The notion that there is no God is quite fashionable and somewhat prevolant these days in certain institutions and intellectual circles in America. And the idea that we are nothing more than a self-assembled collection of proteins with no underlying intent or design is taught in most of our schools now as scientific fact. Certainly a large percentage of the smart, hip, young, secular-educated crowd that comprises the majority of opinion on the blogosphere has been raised to hold nothing but contempt for both God and religion in general. At best, God is written off these days as a fairy tale for children and for those among us who cant deal with life and existence as it really is-a thing without purpose or intent.
And yet isn’t it ironic that these people who hold forth so strongly on the internet about their opinions on everything under the sun- life, politics, culture, war, and peace- these people strangely proceed and behave as though they and their thoughts and opinions ( and lives for that matter ) MATTER greatly even when the philosophy and worldview which underlies all their aguments demands that they DON’T matter in a life with no purpose, intent or design.
In a view of our universe where there is no maker, no design, no purpose, no intent, no spirit, and nothing sacred or divine, we MUST accept that all morality is but illusion and a pretension. What is the notion of right and wrong- of good and evil anyways, but a statement that THIS is how things are MEANT to be, whereas this other thing is NOT as it was intended to be. For without an appeal to a greater plan or meaning, what value can one act or idea possibly hold over another one. In a life where all conceptions are equally meaningless, how shall we say then that this is right and noble, or that this other thing is wrong or bad? And what is the value of a life anyways if we are just random matter flung about in a cold, empty, dead universe devoid of intent or design? A clod of dirt or a man- what’s the difference anyways? To live or to die, to kill or to be killed- it’s just re-arranging a few quantum particles to no particular end isnt it?
And if the sole meaning behind our lives is survival of the fittest, then what shall we say of the weak, the sick,the old, the disabled, the tired, the poor, and the simple? Those whom we labor for and care for and sacrifice for? Why should we bother? For what is their role in secular neo darwinism? Naught but Eugenics I suppose.
This philosophy of a Godless existence which we have so blithely accepted as a matter of fact in our schools and in our society is not a philosophy without consequences, for if we answer to nobody for our actions and for our life, and if we have no responsibility to each other or to a higher moral code than our own wishes and lusts, then we quickly see what becomes of a nation that founds itself on such things. We soon find ourselves looking around ourselves at situations, events, and at a way of life that doesnt seem to make sense, or to sit right with us- like the splinter in Neo’s mind. Life becomes unfamiliar to us somehow because deep down, we know that this thing or that other thing is not as it was INTENDED to be.
Deep down, we humans all have an innate frame of reference that is never able to be totally rationalized away. We KNOW that there is a meaning and a purpose to our lives, and intrinsic value in the lives of others- although we may find that meaning hard to grasp or understand or articulate sometimes. We also know deep-down what right and wrong are, and we know that the foundation of such concepts is NOT survival of the fittest. Rather we see the best that we can be as people in the polar opposite of darwinistic selection – in heroism- when a man or a woman devotes his or her life to serving others rather than themselves, and in the service and bravery of those who would lay down their lives for another. These are lives of signifigance that we hold up as examples for us to be inspired and guided by.
If you want to write off life and everything we are as meaningless, random, and without design or intent, then by all means go ahead and do so. But if you do, then I insist that you also don’t go around acting and writing as though the things you do and say in this life matter- because without a greater metaphysical meaning than random particle interactions and reproduction, everything you are is just meaningless dust in the wind and is therefore of no consequence whatsoever to me or to my valuable time here on this earth.
Deep down inside us all, sometimes hidden behind the walls of rationalization built in the mind, we know that there is a meaning and a signifigance, and a purpose to this life. We all know it -through our lives, our loves, our aspirations, our tears, our laughter, our joys, our sorrow, our losses, and our triumphs in this life. We see in our desires to act and to prosper and to labor and to create and to bring forth some good thing into this life that there is an intent and a design to this thing- that there is right and wrong- and that we are all part of a plan that is greater than us.
