Patricia Hofer

The mystery of faith

While most neuroscientists still maintain that human consciousness is going to be found somewhere in the brain’s firing neurons, others are less sure. More and more today there is support for what Lewis concluded in Miracles when he wrote. “The rational and moral element in each human mind is a point of force from the Supernatural working its way into Nature …” These ethical and moral impulses, he wrote, are likely “conditioned” by the brain’s “receiving set,” but they are “not originated by it” (Miracles 62).

I would not stop with Lewis’ rationality and morality. Our faith, our very need to worship and to believe in something beyond ourselves, isn’t brain-originated but God-inspired. His Spirit, “bearing witness with our spirit” (Rom. 8:17), nudges us to empathy and compassion and, yes, faith. That’s why having faith is not something we accomplish with discipline, but something we allow, something that comes with self-abandonment and yielding. See: http://yieldingtochristianity.com/?attachment_id=548

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *