Dissecting theism, agnosticism and atheism

By Herbert Vego

 

BECAUSE I no longer go to church, my friends and relatives often mistake me for either an agnostic or an atheist.  I am neither; I am a theist or believer in God. But I am also an open-minded maverick. For this article, I am exploring the subject as discussed in the books I have read while “staycationing” at home, staying safe from COVID-19.

You see, an agnostic stands between a theist and an atheist. He believes that it is not possible to know whether God exists or not.

I have been wondering how famous agnostics view God in relation to the awesome “creations” in the universe as amplified by this Bible verse: “The heavens declare the glory of God” (Psalm 19:1).

Learned atheists view order in the universe as a product of the “big bang” theory – resulting from chance, akin to winning the lottery despite the odds. In fact, to admit that human life began with a big bang is to defy the laws of probability. One astronomer calculates the odds at less than 1 chance in a trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion.

“It would be far easier for a blind-folded person,” he said, “to discover one specially marked grain of sand out of all the beaches of the world.”

You must have seen the late physicist Stephen Hawking, a quadriplegic agnostic, speak on TV: “The remarkable fact is that the values of these numbers seem to have been very finely adjusted to make possible the development of life.”

How did “big bang” produce the first life?

We God believers can only reason out that all of the above scenarios are impossible – unless it was fixed by the omnipotent Someone behind the scenes.

Scientists who believe in God may have expected such fine-tuning, but atheists and agnostics are unable to explain the remarkable “coincidences.”

In his book The Symbiotic Universe, agnostic astronomer George Greenstein asked, “Is it possible that suddenly, without intending to, we have stumbled upon the scientific proof of the existence of a Supreme Being?”

In another book, God and the Astronomers, agnostic astronomer Robert Jastrow postulated why some scientists are reluctant to accept a transcendent Creator: “Science is the religion of a person who believes there is order and harmony in the universe. When it is violated by the discovery that the world had a beginning under conditions in which the known laws of physics are not valid, the scientist has lost control. He would be traumatized.”

Greenstein and Hawking could accept a God-made universe because, being speculative, it could not be verified in the realm of science – in other words, beyond the reach of either the microscope or the biggest telescope.

While Hawking spent his lifetime exploring purely scientific explanations for our origins, other scientists have acknowledged what appears to be overwhelming evidence for a Creator.

British astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle wrote, “A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature.”

Albert Einstein wasn’t religious, but he called the genius behind the universe “an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection.”

The late English atheist Christopher Hitchens, who had spent much of his life writing books and debating against God, was forced to admit that life couldn’t exist if things were different by just “one degree or one hair.”

Years after Hitchens had died of esophageal cancer at age 62 in 2011, his friend Larry Alex Taunton, an evangelical Christian, wrote of his last conversations with him:

“His tone was marked by a sincerity that wasn’t typical of the man. A lifetime of rebellion against God had brought him to a moment where he was staring into the depths of eternity, teetering on the edge of belief.”