RE: Restoring Faith After a Challenge to It
October 14, 2013 at 9:22 pm
(This post was last modified: October 14, 2013 at 9:25 pm by FallentoReason.)
The way in which faith is restored is always through something called cognitive dissonance and it's effect on the mind. Basically, the individual holds a belief and when they encounter something that directly challenges that belief, they then have cognitive dissonance - confusion from holding two bits of information that contradict each other. There are two ways to resolve this: (1) to negate the incoming information as untrue. Thus, your original belief still stands. (2) to negate your current belief after seeing how it could be false. And I guess a third option: (3) to warp your belief to fit the newly found info.
(1) + (3) are how faith would be restored.
I'll show you (3) in action from my days as a Pentecostal Christian.
I believed in the Gospels literally and I kept being told that the saints who rose from the grave after Jesus was crucified (Matthew) were never documented by people in the city of Jerusalem.
I couldn't employ (1) because the historical silence on this point was too great to bear. So I opted for (3) after that discussion. My resolution was that it was an allegory for what would happen during the End Days. Thus, I could make sense of the new info *and* continue to believe.
I'd say most deconverts would agree with me in that you don't actually know it right then, but what just happened is that part of your faith has been chipped off. You might feel like your faith grew stronger, but it was *reason* that won that day. It was reason that herded my faith around into a logical spot of apparent non-contradiction. But the more this happens, the more absurdly shaped your belief gets moulded into by reason, until finally you realise that you can't rationally hold onto your belief anymore. Effectively (2) happens to the entirety of your belief. You negate *Christianity* and opt for atheism.
(1) + (3) are how faith would be restored.
I'll show you (3) in action from my days as a Pentecostal Christian.
Zazzy Wrote:Particularly: what was the problem? What challenged your faith?
I believed in the Gospels literally and I kept being told that the saints who rose from the grave after Jesus was crucified (Matthew) were never documented by people in the city of Jerusalem.
Quote: How did you resolve it and restore faith?
I couldn't employ (1) because the historical silence on this point was too great to bear. So I opted for (3) after that discussion. My resolution was that it was an allegory for what would happen during the End Days. Thus, I could make sense of the new info *and* continue to believe.
Quote:Was there a difference in your faith after the resolved challenge?
I'd say most deconverts would agree with me in that you don't actually know it right then, but what just happened is that part of your faith has been chipped off. You might feel like your faith grew stronger, but it was *reason* that won that day. It was reason that herded my faith around into a logical spot of apparent non-contradiction. But the more this happens, the more absurdly shaped your belief gets moulded into by reason, until finally you realise that you can't rationally hold onto your belief anymore. Effectively (2) happens to the entirety of your belief. You negate *Christianity* and opt for atheism.
"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it" ~ Aristotle
