Paul says in Romans 8:18, "For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us." In light of the eternal duration of our lives, the extent of our present condition is so comparatively brief as to be virtually nothing. We must keep this in mind when evaluating what is truly important. We will begin with body image.
Society obviously places a great deal of emphasis on physical appearance and consequently gives some people unrealistic expectations about body image and their own self-worth. What this post will attempt to do is provide a new perspective on body image which will hopefully be of some help to those dealing with such issues.
The Bible tells us that the body is good, contrary to many other religions and schools of thought. God made us to be both physical and spiritual beings, and we will remain that way. The Christian hope is in a bodily resurrection, that is, physical and not only spiritual. We know that Jesus is the "firstfruits of them that slept," or the first sort of new Man. His body was a physical one, capable of eating fish, but it also exerted new power over the physical world. I Corinthians 15, and especially verses 35-58, tell us that the spiritual body will be perfect, incorruptible, glorious, and powerful.
In light of the point made above in Romans, we see that our current physical bodies are ephemeral-- fleeting and impermanent. The bodies Christians will have for the vast majority of their lives will be perfect and glorious ones. In essence, being overly concerned about the appearance or state of my current body is comparable to being overly concerned about food stuck in my teeth.
We must be careful, however. This realization should not lead us to abuse or misuse our bodies. The Bible says in I Corinthians 6:19 "Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?" We must care for our bodies as temples, but we must not make them gods.
Showing posts with label Christian. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Christian. Show all posts
Monday, September 7, 2009
Saturday, September 5, 2009
Values in Light of Eternity: Introduction
As the mood strikes me, I will periodically post an installment in this series, Values in Light of Eternity. What this series aims to do is reconsider what we deem important in light of the fact that we live forever. Certain things will take on far more gravity, and some things which we think crucial now will seem trivial. As far as I am able, I will provide Scriptural backing for why we should reconsider these things.
The first installment will most likely be posted tomorrow, and will deal with body image and physical appearance.
The first installment will most likely be posted tomorrow, and will deal with body image and physical appearance.
Monday, August 31, 2009
How Can I Know Souls Exist?
A poll was taken in class today as to whether we believed in something in us that is not simply our bodies (a soul, or something similar). A large number of people raised their hands to indicate that they didn't believe they had an immaterial soul. The question of how one can know if one has a soul or not was, I thought, a good one to write about.
The gospel is coming up against some rather unusual attacks in recent decades. One finds, more and more, that people do not believe themselves to be sinners, and that if they do, they don't admit it. It is a serious problem for the presentation of the gospel as a means of life if people don't believe they're dead. But another criticism of what was once presupposed to be self-evident is physicalism.
Physicalism simply means that the physical is all there is, and that all there is can be explained in terms of physical means. The consequence of this is elimination of souls (sometimes minds) and the supernatural in general. How can a Christian defend against this?
I think the first thing to do is to present the physicalist with some examples of things which are self-evidently true without physical instantiation, or things which must be true in all possible worlds. For example, the fundamental laws of logic are not only true in this world, but must be true in any possible world. They require no physical evidence for us to see their truth, and do not depend in any way on the physical world for their truth. Once you admit that something cannot exist and not exist at the same time and in the same sense, you will have established that there are things which exist independent of the physical universe (and if you take the case of mathematical propositions, an infinite number of things, at that).
So we are agreed that the soul is immaterial, and that immaterial things exist. But what exactly is a soul, and how do we know that that particular immaterial thing exists? I would define the soul as the (immaterial) seat of reason, intelligence, and personality. Some would argue that all of these can be explained physically, but Lewis shows in his argument from reason that rationality cannot be purely explained by physical causes without removing the basis for rationality itself. I do not have the space here to make a full account of his argument, but it can be found throughout his book Miracles.
I am not saying that there is no physical element in the explanation of these properties, only that it is not the full explanation. If we can even only establish that reason or our capability to comprehend truth cannot (and never can be) fully explained in terms of physical causes we have a large hole in our view of self, something which the Christian faith (and others) offer to fill.
Christianity gives us a theory regarding that gap in our selfhood, and at that point the question becomes probabilistic to a certain extent. If there are no other satisfying explanations, and Christianity (or any other religion) offers an account which provides one, we must weigh which of these accounts seems most likely, and we will be epistemically justified in believing that account.