To not acknowledge a maker and a designer is to write off everything we know and love as nothing but quantum dust. That includes every aspect of our lives and thoughts, our families, the birth of our children, the death of a loved-one, home and hapiness, holidays and laughter, jokes and games, neighbors on the porch, education, all our life’s work and aspirations, competition, charity and sympathy, outrage and tragedy, righteousness and a seeking after justice, the notion of freedom and self-determination, sacrifice, labor and harvest, reaping and sowing, freindship, marriage, war and peace. To not acknowledge a greater plan or intent for our lives writes these all off to random particle interactions in the cosmic microwave radiation background.
If you doubt me, then try this experiment sometime- At SOME point in you life, even the most jaded and cynical of souls will be moved to tears by their experience with one of the above-mentioned concepts. On that day, when your moment of clarity comes, and you find tears of sorrow, or of gratitude, or of anger, or of joy streaming down your face-I want you to go on a walk on a crisp fall day when the gold and red leaves are falling around you and the smell of freshly cut grass and the first chill of coming winter is in the air. Listen to the sound of children playing happily in the distance, and smell bread or maybe warm apple pie baking somewhere. Do that and then tell me there is no God, no meaning, no design, no intent and no purpose in this life. I dare you. If, on that day, you can feel and experience all that and you have nothing in your heart that says any of it it matters or has purpose beyond natural selection, then I won’t argue with you anymore because you’ll never get it. I know there are people like that in this life, and I pity them, these walking dead.
But life is not just a solitary experience or a path we walk alone. Men’s greatest hopes, aspirations and acheivements are only possible acting in concert with other men united in a common goal or faith in a way of life with common metaphysical underpinnings. For this reason nations are brought forth among men- groups of people dedicating their lives and labors to a certain way of life, which to them, seems most harmonious with what they perceive to be a greater intent, purpose, or meaning for our time here for a while under the sun and sky. And among these nations is my nation- America, which I love.
To understand why I love America, you have to look at the ideas and charachter of the nation within the context of metaphysical meaning. The interstate highways and the amber waves of grain are NOT what makes America worthy of our love. But rather the ideals, and the principles that govern it, and underlye it, which make lives of signifigance and goodness possible to live.
Freedom and Democracy are not just words or another theoretical model of social governance. They are the ideas of a good, noble, and morally upright way of life that is how Americans believe God INTENDED things to be for men. I can’t put it much simpler than that. The idea that these metaphyical concepts are proper parts of a greater design and plan than our own is WHY patriots hold our nation up as being worthy of sacrifice and being worth fighting for.
The true idea of America is not a mere physical place or a collection of persons individually pursuing wealth- but rather is the living embodiment of great metaphysical ideas. It is the idea of intrinsic human worth, of the divine INTENT for human liberty, and the notion that every human aspiration should be free to figure out what God intended each of us be. It is the idea that each of us is able to see down our own proper path a little further than another can, and the notion that Governments are instituted among men to preserve liberty, not to rule us. If you don’t view America within the context of a greater metaphysical plan, then you simply can’t get the real meaning of it.
That lack of context explains to a large extent why so many are willing to let our nation slide into mediocrity and depravity- why so many are willing to let America stand idly by instead of leading in this world. It explains why some don’t see America as a shining city on a hill. Or as a light of hope in the darkness of this world.
Viewed in a godless, purposeless frame of reference, that’s all understandable. But I do see America in a greater metaphysical and spiritual context. And so do others. And that’s why we love her and why we love what she stands for. Not out of war-like boastfulness or competetive pride, but rather out of a love for the good things she has brought forth here on this sad, weary sphere of ours. I see the true spirit of America in every child’s lemonade stand, and in the purple ink that stains the finger of every sad, tired Iraqi citizen who thought that it was worth risking their life to go stand in line to vote. I see the true spirit of America in neighbors helping neighbors and in old men at the barbershop speaking their half-baked opinions on whatever they want without fear of government reprisal. I hear the true spirit of America lifted up in thanks to God for all he has given us, from the pews of ten thousand places of worship, and I see it in the flags that fly over the graves of our veterans who gave the last ounce of devotion and love for a metaphysical idea that is America.
