rhetorical question, declaring it to be a blasphemous question:

Now at the moment when a man feels real guilt–moments too rare in our lives–all of these blasphemies vanish away… At such a moment we really do know that our character, as revealed in [some sinful] action, is, and ought to be, hateful to all good men, and, if there are powers above man, to them. A God who did not regard this with unappeasable distaste would not be a good being…When we merely say that we are bad, the “wrath” of God seems a barbarous doctrine; as soon as we perceive our badness, it appears inevitable, a mere corollary from God’s goodness. [4]

Guilt is far too rare? Really? Lewis was not merely telling us that our actions are bad, but also that our very character is something that God hates with unappeasable distaste. He was saying that God is justified in having wrath toward us. For after all, at our very core, we are guilty, bad people.

Why are we so bad? Lewis contended that it is because of Adam’s sin. Can God then blame us for Adam’s sin? Lewis responds to this question:

Theoretically, I suppose, we might say “Yes, we behave like vermin, but then that is because we are vermin. And that, at any rate, is not our fault.” But the fact that we are vermin, so far from being felt as an excuse, is a greater shame and grief to us than any of the particular acts which it leads us to commit. [5]

So we find that we are born as vermin. And Lewis says that it is a shame and grief to us that we are vermin. What is the Christian to do? He continues,

Now the proper good of a creature is to surrender itself to its Creator… In the world as we know it, the problem is how to recover this self-surrender. We are not merely imperfect creatures who must be improved: we are, as Newman said, rebels who must lay down our arms…Hence the necessity to die daily: however often we think we have broken the rebellious self we shall still find it alive…The human spirit will not even begin to surrender self-will as long as all seems to be well with it. [6]

Do you get the picture? Lewis describes us all as inherently depraved descendants of Adam, as evil rebels. We need to die to our own internal wants. Suffering, he claims, is the tool that God uses to effect this change. His books were the biggest influence in my philosophy of life at that time. I also knew of a number of scripture verses to support this low view of humanity (e.g. Job 42:6, Is 64:6, Lu.17:10, and Rom. 3:10-19).

I look at it now, and do not think that I had a very healthy perspective. But this philosophy was mild compared with the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist tradition that I had come out of. And it certainly worked better than apathy. This outlook gave me a reason to live. At the time I assumed that it worked because it was right. Now, I think that it worked because it gave me a purpose. Other ways would have worked better.

C. S. Lewis showed me that life was rough, yes, but that was because we needed pain to change us from vermin to what we should be. Fine. Life is hard, but there was a reason for it. God was dealing with the old me, the vermin. I pushed onwards. And it seemed to be working.

I had found this one great pillar to support my rebuild of faith: Christianity is worthwhile because the path that I had found within Christianity works, at least it works for me.

That pillar would one day collapse on me when it was shown to be inadequate. The observation that faith made me feel better is simply not a good reason to say that the faith is true. But at that time the reasoning seemed solid.

Creationism

There was a second great pillar on which I based my faith. This pillar had stood firm even during the days of despair. I was quite familiar with the teachings of Henry Morris and the young Earth creationists. I thought that this was the most logical explanation for how life began. They argued that the Earth was created by God a few thousand years ago, just as the Bible said. During the time of Noah, a great flood covered the Earth. This flood buried many animals, I was told, and these became the fossils we see today. Creationists argued that all this was supported by scientific findings.

Creationists argued that evolution was impossible. They said that creationism was consistent with true science, but evolution was pseudoscience. I listened to this side only and was convinced.

Other things in the Bible may perhaps be wrong. I was finding simply too many problems with the Bible. But I had these two great pillars of my faith: a belief that Christianity as I knew it worked; and a belief that Genesis was the best explanation of origins.

Exposure to Enlightened Views

In 1987 I moved to the suburbs of Philadelphia and found an exciting Evangelical church. I met many wonderful people and quickly became involved in many aspects of the program. I had found a home and was happy.

Some of the Christians at this church came from a range of religious backgrounds. This was new to me. Some people disagreed with the way I understood Christianity. Some did not agree with me that the Earth was only a few thousand years old, for instance, or that the fossils had come from Noah’s flood.

Others told me that my religious philosophy did not work, that other philosophies worked better. There were big differences. I thought that we should despise our evil inner self; they thought that we should love ourselves. I thought that we must work hard to keep the evil anger inside of us from coming out; they thought that anger was there because we had not vented our anger. I thought that the big problem was overestimating oneself and overconfidence; they thought that the big problem was low self-esteem and a lack of self-confidence. I thought that we needed to die to ourselves; they thought that we need to discover ourselves and self-actualize. I thought that God made us feel guilty about our evil feelings; they thought it was the devil that wanted us to feel guilty about natural feelings. I thought that God allowed people to mistreat us because that was his way of molding our character; they thought that mistreatment damaged our psyche, often requiring counseling to overcome the effects. They thought my philosophy was depressing.

Do you understand why this was a difficult pill for me to swallow? This was a main pillar of my Christian faith–the belief that my Bible-supported views worked. Now here were Christians telling me that my version did not work well. What did they mean it didn’t work well? It absolutely did work. It worked far better for me than the apathy and the depression I had been in. And I had scripture to back it up.

