SECTION FOUR. THE ROLE OF RELIGION.

Religions all involve a matter of faith. Most religions are a commitment to an hypothesis which goes beyond the bounds of reason. Religions that are worthwhile are those that utilize reason as best possible up to the point where a commitment is necessary. From this perspective of faith alone, science is a religion; scientists commit themselves to the hypothesis that there are discoverable orders in the world, knowing that many of those orders are yet to be discovered and will replace those believed to be true now. Science also has a faith that scientific method, however it is defined, will produce explanations that are understandable, that are theoretically believable and testable.

Traditional religions go further than science. There are two fundamental principles most religions entertain. The first is a promise that man is not alone in the world. The second is the hope that things will be better. These are simplistic and straight forward to the point of being viewed as trivial. Yet, close examination reveals that they are, indeed, important considerations. As we saw in examining the existentialist's position, man is forlorn, alone in the world. This is a terrible perspective to face for most persons. Religions assert that man is not alone and can never be alone. Further, the ugliness of the universe is softened by the promise that things will get better, either now or later.

The religious person is someone who can live with the ambiguity of competing explanations that knowledge produces while maintaining that there are meaningful explanations that go beyond testability. However, religions as theories are worthwhile when they are founded as much as possible on evidence which is testable. One serious misunderstanding of religious faith is to think that a particular religion is beyond testing. A good scientist will commit himself to the thesis that the world is ordered and understandable through certain hypotheses, but if research proves otherwise, he will change his hypotheses. Some may claim that religious faith need not be continuously tested for underlying or compatibility with know facts truth value. This is a mistake and can only lead those religions that depend upon such dogma down the path of dissolution. Moreover, persons who maintain a doctrine of "blind faith" leave themselves vulnerable to the vicissitudes of emotions that arise when questions which cannot be answered by blind faith are pressed. Faith, if it is to be meaningful and blind, must only be a toenail's step beyond the limit of current reasons or arguments.

Religion involves well-founded hope. That hope involves, as we have seen, a commitment to the hypothesis that man is not alone, that the world has value (if not some now, more later), and that there can be explanations that make sense even when they cannot be immediately tested. But, as one may see, God is not a necessary part of a religion, only a force of good need be. Thus, with respect to religion, we find strange bedfellows; scientists, poets, dancers, in fact, any persons who value reason and good will as approaches to dealing with the problems of the world, are all in the same category. There is a faith or well-founded hope that our rational powers can make sense out of the phenomena which we experience. Scientists have a faith that the world contains orders which can be discovered through the scientific enterprise, which they also have faith in that it works. Religious persons have very much the same faith save that God or some force of good is added to the picture to underwrite things should everything else fail.

Religion is the commitment to the passion of care of other persons and their ideas. God need not be involved, but in the history of western civilization, usually is. What is important is acknowledgment on a universal basis that it is imperative to care about other persons. At the root of all human intellectual enterprises (medicine, art, humanities, science), the rock-bottom concern is to discover how to make the world a better place for all persons, beings, and things in it. What this is to say is that religion teaches us that other persons are very important in the whole scheme of things. This factor may be why most religions are incompatible with egoism which demands that a person look after his own best interests categorically. That is to say, when the chips are down, an egoist will sacrifice the welfare of another for his (the egoist's) best interests. Religions, in general, indicate that such self-centered actions are morally wrong, for they are incompatible with the religious principles from which the moral codes derive.

On a more theoretical basis, religion tries to answer the fundamental question of teleological causality; is there an end towards which the actions of the world are directed? At the root of many religions is the premise that the world has an end which is good. The end is good because there is intelligence which has either created that good or is that good, or will create the good or become the good.

Here, I am of two minds. To claim that there is an objective good towards which the world progresses seems to involve a commitment to the hypothesis that God exists and is that good or has created that good. On the other side of the coin, to claim that there is in the future a real objective good seems to involve the hypothesis that God will become that good, for He is the world which will become that final end. The positions break down into the following distinctions. In case one, there is God who is distinct and separate from the world which He has created. He designs the world to end up in a state which is ultimately good. That final world state is separate from God. This view is compatible with most theistic philosophies. In case two, God and the world are the same thing. God is like a mysterious question which seeks an end the answer of which is created in the very quest. The final outcome depends upon what God --what the parts of the world-- do to become that end (the end can be good or bad).

My intuition/hope is for case one, but my gut feeling is that case two is the real situation. The world is advancing towards some end, and that end can be either good or bad depending upon what happens in the world. However, again, my faith is that there is a God who oversees the processes of the world and will ultimately prevail in making the world a good place. Saying this sounds very naive on a rational basis, for any person making such a claim must deal with the problem of evil, which we shall take up in the next section.

A bit more on my worries about faith. Faith seems to be a commitment beyond reason. As such, it goes beyond what is known, it leaves reason behind. The problems are multifold. One stickler is that if faith takes us beyond reason, it takes us beyond criticism. Going beyond criticism is dangerous. That is why, if we are to have faith in anything (be it a scientific hypothesis or a religious hypothesis), the faith cannot be but a mere inch beyond what we know. And, if what we find out indicates that the hypothesis we hold on faith is untenable, then we must change our belief. This is why the problem of evil is such a crucial problem for theists whose solutions are based upon faith.

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