Value for faith

• Henry Price

  • Middle ground faith and reason
  • 'Interested' and 'disinterested' belief in God
  • 'Belief in'
  • 'Belief that
• Interested' belief in God

  in the sense that believers benefit from belief
• Disinterested' belief in God

  the sense that God's existence is intrinsically good
• Belief in'

  • an attitude of commitment and trust
  • people who have no religious belief tend to trivialise this
• Belief that'

  • Acceptance of propositions about something
  • No value in belief that it is indifferent
• Pope John Paul II

  • "Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth"
  • minimising the importance of faith/reason reduces our understanding of the truth

  
• Metaphysical


  Beyond the physical
• Faith

  "the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen"- Hebrews 11:1
• Fideism


  using reason to justify faith is inappropriate. Only faith gives certainty, personal experience leads to absolute conviction about the reality of God
• Problems with fideist approaches

  • irrational extremism
  • no meaningful debate with non-believers
• The Great Pumpkin


  • Linus believes every year that the Great Pumpkin will appear
  • Example of faith

  
• Faith and reason

  • supported by Natural Theology
  • Allows theologians to speak meaningfully about god with rational observation
  • Roman Catholics support
  • Some of the CofE support
• Process Theologians

  accept that God cannot eliminate suffering as he is not omnipotent
• Deists


  • God created the world then stepped back
  • What happens to the world is human responsibility
  • No religious experience, revelation, scripture, personal revelation