The issue is whether or not natural science has any epistemological access to non-natural being. If science doesn't have that access, then it wouldn't seem to be of very much use in describing, explaining or even determining whether or not such being exists.
I think both scientists as well as some theists have complicated the matter into absurd proportions, or at least sometimes (or often, as in popular discourse) present it in terms that are impossible to live up to.
I'm not sure whether this is avoidable, or whether it is a common step one has to make in the pursuit of developing spiritual maturity.
A few things to consider about ordinary human interactions:
- People talk about things, and sometimes they don't exactly know what they are talking about, but they talk about it anyway.
- People sometimes want other people to think, feel, say or do things. People sometimes want to influence other people.
- People may sometimes want from others what they themselves don't have or cannot give.
- People sometimes want to get away with less than honorable behavior.
This is how the givens of ordinary human interactions enter the discussion on transcendental matters.
A preacher, apart from talking about God, may also want to gain followers, money, fame, so the way he presents the message about God is affected by those ulterior motives.
What the people who are being preached to then are told is a mixture of pure motives (about God) and impure motives (about worldly gains). If they are uneducated in these matters (and they probably are uneducated on these matters), they won't be able to tell which is which, and will likely confuse the two.
Further, what the people then actually hear from that which they are told will depend on their desires, which are often worldly (they often just want to be sure that they will keep their job or soon find a better one, that their children will be healthy and their spouse will love them, and such). Much of what the preacher says won't get through to them, they may add a few things, not understand this or that.
It's a recipe for confusion.
I think that both science as well as some theists effectively wish to avoid these givens of ordinary human interactions:
Science does it by trying to objectify and neutralize the search for God. But in the process, it denies and eliminates the importance of humans and their intentions and relationships altogether. In theistic religion, the aim is always a personal relationship (of one kind or another) with God, but the scientific approach wants to do without that relationship altogether. It's throwing out the baby along with the bathwater.
On the other hand, some theists emphasize a hyperindividualistic approach to God, where they expect that a person would develop a relationship with God all on their own, simply by an act of introspection, with no help or teaching from other people who have successully done so. That approach can effectively lead to a kind of solipsistic insanity in the name of the search for God.
So when trying to understand and evaluate theistic claims, we need to consider the givens of ordinary human interactions: we need to be sure that the maker of those claims is pure and wishes us well, and we also need to make sure that our own intentions for listening and engaging in discussion of theistic claims are pure.
If one enters discussion of theistic claims because one has old scores to settle with particular theists, or because one is trying to distract oneself from one's life problems and such, then those are not pure intentions, so one shouldn't delude oneself into hoping for pure results.
