The Ego Trick (baggini, Julian) / quote 244 of 254
Reason in the service of faith
Let’s take the resurrection of Jesus Christ. If science somehow – and I can’t even imagine how – but if it told me that the resurrection of Jesus Christ was just categorically impossible, could not happen, I would disbelieve that and continue to believe what the Bible teaches about the resurrection of Jesus Christ, because if you take away the resurrection there is no Christian faith, it just doesn’t exist.’ It’s worth stressing this point because this is not just Thacker’s view. Many, if not most, people of faith start from that faith even when thinking about issues which can be approached in an entirely secular way. And if you want to understand why people believe what they do, you first have to identify what beliefs act as their bedrocks. For many Christians, that bedrock is the Bible, a personal experience of God or Christ, or some combination of the two. And if that is the case, that means they do not approach issues such as the nature of soul and self as objective enquirers after truth. When they reason about the issue, reason is in the service of faith and does not simply follow the argument wherever it may lead.