Conclusion
So in the end, I think I've been a little sneaky in this apologetics. Sneaky in the sense that I have not tried to really argue for the existence of God in the traditional sense of making up some kind of proof to the end that God exists. I have rather, in a kind of roundabout way, tried to show that belief in God is basic to many of our most basic encounters with the world. I'm showing you that at times, whether you believe or not, you act, and feel, as if you believe.
In the end, we are stuck with the basic questions that started the journey: is life really an adventure? Am I at one with the whole of things? More precisely: is fundamental vulnerability a fact of life and is it a good thing? Our deepest, most affective experiences may be nothing more than illusions, lies we have to live to make it through a hard life. But Charles Pierce once said you should never doubt in your philosophy that which you sincerely believe in your heart. I cannot, for one, live one way and believe another. To do so creates in me a cognitive dissonance that leads only to despair and angst.
I have lived long enough to know that vulnerability is kind of the key to everything. Living a full life means learning to come to terms with, and navigate, vulnerability. Yet vulnerability and our ability to navigate it is very tricky indeed. There is a strength that hides weakness, and weakness that exists as a kind of strength. Any attempt to show the reasons for belief in God that tries to side step this vulnerability undercuts truth, and I continue to be committed first and foremost to the truth.
Humor, play, vulnerability, meaning, the moral quest, beauty...these are fundamental to my very existence. More than that, they are everything that makes life worth living. I can pretend to be some 'strong person' who can live with lies when necessary and put them aside when they are not. But that is not me, and being honest about that is the most rational thing a person can do, I think.
Is it you? In your heart, are you that boy I spoke of in Part 9, pretending to the world to be some mature adult who knows that his deepest desires have no satisfaction in life, but really hiding the fact that you do, in fact believe. Apologetics, when done honestly, admits of uncertainty, because life simply is uncertain. This project was more about giving permission to believe, about asserting what William James called 'the right to believe.' That is as far as this kind of project can really go. The pretense to certainty is a way of undercutting the adventure which was supposed to be the entire reason why we care about this religion stuff in the first place. I am a Christian because I believe that the Bible, understood properly, helps us see the world as it is: a place of both goodness and risk, a place where we can embrace all we are and be true to ourselves and the brute facts with which the world confronts us.
Despite all that, let me end with a bold statement: I truly believe that religion, in the end, is the more honest path, simply because it engages the fullest range of the human experience: both internal and external. It is about bringing together ALL we know: about ourselves and about our world. But I do not think I can prove that statement true. But I can, I think, argue that it is rational to accept it. If I've done that here, then I've accomplished much. I tried to make my case, and that is really all anyone is required to do. You state why you believe what you believe, you give your account, and then leave the argument out there for people to evaluate on their own. In the end no one is the final arbiter of your place as a rational agent besides you and God.
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