How Christianity shaped Western values

Last time I talked about the myth of secular progress and how secularists must borrow their morals and ethics from religious sources. The following clip is a video conversation between agnostic historian Tom Holland and Bible scholar N.T. Wright that further brings this point home. The following is a description of the video: 

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The myth of secular progress

I’m always amused whenever I hear the popular sentiment, “We’re better off now without religion” boasted by atheists/humanists as they point to prosperous and largely secular European countries today.

The following conversation illustrates  beautifully why I think this boast is utter nonsense. 

Facts, knowing, and mystery

How do we know something? Do we know it when we have all the facts? Or, is there a more significant knowing? For instance, I might have all the facts about lemonade, but that doesn’t mean I know what it’s like to drink lemonade. It doesn’t describe the purpose of lemonade or why I would want to drink it in the first place.

Jesus Christ IS the Truth

We’ve been looking at how knowing facts does not necessarily mean we know the truth. As I said last time, truth, in the deepest sense, is when we not only know the facts but understand their meaning and significance.

One definition from the Oxford Dictionary says that truth is “That which is true or in accordance with fact or reality.” The truth I’m talking about is how we know reality. This truth transcends human thoughts and reveals divine intentionality. And how we know divine intentionality is found in a Person—Jesus Christ.

When we’ve cut out our souls

Knowing facts does not necessarily mean that one knows truth. Truth can be found in beauty and art and even fiction, while lies can be forged from stainless steel facts.

In my last post I referenced a study by Pew Research that found that most people, especially young people, cannot discern between facts and opinion in the news. 

Can you discern factual from opinion statements?

I read an interesting article from Intellectual Takeout titled, “Pew: 3 in 4 Americans Have Trouble Discerning Between Fact and Opinion” by Anne Holmquist that I thought would be good for us to ponder.

A Pew study found that less than 20 percent of first-year college students are able to tell the difference between fact and opinion. That’s bad enough, but the adults didn’t fare much better. 

Girard and the trajectory of Scriptural revelation

Something I’ve said for a long time now is that you cannot properly understand the Bible without Jesus interpreting it for you. Yet, many Christians read the Bible indiscriminately, as if Jesus never happened. Historically, and even to this day, quoting the Old Testament to justify just about every questionable thing.