Heck No At All!

I was talking to a friend the other night about some of my recent entries and I realized he had entirely the wrong impression of why I think about what I do. At least, he and I disagreed, and I realized that I hadn't made my position as clear as I thought I had. So this is to explain why I write about the dark side of God and such things.

This will sound pretentious, but I read something in Plato's Republic that's analogous to my situation. The character Glaucon challenges Socrates, the protagonist, with a fairly persuasive argument in favor of living unjustly. Glaucon (wonderful name) stresses that he does not agree with the argument he's presenting - he believes, or wants to believe, that justice is superior to injustice - but he has not yet heard an argument in favor of justice that is as persuasive as he would like it to be. For this reason, he presents Socrates with an argument against justice that is as strong as he can make it and challenges Socrates to overcome it, hoping, of course, that he can.

I hope (I'm not certain) it's clear to the reader that I don't have a vested interest in proving God to be unjust. Where would that get me? I really want God to be just, in fact I would do almost anything to continue to believe in God's justice, except ignoring or shrugging off evidence against it. I have long held the conviction that if I am to truly and resolutely believe in something, I must subject it to serious scrutiny. Not a mock-trial. Not a perfunctory, cursory scan of the evidence. I'm talking about honest, diligent examination.

This is why I sometimes write about the wrath of God and other things unbecoming of a devout Christian. Because I don't know anyone else who does, and I take my faith seriously enough to want to discover, to the best of my abilities, whether my beliefs are contradictory or flawed. I have no beef with those of you who find fault in my arguments (that's half the reason I blog) or the presentation thereof. But for those of you who think I'm an apostate, a God-mocker or a recreational doubter, hopefully this clears a few things up. If you still object to the questions I ask, I'm quite willing to discuss this further. And if you still object after that, no one's forcing you to read my blog.

I just remembered I wrote something similar to this a few months ago. I rather liked that post.