Unit 2, Section 2.1: Believing in God

Question 1

How does infant baptism lead to belief in God?

Answer 1

Parents will promise to bring up their children as Christians and encourage them to believe in God. Young children follow their parents’ example.

Question 2

How does prayer lead to belief in God?

Answer 2

Children grow up with the belief that God is listening to them. They may believe that God has answered their prayers.

Question 3

How do Bible stories lead to belief in God?

Answer 3

Children learn stories from the Bible. They learn that God has always been involved in history.

Question 4

How does going to Church lead to belief in God?

Answer 4

Children are surrounded by fellow Christians who all believe the same thing, seeing others pray and worship God is likely to make them think that God must exist.

Question 5

How do religious festivals lead to a belief in God?

Answer 5

Children are taught the Christian meaning of Easter and Christmas and celebrate it in Church, sharing in everyone’s happiness.

Question 6

How does Sunday School lead to a belief in God?

Answer 6

Learning in more detail about God, Jesus and the Bible helps to back up what a child’s parents taught them.

Question 7

How does Church school lead to a belief in God?

Answer 7

Children and young people continue to be surrounded by Christians at school. Belief in God is still seen as normal. Pupils are likely to believe it if their teachers tell them it’s true.

Question 8

How does first communion lead to a belief in God?

Answer 8

Children learn more about God in their confirmation lessons and possibly have a religious experience when the bishop lays his hands on you.

Question 9

How do religious youth clubs lead to a belief in God?

Answer 9

Young people are surrounded by other teenagers with the same beliefs.

Question 10

How does Confirmation lead to belief in God?

Answer 10

The sacrament of Confirmation involves lessons from the Priest/Minister about Christianity and the nature of God.

Question 11

How might religious experiences lead to people believing in God?

Answer 11

There is confirmation He exists, therefore giving an answer to who created the universe.

Question 12

How do miracles convince a person that God exists?

Answer 12

It can only be explained by God (e.g. someone who’s heart has stopped and come back to life)

Question 13

How can feeling numinous convince someone that God exists?

Answer 13

You’re feeling the presence of something greater than you so it must be God (e.g. the creation of the universe)

Question 14

How does a near-death experience convince a person God exists?

Answer 14

God has intervened to save you (e.g. when someone has drowned and they see the light)

Question 15

How does prayer convince a person that God exists?

Answer 15

If someone’s prayer is answered, it assures them that God is listening to them, He exists, and that they can talk to Him and draw strength, guidance and support from him.

Question 16

Why might unanswered prayers not lead someone to believe in God?

Answer 16

• Find it impossible to believe that God would want suffering
• If someone prays and the responses are not consistent (e.g. someone praying for a football team to win and they only win half the time), how can he be omnipotent?
• Favouritism
• How can he be all loving if someone prays for a sick loved one and He does not answer?

Question 17

How do Christians respond to the problem of unanswered prayers?

Answer 17

• They may accept that their prayer was selfish or that it was part of God’s plan for things to happen the way they did
• Sometimes Christians do not expect an answer from God
• Maybe there is a higher power?
• Some believe God created the world but is not on Earth now to answer prayers.

Question 18

What are the main features of a Christian upbringing?

Answer 18

Infant baptism, prayer, Bible stories, going to Church, festivals, Sunday school, Church school, first communion, youth clubs and confirmation.

Question 19

How might religious experiences lead to people believing in God?

Answer 19

Likely to strengthen someone’s belief in God as there is confirmation of his existence, and therefore the creation of the Universe.

Question 20

How can miracles get someone to believe in God?

Answer 20

They can only be explained by God (e.g. someone who’s heart has stopped and come back to life)

Question 21

How can the feeling numinous get someone to believe in God?

Answer 21

The feeling of the presence of something greater than you can only be God (e.g. creation of our existence on Earth)

Question 22

How can a near-death experience get someone to believe in God?

Answer 22

God has intervened to save you, therefore He must exist if he were to resuscitate someone when they have died/nearly died (e.g. when someone has drowned and they ‘see the light’)

Question 23

How can prayer get someone to believe in God?

Answer 23

If your prayer has been answered, it ensures Christians know that God is listening to them, and that they can draw strength, guidance and support from Him (e.g. when one prays for a sick loved one)

Question 24

How might unanswered prayers reject a belief in God?

