How to Doubt your Doubts                                                                                          By                                                                                       Dallas M. Roark                                                (This article appeared in The Baptist Student, February, 1970)          After spending a week directing a philosophy class in a study of the idea of God, I asked a young college girl, "How do you react to the subject?" Her comment was very personal, "I feel more confident about believing in God than before!" As many college students who want to appear sophisticated, she came to college with doubts and questions. But despite her doubts and questions, she had never deeply considered the intellectual basis for her faith. She was pleasantly surprised to discover good reasons for believing in God even though one cannot prove (in the mathematical sense of the word) that God exists. She had confused proving and probability. In few areas of man's knowledge can he have absolute proof.   But probability can be of a high degree. Man cannot prove that the sun will rise tomorrow, but it is highly probable since it has been doing so for some time.          Whether in science or religion, the problem is the same. Knowledge cannot be reduced to the two extremes of absolute knowledge or absolute skepticism. Rather, most knowledge has high probability, and this gives reasonable evidence if not "proof." Thus the alternative to finality and proof is not skepticism and doubt, but a reasoned faith steeped in meaningful evidence.          If this be so, what is doubt all about? Doubt as a learning device must be distinguished from doubt as an attitude or state of mind. Doubt as a learning technique opens various roads that can lead to meaningful evidence in the pursuit of truth. Doubt as a state of mind is dangerous, for it spurns evidence of any kind and leads to skepticism. Soren Kierkegaard declared that the ancient Greeks became skeptics because they willed to do so, not from a lack of evidence. The way out of a skeptical state of mind is an act of will.          When doubt confronts you, it can serve as a stimulus in the pursuit of meaningful answers. Without good reasons, you will not be a Christian very long, or if you remain one, you will not be a good one. Elton Trueblood recently commented that in the three areas of concern in the Christian life--devotional, intellectual, and social outreach --the Christian is inclined to neglect the second. When an intellectual basis for Christian faith is weak, devotion will not last long. Where there is uncertainty of conviction, there will be no guiding principles for social concern.          How do doubts arise in religion, and what may be done about them?          Intellectual ignorance fosters doubt. The average college student is quite unsophisticated in religious knowledge. He may deftly discuss various types of psychological theories or have a reasonable knowledge of the theory of relativity, but often he is religiously illiterate. He may describe in detail how to smash an atom, but be in absolute ignorance about  the Incarnation or the Trinity. Ignorance in religion may lead him to think of religion as bigoted and narrow and the empirical sciences as objective and factual.          Intellectual doubt would hardly persist if the student makes the effort to find out what Christian faith is and is not. He can profit greatly by reading books such as C. S. Lewis'  Mere Christianity, John Stott's Basic Christianity, or Karl Earth's Dogmatics in Outline. Most problems of doubt have adequate answers, but until he takes the time to read, there is slim hope for clearing up the doubt which arises from misunderstanding or ignorance.          Doubt and morality probably interact more closely than most students would like to admit. Doubting religious faith in college often is a convenient salving of the conscience to let down moral standards. After he had turned away from Christianity for what he thought was intellectual reasons, and after his moral fall sexually, Kierkegaard analyzed the issue when he became reconciled to God.. His Journal states: "They would have us believe. that objections against Christianity come from doubt. This is always a misunderstanding. Objections against Christianity come from insubordination, unwillingness to obey, rebellion against all authority .... "          This simply means that as long as you do not doubt God's existence you have someone to render account to. If you can rid your conscience of God and objective morality, you are responsible to no one. What college student has not felt the freedom of being away from home--unleashed from the restraints of being known in a community? Is there not sheer delight in plotting your own path, designing your own exploits, and reveling in freedom? "Who or what can stand in my way?" God is the only meaningful confrontation against all of this.          Often when this happens, a peculiar and subtle change takes place in man's attitude toward God. When God stands in the way, man begins slowly, imperceptibly, to doubt God's being. He begins to weigh more critically the arguments against God's being over against the evidence pointing to his existence.               Some of this analysis of doubt and morality is borne out in a survey of students atat the University of Chicago before 1930. In attempting to discover why students became atheists, researchers designed a questionnaire to cover various types of influences such as books read, influential professors, friends, etc. This study indicated that most of the students who became atheists did so because of pangs of conscience. By doubting the existence of God, the students felt free to pursue the temptations lying before them.          In another way doubt is married to a lack of purpose in life. When faith is without reason, it is meaningless and walks naked in the mind. You can see this in Viktor Frankl's exciting book Man's Search for Meaning. Frankl tells of his concentration camp experiences during World War II. Prisoners who doubted that they would ever get out alive lost their purpose for living. Without a purpose for living, doubt plagued them all the more. But as long as their minds were firmly fixed in belief, they could survive almost anything. Frankl was fond of quoting Nietzsche's words, "He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how."          Frankl described one prisoner who dreamed that he would be liberated by March 30. The dream was so real that it governed his personality. A day or so before March 30 he sensed that his dream would' not come true. On March 30 he became very sick, and on March 31 he died of typhus. As long as his doubt was suppressed by purpose, his weakened body had resistance; but when his doubt flooded over his lost hope, he died.          Purpose must be big enough to survive changing conditions of circumstances, events, and the times. Christians confess that genuine purpose is found only in God's design for our lives. To succeed against doubt, we must stand in this affirmation.          If man knows God in personal dimensions, if he has good reasons for his faith, if he links his life with God's purpose--then doubt will not erode his life.          Doubt can be an easy way out. Anyone may ask questions and raise doubts, but it takes sweat to come up with meaningful answers. The problem may boil itself down to this: Do you want to know or do you want to remain in ignorance? You can have what you want! 1Walter Lowrie, Kierkegaard (New York: Harper and Row, Publihers, Inc., 1962) p. 187. Used by permission Differing Viewpoints For evaluation, criticism, and discussion Roark, Dallas. The Christian Faith, Nashville: Broadman Press, 1969. Temple, William. Nature, Man and God. New York: St. Martin’s Press, Inc. 1934.