The gospel is coming up against some rather unusual attacks in recent decades. One finds, more and more, that people do not believe themselves to be sinners, and that if they do, they don't admit it. It is a serious problem for the presentation of the gospel as a means of life if people don't believe they're dead. But another criticism of what was once presupposed to be self-evident is physicalism.
Physicalism simply means that the physical is all there is, and that all there is can be explained in terms of physical means. The consequence of this is elimination of souls (sometimes minds) and the supernatural in general. How can a Christian defend against this?
I think the first thing to do is to present the physicalist with some examples of things which are self-evidently true without physical instantiation, or things which must be true in all possible worlds. For example, the fundamental laws of logic are not only true in this world, but must be true in any possible world. They require no physical evidence for us to see their truth, and do not depend in any way on the physical world for their truth. Once you admit that something cannot exist and not exist at the same time and in the same sense, you will have established that there are things which exist independent of the physical universe (and if you take the case of mathematical propositions, an infinite number of things, at that).
So we are agreed that the soul is immaterial, and that immaterial things exist. But what exactly is a soul, and how do we know that that particular immaterial thing exists? I would define the soul as the (immaterial) seat of reason, intelligence, and personality. Some would argue that all of these can be explained physically, but Lewis shows in his argument from reason that rationality cannot be purely explained by physical causes without removing the basis for rationality itself. I do not have the space here to make a full account of his argument, but it can be found throughout his book Miracles.
I am not saying that there is no physical element in the explanation of these properties, only that it is not the full explanation. If we can even only establish that reason or our capability to comprehend truth cannot (and never can be) fully explained in terms of physical causes we have a large hole in our view of self, something which the Christian faith (and others) offer to fill.
Christianity gives us a theory regarding that gap in our selfhood, and at that point the question becomes probabilistic to a certain extent. If there are no other satisfying explanations, and Christianity (or any other religion) offers an account which provides one, we must weigh which of these accounts seems most likely, and we will be epistemically justified in believing that account.
Friday, August 28, 2009
Is There Objective Beauty?
As I mentioned in my previous post, I am currently taking a class on aesthetics, which, for those of you not familiar, is the philosophy of beauty (more or less). As I also mentioned, I've never taken a course in this area before and it's raising some very interesting questions. For example:
The Bible says in Colossians 1:15 that Christ is the "image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature." Is an image necessarily inferior to the thing being represented? Or should we reject the ancient Greek notion of mimesis altogether and hold that images do not have to have implied referents? What does that mean for this verse?
Why does beauty transcend language? Dr. Kyle Grady says that at the same time that beauty compels us to speak it robs us of our words. Can we find a justification for this in Christian thought?
Is there such a thing as objective beauty? From whence would it be derived, and how could we know it? What does Christianity have to say about this?
I'll be responding to each of these questions in upcoming posts, but I want to begin with the last one, which in a way rather shows my hand in regards to my personal philosophy of beauty.
I believe that beauty is indeed objective, though it comes to us subjectively. Beauty is an attribute of God, and as all Divine attributes is eternal, absolute, and universal. God's other attributes (truth, goodness, justice, power, etc.) are all the source from which we draw our conceptions of these things in the world, and I think it is the same with beauty. Just as all of these other attributes have an absolute (and thus objective) reality or fulfillment in God, so absolute (and thus objective) beauty can also be found there.
We see reflections of this perfect beauty in the world, in varied and diverse places, all of which give us a glimpse of that true, perfect beauty beyond this world (forgive me for sounding Platonic), in God. So the different reflections of this attribute, each impacting us in different ways and to different degrees, are all facets of ultimate and objective beauty. So while it may seem that beauty is subjective on one level, of we "zoom out" and consider God, we can see that objective beauty exists because it finds its absolute in Him.
The Bible says in Colossians 1:15 that Christ is the "image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature." Is an image necessarily inferior to the thing being represented? Or should we reject the ancient Greek notion of mimesis altogether and hold that images do not have to have implied referents? What does that mean for this verse?
Why does beauty transcend language? Dr. Kyle Grady says that at the same time that beauty compels us to speak it robs us of our words. Can we find a justification for this in Christian thought?
Is there such a thing as objective beauty? From whence would it be derived, and how could we know it? What does Christianity have to say about this?
I'll be responding to each of these questions in upcoming posts, but I want to begin with the last one, which in a way rather shows my hand in regards to my personal philosophy of beauty.
