Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Kelly James Clark is Senior Research Fellow at Grand Valley State University's Kaufman Interfaith Institute. He is editor of Abraham's Children: Liberty and Tolerance in an Age of Religious Conflict (2012), and author of Religion and the Sciences of Origins (2014), Return to Reason (1990), The Story of Ethics (2003), When Faith Is Not Enough (1997), and 101 Key Philosophical Terms and Their Importance for Theology (2004). Aziz Abu Sarah is an entrepreneur, speaker, peace builder, and author. He is the recipient of the Goldberg Prize for Peace in the Middle East, the Eliav-Sartawi Award, and was named one of the 500 most influential muslims in the world by the Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre. Rabbi Nancy Fuchs Kreimer is Associate Professor of Religious Studies and the founding Director of the Department of Multifaith Studies and Initiatives at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College where she was ordained in 1982. She co-edited Chapters of the Heart: Jewish Women Sharing the Torah of Our Lives (Wipf and Stock, 2013).

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when faith is not enough

William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company

Contents

Don't Skip This....................................ix1. Inside the Darkness.............................32. Moments of Light................................193. Moments of Darkness.............................374. Fear and Trembling..............................535. Hope and Human Suffering........................716. Help Thou Mine Unbelief.........................93Part II. Searching for My Self.....................1077. Sound and Fury..................................1098. What's in a Name?...............................1219. Searching for My Self...........................13710. Stages on Life's Way...........................15911. Home...........................................175

Chapter One

Fact is sonny, I've always had notions of my own concerning young David's harp. A gifted lad, to be sure, but not all his strumming kept him clear of mortal sin. Of course I know our poor dear old-fashioned scribblers, with their tuppeny Lives of the Saints, take it for granted that a fellow can find safety in transports of ecstasy, that he curls himself up all snug and safe as though he were in Abraham's bosom? Safe? ... Oh, I grant you there are times when it's as simple as pie to attain such heights. God sweeps you up. The real snag is to stick there, and know how to get down again—when you can't hold on any longer.... Georges Bernanos, Diary of a Country Priest

The Bible knows of God's hiding His face, of times when the contact between Heaven and earth seems to be interrupted. God seems to withdraw Himself utterly from the earth and no longer to participate in its existence. The space of history is then full of noise, but as it were, empty of divine breath. For one who believes in the living God, who knows about Him, and is fated to spend his life in a time of His hiddenness, it is very difficult to live. Martin Buber, "The Dialogue between Heaven and Earth"

    The Sea of Faith,
    Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
    Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furl'd.
    But now I only hear
    Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
    Retreating, to the breath
    Of the night-winds, down the vast edges drear
    And naked shingles of the world.
    Ah, love, let us be true
    To one another! for the world, which seems
    To lie before us like a land of dreams,
    So various, so beautiful, so new,
    Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
    Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
    And we are here as on a darkling plain
    Swept with confus'd alarms of struggle and flight,
    Where ignorant armies clash by night.

Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach

* * *

I went hiking many years ago with a well-known mountain guide. We took a lunch break in a wondrous canyon, surrounded on all sides by magnificent wildflowers in full bloom. I had recently read that one of America's most famous climbers, a pioneer of many extreme ascents, professed to be a Christian. Since my guide knew this famous climber, I asked him about the circumstances surrounding the climber's conversion. He sneered that the famous climber had joined the "cargo cult." Since I was unfamiliar with this exotic sounding cult, I asked him to explain.

During World War II, the guide explained, the United States military mistakenly but periodically parachuted supplies to a group of natives living on a small island in the South Pacific (they knew nothing of wars or rumors of wars). The supplies included food items, for which they were extremely grateful. I am told they grew especially fond of canned peaches. Once a week they looked to the eastern skies for the anticipated return of the cargo plane, which would miraculously deliver their tin bounty. They looked upon these deliveries as a sign of favor with the gods. When the war ended, however, the deliveries ceased. Nevertheless, the natives regularly gathered at the appointed time to await their sign of the gods' favor.

According to my guide, becoming a Christian is tantamount to joining the cargo cult—one must be misinformed and credulous while waiting for a messenger from a self-created God. We have all had the fear of joining the cargo cult. Although we have made religious commitments, we are often anxious that we may await his return as the natives awaited the return of the cargo planes—benighted and misinformed.

the shadow of a doubt

Authentic Christian faith is at once compelling and disputable. We live in a post-modern and post-Christian world, where certainty is an illusion and where many hold our deepest commitments in suspicion. For those outside of a religious community, faith seems monumentally absurd and to some, morally perverse. That many people whom we respect find the Christian faith intellectually deficient is a source of consternation. The world no longer seems solidly Christian. We are making our way through shadows of gray. We form our beliefs in a wilderness of darkness. Doubts seem inevitable.

What does it mean to be an authentic religious believer when we are called to have a sure and certain faith but see our present believing reality plagued with ambiguity and doubt? Our traditional confessions of faith are a reproach when we mouth words that do not resonate deeply within our hearts. The classical creeds and confessions seem to give witness to a distant era when belief was somehow easier. We are left to find our way in this world with little guidance and, so it often seems, with little honesty from our religious leaders. Doubt is the secret sin buried deep within our souls. We are all afraid to touch it, to unloose the monster. But authentic Christian belief demands that we uncover it, name it, understand it, and make our peace with it. We must learn to live as sincere believers in an age of unbelief—honestly acknowledging the enemy that lies within. This chapter will consider the major sources of doubt and their recent expressions.

the hiddenness of God

In The Diary of a Country Priest by Georges Bernanos there is a remarkable interchange between a young country priest and a wizened priest near his parish. The ancient cleric is more worldly wise than his younger counterpart and has clearly struggled his whole life with matters of faith and doubt. While conceding the ease of belief that attends those privileged mortals who catch momentary glimpses of the divine—"curl[ed] up all snug and safe as though he were in Abraham's bosom"—he is also aware of the difficulties that attend ordinary believers on the descent from Mt. Carmel: "The real snag is to stick there, and know how to get down again—when you can't hold on any longer...." It's easy to believe during a moving worship service, upon hearing a powerful sermon, or while watching the sun set during a retreat. But how are we to believe when our children are squawking, our finances are a mess, and a...