Common Sense: Use It, or Lose It

A few weeks back I listened to an interview with noted British evolutionary biologist and author of The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins, who persistently claimed the supremacy of science and the empirical search for answers over religious faith in a Creator. The interviewer kept insisting that although the existence of God could not be proven, believing in a Creator just made more sense than believing there is no God. Dawkins, admitting he couldn't explain how the universe came to exist or that he could prove there is no God, continued to put his faith (oh, yes, it's faith) in his belief (because there's absolutely no proof) that one day (somewhere, somehow) science would be able to explain the spontaneous, "God-less" beginnings of the universe.

Frankly, to use a popular phrase, it seemed Mr. Dawkins couldn't see the forest through the trees. Now, I'm not trying to put him down or to pretend that I'm all-wise and all-knowing. Don't get me wrong. Obviously, Mr. Dawkins is a very intelligent guy, but with all his knowledge, experience, faith and belief, he seems to be missing a little common sense. I'm totally convinced that common sense, which would lead a person to acknowledge the existence of a Creator, is something with which we are all born. But like all skills, if we don't use it, we lose it, and it seems Mr. Dawkins has spent so many years denying the common sense truth of a Creator, that he can't see his faith in science isn't really an empirical search for the truth, but is in fact a belief which ignores reason.

Contrast the Dawkins interview with a discussion I had with my 6-year-old son a couple of weeks ago during our science lesson. We were discussing the formation of fossils and how fossils give us clues to the Earth's beginning. We talked about how we believe God created all things and flooded the Earth in the days of Noah and that causes us to view fossil evidence differently than a person who believes all matter formed spontaneously and lifeforms evolved. I asked my son what he thought about the idea that God didn't create the Earth, but that it just "happened". He said something like this: "That's ridiculous! Look at that beautiful painting up there," pointing to a painting by my husband's grandmother, which hangs above our mantle. "That painting didn't just happen. Grampy's mom painted it. It can't happen all by itself!"

And there's the common sense - out of the mouth of a child.

That's my boy.

"I'm telling you, once and for all, that unless you return to square one and start over like children, you're not even going to get a look at the kingdom, let alone get in. Whoever becomes simple and elemental again, like this child, will rank high in God's kingdom."

Matthew 18:3-4 -The Message Paraphrase