The Deeper Source of Religion: Passional Reason in William James’s Writings

Introduction: Encountering Truth

            Pilate asked Jesus, “What is truth?”[1] This is no simple question. Given the gravity of the moment in which it was asked, and to whom it was directed, Pilate’s question strikes at the very heart of humanity’s encounter with God. Some answer that truth is an outcome, the product of a logical process of considering a given situation’s evidence. Some say that truth is an encounter, whereby a person’s passional nature is the means by which circumstances are experienced and volitional conclusions are drawn. Is it possible that between the two—between reason and passion—truth is to be found as a result of utilizing both one’s passions and reason? The following research considers this possibility through an expository examination of the works of American philosopher William James (1842-1910), specifically considering aspects of his The Will to Believe, and The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature.[2] Three questions provide the framework for this investigation: 1) What is passional reason?; 2) What are examples of passional reason in the writings of William James?; and 3) What is the significance of James’s passional reason for religious epistemology? Research findings will suggest that James’s emphasis on the role of the passional nature provides a view of religious beliefs as both reasonably and passionally derived.

What is Passional Reason?

            To lay the groundwork for the discussion of James’s thought regarding the role of the passional aspects of human nature in forming religious beliefs it is helpful to begin with a definition of passional reason. Drawing upon the work of Wainwright, passional reason may be defined as the culmination of human reason’s investigation of proofs, history, and other logically arguable facts regarding religious truth claims, and the affective component of the human heart regarding such rational concerns that accepts them and recognizes their role in developing religious belief.[3] Wainwright explains,

This view was once a Christian commonplace; reason is capable of knowing God on the basis of evidence—but only when one’s cognitive faculties are rightly disposed. It should be distinguished from two other views that have dominated modern thought. The first claims that God can be known by ‘objective reason,’ that is, by an understanding that systematically excludes passion, desire, and emotion from the process of reasoning. The other insists that God can be known only ‘subjectively,’ or by the heart. . . . [Passional reason] steers between these two extremes. It places a high value on proofs, arguments, and inferences yet also believes a properly disposed heart is needed to see their force.[4]

In this explanation, Wainwright brings together both objective and subjective components to form a center ground for faith formation, the ground of passional reason.

            This concept of passional reason draws upon various aspects of the Christian tradition, including Calvin (with his Augustinian influence) and Aquinas. Calvin emphasizes the necessity of the Holy Spirit in confirming the authority of Scripture, and Aquinas teaches that even though “there is good evidence for the divine origin of Christian teaching . . . [it is not] sufficient to compel assent without the inward movement of a will grounded in a ‘supernatural principle.’”[5] Thus both Calvin and Aquinas, while making their arguments for Christianity utilizing proofs and evidences of various types, clearly highlight the role of affective, non-discursively derived conclusions relative to the formation of religious belief. This is passional reason, where reason (i.e., the mind) and the passions (i.e., the heart) synergize to cultivate religious beliefs.

What are Examples of Passional Reason in the Writings of William James?

            Moving on from this definition of passional reason, the investigation turns to the thought of William James, seeking to find how passional reason contributes to his understanding of the formation of religious beliefs. As a preface to the following quotes and the ensuing discussion, it is worth noting that interpretations of James vary from, on the one hand, those who think James does not accept religious beliefs as anything more than individual predilections that serve some ultimately personal need and have no connection, necessarily or actually, to any metaphysical reality; and, on the other hand, those who argue that James did, while recognizing the individual usefulness of religious beliefs, also affirm that such beliefs were metaphysically real and not only could but should be believed.[6] Whichever view one takes of James’s ultimate intention does not necessarily detract from the discussion below, insofar as the issue under consideration is how James understood the role of passional reason in cultivating religious beliefs, not the ultimate veracity of such beliefs.

            Four quotes from James are now considered. The first two are from The Will to Believe, an address to the Philosophical Clubs at Yale and Brown Universities in 1896. The last two are from The Varieties of Religious Belief: A Study in Human Nature, a work borne of James’s delivery of the Gifford Lectures on Natural Religion at the University of Edinburgh beginning in 1900. The presentation of these four quotes is an attempt to demonstrate what may be described as a “Jamesian Justification for Passional Reason,” which, though far from exhaustive regarding his thought on the topic, do, as the comments given after each quote will attempt to show, reveal the centrality of passional reason in James’s work.

            Quote One: “Our passional nature must, and lawfully may, decide an option between propositions, whenever it is a genuine option that cannot by its nature be decided on intellectual grounds.”[7] Notice in this quote that James attributes to the passional nature the role of final decider in certain matters of belief, such that the evidence as reasonably considered may bring someone to the precipice of belief, but only the passional nature can and may let them take the step into belief. In taking this approach to passion and reason, James, according to Fuller’s estimation, “deftly pull[s] the philosophical rug out from under those committed to a modernist faith in the ability of the scientific method to usher humanity into the domain of universal truths and intellectual certainties. . . . His understanding of religious belief steer[s] a defensible middle course between naive credulity and agnostic skepticism.”[8] The conclusion that may be drawn from this first quote by James is that not only the intellect, but the whole person, is required in order to make choices regarding what to believe.

Quote Two: “I have said, and now repeat it, that not only as a matter of fact do we find our passional nature influencing us in our opinions, but that there are some options between opinions in which this influence must be regarded both as an inevitable and as a lawful determinant of our choice.”[9] While similar to the fist quote by James, the key distinction in this second quote is James’s conclusion that is it not only permissible to allow passional reason to guide in forming one’s beliefs, but that the use of passional reason may be “inevitable;” more than a choice, passional reason is a requirement in certain instances. Wainwright remarks that, for James, “all conceptualizations, including scientific ones, are simply abstractions from the richness of concrete experience. The ‘personal point of view’ is thus essential.”[10] James, as this second quote demonstrates, recognizes passional reason as a universally constitutive element in belief; it is much more than a subjective option for a few.

Quote Three: “I do believe that feeling is the deeper source of religion, and that philosophic and theological formulas are secondary products, like translations of a text into another tongue.”[11] In this quote, James identifies the passional nature (i.e., “feeling”) as primary, whereas more rational considerations are secondary. His use of an analogy from language reveals that James views the passional as the vital language for religious experience, and the rational as its expression in the language of the intellect. As Croce explains, in this way James “distinguishes religion lived at first hand, which would include direct personal encounter with spiritual forces, from religion at second hand, based on traditions derived from those first hand experiences.”[12] Thus in this third quote from James there is a sense in which he views passional reason as paradigmatic for properly evaluating all religious conclusions; passional reason becomes a lens through which religious truth formulations are derived and evaluated.

            Quote Four: “In all sad sincerity I think we must conclude that the attempt to demonstrate by purely intellectual processes the truth of the deliverances of direct religious experience is absolutely hopeless.”[13] The context in which James makes this statement is his discussion of the various proofs for God’s existence presented by Aquinas and others; it is important to note, therefore, that he is not dismissing the value of proofs, per se, but acknowledging that they are not, in themselves, sufficient to the task. Just as a person made in the image of God is both reasonable and passional, so arguments for the existence of God must be more than reasonable; the passional element is indispensable. Is it possible, as Wainwright surmises, that James’s point of critique is not that proofs for the existence of God do not establish certainty, but that the passional element should be considered, along with the intellectual element, as part of a broader definition of proofs?[14] This fourth quote by James certainly leaves open the possibility that this is so; passion and intellect combine in James to make the case that passional reason is the best arbiter for religious belief.

            As this brief expository analysis demonstrates, James certainly gives a fundamental, if not primary, role to the passional elements of human nature in the formation of religious belief. However, whether or not James’s conclusions about passional reason are epistemically helpful is another matter. Although far short of a full critique of James’s religious epistemology, the next section considers one positive and one negative aspect of his thought.

What is the Significance of James’s Passional Reason for Religious Epistemology?

Briefly considered, there are two aspects of James’s passional reason of significance to religious epistemology; one is positive, and one is negative. Positively, James attempts to engage the total person in the matter of faith formation, rather than focusing exclusively on the rational and evidentiary aspects, or on the subjective and experiential aspects. In biblical parlance, there is a sense in which James encourages the formation of religious belief utilizing one’s heart, soul, mind, and strength; with the whole being.[15] In an era of radical materialism and scientism, which bring with them a diminution of any philosophical metaphysic, James’s perspective can provide a helpful corrective and balance.

However, given James’s radical empiricism and its attendant emphasis of the nature of belief as dependent on currently observable facts (be they experiential or otherwise), and his commitment to human experience as the final test of truth, James implicitly opposes the primacy of theological dogma and its necessary authority in matters of faith and practice.[16] While James may allow a place for dogma in forming religious beliefs, there is no absolute sense in which dogma provides the objective standard by which all religious matters are to be evaluated. Yes, passional reason impacts faith formation, but unless there is a final standard of truth as divinely revealed through Scripture and Tradition, then the creature, rather than the Creator, becomes the determiner of reality.

Conclusion

William James’s articulation of the role of passional reason in forming religious belief provides a seminal contribution to discussions of faith, in general, and religious epistemology, in particular. The preceding research considered this contribution of James by initially defining passional reason, then identifying and expounding examples of passional reason in James’s writings, and finally by critically evaluating the positive and negative aspects of James’s approach. Research suggests that, with correctives regarding the role of dogma in faith formation, James’s conclusions about the interplay of the rational and passional offer helpful insights for the interdependent areas of philosophy and religion.

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Bibliography

Aquinas, Thomas. The Summa Theologica. New York: Benziger, 1947.

Calvin, John. Institutes of the Christian Religion. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1957.

Corbett, Robert. “The Will to Believe: An Outline.” St. Louis: Webster University, 1980.

Accessed 1 December 2016. http://faculty.webster.edu/corbetre/philosophy/misc/james.html.

Croce, Paul. “Spilt Mysticism: William James’s Democratization of Religion.” William James

Studies 9, (July 2012): 3-26. 

Elwell, Walter A., Ed. Evangelical Dictionary of Theology. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Baker, 2001.

Fuller, Robert C. "'The Will to Believe': A Centennial Reflection." Journal of the American

Academy of Religion 64, no. 3 (September 1996): 633-650. 

James, William. The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature. South

Australia: eBooks@Adelaide, 2009. Accessed 25 November 2016. https://csrs.nd.edu/assets/59930/williams_1902.pdf.

------. The Will to Believe. Accessed 2 December 2016.

http://norm.unet.brandeis.edu/~teuber/James_The_Will_to_Believe.pdf.

Smith, John E. Purpose and Thought: The Meaning of Pragmatism. New Haven: Yale University

Press, 1978.

Wainwright, William J. Reason and the Heart: A Prolegomenon to a Critique of Passional

Reason. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995.

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[1] John 18:38. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible, New King James Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1982).

[2] William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature (South Australia: eBooks@Adelaide, 2009); and The Will to Believe, http://norm.unet.brandeis.edu/~teuber/James_The_Will_to_Believe.pdf.

[3] William J. Wainwright, Reason and the Heart: A Prolegomenon to a Critique of Passional Reason (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995), 3-4.

[4] Ibid., 3. Italics in original.

[5] Ibid., 4. Wainwright’s reference to Calvin is from John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1957), vol. I, book I, chap. 7, sec. 4; the reference to Aquinas is from Thomas Aquinas, The Summa Theologica (New York: Benziger, 1947), vol. 2, part II-II, quest. 6, art. I.

[6] An example of the former evaluation of James is John E. Smith, Purpose and Thought: The Meaning of Pragmatism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978). An example of the latter evaluation of James is Wainwright, Reason and the Heart, 84-107.