Put simply, America is most properly understood within the context of God and his greater plan and intent for what humans can be if we follow that plan. Indeed, the Declaration of Independance basically is nothing but a defiant proclamation of what the founding fathers believed was God’s INTENT for Man. Read it and you will see that that is actually the case. It EXPLICITELY appeals to a higher justice and to a divine intent that man should be free. The whole nation and everything that it has brought forth since it’s birth therefore HAS to be viewed in that context to be understood. It was ALL built upon faith in a divine intent.Given that , it should come as no surprise that sometimes prayers lifted up to God for our nation capture and articulate the essence of America best.
I want to share two prayers for America with you. They were not written by me- I could never write anything so beautiful, but rather were uttered by two Americans ministers at two memorial services seperated in time by more than a century. Both prayers captured with a few words some of what is best about our country. One prayer was given at a time of great national and personal sorrow, and another at a time of celebration. But both were spoken out of thanks to God for what he has given us. Both ask for his blessing and lay out the reasons why we should expect to hope for that blessing, by expressing succinctly the purpose of America within the context of God’s greater plan. Both prayers also remembered those who made the ultimate sacrifice for a few metaphysical ideas that were deemed greater than the value of their own lives. Across so many years, and through so many trials and tribulations that this nation has been through, it is remarkable to note how much these prayers have in common.
The first prayer I want to share is one that was read by Major General Lorraine Potter, US Air Force Cheif of Chaplains, October 11nth, 2001 at the memorial service that was held to honor those who died in the 911 attack on the Pentagon.
” Let us pray. Almighty God, from the watchfires of a thousand circled camps, to the flames within the Pentagon offices, the World Trade Center, the Pennsylvania landscape… Our great land has known the brutal sounds and sights of war. The truth of Democracy, the truth of goodness found within this nation goes marching on. You destined our great nation to be birthed as a free land from sea to shining sea. We have taken our purple mountain’s majesty and made them a shining beacon of hope to a world in conflict. We have been inspired by your holy grace to use our amber waves of grain to feed the hungry of the world. We do not forsake our destiny now. We remember those who have now made sacred this hallowed ground by the sacrifice of their lives. Bless them and those who celebrate their lives and deeply mourn their loss. May the citizens of our nation be inspired by the devotion and service of our national leaders, and of all soldiers, sailors, and airmen, marines, coast-gaurdsmen and civilians of our military in the removal of terrorism from this world. May this and all nations be assured of our thoughtful seeking after Justice. Creator God we stand in the history of your presence within our land, assured that you do bless America today and into the challenges of the future. May our world see that you oh Mighty God, Jehova, are indeed in this place. God bless all those who serve the cause of freedom, and God bless America. ”
The second prayer I want to share was sung as a hymn at a service held on July 4th, 1847, to dedicate a monument that was erected at the Old North Bridge in Concord Massachussets to the memory of the farmers who died there and fired the first shot of the American Revolutionary War. It was written by my favorite poet and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson.
“By the rude bridge that arched the raging flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once embattled farmers stood and fired the shot heard round the world.
The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conquerer silent sleeps;
and Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.
On this green bank, by this soft stream,
We set today a votive stone;
That memory may their deed redeem ,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
Spirit, that made those heroes dare
To Die and leave their children free,
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee. “
The hearts that wrote those words and lifted up those sentiments to God on behalf of America spoke for me too, and were inspired by the same love I have in me for this nation, and for human liberty which she rightly stands for. I know I am not alone in that.
I’m sorry, I had to stop here, but tell me if you revoked this in a later part of the post:
“And the idea that we are nothing more than a self-assembled collection of proteins with no underlying intent or design is taught in most of our schools now as scientific fact”
That’s funny, I’m studying biology in college and no one’s ever taught me this. Could you be, perhaps, talking about a different kind of evolutionary theory? Why would people not created by some magic-man not have a purpose? I have a firm idea of getting a good dinner tonight (It’s Rosh-Hashana back here in Israel) – I’m practically SWIMMING in purpose.
I’m also an evolved ape.
Are you saying then, that intelligent design is being taught as a legitimate possibility for the explanation of life’s origins right along side darwinism in your class? If so, then that’s fantastic that the intellectual gestapo hasnt gotten to your corner of academia yet. If not- like it is in most universities- then my statement is correct. The curent dogma largely being shoved down everybody’s throats by the intellectual elites in academia is that life came about as a natural, physical process unguided by a designer. That is to say that the constituent particles of the universe left over after the big bang SOMEHOW managed to congeal and arrange themselves together over the millinea with no intent or design from any outside intelligence to form self-replicating DNA, the millions of lines of coded programming it contains, and all of the specific complex information that translates itself into physical structures like the human brain. That IS the current dogma.
