Yeah, but, no...

[jainakay]

This article has been cross-posted to my website.  Read it there!

Lately I have been painfully aware of well-meaning Christians who genuinely believe that we still live in a Christian nation, and/or that we were founded by Christians or under Christian principles. This breaks my heart, for I wish it were true... but it is not. Let me give you an

Comments

[jainakay]

I meant to imply that it was a taint insofar as it resulted in the rejection of anything that sounded supernatural without applying those very same rational methods it brought us.

While the Enlightenment has given us more in the way of scientific and logical developments than just about any single period in human history, I take issue with the immediate rejection of anything that could not be rationally explained away as impossible. Just because we cannot explain something with our current understanding and knowledge does not make it impossible - apply those same principles to the years before the enlightenment and you'll see what I mean. Surely lightning really exists whether or not we have figured out exactly how it works! Just because we don't understand it doesn't mean it's not real. The Enlightenment approach to faith has tainted years of Christian theology, even for those who rejected deism. Now, there is this need to prove everything empirically, and while I think that is essential for the sciences, and even for some aspects of Christian faith, there is a deeper knowledge than simply mental assent that is involved in matters of faith, and it does not lend itself easily to rational methods. I don't mean to imply an esoteric knowledge - just something that is known with one's whole self, not just the mind.

I suppose the best way to put it is that yes, the Enlightenment brought us reason and the scientific method and more useful and good and worthwhile things than we could ever have dreamed of having before. But in so doing, it rejected some other aspects of human understanding that involve much more than pure reason, and that is a real shame.

Re-reading what I wrote, I can see how you misconstrued what I was trying to say; I hope this clears it up for you! Thanks for keeping me accountable, and if this still doesn't sit right with you, let me know! You've already made me think through this more thoroughly than I had been doing, and that's always a good thing.