What actually happened made all the difference

I'm reading Mark D. Roberts' new book, Can We Trust the Gospels? As a former teacher of history, but someone without any formal training in Bible, I find it very convincing. I recommend it as a very accessible source of information about the historicity of the primary documents of the faith.

At one point [pages 120-121] he says this about Matthew, Mark, Luke and John:

They, like the vast majority of Jews before them and Christians after them, believed that what actually happened made all the difference in the world. It was in the realm of history that God made his presence known, revealing himself and his salvation. Therefore history wasn't inessential. It was at the heart of the evangelists' theology.

In this regard the Gospel writers were quite similar to the apostle Paul. In his first letter to the Christians in Corinth, Paul dealt with the view that resurrections, including the resurrection of Jesus, don't happen. Here's what he wrote:

If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in vain. [I Cor. 15:13-14]

In other words, it isn't nearly enough to regard the story of Jesus' resurrection as an inspiring fiction, or a symbolic rendering of some historic reality. Paul said, "If Christ has not been raised," in space-time reality, then Christian faith isn't true. What happened to Jesus has everything to do with theology.

Christianity is rooted in events that actually happened. If they didn't happen, if it's all just a nice story, then it is false. If it didn't happen, it doesn't matter.

There are those who demand proof, in a scientific sense, that the events occurred. Proof, in that sense, isn't available for any event in history. Things happen, and are past. They are unique and, although the sciences may have something to say about them, they cannot be proven the way experiments in a laboratory may make a conclusion increasingly likely. Later in the book [p. 135] Roberts makes this point [an observation any student of history will recognize]:

Reasonableness and proof are not the same thing, however. There is no way I can prove that Jesus actually did miracles or actually rose from the dead. Nor can anyone prove that he didn't, for that matter. History doesn't allow for such proof, but only for contingent knowledge based on evidence, probabilities, and reasoned argument.

We rely on that kind of knowledge for most of what we know. Mark Roberts makes a good case that the Gospels can be relied on, not just for theology, but for what they say about history.

He is posting some of the material from the book at his blog.

"What liberal media?"

Mollie Hemingway at GetReligion on a study of the political attitudes of reporters:

MSNBC investigative reporter Bill Dedman had an obvious but interesting story looking at political contributions from journalists. He found that reporters gave to Democrats and liberal causes nine times as frequently as Republican or conservative causes:

MSNBC.com identified 144 journalists who made political contributions from 2004 through the start of the 2008 campaign, according to the public records of the Federal Election Commission. Most of the newsroom checkbooks leaned to the left: 125 journalists gave to Democrats and liberal causes. Only 17 gave to Republicans. Two gave to both parties.

...Why should reporters check their citizenship at the door? The test of whether this lack of diversity is a problem is not a listing of statistics about who gave what — it’s whether each reporter’s politics affect the quality of their journalism. I have worked with extremely liberal reporters — socialists, basically — who I would trust to report and write any story out there. A good reporter is a good reporter.

The reporters I worry about are the ones like Linda Greenhouse, the New York Times’ superstar Supreme Court reporter who thinks her extremely liberal views are not opinions but facts. I’ve worked with that kind of reporter, too. The arrogance and ignorance implicit in such an approach is what’s wrong with mainstream media. And reporters are insane if they don’t think readers and viewers pick up on that vibe. .... [more]

What liberal media? » GetReligion

Legalism

Between Two Worlds calls attention the following about "legalism" at Reformation Theology. The errors described are common in the Christian world, but it may be that those of us who are a distinct minority in our belief about some aspect of the law are especially vulnerable. C.R. Biggs quoting and commenting on Dan Doriani:

The point he makes about "class-four legalists" is that they have the correct teaching, but that they make the correct teaching oppressive without the love of Christ and his fulfillment of the Law as foundational to all of their preaching. This is helpful for preachers, teachers, as well as all Christians when sharing and living the gospel with others.

Prof. Doriani writes:

• Class-one legalists are auto-soterists; they declare what one must do in order to obtain God's favor or salvation. The rich young ruler was a class-one legalist.

• Class-two legalists declare what good deeds or spiritual disciplines one must perform to retain God's favor and salvation.

• Class-three legalists love the law so much they create new laws, laws not found in Scripture, and require submission to them. The Pharisees, who build fences around the law, were class-three legalists.