It was not easy for me to accept that my way did not work well and was not based on truth. So, I prayed about it and read the Bible. And what do you think happened when I prayed? That’s right. I was convinced that God was telling me I was right. Seriously, who was I to go against what God was saying to me?

My friends and I all agreed that Christianity had the best answers to life. My experience and prayers told me that my version worked better. Their experiences and prayers told them that their version worked better. Who was right?

Computer Debates

I was soon to have my eyes opened to many other philosophies that supposedly worked best. I would soon meet believers in Mormonism, Islam, Bahai, Judaism, Wicca, and Atheism. Each was sure that his way had worked for him, thus showing that it was the best.

I was going to also hear of many psychological solutions, again with testimonials for each claiming that it was better than other techniques. I was not the only one who had claimed that my experience proved that I was right. Lots of people were claiming that they had tried something, and this made them feel better. Do all philosophies work? Some researchers had looked at the conflicting cures within psychology and wrote, “Is it true that ‘Everyone has won, and all must have prizes’?” [7] Indeed!

I met these people of many religions in the CompuServe debate forum, back in the days when one used a modem to dial into a computer instead of using the Internet. I began to participate in the religion section. I actively debated religion and psychology with anybody that wanted to discuss them. This was to become an important focus of my life.

The biggest lesson I learned during these debates was how to form an argument. It was not enough for me to state that Jay Adams, C. S. Lewis, or Thomas Szasz had written something that agreed with me on a particular point. After all, one can find somebody who will agree with almost any religious viewpoint that he expresses. I needed a more effective argument.

My favorite resource was the Psychoheresy Awareness Ministry of Martin and Deidre Bobgan. They referred to psychological experiments to support their arguments, and often quoted scientific journals. I found that when I described experiments people often listened to what I had to say and were less likely to attack my writings. I developed a love for scientific experiments and the scientific journals that described them.

And so began a regular series of trips to the Philadelphia Public Library, and later, a university library. I would make lists of articles that favored my positions and would go to the library to get more ammunition for my side.

Cracks in the Foundation

These trips became time-consuming, and so, in 1992, I subscribed to my favorite journal, The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. At $247 a year, this represented a major desire to learn the truth. Having made the commitment, I was determined to learn something from each issue. I began to read papers whether I thought they agreed with my position or not. This was a change for me. I was not merely reading to prove I was right. I was reading to learn.

I read some papers that were enlightening. I read that trying to suppress thoughts can make them stronger. [8] Were my efforts to keep my true thoughts under control making those repressed thoughts stronger? I learned more about the function of self-esteem. Was my viewpoint of myself as an evil sinner harmful? Did my Christianity really not work as well as I had persuaded myself it had? Slowly, microscopic cracks began to develop in this great pillar of my faith. It was slow and subtle, but the cracks were beginning.

The Creationism Pillar Caves

Meanwhile, a strange twist of fate put me right into the middle of the creation-evolution debate. That was not where I wanted to be, for these fights were often quite nasty. I couldn’t believe that I was there in the middle of it all. But I was not about to leave a good debate. I decided to let people know that evolution could not possibly happen.

I made some progress arguing that the complexity of genes made evolution difficult, but somebody wanted to know where all of those fossils had come from, if not from hundreds of millions of years of evolution. I suggested they might have been caused by Noah’s flood. My argument was defeated in one round. I was asked to explain how it is that we find rocks made of wind-blown sand in the midst of all these rocks under the earth. I had no answer. Wind certainly wouldn’t be blowing sand around under the floodwaters. I told myself the problem was that I was not familiar enough with that issue. So, I avoided the flood altogether until I could find better answers.

I never did find a satisfactory answer to this simple question, nor to many of the other problems with Noah’s flood. So, I concentrated instead on problems that I perceived with the mechanism of evolution.

To make a long story short, this led me to a moment of epiphany in which I found myself in a library completely overwhelmed with the evidence for evolution. In shock, it dawned on me that I had no convincing case for my young Earth Creationism.

After the dust had settled, 18 months later, I had switched to arguing for evolution. I describe this transition elsewhere, and won’t repeat it here.

It was a complete change. Many people have survived the switch to evolution, and they still have faith. But the switch to evolution was traumatic for me. For I had two strong pillars left in my faith, the supposed evidence for creationism, and the understanding that Christianity works. The creationism pillar was now gone. The building above was resting on one unstable column.

The Second Pillar Caves

Meanwhile the other pillar of my faith–the one that said conservative Christian philosophy worked–was severely cracking. When I had met people offering all kinds of psychological cures for the condition of the human heart, I had argued that some researchers had found that it was not just the specifics of the cure that helped people, but that it was the caring, nurturing relationship with a friendly helper that was doing more to build hope, and thus help troubled people. [9] I argued that, therefore, others could not force a view on me that they found had worked for them. Perhaps the fact that they felt better had nothing to do with their method. Perhaps they were feeling better only because they were making a cooperative effort with others to address the problem.

One day somebody turned that argument on its end. He asked me how I knew that Christianity worked. Perhaps people were helped within Christianity because they were in a nurturing relationship with caring people, not because of the specifics of the Bible. I had been caught by my own argument, and I had no answer. I knew I could not be sure that it was Christianity that made the difference.

