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Return to Home Page Return to Book Contents & Summary LIVING BELIEF - CHAPTER 1 WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
Imagine a man driving along a road.
He is driving well and carefully, watching the road ahead, the side
roads, the traffic, and other road users.
He handles his car well and takes pride in his vehicle, having chosen
it with care to suit the kind of life he leads.
He not only knows the Highway Code but also follows it intelligently,
neither carelessly nor slavishly. He
is an admirable driver. The only
problem is that he doesn’t know where he has come from, where he is, beyond
the roads immediately around him, where he is going, or what is the purpose of
his journey. Doesn’t that seem
remarkable? But it appears that this is how many people go along life’s journey, for much of the time at least. They get along with their lives with intelligence and care, attentive to what is around them and to those travelling with them, choosing the most suitable career or way of life to take them along their road, and following a moral code seriously but without rigidity. Yet they have given little consideration to the purpose of their journey, and may have no real view of their starting point, the area in which they are travelling, or their destination. In other words, they have no real awareness of the life-view which is shaping the way they live.
It is not that they do not have such a life-view; if
you are travelling you must be going from somewhere, through somewhere and to
somewhere. There are various ‘maps’,
ways of seeing life, around us in human society, and each of us absorbs one or
other of these while we are growing and developing. Our conscious beliefs and day to day actions and decisions
are then derived from and based on that fundamental life-view laid deep within
us. We have acquired a map for
our life’s journey which indicates the origin, purpose and destination of
that journey, and which must therefore affect every step that we take along
our way.
2. THE DANGERS OF AN UNEXAMINED LIFE-VIEW
The problem, then, is not that
some people do not have a fundamental view, a map for their life’s journey,
but that they are not aware that they have one, or of what it might be.
This is because we begin to absorb our ideas about life from our
earliest childhood, and they became part of our thinking and feeling before we
are at an age when we can consciously understand and analyse them.
These life-views are not in what has been described as our unconscious
mind but are, as it were, on the very borders of our consciousness,
representing as they do our earliest impressions, formed in connection with
our most basic feelings. As such
they provide the groundwork of the attitudes and assumptions we have about
ourselves and others, and about the world and our place in it.
On this ground we move about in our daily lives, forming our ideas and
decisions and actions. But just
as we don’t often examine the ground under our feet, so also we are not
generally aware of this mental groundwork underlying all we do.
If we never come to a point in our education and development when we
can look at and examine our deepest attitudes and feelings about life, and the
beliefs which express them, if we never take out our ‘map’ and study it
critically, we will never really be in control of our journey.
No matter how carefully we take our decisions we will never know how
they are being influenced by our deeply set assumptions.
M. Scott Peck, a psychiatrist to whose work we shall be referring, has
said that the world view of his patients is always an essential part of their
problem, and that a correction of their world view is necessary for their
cure. It is obvious that there are dangers in this kind of
‘blind journeying’: not understanding the direction he is taking, the
traveller may feel lost or dissatisfied, particularly in the later stages in
his life, as he begins to wonder where he is going and why.
(Throughout this work we will use the pronoun ‘he’ because all the
alternatives such as ‘he or she’, are cumbersome and distracting.
It is very understandable that some people find this use of the
masculine pronoun offensive, but in this particular work it may redress a
balance. It has been the case in
many traditions that, while women have not been given positions of influence
in the religious communities, the actual practice of religion has been seen as
more the business of women than of men. This is patently untrue.
We are all spiritual beings, and if in this work our ‘traveller’ is
referred to as male it may remind us of this fact, while in no way forgetting
that half of those on this ‘road’ are female.) There is a danger that the traveller may feel lost, but
this may lead to an even greater danger.
If we are not in control of our own lives, others will control them for
us. If a person is not sure where
he is going it is likely that he will follow persuasive directions offered to
him by others. Political and
religious extremists, even the media and manufacturers, use our basic
attitudes and hidden assumptions when they want to manipulate us into choosing
their products or policies. To
give an extreme example, Hitler was able to persuade the German people to
accept the unthinkable by appealing to their deep feelings of pride in their
Fatherland and their race. Such
feelings are good in themselves, but if they are not consciously and
critically thought out they can engender a shared belief in national and
racial superiority. At a time of
widespread hardship and unemployment Hitler was able to play on that national
pride because it restored some dignity and security to the individual, and he
could then lead people in a direction which few would consciously have chosen. In the world of marketing, the advertisers work on the customers’ ‘image’, the idea they have of themselves as they are or would like to be, based on their underlying feelings about how the world is and about what is worthwhile. Most cars are advertised to men, and express an image of power, control, sexuality. Cleaning products and foods are advertised to women, in ways which play upon their feelings, guilts and beliefs about how they should be performing as carers. Many of us would deny that we are swayed by this, and the advertisers themselves will claim that they are not being unduly persuasive; but if we are not being manipulated via our unexamined attitudes, then advertising is a weak instrument and global corporations are wasting billions in their use of it.
