by Ben Montoya

I’m new to the Windsor area; I moved here in April of this year from the cold, great white north of Canada to the warm South. I moved to an area where southern hospitality is alive and well. After living in the North for a few years, the difference was a pleasant, unexpected surprise. But, I also moved back to the Bible Belt. Growing up in the Bible Belt, I had some ideas of what to expect coming back. People usually go to church. They typically have some kind of knowledge of the Bible. They generally want to live as Christians in some way. But, the Bible Belt is changing; although the South is typically considered to be part of the “Bible Belt,” people in the South have begun to loosen this belt, and in the majority of cases, have taken it off and exchanged it for something else. This “wardrobe change” is happening because the majority of people are adopting other worldviews besides Christianity. A worldview is the lens through which we see and understand the world. Our worldview shapes how and what we think, what we value and how we live — for better or worse. We all have one whether we fully understand it or not. For some time in the Bible Belt, it appeared that many people held Christianity as their worldview. Now, however, over 60 to 70 percent of the people in our county now claim no religion at all, according to City-data.com. What, then, do people believe now? One of the most popular worldviews is atheism. Atheism refers to the belief that there is no God. The term “atheism” is an unfortunate one because it is inherently negative, meaning no-God (a-theos, in Greek). Atheists believe that there is no God, and usually, all that one sees in this life is all there is. Furthermore, they usually accuse Christians of taking a blind leap of faith to accept Christianity’s teachings.

This accusation sometimes involves saying that Christians are jumping off some kind of cliff to hold to the truth claims of their faith. In this brief article, I, however, want to argue that atheism is perhaps the biggest blind leap of faith that exists because it cannot account for so much of what we see in our world. I will consider three.

First, atheism struggles to account for the meaning of basic terms like “good” and “evil.” They will say things like, “How can God be good if there is so much evil in this world?” This question, though worth discussing, is filled with logical problems. There can be no sense of good and evil without a standard of good and evil. To assume that such concepts exist assumes someone who can judge something or someone to be such, and some higher standard by which to do it. Atheism has no such standard, and cannot.

Yet, when people see things that they would call evil in this world, they feel repulsed at it in a deep way. People even use the term evil and understand what it means. Choosing atheism instead of recognizing that something deeper is going on is taking a blind leap of faith.

Second, atheism struggles to account for appearances of design in nature. When we look at this newspaper, we see evidence of design. When we look at smartphones, we see evidence of design. When we look at houses, cars, etc., we see evidence of design. Similarly, when we look at the basic single cell under a microscope, we see evidence of design. When we consider the build of the human body, we see evidence of design. When we see the stars at night, we see evidence of design. Atheism, however, usually believes that everything we see is the result of macro-evolutionary theory that requires a random evolution. Randomness has never, and will never, produce design. Ignoring the signs of design in favor of accepting atheism is a blind leap of faith.

Third, atheism struggles to account for marriage. People have a sense of what marriage is, that it involves two people, and that entire understanding comes from a Judeo-Christian worldview. Yet, atheists will often want to get married. In an atheistic worldview, there is little reason, if any, to get married. And, in fact, that may be part of the reason why so many people now choose to cohabitate rather than marry. Furthermore, there is little reason to limit marriage to one man and one woman. Again, if there is no larger ethical standard at play because there is no God, then almost anything goes in marriage. But, the mere fact that marriage exists and that people have an understanding of what it entails is something that atheism cannot account well for.

The list of ways that atheism struggles to account for things in this world could go on. Furthermore, I am probably just as aware as anyone that each of these points could be fleshed out more, especially in a discussion. Similarly, I am also aware that just by showing some of the problems of atheism that I have not proved Christianity can make good sense of each of these issues; I plan to do that in subsequent articles. If, however, anyone is interested in discussing these matters further, please contact me. I would love to have an open forum, either at our church building or anywhere else, to discuss these matters further.

BEN MONTOYA is senior pastor at Antioch Church. Contact him at benjaminjmontoya@gmail.com.