As this was happening, I was also needing to deal with the errors in the Bible. I had known about these problems for years, ever since I had read through the entire Bible six times in my youth. But I had found those two great pillars of my faith, and thus could ignore the Bible’s problems. Those pillars were now in shambles. And I was seeing skeptics on the forum arguing that the Bible commanded massacres (e.g. 1 Samuel 15); praised terrorism (e.g. Psalm 137); and allowed slavery (e.g. Exodus 21). They pointed out contradictions in the Bible. I knew I had no chance against their arguments. It was no longer possible to ignore what the Bible said. My faith was crumbling.

What should I do?

I began to rapidly incorporate new ideas into my mind. I did my best to piece together a progressive philosophy of life that would keep my faith in spite of these problems. I experimented with ways to include evolution, an obviously errant Bible, a higher view of the self, and even Humanism into my Christianity.

Meanwhile, I moved on to other interests: country dancing, movies, and romance. Ah yes, romance. I fell in love with a very special lady, who has become my best companion in life. She has supported me through some tough times, and I am very grateful to her. She has a compassion and concern for others that I can only dream about. I had found somebody that I could love with all of my heart. We were soon to be married. She has not agreed with where my skepticism has finally led me, but she is always my best friend.

I had drifted away from participation in church. I now made one last effort to find my place again. There had been a radical change in my thought process. I was no longer the most conservative thinker on the block. Now I was perhaps the most liberal thinker at church. I persuaded myself that I could still fit in–after all it was the progressive element at church that started me on my journey–but I found it increasingly hard to identify with the church program. And I asked questions that surprised everyone.

There is no stopping the mind set free. It is like that first leak of water through the dam. It reaches a critical size, and then bursts free. My thoughts refused to stop. The dam had been broken. I read books that were critical of the Bible. I read the Bible from a whole new viewpoint. I found skeptical sites on the Internet. I asked many questions–many of which are on my website. I found it harder and harder to identify myself as a Christian.

Even the label of Liberal Christian was losing its appeal. I could no longer believe the basics of Christianity. If I still identified as a Christian, while sidestepping the problems, was I committing the sin of silence?

The Sin of Silence by Gerald A. Larue What’s the Harm? Why Religious Belief Is Always Bad by Richard Carrier

Liberal Christianity Links

Where it All Led

In 2002 I decided that I could no longer identify myself as a Christian. What am I? I am now an Ex-Christian, an Agnostic, a Humanist, and a Freethinker. In September 2002 I created the website Questioning: An Examination of Christian Belief to discuss my questions and to explain what had happened to me.

I have not chosen an easy path. It is not easy to tell people that I no longer believe that this message is true. But I find the evidence overwhelming. If the weight of the evidence were marginal, I would follow the believing crowd and not raise the issue. I do not like to be different. I prefer to follow the crowd. All of my life I have been a follower. I have always wanted to fit in. But there are just too many problems with the Bible. I simply cannot unlearn what I have learned. Knowing what I know, I cannot be a Christian. So, I choose the road less traveled.

I am not asking you to follow me. You have a mind of your own. You can decide for yourself. But perhaps you could learn from me.

I now have a different perspective in life. I wrote earlier of how I once saw people that hurt me as being evil. If somebody hurts me now, I think they must do it because, from their perspective and current knowledge, it seems best for them to do what they do. Years ago, it was hard to forgive hateful vermin who did hateful things. It is much easier to forgive confused but well-meaning individuals. This change in perspective works wonders. Instead of concentrating on bridling the tongue, one can concentrate on understanding the person who did hurtful things. Rational questioning changes perspectives, and changed perspectives change lives.

I find that I am far happier without the bonds of a preset religion. My mind has been set free. I am free to explore the world without the need to fit everything into a predefined religious bias.

It is fine to question. It is safe to explore. There is always more to learn. I hope that neither you nor I will ever stop questioning.

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The above is an edited copy of the story I shared on the web in 2002. Since then, I have enjoyed a life that is truly free. This story had been part of my Questioning: An Examination of Christian Belief website that was on the Internet until 2017. I have now brought that site back online with a major facelift. I have rebranded it as The Mind Set Free.

by Merle Hertzler, June 11, 2022

Here’s the link to this article by Merle Hertzler.

We come now to the key question: Is there a God? Here is my answer: I don’t know.

If you have been reading through this series, you have seen that, if God exists, I do not find him doing many of the things that have been claimed about him. He did not create the world in seven days. He did not inspire the Bible. He did not raise Jesus from the dead. He is not preparing a home for us. He is not in intimate control of our circumstances. He is not speaking to us. What is left for him to do?

Some will claim that he created the universe, and that he still occasionally responds with miracles and answers to prayers. Let’s look. If God exists, we certainly would want to get to know more about such a powerful being. So, let’s honestly look at the evidence.

We will begin our search in the present, and work our way backwards through time, looking for evidence for God. We will look for God in four places.

1. The present.
2. The first humans.
3. The origin of life.
4. The origin of the universe.

1. Is God working today?

Some might suggest that God is performing occasional miracles. Where is the evidence? In the past, many people claimed to have seen miracles, but a funny thing happened as time went on. More and more, people realized that there were scientific answers for the unexplained. In modern times, when people can search claims using science, miracle claims are readily debunked. Past claims of miracles could have been sheer fabrications, or misunderstandings from people who didn’t have the backgrounds to scientifically examine the claims.

