I am Kyle's self-indulgence

Ever since my friend Danny announced his conversion to atheism I have been challenged to examine my own reasons for belief in a rational world that has a dwindling need for an almighty creator. I tend to think that critically examining one's own beliefs now and then is a very healthy thing.

A couple of times I started writing a statement of my belief, but stopped because I was dissatisfied with it. Recently Gringo e-mailed me wanting to know why I have faith, which motivated me to sit down and finally compose it.

Follow up:

I'd like to start with the Numinous, a concept I discovered through the atheist Carl Sagan. It is a sense of wonder at the universe, and could alternatively be called Holy or Sacred. Sagan's numinous experiences were in response to the grandeur of the billions and billions of stars, planets, galaxies, nebulae, and the absolutely unfathomable size of the universe.

Nature-lovers may marvel at objects closer to the human scale: mountains, sunsets, a calm lake reflecting the clear blue sky.

My most significant religious experience came in a moment of contemplating life at the microscopic level. I thought about a single leaf, and all its cells replicating and working together to feed the tree. Then I thought about a single cell, and how it's made up of proteins and other chemical chains. Then I went deeper, and thought about the individual atoms that combine to make the chemicals. And somewhere in this system that wonderful thing we call life is formed. It's a mystery to me.

This may sound a lot like the "God of the gaps" that Danny has criticized: the habit of merely attributing to God whatever is unexplained by science (so far). But I'm talking about something more than that. I'm talking about wonder and beauty. I'm talking about those things that go beyond the physical world to the realms of philosophy, literature, art, music...and religion.

Kurt Vonnegut famously wrote that he wanted his epitaph to read "The only proof he needed for the existence of God was music." It's an ironic statement coming from a Humanist, but I believe the sentiment is sincere.

Music is amazing. Physically speaking, it's just air particles vibrating at different frequencies, yet it has the ability to express emotion free of language and rational thought. It has the power to move our souls.

All music, art, and literature look to a beauty that is greater than us and a world that exists beyond the purely physical. This belief in a spiritual world is far more than just an attempt to explain what we don't understand. It's an innate conviction that has existed in every human culture throughout history.

These are the reasons I am convinced there is a God. But how do I make the leap from a vague deism to Christian faith? Am I a Christian merely by default because it is the dominant religion of my culture? If I'm being honest I must admit that's at least part of it, but I don't think that disqualifies Christianity for me either. There is still plenty of reason to believe.

The scripture that best reaffirms my faith is Isaiah 53, which prophecies numerous details about Jesus' life and death as told in the Gospels. Even more significantly, it contains the essential message of salvation for all nations through the sacrifice of the Messiah is evident in it. In other words, the gospel of Christ is not just a splinter movement started by the disciples, but the fulfillment of Hebrew prophecy written centuries earlier.

But couldn't the stories of Jesus' life and teachings have been invented specifically to align with these prophecies? Perhaps, but that would require us to assume a great deal of invention, including his manner of death and his burial in a rich man's tomb--things that could easily be disproven by witnesses.

Then there are the disciples themselves. Some of them who knew Jesus firsthand were willing to die for the message they preached. I would argue that a good deal of the accounts of Jesus must be true for them to believe so strongly.

I'll admit these are not bulletproof arguments--if they were, there would be no room for disbelief. But the final issue for me is not what can or cannot be proven.

Let's suppose for just a moment that I'm wrong. Science explains everything that exists now and has ever existed, including whatever it was that caused the Big Bang and started the universe as we know it. Suppose nothing exists beyond the physical world. There is no God and Jesus of Nazareth was just a man like the rest of us. Let's even suppose that Jesus did not say or do any of the things attributed to him. If that were the case I would still choose to call myself a Christian, because even if everything else we believe about Jesus is false, the idea of him still remains, and that is enough to change the world.

The teachings of Jesus call for a radical shift in human relationships. They say we should love our enemies, turn the other cheek, and respond to violence with self-sacrifice. When people have truly taken these teachings to heart they have started revolutions.

Mahatma Gandhi acknowledged that his methods of non-violent resistance have no precedent in Hinduism, but are rather inspired by the teachings of Jesus. Martin Luther King, Jr. followed Gandhi's lead in preaching non-violence that is very clearly grounded in Christianity.

Both men met hatred and violence with peace and love, and won their freedom more effectively than they would have by taking up arms. They also shared that reached beyond the plight of their own people to a future world in which all people coexist peacefully, holding to the principles of brotherly love.

In short, the teachings we have from Jesus contain the most revolutionary and important Idea this world has ever seen.

So even if everything else I believe turned out to be wrong, I would still be left with this one great Idea--for that I'll still be proud to call myself a Christian.