IN A PICKLE

Over the millennia there have been numerous arguments and discussions between scientists and theologians. For the most part they have gone nowhere. The scientist wants proof: proof of God’s existence, proof that a certain miracle has taken place, proof that a law of nature has been suspended in this instance – proof. The theologian, on the other hand, does not demand such. The theologian only demands that what he believes is, well, believable, given his first belief, namely, that of his belief in God.

Novelist Robertson Davies, discussing his joining of the Anglican Church: “Yes, indeed, I consider myself a believer. But if I were asked to nail down and defend what it was I believed and why, I would be in a pickle like a lot of people. I think this is the kind of thing that is not perhaps very widely or sympa­thetically understood. Religious belief is not susceptible to the kind of discussion and proof that appeals to skeptical minds that generally want to work on scientific principles. They’re so imbued with the scientific method that intuition and a sort of native awareness don’t count for anything.”

We believers are always in a pickle, often with ourselves let alone with those who demand scientific proof. We, too, wonder why we sometimes believe what we believe. We, too, have our doubts about God’s love for us, even about God’s very existence or certainly that God cares about us either individually or as a whole. Given the mess that the world is in and has been in almost since creation, we have to wonder about this God of our faith.

Thus, when we try to defend our faith or our God or both, we wind up in a pickle. We have no adequate answers, answers that will satisfy the questioner even when that questioner is ourself. Yet, while the scientist will walk away shaking his head at our foolishness for believing what is impossible to prove and what, in many instances, makes no sense at all, we hang on. We don’t give in or give up.

That’s not to say that it wouldn’t be easier to live with ourselves if we did. There are times when we would just like to shuck it all and give up on this God of ours who seems so often to be so distant and so uncaring about the pain and suffering that we are enduring, unjustly and undeservedly enduring. Just mark it up to fate and get on with life without God. Wouldn’t that be so much easier and certainly make so much more sense?

Perhaps. But we do not. Why we do not, why we hang on and hang in when everything in us says to give up and walk away, we cannot explain. As Davies asserts, if and when we try, we end up in a pickle of our own making. There is no scientific explanation for this instance of ours to hold on to a God who sometimes does not seem to care to hold on to us. Sometimes.

But it is in those times when God holds on to us, won’t let us go, who even forcibly grabs us, that we know why we still believe even when it might make complete sense not to. We wish we could explain this faith of ours, but we cannot. That may put us in a pickle but it is a very sweet one, is it not?