[7] James, The Will to Believe, sect. IV.

[8] Robert C. Fuller, “’The Will to Believe’: A Centennial Reflection,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 64, no. 3 (September 1996): 634.

[9] James, The Will to Believe, sect. VIII.

[10] Wainwright, Reason and the Heart, 93.

[11] James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, 327.

[12] Paul Croce, “Spilt Mysticism: William James’s Democratization of Religion,” William James Studies 9, (July 2012), 4.

[13] James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, 344.

[14] See Wainwright, Reason and the Heart, 1-6.

[15] See Luke 10:27.

[16] R. J. VanderMolen, “Pragmatism,” in the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, 2nd ed., Walter A. Elwell, ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2001), 945-946.

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T. J. Gentry is the Executive Editor of MoralApologetics.com, the Senior Minister at First Christian Church of West Frankfort, IL, and the Co-founder of Good Reasons Apologetics. T. J. has been in Christian ministry since 1984, having served as an itinerant evangelist, youth minister, church planter, pastoral counselor, and Army chaplain. He is the author of numerous books and peer-reviewed articles, including Pulpit Apologist: The Vital Link between Preaching and Apologetics (Wipf and Stock, 2020), You Shall Be My Witnesses: Reflections on Sharing the Gospel (Illative House, 2018), and two forthcoming works published by Moral Apologetics Press: Leaving Calvinism, Finding Grace, and A Moral Way: Aquinas and the Good God. T. J. is a Clinical Pastoral Education Supervisor, holding board-certification as a Pastoral Counselor and a Chaplain. He is a graduate of Southern Illinois University (BA in Political Science), Luther Rice College and Seminary (MA in Apologetics), Holy Apostles College and Seminary (MA in Philosophy), Liberty University (MAR in Church Ministries, MDiv in Chaplaincy, ThM in Theology), Carolina University (DMin in Pastoral Counseling, PhD in Leadership, PhD in Biblical Studies), and the United States Army Chaplain School (Basic and Advanced Courses). He is currently completing his PhD in Theology at North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa (2021), his PhD in Theology and Apologetics at Liberty University (2022), and his PhD in Philosophy of Religion at Southern Evangelical Seminary (2024). T. J. married Amy in 1995, and they are blessed with three daughters and two sons. T. J.’s writing and other projects may be viewed at TJGentry.com.

Shame, Deserved and Undeserved

Whereas guilt reveals that we have morally transgressed, shame pertains more to who we are, not just what we have done. And so shame can be particularly damaging if we allow it to detract from recognizing the value we have in God, which it can all too easily do. If we become convinced that we are useless, that our lives are pointless, that we as people lack value, it becomes exponentially harder to see ourselves as creations of God with infinite dignity and value and worth. The topic of shame is thus vitally important for moral apologists to think about and understand.

A temptation is to think that all shame is bad—nothing but a toxic emotion. Whereas guilt might be fine, shame is thought to just saddle us with needless negative emotional baggage. Victims of abuse may feel great shame over what happened to them, even though they did nothing wrong. That is undeserved shame, and the problem is not theirs. It’s all of ours; we need to listen to such victims, not sideline them, nor silence them, but give them a voice and really hear them. There is also deserved shame, however. If I do something shameful, I should feel shame—if I were the abuser of that victims we just discussed, for example. Not that anyone should let shame decimate their sense of self or think of themselves as unredeemable, nor should engage in the practice of shaming. That is different, and little compatible with loving our neighbors as ourselves. To get a better understanding of shame, both undeserved and deserved, let’s consider an example of both.

If you have the time, watch the first half of the following clip.

It is a 1981 YouTube clip of Mister Rogers hosting a ten-year-old wheelchair-bound Jeffrey Erlanger. They had originally met five years before, and Rogers remembered him and invited him to his Neighborhood. Fred would later say that these unscripted ten minutes were his most memorable moment on television. The scene is deeply moving, and if there’s any doubt as to why, I might suggest it has to do, at least in part, with this matter of shame. Ours is sadly a society in which certain people—those who have been sexually abused, those with visible disabilities—carry a stigma and are often, for no fault of their own, riddled with a sense of shame—a loss of social standing, and a resultant tendency to shrink and hide. It threatens their sense of humanity. The solution has to be communal—usually involving someone with social capital to spare conferring honor upon them.

And that is exactly what makes those ten minutes of television so undeniably magical. It is a simply profound microcosm of the divine love that deigns and condescends to broken and marginalized people and, in the process, exalts them, replacing shame with honor, beauty for ashes. Mister Rogers gets eye level with Jeff, asks him about his experiences, gives the boy a chance to share about his condition and feelings, and talks to him like a friend. Like Mister Rogers did for Jeffrey—who was on the stage years later to confer on Rogers his Lifetime Achievement Award—this is a means by which to make goodness attractive, which is sort of part of our job description as Christians. It’s an important way to love God and our neighbor.

And now an example of deserved shame. The pages of scripture are replete with narratives of honor and shame, from Adam and Eve to the story of the prodigal son and lots in between. You know the story of the prodigal son. He insists on his inheritance ahead of time and engages in profligate spending and living, bringing shame on himself and an almost complete loss of social standing as a result. Finally, he repents and comes home, and the father, seeing him far off, comes running to him with a kiss and embrace. Here is a young man who did shame-worthy things. He felt shame, and he deserved to, and he couldn’t fix it on his own. He needed someone to confer on him the honor he had lost.

And this gives us as believers a simply wonderful opportunity. As Gregg Ten Elshof puts it in his forthcoming excellent book For Shame, “All of us, whether we have social capital to spare or not, are in a position to remind those around us that each and every person is loved and pursued by the God of the universe. The maker of heaven and earth is in a full sprint—robes and all—to embrace you, kiss you, put a ring on your finger, and throw a feast in your honor. Whatever the opinion of the company you keep, you are of immeasurable value to the One who matters most. You are so valuable that the God of the universe suffered the indignity of limited human form, betrayal, public humiliation, and naked crucifixion to rescue you not just from guilt, but also from the shame of your condition, all to enjoy an eternal life of friendship and communion with you.”

If there is any doubt that this is what the life and work of Jesus was all about, recall the OT passage that inaugurated his public ministry in Luke, from Isaiah 61: “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is on Me, because the LORD has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent Me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and freedom to the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor and the day of our God’s vengeance, to comfort all who mourn, to console the mourners in Zion—to give them a crown of beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and a garment of praise for a spirit of despair.”

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David Baggett is professor of philosophy and Director of the Center for Moral Apologetics at Houston Baptist University.

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What Makes Something Morally Good or Bad? Natural Law vs. Divine Command Theory (Part 3)

Editor’s note: Adam Johnson has graciously allowed us to republish his video series, “What Makes Something Morally Good or Bad?” Find the original post here.

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The two predominant positions within Christianity that answer the question of “Where does objective morality come from?” are known as Natural Law Theory and Divine Command Theory. Both theories have strengths and weaknesses, which leads to robust debate between proponents of each. Natural Law Theory says that both human moral values (i.e., what things are good and bad) and moral obligations (i.e., what things are right and wrong to do) come from facts about what causes human beings to flourish. In Natural Law Theory, God created the world, including human beings, and thus something is good or right when it causes human beings to flourish. On the other hand, Divine Command Theory says that our moral obligations come from God’s commands. Right and wrong are determined by what God commands us to do, and God commands us according to what is good. In this lecture, Adam explores each of these theories and discusses objections against each offered by proponents of the other.

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Adam Lloyd Johnson serves as a university campus missionary with Ratio Christi. He also teaches classes for Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and spends one month each year living and teaching at Rhineland Theological Seminary in Wölmersen, Germany. Adam received his PhD in Theological Studies with an emphasis in Philosophy of Religion from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in 2020.

Lord's Supper Meditation: Death and Renewal

A Twilight Musing 

           The Catholic doctrine of the Lord's Supper holds that it re-enacts the sacrifice of Christ on the cross each time it is observed, even to the point of the substance of the bread and wine being turned into the actual body and blood of Christ.  Protestants have correctly rejected that doctrine in its most literal form, but the idea has relevance to what we ought to experience in the observance of this symbolic feast.  If we give ourselves over to the action of God's presence in our lives as we partake of the Lord's Supper, He will enable us repeatedly to sacrifice our bodies so that they are put to death and renewed in service to Him.  Paul admonishes Christians to “present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship” (Rom. 12:1).

           The Lord’s Supper, then, serves to focus our thoughts more effectively on what it means to die with Christ and to be raised to "newness of life."  I think the most memorable scripture to encapsulate this concept is Gal. 2:20: "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me."  When we take the bread, we embrace the sacrifice of our sinful desires by applying to ourselves what Jesus did on the cross.  Though we continue to exist in these fleshly shells in order to serve Him on this earth as long as He chooses, they are not the real "us."  Paul goes on to say, "The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God."  Imprisoned as we are by "this body of death" (Rom. 7:24), the only way that we can describe our existence on this earth as life is by faith that God has instilled His life in us through what Christ did on the cross.  Thus, as we partake of the wine, we affirm anew that though we are dead, yet we live through the life-giving blood of Christ.

           The transformation that occurs in our partaking of the Lord’s Supper is not in the elements of bread and wine, but in ourselves.  Through the Holy Spirit within us, God empowers us to transcend these sinful and frail bodies and to complete joyfully and purposefully whatever He has set for us to do while we are yet in this world.

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Dr. Elton Higgs was a faculty member in the English department of the University of Michigan-Dearborn from 1965-2001. Having retired from UM-D as Prof. of English in 2001, he now lives with his wife in Jackson, MI. He has published scholarly articles on Chaucer, Langland, the Pearl Poet, Shakespeare, and Milton. Recently, Dr. Higgs has self-published a collection of his poetry called Probing Eyes: Poems of a Lifetime, 1959-2019, as well as a book inspired by The Screwtape Letters, called The Ichabod Letters, available as an e-book from Moral Apologetics. (Ed.: Dr. Higgs was the most important mentor during undergrad for the creator of this website, and his influence was inestimable.

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Living HOPE: Pastoral Counseling and the Resurrection of Jesus

Introduction: Hurt and Hope

When reflecting upon nearly forty years of a pastoral ministry carried out in numerous forms and contexts, two recurring realities emerge as most prominent in my experience. First, people are often profoundly troubled and deeply hurting amid the moral chaos and cultural decay of a sin-stricken world, resulting in a brokenness that reaches to the deepest recesses of the human mind and heart. Second, the gospel—the hopeful proclamation of the now-and-not-yet kingdom of God as manifested in the deity, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ—is the greatest source of healing for individuals, families, churches, and cultures.[1] In a word, the world is profoundly out of sorts and only Jesus can set it to rights. It is the concomitance of these two concerns which provide much of the context and content of what has become something of a specialized focus in my ministry, namely the ongoing need (even demand) for competent, biblically based, gospel centric pastoral counseling. Bearing this in mind, the following reflection is offered as a brief introduction to a model of pastoral counseling utilizing the acrostic HOPE (Hear the Pain; Optimize Passional Reason: Proclaim the Gospel; Emphasize the Resurrection). Of particular significance for this model is that it gives principal place to the implications of the resurrection and moral transformation in the caregiving process. The intention is to demonstrate vis-à-vis a notional scenario derived from real counseling experiences how the resurrection provides a key component in helping broken people experience moral transformation and lasting wholeness.

