Recipes for keeping belief honest

The earth is clearly not flat (thanks Christopher) and time, far from being constant, ticks relative to the observer (thanks Albert). These relatively new beliefs stack up well against observational data, so much so that we call them fact. But they’re really just beliefs like anything else. That the sun rolled around the stationary earth was universally held for millennia until Copernicus ellucidated his fully predictive mathematical model of the heliocentric solar system. A few dozen heritic matyres later and we all know better.

We may live in what we think of as scientifically enlightened times but for all our knowledge we’re still running the same hardware and operating system. We continue to have and act on beliefs in the absence of hard data or even despite it.  She truly loves me (I hope). My job is safe (today). UFOs are actually weather balloons (they said). Thalidomide is safe for unborn children (wrong). Beliefs continue to powerfully shape our world view.

And this is as it should be. We are not inflexible machines but adaptable, malleable and imaginative human beings. Love and faith and hope come naturally to us. This is something to celebrate. And it provides resilience and functionality. You see, we don’t have to wait for the facts. The absence of hard data is no impediment; imagination allows us to ride comfortably over bumpy ground.  Where a machine would pause for more and better data we plunge in, extrapolating on what we think we know and guessing the rest. Belief frames and guides our actions in the absence of complete knowledge.

Beliefs peek out from the river of information pouring over and around our conscious experience. They grow by snagging flotsam and producing about themselves wakes and eddies and turbulence. They are naturally self-enforcing because they affect that which we notice and fail to notice. If I believe (I don’t) that Jews are responsible for my country’s economic woes then whenever I read the Berlin Times I find corroborating evidence. If I am convinced that she is unfaithful then the betrayal I read into every situation poisons our relationship which becomes further proof of betrayal. If I believe that the stars influence my fate then the passage of Mars through the constellation of Scorpio explains why I just lost my job or made a new friend or won lotto. We find what we are looking for and we are usually unconscious of the back-of-house processes. Our brain is as much filter as memory stick and our beliefs and interests calibrate the filter.

Then there is the influence exerted by the communities to which be belong. Let’s say you believe a thing strongly. It’s only natural to gravitate towards others who believe the same – we are social animals. The gravity well of collective belief draws in more people of like mind until a new star is born (or a church or a club or a crime syndicate). Another’s convictions reinforce your own so that eventually the thing in your mind, rightly or wrongly, becomes an irrefutable and self-evident truth. You may have grown up where there were very logical reasons to burn crucifixes in the front yards of African-Americans or perhaps patriotism has you marching into war against all reasonable moral judgement. Cults gone wrong are just the obvious examples of harmful beliefs reinforced in closed communities of well intentioned believers.

You may have concluded by now that I am ranting against belief itself – but I am not. You see, I believe in all sorts of things and this is natural and good. Some of these things will turn out to be wrong but others (I hope) will prove rock solid. It’s just that I’m weary about unchecked or unaccountable belief. That brand of fundamentalism which actively cuts itself off from anything or anyone that might contradict. Close-minded belief disconnected from reason is as harmful as clinical reason disconnected from belief. I seek to strike a balance.

I don’t want to explore here the merit of holding particular beliefs but rather the extent to which we keep them accountable. We all have beliefs and they are important to our sense of meaning (without which we are lost) but some are wrong and others are outright harmful. Do we, or indeed should we, continuously test the veracity of a belief? Should we scrutinise it, holding it up to the light of logic and reason and fact or simply accept its unprovable nature and get on with the business of living?

In the final analysis a defence of ignorance is no defence at all. I hold we should be not only aware of our beliefs and the basis for them but should rigorously and regularly test their worthiness. This must be done if we are to avoid being blinded by them. This must be done if we are to spiritually and personally grow and mature. This must be done to find the truth because there is one to be found (though I admit this is a belief in itself).

The testing I speak of may begin as a simple internal objectivity. That is; turning your eyes inward and holding the belief at arms length – dissociating it from self long enough to treat it impartially. You ask the hard questions and stay open to the hard answers. This can be difficult if self is deeply tangled with a belief (as it often is) because it feels like heresy – you are potentially undermining all that makes you who you are.  A belief will protect itself when threatened.

If you’re game, a more intrusive form of testing a belief might involve actively seeking out a contradictory position. You might hold in your mind the opposite position and then play devils advocate to a belief. You might watch a film or read a book that represents a different view of the world and contrast it with your own. You might find people that disagree with you and have a frank and open discussion about your differences. This can be jarring and confronting and dangerous but if your belief is sound (so my theory goes), it will grow stronger as it defends itself. If the belief is not sound then it will quickly be overcome and your belief will change – which will produce spiritual or personal growth (or not).

