lewis' metaphysical quandaries

Barry Wallace writes:

[C.S. Lewis] was a careful thinker, and a former atheist, which means he wrestled with a multitude of metaphysical quandaries both as an unbeliever and as a believer. In neither case were all doubts erased from his mind.

Here are a couple of other excerpts from his writings that shed some additional light, I think, both on his reasoning and on your reflections.

"Now Faith…is the art of holding on to things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods. For moods will change, whatever view your reason takes. I know that by experience. Now that I am a Christian I do have moods in which the whole thing looks very improbable: but when I was an atheist I had moods in which Christianity looked terribly probable. This rebellion of your moods against your real self is going to come anyway. That is why Faith is such a necessary virtue: unless you teach your moods where they get off, you can never be either a sound Christian or even a sound atheist, but just a creature dithering to and fro, with its beliefs really dependent on the weather and the state of its digestion." [Mere Christianity]

“Atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning...”

“A theory which explained everything else in the whole universe but which made it impossible to believe that our thinking was valid, would be utterly out of court. For that theory would itself have been reached by thinking, and if thinking is not valid that theory would, of course, be itself demolished. It would have destroyed its own credentials. It would be an argument which proved that no argument was sound-a proof that there are no such things as proofs-which is nonsense. Thus a strict materialism refutes itself for the reason given long ago by Professor Haldane: `If my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain, I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true … and hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms.’” [Possible Worlds] But Naturalism, even if it is not purely materialistic, seems to me to involve the same difficulty, though in a somewhat less obvious form. It discredits our processes of reasoning or at least reduces their credit to such a humble level that it can no longer support Naturalism itself.'” [Miracles: A Preliminary Study]

the so-called evangelical atheist

Joshua Moran writes:

I've put a lot of thought over the past year or two into men like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris, whom I would consider evangelical atheists. Their books The God Delusion and Letter To A Christian Nation are two of the "best" attacks against Christianity today. Last time I checked both authors were in the top 100 best sellers, I think with Dawkins staying in or around the top ten (I think Harris was 33rd). I'm not writing this to give out a critique to all of their thought, I've thought and come up with my own critiques in the past and can honestly say that their thoughts neither frighten me nor hinder my faith. However, their thought has harmed many Christians over the past few years and the since the Enlightening Christians have had a hard time dealing with the ideas of faith and reason. I'm going to offer two thoughts in this note, one on Dawkins and Harris and one, albeit loosely, on the idea of faith and reason. Here it goes.

"1. I can't take full credit for this idea. It's one that [another Christian] and I talked through last year at the gym. It's not worth getting mad at Dawkins and Harris. We shouldn't scathe every time we think of them nor every time someone brings them up. We shouldn't blame them for the doubt that has come up in our own lives or in those around us. Rather we should PRAY for them. My last note was on grace and how it comes free and should cost us all something. Grace is there for Dawkins and Harris. We should pray for them. Pray that they would receive power from on High. And not one of those stereotypical holier than thou prayers but a prayer of sincerity because we value their souls, we value their eternal beings. Also, we should think back to the church in Acts being prosecuted by one of the best evangelical "atheists" ever, Saul of Tarsus. Think about the impact Paul has made since his conversion, there's no reason to think that Dawkins and Harris can't do the same thing. Prayer works. do it.

2. Last night as I lay in my bed, I was thinking about men like Dawkins and Harris and anyone else that I've come into contact with that has been closed off to the gospel, or to take it a step further, anyone who has been closed off to seeing the power of God today. I wonder why is that, why are people closed off to God. I think the answer is a lack of imagination. Honestly. I think that we've begun rely only on results, creativity gets you no points. Kids in America today are involved in eight different activities at the same time, so they can boost their college resumes, so they can get into a good grad school, so they can start in six figures. They base everything on results, results, results. There's no time for daydreaming, no time for pondering, no time for imagination. I think this keeps people from God. I see it in college students, students who only want to rely on what they've seen, what they've felt, and think that's all there is out there. I'm a culprit of this myself. I often stop myself short of what God has for me because I don't think it's possible, because I have no imagination as to what God can do. All I have is my own experience, all I have is reason. I love reason and the enlightenment movement, but reason without imagination is no good at all. God is the Creator God, the creativity and imagination required to from the world out of a void is astounding, it's silly to think He doesn't want us to be creative also.