Doubting Thomas, Reasonable Faith, and the Global Atheists Convention!

Dr. Geoff Francis

They still call him “Doubting Thomas” – the disciple of Jesus who became famous for demanding evidence. When the other disciples told Thomas that Jesus had come back to life, Thomas was sceptical. He said, “Unless I see His wounds with my own eyes, and touch them with my own hands, I will not believe!” (1) (This response could be the Manifesto for the Global Atheists Convention: – “Unless I see the evidence, I will not believe!”)

The resurrection is an event beyond normal experience, as difficult to believe then as it is today. And yet the spread of the Christian faith was based on this central fact, presented as a happening both historical and super-natural.(2) Within five years of Jesus’ execution, the core beliefs of the new religion had been crystallised into a simple creed taught to new converts, including Paul.(3) It was this; “Christ died for our sins; he was buried and rose again!” – and, as Paul wrote a few years later, – “Most of the witnesses are still alive today.” (4)

If the resurrection could be shown to be a hoax, a delusion, or the wishful thinking of disappointed disciples, Christianity’s foundation as a supernatural religion would crumble. If there is a brief of evidence that could be presented in a court of law, that case should be tested by those who gather to “Celebrate Reason,” and claim a passion for evidence. The story of Thomas calls out for intelligent examination, and a viable explanation.

Baffling then indeed that Richard Dawkins, in his popular book, The God Delusion, strenuously avoids any serious consideration of the resurrection. Look for it in vain in his index! Dawkins confidently volunteers his personal opinion of the immorality of the Atonement, trivialising the Christian understanding of forgiveness, mercy and justice.(5) (The Atonement is meaningless without the resurrection!) But in his discussion of Stephen Unwin’s The Probability of God, Dawkins avoids assessing the probability that “Jesus might have risen from the dead”, abruptly changing the subject rather than dealing with historical evidence.(6) Dawkins fails his own standard of reason; – nothing to celebrate! He urges his readers to “check their ideas against the facts, and be ready to discard even cherished belief if it does not conform.”(7) But while thousands of academics around the world – Christians, Jews, Atheists and agnostics – spend their careers studying the source documents of Christianity in University Departments of History, and Biblical Studies,(8) Dawkins offers only the cop-out option that perhaps Jesus was not a real historical figure!(9)

But what can we make of the story of Thomas?

Australia’s official Vietnam War history has just been finalised, 40 to 50 years after the events. And there remain plenty of surviving Vietnam Veterans to verify the recorded history. In the same time scale, John documents his personal eyewitness account of the game-changing encounter between Thomas and Jesus (John ch 20.19-31.) Something extraordinary must have happened that motivated sceptical Thomas to spend the next 40 years of his life taking the Message of Jesus to India. And something has to explain why today there are over 8 million Christians in India’s Kerala state who worship in the various St Thomas Christian Churches which trace their history back to the witness of Thomas.

This year at Easter, Christians in every part of the globe will celebrate “the good news about Jesus and the resurrection”,(10) and once more affirm “THE LORD IS RISEN INDEED!” (11) – a statement of reasonable faith based on evidence.

References; 1 John 20: 25. 2 Acts ch 1:22, ch 3:15, ch 11:40-41, ch 30:39, ch 31:32. 3 John Dickson Investigating Jesus An Historian’s Quest Lion 2010 pp98, 99. 4 1 Cor 15:1-7. 5 Richard Dawkins The God Delusion Mariner Books 2008, pp 285-287. 6 Dawkins, ibid; pp 134-136. 7Dawkins, ibid: p 299. 8Dickson, op cit, p 2. 9Dawkins, op cit: pp 122-123. “The DaVinci Code .. is indeed fabricated from start to finish: invented, made-up fiction…exactly like the gospels.” 10Acts 17: 18. 11 Luke 24:34.

Dr. Geoff Francis,

Editor, www.whatdidjesussay.com

28/3/12