Richard Lloyd Jones: Welcome to Episode 10 of the Modern Relevance of God podcast series here on Thinking with Somebody Else's Head. I'm Richard Lloyd Jones. Can God and science exist together? That sounds like a postdoctoral theology thesis, doesn't it? But I think it's a fundamental question. I've heard some of the more vocal scientists proclaiming that a belief in God is the sign of a weak mind.
Well, we have weak minds in all areas of human activity, don't we, including science. One thing I do know, the deeper I delve into the theological and philosophical knowledge, the more I encounter rather brilliant minds, actually. Some very intelligent people have speculated about, argued for, worshipped, and drawn inspiration from what they believe to be a higher power. So I don't think you and I are losing any brain capacity in wandering a little down that well-trodden but increasingly abandoned pathway.
Belief in God in many so-called developed countries is at an all-time low. Well, maybe it's more a lack of belief in organized religion that's really being expressed in any of these studies that are quoted. But the baby-with-the-bathwater analogy that I mentioned in Episode 9 is relevant again here, too, isn't it? We mustn't, I guess, confuse one with the other. And I wonder about the real beliefs of some self-professed atheists and agnostics anyway, who profess no belief, but live their lives according to strong ideals of goodness and service.
Why are they doing that? There's a belief in something being evidenced there, even though they might cringe at that being called God. You know, living in Brazil has been so interesting for me. I'm a clear product of a modern education that strips the belief in the divine out of you as being unscientific.
In Brazil, everyone believes in God. Well, virtually everyone, I think 90% or something is the latest stats I've seen. So there's an incredible support, not demand, but acceptance of the reality that allows for deeper reflection on this rather than immediate rejection of belief in a higher power that was my knee-jerk reaction coming from my upbringing. In episode 10, I explore the problem with atheism with Cláudia Bernhardt Pacheco.
Cláudia, I had a very interesting question from one of my students the other day. She said, "but Richard, how can you explain Dr. Keppe's concepts to someone who doesn't believe in God?" And this may be relevant for many people who are listening, who may be skeptical, cynical about this. "A
Cláudia Bernhardt Pacheco: person who does not believe in God is already like a proof of what we are saying we are speaking here, because it's impossible not to believe in God."
"Creation is totally immersed in God's energy, is God's energy, the result of God's energy. So the presence of God in our lives is blatant. It's so obvious. Notions of good and evil are so obvious that If a person says he denies the knowledge of the existence of God, it's not that he does not know about God, but he knows and denies it."
Richard: "Yeah, you need a big effort to deny what is
Cláudia: so obvious.
So it's not a matter of wanting to believe or not, but it's a matter of why some so-called atheists are denying the existence of God. When Keppe started to build his own theory and method, what did he discover? That the basis of all illnesses was what he called theomania. The sickest person is so arrogant, so delirious in being the owner of the truth, the creator of his own reality, that it was like beyond any reasonable idea or attitude."
"Self-confidence or something,
Richard: way beyond that. It's way beyond. It's overly self-confident, right?
Cláudia: Which is taking over humanity, mostly in the 20th century and on. This is a manifestation of mental sickness. So, speaking about people who do not
Richard: believe in God, this is an obstacle because if they are denying the obvious, it's already a demonic attitude." I've tried to understand what this is because I come from a country that I think has a lot of resistance to this idea.
Somebody was arguing about why he didn't believe in God. He said, "I don't like being watched all the time." And I thought, well, there it is. We don't want to be forced to do what's good. So, if we want to not believe in God, it's because we want the freedom to do whatever we want.
Cláudia: But here,
Richard: Richard… "It's ridiculous, isn't it?
Cláudia: Here,
Richard: we have another aspect."
Yeah.
Cláudia: Another perspective. Yeah. And this is very beautiful when we work with integral psychoanalysis, Kapian analysis. Because when a person comes with an idea like this, let's take these two examples. First, the first example, and then the second example. Remind me, please.
Richard: So the, I don't like...