Suppose God does work miracles. Why would he limit himself to occasional miracles? If he loves everyone, knows we suffer unjustly, and easily works miracles without getting tired, why do so many of our pleas go unanswered? Even if there were a few answered prayers, how can you explain a God who is so absent?

And why does he not readily display that power for all to see? If God can do anything, and wants us to believe in him, why does he not clearly show himself?

Do you remember the story about Elijah demonstrating God’s power? The Bible says Elijah gathered the people together and set up a contest to see who could call fire down from heaven. According to the Bible, Elijah won the contest. Fire came down and burned up a water-soaked sacrifice on an altar. Could you have God duplicate that feat? No? Why not? If God did it once in answer to prayer, why won’t he do it again?

You might say that you are not allowed to test God. Then why does the Bible say that Elijah was allowed to do that test? If he was allowed to do it, why not you? Why wouldn’t God want to make his power clearly known? Or is it possible he isn’t there?

Years ago, magician James Randi had a challenge where he offered a million dollars to anybody who could prove a supernatural or paranormal phenomenon. Over a thousand people tried to do this. All failed. When put to the test, all the claims of supernatural miracles brought before James Randi failed.

So maybe there are no verifiable miraculous events happening today.

Prayer

You may tell me that you have personally seen God answer prayer. I once made similar claims. But it is not enough simply to say that you were once sick, prayed, and get better. After all, many people got sick and got better. Some of them did not pray. And so, you would need to show that prayers actually made a difference. Ideally, you would show that people that were prayed for were more likely to recover compared with those who didn’t have anybody pray for them.

In science, we verify claimed cures by testing them. Preferably, we set up a large study in which some people get the proposed cure, some may get alternate cures, and some just get a placebo. Ideally the patients and the examiners do not know who got which treatment. In the end of the study the researchers reveal who was in which treatment group. They compare the results and see which treatment, if any, worked best.

How would prayer work in a controlled study? Would it work better than a placebo? Recently, researchers did several such studies. When the methodology and statistics were examined, they found no good case for prayer. By contrast, new drugs regularly show evidence of being effective after such trials. Why does prayer not also show a clearly significant effect when tested?

Although your experiences may be very convincing to you, many of us see it as a case of special pleading. We would not allow a new drug on the market based solely on the testimony that somebody once tried it and got better. Why should we accept the claim of miracle with no better evidence for it than similar testimonial evidence for quack cures?

Does Prayer Work? by Dariusz Jemielniak Have Christians Accepted the Scientific Conclusion That God Does Not Answer Intercessory Prayer? by Brian Bolton Efficacy of Prayer by Irwin and Jack Tessman How Christians Can Test Their Own Prayers Objectively by John W. Loftus This article is behind a paywall at Free Inquiry. Loftus explains how you can test for yourself if your prayers work. The Science of Prayer by Victor J. Stenger Debunking Medical Prayer Studies: Let Us Pray That People Stop Praying by James W. Williamson, M.D. Miraculous Cures by Anthony Campbell The Study of Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory Prayer by Jeffery A. Dusek, PhD et. al. How to properly study prayer.

Shall we pray? Links to research on the effectiveness of prayer.

In your heart

Others will tell me that they know he lives, for he lives in their heart. I understand. I was once there. I thought my experience proved that it was God working inside me. But I found out later there were many people with quite different experiences, with each thinking his experience proved he was right. Does this prove all are right? No. Simply trying something and feeling better does not prove that what you tried is best for all, or that it is based on truth. Sometimes simply trying, with the help of others, is already a huge part of what it takes to find a better life.

2. Did God create humans?

Many will turn to creation as their proof of God. They will look at something like the greatness of the human mind, and come up with an argument that looks something like this:

1. There must be an explanation for why the human mind exists.
2. One explanation is God.
3. I cannot think of any other good explanations.
4. Therefore, God exists.

This argument is faulty. There is indeed another good explanation for why the human mind exists: evolution. We met up with evolution back at the beginning of this series. There I explained how I became convinced that we evolved. You may perhaps agree that there is evidence for evolution, but you just don’t see how this could happen on its own. Something or someone must have been guiding it. Hence, God is still involved in the process.

What do we see if we look at the fossil record? If God is behind it all, gradually transforming life into the humans he wants, one would expect to see most incremental changes be specifically in that direction. Instead, what we see are widely diverging branches in all directions. It sure looks like evolution is trying many different approaches, some of which work, and some of which just branch out to a dead end. This does not look like anybody is actually guiding the process.

Why all the dead-end paths? Dinosaurs, for example, were a major branch of evolution that later died out. Only one small group of dinosaurs survived, becoming modern birds. All the rest died out with no living descendants. If God was guiding evolution to lead to humans, why bother with thousands of species of dinosaurs over many millions of years? Why did that unspeakable carnage in the struggle for existence need to occur? They all died out anyway. A small group of competitors to the dinosaurs, the early mammals, eventually took over and now rule the world that dinosaurs once dominated.

As another example, we talked earlier about the amazing mammallike reptiles that developed mammal features over many millions of years. If we look closely at them in the fossil record, we see this is not a guided evolution toward modern mammals. Rather, there were a whole series of trials and errors in many directions before the group we now call mammals evolved to dominate.

