I have been following the history of Western Civilization thought and how we got to this juncture, where, over the past sixty years or so, our churches and society at large have lost their rationality. In both the conservative and progressive churches, irrationality is now glorified as the ideal; reason and thoughtfully looking at the evidence are seen as worldly, “of the flesh,” or even satanic. I was forced out of my last conservative church when I was declared, in front of the whole congregation, not to be a “real Christian” when I opposed forcing our teens to believe in a six-thousand-year-old earth. I was forced out of a small group at my present progressive church and much of its spiritual life when I declared that reason was an important part of my relationship with God, which prompted an e-mail from one of the leaders explaining that my relationship with God was therefore no good.

This state of Christianity is mirrored in our public life: politicians have always lied, but the difference today is that lying is the MO. Previously, when a politician was caught in a lie (say, Nixon, where his own party prosecuted him for his lie), now political careers are enhanced by lying often and well… with no repercussions. Also, education and scientific investigation are under attack, reflecting the wishes of the Christian Nationalists, who are part of this administration. Baseless conspiracy theories now dominate both the church and politics, and ignorance is seen as bliss (see the video reel of Fox News below praising being uneducated ). This is an aberration in the history of Western civilization… how did we get here?

Last time, I ended with the Enlightenment. The Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment had a profound positive impact on the quality and endurance of human life.  It was built on the simple ideas of Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274): that nature is created by God, is therefore very good, and stands as the second source of inspiration alongside Scripture; and that God gives us reason as our best tool for finding truth. Several movements emerged after the Enlightenment, but for simplicity, I will focus on three: German Idealism as expressed by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, modernism, and postmodernism.

The Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment, as great as they were, had some problems. For one, while they offered huge advances in ease of life, health, and happiness, science struggled to address human moral problems. The last great attempt was B.F. Skinner(1904-1990), a modernist and behavioral psychologist, believed he could use the scientific method (behavior modification) to cure all social ailments, end all wars, empty prisons, and end hunger and hate. I graduated from a Skinner-inspired college of psychology, the dean a student of Skinner, and know that perspective well. But he and other scientific modernists (believing science could solve all our problems) failed in the trenches of World War I and with the nuclear bomb of World War II. This created deep disillusionment with the scientific method, which, building on its success in previous centuries, overpromised and underdelivered.

Hegel (1770 –1831)

The Enlightenment may have peaked with the German Idealist Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. To summarize Hegel, he carried reason to the utmost conclusions. The scientific method, being so successful, found experimentation to be the key to finding truth, then concluded that if something cannot be observed, it isn’t real, and finally (unfortunately) concluded that if something can’t be observed, it is not true. Building on that idea, Hegel, a technocrat, created ideas for the totally rational society, but here is the rub… he considered himself a devout Lutheran. Carrying the extreme Scientific idea that if something can’t be observed, it is not true, he did not believe in any miracles, including those of the Bible.

Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855)

Kierkegaard was a theologically trained Dane who, unassumingly, became the father of our present-day postmodernism. As a Christian, he became appalled by Hegel’s writings and believed that his thoughts, the empty rationality of Christianity, were a death knell to the faith.

He was an odd feller (like me) who became a strong critic of the Danish church (I am not a church critic) and Christianity in general, as spiritually dead, and thought that people were born into it without a personal conversion and faith. That the clergy were all hypocrites, becoming rich without a true faith.

The equivalent in his day to Blogs like mine, were self-published books and newsletters, which he used to condemn that status quo, so much so that when he ran out of his father’s money and needed to get a job, the only job he was trained for was being a pastor, but no church wanted him… leaving him to die in poverty.

I will focus on just one aspect of Kierkegaard’s writings, and that was his notion of Christian faith, which must be irrational, as the bedrock of the Christian experience. I will only point out here that his ideas were in reaction to the overemphasis of Hegel on reason and objectivity (if not observed, it isn’t true). I agree Hegel went too far, but so did Kierkegaard… in the opposite direction.

It is important to note that upon Kierkegaard’s death, he was not known outside of Copenhagen. A real nobody. It wasn’t until the disillusionment with modernity (in the twentieth century) that he was discovered and elevated to become the key voice of postmodern irrationality, The Lord of Postmodernism (my term).

I will do two more posts focusing on the concept of faith as introduced by Kierkegaard, which has become the dominant kind of faith in modern Christianity and Western society, both the conservative and progressive churches being totally intolerant of any other kind.

Mike