Answer 24

• Why would he want suffering if he is omnibenevolent?
• If someone prays for a football team to win and they only win half the time, how can he have complete control if he’s not consistent?
• Favouritism (e.g. two people pray for the same thing and only one of them’s prayer is granted)

Question 25

How do Christians respond to the problems of unanswered prayers?

Answer 25

• May accept that their prayer is selfish
• Part of God’s plan for things to happen the way they did
• Sometimes Christians don’t expect an answer from God
• Maybe there’s a higher power?
• Some believe God created the world but is not on Earth now to answer prayers

Question 26

Why do evil and suffering lead to some people not believing in God?

Answer 26

God cannot exist as the classic theistic interpretation of Him, as he cannot be omnipotent, omnibenevolent and omniscient and let evil and suffering exist throughout the world.

Question 27

How do Christians respond to the problem of evil and suffering?

Answer 27

• Pain is a punishment for the bad things we do.
• Pain is a test of our faith in God (e.g. Job in the OT)
• We learn from pain.
• We need to experience the bad so we can appreciate the good.
• Evil and suffering are a result of free will.
• We should not question the will of God, merely accept it.
• The devil is the cause of all evil and suffering.

Question 28

What is Iranaeus’ Theodicy?

Answer 28

• World is the best of all possible worlds as it allows human character to fully develop
• Evil and suffering allows people to differentiate between good and bad
• Gain qualities such as perseverance, resilience and courage as a result
• Evil exists because God gave us free will so we have the freedom to disobey Him, so we don’t necessarily do what God wants us to do all the time

Question 29

What is the Augustinian Theodicy?

Answer 29

• Adam and Eve burdened everyone with evil when they disobeyed God and Eve took the Forbidden Fruit from the Tree of Knowledge (world started good before the ‘original sin’)
• Jesus had the opportunity to save our souls from evil but we killed him and wasted the chance
• Judgement Day, when you die, you’ll be given an afterlife if you are a good person

Question 30

What is the design argument?

Answer 30

William Paley’s watch: if you were walking down the street and saw a watch lying in the grass, you would assume it has been designed by someone. Its intricate mechanism can’t happen by chance. Paley said the same is true of the world. It’s unlikely the complex structures of nature are the result of chance.

Question 31

How can the design argument lead someone to believe in God?

Answer 31

• Fibonacci sequence
• There is evidence of design in the world (e.g. the eye)
• Paley’s example of a watch is easy to understand
• Only God has the qualities of designing the world (i.e. the omnis)
• Comforting?
• Evolution -> science

Question 32

How can the design argument lead someone to not believe in God?

Answer 32

• Darwin: evolution and survival of the fittest, why would God design a race that would die out?
• Dawkins: the world doesn’t need to have a purpose as it was an accident; everything is an illusion, no design just evolution
• David Hume: everything was done by chance, including the universe, it only takes so long for every combination to be done
• John Stuart Mill: why would God design a world with flaws if he is all loving? If you have a flawed design, you have a flawed designer

How can the argument prove anything if the design of the world is always changing?

Question 33

What is the causation argument?

Answer 33

Everything has a cause. God is the first cause, an uncaused cause (He was the beginning of everything). The universe and everything else followed after.

Question 34

How can the causation argument lead someone to believe in God?

Answer 34

• The universe could not have happened by accident, and only someone as powerful as God could have brought it into existence, so God must exist
• Ties in with science/big bang
• Something cannot come from nothing - Swinburne
• Attributes of God (e.g. omnipotent)
• Clear argument

Question 35

How can the causation argument lead someone to not believe in God?

Answer 35

• Inductive leap
• God can’t just be the first uncaused cause, if everything must have a cause that’s a contradiction, God must have been caused by something
• Assumes a starting point and that God is eternal
• Series of uncaused causes
• Brute fact - Russell (we’re here and we can’t change it)

Question 36

How does the media portray religion in a positive light?

Answer 36

• Informative and helpful, can explain ideas (e.g. God TV)
• Can show religion in an attractive light (e.g. Songs of Praise, where ‘worship becomes magical through music’)
• Share people’s experiences (e.g. Lourdes, a major Catholic pilgrimage