None of this looks like deliberate, guided evolution. We are not seeing the man in charge here.

Hominids

Similarly, when we look at human evolution, we see many fossils, but we don’t see a clearly directed path to Homo sapiens. The lines branch out in many different directions.

We are often not sure which of those branches are our direct ancestors. In fact, since there were many species besides the ones we have found in the fossil record so far, then most likely it is one of these unknown species that is our true ancestor. Unknown species were cousin species to the ones we have found. By studying these cousin species, we can get a good idea how we got here. But what we are seeing may just be dead end species that are cousins to our true ancestors.

But aren’t humans so very different from other animals? Were earlier animals really capable of evolving into Homo sapiens? Yes. In essence, our anatomy is very close to the anatomy of other apes. We share 98.8% of our DNA with chimps. Even that part of our anatomy that we value most, our brain, has clear connections to all animal brains. Other animals experience thoughts, emotions and will just like we do. Their brains store memories just like us. There is a quantitative difference, yes, but the forerunners of all these functions are in the other great apes also.

How can an animal we would class as an ape walk out of the forest and become human? It’s a long story. It appears that, in The Great Rift Valley in Africa, a unique stretch of grasslands opened up as the continents moved. Certain apes ventured out of the woods, perhaps searching for food. They found a different world, one in which they could survive using the high intelligence inherent in all apes. Problem solving was so important out here, brains began to evolve for higher intelligence.

Likewise, out in the plain, there was an advantage to standing upright. One could travel more efficiently, look out over the tall grass to see predators, and use one’s hands for many tasks. The combination of increased intelligence with increased availability of the hands worked out quite well in this new environment, leading to strong evolution of these traits.

But intelligence and dexterity alone would have left our ancestors helpless in the vast grassland. They found that, like us, they needed each other. It’s true. We all need somebody to lean on. So, our ancestors, which we refer to as hominids, used their new brainpower for more than just individual problem solving. They used their brains to communicate with other hominids. This turned out to be quite difficult. Understanding others is hard. If you want to communicate effectively with me, you need a big brain. Likewise, our hominid ancestors needed big brains to communicate.

With effective communication, we learn from each other. You learn things from me. I learn things from you. Together, the combined knowledge can lead to new ideas. The end result can be far greater than simply adding two experiences. And so, there is a huge advantage to good communication. This requires a lot of brainpower.

As human cooperation and brainpower became ever more important, brains became larger, and that can be a big problem for the mothers. There is only so much head that can squeeze down the birth canal. Unfortunately, many hominid females must have died in childbirth–may they rest in peace–as evolution drove brain sizes larger.

But, once again evolution found a solution. If the skull can wait to finish its growth until after birth, then it is easier to give birth to a child who will have a large adult brain. For the mothers, this was good news. They could give birth to babies that then grew up with big brains capable of better supporting the mother, her other offspring, and her grandchildren. This solution was a winner.

But there was a big side effect to all this. Hominid babies are quite helpless while their brain grows. They go through a prolonged childhood before emerging as super-intelligent hominid adults. Other animal babies can walk and begin caring for themselves soon after birth. Not so with hominids or our close ancestors. Nevertheless, when intelligence is a primary necessity for survival, the sacrifice can be worth it. The mother devotes herself to her helpless baby, yes, but oh what a wonder this produces.

How can a mother afford to spend all this effort raising children? It takes a village. That’s right. Child raising requires a team: mothers, fathers, grandparents, siblings, cousins, neighbors, anybody. And that is the beauty of the intelligence and social communication that had evolved. It allowed these hominids to develop as a team, caring for each other and for the young. That led to longer childhoods; to larger brains; to more intelligence; to better communication and cooperation; and back around to longer childhoods and still larger brains. It was an endless upwards spiral.

This led to all the wonderful adaptions of hominids: better tools to hunt and get the needed protein to feed these demanding brains; fires to scare away predators; fires to cook meals; loss of hair, which allowed more persistent hunting without overheating; clothing and blankets to stay warm without all that hair; language; structured social interaction; and yes, partying into the wee hours of the morning while sitting around the campfire. Keep that up for hundreds of thousands of years, and before long we see a big change.

None of that requires direct intervention of God. It is simply the working of nature, driving one evolutionary line in a unique direction after a number of prior adaptions had given that genus a unique survival strategy. No miracle was required.

Human Evolution –Encyclopedia Britannica Introduction to Human Evolution–Smithsonian Institution Human Evolution–Berkeley University Why Are There Still Apes? A debate at Christian Forums site. How Did Humans Evolve?— History.com Fossil Hominids— TalkOrigins

Human Evolution Links

3.Did God create the first life?

Years ago, when I was a Creationist, I was losing the argument attacking evolution, so I turned to the origin of life. Here it was much easier to make convincing arguments. For evolution, there was all that pesky evidence that shut me down whenever I tried to bring in creation. But as to the origin of life, here was a gap in which I could insert God. My argument went something like this:

1. There must be an explanation for why life exists.
2. One explanation is God.
3. I cannot think of any other good explanations.
4. Therefore, God exists.