H: Hear the Pain

Scenario: Randy walked into the pastor’s office with a look of consternation on his face and a certain slowness in his step. The appointment was scheduled the prior Sunday after Randy asked for prayer at the conclusion of the service. The pastor had heard a certain familiar pain in Randy’s voice, so he offered to not only pray that day, but to meet in person for a follow-up counseling discussion. Randy was happy to accept the offer, and now he stood in the office. “Sit down, Randy,” said the pastor, “and tell me what’s on your mind.” Randy sat opposite the pastor’s desk and, after an opening prayer by the pastor, began to share his story. Moment by moment, hurt by hurt, Randy recounted his experience with Post Traumatic Stress precipitated by several tours of combat in Iraq. The pastor listened intently, careful not to interrupt and trying to avoid anything like a leading question; his concern was to give Randy ample space and time to tell his story, and it was quite a story. At one point the emotion in Randy’s voice became heightened and he burst into tears as he recounted the loss of several dear friends during a combat operation gone awry. It was clear that Randy was hurting, and the pastor was glad Randy was able to get the hurt out into the open in the safety of a counseling session.

Discussion: All counseling begins with listening, or at least it should.[2] It is when the pastor listens without leading or stifling responses, that the counselee can paint the picture of the problem that brought them to seek help. As the counselor listens, there are two goals: 1) establish with the counselee that the pastor wants to hear before responding, to listen before counseling; and 2) to give the pastor a sense of the depth of the pain involved in the situation and what related matters may need to be addressed later and/or may justify a referral to caregivers with relevant expertise. Further, hearing the person’s pain may involve more than one session where the counselor offers little by way of input, opting to show support by listening intently and for as long as it takes to get the counselee to the place where their burden is sufficiently expressed and understood.[3] Again, counseling begins with listening, with hearing the pain.

O: Optimize Passional Reason

Scenario: After talking for nearly an hour without interruption, Randy began to quiet himself, finally coming to a point of asking, “Pastor, what can I do to get through this pain?” After a thoughtful pause before answering, the pastor replied with a question of his own. “Randy, what do you think would help you?” Seeming a bit frustrated, Randy responded, “I’m not sure. That’s why I’m talking to you, pastor. I need your help.” After another pause, the pastor stated, “Randy, thank you for trusting me with your pain. What I heard as you recounted losing your friends was two things. First, your emotions are up and down, high and low, and I suspect you are unable to find a balance most of the time. Second, there are a few areas in your explanation and evaluation of what you are going through that are a bit out of sorts with what is true.” Randy looked intently at the pastor, nodding slightly. The pastor continued, “Randy, getting to the place of wholeness involves both how you think and how you feel—not one or the other, but both. My goal is to help you think and feel your way through this issue. I want you to learn to check your feelings with your reason, and to allow your reason to be properly informed by your feelings.”

Discussion: Much of what constitutes a counselee’s burden is a mismatch between facts and feelings, between reason and emotions. However, the counselor must not assume that feelings are always wrong, or that the answer to the counselee’s problem is simply a matter of clearer thinking. It is imperative to recall that humans form beliefs based on a combination of reason and emotion, with both coming together and each informing the other so that the whole person comes to a particular conviction or position with their head and their heart. This confluence of reason and emotions in relation to forming beliefs is called passional reason,[4] and counselors who learn to optimize it in the counseling process are more likely to see holistic transformation encompassing noetic and affective capacities in the counselee. Thus, when a counselor begins to engage the counselee’s story, he should look for instances of misshapen thoughts and feelings and explain to the counselee that both areas will be addressed during the counseling process. Lest this point seem to call for some type of specialized knowledge on the part of the pastor, consider that with or without the nomenclature of passional reason there is an intuitive sense that thinking and feeling are fundamental aspects of being human. Thus, optimizing passional reason is simply another way of inviting the counselee to experience wholeness as a “whole” person, beginning with their thoughts and feelings.

P: Proclaim the Gospel

Scenario: Randy sat for a moment, then asked, “So what you’re saying, pastor, is that my head and my heart need healing?” “Correct,” replied the pastor, “and that healing begins with hearing one more time something I know you already believe with all your mind and heart.” After sitting quietly for another moment, Randy replied, “What do I need to hear, pastor?” Looking intently at Randy, the pastor spoke with passion and clarity, “Randy, Jesus is Lord. He died and rose again. He loves you, and because he rose again and overcame death, he can and will help you overcome your pain and grief.” After letting those words of the gospel settle onto Randy for a moment, the pastor continued, “Randy, am I right? Do you believe the gospel with all your heart and mind? Do you believe that Jesus is Lord, and that he died for you, rose again for you, and is right now at his Father’s right hand, praying for you?” With tears in his eyes, his voice breaking, Randy replied, “Yes, pastor, I do believe those things.” “Good, Randy,” replied the pastor, “because the Jesus’ resurrection is essential to your wholeness and healing.”

Discussion: What makes Christian counseling unique is not method but focus. The Christian counselor’s ultimate point of reference from beginning to end of the caregiving process is the message of the gospel.[5] While the pastor’s counsel may include more than the gospel, it certainly should never leave out the gospel. In this sense, pastoral counseling is evangelical counseling, which is to say that it is counseling through the lens of the evangel, the good news, the gospel. Thus, in the notional scenario the pastor has laid the groundwork by hearing the pain of the counselee and optimizing passional reason as the epistemic pathway to wholeness. Now enters the gospel, which encapsulates all the hope the counselee seeks. While there may be varied approaches to proclaiming the gospel and different points of emphasis by its proclaimers, what is fundamental to the Christian path to remedy is the declaration of the deity, death, and resurrection of King Jesus. It is not enough to assume that because counseling is Christian that the gospel is clear. Rather, the pastor has the privilege and necessity to proclaim the gospel to his counselee, thereby given center place to the lordship of Jesus over death and the grave as his resurrection is highlighted as the ultimate demonstration of victory in place of defeat.

E: Emphasize the Resurrection

Scenario: Randy continued to listen as he leaned forward in his chair and drew a bead on the pastor with his eyes. The pastor continued, “Randy, the healing you seek in your mind and heart will take time, but it is possible because of Jesus’ victory over the grave. What we will do going forward is sort of like taking a tube of antibiotic cream and applying and reapplying it to an open wound, except in this instance the wound is your Post Traumatic Stress, and the antibiotic cream is the resurrection.” Randy thought for a moment, then asked, “Pastor, exactly how does that work? I mean, how do I apply the resurrection to my situation?” After a pause, the pastor replied, “Think of it like this. You told me that lately you struggle most with a feeling of hopelessness when you think of how your heart seems to know only an aching sense of despair. You wonder if it is possible to ever get past the hurt and loss.” Randy nodded in agreement. “Your homework is to write down on a card that you will carry with you at all times the following: ‘But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.’ That is Romans 8:11, and it is a powerful reminder that the Spirit is at work in you giving you the life—the same life—that brought Jesus from the dead. His resurrection is your victory, and as often as you find yourself struggling with the thoughts of despair you must apply the hope of the gospel to your situation. Over time you will come to experience a change in your outlook as your mind learns that the hopeless thought is a trigger to the hope of the resurrection. This is how you can do what Paul said later in Romans 12:2, ‘be transformed by the renewing of your mind.’” A smile came to Randy’s face, the first one the pastor had seen since the session began. “Pastor,” Randy said with confidence, “I know I have a long way to go, but I’m starting to think and feel like I can get there with your help…with Jesus’ help. His resurrection is my hope.” “You are right, Randy, there is hope because of Jesus’ resurrection.”

Discussion: As an example of the blending of methods from cognitive behavior therapy and the hope of the Christian gospel that flows from the resurrection, what the pastor offers is an approach to healing the mind and emotions with the truth of Scripture that capitalizes on neuroplasticity and trigger thoughts/words.[6] Again, just as with passional reason, so with this aspect of pastoral counseling there is no need for the pastor to be an expert in various counseling modalities. Rather, through a simple and consistent process of learning to correct thoughts and feelings with the hope of the resurrection, the pastor can lead the counselee along the path of a renewed mind and heart. In the notional scenario discussed here, the pastor would continue to help Randy apply the truths of God’s Word, and especially the message of Jesus’ resurrection to the thoughts and feelings that are out of sync with the Spirit’s work in sanctification. This would happen over numerous counseling sessions and periodic check ups thereafter.

Conclusion: Hope Lives Because Jesus Arose

Although only briefly, this discussion has considered how the resurrection can play a significant role in pastoral counseling. While a more complete exploration of the topic merits far more space, this is offered as a start to an important topic for Christian counseling. By utilizing the HOPE acrostic, the notional scenario illustrates how a pastor may combine elements of cognitive behavior therapy with the gospel message of the deity, death, and resurrection of Jesus. The counselor hears the counselee’s pain, optimizes passional reason, proclaims the gospel, and emphasizes the resurrection in ways that help the counselee apply the truth of Jesus’ victory over death to their struggles and shortcomings. Indeed, because of the resurrection, hope lives in a tangible and powerful way through the work of pastoral counseling.

Bibliography

Collins, Gary R. The Biblical Basis of Christian Counseling for People Helpers: Relating the Basic Teachings of Scripture to People’s Problems. Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2001.

Kollar, Charles Allen. Solution-Focused Pastoral Counseling: An Effective Short-Term Approach for Getting People Back on Track. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011.

Shields, Harry, and Gary Bredfeldt. Caring for Souls: Counseling Under the Authority of Scripture. Chicago: Moody, 2001.

Wainwright, William J. Reason and the Heart: A Prolegomenon to a Critique of Passional Reason. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995.

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[1] Cf. 1 Cor. 15:3-4. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotes are from The Holy Bible: New King James Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1982).

[2] For a discussion of the importance of listening to the counselee, see Harry Shields and Gary Bredfeldt, Caring for Souls: Counseling Under the Authority of Scripture (Chicago: Moody, 2001), 179-180.

[3] Charles Allen Kollar, Solution-Focused Pastoral Counseling: An Effective Short-Term Approach for Getting People Back on Track, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011), 79-88.

[4] William J. Wainwright, Reason and the Heart: A Prolegomenon to a Critique of Passional Reason (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1995), 1-6.

[5] Gary R. Collins, The Biblical Basis of Christian Counseling for People Helpers: Relating the Basic Teachings of Scripture to People’s Problems (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2001), 3-11.

[6] Shields and Bredfeldt, Caring for Souls, 193-223.

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T. J. Gentry is the Executive Editor of MoralApologetics.com, the Senior Minister at First Christian Church of West Frankfort, IL, and the Co-founder of Good Reasons Apologetics. T. J. has been in Christian ministry since 1984, having served as an itinerant evangelist, youth minister, church planter, pastoral counselor, and Army chaplain. He is the author of numerous books and peer-reviewed articles, including Pulpit Apologist: The Vital Link between Preaching and Apologetics (Wipf and Stock, 2020), You Shall Be My Witnesses: Reflections on Sharing the Gospel (Illative House, 2018), and two forthcoming works published by Moral Apologetics Press: Leaving Calvinism, Finding Grace, and A Moral Way: Aquinas and the Good God. T. J. is a Clinical Pastoral Education Supervisor, holding board-certification as a Pastoral Counselor and a Chaplain. He is a graduate of Southern Illinois University (BA in Political Science), Luther Rice College and Seminary (MA in Apologetics), Holy Apostles College and Seminary (MA in Philosophy), Liberty University (MAR in Church Ministries, MDiv in Chaplaincy, ThM in Theology), Carolina University (DMin in Pastoral Counseling, PhD in Leadership, PhD in Biblical Studies), and the United States Army Chaplain School (Basic and Advanced Courses). He is currently completing his PhD in Theology at North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa (2021), his PhD in Theology and Apologetics at Liberty University (2022), and his PhD in Philosophy of Religion at Southern Evangelical Seminary (2024). T. J. married Amy in 1995, and they are blessed with three daughters and two sons. T. J.’s writing and other projects may be viewed at TJGentry.com.