In the area of religion we may
see some of the most damaging results of holding beliefs whose basis has not
really been examined or understood. In
every part of the world powerful sects have arisen which play on people’s
underlying hopes and fears to induce unquestioning acceptance by their
followers of any beliefs imposed upon them, however bizarre these might be. All kinds of people, especially the young, can have their
lives taken over completely by these sects, to the extent that they give up
all their worldly possessions, sever all ties with those who love them, and
even allow themselves to be killed in obedience to their leader. Such demands can of course be made of the followers of
mainstream religions, but the difference between these and the demands of the
sects lies in the fact that those of the main religions are not based on an
improper manipulation of people’s deepest feelings.
A further test of the validity of a religion’s demands is whether the
beliefs it proposes are rational and open to critical questioning.
No religion or philosophy can be followed blindly, since we are
rational beings each of whom is ultimately responsible for his own journey. The main proposition of this present work is that each
of us should examine the beliefs we hold, and try to recognise the deep
underlying attitudes and feelings which they are meant to express, so that we
may better understand why we think and act as we do. That is the only way that we can prevent ourselves from being
manipulated by others and can ensure that we are, as far as possible, shaping
and directing our lives in the way we really want them to go.
It is beyond the scope of this book to set out how every person might
do this, but it is hoped that in seeing how one belief tradition is examined
people may gain encouragement and some indication of how to seek a better
understanding of their own beliefs.
Before we can examine our beliefs we need first to ask
‘what is belief?', ‘what is believing?’ Non-religious or anti-religious people often suggest that it
is something which only religious people do, and that it is a matter of
blindly accepting a number of irrational propositions.
Religious people themselves can sometimes make it seem like this when
they indicate that they don’t really know what their beliefs mean but that
they are grimly determined to hold on to them and defend them to the death. As we have said, every one of us has beliefs which are
the expression of our view of the world, and these are in the form of ideas or
propositions, such as ‘the rights of man’ or ‘the survival of the
fittest’, to which we give conscious intellectual assent.
But underlying these, as we have suggested, is a deeper level of
attitudes and assumptions which everyone of us acquires from earliest
childhood. The young child senses
what those around him feel about the world, about themselves, about him, and
he begins to feel the same way. He
absorbs and develops those feelings not from instructions or explanations but
from what people do, from the way they treat the people and things around
them, from the tone of their voices, from the way they touch him. He may for instance develop the feeling that the world is a
secure and hopeful place, that he has a right to be there as a valuable and
loved individual, and that others have the same rights.
Or he may come to feel that the world is a frightening and hostile
place in which he must fight to get whatever advantage and attention he can,
with no regard for others. This is not itself believing, but it is the basis from
which all believing develops. From
earliest childhood we form from our experiences a pattern of feelings and
assumptions about what the world is like, what human life is about, and how we
fit into all this. As we grow
older this fundamental view influences the way we interpret the experiences
and information we encounter. Two
people may come into contact with the same events and facts yet understand
them very differently as each fits them onto his mental map. It is possible that a new experience may cause a person to
alter his fundamental view, but since this was imprinted so deeply into his
feelings and thinking and action as he developed, it is far more likely that
he will interpret and even distort new facts and events to fit in with what he
‘knows’ in his heart to be true. Specific
attitudes, conscious beliefs and actual behaviour will arise from, and will
reinforce and fit, the underlying pattern of attitudes, whether we are
conscious of that pattern and its influence or not. A person might, for instance, have absorbed a feeling of
insecurity and a suspicion of others as threatening to him.
In a society where different races share the available resources, he
might develop racist attitudes, accept and put forward political ideas in
support of these, and practise discrimination. A child may develop an attitude of faith, of trust, in
the people around him, and in the goodness of the world, and in his own value.