• Class-four legalists avoid these gross errors, but they so accentuate obedience to the law of God that other ideas shrivel up. They reason, 'God has redeemed us at the cost of his Son's life. Now he demands our service in return. He has given us his Spirit and a new nature and has stated his will. With these resources, we obey his law in gratitude for our redemption. This is our duty to God.' In an important way this is true, but class-four legalists dwell on the law of God until they forget the love of God. Worshiping, delighting in, communing with, and conforming to God are forgotten.

Class-four legalists can preach sermons in which every sentence is true, while the whole is oppressive. It is oppressive to proclaim Christ as the Lawgiver to whom we owe a vast debt, as if we must somehow repay him - repay God! - for his gifts to us.

Reformation Theology: "I've Been Reading...": Quotable Quotes from Excellent Books, Issue 4- C.R. Biggs

Forget reinvention

The interview in the post below took place at a conference by "Na" which stands for "New Attitude" and that attitude is "humble orthodoxy" which they explain on their site:

Humble orthodoxy is a commitment to believing, living, and representing the truth with humility. We believe that God's truth in Scripture should not be redefined or reinvented to suit our own preferences or culture. Our role is not to change truth but to let truth change us.

It's not a revolution. It's not a movement. It's a group of people in local churches, passionate about rediscovering truth and recommitting to it. We stand on the shoulders of those who have followed God before us. So this is what we offer to the conversation:

Forget reinvention. Embrace a humble orthodoxy.

All of the messages delivered at the recent conference on "Discernment" - messages by people like Mark Dever, John Piper, C.J. Mahaney and Albert Mohler - are available for download free, as are brief video interviews with some of the speakers. [The picture on the left links to a statement by Mark Dever about doctrinal discernment, and includes a good, orthodox, statement of the Gospel.]

Na - New Attitude

"The mind is a muscle"

Justin Taylor of the Between Two Worlds blog was interviewed at the Na: Humble Orthodoxy blog about the study of church history:

Na: ...Why do you think it’s so critical for us to learn from Christians that have gone before us?

JT: ...[I]f we try to come up with a new doctrine, if we’re not learning from those before us, it’s the ultimate act of arrogance. Because it tends to be our default position to assume that the Holy Spirit is starting his work with us and we forget that he’s been working for 2,000 years and beyond. ....

So thinking that you’re really doing something completely “new” is just naïve. After 2,000 years if anyone says anything absolutely new it’s probably just going to be bizarre.

Na: Laughs: Right.

JT: But if you say something that sounds new and somewhat plausible and creative, more likely than not it’s already been said a hundred years ago and responded to and dealt with. .... And that’s why if you don’t know history lots of this can seem new and you don’t know how to respond. That’s part of the importance of studying church history. ....

Or, "those who will not learn from history...." He goes on to an observation about why so many fail to read and learn:

JT: .... It’s interesting because reading and thinking is one of those areas as Christians that the fact that it’s hard deters us. But in other areas of our lives we don’t think the fact something is hard should prevent us from doing it. In athletics you run out of breath if you’re out of shape but you keep going and eventually it’s worth it. Or you work hard at a job because you know the results will be worth it.

Na: But we’re not that patient with reading and studying.

JT: When we get to mental activities it takes about a page before we say, “Oh it’s too hard. I can’t do this. It’s not for me.” The mind is a muscle that needs to be exercised like any other muscle in your body.

Abraham Lincoln, who had only a year of formal education, but who read just about everything he could obtain, advised a law student:

"Get the books, and read and study them. The books, and your capacity for understanding them, are just the same in all places.... Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed, is more important than any other one thing."

Na - Justin Taylor on Old Dead Theologians

Overheated Rhetoric

Charles Colson reacts to the attacks on American Christians, and suggests how we ought to respond:

The question for us is how to answer their hysterical assaults. The writers know that evangelicals and conservative Catholics have had decisive influence on public policy and recent elections. Their books have one purpose: to silence us in the public square.

But we must not be intimidated; rather, we must continue to speak out boldly against abortion, embryonic stem-cell research, slavery in Sudan, and same-sex marriage.

.... We answer not by firing back, but by feeding the hungry, redeeming prisoners, and freeing today's slaves.

