I was baptized Catholic as a child, and as an adult Catholic I am required to believe that that baptism was sacramentally valid, even though, as an infant, I had no capacity for personal belief in Christ. This fact of the infant psychology—the incapacity to have faith—is the source of the longstanding protestant belief that the Catholic practice of infant baptism is a grave error and ultimately invalid. After all, Christ taught that "Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved", which suggests that personal belief is a prerequisite for baptism.
Read moreThe Fall of a Sparrow
There is emotional power in the smallness of human existence when set against the skene of the terrible vastness of the universe. This power drives what remains, along with the Problem of Evil, one of the most effective atheist arguments. The pedigree of its use is impressive: from Carl Sagan—“We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a hum-drum star lost in a galaxy tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people”—to, more recently, Gad Saad.
Read moreFaith Defined?
The fashionable commonplace used to shout down religious believers is this:
“Faith is belief without evidence.”
If you pry at this simplistic and decidedly question-begging "definition" you will find, though, that what the accuser really means is:
“Faith is belief without scientific proof.”
Scientific proof being the only kind of evidence that the non-believer will typically accept from the believer....
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