SCIENCE AND FAITH
Sir,-I don’t wish to prolong this correspondence, for volumes may be filled with the mental gymnastics of those who are seeking truth from two different directions. But I wish to make plain to all interested that faith, in the spiritual sense, is not wishful thinking, or the acceptance of dogma on a "take it or leave it" principle. Now I have a great respect for that mine of practical knowledge, the Oxford Dictionary, but wher it defines faith in the religious sense as "spiritual apprehension of divine truth apart from proof" it is definitely misleading. It is that "apart from proof" that I object to. Whatever kind-of faith the compilers of the dictionary had in mind, it was not Christian faith, for one:of the characteristics of the latter is that of assurance, -we know and are sure of what can only be spiritually apprehended. I am grateful to Mr. Ruffell for clarifying the position for us, but when he quoted the Letter to the Hebrews (and we must be careful not to charge St. Paul with something he did not write) he should have finished the sentence "the evidence of things not seen" which Dr. A. S. Way translates more fully as "that which satisfies us of the reality of things beyond our ken." This faith is not merely credulity, or unquestioning acceptance, but the result of thought upon certain facts and experiences, phenomena, which demand an explanation-an explanation more fundamental than that which a materialistic interpretation can give. And what I tried to point out was that this process of thought is as legitimate and as worthy of consideration as any other. But the truth is the same, only some of us make blue-prints of it, others seek to transcribe its full glory in engraving or oils.
WARREN
GREEN
(Ngaruawahia).
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 12, Issue 295, 16 February 1945, Page 23
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304SCIENCE AND FAITH New Zealand Listener, Volume 12, Issue 295, 16 February 1945, Page 23
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