To specifically answer your question, about why something that was not created would not have a purpose, I would refer you to Webster’s dictionary, which defines purpose as “something set up as an object or end to be attained.” It lists as it’s synonym “intention”, and the origins of the word are the anglo-french term for “to intend or propose”. Literally, by definition then, “purpose” means intent and design. If there is no intelligence that INTENDED or DESIGNED who and what we are, then there is literally NO PURPOSE possible for us. The metaphysical consequences of that scenario would be that right and wrong, good and evil, morality and conscience are without meaning, because there would be no intent, design, plan, or PURPOSE to act as a frame of reference FOR these things.
I hope you have a great dinner and enjoy the holidays, the love,the laughter, your freinds, and your family. But just consider the implications of your worldview as pertains to these things. If we really are just a collection of random particles with no purpose, then none of those things has any meaning. A pile of rocks or a human life- in a designless universe, there is no particular difference, and as I said later on in the essay you couldn’t be troubled to read, we must accept that all morality is but an illusion and a pretension. That is the philisophical bed you have made- are you prepared to lay in it? Godless worldviews have serious consequences and implications when you extrapolate those theories out to their logical ends. I hope you’ve thought this through, my freind. Best wishes. – Ty
I see your reasoning as solid. Your writing shows a lot of reading you’ve done. I especially like what you posted in the “How to Stump Anti-Abortionists” recently.
Ty, I just found your blog after I read your thoughts on the thread of “how to stump an anti-abortionist with one question.” Love your reasoning. I haven’t had time to look into any other of your posts, but I wanted to ask if you do this as a side hobby, or if you have a career in the sciences? Sorry this comment doesn’t have anything to do with this post. Thanks a lot. Keep up your work.
-Elrond
Master Elrond- Thanks for the kind comment. I do not have a career in the sciences, as my life took some interesting twists and turns in my early twenties that took me down a different path. I may be looking to change that soon though. That path really does call to me. Maybe it’s not too late.- Ty
PS. Give Lady Arwen my regards. I hear the mallorn trees are lovely in Rivendell this time of year. Now that I think about it, Tolkien had a line that I think applies to America’s current situation as well as it did to that of Minas Tirith’s…
“It is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succor of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till. What weather they shall have is not ours to rule.”
I am not pleased with what we are handing down to the next generation. It’s certainly not what we were given.
Matt, thanks for the attaboy. It’s a rough ol’ blogosphere sometimes, and I’ll take any encouragement I can get!- Ty
Ty,
Thanks for your response on the “How to Stump…” post. Sorry for posting here but I can’t deal with the # of posts there. I appreciate that you seem to defend your position with reason rather than emotion. If you’re interested in continuing the argument, please drop a line to dave at hellsquid dot com. I’m trying to catch up on all your posts right now…
Davux- Hi. I try to be reasonable, but do get as emotional as the next guy sometimes. Especially when I hear people debating so cavalierly about whether or not a human life should have any value or rights. I do have a hard time keeping my cool as I listen to people yammer on about trimesters and fetuses and a woman’s “choice”. Spreading your legs is a choice too, I think. Some things really arent up for debate, and whether an unborn child has a right to his or her own life is one of them as far as I am conscerned.
Obviously, the fact that I was given up for adoption as a baby by a biological mother that I have never met makes me just a LITTLE BIT sensitive to the idea that some people would have terminated me instead if they had their way, ( and HAVE sucessfully terminated millions of people just like me before they had a chance to live the life I was blessed to have.)
Nancy Pelosi was just telling George Stephanopolus yesterday that the hundreds of millions of dollars she put into the 850 billion dollar “stimulus bill” for “family planning” is justified because not having those unwanted children constitutes a budgetary savings. What a statement!!! The whole thing is just an unmitigated outrage and an affront to all that is good and decent.