I believe that beauty is indeed objective, though it comes to us subjectively. Beauty is an attribute of God, and as all Divine attributes is eternal, absolute, and universal. God's other attributes (truth, goodness, justice, power, etc.) are all the source from which we draw our conceptions of these things in the world, and I think it is the same with beauty. Just as all of these other attributes have an absolute (and thus objective) reality or fulfillment in God, so absolute (and thus objective) beauty can also be found there.
We see reflections of this perfect beauty in the world, in varied and diverse places, all of which give us a glimpse of that true, perfect beauty beyond this world (forgive me for sounding Platonic), in God. So the different reflections of this attribute, each impacting us in different ways and to different degrees, are all facets of ultimate and objective beauty. So while it may seem that beauty is subjective on one level, of we "zoom out" and consider God, we can see that objective beauty exists because it finds its absolute in Him.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Something About the Tone/ Pro-Life Dialogue
I just wanted to let readers know that not all of my posts are going to be quite as academic as the last one. I will periodically be posting some of my papers which I think most appropriate for this blog, and those may have a bit more verbose or technical language than more casual posts. They will also be rather longer, so don't feel like you have to free up your calendar to read this blog.
Classes start tomorrow, and I'm fairly excited to be learning more about existentialism and aesthetics, two fields in which my knowledge is somewhat limited.
My roommates and I were talking today about the abortion controversy. We agreed that one of the reasons the two sides of the debate have such trouble talking to one another is the divergence in definition of certain terms, namely: life, person, body.
Pro-choice advocates feel as if they have a right to choose what happens to them and to their own bodies. Pro-life proponents would most likely agree with that simple idea, but disagree on the referent. To a pro-life person, the fetus is a person, not a part of the mother. It is not a question of what the mother is doing to her own body, but what she is doing to the other inside of her.
John said that he thought the pro-life position was more suited to the liberal side than the conservative, by the fact that protecting the helpless/defenseless is a defining trait of the leftist camp, and opposing abortion is simply carrying the idea further. Something interesting to think about, but it still comes down to the definition of terms. A respectful explanation of what each side means by certain words may help a little in conversations between the two groups.
Classes start tomorrow, and I'm fairly excited to be learning more about existentialism and aesthetics, two fields in which my knowledge is somewhat limited.
My roommates and I were talking today about the abortion controversy. We agreed that one of the reasons the two sides of the debate have such trouble talking to one another is the divergence in definition of certain terms, namely: life, person, body.
Pro-choice advocates feel as if they have a right to choose what happens to them and to their own bodies. Pro-life proponents would most likely agree with that simple idea, but disagree on the referent. To a pro-life person, the fetus is a person, not a part of the mother. It is not a question of what the mother is doing to her own body, but what she is doing to the other inside of her.
John said that he thought the pro-life position was more suited to the liberal side than the conservative, by the fact that protecting the helpless/defenseless is a defining trait of the leftist camp, and opposing abortion is simply carrying the idea further. Something interesting to think about, but it still comes down to the definition of terms. A respectful explanation of what each side means by certain words may help a little in conversations between the two groups.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Obligatory Introductory Post
Hello all, and welcome to my little piece of the internet. I've been urged to start up a blog on apologetics, so I thought I would oblige. This blog will incorporate Christian theology, apologetics, philosophy, and good old opinion into what I hope will be a cohesive and engaging whole. It may or may not be updated regularly, so we'll see how that goes.
A little about me for those who don't know: I am, as of this writing, a junior at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee. I am double-majoring in Religious Studies and Philosophy, and I plan on perhaps pursuing a professorship [Alliteration Bonus +10!] someday. My passion is for Christian apologetics, engaging and discussing the important ideas and beliefs of the system and pointing out what I see to be flaws in our thinking.
C.S. Lewis, more than any other (non-biblical) thinker, has influenced me the most, and for those of you familiar with his thought you will assuredly see echoes in my writing. It is my hope and prayer that Christians will find this blog a source of confidence and encouragement, and that non-Christians will find it challenging and engaging.
A little about me for those who don't know: I am, as of this writing, a junior at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee. I am double-majoring in Religious Studies and Philosophy, and I plan on perhaps pursuing a professorship [Alliteration Bonus +10!] someday. My passion is for Christian apologetics, engaging and discussing the important ideas and beliefs of the system and pointing out what I see to be flaws in our thinking.
C.S. Lewis, more than any other (non-biblical) thinker, has influenced me the most, and for those of you familiar with his thought you will assuredly see echoes in my writing. It is my hope and prayer that Christians will find this blog a source of confidence and encouragement, and that non-Christians will find it challenging and engaging.
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