Overheated Rhetoric | Christianity Today

July/August 2007 Sabbath Recorder Online

The July/August, 2007, Sabbath Recorder is available online here as a pdf. The theme of the issue is "Growing in Christ: Step by Step" and it includes stories about the growth of the Brazilian SDB Conference, the Lincoln [Nebraska] SDB Fellowship, Larry Graffius's explanation of the Seventh Day Baptist logo [the one on the left], and much else.

"Everyone has a story. My cat has a story. So what?"

At Intellectuelle Bonnie reacts to an article in Christianity Today about the author of Blue Like Jazz, Donald Miller. She hasn't read the book, but has some problems with some of what he seems to be saying:

...Miller delivers a variation on a theme ascendant in evangelical Christianity: Truth is rooted in story, not in rational systems. The Christian mission is not well served when we speak in terms of spiritual laws or rational formulas. Propositional truths, when extracted from a narrative context, lack meaning. "The chief role of a Christian," he says, "is to tell a better story."

Well, truth isn’t rooted in story. The Christian story and those that make it up are rooted in truth. Neither is truth rooted in rational systems; the Christian mission is not well served if we speak only in terms of spiritual laws, or only in stories – the problem with elevating story to truth, besides the fact that not all stories point the way to truth, is that significance is found in the story rather than in the truth. We all have stories. Some of them have good endings, some don’t. Seung-Hui Cho had a story. His victims have stories. Everyone has a story. My cat has a story. So what? ....

Though they may be harder to grasp, propositional truths extracted from a narrative do not lack meaning; truth’s meaning is not dependent upon whether or not it is understood. ....

Sales do well for items that meet felt needs, notes Dodd [author of the article]. Trouble is, "felt need" doesn't always equate with "actual need." We don't always know or want what we need. I know I don’t. Sometimes the Holy Spirit has to lay you flat in order for you to, uh, feel your needs, and who knows how you may feel. But Dodd’s premise, and Miller’s as related by Dodd, is that we can judge the effectiveness of a message by whether or not it makes people happy. Sure, sometimes it's bad to hurt peoples feelings, or offend them, but sometimes it isn’t. The focus shouldn't be on their feelings. ....

Dodd suggests that spirituality is dialectical. That it combines deep self-examination “with a call to integrate with the world outside the self.” He seems to encourage a person's projection of their human relational needs onto God, but this model is backwards. ...[I]t's about learning who God is, and mankind in relation to Him. ....

So I question whether, as Dodd says, readers are responding to Miller’s “true spirituality” if the things he says in his article about readers, listeners, and Miller are true. They are perhaps responding to his humanity and authenticity. But if, in fact, “his books encourage a certain amount of Christian navel-gazing, but only long enough to get the fuzz out,” then where is their gaze once the fuzz is out? [more]

Intellectuelle: I feel your need

Tying the knot

It has been some time since a typical wedding involved the groom in a good suit, the bride in a new dress, and a simple reception in the church social hall after the ceremony. Even before Father of the Bride middle-class parents felt pressure to marry off a daughter in style, imitating a society wedding. According to CNN/Money.com, the average cost of a wedding is today approaching $30,000:

A total of $125 billion - about the size of Ireland's GDP - will be spent on 2.1 million weddings in 2005, according to the "American Weddings" study conducted by The Fairchild Bridal Group. Fairchild surveyed more than 1,000 brides.

Tying the knot used to involve a trip to the altar and a simple reception, but low-cost affairs are increasingly a thing of the past as brides and grooms flex their consumer power and buck tradition. The average price tag that is fast approaching $30,000 represents a 73 percent increase during the past 15 years, according the study.

And comparatively normal people give in to this absurd extravagance:

About a dozen years ago, an old friend of mine was told by his daughter that she was going to get married. This suited him fine, but he balked at pouring untold thousands of dollars down the drain of a full-dress wedding. "I'll tell you what," he said to her. "I'll give you a choice: You can have a wedding, or you can have $30,000 to help you get started on your new life." Without a moment's hesitation, she astonished him - and me, too, when he told me the story - by replying, "I'll take the wedding." ....

...[T]his was a young woman of reason and moderation, a sensible person who nonetheless had been caught up in an early wave of the phenomenon that - all unknown to her father and me - was beginning to sweep across America: the rise of the wedding industry ....

