What motivates the opposition to Apologetics in churches? In my
experience it's anti-intellectualism that's actually rooted in
communism. Communism has a wide appeal because it boils down to a
distrust of people in power and a fear that they are really oppressing
the rest of us. Intellectuals, academics, professors, etc. are people
who have great influence and therefore power.
What I often find is that the churchgoer opposes Apologetics for the same reason he opposes learning and education in general. This leads to preachers selling themselves as regular common sense guys when in reality they are leaders and therefore have power. Thus 2 Peter 1 may tell us that we should always pursue knowledge, our theologians will very liberally reinterpret this to mean getting to know Jesus and nothing else.
You might prefer to explain opposition to Apologetics as confusion and doubt created by evolution and geology that have opposed a very common interpretation of Genesis. But why are people so opposed to an old earth interpretation of Genesis? It's actually not unreasonable at all? Instead they say that this is compromise of the authority of scripture and bowing to modern science. But this is a ridiculous assertion. Augustine defended an old earth view in 350 AD.
It becomes clear all to fast that people don't learn because they don't want to. There is a distrust of authority figures. Since we can't avoid having preachers in churches, we end up with preachers who are anti-intellectual, at least in their presentation. In reality we want them to have studied, but they are only allowed to be knowledgeable about certain things.
Of course there's is an added issue. It's an old debate that appears to go back to the 1700's. In that era, John Locke was perhaps the most influential among Christian intellectuals. Rejecting the pure rationalism of De Carte, he opted for an evidence based apologetic, and defended theological rationalism. This is the view that you should never hold a religious view unless it's been proven true.
This was part of a movement called the Enlightenment which was mostly confined to France and England. It fizzled out in England and turned into the Revolution in France. In the 1800's, Germany picked up the movement and took it in a new direction. These thinkers embraced fideism, the leap of faith. They argued that you would have to be 90 years old before you would have learned enough to prove Christianity true. So they concluded that you cannot prove anything about it. You just make a leap of belief.
The thing is that this debate isn't an unreasonable one. Both sides have a valid point. It's incredibly dumb to believe in something when you don't know if it is true. But it's also dumb to think that God expects us to get multiple doctoral degrees in history, ancient languages, philosophy, physics, biology, psychology, etc. before we come to faith.
What people don't realize is that there are actually a number of ways these two sides can be reconciled. I will share my own, but there are others. Simply put, it is possible to know something without being able to explain it. I propose that people are aware of the apologetic proofs for Christianity, but cannot explain them. So often the arguments are based on philosophical reasoning. In other words, you already understood it, you just weren't so good at putting it to words.
Life is filled with things like this. Imagine something funny that happened to you. Now imagine explaining it to someone else. Yeah that will be pretty hard won't it? If the book of Romans is true, then everything in creation demonstrates proof for God's existence. The language in the first chapter of Romans implies that we all have a bird's eye view on the matter. If this is true, then we would be overwhelmed with so much evidence for God, that we won't be able to explain it. We would just know that God is real, and yet have no ability to explain it to anyone.
Fortunately, Christians have taken up this problem over the centuries since Paul wrote. And even when Paul wrote, there were already proofs for God's existence. The Greek and Roman world had already come to accept that there is one supreme God on the basis of arguments for God that they had developed. But their understading of the one God was all over the place. This led to later Christians like Augustine, Aquinas and( honestly a super long list) who not only worked to resolve the theology problems, they also developed the arguments for God. Christians have refined these and even found new ones. If what Paul says is true, then there would be no limit to the number of evidences for God that can be provided. The proofs we have so far would just be the tiniest fraction of the larger case God has provided for Himself.
What I often find is that the churchgoer opposes Apologetics for the same reason he opposes learning and education in general. This leads to preachers selling themselves as regular common sense guys when in reality they are leaders and therefore have power. Thus 2 Peter 1 may tell us that we should always pursue knowledge, our theologians will very liberally reinterpret this to mean getting to know Jesus and nothing else.
You might prefer to explain opposition to Apologetics as confusion and doubt created by evolution and geology that have opposed a very common interpretation of Genesis. But why are people so opposed to an old earth interpretation of Genesis? It's actually not unreasonable at all? Instead they say that this is compromise of the authority of scripture and bowing to modern science. But this is a ridiculous assertion. Augustine defended an old earth view in 350 AD.
It becomes clear all to fast that people don't learn because they don't want to. There is a distrust of authority figures. Since we can't avoid having preachers in churches, we end up with preachers who are anti-intellectual, at least in their presentation. In reality we want them to have studied, but they are only allowed to be knowledgeable about certain things.
Of course there's is an added issue. It's an old debate that appears to go back to the 1700's. In that era, John Locke was perhaps the most influential among Christian intellectuals. Rejecting the pure rationalism of De Carte, he opted for an evidence based apologetic, and defended theological rationalism. This is the view that you should never hold a religious view unless it's been proven true.
This was part of a movement called the Enlightenment which was mostly confined to France and England. It fizzled out in England and turned into the Revolution in France. In the 1800's, Germany picked up the movement and took it in a new direction. These thinkers embraced fideism, the leap of faith. They argued that you would have to be 90 years old before you would have learned enough to prove Christianity true. So they concluded that you cannot prove anything about it. You just make a leap of belief.
The thing is that this debate isn't an unreasonable one. Both sides have a valid point. It's incredibly dumb to believe in something when you don't know if it is true. But it's also dumb to think that God expects us to get multiple doctoral degrees in history, ancient languages, philosophy, physics, biology, psychology, etc. before we come to faith.
What people don't realize is that there are actually a number of ways these two sides can be reconciled. I will share my own, but there are others. Simply put, it is possible to know something without being able to explain it. I propose that people are aware of the apologetic proofs for Christianity, but cannot explain them. So often the arguments are based on philosophical reasoning. In other words, you already understood it, you just weren't so good at putting it to words.
Life is filled with things like this. Imagine something funny that happened to you. Now imagine explaining it to someone else. Yeah that will be pretty hard won't it? If the book of Romans is true, then everything in creation demonstrates proof for God's existence. The language in the first chapter of Romans implies that we all have a bird's eye view on the matter. If this is true, then we would be overwhelmed with so much evidence for God, that we won't be able to explain it. We would just know that God is real, and yet have no ability to explain it to anyone.
Fortunately, Christians have taken up this problem over the centuries since Paul wrote. And even when Paul wrote, there were already proofs for God's existence. The Greek and Roman world had already come to accept that there is one supreme God on the basis of arguments for God that they had developed. But their understading of the one God was all over the place. This led to later Christians like Augustine, Aquinas and( honestly a super long list) who not only worked to resolve the theology problems, they also developed the arguments for God. Christians have refined these and even found new ones. If what Paul says is true, then there would be no limit to the number of evidences for God that can be provided. The proofs we have so far would just be the tiniest fraction of the larger case God has provided for Himself.
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