That argument should look familiar. It is the same argument I wrote above about humans; except this time I changed the word in italics. It is the same argument from personal ignorance: I cannot think of another explanation; thus, the only explanation I can think of must be true.

This argument is also faulty.

It is true that there are limits to what we understand about the origin of life. It happened long ago and did not leave a lot of evidence. But we have learned a lot about this since the 90s, when I had argued for God as the originator of life. And yet, even back then, I could see that my arguments were losing.

Although we do not know exactly how it happened, we have many good hypotheses and understand how many of these processes may have happened. There are other explanations besides God.

A leading view suggests that self-replicating RNA molecules began to compete to be the best self-replicator, building more elaborate support until they put molecules together as cells. See The Origin of Life.

We don’t understand it all. Can we therefore insert God? What we have here is a God of the Gaps argument. We find a gap in our knowledge. In this gap, we conveniently insert God. The problem is that these gaps keep getting smaller as science fills in our previous lack of knowledge.

If you elect this defense of the faith, you keep on needing to back down as the gaps disappear. So, unless you enjoy doing a moonwalk, constantly going backwards while appearing to go forward, I would suggest avoiding arguing for a God of the Gaps. After several steps backwards, arguing for ever smaller gaps, you may eventually come to the point that I did, where I could no longer take myself seriously when moonwalking backwards while pretending I was making progress defending God.

From Soup to Cells: The Origin of Life at Berkeley University site Biogenesis and the Laws of Evidence by Richard Carrier

Biogenesis links

4. Did God create our universe?

So maybe we just better go back further in time, back beyond the story of life on earth, and ask about the beginning of the universe. How could a universe pop up out of nothing? We might frame an argument for this based on the format we had used above:

1. There must be an explanation for why our universe exists.
2. One explanation is God.
3. I cannot think of any other good explanations.
4. Therefore, God exists.

You may only be able to think of one explanation for the universe–God. But God is not the only possible universe maker. Perhaps natural forces could also do it.

So, before tracing back to the ultimate cause of everything, let’s look at how whatever or whoever it was that made the universe did it.

Let’s cut to the chase and state how the universe began: with a Big Bang. Regardless of who or what caused the Big Bang, we know the broad overview of what it (or he) did. First there was no universe. Then boom, a Big Bang. And the rest is history.

How do we know there was a Big Bang? Well, for one thing, when we look at distant galaxies, we find that they are all soaring away from us at a high rate of speed. This is exactly what we would expect if they had all originated from matter that was concentrated at the same spot and scattered in the Big Bang. In fact, if we trace back the trajectories of galaxies, we find they all came from the same spot in space 13.72 billion years ago. (That’s right, we now know the answer to 4 decimal places.) They must have all left that location simultaneously at high speed in different directions.

As the galaxies spread out, gravity slowed them down. We can conclude that they must have been going quite fast when the scattering started and slowed down gradually as gravity pulled backwards.

If we trace back to the time when the universe was about 1 second old, they would have been bunched together in a huge mass of high velocity particles at 10 billion degrees C. At that temperature neutrons and protons would have been traveling far too fast to make atoms.

But as the universe expanded and cooled, there would have been numerous atomic “marriages”, as particles settled down to form atoms. Almost all of the atoms that were created at that time would have been one of the three lightest elements, hydrogen, helium, and lithium. We can even calculate the ratios of each element created at those high temperatures. Most protons would stay as single protons and unite with one electron to form a hydrogen atom. About 25% of protons would pair up with another proton and with neutrons to form a helium nucleus. And about 1 in a billion would join with 2 other protons, ending up in the nucleus of a lithium atom.

We can compare this to what we observe today. Obviously, those elemental ratios have changed as time marched on. Much hydrogen has fused in stars to become helium. We know how fast this is happening, and so, if we trace back into the past, we can calculate the ratios these elements would have had 13.72 billion years ago. We find, to a high degree of accuracy, that the ratios predicted by the Big Bang theory (the science, not the show) correspond to the ratios that physical observations today tell us must have originally been there. The two calculations agree to a remarkable degree.

So how can you explain this complete correlation between the physics of a Big Bang and what is actually there today? If a creator did it without that superheated mass of the Big Bang, and he could have used a different ratio, why did he pick that exact ratio that the Big Bang would have created?

It is similar to the conclusion we reached at the start of this series where we saw that the earth is either many millions of years old or was created deceptively to look old. Ruling out deception, we concluded that the earth was old.

Similarly, if we rule out a God that deceptively made the element ratios such that they matched a hot Big Bang, then we are left with the conclusion that the elements came from the Big Bang.

A third verification of the Big Bang is the fact that we can see the background radiation from the Big Bang, exactly as predicted.

I won’t explore all the details of the Big Bang here. There are many sources with more details if you are interested.

A Universe from Nothing book by Lawrence M. Krauss. The Big Bang at NASA Spontaneous Creation of the Universe from Nothing He Dongshan, et. al. Quantum Fluctuations in Cosmology by Alan H. Guth

Big Bang Links

Could it be caused by nothing?

Our concern here is not so much the details of the Big Bang, but what caused it. What or who caused it to happen?

One obvious answer is, “God did it”. That is certainly a possibility.