We are all creatures of our time and culture, and it can be very difficult to upset the expectations of family and friends, but why has this come to pass? Rebecca Mead believes that an expensive and stressful event meets a need:

I think that people need the wedding and the planning to be in some way a traumatic experience. It used to be that a wedding was a definitive break in your life, and the new traumas of married life were real. Suddenly, you were waking up next to somebody with whom you’d never spent the night before. We don’t have that anymore—marriage is not the beginning of your independent life, it’s probably not the beginning of your sexual life, and it’s not your entry into adulthood, as it once was. So there’s a sense in which what used to be the trauma of newly married life has been transferred to the trauma of planning a wedding, because we need a wedding to feel momentous, and one way to make it feel momentous is to make the planning of it complicated and difficult and an enormous production.

Reflecting on all of this, Douglas LeBlanc, at Get Religion, found an example of someone who bucked the trend:

After reading through People Extra, my new heroine is Mary Beth Baptiste, who wrote recently in Newsweek about how she and her husband began their new life together for a total of $150.

All of this, of course, having very little to do with what a Christian wedding is really about.

CNN/Money.com: Ka-ching, Washington Post: Jonathan Yardley, The New Yorker: Do We Ever, GetReligion.org: Wedding Bell Blues, Newsweek: Love on a shoestring

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

At least two more of C.S. Lewis's Narnia books will appear in theaters. NarniaWeb links to this story from The Hollywood Reporter:

Michael Apted has signed on to direct Walt Disney Pictures/Walden Media's The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

This is the third installment in the series that includes the 2005 film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and the upcoming 2008 release of The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader will begin filming in January and it is set for a May 1, 2009, release date.

Among the cast members who will reprise their "Narnia" roles are Ben Barnes, Georgie Henley and Skandar Keynes. ....

Apted's credits include The World Is Not Enough, Gorky Park, Gorillas in the Mist and Coal Miner's Daughter, as well as his most recent film Amazing Grace (for Walden Media's sister company Bristol Bay Prods.) and the first three episodes of the HBO dramatic series Rome.

Several of those involved in the production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe expressed a desire to not be too overtly religious. One wonders how they will handle Eustace and the dragon, or the lamb at the end of the world.

Apted on voyage with third 'Narnia

Good stuff

Justin Taylor at Between Two Worlds has a lot of good stuff [he always does].

1. A link to the new blog at 9 Marks, blog.9marks.org.
2. A link to a response to Dawkins by Francis Beckwith at First Things titled "The Irrationality of Richard Dawkins."
3. A recommendation from Ed Welch that we read Job 38-42 every day for a month:

   If you read these chapters every day for a month you will find that they are a treatment for almost anything. Do you fear people? Are you suffering? Are you anxious? Depressed? Struggling with anger? Hard-hearted? listen to these questions from the mouth of God.
   
   

   • "Have you ever given orders to the morning?" (38:12)
   • "Have you seen the gates of the shadow of death?
     
   • Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth?" (38:17-18)
   • "Do you send the lightning bolts on their way? Do they report to you, 'Here we are?'" (38:35)

   
   The pace of God's questions is relentless. They leave you speechless. But they are graciously delivered to a righteous man who prizes the fear of the Lord above all else.

4. A quotation from Anthony N.S. Lane about the difference between justification and sanctification:
   

   The Reformation doctrine makes a deliberate and systematic distinction between justification on the one hand and sanctification or regeneration on the other hand.
   
   

   • Justification refers to my status; sanctification to my state.
   • Justification is about God's attitude to me changing; sanctification is about God changing me.
   • Justification is about how God looks on me; sanctification is about what he does in me.
   • Justification is about Christ dying for my sins on the cross; sanctification is about Christ at work in me by the Holy Spirit changing my life.

   
   The Reformers were careful to distinguish these two--but not to separate them. One cannot have one without the other--as with the heat and light of the sun. The sun gives out heat and light. These two cannot be separated. When the sun shines there is both heat and light; yet they are distinct and not to be confused. We are not warmed by the sun's light nor illumined by its heat. To use a modern illustration, justification and sanctification are like the two legs of a pair of trousers, not like two socks which may well become separated and, in the author's experience, too often do become separated.

5. And more...

Between Two Worlds

Religious liberty

Americans are inclined to take religious liberty for granted. It is guaranteed in our Constitution. That is far from true elsewhere, even in countries supposedly democratic:

Malaysia's best known Christian convert, Lina Joy, lost a six-year battle on Wednesday to have the word "Islam" removed from her identity card, after the country's highest court rejected the change. ...