Something in us instinctively avoids situations or ideas that challenge the beliefs we hold. It’s always unsettling to have the rug pulled out from under us. Our confidence is rattled when our precious paradigms are found to be false. So we form habits which insulate us from the discomfort of finding out we might in fact be wrong. The belief that the poor have the same opportunity as the rich - they just don’t work hard enough - is protected by the fact that we don’t really know any poor people.  We hold that the Bible is inerrant but we’ve never read or listened to any other point of view. We oppose a Muslim prayer house in the neighbourhood because we fear terrorism but we’ve never read the Quran nor do we have any Muslim friends. That Fox documentary proved that the lunar landings in the 1970s were faked and I won’t hear otherwise (how easy to prove otherwise)! We are not just lazy we actively obstruct facts that might challenge our precious beliefs. If we don’t recognise this and guard against it our beliefs will blind us from seeing the truth – the very thing we imagine our beliefs represent. The truth is out there but let’s not be so presumptuous and arrogant to think that we know it in its entirety. This life is a journey of discovery; an adventure packed full of surprises. We get to choose whether we push on and live or retire at the side of the road and die.

I know that all of this sounds very intellectual. In fact as I’ve been working through this topic personally that’s all it’s really been. To be self-credible it seemed important to me to be intellectually rigorous with my beliefs. And as described above I have through the years tortured my beliefs with questions to test their depth and dependability. I have tried to strike a balance between the fundamentalism of my Christian inheritance (it all began in the garden), scientific fact (the universe is 13.75 billion years old depending on how close you are to a gravity well) and the flexible reasoning (who’s to say God didn’t trigger the big bang) of 21st century western culture. I have been my own sceptic finding that I could happily hold two contradictory points of view whilst working out which was truth (or not).  I’ve tried to walk a line between reason and belief all for the sake of my own sense of intellectual internal consistency. This approach has had some major short-comings. The doctor did indeed take his own medicine but the medicine did not make him well.

If you’ve got this far you must be wondering where this discussion is going. This is a kind of internal personal dialogue I’ve been having now for a while. I wrestled with it for a month until the pieces started fitting together. And it wasn’t long ago that I reached a kind of conclusion which may or may not satisfy you. When the last piece clicked into place I found I was pregnant with a conviction that needed birthing in a blog sacrificially given to the world like an orphaned child. So here it goes.

My particular set of beliefs has the sovereignty and love of God for his creation squarely at its centre. I don’t remember a time in my life where I haven’t believed that God cares not just for the squirming multitudes of humanity but equally about little old dysfunctional me (that is he actually loves me). Reason has never needed to be far from my faith in God’s promises. The two friends sit easily side by side looking at the world quite differently but not incompatibly. They do however often compete for my attention.

I should first explain that faith and belief are (at least in my vocabulary) distinctly different animals.  Belief is what we think of as a reliable interpretation of that which we observe. Faith is courageously trusting in a promise. I once met a woman who 30 years ago worked for 20 years in a primitive and dangerous part of Papua New Guinea. She told me she went there in faith (a courageous decision in those days) but after repeatedly seeing God staying true to his promises came to believe in him deeply (heart-felt response). Hebrews 11:11 describes faith as being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. It is a vision of what will result from a promise and it demands a response. Faith is always connected to an action. Belief is more of a prejudice resulting in an interpretation – no action is demanded.

To live by faith is my end-goal and central to the teachings of Jesus (it actually produces righteousness). It is not as easy as it first appears because we are conditioned by life to be self-reliant.  A faith-life requires surrender of will which if you are anything like me comes at some cost.  But the reward is immeasurable in this life and the next. When you live by faith, and I only had a glimpse of this personally, there is a dynamic set up between the physical and spiritual realms. You find yourself becoming the out-working of God’s actions in the world. A faith-life is potent and unpredictable and effective. You feel the joy and the pain and the love and the sorrow and the brokenness that God feels for his creation. His values and yours are aligned. The terror of this repels and the awe attracts.

Why all this talk about faith? This dialogue is strictly not about faith. The faith connection is my personal revelation. You see, when one lives in faith he is testing belief all the time. It is not an intellectual test but a whole-of-life test. My faith in God’s promises is at the heart of my belief. As I act in faith, as I make the hard daily decisions on the strength of my conviction that God’s promises are true the outcome demonstrates the veracity of my belief. I don’t have to hold up the candle of reason as a counter-balance to my belief in God but rather I need to trust God and he personally validates my belief my fulfilling his promises (which by nature he must do). This is the way it’s supposed to be. To intellectually audit my beliefs or to attempt to prove their currency by dwelling on their opposites is intellectual masturbation with self squarely enthroned centre-stage. To act and decide to act because of the hope I have in God’s promises puts God centre-stage and at the same time vet the accuracy of my beliefs. Those beliefs which are false will be shown for what they are in the brilliant light of God at work through me in the world.

All of this is available free of charge and you don’t even have to be particularly smart. All you’ve got to do is come to Jesus like a little child full of hope and trust and openness and he does the rest - simple.

So I began by saying that belief is a necessary part of the human condition but unaccountable belief can blind us harmfully. I then played around with the idea that we can self-assess belief to keep it honest. Then I dismissed this in favour of a life lived in faith which has the belief-test process built in – no smarts required.

So live by faith not by sight and be prepared to have your world turned up-side-down. Pray the dangerous prayer – do with me as you will. And when the chips are down and all seems lost boldly declare in your heart (as did ancient biblical Job) “though he may slay me, yet I will trust him”. This is faith at work in a humble heart. This attitude will keep belief honest, enrich your life and at the same time will bring glory to God.