Or on the other hand he may develop reliance on power as the only
defence against cruelty or hardship, and on possessions as giving him value in
others’ eyes. Then as the person goes through life he is likely to notice
and accept information which confirms his underlying convictions, and from
this he forms his beliefs. The
person who has faith in the goodness and value of people might then believe
that it is good to commit oneself to marriage and a family, whereas the one
who only sees a struggle to get what he can might believe that these things
are outdated customs which can only hinder his ambitions. These two opposing views of the world bring us to an
important question: which of them is true?
Or if truth is not absolute but a matter of degree, which is more true
than the other? In philosophy
this is a vast and difficult question, but in general people might accept that
things are said to be true if they match the feelings, the experiences, the
insights and the knowledge of the human race up to the present time.
On this basis most of us would judge that the person who has a
positive, open and trusting attitude has a good view and true beliefs, whereas
the one who sees only a struggle for survival has a bad view and false
beliefs. While not using the
words ‘true’ or ‘untrue’, medical and psychological studies would
support this judgement in describing the positive attitude as ‘effective’
and indicative of a healthy person, while describing the negative attitude as
‘dysfunctional’ and typical of someone who is not coping well with his
life. The major religions would be considered to be among
those life views which represent and express a positive attitude.
Each of them encourages faith in life as having a good purpose and as
offering us the chance of fulfilment. Each
promotes a moral code which exhorts its followers to do what is helpful rather
than harmful to all around them, and all endorse goodness against evil.
In these respects all the great religions and philosophies are alike
and are true. The vast and
important difference between them is that each offers a very different view of
what and where goodness is, and of how it can be achieved.
Is it in us? Or do we have
to fight against our evil selves to find it?
Is the world good? Or
evil? Or neutral?
Is there a God who is good? Or neutral? Or is there no God?
A religion’s answer to such questions are found in its doctrines, its
teachings. These set out the
beliefs which a follower will hold as arising from and expressing his deep
underlying attitude of faith. We can see from this that a religious person believes
in the same way as does everyone else. If
a child’s parents have an underlying life-view which is one of faith, a
faith based on trust in a God who cares for them, they will communicate this
to their child in everything they do. Then
as he gets older his parents and teachers will teach him how to express his
feelings of trust and hope and his desire for goodness, through the symbols,
the rituals, and eventually the beliefs, of their tradition.
Much that is said about believing, and about religious education as
being indoctrination, is based on a misunderstanding of this.
We all need a positive attitude, and beliefs which will express this
for us. The religions do promote
such an attitude and offer rich patterns of beliefs and symbols to help each
person to understand and express the way he sees his life.
Bringing up a child within a religious tradition can only be
indoctrination if it is done in such a way that the person is prevented by
guilt, fear or ignorance from ever examining or changing what he has been
given. Can a person change his faith or beliefs?
Members of a religion may say that someone has ‘lost his faith’ if
he ceases to follow their tradition of beliefs, but this may not be so.
A person can certainly lose his faith if intense suffering causes him
to reject his trust in the goodness of life and the love of God.
He can also lose his faith in God and all that he trusts if he comes to
think that the religious beliefs he has followed are false and foolish.
But it is equally possible for someone to retain his deep attitude of
faith in life as good and meaningful but to have found that another pattern of
beliefs and symbols, whether those of a secular philosophy or of another
religion, better express that attitude for him.
So he retains the faith which his childhood developed in him but alters
the beliefs which he accepts as expressing it. We say that a person can lose his faith if he
experiences overwhelming suffering which appears to call into question all
that he has trusted. Can he
regain that sense of trust? It is
thought that he can, if he receives the kind of love and support which first
develop in him his positive and hopeful view of life.
By the same token, someone who starts out in life with a negative view,
without faith or hope, can be given the help in later years to change this
fundamental attitude. But it has to be said that such fundamental changes to the
whole pattern underlying a person’s existence are not easily achieved.
The word ‘conversion’ has been employed to express this change, but
it has lost much of its meaning with over-use.
The Greek word ‘metanoia’ is often used in Christian writings and
it indicates much better the complete turnabout of the inner person which we
are describing. So a person may be able to alter his fundamental view
of life if he finds it to be one which is negative and distorting rather than
truth-seeking and positive. And a
person can also alter beliefs if he discovers that they do not truly express
what he feels and do not make sense in his life. We have indicated that faith and believing must not be
unquestioning or irrational, and now we are seeing that they do not set people
in concrete, keeping them in rigid attitudes throughout their lives.