Cláudia: The first, how can I speak about this? How can I
Richard: speak these concepts to people who don't believe in God
Cláudia: yet?
To this person, we would not talk through a dogmatic point of view or theoretical point of view. So we would ask, what do you associate God with? What do you think she would say?
Richard: She would say everything all-knowing, all-powerful, the right way. A force, maybe, yes. Universal force. Might
Cláudia: say a being or certainly a consciousness. Yeah. Yeah. So you are saying that you do not believe in the force and the power and the reality of everything that is good, beautiful, and truthful.
So you deny the reality of goodness, beauty, and truth. Which is psychotic, too. Which is psychotic. So how can you live without believing in truth, goodness, and beauty? You don't
Richard: live without
Cláudia: this belief, this faith. In everyday life, we need the faith to believe in practical good things, like breathing a good air, like drinking a good water, like walking to your office to work.
This is this is something that you can trust, or it's valid. Yeah, it's a good in your life.
Richard: Piano's not gonna fall out
Cláudia: of the sky. And yeah, so the the sun will rise today and tomorrow and the day after, and you go down and and the night will come and I will sleep. All this real, the reality good beautiful and truthful, the divine creation, it's so obvious.
And that we do not create anything. Human beings do not create anything. We just mimic god sometimes, but we did not create.
We don't have this power. So we go through another path. We go directly to the inner life of that that individual. Yeah,
Richard: I mean, nobody starts a relationship with the idea that the person is going to betray them or tell
Cláudia: a lie. Sure. Everybody. You need to be able to have, like, to be…
Richard: Faith somehow.
Cláudia: Yeah,
Richard: to trust. Yeah.
Cláudia: Trust is the basis of life.
Yes. Trust in loyalty, in justice, loyalty.
Richard: It's a beautiful answer. And then the second… No, the second. The second
Cláudia: one, yeah, right. I don't like somebody watching me all the time. But he referred to it as a big
Richard: watcher and that he's a dictator that you can never vote him out of power.
Cláudia: Yes. So he's totally right. But the only thing is that he's inverted.
He's seeing in God the devil and in the devil God. So who is the watcher? Who is commanding his life all the time?
So he is saying something that he feels uncomfortable. And it's true. But he allows this to happen all the time, blaming God. So this is a very practical example of inversion. Seeing, I think this is the biggest inversion of all. Maybe. Seeing
Richard: in God the devil's qualities. Right.
Cláudia: And in the devil, God's qualities. This is freedom.
Richard: Total freedom and
Cláudia: well-being. And God restrictive.
Imagine, God is totally mercy. He leaves us to be totally free. He never interferes, like prohibiting us to do anything. He even allows us to be evil. He let us free. He wants all good to us. But if we want to
Richard: say no to him, he will accept. But the devil, he doesn't. He
Cláudia: is a dictator. He is after you all the time, watching you, ready to take you over, accusing accusing blaming persecuting, and all this watcher attitude that people see in God.
It's not God.
Richard: There's something so essential in what Cláudia Pacheco was saying there, and it got me thinking about Norberto Keppe's reminder that it's a waste of time proving what's obvious.
This obviousness forms the basis of what we depend on to live. When I first started to understand the significance of that, I started to develop the idea of a workshop looking at how all the greatest achievements of human beings depend on something that we didn't create.
If you go back to look at all the inventions, the compositions, the works of art, you'll find some ability or condition that did not originate with human beings, but without which human beings could do nothing. I'm speaking, for example. I only have control over what I say. Then I can train and develop the sound and texture of my voice.
But the vocal cords? Nothing to do with me. I'm realizing again, back of our human talents and abilities, there's an infrastructure, if you will, of oxygen and gravity and sunlight and mental and physical processes that originate somewhere other than in human beings. That's the creation Cláudia was talking about. And this is not the consideration of fanatics and fools, but of serious and profound contemplation of geniuses and extraordinary thinkers. That's what I've come to. Now, of course, I realize there are resistances and arguments to all of this, including the idea that if God is real, How could he allow such evil to exist here?
We'll look at that in our next episode.