I don’t really want to get into semantics and arguments that most people use to frame the debate as to when a fetus becomes a baby, because it doesnt MATTER to me. Whatever it is, it will become a human life if you will just leave it alone. My life wasn’t “planned”, and I could have had my brains sucked out and had my body thrown in the trash for the sake of convenience or budgetary savings ( !!!), but somebody decided that my life has value . And they were right. I do have value, and so do the unborn for whom I speak now. And I don’t care who agrees with me or not. I’m right.
The whole abortion argument all comes down to what value you place on a human life- nothing more, nothing less. And without a common frame of reference based on a morality and a metaphysical PURPOSE for humanity beyond mere survival of the fittest darwinism, there seems to be no context or common point of reference for any relevant discussion on this matter. -Ty
I’ve a dozen thoughts at the moment, but I’ll choose this one: So, you were fortunate enough to have found adoptive parents after your birth mother, for whatever reason, gave you up for adoption … and that justifies the millions of babies born into the world with no hope whatsoever of having anything approaching a life worth living. I don’t get it.
I see…
And just who exactly are YOU to decide if a person’s life is worth living or not?
Hypothetical question…If all the tens ( hundreds? ) of millions of babies who were never given a chance to live because of legalized abortion could somehow be brought to life today and given the opportunity to say what they think of their fate and to say whether they would have liked to have had the chance to live or not, of these, how many of them do you think would thank their mothers for having spared them a life “not worth living”?
It’s pretty easy for you to throw away somebody ELSE’S life with a blithe “oh, you wouldnt have wanted that life anyways…”, but that’s because we arent talking about YOUR life right? YOUR life has value, but all of these aborted babies lives would not have been worth the bother I suppose?
Of all of the millions of unborn babies that have been terminated here in America- the wealthiest country ever to exist with the greatest opportunities of any society since the dawn of human civilization- what percent of those canceled lives would you say had no chance of anything approaching “a life worth living” if they HAD been allowed to live?-even if they had been put up for adoption as a baby as I was? How many of those lives would have been worth living Mary? Was MY life worth living in your eyes? Would it have been better if I had been terminated? Why is my life any more or less valuable than all the lives you ARE willing to cast away as “not worth living”?
When you speak of these children’s lives that might wind up being “not worth living”, you are talking about ME. What gaurantees did I have of how it would all turn out when I was abandoned out into the world? There ARE no gaurantees as to how a person is going to turn out or what value they might wind up having, or what they might do with their life. You have no idea how it may work out. Who are you to decide for them whether to live or die?
Somebody chose to give me a chance to live – a chance to roll the dice and see what comes of it. Life may not have always turned out to be a bed of roses, but I appreciate very much the chance to have been here anyways.
Who are you to take that chance from somebody else?
Lets be honest shall we? Most babies that are terminated in this country are done so for the convenience of the mother- not to mercifully spare these children the hardship of living a life “not worth living” here in America the prosperous. Let’s call a spade a spade and judge it for what it is, not what the American left chooses to couch this genocide as to assauge their guilty consciences.
It’s pretty arrogant to say you are doing somebody a favor by killing them to keep them from having a life not worth living wouldnt you say? If that is truly your conscern, then why not let the child make that decision about their own life? If they are allowed to live and they later find their life is NOT worth living, then I suppose they still have the choice of suicide right? If life really does turn out to be so terrible, nobody can force them to stick around if they dont want to.
Of all those millions of children who were denied their right to life because they were too inconvenient, I was one of the ones who escaped their fate. I slipped through the cracks somehow. I speak for those others now because they have no voice. On behalf of the silent leigons of the murdered unborn I say to you that life IS worth living. Life DOES have value.
Don’t do us any more favors please by sparing us a life not worth living…
Mary- Sorry if I sounded snippy in the previous comment, but this isn’t the usual abstract, subjective argument about politics or the semantics of philosophy. We are talking about the brutal and involuntarily termination of hundreds of millions of human lives here- ie. mass-murder and genocide. This is about the value of a human life- nothing more and nothing less. It just insn’t one of those situations where I am willing to agree to disagree, nor am I going to mince any words, pull any punches, or countenance any liberal rationalizations about how we are doing the unborn a favor by sparing them “a life not worth living.” I’m calling you and everybody who agrees with you out on this one.
It’s not your place to make that choice about somebody else’s life.
Sincerely, Ty