Loki and the Locus of Identity

Warning: This article contains spoilers of the Disney+ series “Loki.”

 Loki is a television series found on Disney’s streaming service called Disney+. It follows the life of Loki after he swiped the tesseract and was swept into another dimension. He is captured for crimes against time by the TVA (Time Variance Authority). As the series progresses, Loki introspectively reviews his life, his multiple failures, and what makes a Loki a Loki. He encounters other variations of himself by the integration of beings across multiple dimensional timelines. He comes to meet a female version of himself who calls herself Sylvie. Oddly, he finds that he finds the love of his life in a deviation of himself. That is to say, the only love of his life is himself.

            Loki’s quest to find his identity reminds me of an episode of the television series The Big Bang Theory. In one episode, the gregariously free-spirited Penny meets the hyper-analytical Dr. Beverly Hofstader who is mother to Dr. Leonard Hofstader, Penny’s next-door neighbor and future husband. Beverly uses her psychoanalytical skills to inquire into the life of the vivacious young Penny. At one point, Penny notes that she is an aspiring actress. Beverly coldly retorts, “Why?” She goes on to pinpoint that Penny suffers from an external locus of identity. That is, Penny finds her sense of identity in what others think of her. Likewise, it may be said of Loki that he found his value of identity by what others thought of him. Perhaps Loki desired to rule the world because of his deep insecurities about what others thought of him. If he ruled the world, then everyone must appreciate him. Yet as one evaluates three loci of identity, one begins to find one option is much better than the other two.

The External Locus of Identity: To Find One’s Value in What Others Think

            Every person likes to be liked. As the saying goes, people will buy things they don’t need, with money they don’t have, to impress people they don’t even like. For this reason, individuals will spend exorbitant amounts of money for the latest and hippest clothing, the fanciest cars, and the most luxurious homes to stand out as an impressive person. Others will spend countless hours in the gym to chisel themselves into the image of a Grecian god or goddess so as to receive the approval of individuals in their community. An invisible form of competition emanates in the mental state of a person to see if they can outdo everyone else around them. The problem with the external locus of identity is twofold. First, the internal competition against all others is doomed for failure because somewhere and somehow, someone is always better than you in some capacity. The Westernized conception of competitiveness has its setbacks particularly when a person sets oneself against all others. Additionally, the person will never rest and appreciate what one possesses because he or she is always seeing to best their adversaries. In contrast, the apostle Paul noted that he had “learned to be content in whatever circumstances I find myself” (Phil. 4:11, CSB). Second, the internal competition is impossible to win because not even Jesus himself could please everyone. The early church taught that Jesus was sinless (2 Cor. 5:21; Rom. 3:25-26; Gal. 3:13). As such, Jesus always said the right things, always thought the right things, and always behaved appropriately. Yet he still managed to find himself on a Roman cross condemned with criminals, betrayed by a close compatriot, and buried in a borrowed tomb. If Jesus, the exemplification of perfection, could not please everyone, what makes us think that we can?

The Internal Locus of Identity: To Find One’s Value by How One Sees Oneself

            Some might say that the better option of identity is found by looking within oneself to find one’s identity. While a better alternative than the former, it still elicits problems. John Hare wrote a book entitled The Moral Gap where he identifies a gap between the moral demands placed upon us, both internally and externally, and our ability to meet them. Sagely, Hare denotes that “we see people constantly failing by the moral standards they and we uphold at least verbally, and we want to hold them accountable for each failure.”[1] In response, the church has taken two attitudes to the problem: 1) moral idealism, which holds that people are capable of living good lives and holds them accountable for such, 2) cynical realism, holding that no one can live a virtuous life, thereby removing all blame upon a person for an indiscretion committed.[2] The apostle Paul lamented, “For I do not understand what I am doing, because I do not practice what I want to do, but I do what I hate” (Rom. 7:15, CSB). If a person finds one’s sense of identity only within oneself, the person’s inability to live perfectly could cause great stress and strain on one’s mental and emotional faculties. Not to mention, the mind plays horrid tricks on a person much like a funhouse mirror, leading to false notions of oneself (i.e., he/she is not worthy of love, he/she will never do better in life, and so on). Is there not a better way?

The Upward Locus of Identity: Seeing Oneself through the Lens of God

            Thankfully, a better choice is found in possessing an upward locus of identity. By this, it is meant that a person finds one’s worth and value in God’s love and value for the person. This perspective is not unique in Christian thinking. In his eighth book on The Trinity, Augustine argued that God is the good and that human beings find ultimate happiness and value when they enter into a loving relationship with a good God.[3] By this union, God’s righteousness unites with the receptive person and guides the person to live ethically and morally. Hare states, “The emphasis is not on Christ’s righteousness being external to us, but on the unity he establishes between himself and us.”[4] Granted, professing Christians do not always act ethically. However, it can be said that moral transformation can only come about by the unity with the good God and continued dependence on his moral empowerment. Ultimately, a person’s sense of worth, value, and ethics is vastly intensified and expanded when a person sees oneself through the lens of God. Romans 8:31-39 becomes an integral aspect of one’s sense of worth as it is realized that nothing can separate him or her from the awe-inspiring love of God.

Conclusion

            Much, much more could be said about this topic. But to conclude, think of the following scenario. How would the fictional Loki’s character have changed had he been able to view himself through the Creator’s lens? Would he have sought a better relationship with his brother Thor? Would he have resolved the conflicts he had with his father Odin? What about Penny of the Big Bang Theory? Would she still have desired to be an actress if she was not as concerned with how other people viewed her? While Loki and Penny are fictional characters, their internal conflicts and sense of self-worth are far from make-believe. Real-life people deal with these issues every day. Loki and Penny can serve as parables for us to exemplify the need to view ourselves not as others see us or even how we see ourselves, but rather to see ourselves by the divine viewpoint of God. Experiencing the love and moral transformation that comes from a real-life omnibenevolent God is much better than what any writer of fiction could ever muster.

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About the Author

Brian G. Chilton is the founder of BellatorChristi.com, the host of The Bellator Christi Podcast, the author of the Layman’s Manual on Christian Apologetics, and a Ph.D. Candidate of the Theology and Apologetics program at Liberty University. He received his Master of Divinity in Theology from Liberty University (with high distinction); his Bachelor of Science in Religious Studies and Philosophy from Gardner-Webb University (with honors); and received certification in Christian Apologetics from Biola University. Brian is a member of the Evangelical Theological Society and the Evangelical Philosophical Society. Brian has served in pastoral ministry for nearly 20 years and currently serves as a clinical chaplain, an editor for the Eleutheria Journal, and an Associate Editor for MoralApologetics.com.

https://www.amazon.com/Laymans-Manual-Christian-Apologetics-Essentials/dp/1532697104

© 2021. BellatorChristi.com.

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[1] John E. Hare, The Moral Gap: Kantian Ethics, Human Limits, and God’s Assistance, Oliver O’Donovan, ed (Oxford, UK: Clarendon, 1996), 140.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Augustine of Hippo, On the Trinity, in St. Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises, Philip Schaff, ed, Arthur West Haddan, trans, vol. 3 of A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, first series (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1887), 244; David Baggett and Marybeth Baggett, The Morals of the Story: Good News about a Good God (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2018), 66.

[4] Hare, The Moral Gap, 263.

Making Sense of Morality: Objections from Euthyphro and Evil

Editor’s note: R. Scott Smith has graciously allowed us to republish his series, “Making Sense of Morality.” You can find the original post here.

Introduction

In the previous post, I argued that there is another explanation for the ground of core morals, such as justice and love are good, and murder and rape are wrong: they are grounded in God. However, there are a couple serious objections that I will address here, and then I will summarize several of my findings.

Euthyphro Dilemma

“Euthyphro” poses a dilemma: are morals good because God commands them, or does God command them because they are good? If the former, it seems God’s will alone is the ground of morals. But, it seems God could will whatever God wanted, and it would be moral. If so, God could will things we clearly know are wrong, even evil, such as justice being bad, and rape being permissible. Earlier, I suggested this issue seems to face Allah, due to the supremacy of Allah’s sovereignty.

If the latter, it seems God’s commands are redundant, for we already should know morals are valid. Also, they seem to be valid independently of God; if so, God is not needed to ground morals. Moreover, God must consult these morals before commanding them.

 Regarding the former, the Scriptures of Judaism and Christianity portray God as being morally perfect and good. That is, God is bound by God’s character, so God would not will something that is contrary to that character. Moreover, that God is good fits with what we may know by reason and reflection (i.e., what many have called natural law), including our core morals and others too (e.g., we should not torture babies for fun).

On the latter, we may need to have some understanding of goodness before we can know God is good. But, it does not follow from that that morals are independent of God. Further, just because we can know some moral truths without God’s commands (e.g., by reason), still we possess a remarkable ability to suppress or rationalize away what we know morally. In that case, God’s commanding something we can know via reason would not be redundant, but a reinforcement and clarification of that knowledge. 

Back to Evil

So far, I’ve suggested that the best explanation of our core morals is that they are grounded in God’s moral character. But, is there more we can infer by reason?

Suppose we consider evil. Many think evil provides one of the strongest arguments against God’s existence. Yet, what kind of thing is evil? Earlier, I suggested that evil is a privation (or perversion) of goodness. Indeed, it seems hard to define evil is some way other than the way things should not be.

If that is the case, evil presupposes goodness, like Augustine suggested. What then is the best explanation for this standard of goodness? Above, I suggested it is God’s own character. Yet, we can infer more, I think. To be truly good, God must be love. This suggests God is personal. Furthermore, to be truly good, God must be truly just.

Together, these two findings suggest that God would deal with evil, yet in love and care for humans. This in turn raises questions for consideration that are beyond the scope of this book: which God is this? And, has God done this? If so, how? What are implications for us?

Final Thoughts

We have completed our survey of the major moral views in the west. I’ve argued that the best explanation for our core morals is that they are universals that are grounded in God’s morally good character. I’ve argued for this while also arguing for several more key points; e.g.:

• Nominalism is false, and Platonic-like universals exist;

• There are essences, including of core morals, human beings, and mental states (they have intentionality); and

• We can know reality directly, even though our situatedness does affect us in significant ways. So, historicism is mistaken.

Notice too that from our findings, the fact-value split, the deeply held belief that science uniquely gives us knowledge of the facts, whereas ethics and religion give us just opinions and preferences, is false. Science, if grounded in naturalism and nominalism, cannot give us knowledge at all. On the other hand, we do have ethical knowledge of at least our four core morals. Maybe there are more we can know. We also have justified reasons to believe it is true that God is ground of morals – another item of knowledge.

For Further Reading

William Alston, “What Euthyphro Should Have Said,” in Philosophy of Religion: A Reader and Guide, gen. ed. William Lane Craig

R. Scott Smith, In Search of Moral Knowledge, chs. 12-13

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R. Scott Smith is a Christian philosopher and apologist, with special interests in ethics, knowledge, and seeing the body of Christ live in the fullness of the Spirit and truth.

