Why Is Faith Considered A Virtue?

[chakka35]

I’d like some Christian to explain, please, why ‘faith’ is regarded as a virtue.

Faith is belief without evidence, more brutally described as blind credulity. Why is that good? Jesus is supposed to have said to Thomas (John 20:29) “…blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed”.

This seems to me to open the gates to making all beliefs respectable. Not only can I believe in astrology, magic crystals, leylines, unicorns and the like but I must be praised for such beliefs in the face of no evidence. Since the pass mark is zero I graduate with flying colours every time. Blessed am I, a place in heaven secured.

Someone please explain.

[Peter Pedant]

The cynic is one who never sees a good quality in a man, and never fails to see a bad one. He is the human owl, vigilant in darkness and blind to light, mousing for vermin, and never seeing noble game. - See more at: http://quotationsbook.com/quote/9613/#sthash.vvWO91Oy.dpuf

Hy Ward Beecher

pity I thought the Divine Oscar had come to religion at long last.

[jomifl]

Sandy, you argued that people need belief in god in order to have a sense of moral value. Unable to explain why atheists can 'do good works' you attribute it to their 'soul' prevailing despite their intellect. Thus you have conceded that moral values are a property of the 'soul' rather than acquired through religion thus dismantling your own justification for belief (other than the entirely selfish desire for a place in paradise). Of course since the soul has no more been proven to exist than god has, it looks as if moral values reside in the intellect rather than anywhere else. So, it rather looks as if intellectual development is more likely to elevate moral values than blind belief in a 'creator' who has hardly been a shining example of those values promoted (though not acted upon) by the church.

[naomi24]

^^Good point.

[goodlife]

Peter @ So can you see it is not cynicism but brotherly love that identifies Jesus’ followers, for he said-By this all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love among yourselves.(John 13:35) doing so will help all of you to avoid the traits of a Cynic person.

[Octavius]

Not really, moral values such as love and compassion can defy reason and intellect. And often do.

[jomifl]

Goodlife, please stop attributing your own quotations to jesus, it is dishonest so therefore a sin. You should be ashamed of yourself ..50 hail marys and 5 minutes self flagellation at the very least.
Ps. I don't suppose you can explain what your post means, just for a change, as some ABers aren't familiar with 'biblespeak'.

[naomi24]

Goodlife, //doing so will help all of you to avoid the traits of a Cynic person.//

One of those traits being honesty. It works for you! ;o)

[Octavius]

Or, in the case of Peregrinus Proteus, outright stupidity.

[Khandro]

jomifl; It distresses me to think that you have no comprehension of what is meant by soul, purely on the basis that it cannot be proved to exist by the intellect alone.

[society]

To have faith is to believe, and sometimes this involves stretching ones imagination. I see this as a matter of expectations more than being virtuous.

[Peter Pedant]

No society - this is the level of the discussion which only rarely rises above the horizon.

You can check with your sticky mitt that you have sixpence in your pocket
and then believe that you have.
But you dont have faith there is sixpence in your pocket

Faith is more than that - and is only flickeringly apparent in the discussions.
Naomi scoring much higher than most

Believing without evidence is not faith either.
You can believe not knowing what the south american weather reports are, that it is raining in Buenos Aires. No-one would say you had faith it is raining in BA. The word I would use is 'assume' (with evidence you would be concluding)

at least old git hasnt had a go at this

[jomifl]

Khandro, It saddens me that you have no understanding of the meaning of the word 'comprehension', can I suggest that it has little to do with self -delusion.

[chakka35]

A first I was impressed, though daunted, by the number of responses. Then I realised that so few of the answers even begin to address my original point that there is little need to comment.

Let me remind you: since faith is (pace Peter Pedant) belief without evidence I asked why I shouldn’t believe any nonsense I like and, since faith is considered by Christians to be a virtue, I am to be commended for it.

A few comments:

Thank you, naomi, for pointing out to woofgang that three years have elapsed since the last similar question from me. After all, if it would be OK for me to ask the same question of six different Christian church congregations why should I not ask it of two different AB congregations three years apart?

To those who ask where I got the idea that faith is considered a virtue I suggest that they listen to a few Christian sermons and the odd episode of ‘Thought for the Day’.
Also see sandyRoe at 16.09 on the 10th.

EPONA – you are, of course, entitled to your own ‘personal interpretation’ of faith. But it is not the one required by Jesus of Thomas. (Not that I believe a word of it, of course.) Again, I must ask why I should not give the benefit of the doubt to palmistry, say.