Faith and believing are living processes, and every human being needs
to understand and develop them throughout his life’s journey.
To return to our image of the car driver, every traveller needs to know
that he has a map, and to understand what it is telling him, and he should be
able to alter that map or even exchange it for another if he finds that it is
leading him astray.
4. A PARTICULAR DIFFICULTY IN RELIGIOUS BELIEF Let us look now at the
question of believing in the context of a religious tradition. As we have said, the follower of a religion believes in the
same way as does a non-religious person; he has a deep faith in life as having
meaning and purpose, and he has beliefs, customs and practices which express
this. But the religious person
has a particular difficulty in understanding his beliefs, since they are
couched in words which are highly symbolic, rather than in everyday language. Let us go back to our imaginary driver.
Now we see him as being aware that he has a map which sets out for him
a broad view of the area, and which indicates where he has come from and where
he is heading – directions which also suggest what might be the purpose of
his journey. The way he drives
for his own and other’s safety is still a matter of using the Code which is
common to us all. This is of
course essential since none of the road users can get far without it, but it
cannot have the same importance as the journey itself.
But once again we see something strange.
Our driver has a map which he values highly, but the key and the
details of the map are written in a language which he does not really
understand. As a result this
driver does not actually use his map but muddles along, referring to the map
from time to time but never quite working out what it is telling him about his
journey. At times it even seems
to him that it relates to some other place entirely, and that it is not
supposed to tell him anything practical about the way he has to travel. This is how Christians may sometimes feel about their
faith and about the doctrines which set out their religion’s beliefs.
They value these but have no sure understanding of how they are meant
to relate to the actual business of a person’s life, or even whether they
are supposed to do so. If we look
at the Christian creed, the formula which sets out the tradition’s major
beliefs, we see that the statements it makes appear to be about events and
ideas which have no connection with the actions, the careers, the life-styles
of the people who declare their belief in them.
‘Of one being with the Father’; ‘For us men and for our salvation
he came down from heaven’; ‘The Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life’;
‘We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins’; it is not easy
to understand what relevance such statements from the Nicene Creed could have
in a person’s life today. It is not only Christianity which presents this
difficulty: the ordinary follower of Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism or Islam may
have some knowledge of the doctrines of his faith and yet may gain little
practical understanding from them. As
a result people of all religions tend to look more to the moral rules, the ‘Highway
Code’, leaving considerations of doctrine to the priests and leaders of
their religious community. These
in turn would have knowledge of the sacred teachings but might still have
little understanding of how they might reflect the meaning of people’s
lives. So the priest might resort
to teaching the doctrines without useful interpretation, while concentrating
his real efforts on exhorting his people to be good.
But, as we have indicated, most religions and philosophies have rather
similar moral codes, all of them encouraging people to be kind to one another
and not to cheat, lie or kill etc, and it therefore becomes difficult to see
that there is any difference between the various faiths.
No one wants to see differences between religions causing wars and
persecutions, as they have in the past and still do today, but this does not
mean that we should say that they really all teach the same thing.
We will be looking further at this, but for now we might suggest that
to do that is to lose the unique light on the human condition which each may
offer. Rather than trying to submerge the differences between them
it would be far better if each of the great faiths and their belief systems
could be interpreted and expressed in ways which would make them more
applicable to their followers and more available to those who are searching
for truth by which they can live.
Christian doctrines are based on the person of Jesus
Christ, on the biblical writings and on the traditions of the worshipping
Church. Many Christians, however,
may not derive the fullest benefit from the view of life which these express
because they have difficulty with the technical and symbolic language in which
the doctrines are written. In
this work we will examine the main Christian beliefs in a way which may relate
them to people’s experiences and support the truth which people find in
those experiences.
But in doing this we will encounter another difficulty
which people have to deal with as they try to make sense of their beliefs.
Look once more at our imaginary driver: he has the map which was passed
on to him by his parents and he is trying to make use of it, but with
increasing unease. As his journey
progresses he finds that his map is regarded with contempt by other
travellers, and that he is seen by many of them as something of a fool for
following it. They point out to
him that there are large and efficient direction boards all along the way,
giving full and specific information on all routes, together with constantly
updated warnings on weather and hazards. These indicators, they point out somewhat scornfully to our
traveller, are constructions that you can see and touch, and not just lines on
a flimsy piece of paper.
This is a situation in which many people from a
religious tradition find themselves today.
