Replies

I know God not as a result of any intellectual effort on my or anyone’s part but because He has made Himself known to me. The revelation of God to His followers, and others, is the a priori of reformation. No amount of rational discourse changes this truth. It is true because God has said it is true. This is the stumbling stone against which rationalists crash and burn.
Dialog among believers strengthens faith and encourages understanding. Because knowledge of (the existence of) God does not come through rational effort is is meaningless to argue the merits of belief on rational grounds. God exists because He who is within me says He exists. I stake my life and my soul upon that knowledge.
The Constitution and Founders premised their efforts at creating a nation upon precisely this knowledge. In this very particular sense our nation is founded upon revelation. All of the devices brought to bear to tear it down have been promulgated in the name of rational understanding, not revealed wisdom.
We know, for example, that abortion is the killing of innocents and is profoundly evil in God's eyes. We justify this slaughter, however, in the name of a Renaissance attitude of personal liberty. As if one’s body had no connection to any other body and thereby no responsibility for another. Rationalism, of the kind brilliantly described in Betty's essay, is the downfall of this grand experiment in Godly government.
Thank you Betty for the opportunity to clarify the morass in which we find ourselves. Overcoming the devils of deception requires an unflinching commitment to what we have certain knowledge of as the Truth of God's presence in the history of our nation. About this I am not simply adamant. I am fanatic.

No amount of rational discourse changes this truth. It is true because God has said it is true. This is the stumbling stone against which rationalists crash and burn. Dialog among believers strengthens faith and encourages understanding. Because knowledge of (the existence of) God does not come through rational effort is is meaningless to argue the merits of belief on rational grounds.

God exists because He who is within me says He exists. I stake my life and my soul upon that knowledge.

Amen!!!

Thank you so much for sharing your testimony, dear YHAOS, and thank you for your insights!

I know God not as a result of any intellectual effort on my or anyone’s part but because He has made Himself known to me. The revelation of God to His followers, and others, is the a priori of reformation. No amount of rational discourse changes this truth. It is true because God has said it is true. This is the stumbling stone against which rationalists crash and burn.

So beautifully, beautifully said, dear Amos! And so very, very true.

Why rationalists crash and burn on the "God problem" is a mystery to me. For it seems to me that reason itself absolutely depends for its own proper function on a single, non-phenomenal, that is universal principle, or Logos. And they claim to use reason all the time — even after they've utterly uprooted it from its ground in Truth.

Cicero had a name for this phenomenon: aspernatio rationis, meaning "contempt for reason."

But that's not the most important point you raised. It seems that would be: "God exists because He who is within me says He exists. I stake my life and my soul upon that knowledge."

And I think you are right that "the Framers premised their efforts at creating a nation upon precisely this knowledge. In this very particular sense our nation is founded upon revelation."

Thank you so very much for your so deeply affecting, beautiful, and insightful essay/post, dear Amos!