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Lord’s Supper Meditation: God’s Eternal “Now”

A Twilight Musing

          As we gather around Christ’s table, we begin with the purpose the Lord established, that is, remembering Him.  But paradoxically, we are also invited by God to suspend time by uniting past and future into God’s divine “Now.”  For in our own mortal past lies sin, and in our natural future as human beings lies damnation.   But as we symbolically drink the blood of Christ, we tap into the artery of Divine Life, which has no beginning and no end; and in eating the bread we reaffirm our participation in the immortal risen Body of Christ.  In both, we celebrate our liberation from the tyranny of time; having sacrificed to Him our past and our future, we experience His reaffirmation that within us we have, through the Holy Spirit, a portion of the timeless Life that is, and was, and ever shall be.   

          What are the implications of this epiphany of suspended time in the Lord’s Supper?  For one thing, it means that we are not doomed to carrying the baggage of the past, nor to fearing the pitfalls and uncertainties of the future.  Both are subsumed by the absolute safety of God’s time-redeeming “Now.” 

          There is also a message of divine fellowship in God’s perfect “Now.”  Just as in Christ we are freed from our own sinful actions of past and future, so we are also freed from the bondage of bitterness, whether in a long-held response to past actions of others or in a readiness to take offense in the future.  If we are truly in God’s “Now,” there is no longer any need to maintain our pride or our imagined welfare by holding grudges or harboring suspicions against one another.  The refreshing dew of God’s power of forgiveness is always available to us.

          So beginning with a humble remembrance of what God has done for us in the sacrifice of Christ, we can reaffirm that the efficacy of that sacrifice is eternally new, and that it enables us to transcend our captivity to time and all that is mortal.

               REGRETS

It's part of Adam's curse

That here the past is never quite forgot;

Though God can blot it out,

We humans find the bitter-sweet of past events

To be the ever-present evidence

Of our mortality.

The Lethe of God's forgiveness

Is imperfectly imbibed

In this domain of time;

But even diluted doses

Bespeak an unstained "now"

In another clime.

                                                --Elton D. Higgs

                                                    Dec. 29, 1976

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Dr. Elton Higgs was a faculty member in the English department of the University of Michigan-Dearborn from 1965-2001. Having retired from UM-D as Prof. of English in 2001, he now lives with his wife in Jackson, MI. He has published scholarly articles on Chaucer, Langland, the Pearl Poet, Shakespeare, and Milton. Recently, Dr. Higgs has self-published a collection of his poetry called Probing Eyes: Poems of a Lifetime, 1959-2019, as well as a book inspired by The Screwtape Letters, called The Ichabod Letters, available as an e-book from Moral Apologetics. (Ed.: Dr. Higgs was the most important mentor during undergrad for the creator of this website, and his influence was inestimable.

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My Dear Apologist, Please Be Holy.

Apologist, I have a question for you. If forced to choose, which would you rather have, holiness or a good answer? Should be obvious which one to choose, right? Of course, we should want to be holy more than we want good answers. Further, it’s not as though holiness and good answers are opposed to one another, are they? But I have noticed a disturbing tendency in apologists over the years, a tendency toward separating the work of the craft of apologetics and the work of moral transformation. Apologists sometimes abound in facts, arguments, and answers, all the while lacking in any deliberate expression of personal holiness. So, I say to you: my dear apologist, please be holy.

Here are two instances where I think we have room to grow in our holiness as apologists. These are what I would call examples of “practical apologetic holiness.” First, there is a holy and unholy way to present an opponent’s position on a given topic of debate. It is unholy to replace what an unbeliever said with a strawman. When we do this, we are bearing false witness; we are lying. Nothing holy about that, is there? Rather than giving in to this foolish and sinful temptation, why not take the honorable and holy route of always…and I mean always…presenting the best argument an opponent has to offer. Jesus did not die to save strawmen, but He did die to save that person whose argument we should learn and carefully present. So, learn what the atheist is saying, and then, with a commitment to bearing true witness and honoring the One who is truth Himself, show practical apologetic holiness by giving your opponent an honest and faithful representation.

Second, there is a holy and unholy way to present an argument. For example, anytime I stoop to make an ad hominem argument I am not arguing in a holy way. Even if my opponent is a truly unsavory character whose moral compass is clearly broken, it is not honoring to God, or my opponent, or myself to make a personal attack rather than a careful and charitable argument based on the substance of their ideas. When someone resorts to ad hominem attacks it reveals a lack of appreciation for the very sacredness of the moment when one person’s ideas are considered against another’s. Every encounter in apologetics is with an image bearer of God, one whose existence is precious and of infinite worth, such that to encounter an opponent of the Gospel is to encounter the reason there is a Gospel. We all need the grace of God, and when I don’t take seriously the argument of a person and choose, instead, to attack them for some real or perceived personal shortcoming I sully the moment and demean the holy work of apologetics. We are seeking to build relationships and see lives transformed, not win arguments at any cost; and only when we make arguments and refuse to ever attack people can we show practical apologetic holiness.

I’m sure you can think of other instances of practical apologetic holiness, and I hope you will. Let us never forget along the way to learning and doing apologetics that holiness is required of us. So, I say to you again: my dear apologist, please be holy.

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More from this series

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T. J. Gentry is the Executive Editor of MoralApologetics.com, the Senior Minister at First Christian Church of West Frankfort, IL, and the Co-founder of Good Reasons Apologetics. T. J. has been in Christian ministry since 1984, having served as an itinerant evangelist, youth minister, church planter, pastoral counselor, and Army chaplain. He is the author of numerous books and peer-reviewed articles, including Pulpit Apologist: The Vital Link between Preaching and Apologetics (Wipf and Stock, 2020), You Shall Be My Witnesses: Reflections on Sharing the Gospel (Illative House, 2018), and two forthcoming works published by Moral Apologetics Press: Leaving Calvinism, Finding Grace, and A Moral Way: Aquinas and the Good God. T. J. is a Clinical Pastoral Education Supervisor, holding board-certification as a Pastoral Counselor and a Chaplain. He is a graduate of Southern Illinois University (BA in Political Science), Luther Rice College and Seminary (MA in Apologetics), Holy Apostles College and Seminary (MA in Philosophy), Liberty University (MAR in Church Ministries, MDiv in Chaplaincy, ThM in Theology), Carolina University (DMin in Pastoral Counseling, PhD in Leadership, PhD in Biblical Studies), and the United States Army Chaplain School (Basic and Advanced Courses). He is currently completing his PhD in Theology at North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa (2021), his PhD in Theology and Apologetics at Liberty University (2022), and his PhD in Philosophy of Religion at Southern Evangelical Seminary (2024). T. J. married Amy in 1995, and they are blessed with three daughters and two sons. T. J.’s writing and other projects may be viewed at TJGentry.com.

Loki and the Problem of Determinism

Warning: This article contains spoilers of the Disney Plus Series “Loki.”

Recently, my family and I binged the series Loki which is the latest of the burgeoning MCU[1] programs on Disney Plus. While all MCU programs thus far have been very well done—and mind you, I am a huge MCU fan—the Loki series proved to engage deep philosophical and theological questions which should be considered and pondered.

The series begins with a scene from the movie Avengers: Endgame where Loki steals the tesseract and warps himself into another dimension of time. Having thought that he outsmarted his foes once again, the God of Mischief discovered that he would soon be captive to an organization that protected time itself. Since he had disrupted the timeline, he had become dangerous to the TVA (Time Variance Authority) and thus labeled a “variant.” Eventually, Loki meets numerous iterations of himself including a female version known as Lady Loki. Lady Loki abhors the name and decides to call herself “Sylvie.” Loki finds himself in love with Sylvie, the only true love of his life. Technically, he falls in love with himself which creates a whole other set of problems for another time and another article.

The first season of the Loki series ends with Loki and Sylvie standing before a scientist who found a way to stabilize time. Known only as “He Who Remains” (most likely, he either is or will become the fierce villain Kang the Conqueror), the mystery man reveals that he has plotted the lives of every single person in every dimension to stabilize the flow of time. Free will is a farce according to this mystery man as each event was scripted which led Loki and Sylvie to the point that they would meet him. This led to a threshold event in which the One Who Remains found himself at a point that he did not know what would occur.

Sylvie and Loki found themselves at a crossroads trying to decide what to do with the timekeeper. Sylvie desired to kill the keeper of time because she deemed him responsible for what she considered a meaningless life, whereas Loki viewed the timekeeper as a necessary evil. After an epic combat scene, Sylvie warped Loki back to the momentarily defunct TVA before killing the timekeeper. This leads us to our current question: Is God like the One Who Remains? This question kept plaguing my mind as the series unfolded. For three reasons, God’s involvement with the arrow of time is unlike the timekeeper of the Loki series.

1.     God grants moral freedom to creatures, unlike the MCU timekeeper.

While various sects of Christianity may differ in this concept, the cumulative biblical and philosophical data suggests that people are free. As Thomas Aquinas masterfully contended, “I answer that, Man has free-will: otherwise counsels, exhortations, commands, prohibitions, rewards and punishments would be in vain.”[2] Morally speaking, a strict determinist God may be likened to the MCU timekeeper. In such a universe, one discovers oneself in a situation not that dissimilar to the Hindu caste system, whereby a person cannot free oneself from the caste in which one is born. In contrast, as Baggett and Wells denote, “freedom is altogether at home in a universe that is the creation of a perfectly good God who freely created this universe and made us in his image.”[3]

2.     God’s foreknowledge does not necessitate determinism unlike the MCU timekeeper.

Unlike the MCU timekeeper, Scripture defines God as a necessarily omniscient Being. The psalmist praises God as being “great, vast in power; his understanding is infinite” (Psa. 147:5, CSB). It is also noted that God knows a word that comes to a person’s mouth before it is even uttered (Psa. 139:4). The late Thomas Oden defined omniscience as “the infinite consciousness of God in relation to all possible objects of knowledge.”[4] As such, God is intricately involved in all aspects of life. However, God’s knowledge does not necessitate God’s dictation of all events. As Tim Stratton has argued, God’s knowledge includes free choices, but “God does not cause a person’s choices.”[5] Oden further states, “God not only grasps and understands what actually will happen, but also what could happen under varied possible contingencies.”[6] Thus, an Anselmian God—the maximally great Being—is one who knows all choices without forcing choices on a creature.

3.     God’s moral code means that he desires the best for all people, unlike the MCU timekeeper.

The MCU timekeeper was not concerned about the wellbeing of those under his watch care. Rather, he was merely interested in keeping the timeline together. While the timekeeper claimed to loath the position he held, his last words before dying seemed to suggest otherwise. The suspense builds! Enter the ominous music. In contrast, God is an omnibenevolent Being who desires the best for all people. One could not argue the same in deterministic models. The best data suggests that God loves us and has given all of us inherent dignity and worth.[7] Rather than bargaining with Loki and Sylvie to provide them their best life, God desires the best for all creatures. It is because of human rebellion and the impact of sin that people are unable to live to their maximal potential, something which in my opinion will be corrected in heaven.

Conclusion

The Loki series on Disney Plus is a philosophically rich program. In my honest opinion, I believe it is one of the best television programs of the MCU currently available on the streaming app. With that said, some may be tempted to compare He Who Remains (potentially an iteration of Kang the Conqueror) with the Anselmian God of Scripture. However, as has been shown, the two are worlds, if not dimensions, apart. Unlike the MCU timekeeper, God has given his creation moral freedom, purpose, and meaning. We truly serve a good God who desires the very best for us all.

