The following thoughts are the hypothetical reflections of what could be a typical Ohio State student.
It’s a silly myth right? I mean, have you ever seen a dead person, like a really and truly dead person, come back to life? Yeah millions of people believe this stuff, but it’s not because they’re rational about it. Their parents told them to believe it, whose parents told them to believe it, and so on. They believe it because somewhere in their psyche they have to believe it. It consoles them, brings them comfort. It’s a superficial confirmation that their whole belief system doesn’t have to be discarded, even though most of us know now that it probably should be.
IT'S HARD TO BELIEVE
I mean look for a second at the people who believe this stuff. It seems like if it really happened that the people who believe it should be different than they are. If this Jesus they believe in is supposedly alive and well today as they say, does this Jesus they believe in support their ignorant selfishness, their judgmental attitudes, their hypocritical lifestyle? Even if for a moment it might be possible, would I even want to believe it’s true if it means joining that crowd? If they want to believe in this stuff, well good for them. It’s just not for me.
We live in a much more sophisticated age, after all. People all around the world, in many different cultures, believe a lot of different things. A lot of it seems pretty far-fetched to me, but who am I to say what’s true? All I know is that if religion gets anything right it’s that we should love each other. There’s still too much racism, sexism, etc. If religion has anything to offer it should help us to lay down our prejudices. It should help us love one another.
YET I'M SURPRISED BY BEAUTY
But then, there are those moments where I’m surprised by the sheer beauty I see in nature, or the desire that seems to come out of no where when I watch a great movie, read a captivating book. There’s this nagging doubt about my skepticism. I mean in a vast galaxy of solar systems I live on this immensely rare planet where life is even possible, let alone the idea that the complexity of my own body and mind supposedly evolved by happenstance from the right collection of molecules. Am I really so sure that miracles are impossible? Maybe the entire universe is one big miracle?
And how do I know that all religion has to offer is the impulse of love? If all I am is a meaningless collection of molecules, maybe this belief in the supreme value of love is just something I tell myself to make life more tolerable in a painful and tragic world. Is the rightness of love objectively true if it’s just the evolution of human conscience? If religion has something important to say about love, then maybe I should consider what else religion has to say.
MAYBE IT DESERVES MORE THOUGHT
It seems like most of the really smart people I know don’t believe this stuff. Yet strangely, there are some really smart people that somehow do believe? As ridiculous as it seems to me to believe Jesus rose from the dead, if I’m honest I haven’t even given it much thought. I’ve made an assumption. Maybe I should look into this and at least become more informed. What do I have to lose?
Join us on Sunday, February 26th at 8pm in Mershon Auditorium for Resurrected or Reimagined. Christian and atheist professors will discuss the plausibility of Jesus rising from the dead and help us think more deeply on this important topic.