THE UNITED CHURCH OF CANADA AND ONE ATHEIST PASTOR

Colin Perkel/The Canadian Press

She is one of their own. They don't want her anymore. She is Rev. Gretta Vosper. The United Church ordained Rev. Vosper in 1993. We assume that she was approved because in good faith she agreed with the tenets of faith of the United Church which includes a faith in God, which is stated with astonishing theological liberality. Among the belief statements of the United Church of Canada, is the following statement entitled 'Multi-faith Relations', with its deliberate non-discrimination that submits Christianity as merely one of the many ways by which humans find their way to God.

"The United Church of Canada views the religious practice of all people of goodwill with respect and gratitude. We believe the Spirit of God is at work in many different faith communities.For Christians, Jesus is the way we know God. Our understanding is nonetheless limited by human imagination. God is greater still and works in our world by a mysterious Spirit that knows no distinction at the doorway of a Christian chapel; Buddhist, Hindu, or Sikh temple; Aboriginal sweat lodge, Muslim mosque, or Jewish synagogue.
We work together with other Christian churches whenever possible, and among people of other religions in Canada and throughout the world on matters of justice, peace, and human dignity.
Today, difference is everywhere around us and, we believe, a great cause for celebration.”

The United Church's doctrinal broad-mindedness afforded Ms. Vosper a vast expanse of theological possibilities that unpredictably brought her to the conclusion that she no longer believes in God and she went public with this in 2001. This incongruence has been quiet but unresolved for over a decade but now the United Church of Canada Executive is questioning her fitness to serve as a minister. Colin Perkel's article in the Globe and Mail quotes Ms. Vosper saying, “I don’t believe in...the god called God….Using the word gets in the way of sharing what I want to share…. Is the Bible really the word of God? Was Jesus a person?... It’s mythology. We build a faith tradition upon it which shifted to find belief more important than how we lived.”

This United Church statement acknowledges God as an entity who is accessible by way of Jesus, but not exclusively so, since God's Spirit works to make God known to Buddhists, Hindus, Sikhs, First Nations, Muslims and Jews. In our obsessively politically and religiously correct culture this is a commendably acceptable. But is it acceptable to God? Doesn't the concept of Jesus as eternal God, incarnated briefly for the purpose of dying a substitutionary, atoning death for sinners, define God to the exclusion of every other religious alternative? Well you can hear where I am coming from. Yet, Rev. Vosper insists that she should not be bound by a belief in God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, even though that was basic to her ordination vows. Vosper believes that her movement to humanism should be embraced by her church as she explores new ways to express spirituality and values. An ecclesiastical court will decide this autumn 2015 whether she has gone too far.

QUIT ARGUING & START LIVING

Although I have written the past few posts with a view to distinguishing the plausibility of faith and the implausibility of atheism, I have another thought today.

I think that Christians in North America assume that all non-believers are convinced atheists or at least agnostics, so the assumed approach to them is refutation and defense and argumentation. In fact, we live in such an irreligious time that the majority of people of no faith, have simply never considered faith claims. They have little or no experience with the Bible, with Christians, or with church. They pay no attention to these. They simply live life. They may not require arguments to belief but rather winsome examples of life being lived by people who are thriving as they make sense of life by trusting God and finding his involvement at so many levels.

THE ATHEIST’S DILEMMA

Not wanting to believe in God, the atheist must face the interpretation of honest science, which acknowledges that the universe did have a beginning. If the universe had a beginning, it cannot be eternal. That the universe had a beginning, compels the presumption of cause. That cause cannot be nothing, but must be something and the only conceivable eternal something is God. The human creature resembles its cause, and that cause certainly cannot be an amoral universe. Rather, only divine causation can account for created beings who have personality and are occupied with purpose, meaning, and moral values. It is unthinkable that random ‘nothing’ produces finely-tuned everything. It’s improbably that non-life produces life. It’s unimaginable that unconsciousness produces reason. Those are greater leaps of faith than is required to believe in God. Belief in God is affirmative not speculative.

MIND BEFORE MATTER

Dissimilar to other creatures, the human has capacity to reason that his very existence points to a supreme power or being. Beyond mere instinct, the human creature thinks. She thinks and concludes her own existence is reality rather than illusion. She is something, a something extant in a universe of planets and stars. The universe too, is something rather than nothing. Convinced by thinking that her existence is not an illusion, she can reason that she created herself, or she must choose to believe she exists as a creation of an eternal universe or an eternal power/God. An atheist cannot evade faith, since if he will not believe in eternal God, he must believe in eternal universe. With either alternative, mystery remains profound, unexplainable. Did matter simply always exist? Or, did a Mind exist before matter?

JESUS REGARDED THE OLD TESTAMENT AS GOD'S WORD

We are told that Jesus explained his identity and purpose using Old Testament scripture as resource material. Please read this bit of evidence.

According to Luke’s account, there was an occasion soon after Christ’s resurrection from death and the grave, Jesus made an appearance to two of the disciples who were walking on a road that would take them from Jerusalem to Emmaus, seven miles away. They were as yet unaware of the resurrection reality and were discussing everything that had transpired over the past several days.