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Brian G. Chilton is the founder of BellatorChristi.com, the host of The Bellator Christi Podcast, the author of the Layman’s Manual on Christian Apologetics, and a Ph.D. Candidate of the Theology and Apologetics program at Liberty University. He received his Master of Divinity in Theology from Liberty University (with high distinction); his Bachelor of Science in Religious Studies and Philosophy from Gardner-Webb University (with honors); and received certification in Christian Apologetics from Biola University. Brian is a member of the Evangelical Theological Society and the Evangelical Philosophical Society. Brian has served in pastoral ministry for nearly 20 years and currently serves as a clinical chaplain, an editor for the Eleutheria Journal, and an Associate Editor for MoralApologetics.com.

https://www.amazon.com/Laymans-Manual-Christian-Apologetics-Essentials/dp/1532697104

© 2021. BellatorChristi.com.

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[1] Short for Marvel Comics Universe.

[2] Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica 1.q83.a1, Fathers of the English Dominican Province, trans (London: Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1911),

[3] David Baggett and Jerry L. Walls, God & Cosmos: Moral Truth and Human Meaning (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2016), 104.

[4] Thomas C. Oden, The Living God: Systematic Theology, Vol. I (San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 1992), 70.

[5] Timothy A. Stratton, Human Freedom, Divine Knowledge, and Mere Molinism: A Biblical, Historical, Theological, and Philosophical Analysis (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2020), 189.

[6] Oden, Living God, 72.

[7] Baggett and Walls, God & Cosmos, 280.

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Lord’s Supper Meditation: Frequency of the Lord’s Supper

A Twilight Musing 

           The minority of Protestant Christians who partake of the Lord’s Supper every Sunday (or more often) have a special obligation to make sure that the frequent observance of this feast does not become commonplace.  It is important, accordingly, that we develop a positive “theology of frequency,” rather than merely excoriating those who disagree with us on the matter.  (By the same token, those who partake of  Communion once a month or less should make sure that they are not neglecting its vital importance in the life of the church.)

           Jesus balanced his caution against vain repetitions in worship by also emphasizing the value of importunity in approaching God.  He praised the Canaanite woman for her persistence in asking for the healing of her daughter, and He told parables (Luke 11 and 18) to show that though God is more than willing to give us what we need, it is part of our spiritual development to keep asking Him.  The Lord’s Supper, like prayer, is a special way of acknowledging our need of what God has to give.  We need to see the incremental value in our frequent remembrance together of God’s greatest gift, His Son, and the resulting life that dwells within us.

           Why does any act become commonplace to us?  Because we develop a tolerance for it or fall into a habitual response to it.  We assume that it will no longer surprise us, and consequently we are not alert to anything fresh that it may have to offer.  But we can never exhaust the possibilities of God’s being able to bless us when we come before Him, and especially must we guard against becoming hardened to the inexhaustible meaning in the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper.  Even when our weakness gets in the way, God is always there, ready to weave even these unsatisfactory times into the whole fabric of growing His will in us.  For, unlike addiction to physical substances, addiction to God, though it increases in intensity, has no annihilating overdose looming at the end: “We are transfigured into His likeness, from splendor to splendor; such is the influence of the Lord who is Spirit” (II Cor. 3:18, NEB). 

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Dr. Elton Higgs was a faculty member in the English department of the University of Michigan-Dearborn from 1965-2001. Having retired from UM-D as Prof. of English in 2001, he now lives with his wife in Jackson, MI. He has published scholarly articles on Chaucer, Langland, the Pearl Poet, Shakespeare, and Milton. Recently, Dr. Higgs has self-published a collection of his poetry called Probing Eyes: Poems of a Lifetime, 1959-2019, as well as a book inspired by The Screwtape Letters, called The Ichabod Letters, available as an e-book from Moral Apologetics. (Ed.: Dr. Higgs was the most important mentor during undergrad for the creator of this website, and his influence was inestimable.

One Good Reason to Believe in God: The Intrinsic Value of His Image (and Man’s Attempt to Escape It)

Editor’s note: Good Reasons Apologetics has graciously allowed us to republish their series, “One Good Reason” You can find the original post here.

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“Then God said, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness.’” (Gen. 1:26)

Of the 10.7 million Africans who were taken captive and brought to the new world, it is believed about 388,000 ended up in what is now the United States. Congress outlawed bringing slaves into the U.S. in 1808, and yet the population of Africans in the U.S. by 1860 was 4.4 million, 3.9 million of which were slaves, and it was almost entirely the result of natural growth (i.e., babies born into slavery generation after generation).     

According to the Columbia Guide to the Holocaust, almost 6 million Jews were killed in Europe and Russia in just a few years during World War II. This represented about 55% of the population of Jews in the regions. At least 50 million people lost their lives as a direct result of the fighting in World War II, with as many as 85 million who lost their lives in total when things like war related famine and disease are included.

Today in the US, according to the conservative numbers we have, it appears we abort about 850,000 unborn children a year. This has been occurring legally since 1973 thanks to a Supreme Court decision that birthed the idea of the “right” to abort a child. It is now estimated that there have been approximately 42 million unborn Americans aborted.

Many who championed chattel slavery did not view Africans as fully human. The idea of evolution provided racists and eugenicists a way to claim that Africans, Aborigines and other people groups were less evolved, and thus less deserving of life than their more evolved counterparts. Nazi propaganda called Jews “rats” and referred to their homes as “nests.” They systematically exterminated Jews, “invalids” and other groups they called “life unworthy of life.” The most common defense of abortion is that it is not a person, but rather a “clump of cells,” or a “choice.”

The cycle of dehumanizing other humans, followed by murder and genocide and eventually negative historical judgement through time is evidence that man still intuitively recognizes the implicit value in other men, and must overcome the idea his target is fully human before taking life in cold blood.

One might argue that humans enslaving and killing other humans on a large scale is just evolution’s “red in tooth and claw” history playing out as always. However, the overwhelming historical tendency for man’s need to dehumanize other men before enslaving or murdering others seems counter to evolution’s “survival of the fittest.” Shouldn’t it be easier to kill with all this practice?

Anyone who has suffered the loss of a loved one or cried out at the senseless loss of a stranger’s life knows the unexplainable angst that comes from the unjustified or systematic taking of a human life. Does this come from blind, purposeless accidents through time that create the psychological illusion of value in one another based only on mutual advantage as is suggested by some?

It seems far more likely to be the residue of his Creator’s imprint of the value of fellow image bearers on every man’s soul. We dare not kill the King’s sons and daughters, and we know it. 

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Tony Williams is currently serving in his 20th year as a police officer in a city in Southern Illinois. He has been studying apologetics in his spare time for two decades, since a crisis of faith led him to the discovery of vast and ever-increasing evidence for his faith. Tony received a bachelor's degree in University Studies from Southern Illinois University in 2019. His career in law enforcement has provided valuable insight into the concepts of truth, evidence, confession, testimony, cultural competency, morality, and most of all, the compelling need for Christ in the lives of the lost. Tony plans to pursue postgraduate studies in apologetics in the near future to sharpen his understanding of the various facets of Christian apologetics. Tony has been married for 9 years and has two sons. He and his family currently reside in Southern Illinois.

What Makes Something Morally Good or Bad? Erik Wielenberg’s Theory (Part 2)

Editor’s note: Adam Johnson has graciously allowed us to republish his video series, “What Makes Something Morally Good or Bad?” Find the original post here.

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Erik Wielenberg has proposed an atheistic theory of where morality comes from. He claims that God is not necessary in order to have objective morality by which humans are required to live. Wielenberg’s theory has three main components: First, it is not a materialistic theory, meaning that it does not assume that the physical world is all there is. Second, Wielenberg’s theory proposes the existence of “brute ethical facts” that exist outside of nature which ground moral values and obligations. Third, Wielenberg says that these facts become applicable to human beings by something he calls the “making relationship,” whereby facts about circumstances in the world cause moral facts to become applicable to certain situations (to be instantiated). This lecture explains the main concepts of Wielenberg’s theory and also examines some objections to his theory.

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Adam Lloyd Johnson serves as a university campus missionary with Ratio Christi. He also teaches classes for Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and spends one month each year living and teaching at Rhineland Theological Seminary in Wölmersen, Germany. Adam received his PhD in Theological Studies with an emphasis in Philosophy of Religion from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in 2020.

Making Sense of Morality: Where Do We Go from Here?

Editor’s note: R. Scott Smith has graciously allowed us to republish his series, “Making Sense of Morality.” You can find the original post here.

Summary of the Survey

We have surveyed major ethical options for what our core morals are, including:

• Are they how we happen to talk?

• Are they physical things? Perhaps evolutionary products?

• Are they ways of behaving or moving our bodies?

• Are they results of a utilitarian calculus?

• Are they emotive utterances?

• Are they particulars? (nominalism)

But, at least since Hobbes, I’ve argued that none of the views can preserve our core morals of murder and rape being wrong, and love and justice being good.

What Are These Core Morals?

For one, they seem to be objectively real. They seem to exist independently of us as moral principles and values. They also simply seem to be intrinsically valid, and not due to anything else (like, the consequences). That is, they seem to have an essential moral nature. Moreover, they cannot be just physical things or particulars, as we’ve seen. Instead, they seem to be a “one-in-many” – each one is one principle (or value), yet it can have many instances/examples. In sum, they seem to be Platonic-like universals.

That raises many questions, however. Earlier, I remarked that Christine Korsgaard rightly observed that it’s hard to see how such things could have anything to do with us. While she thinks people are physical, it still applies if we are a body-soul unity. Why should these abstract objects have anything to do with us? On Plato’s view, they exist in a heavenly realm of values as brute features of reality.

What makes justice and love character qualities that should be present in us? Why is it inappropriate morally for us to murder or rape? These are normative qualities, not merely descriptive. As we’ve seen, it is hard to see how we can get the moral ought from what is descriptively the case. Yet, that problem could be overcome if humans have an essential nature that makes these moral values appropriate for them, and these acts inappropriate.

Earlier, I argued that the soul as our essential nature provides a sound explanation for how we can be the identical person through change. Body-soul dualists affirm that the soul is our essential nature, and it sets the boundary conditions for what is appropriate for us. For instance, it is inappropriate for us to grow a cat’s tail due to our nature, and it is inappropriate for us to murder due to our nature.

We also saw another reason for the soul’s existence. We do in fact think and form beliefs, yet these have intentionality, which I argued is best understood as something immaterial and having an essence. Now, it is hard to conceive how a physical brain could interact with something immaterial, but that problem does not seem to exist for an immaterial soul/mind.

Moreover, why should we feel guilt and shame when we break these core morals? That doesn’t make sense if these morals are just abstract objects that are immaterial and not located in space and time. Instead, we seem to have such responses in the presence of persons we have wronged morally. Also, retributive justice doesn’t make sense if we repay an abstract principle or value. But it would make sense if a person should be repaid.

There is another explanation we have seen for the grounding of these core morals: they are grounded in God. That helps solve the question of why we feel shame when we break one of these morals. But, that also raises questions, such as: are they good because God commands them, or does God command them because they are good (i.e., the Euthyphro dilemma)? Also, which God would this be?

I will start to tackle these in the next essay. But, first, there is another option for properties besides universals (realism) and nominalism. It is divine conceptualism; properties just are God’s concepts. Justice in us is God’s concept. Yet, concepts have intentionality, but virtues do not. When we think about people being just, we don’t mean they have a concept of justice (though they could), but that they have that virtue present in them. So, offhand, divine conceptualism seems to trade on a confusion.

For Further Reading

R. Scott Smith, In Search of Moral Knowledge, ch. 12

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R. Scott Smith is a Christian philosopher and apologist, with special interests in ethics, knowledge, and seeing the body of Christ live in the fullness of the Spirit and truth.

