The Decline of Faith


	Seed Newsvine

Remarkably, there is no good definition for the concept that the vast majority of Americans claim to possess, namely "faith." The most common definition of faith found in dictionaries and encyclopedias is that faith is "a belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence." Some definitions; however, go much further and claim that faith is not only a belief in the absence of evidence but also a belief in spite of contradictory evidence. As we will see, this is a radically different concept.

The most commonly understood conception of faith held by Christians adds yet another component. The Christian concept derives from the story of Thomas after the resurrection of Jesus; a.k.a. "The Doubting Thomas." Thomas was the Apostle who refused to believe Jesus had arisen from the dead until he was given the opportunity to put his fingers in Jesus' puncture wounds. The Gospel of John quotes Jesus as saying "blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed" (John 20:26-29). Thus, for Christians faith is simply believing without the need for evidence.

The problem with this view of faith as well as the belief without the need for evidence definition is that it depends on the belief to actually be true. If I did not watch the Super Bowl (absence of evidence) and I believe the Giants won the game I have faith in the Christian sense of the meaning. However; if I believe the Patriots won the game I do not possess faith. I possess ignorance. If we extend the analogy one step further to include that broader definition of faith mentioned above my ignorance gets compounded. If I believe the Patriots won the game in spite of contradictory evidence (I watched the game) what is it that I have? I watched the game. There is evidence that the Giants won yet I continue to believe that the Patriots won. Am I faithful? I'm certainly not ignorant since I did watch the game. The best thing that can be said about me is that I am a fool.

Thus, we come back to the original definition of faith; namely a belief in the absence of evidence. This is where the problem arises for the peoples of the book (Jews, Christians, Muslims). There is overwhelming evidence that the accounts of the origin of humanity depicted in the Bible are false. There is overwhelming evidence that the human species has changed since it first materialized on the planet. There is overwhelming evidence that the Earth has gone through many cycles and that humans were not the first species to inhabit the planet (if dinosaurs existed you cannot believe in the Genesis version, even allegorically, without being a fool.

To believe that God placed an unchanging man on the planet is even tougher to swallow. At the simplest level the average American male was 5'8.1" tall in 1800. By 1950 he was 5' 9.7" tall. I could go into a myriad of explanations for this but they all indicate that man has changed (evolved) in a very measurable way. This is evolution! What excites scientists is not this fact but the myriad of explanations. (If you want to deny evolution, then feel free to dispute these numbers).

There has been a rash of polls taken measuring both people's belief in God as well as their understanding of scientific principles (usually unrelated polls). About a quarter of the American population is unaware of even the most basic natural truths (i.e. the Earth revolves around the Sun). It is one thing to know about the theory of evolution and believe it to be false verses simply not knowing about the theory at all. The latter are not faithful, they are ignorant. The former are just fools.

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