What is the Christian Church good for?

[coffeeveritas]

Although I do like your answer, it does delve into tangents a bit.

There is a simple reason for this, it was 3AM and I kept losing track of what I wanted to say. I noticed that it was a bit unpolished when I posted it, but I thought I'd get the first draft out and then workshop it.

You go more into the fact that you distinguish fact from fantasy, but you never really explain how. You talk about the wealth of knowledge you have at your disposal to make an informed decision, but don't elaborate on exactly how that is done. I didn't ask you anything of certainty, nor did I imply that I held all the answers, I merely asked what method you use to determine and evaluate phenomena in reality.

I certainly wasn't trying to imply that you think you have all the answers, I was saying that that is a human tendency and pointing out that it is counterproductive. I would agree that I didn't get very specific, but for me, answering your question first necessitated an explanation of how I see reality. Also, I was tired and I forgot how I was going to bring all of it together. I remember thinking, "I was going to make some kind of point here at the end, what was it?" Ha! I amuse myself with my tired rambling.

Basically what I was trying to say is that all the typical ways we "know" something are flawed and they all have some value. We know things based on the data we can collect personally, the influence of our culture, and our own subject personal experience. Under each of these are many subcategories like logic, science, emotion, intuition, etc. I argued that they are all limited, but taken together they give us the best possible chance of knowing what is real. So for something to be real, it has to be the most real on every level. If I can't see something as being scientifically true and subjectively true and a bunch of other kinds of trues, than I would suspect that thing of being less than real.

I'll give you an example:

If I told you you are the indebted to a great celestial leprechaun for subconsciously stealing his invisible gold, by what standard would you assess the validity of that statement?

Well let's try out the method I outlined. First of all I have no sensory data on this leprechaun, and the logic here seems iffy to me personally. Highly suspect, but to be fair I must look at all my sources. In human history I see no tradition of the celestial leprechaun, no society seems to know of him. The story of mankind does not make sense when told through the view of this leprechaun, he doesn't seem to have any logical role in the order of the universe. Scientifically speaking, there is no evidence that points to a cosmic leprechaun whose gold can be stolen. From what I've heard so far he's just a banker of sorts, and he has no role in shaping creation in a way that could suggest his presence. Logically speaking there is no great reason to expect that a leprechaun, whose role I can trace in mythology and whose origin in fable I can see quite clearly, would be a cosmic force. How would one subconsciously steal gold and why would we value an invisible commodity that serves no purpose? Subjectively speaking I don't feel indebted to the cosmic leprechaun. I've never had an experience of him, the story doesn't make any sense in the context of my life, so he's not subjectively true to me. If I were seriously troubled over this question I could directly consult my community about it by reading up on leprechauns in scientific and religious context. I could also ask someone for help refuting or proving the leprechaun, and weighing the arguments against each other. These are just some of the ways I get the total picture of whether or not something's real, but the point is that reality has to be established on every level we can experience as humans. It has to fit the big picture of the world as we see it, it has to explain something.

Still a big question to answer, but I gave it a shot. Great stuff my friend!