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What Makes Something Morally Good or Bad? Introduction to Metaethics (Part 1)

Editor’s note: Adam Johnson has graciously allowed us to republish his video series, “What Makes Something Morally Good or Bad?” Find the original post here.

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Metaethics is the study of what makes something good or bad. It is not the study of what is good or bad, but why there are such things as moral good and moral bad. What is morality? Where did it come from? There are many theories of what morality is; some think morality is subjective and depends on individual people, cultures, and circumstances. Others believe that morality is objective, that it is independent of human beings. Most theists think that morality comes from God, but many atheists claim that God is not necessary for morality. Non-naturalists, for example, believe that morality can exist objectively without God. Thinkers throughout Western history have defended many positions, both subjective and objective as well as theistic and atheist ones. Listen in as Adam gives an overview of the different metaethical theories.

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Adam Lloyd Johnson serves as a university campus missionary with Ratio Christi. He also teaches classes for Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and spends one month each year living and teaching at Rhineland Theological Seminary in Wölmersen, Germany. Adam received his PhD in Theological Studies with an emphasis in Philosophy of Religion from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in 2020.

Mormonism and the Moral Argument

Many moral apologists hold that the moral argument ultimately points beyond mere theism to the truth of Christianity in particular. Such a view is held by David Baggett, Jerry Walls, H.P Owen, and C.S. Lewis. But if that’s the case, then we should discover that Christianity really does explain the moral facts, facts about moral value, moral knowledge, and moral rationality, better than not just secular atheistic theories, but alternative religious explanations as well. Today, I give some suggestions about why Christianity is a better explanation than Mormonism.

Some may be perplexed that I would draw such a sharp distinction between Christianity and Mormonism. Isn’t, after all, Mormonism just another Christian denomination? In that case, it might be like saying Methodism better explains the moral facts than does Catholicism. Such confusion is understandable, especially given that in recent memory, the LDS church, the largest of many different restorationist Mormon denominations, has seemingly tried to represent themselves as just another Christian denomination, even officially dropping the “Mormon” moniker in 2018.[1] They now wish to be known simply as the “Church of Jesus Christ.” So, to make the distinction clear, it will help to lay out, briefly, a few key facts about the Mormon religion.

Mormon Theology and Metaphysics

Most know that Mormonism is a religion founded by Joseph Smith, who claimed to be a prophet, seer, and revelator. Smith claims that “God the Father and Jesus Christ appeared to him in a grove of trees near his parents’ home in western New York State when he was about 14 years old.”[2] Smith went into the woods to pray, partly to find out which church he should join, frustrated by the “war of words and the tumult of opinions” among the Christian denominations.[3] Smith wanted to know which church was right, but in the grove he learned that none were. A few months later, Smith claims that he was visited by the angel Moroni, who directed him to the location of some buried gold plates, which contained an account of “the former inhabitants of this continent” and “the fullness of the everlasting Gospel.”[4]

Later, Smith supposedly found and translated these golden plates, the resulting work being the Book of Mormon. Christian critics of the Book of Mormon note that despite its unusual provenance, its “theology is largely orthodox in nature.”[5] However, Smith had started a new religious movement, one that would evolve and develop new doctrines, largely supported by its commitment to ongoing revelation. Through continued revelation and inspired translations, Smith would build upon the mostly benign theology of the Book of Mormon and would include, infamously, the doctrine of plural marriage (polygamy) among others.

I suspect that most with at least a passing awareness of Mormonism know these basic facts, but many are not familiar with some of the more exotic teachings of Prophet Joseph. In the late 1830s and into the 1840s, Smith produced a “translation” of some Egyptian papyri. Smith claimed that the documents he bought from traveling salesmen Michael Chandler was actually a lost, first person account from Abraham himself, about his days in Egypt.[6] In this “Book of Abraham,” we learn that there are eternally existent “intelligences” (3:18). God is said to dwell in the midst of these; these intelligences were “organized” before the making of the world (3:22-23). The Book of Abraham is clear that all human beings are organized from these eternal and pre-existing intelligences. Such a view raises important questions about God’s relation to these intelligences. Are they, though eternal, nevertheless ontologically dependent upon him in some way?

Fortunately, in 1844 Joseph Smith would answer this question directly in a sermon given shortly before he died. In his “King Follet Sermon,” Smith proclaimed that “God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens!” He adds that God is “like yourselves in all the person, image, and very form as a man.”[7] Smith provides further detail, explaining how God came to be God: “We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea, and take away the veil, so that you may see… He was once a man like us; yea, that God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ Himself did; and I will show it from the Bible.”[8]

LDS scholar Richard Bushman says that in this sermon, Joseph taught that “God was one of the free intelligences who had learned to become God.” Bushman adds that this interpretation is “obvious.”[9] Bushman further comments that Joseph Smith’s “words evoked a hierarchy of gods, succeeding to higher stations of greater glory as kingdoms are presented to them and as rising souls below them ascend to godhood… He [God] is their teacher, not their maker.”[10] Additional clarification and endorsement of this doctrine was given by later church president and prophet, Lorenzo Snow, who said, “As man is God once was, as God is man may be." A church produced magazine comments on this couplet that “it is clear that the teaching of President Lorenzo Snow is both acceptable and accepted doctrine in the Church today."[11]

The moral argument is an argument for the existence of God. Proponents of the moral argument understand this God to be the only God, eternally existent, the ground of all that exists, singular, and that there is none other like him. Many moral apologists adopt a broadly Anselmian understanding of God as the Greatest Conceivable Being, the sort of being that possesses all great making properties in a maximal way. He is all good, all powerful, and all knowing. This point is critical and not merely incidental to the moral argument. God must be maximally great, and therefore sui generis, or else God cannot be the explanation of morality.

The Problem of God’s Goodness

Plato’s famous Euthyphro Dilemma can highlight the difference between Christian monotheism and Mormon theology.[12] Plato argued that either the Gods love what is good or something is good when it is loved by the Gods. If the Gods love what is good, then morality doesn’t need the Gods. We can have morality without appeal to the Gods. We simply love the good and we will be moral. But if something is good just because it is loved by the Gods, then morality is arbitrary and irrational. Christian moral philosophers like David Baggett have argued that theism can “split the horns” of the dilemma. One can identify the good with God, so that morality depends on God but is not arbitrary. Theists can also think of moral obligations as identical to God’s commands so that what is morally right is determined by God.

However, such an option is not available to Mormons. Since the person they call “God” is an uncreated intelligence, and the same kind of thing as all other persons, he cannot be identified with the good. No finite and concrete thing like an intelligence would rightly fill that role. If we pose the Euthyphro dilemma to the Mormon, the answer can only be that God loves what is holy. God is simply an exalted man and cannot be the ground of what is moral. Therefore, on the Mormon view, objective morality would exist whether God exists or not.

Certainly, the Mormon God may issue commands to us, but why should we obey them? And the Mormon God may even be good; he might have a perfected moral character, but he cannot identical to the good; he is not Anselm’s Greatest Conceivable Being. He is, as Smith said, an exalted man. He is not the creator of human beings, merely their organizer.

In my view, this issue about the Mormon God’s relation to the good is the central challenge to morality on a Mormon view of the world. But there are other formidable issues. I want only to mention two more.

The Problem of Moral Knowledge

First, there is the problem of moral knowledge. On the Christian view, God is omnipotent and makes the world ex nihilo. He has meticulous control over the world and over the creation and development of our minds. Since he is good and capable, it is natural to think he would make us to know moral truth. However, on the Mormon view, we have always existed as “intelligences” and God’s power is limited. He can form us, but does not create us. Our minds, in particular, seem to exist from eternity past as “intelligences.” Why think, then, that our cognitive abilities are able to discern moral truth? If we are able to know moral truth, one possibility would seemingly be that it is an inexplicable, brute fact about our status as uncreated intelligences. Intelligences just know what is moral and that is the end of the explanation. This would not be a satisfying explanation of how we can rationally have moral knowledge.[13]

The Problem of Moral Rationality

Second, there is the problem of justice and of the ultimate reconciliation between happiness and morality. Kant, in his moral argument for theism, argues that we must presuppose that God exists if for no other reason than to guarantee that justice is ultimately done. God judges, rewards the righteous and punishes the wicked. And he has the power to balance the scales in the final judgment. However, the Mormon God, limited in power and subject to the eternal laws of the universe, cannot guarantee the ultimate victory of good over evil. How things work out in the end are beyond his control. Certainly, we can grant that the Mormon God, as an exalted man, may have, relatively speaking, a tremendous amount of power. But not all power and not all knowledge. As Joseph Smith said, God is subject to the eternal laws of the universe, including the principles of exaltation and eternality of matter.[14] It would seemingly be a happy coincidence that God, given his limitations, was able to bring about the ultimate harmony of morality and happiness. Even if obedience to the Mormon God could, somehow, count as fulfilling our moral obligations, it remains to be seen how the moral life can be ultimately rational.

In conclusion, then, I want to reiterate I intend this short essay to be merely suggestive, one that probes potential issues with the Mormon worldview considering morality. I think these three issues, related to the goodness of God, moral knowledge, and moral rationality, are likely indicative of some serious shortcomings in Mormonism’s explanatory power regarding the moral facts and they give us at least a prima facie reason to think that Christianity better explains the moral facts.

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[1] https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/church/news/mormon-is-out-church-releases-statement-on-how-to-refer-to-the-organization?lang=eng

[2] https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/first-vision-accounts?lang=eng

[3] https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/pgp/js-h/1.5-20?lang=eng#p5

[4] https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/pgp/js-h/1.5-20?lang=eng#p5

[5] Carl Mosser, “And the Saints Go Marching On” in The New Mormon Challenge.

[6] However, it is very likely that the papyri had nothing to do with Abraham and were a collection of well-known texts. These have since been translated by Egyptologists and no connection to Abraham is evident. Cf. https://coldcasechristianity.com/writings/how-the-book-of-abraham-exposes-the-false-nature-of-mormonism/

[7] https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1971/04/the-king-follett-sermon?lang=eng

[8] https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1971/04/the-king-follett-sermon?lang=eng

[9] Richard Bushman, Rough Stone Rolling, 534.

[10] Bushman, 535.

[11]The comment was made in 1909, but reprinted in 2002. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/2002/02/the-origin-of-man?lang=eng 

[12]Some LDS scholars argue that LDS doctrine is not polytheistic. They say such a term is “pejorative, inaccurate, and inappropriate.” Cf. https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/answers/Mormonism_and_the_nature_of_God/Polytheism#Question:_Are_Christians_monotheists.3F

Note, however, that the FAIR explanation of monotheism seems to be functional rather than ontological. They are monotheists because they worship one God. However, this would be, at best, an idiosyncratic use of the terms monotheistic and polytheistic. The article further incorrectly defines “social trinitarianism” as the denial that the Trinity is one substance. They also try to argue that the Christian doctrine of theosis, which has some biblical basis, is the same as the one taught by the LDS church. That is also simply incorrect; orthodox Christians have never taught that human beings can become God in exactly the same way as God is God, even if they held that there is some mystical union between a human person and the divine.

[13] There are potentially some other explanations for grounding moral knowledge, which I consider here.

[14] https://abn.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1971/04/the-king-follett-sermon?lang=eng

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The Managing Editor of MoralApologetics.com, Jonathan has been a vital part of the Moral Apologetics team since its inception. Currently, he serves as adjunct instructor of philosophy for Grand Canyon University and Liberty University. Prior to these positions, he was ordained as a minister and served as spiritual life director. He is the author or co-author of several articles on metaethics, theology, and history of philosophy. With a Master’s in Global Apologetics and a graduate of Biola’s Master’s program in philosophy, he is currently in the throes of finishing his doctoral dissertation in which he extends a four-fold moral argument from mere theism to a distinctively Christian picture of God. Jonathan, his wife Sara, and their two children presently live in Lynchburg, Virginia.