JAKE – That is precisely what I am trying to do: to see the world as believers do.

KHANDRO – Have you read Tommy Aquinas’s ‘proofs’ of the existence of God, most of which say the same thing and are not proofs but merely assertions. Silly old devil, as naomi says.

JOMIFL – Good stuff.

That’ll do for now.

[birdie1971]

There is absolutely no doubt that Thomas Aquinas was a great philosopher and thinker. He was also unfortunately mentally handicapped by his Catholic belief in a creator deity and all the attendant Abrahamic scriptural garbage that goes with it (eg. believing that women are mentally inferior to men, etc.) and he desperately tried to square this belief with rationality and logic.

He failed.

Not one of Thomas Aquinas' “proofs” are anything of the kind. Each and every one is logically invalid.

[atalanta]

Thomas Aquinas' handwriting is officially described ( by palaeographers, among whom I like to include myself) as " Littera Unintelligibilis". It actually looks like lines of very untidy barbed wire strung across a page. I can read all sorts of mediaeval writing, but with his, I can't even tell which way up to hold it.
And no, I am not a teacher. Historian in a modest way, perhaps.

[whatarethat]

My best analogy would be as follows. First we have to understand the definition of virtue. It is moral excellence, a standard of right. So, lets say I am a kid who is bullied. I am depressed and can barely make it another day because of the mental and physical anguish I may endure. Rather than allowing the disparity to bring me to the brink of self destruction, I choose instead to have faith in the unknown future that this trial in my life will come to an end on its own. That is where the virtue lies. In the face of all adversity you rise above it virtuously by believing in something you have yet to see, i.e., the future. The virtue also lies in the fact that it is easier to give up and give in to the pressure of it all and find instant relief, as opposed to valiantly carrying on with courage, hope and faith, especially when it is hard to believe (have faith) that the pain will ever end. Though, this is really not just a Christian concept. That being said. You cannot simply go around in all honesty and say you believe in something like unicorns, astrology, God, or even a bright future, and actually expect to be blessed by it. If that kid truly believed by faith in his heart that the future will be great, he can be joyous (blessed) in the face of all the adversity. In this day and age, I believe that to be more of a gift than a blessing. However, if you did believe in unicorns, truly believed, the key word is believe, there would be a sense of joy of having something to believe in, thus you would be blessed (joyous). The issue is not about whether you can prove it to someone else or not. What difference does that make to you? Someone can cram all they want down someone else's throat hoping to make them believe, but it cannot be done, nor will it ever work. Nor should anyone want to do that. Believing in something comes from the free will of one's own mind and soul. Perhaps your faith resides in science. There is a lot of theory that has not been proven, yet you are excited and overjoyed of the possibilities. You are now believing and having faith in something you do not see, nor has been proven. Only the concepts have been made manifest, not the proof of those possibilities. Maybe one day those possibilities will be made manifest. But blessed are you to have been overjoyed with those possibilities all along rather than emotionless until you actually saw the proof, especially when that proof may never come in your lifetime. Anyway, just my take on it.

[Khandro]

^^Well said! Behind one of the great doors of Gloucester Cathedral is a crudely carved stone in the shape of a cross, it was made by some soldiers of the Gloucester regiment held prisoners in the notorious Japanese Changi POW camp forced, beaten and starved to build the Burma railway, it was used for holding simple services in the face of appalling adversity and at the risk of death if discovered. I would say their faith gave those who survived the strength to continue.

[Old_Geezer]

Faith is very important. Has to be a virtue or I'd not be able to do some things I do. For example, I have faith in my dentist and doctor. Hope it's not misplaced.

[mibn2cweus]

//I would say their faith gave those who survived the strength to continue.//

I would say that if you retrace their steps you would find that it was faith, along with the lack of knowledge which breeds and sponsors it, that put them in the predicament they found themselves in the first place. Belief, apart from the knowledge which justifies it, inevitably and unavoidably leads to regrettable consequences. One can at any point choose to ignore reality but sooner or later reality will eventually have the last word.

[mibn2cweus]

[All religions] make the same mistake. They all take the only real faculty we have that distinguishes us from other primates, and from other animals—the faculty of reason, and the willingness to take any risk that reason demands of us—and they replace that with the idea that faith is a virtue. If I could change just one thing, it would be to dissociate the idea of faith from virtue—now and for good—and to expose it for what it is: a servile weakness, a refuge in cowardice, and a willingness to follow, with credulity, people who are in the highest degree unscrupulous.

--Christopher Hitchens