This question, which would have been considered scandalous a generation ago, is voiced openly today by such religious skeptics as Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris. Various spokespersons have responded with philosophical arguments and have engaged in public debate with leaders of the "new atheism" movement.
As a working journalist, I take a different approach. In my latest book, I travel to six countries in search of an answer to the question of whether faith makes a positive difference. Looking back on my experiences, I conclude that it does, in significant ways. The failures of the Christian church (Crusades, Inquisition, Salem witch trials) have been widely reported, and rightly so. I highlight instead its positive contributions, many of which go overlooked.
First, the Christian faith has an enormous influence on the broader culture. I remember my first trip to Sweden, soon after I had read historical accounts of the Vikings. For 250 years prayers in Europe ended with the line, "Lord, save us from the Vikings. Amen." Yet in modern Sweden I found a people known for charity, cleanliness, honesty and hospitality. What happened to change a culture from raping and pillaging barbarians to this admirable society? Christianity happened. It took several centuries, but gradually the moral principles of the Christian gospel percolated up to affect all of society.
If you Google the indices that measure prosperity, corruption and freedom, you will find that with one or two exceptions (notably Japan and Singapore), the nations that are most prosperous, most free and most resistant to corruption all have a strong Christian heritage. Though some of these nations, such as in Western Europe, no longer have a high percentage of churchgoers, all of them have their moral roots in a Christian past. The atheist government in China is well aware of this truth, and partly for this reason has gradually loosened restrictions on Christianity there.
Secondly, the Christian faith affects community. Visit New Orleans today and ask residents about their experience. They will tell you of the substantial federal aid that flooded in but then receded like an ocean tide. Today, however, you will still find church groups from cities nearby, like Houston and Dallas, as well as from distant parts of the U.S. who travel to New Orleans to continue the less glamorous and essential task of long term renewal. After 9/11, the Salvation Army provided a center of organized compassion in lower Manhattan. After the earthquake in Haiti, relief agencies like World Vision and Catholic Relief Services moved in, as they do after every major disaster.
My book includes chapters on Virginia Tech and on Mumbai, India, where I inadvertently found myself the day of the terrorist attacks there. At times of crisis, people instinctively rely on their faith for comfort and hope. On 9/11, my church spontaneously filled with people, even though no service had been scheduled. Where else can we turn in a time of crisis?
Finally, faith transforms individuals. I visited a conference of organizations that work with victims of human trafficking. There, I interviewed several score former prostitutes or "sex workers," the term they prefer. Far from the glamorous portrayals of prostitutes on television, sex workers in poor countries face hardship, abuse and degradation. One by one they told me of the transformation that took place as they experienced forgiveness from guilt and a dawning realization that God loved them despite their feelings of shame and humiliation. In a conference of recovering alcoholics I heard similar stories of reliance on a "Higher Power" to help battle unrelenting temptation.
It is always dangerous, of course, to rely on personal experience to establish truth. On the other hand, if ideas don't manifest themselves in the lives of people who hold them, what good are they? Growing up in the Bible Belt South, I saw my share of church abuse, the negative consequences of misguided faith. In a 40-year career as a journalist, I've also seen the opposite. Faith matters, especially by offering hope and comfort in times of trauma.
In the book, I tell of my own up-close encounter with death. When my Ford Explorer hit a patch of ice and tumbled off a Colorado road down an embankment, I ended up with a broken neck. For seven hours that day I lay strapped to a body board as doctors tried to determine whether a bone fragment had pierced a major artery. If so, I would not survive to see another day. "Here's a cell phone. You should call those you love to tell them goodbye, just in case," the doctor told me.
As I lay there, I concluded that most of what I spend my time worrying about matters very little. I gave no thought to how much money I make, how many books I sell, what kind of car I drive (it was being towed to a junkyard at that moment). I decided only three things matter ultimately: Whom do I love? How have I lived my life? Am I ready for whatever is next? Like others, I have found meaningful answers to those questions in my Christian faith.
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Like too many Christian apologists, this author lives in a fond world of half knowledge and wishful thinking. This prayer was not that of "Europe," which wasn't particularly afraid of the Vikings (who pillaged but did not rape, by the way,) but merely the prayer of the monks in the northern English monasteries, which were favorite Viking targets. The reason? Revenge for Charlemagne's massacre of the Saxons, on behalf of Pope Leo III's agenda of turning Europe into a Holy Roman Empire by means of fire, sword and, oh yeah, prayer. The Christianization of Europe amounted to a 500 year blood bath. Was it worth it? Most Europeans of today, bustling along past their empty churches, don't seem to think so.
