August 30, 2003

In case you cannot tell by how infrequently I am posting, writing this column is getting harder and harder for me. Not because I have nothing to write about, to the contrary, because there is so much to write about that I am having a hard time focusing.

I feel overwhelmed with the evidence that the world, and in large part the church, has left God far behind. What’s worse though is that I have little sense that God is trying to break back in – at least in this country. I am really beginning to wonder if God has not left the western world to its own devices. The western world seems to be working so hard to forget about God.

What’s worse is that I am at an absolute loss as to what to do to improve things. I am increasingly convinced that the improvement will not come from anything of this world, and that includes the church.

I have been thinking much lately about the relationship of church and government. They are both necessary for the ordering of society. As is pointed out so often, virtually every society has some form of both, in some cases they are the same. We have discovered that governmental and moral authority are two different things; religion provides moral authority. That said; however, the boundary between the two is highly diffuse, and mobile.

Lately I have been thinking that the church needs to wield more influence with the government since the government is sticking its nose into so many moral issues (gay rights, etc.) But then, I look around me I am find so many people in the church that confuse that governmental action with faith itself.

There is also the distinction between religion and faith. Religion is the institutions in a society that provide that moral authority. Faith is one’s personal relationship with God. Faith is subjective, religion is objective. In an ideal world, faith shapes religion and religion in turn shapes society, and then the government reflects that society. For a long time in the US, religion went a long way towards shaping society and the government did indeed reflect it.

I believe that the breakdown we are seeing in our society today is a breakdown, ultimately of faith. Once faith breaks down, religion becomes fractious and once that happens it loses is influence in society.

So, where did we lose faith, and how do we get it back. In my opinion, we have lost faith because of the increasing application of the "scientific method" to areas of study that are not as regular as the physical sciences.

For the uninitiated, the scientific method is the means by which we have made so many technological advances. In essences, it is the formation of a model to describe the behavior of a system, using that model to predict the behavior of the system in some unexplored way, and then through experimentation, to test that prediction, modifying the model as necessary. This works great when describing electrons, or billiard balls, but it breaks down in so many other areas.

On a purely descriptive level, it breaks down whenever the system being studied cannot be modeled mathematically. I include in this category anything where the model is PURELY statistical. Mathematics are necessary both to build a model and to test it. Thus pretty much anything that studies human behavior is not a good place to apply the scientific method. Why – well, for one thing any mathematical description of human behavior must be statistical. Thus there will always be people who do not fit the norm, therefore the model is not entirely descriptive of the whole system. Secondly, it is patently immoral to experiment on people.

But here is the real bottom line, the process, objectifies people. The process assumes that a person is no more than a set of predictable responses to given stimuli. It removes from consideration anything resembling a spirit. When we fail to acknowledge that there is some part of us that is spiritual, then we have no need for faith, and the great break down I wrote of earlier occurs.

I watched a movie this week called "Just Married." I think it depicted perfectly what is wrong in our society. The couple went through the motions of love and marriage, but they were just that motions. Reviewers have said it was because the movie was poorly acted. I am not sure, I think it may have been written that way, or at least edited. The movie reflected precisely the kind of spiritless life I am discussing here.

So, how do we return our society to something more normal? I think two things need to happen. First, I think we need to work towards a more reasonable vision of where and where not it is appropriate to use the scientific method. We need to find a way to study human behavior that does not objectify it. That may be impossible, in which case, I strongly advocate abandoning the study altogether. Secondly, and I think this will only happen through God’s awakening, people need to wake up and realize that some part of them is not being nurtured.

For the first we need to find academics that are similarly inclined. For the second we need to pray. Join me.