The Rationality of Religious Belief

Abstract

I have argued thus far that religious belief does not properly depend upon inference from evidences discovered in the structure of the universe or in the course of human experience — for such evidences are always theoretically ambiguous — but upon unconsciously interpreting the impacts of the environment in such a way that it is consciously experienced as having the kind of meaning articulated in religious language. In interpreting in this way the believer is making a basic cognitive choice and thereby running a risk: the risk of being very importantly mistaken. For in proceeding in this way one is living ‘by faith’ and not ‘by sight’. Under the influence of one of the great religious figures and/or traditions one is interpreting and experiencing one’s situation in a way which will ultimately prove to be either appropriate or inappropriate. If inappropriate, we are being profoundly deluded. If appropriate, we shall have so interpreted our situation that the picture of it in terms of which we live is in basic conformity with its actual character. In either case we have made a cognitive choice which has some of the characteristics of a wager.

It is as reasonable for those who experience their lives as being lived in the presence of God, to believe in the reality of God, as for all of us to form beliefs about our environment on the basis of our experience of it.