"You can't at whim and fancy convert from one religion to another," Federal Court Chief Justice Ahmad Fairuz Sheikh Abdul Halim said in delivering judgment in the case, which has stirred religious tensions in the mainly Muslim nation.

He said the civil court had no jurisdiction in the case and that it should be dealt with by the country's Islamic courts. "The issue of apostasy is related to Islamic law, so it's under the sharia court. The civil court cannot intervene."

The Belmont Club: Oh Joy

Politics

For those who are interested in how the American political system works, Michael Barone is the gold standard. His The Almanac of American Politics, published every two years, is the indispensable reference about politics and elections in this country. The 2008 edition has just been completed and the publisher, The National Journal, has made available Barone's introductory essay - a good primer on the political environment as we enter another Presidential election year.

National Journal: Open-Field Politics

Infuriating phrases

Christopher Howse at the Telegraph [London] asked his readers to "come up with a paragraph or two, no longer than 150 words, packed with as many infuriating words and phrases as possible." Here are their contributions.

Telegraph newspaper online

Atheists v. Faithful

World Magazine's blog cites a recent survey by George Barna which compares American atheists and agnostics with Christians. The blog notes some results which may be discouraging to Christians, but which also bode ill for society at large:

- The no-faith segment grows with each successive generation: "The proportion of atheists and agnostics increases from 6% of Elders (ages 61+) and 9% of Boomers (ages 42-60), to 14% of Busters (23-41) and 19% of adult Mosaics (18-22)." Each generation's degree of secular fervor appears to stay relatively constant over time, contradicting the popular notion that such generational differences are simply a product of people becoming more faith-oriented as they age.

- No-faith Americans exhibit more cultural disengagement: "Atheists are less likely than active-faith Americans to be registered to vote (78% versus 89%), to volunteer to help a non-church-related non-profit (20% versus 30%), to describe themselves as 'active in the community' (41% versus 68%), and to personally help or serve a homeless or poor person (41% versus 61%)."

Atheists v. Faithful

"Only God can build up Zion"

Between Two Worlds summarizes J.I. Packer on "Lessons from Luther":

1. The necessity of reformation when the church's outward form and life contradict the gospel, whether doctrinally or practically.
2. The nature of reformation as spiritual renewal, wrought from within by the Word of God.
3. The pastoral purpose that must govern church reorganization. Good church order is not an end in itself, but must be thought of as a means to the good of souls by inducing fellowship, edification, and holiness.
4. The primacy of preaching and teaching the Word as the means to reformation. All Luther's emphasis was laid on teaching, by catechisms, sermons, books, and schools. This emphasis on Christian instruction was itself epoch-making.
5. Piecemeal improvement is better than none: and it is better to carry out innovation in a slow and piecemeal fashion than to outstrip weak consciences and make them stumble.
6. Patience is needed by those who seek reformation: having set ourselves to teach the Word, we must wait for it to do its own God-appointed work. Only God can build up Zion, and he is not always in such a hurry as we are.

Between Two Worlds: Packer on Lessons from Luther

"head and heart, reason and faith"

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Romans 12:2 [ESV]

Ben Witherington reflects on the fact that the leaders of the New Testament church were all members of the social and educational elite, literate and learned, not anti-intellectual. In a world in which very few were literate,

.... What does it tell us about early Christians and early Christianity that it had so many documents, and was spread by writers and writings, among other things? For one thing it tells us that Christianity was not a movement led by illiterates. This does not mean the leaders were all lettered or learned persons (Peter and John for example are said not to be such in the early chapters of Acts), but all of the major leaders of the early church were literate - could read and write. This includes Jesus, Peter, James, Jude, Paul, the Beloved Disciple, Apollos, Silas, Luke, Matthew, Mark, and many more. As E.A. Judge long ago demonstrated Christianity was not led by bucolic charismatics. It was led in the main by the more educationally and socially elite members of its ranks. This is hardly a surprise when we realize that the church met in the homes of their more socially elite members (former synagogue leaders, city treasurers like Erastus, successful business persons like Lydia. The idea that early Christianity was a movement chiefly composed of or even led by peasants, slaves, and in general the ignorant or illiterate is absolutely a myth. This is not to say that it was led by a bunch of scholars either, but for sure it was led by some of the more socially elite and/or well educated persons in antiquity.

