Intellectual Cowardice

It hit me recently that I am an intellectual coward. That is, I often avoid confronting things I disagree with. For quite some time I thought this was a weakness. But recently it occurred to me that it is good to recognize weaknesses and what they imply.

Part of the reason I’ve come to this conclusion about myself is due to listening to a podcast called Ear Muffins. Both of the podcasters were formerly Christians, and both have left their faith.

Both of them have podcast about their journey away from faith. One, named Rhett, went into considerable detail about how his intellectual doubts, starting with evolution, moving through questions about the truth of Old Testament accounts and so on, led him to a place of intolerable pain and conflict, to the point where he could not continue to believe Christianity.

Rhett described his former faith as genuine. Actually this was the most alarming thing about what he said, because he talked about a genuine encounter with God. I was reminded of the passage in Hebrews:

For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt.

(Hebrews 6:4-6)

If he really had the kind of experience described above and then fell away, the prognosis is not good.

There have been a number of other “high profile” Christians who have abandoned their faith in the last few years. These people had considerable influence and name recognition. (The most discouraging one, from my perspective, is Gungor. He went through a phase where he “fully embraced atheism” but now has, according to some, “found his way back to God.” But that turns out to be in the guise of Buddhism. Not sure where that leaves him with regard to Jesus Christ.)

One thing that they all seem to have in common is confidence in their own ability to tease out truth, or authenticity, or whatever. (Gungor, for example, says, that he and his fellow musicians “always tried to stay true to what’s happening in our hearts at the time of recording a record.”) Here’s where my intellectual cowardice comes to the fore.

People think I’m pretty smart. But because I’m above average in this area, I find myself living in an intellectual atmosphere where many other smart people live.

It’s like if I were good at basketball, and I went out and played street basketball a lot. Unless I was NBA caliber, I’d doubtless run into a lot of players better than I am, simply because I would be exposing myself to that environment. In the same way, I constantly read books by people who are smarter and harder working than I am. If I were to take these people as authorities I would be “tossed about and carried by every wind of teaching”.

Instead, I distrust my heart. I distrust my mind. I don’t consider myself as able, by my own faculties, to figure out the details about all the critiques of the faith.

Of course I think, and think a lot. I also feel, meditate, read, listen to music, read and write poetry, and so on, and all these things give a perspective on reality. And sometimes those perspectives are fruitful. Other times they are dead ends.

But I no longer look to that kind of thing to guide me into all truth. My reason and knowledge can be inaccurate and incomplete. My emotions can lead me into dead ends. My intellectual activities can pull me away from fellow believers who cannot enter into them. All these faculties, given by God, can become enemies of God if I let them stand over against God.

I’m reminded of a song called “Smell the Color Nine” by Chris Rice. The chorus goes something like this:

I can sniff, I can see, I can count up pretty high,
But these faculties aren’t getting me any closer to the sky,
But my heart of faith keeps pounding so I know I’m doing fine,
But sometimes finding you
Is just like trying to
Smell the color nine.

(Voices in the background:
Voice 1: Nine’s not a color, and even if were you can’t smell a color.
Voice 2: That’s my point exactly.)

Does this mean I’ve given up on reason? Or aesthetic or moral intuition (i.e. truth, goodness and beauty)? No! Rather, I have a firm foundation for all of them in the One who is the truth, who alone is good, who is glorious.

So any line of reasoning, any moral critique, or even any aesthetic experience, no matter how compelling, does not lead me away from that foundation. Because I know that if some experience leads me away from Jesus, it undermines the very basis for thinking that the experience has meaning and tells me something about reality.

It really is “credo ut intelligam” — I believe in order to understand. Without faith I have no real basis for finding meaning or truth in anything. At least, these things must be purely subjective, having no grounding in anything outside myself. E.g. “Point at a meaning for me, so I can know what one is.” “Show me a true idea.” Show me beauty — no, not a beautiful thing, but beauty itself, as an objective reality.”

None of these things make sense unless I trust the one who speaks all of these things into being.

That doesn’t mean that I don’t think about things that challenge my faith. I just don’t do it too much, because it’s a dead end. If Jesus is “the way, the truth and the life”, then anything that points away from him points to confusion, lies and death.

Nor do I place confidence in my ability to distinguish true and false ideas on their own merits. I’ve been wrong many times and being wrong in this area could have really serious consequences.

No, I will not step off the edge of that cliff. Instead, I remain cowardly and trust in the one who is strong on my behalf.