Another answer is that “Nothing did it”. Wait, what? Yes, I said what I mean, maybe Nothing did it. Please note that I capitalize the word Nothing. For it turns out, in our universe, there is no such thing as a spot that is devoid of all forces, all energy, and all matter. Something exists everywhere, even if it is no more than the presence of certain laws of physics. So when I refer to Nothing, I am referring to the specific state of emptiness that is as close to true nothingness as is possible.

The emptiness of outer space is not truly a state of no-thing. For instance, there is that strange dark energy that permeates all of our universe. This dark energy acts in such a way that it tends to force the universe to spread out. Not only is this dark energy within our universe present at every point in space, but it appears to be everywhere, even outside our universe. As the universe gets larger, it contains more volume. Since dark energy is everywhere, the universe is constantly getting more total dark energy as it grows.

A strange thing happened as the universe grew and incorporated more dark energy. Dark energy now overwhelms the rest of the universe. In fact, the total dark energy in the entire observable universe is now 70 times the total energy in the familiar matter that we think of when we think of the universe.

Earlier, we said that the expansion of the universe had slowed down since the initial jolt of the Big Bang. But scientists have also found that, as more and more dark energy is being incorporated into the universe, and as this additional dark energy acts to accelerate the expansion of the universe, the universe is now accelerating. And as it accelerates, it incorporates dark energy even faster, and that makes it accelerate even faster. We keep going outward at faster speeds. Buckle up. We are off for the ride of our lives!

All that comes from the dark energy that inherently exists in all empty space. Empty space is not no-thing.

Not only is Nothing full of dark energy, but quantum mechanics predicts that Nothing regularly creates matter and anti-matter. And it turns out that, in every atom of your body, electrons and anti-electrons pairs are constantly bursting into existence, and then, almost instantly, annihilating each other. For that moment in time there is enough energy involved in this process to affect the energy state of atoms.

If we calculate the energy of atoms without taking these particles into account, our calculations are always inaccurate. But if we include these short-lived particles, we find our calculations reflect the actual energies of atoms to extremely high precision. Thus, they must really be bursting in and out of existence, just as quantum mechanics predicts.

So yes, even in empty space, matter and its evil twin, anti-matter, are constantly coming into existence. Most such particles quickly annihilate each other, but it is at least theoretically possible that some of them have continued to exist. The anti-particle could be swept into a black hole, while the particle itself lives on as a truly new something that came out of Nothing.

Yes, Virginia, in the cosmos there is indeed such a thing as a free lunch!

Similarly, at the Big Bang, we would have had these same quantum mechanics and all its weirdness at play. Quantum mechanics could have caused particles to come into existence.

In addition, we find that our universe in its earliest phases was experiencing a tremendous stretching of space-time itself, a period that we refer to as cosmic inflation. It was a brief period of time, far quicker than the blink of an eye. It lasted less than 10^-32 seconds.

As the end of this inflationary period approached, inflation stopped in certain spots quicker than other spots. It was as though those spots had suddenly become frozen and no longer participated in the rapid cosmic inflation that was going on all around them. This caused immense quantum effects in these areas that were dropping out of the inflationary expansion. The quantum events associated with this sudden stoppage could have caused untold billions of particles, both matter and anti-matter, to come into existence.

As the universe continued to expand and cool, these spots multiplied. It was like popcorn: slow popping at first, and then popping everywhere. Eventually inflation stopped completely, and we were left with a boiling broth of matter and anti-matter.

It appears that, for every 1 billion particles of matter created this way, there were also about 999,999,999 anti-particles. As the universe expanded and cooled, most of these particles found mating anti-particles and annihilated each other. But the bachelors, so to speak, lived on to become the universe as we know it.

As mentioned before, the plasma started at temperatures over 10 billion degrees C. How did it get so hot? It appears that, when quantum mechanics creates particles, they start with a velocity equal to their escape velocity. The escape velocity is that speed which is just enough that, if a particle left the brew, it could continue to infinity before gravity finally stopped it. Any slower, and gravity would catch up to it and pull it back down where it started. Any faster, and the particles would easily sail away, to infinity and beyond!

So, the particles were traveling very fast. Since temperature is simply a measure of the average velocity squared of all the particles, that means the brew was very hot.

As the state of this plasma dropped below 10 billion degrees C, the particles then congealed into atoms. These atoms later combined into molecules, then lumps, and finally into stars and planets.

It is possible that this interaction of cosmic inflation and quantum mechanics was much larger in extent than just our universe. Possibly, as our universe “froze” and no longer experienced this wild, inflationary stretching of space-time, all the rest of nearby space-time beyond our universe possibly continued to stretch. And events similar to the Big Bang could have then been happening all over that vast expanse of space-time. We call this a multiverse.

These events could have been separated so far that, if our entire universe were drawn as the size of a period on a map the size of our universe, the nearest neighboring universe might be on the other end of that map. And the total expansion of space time could be so rapid that even light could not possibly make it from one universe to the other. We would never be able to detect any of these other universes. For all we know, we might just be in only one of the possibly infinite number of universes that actually existed or will exist.

If there are many universes being created, they may all be different. They may actually have different physics. Some may be duds, quickly disappearing. Others, like ours, may expand to the point where they can support life. In the dud universes, there is nobody around to observe that space-time creates dud universes. In universes like ours, there are people that ask, “Why is there something rather than nothing at all?”

