The new Materialism

Some of you may have noticed a growing trend among the scientific community.
In some ways, it has been subtle, and in others, much less so.

This is one of the less subtle declarations, but is a good illustration of the point.

Our scientists are increasingly religious these days, it seems. But not in the traditional sense.
More and more, they give their allegiance to an idea, and demand the same from all of their colleagues. The idea is this: a blind, unquestioning, dogmatic faith in Science.

While it is commonly acknowledged that there are things that science can explain, but domains in which it cannot pass, I have increasingly noticed that these domains are brushed aside as irrelevant or nonexistent.

There is a growing chorus behind the words of Carl Sagan:
"The Universe is all there is, all there was, and all there ever will be”

You can see it in the growing aggressiveness of atheists such as Richard Dawkins, who calls fellow atheists to spread their faith and counteract the societally damaging influence of religion in general and Christianity in specific. And he is far from alone in his views.

Secular Humanists grow increasingly strident in their criticism and mockery of antediluvian notions such as Creationism or a personal God, and they aren't keeping it to themselves much these days. While some of their comments (often disrespectful to the point of blasphemy, and very much intentionally so) are infuriating, sadly the responses of Christians are often no less frustrating in their ignorance.

Which leads to another observation. So many Christians are ill-prepared to deal with real skepticism and intellectual antagonism, often due to the ridiculous straw-men of other views presented for attack by a watered-down Christian culture.

If we believe that the Bible and our Faith can truly withstand the attacks of arrogant skeptics and dodgy post-modernists alike, why do we feel the need to shield them from all questions?
We claim that the Bible is the inspired Word of God. If we really believe this, then we know that it can withstand every criticism and accusation thrown against it.

This being the case, why not try it? Take a stand, stop pandering and disguising and watering down our faith, and unapologetically proclaim what we believe, wrestling with both our hearts and our minds against those who seek to discredit the Truth we hold, yet loving them and praying for God to open their minds?

This leads to an unfortunate observation on the church in America. (I specify the American church because I do not know the state of churches in other countries and cultures. Perhaps they are as badly off as we are, perhaps not.)

We tend to form two camps:
The first camp feels that intellectual arguments are not our business, and that we should just love and accept our enemies as they are.
The second camp feels that intellectual arguments are indeed our business, and that we should tear down our opponents who assault our faith at every opportunity.

In my opinion, which is by no means authoritative, both camps are wrong.

Without a strong intellectual knowledge and defense of our faith, we are left exposed for both the accusations and the false teachings of the enemy, and can neither repel the first nor guard against the second.

However, without loving our enemies, we disobey the second great commandment and forget what is our primary goal: Not to defeat our opponents arguments, but to bring them to a relationship with Christ. If our arguments can serve this purpose, by all means let us proceed, but without our true objective in sight, argument is fruitless and leads only to division.

So, if we are to halt our culture's slide into a Roman-style decay and fall, and cause God to be glorified to a greater extent in both our nation and the world, we will need both strengths.
Both love and knowledge are necessary and crucial in our quest for God's glory.

Remember the words of Christ: "be wise as serpents, and gentle as doves".

At present, we tend to be one or the other. Let us follow His command and be both.