This brings me to an important point. There is, and has long been, an anti-intellectual element in low church Protestantism, especially in its more fundamentalist and charismatic branches. This is not always the case of course. Yet even today there is often a suspicion that too much study, intellectual effort, too much schooling can ruin one's faith, as if head and heart, reason and faith were necessarily at odds with one another. Not only is this not necessarily the case, a close study of the leaders of the beginning of the Christian movement gives the lie to such an assumption. It is an irony that Paul, one of the great minds of any age, could have been used to spearhead an anti-intellectual approach to the Christian faith. Paul would not have been pleased with this misuse - indeed if you read Rom. 12.1-2 closely you will discover that submission to God necessarily leads to the renewal of the mind, a crucial part of any conversion or Christian life. In the 21rst century it is time for Christians to get beyond the faith vs. reason, head vs. heart, dichotomies. We need all our human resources mental and otherwise to save a lost world. Indeed we need all that we are and can be just to adequately worship God - we must love God with our whole hearts, souls, minds, and strength.

Ben Witherington: Ephesos - 2007

"Everything else is postmodern chatter.”

Philip Jenkins, in an article about the resurgence of European Christianity:

Jürgen Habermas, a veteran leftist German philosopher stunned his admirers not long ago by proclaiming, “Christianity, and nothing else, is the ultimate foundation of liberty, conscience, human rights, and democracy, the benchmarks of Western civilization. To this day, we have no other options [than Christianity]. We continue to nourish ourselves from this source. Everything else is postmodern chatter.”

Foreign Policy: Europe's Christian Comeback

Artificially extended childhood

Robert Epstein, in an interview for Psychology Today, thinks teenagers are simultaneously too controlled and too free. They need to be with adults and treated like adults. Excerpts from the interview:

The whole culture collaborates in artificially extending childhood, primarily through the school system and restrictions on labor. The two systems evolved together in the late 19th-century; the advocates of compulsory-education laws also pushed for child-labor laws, restricting the ways young people could work, in part to protect them from the abuses of the new factories. The juvenile justice system came into being at the same time. All of these systems isolate teens from adults, often in problematic ways. ....

.... We need education spread over a lifetime, not jammed into the early years—except for such basics as reading, writing, and perhaps citizenship. Past puberty, education needs to be combined in interesting and creative ways with work. The factory school system no longer makes sense. ....

We have completely isolated young people from adults and created a peer culture. We stick them in school and keep them from working in any meaningful way, and if they do something wrong we put them in a pen with other "children." In most nonindustrialized societies, young people are integrated into adult society as soon as they are capable, and there is no sign of teen turmoil. Many cultures do not even have a term for adolescence. ....

Teens in America are in touch with their peers on average 65 hours a week, compared to about four hours a week in preindustrial cultures. In this country, teens learn virtually everything they know from other teens, who are in turn highly influenced by certain aggressive industries. This makes no sense. Teens should be learning from the people they are about to become. When young people exit the education system and are dumped into the real world, which is not the world of Britney Spears, they have no idea what's going on and have to spend considerable time figuring it out. ....

Are you saying that teens should have more freedom?

No, they already have too much freedom—they are free to spend, to be disrespectful, to stay out all night, to have sex and take drugs. But they're not free to join the adult world, and that's what needs to change. ....

Psychology Today: Trashing Teens

"When people stop believing in God ..."

At NRO's The Corner today, Jonah Goldberg quotes himself from an article he wrote last year. He comments several times today about "secular religion," making, among others, this point:

.... According to Voegelin, you cannot eliminate the religious instinct. "When God is invisible behind the world, the contents of the world will become new gods; when the symbols of transcendent religiosity are banned, new symbols develop from the inner-worldly language of science to take their place." Translation: When you rely on science and technology to do God's job, it won't be long before you worship science as a god. Marxism, the apotheosis of progressivism, purged the divine and replaced it with materialism. For the Marxist, proclaimed Voegelin, "Christ the Redeemer is replaced by the steam engine as the promise of the realm to come." For many people today, the steam engine has been replaced by the embryonic stem cell as the promise of the realm to come.

I once knew someone who had lost his faith in God, but replaced it with faith in cryogenics, believing that his immortality could be insured by freezing his body until a cure could be found for whatever killed him. The statement "When people stop believing in God, they don't believe in nothing — they believe in anything" is commonly attributed to Chesterton. If he didn't say it, he should have. It seems to be true.

National Review: The terms of debate