So, scientists agree that something could come from Nothing in a process similar to that described above. Quantum mechanics produces particles. Empty space itself is full of energy. And a universe that quickly decelerates from cosmic inflation, as our early universe has, could experience a major creation of matter due to quantum effects. All this could have created matter that would be at high temperature and fly rapidly outward to form a vast universe.

This was a brief introduction to the Big Bang. We don’t know exactly how it happened, but we are learning more about it all the time.

What caused the cause of the Big Bang?

For our purposes, we are not so much concerned with how the Big Bang happened, as we are concerned with the ultimate explanation for it. Where did quantum mechanics, cosmic inflation, and all other physical actions come from?

Perhaps quantum mechanics and cosmic inflation always existed. Perhaps it could not be otherwise. Perhaps these physical realities just keep on creating universes.

Or perhaps other physical forces caused quantum mechanics and cosmic inflation to begin. Perhaps there is a multiverse of multiverses. Perhaps there is some innate source of multiverses that is creating multiverses with different physics. These multiverses could be creating universes, each with perhaps distinct versions of the inherited physics of the multiverse they came from.

Ah, but what caused the source of the source of the source of the multiverses? What is the ultimate thing that drove this all? We don’t know. Perhaps there is an infinite series of causation that never ends. Or perhaps, at root, there is a circular causation where A causes B that causes C that causes A ad infinitum. Or perhaps there is some root cause of everything, A, that simply is, and could not be otherwise. Perhaps the root cause is nothing more than, “Things happen.”

Regardless of whether the root cause is a distinct something (A) or a circular something (ABC), an infinite regress, or things just happening, let’s call this root cause of any physics the first cause.

This first cause could either have a mind or not have a mind.

If it has a mind, how could that mind remember anything before there was any matter that can be arranged to save the memories? All memories we know of (brains, computers, books, etc.) consist of an arrangement of atoms that document things. How can a creator’s mind do this, if there is not yet any matter to arrange to preserve those memories?

If the first cause, the process that started it all, had a mind, we should probably call it God. If it didn’t have a mind, we probably should not call it God.

Did the root cause have a mind? Would it be proper to call it God? Ultimately, we don’t know. Hence, regarding God, I am agnostic.

The Problem with Nothing by Richard Carrier Multiverse Cosmological Models by Paul Davies Six Arguments that a Multiverse is More Probable Than a God by Richard Carrier Cosmological Arguments on the Secular Web. This has many counterarguments to the first cause argument. The God Impossible by Richard Carrier. This explores the question of how a mind could exist if there was no matter. Six Arguments That a Multiverse Is More Probable Than a God by Richard Carrier

Links about the multiverse and God

Is God knowable?

We could get into endless discussion of what or who is behind it all. But ultimately, it doesn’t matter. Even if a God exists, I find no way of knowing what He wants. I don’t find that the Bible or any book reliably tells us what God wants. And I don’t find that God speaks to us and tells us what he wants. So even if God exists, I have no way of knowing what he wants.

If it turns out the maker of the process that made our universe has a mind, is still alive, and wants to communicate with us, then yes, of course, I would love to be introduced. But as I find no evidence that such a being is communicating, I am not expecting to be contacted.

And besides, even if God did try to speak to me, how would I know it was God? Sure, something like a seemingly miraculous Internet feed could suddenly come through a wormhole in space, complete with unimaginable knowledge and the ability to do things we would see as miracles. Would that prove that the source created the universe? No. It could simply be a super-advanced space alien with powers far beyond human powers. How would we ever know it was the source of the processes that started the universe?

And for that matter, even if you went to heaven after you died, how would you know that the being in charge of this paradise in which you find yourself is actually the originator of the processes that made the universe? Could you prove that the ruler of your paradise was not simply a highly advanced space alien with amazing powers? You would not know. Even though this ruler of this paradise had a Scotty that had beamed you up to this paradise as you were dying on earth, how would you know that there is not actually somewhere a more powerful being than him? How would you know that there are not more powerful beings out there, who will eventually attack your paradise and conquer it? How could you be sure you are on the winning side?

And how would the ruler of this heaven even know that he was really the ultimate God? If a different, more powerful God existed in some other part of spacetime beyond his knowledge, how would he know? If he couldn’t know that which is beyond his knowledge, is it possible that within that “unknown unknown”, as Donald Rumsfeld might have put it, there was some being greater than him?

In summary, I find no convincing evidence that God exists. I find no evidence when I look at the present, at evolution, at the origin of life, or at the origin of matter. If God does exist, I find no way of knowing what he wants. And if someday a being claiming to be the omnipotent creator contacts me, I would have no way to know that he actually was the omnipotent first cause, the creator of all universes.

How COVID-19 Falsifies the God Hypothesis by Gary Whittenberger

other links

All of that is a diversion from the business of living life. We have all we need to make our own lives productive, to build meaning and purpose in life. If a powerful, all-knowing someone from space reveals himself, great, I will be first in line to ask to meet him and learn from him, regardless of whether he actually initiated our universe. But until then, I live my life based on the information I do have.

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We need to ask one more question before I complete this series. Some would think we are lost in hopeless despair without our faith. Are we lost without hope? I will finish this series by looking at hope.