To start with -- I am a Christian. That said, the author mentions older failures of the Church, as if the Church has not and does not fail in modern times. The sad fact is that it does. The following is painful to mention, but,
Faith has been the basis -- or excuse -- for hateful attitudes and hate crimes. Pastors proclaiming that Islam and its followers are demonic, faith-based inciting of hatred of gays, religious groups inciting hatred against health care providers for providing family-planning medicine. George Tiller, an abortion provider AND a Christian was murdered by a religious zealot as Tiller served as an usher in his church. Religious groups rejoiced.
The majority of Birthers questioning Obama's citizenship? Church-going conservatives. Politicians who want to eliminate Social Security and unemployment insurance? Church-goers and professing Christians. The group that supported torture the most? Conservative Christians. The main supporters of US wars of aggression? Conservative Christians. I asked one why he supported the Iraq War -- "We need to fight them there so we don't fight them here." When asked about innocent people hurt or killed as a result, he merely shrugged.
Faith transforms individuals? Really? What politics, what fruits of faith are seen in the conservative faithful today that excuses their hatred? It makes you wonder.
But wait: this hypothetical, completely non-violent, moral religion does exist. Only it's called Jainism, and predated Christianity by over 900 years.
Remove the "good" from the religious context, and teach it in it's own right. Community, charity and other moral issues are valuable, and attaching religion to them complicates them in unnecessary, complex ways. If a person suddenly becomes atheist should they stop sharing community bonds with others, stop charity works, stop doing "good" things? Of course not, because those things aren't inherently religious; religion was just the vehicle to transport basic morality, just as it transported basic history and "science." Now that science and history have been removed from their religious chains they flourish. I can only imagine how morality would bloom when removed.
Hola Arkage,
What do you mean when you say that science (history and morality included) flourishes? How something that doesn't exist can flourish? And, besides, what exactly means “to flourish”?
Aren’t all those, in themselves, religious notions?
1. To grow luxuriantly; to increase and enlarge, as a healthy growing plant; a thrive.
2. To be prosperous; to increase in wealth, honor, comfort, happiness, or whatever is desirable; to thrive; to be prominent and influental; specifically, of authors, painters, etc., to be in a state of activity or production.
See also: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/flourish#Verb
The simple answer is: becuase he chooses to be one.
The teachings of Jesus, not the wrongs committed by some followers, is what determined his decision to continue believe in God.
When he was in his worst situation - he turned to the teachings that related to things that really mattered in life.
This is why I continue to be a Christian, becuase it means something to me, not anyone else - it means something to me.
If Christianity is a delusion - it is a delusion I readily accept, and am fully content in.
How shocking that the people who were writing a book designed to convince people that the guy they followed was the perfect son of God didn't put anything in it about him being an occasional petty jerk, or intemperate, or rude, or dishonest. I'm shocked... shocked I say!
The truth is that it would have happened anyway as it HAS happened in many cultures before Christianity was so much as a thought in the minds of others.
This article turns out to be nothing more than a propaganda campaign for Christianity.
"Oooo look at how much Christianity has done for us."
No. Forcibly concentrating on the positive is NOT a valid argument for Christianity nor is it a valid argument for "God is Good" just as concentrating only on the negative is not valid for those going against Christianity.
You have to take it all as a whole. While the efforts in trying to put Christianity into a good light are grand, they are also completely faaaaaaar-fetched to say the least.
After reading this article, my view Christianity is even more destroyed than it was before because I realize a lot of what was written is pure nonsense if not questionable.
There is only one God who sent his son Jesus to die for and save us from our sins and the comng judgement. Yet it is His name alone that is a curse word. Why? Because we don't want THIS god, but one in our own image, our own imagination - ("no god" is part ot the imagination set) What could be more offensive to a sinner than to leave his sin,his imaginary gods or philosophy and ask for mercy from the real God?
No one ever gives their life to God when they are riding high, it's only when they are in the gutter when they decide nothing else worked, let's try this.
What good is god?
The question remains because you are answering, "What good is Christianity?"
If there is a god, then religion has not much to do with it.
I've seen individuals get transformed by religious superstition in horrifying ways. A good example is those people who use religion to justify murdering doctor.