Lord’s Supper Meditation: Frailty and Fruitfulness

A Twilight Musing

                      A grain of wheat and a grape are fragile fruits.  By themselves they will neither greatly nourish nor produce fruit, but if either one is combined with others of its kind, the aggregate of them can be transformed into food and drink that will sustain us and make our hearts glad.  And if either one is planted as a seed, it will be fruitful and produce more of its kind.

           Jesus spoke explicitly about the spiritual implications of a grain of wheat being planted: in order to bear fruit, it must die to what it is and be transformed into something else—must die in order to achieve its full potential of life.  Even if it is joined with others and made into bread, it must endure the transmutation into flour.  The grape also finds its larger purpose in being crushed into juice to make a drink or to flavor some food.  Either the grain of wheat or the grape loses some of its potential if it is consumed by itself.

           As we partake of these products of wheat and grapes which have been changed in a natural way, we do well to remember that we as individual “grains and grapes” must be ready to be transformed spiritually into what God can make of us together, as well as being acutely aware of what that requires of us as individuals.  Jesus Himself did not pull back from going through death in order to become our Redeemer, knowing that there was no way to be what God needed Him to be except to lose all that He was.  When we share these symbols of His body and blood, we are renewing our consent to be continually transformed from puny “grains and grapes” into the Body of Christ, not as that body walked the earth, nor even as it hung on the cross and was buried, but as it was raised to perfect and nourishing Life, filling all of us with that divine power which brings us together in Him.

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Dr. Elton Higgs was a faculty member in the English department of the University of Michigan-Dearborn from 1965-2001. Having retired from UM-D as Prof. of English in 2001, he now lives with his wife in Jackson, MI. He has published scholarly articles on Chaucer, Langland, the Pearl Poet, Shakespeare, and Milton. Recently, Dr. Higgs has self-published a collection of his poetry called Probing Eyes: Poems of a Lifetime, 1959-2019, as well as a book inspired by The Screwtape Letters, called The Ichabod Letters, available as an e-book from Moral Apologetics. (Ed.: Dr. Higgs was the most important mentor during undergrad for the creator of this website, and his influence was inestimable.

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The Most Shocking Truth Learned about God's Love in Chaplaincy Ministry

In recent years, I have heard an increasing number of evangelical Christians who have stated that the church speaks too much about the love of God. Just a casual search on social media revealed the following comments—note that the comments have been reworded for the sake of confidentiality:

“There is too much modern preaching on God’s love.”

“Jesus would never have been crucified if he only preached love.”

“People need truth and not love.”

“No one has been transformed by hearing messages on God’s love.”

Since last September, I have worked as a hospice chaplain. Due to HIPAA laws, I cannot afford personal details concerning any individual visit. However, I can share generalized trends. Chaplain services are often accepted across a vast demographic that includes non-churchgoers, skeptics, doubters, faithful church attendees, and church dropouts. When I visit patients and they permit me to read from the Scripture, I almost always read Romans 8:35-39 which says,

Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or trouble, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? … But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom. 8:35, 37-39).[1]

The most shocking truth that I have learned in chaplaincy ministry is that people from across the board will respond to this Scripture while smiling and with a tear in their eye, saying, “I have never heard that passage before,” or “I never knew that about God.” Thus, from my personal observations, it would appear that rather than talking too much about God’s love, the modern church does not speak on God’s love enough. The shock received doesn’t end there. On numerous occasions, I have heard yet an equally shocking question. From across the demographic spectrum, people will then ask, “Where do you pastor? I want to go to a church like that.”

As a theologian, it is estimated that many modern Christians do not understand God’s love. Four theological characteristics of God’s love must be explained, which will hopefully clear some confusion when thinking about God’s love.

1.               God’s love is at the center of the gospel. God is under no obligation to save anyone. God would have been perfectly justified had he never saved anyone. God is the ultimate Lover of humanity. In Psalm 23:6, the CSB notes that God’s “goodness and faithful love will pursue me.”[2] The Hebrew word radaph indicates one chasing after someone or something. In this case, God’s love actively pursues his children. As Dr. Baggett has often said, “Not only does God love us, but he also likes us.” Psalm 23:6 seems to indicate that very truth. Additionally, the NT expresses that the ultimate act of love is found in one sacrificing oneself on behalf of another (John 15:13). A person is not saved by loving God, but rather by accepting God’s love first given to them (Rom. 5:8). Rather than being a secondary issue, the concept of divine love is the cornerstone of Christian theology.

2.               God’s love is the focus of Christian living. Jesus heavily emphasizes love in his messages. He noted that the mark of Christian discipleship is love, saying, “By this shall all people know that you are my disciples: if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). Furthermore, the two greatest commandments are centered on a person’s love for God and others (Mark 12:28-31). The love of God must not be deemphasized if one is to focus on the things that Jesus did.

3.               God’s love is rooted in his holiness and truth. Too often, people create a false bifurcation between God’s holiness or truth and love. Paul described the characteristics of love in 1 Corinthians 13. Among the traits listed were that love “does not rejoice in unrighteousness” (1 Cor. 13:6) but “rejoices with the truth” (1 Cor. 13:6). Deception and sinfulness are not virtuous traits. Thus, truth and righteousness are rooted and centered in the love of God and, thereby, cannot be found outside of the morally benevolent nature of God. Ironically, objectors do not seem to realize that the very truth and holiness they are espousing are intricately interlocked with the very thing that is being shunned.

4.               God’s love can be dangerous. Some tend to think that messages of love are innocent and passive. However, genuine love is vulnerable, addresses injustices, and stands up for the rights of the oppressed. Jesus defended the rights of the oppressed. When he overturned the tables, he stood against the political and religious institution that had made the temple of God into a business. Quoting Isaiah 56:7 and Jeremiah 7:11, Jesus said, “It is written: ‘My house will be called a house of prayer’; but you are making it a den of robbers” (Matt. 21:13). Historically speaking, it was because of Jesus’s love for the Father and the oppressed that he found himself on a cross. Theologically speaking, it was because of Jesus’s love for humanity that he willingly sacrificed himself for the atonement of sins.

Love is difficult. People often desire to worship a God like themselves. As such, it is easier to view God as vindictive and instantly righting wrongs as they are committed. Yet, those who are quick to cast a condemning voice against others fail to realize that it was also for their sins that Jesus died. Each person is guilty of some sin and for harming another person in some way, albeit unintentionally. What if God condemned us as we sometimes wish God would condemn others? Love makes us vulnerable. That is why it is often eschewed. Yet if we really want to see a move of God, we need to emphasize God’s love more, not less. As God’s love is stressed, it will include his truthful and holy nature. It was not the judgmental nature of God that saved us, it was by his all-encompassing love we were set free.

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About the Author 

Brian G. Chilton is the founder of BellatorChristi.com, the host of The Bellator Christi Podcast, and the author of the Layman’s Manual on Christian Apologetics. Brian is a Ph.D. Candidate of the Theology and Apologetics program at Liberty University. He received his Master of Divinity in Theology from Liberty University (with high distinction); his Bachelor of Science in Religious Studies and Philosophy from Gardner-Webb University (with honors); and received certification in Christian Apologetics from Biola University. Brian is enrolled in the Ph.D. program in Theology and Apologetics at Liberty University and is a member of the Evangelical Theological Society and the Evangelical Philosophical Society. Brian has served in pastoral ministry for nearly 20 years. He currently serves as a clinical chaplain.

https://www.amazon.com/Laymans-Manual-Christian-Apologetics-Essentials/dp/1532697104

© 2021. BellatorChristi.com.

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[1] Unless otherwise noted, all quoted Scripture comes from the New American Standard Bible (La Habra, CA: Lockman Foundation, 2020).

[2] Scripture marked CSB comes from the Christian Standard Bible (Nashville, TN: Holman, 2020).

Making Sense of Morality: A Brief Assessment of MacIntyre’s Ethics

Editor’s note: R. Scott Smith has graciously allowed us to republish his series, “Making Sense of Morality.” You can find the original post here.

Some Contributions

What should we make of MacIntyre’s proposals? His ethics focuses on the importance of good character by embodying moral virtues and being authentic. He also draws attention to the importance of community. And, he emphasizes the need for living out the virtues, and not merely engaging in abstract theorizing.

Broad Concerns

As we have seen, MacIntyre and other authors writing in the light of the postmodern turn embrace nominalism. Yet, we have seen its disastrous effects, leaving us without any qualities whatsoever. So, there are no people, no morals (not even our core ones), no world, etc. But surely this is false, and it destroys morality.

We also have surveyed issues with historicism, which ends up with no way to start making interpretations. Yet, are we really so situated that we cannot access reality directly? Now, surely no human is blind to nothing, and we cannot know something exhaustively. Surely we have our biases, too.

Yet, from daily life, it seems we can notice that we do access reality. For example, how do children learn to form concepts of apples? It seems it is by having many experiences of them. Then they can notice their commonalities, and they can form a concept on that basis. Then they can use that concept to compare something else they see (e.g., a tomato) and notice if it too is an apple or not. Adults do this, too, when they use phones to refill prescriptions, or enter their “PIN” for a debit card purchase.

It seems to be a descriptive fact that we can compare our concepts with things as they are, just as in that apple example. We also can adjust our concepts to better fit with reality. I think we can know this to be so, if we pay close attention to what is consciously before our minds.

However, how we attend to what we are aware of can reflect patterns. We can fall into ruts, noticing some things while not attending to others. As J. P. Moreland suggests, “situatedness functions as a set of habit forming background beliefs and concepts that direct our acts of noticing or failing to notice various features of reality” (Moreland, 311). But these habits do not preclude us from accessing reality.

Specific Concerns

Now, MacIntyre rejects the soul as the basis for one’s being the same person through change. For one, it would be an essence, and he seems to think humans are just bodies (Dependent Rational Animals, 6). Can the unity of one’s narrative meet this need?

For him, a narrative does not have an essence; it is composed of sentences that tell a person’s story. At any time, the narrative’s identity just is the bundle of sentences that are its members. However, if a new sentence is added, then the set of members has changed, and a new story has taken the old one’s place. Sadly, then, someone cannot grow in virtue or rationality on this view, for they do not maintain their identity through change.

Moreover, can we really see that one tradition is rationally superior to another? MacIntyre in banking on our ability to become bilingual. However, on his view, a person at any time is constituted by his or her narrative, and that in turn cannot be pried off from the tradition on which it is based. When a person immerses him or herself into another tradition to learn its language, that learning always will be done from the interpretive standpoint of the first tradition, by which that person has been formed. Indeed, it could not be otherwise, since that person is narratively “constituted” by the first tradition’s conceptual/linguistic framework. But, as that person “learns” that second language, new sentences should be added to that person’s narrative. Yet, if so, that person no longer is the same! So it becomes impossible to see the rational superiority of another tradition on his own views.

For Further Reading

Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue, 3rd ed.; Dependent Rational Animals; and Whose Justice? Which Rationality?

J. P. Moreland, “Two Areas of Reflection and Dialogue with John Franke,” Philosophia Christi 8:2 (2006)

R. Scott Smith, In Search of Moral Knowledge, ch. 11

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R. Scott Smith is a Christian philosopher and apologist, with special interests in ethics, knowledge, and seeing the body of Christ live in the fullness of the Spirit and truth.

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