In the modern, rational and scientific world they are seen as foolish
for following a set of beliefs rather than the solid facts supplied by
science. But our picture may
begin to suggest why this is a very odd argument.
It does not seem to occur to those who pour contempt on our poor
traveller that those ‘solid’ ‘real’ signboards must have been put
there on the basis of someone’s map. In
other words, scientists also base their work on a pattern of beliefs, grounded
on a particular life-view, just like the rest of us. There is a real danger for us all when they are unaware of
this, and do not recognise the assumptions and beliefs which underlie their
enquiries and inventions. This is not to derogate the work of the sciences.
Our aim in this book is to examine Christian beliefs in order to see
how they can make sense for us, but we have insisted that beliefs must be
rational, and that people can only regard as true those ideas which are in
keeping with all that human experience, insight and knowledge have revealed to
us. Therefore as we look at the
Christian doctrines we will do so in the light of the understanding offered by
other areas of human knowledge, including those of sciences such as
palaeoanthropology and psychology.
5.
AN ILLUSTRATION OF HOW A PERSON MIGHT LOOK AT THE TRUTH IN HIS BELIEFS: The fundamental attitude of a Christian is one of faith
in God, as revealed to the world in Jesus and to each of us by the Spirit of
his love in the people we meet. This
faith was transmitted through the scriptures and was expressed in the creeds
as the Christian doctrines. These
are: Creation; Salvation; Incarnation; Trinity; Church. In this work we will follow a person through the various
stages of his life, and at each stage we will examine the doctrine which seems
particularly appropriate to that stage, and we will look at the related
findings of science to see whether they oppose or bear out the understanding
of ourselves which the doctrine suggests.
6. TRUTH MUST MAKE SENSE FOR US
If the doctrines looked at in
this way really seem to be in keeping with our past experience, and of help in
finding our way in the future, this is what we would mean by ‘making sense
from beliefs’. And if we feel
that we can make sense from our beliefs in this way, that is what would be
meant by ‘believing that they are true’.
1. EVERYONE HAS A LIFE-VIEW Everyone has a fundamental view of themselves, of others and of the world which they have acquired from their earliest experiences. This basic attitude may be positive or negative, but most people would agree that a negative view is neither good for nor true to human nature. Our fundamental view shapes the way we think and act in response to the events of our lives. 2.
THE DANGERS OF AN UNEXAMINED LIFE-VIEW As we grow up we take on various beliefs, or a system
of beliefs, from those held by our family or by others who influence us. Those beliefs should express
and be in tune with our fundamental view, but this may not be the case.
It is difficult for a person to control the direction of his life if he does not recognise what his fundamental attitude is, or if he does not properly understand the beliefs he holds and cannot therefore be sure that they express what he really feels. 3.
WHAT IS BELIEVING? All people, not just those who
are religious, believe in this way. The
fundamental attitude of a religious person should be one of positive faith,
usually in relation to a God who cares for him. The doctrines of his religion should be an effective
expression of that faith, and should be rational and in keeping with what has
been established in other areas of human knowledge.
Each person should look at his basic attitude and at
his structure of beliefs to ensure that he knows and understands them, and can
judge whether those beliefs truly express that attitude.
He will then be better able to control the direction of his life,
rather than wandering aimlessly or being controlled by others.
4. A PARTICULAR DIFFICULTY IN RELIGIOUS BELIEF Religious people can have a
particular difficulty in that the language of their beliefs is highly
symbolic, and it may therefore not be easy for them to know whether those
beliefs truly express their own attitude and understanding, and whether they
are in opposition to the findings of science, as some would claim.
5.
AN ILLUSTRATION OF HOW A PERSON MIGHT LOOK AT THE TRUTH IN HIS BELIEFS: This work suggests that
everyone should examine their views and beliefs, and offers a way in which a
Christian might do this. The book
will follow the stages of a person’s life, seeing each of these in relation
to one of the major Christian doctrines: Creation; Salvation; Incarnation;
Trinity; Church. At each of the
stages we will look to the findings of science to see whether these oppose or
bear out the understanding of ourselves which the doctrine suggests.
6.
TRUTH
MUST MAKE SENSE FOR US Our beliefs should make sense
to us and they should make sense for us.
If a belief makes sense for many of us in this way, and if it is in
keeping with human knowledge, insight and experience, then we may well
describe it as being ‘true’. Return to Home Page Return to Book Contents & Summary Start of Chapter 1 Go forward to Chapter 2 |