Leaps of Faith

gmilam said:
The "context" is that no matter how hard you try, I'm going to bet that you cannot choose to "believe" that you can fly.
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Your objection is substantially true. No-one "chooses" their beliefs. What we do choose, however, is how to deal with our beliefs, especially if they leave open room for doubts and objections (as things of Faith do). You can choose to think about something or not; to study a subject more deeply or not.

Sometimes merely thinking about what we are doing, trying to find out our own implicit premises, changes our whole outlook.

All of these things can have an impact on our beliefs. In fact, it seems pretty clear to me that most people who drop away from the Faith do it not because of a powerful case made by a competing world-view (atheism, agnosticism, another religion), but from a mere lack of knowledge about their own Faith, which thus becomes very weak and unable to withstand even the slightest objections. Not that most people actually think in terms of arguments and objections; their mind keeps absorbing all kinds of different and often contradictory beliefs and values until one day they realize their last vestiges of Faith no longer square with their basic outlook on life.
 
gmilam said:
The "context" is that no matter how hard you try, I'm going to bet that you cannot choose to "believe" that you can fly.
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You're a poet and you don't know it! Or perhaps you do... :)

I have flown about twenty times - without having to sprout wings. ;)

But seriously, do you rule out miracles on principle? If so, Hamlet's words are appropriate:

"There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy...."

BTW your context was: "Peter Pan says all you have to do is believe.." Can you enlighten us further?
 
MZ3Boy84 said:
No one can chose to believe in anything. You either have enough supporting evidence to convince you that something is correct and/or legitimate or you don't. Beliefs are not the result of conscious choices that we make. We don't decide to believe in something. Our beliefs are systematically beat into us by evidence. We simply form conclusions based upon the best available evidence at our disposal.
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You underestimate our power to deceive ourselves.
 
Signal said:
Thank you for suggesting that humans are basically evil and crazy. :rolleyes:
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Good morning, Signal. Perhaps this is your wake-up time in England or wherever.

Humans are indeed still basically in their infancy, and ever playing at world building in their imaginations, I guess. If all of history was compressed into a year, it's like we appeared at a minute or so to midnight on Dec 31.
 
Mind Over Matter said:
In fact, it seems pretty clear to me that most people who drop away from the Faith do it not because of a powerful case made by a competing world-view (atheism, agnosticism, another religion), but from a mere lack of knowledge about their own Faith, which thus becomes very weak and unable to withstand even the slightest objections. Not that most people actually think in terms of arguments and objections; their mind keeps absorbing all kinds of different and often contradictory beliefs and values until one day they realize their last vestiges of Faith no longer square with their basic outlook on life.
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In my case you would be wrong. It was a few years of fairly serious Bible study, introspection and reading many POV in general (aka - soul searching) that made me come to the conclusion that I did not believe the whole YHWH/Jesus story. No anger. No evil priests in the closet. Just honest studying and thinking about it.
 
tashja said:
Yes. Faith is very personal. How can we tell if a person has 'faith', or is simply suffering from a bad case of presumption or even foolishness? :shrug:
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It is tough . There are only small glimpses of successes in long term projects . People wonder all the time if they are doing the right thing . A lot of it is pure guess work . Self doubt is a cancer. Yet we have to do reality checks and then use them as a barometer of our success. We find that we may have to make some alterations to the plan if we want to reach the objective , or you can drop out like Me , Find a little cabin in the woods, Catch wild fish and cook em on an open fire with a verity of fresh greens on the side. Toast your mate and do the do like a foo
 
Mind Over Matter said:
This is an excellent summary of faith and reason:

http://www.truthinspire.com/reason-and-faith/
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Faith is consent without inquiry in that faith’s assent is not caused by investigation. Rather, it is produced by God. Commenting on Ephesians 2:8-9, Aquinas contended that “free will is inadequate for the act of faith since the contents of faith are above reason…. That a man should believe, therefore, cannot occur from himself unless God gives it” (Aquinas, Ephesians, 96; unless noted, all citations in this article are from works by Thomas Aquinas). Faith is a gift of God, and no one can believe without it.
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Will It Go 'Round In Circles?
 
O.K> I got a leap of faith story for you all . I been saving it . Most of you know who Molly Ringwald is " Pretty in Pink " and many other movies , Well I know her . Lost contact with her , but Me first Wife and Daughter still see her on occasions . I knew her as a snot nosed little kid in Sacramento . Her Dad was a piano player that would play at Straw Hat Pizza , SHakey's and what have you for back in the day they would have honky tonk piano plays in pizza joints So Bob he was a regular at a place called Al Capone's Pizza . He would bring his daughter Molly to sing while he was playing the piano . Homeliest little girl you could imagine . WE would tease poor Molly about her plainness and lack of Talent . Goofy little Molly was the take of the day and the music she was singing was more Dixieland in nature ( Jazz Jubilee I think is this week end in Sacramento now that I think about it ) Any way Bob Is blind so he don't know his daughter is well pretty ugly little girl . He would say " MY Daughter will be a star one day. So We would him Bob your bind " She is not that attractive and her natural voice is dull in tone . She could stay in tune very well I have to give her that . So he would not listen and insisted she was going to be a star , so he packed up all the belongings and moved to L. A. That was the last time I saw Molly my self and you what ? I just about shit my Self when I saw her in a movie for the first time . I didn't know it was her at first until My My First Wife called and Asked me if I saw Molly in the Movie . I said Shit I can't believe that shit . Her dads Faith must have had something to do with it . Fuck If I believed She was going to make it big like that I would of never teased her about being a goofy little shit. The point is Bob believed , course he was blind and could not see his daughter as ugly . I guess you could call it bind faith
 
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