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Faith in search of understanding
Author(s)
Date Issued
2003-06
Date Available
2014-02-20T15:51:34Z
Abstract
From the age of about fourteen my religious faith was marked by increasing intensity,
a common enough teenage experience. At the same time, however, I was coming to
have doubts, doubts that I found difficult to express since I didn’t possess the requisite
vocabulary or ideas, nor did I have those around me with whom I could discuss such
matters. When I was sixteen I discovered Bertrand Russell’s Why I’m not a Christian.
On reading this book all the inchoate questions I had suddenly became clear. Russell’s
book acted like sulphuric acid on the grounds of my faith; I found that they could not
stand up to rational criticism so I abandoned my faith and, for the next 14 years or so,
I was a convinced atheist—an atheist, note, not an agnostic for I subscribed to the
principle that if there was no evidence for a belief system then that constituted
evidence for its negation.
a common enough teenage experience. At the same time, however, I was coming to
have doubts, doubts that I found difficult to express since I didn’t possess the requisite
vocabulary or ideas, nor did I have those around me with whom I could discuss such
matters. When I was sixteen I discovered Bertrand Russell’s Why I’m not a Christian.
On reading this book all the inchoate questions I had suddenly became clear. Russell’s
book acted like sulphuric acid on the grounds of my faith; I found that they could not
stand up to rational criticism so I abandoned my faith and, for the next 14 years or so,
I was a convinced atheist—an atheist, note, not an agnostic for I subscribed to the
principle that if there was no evidence for a belief system then that constituted
evidence for its negation.
Type of Material
Book Chapter
Publisher
The Liffey Press
Copyright (Published Version)
2003 the author
Language
English
Status of Item
Not peer reviewed
Journal
Stephen J. Costello (eds.). Credo: Faith and Philosophy in Contemporary Ireland
ISBN
1-904148-30-1
This item is made available under a Creative Commons License
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Faith_in_Search_of_Understanding.pdf
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122.78 KB
Format
Adobe PDF
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