Throughout my writings there is one constant that I have not yet written about. That is the phenomenon of belief in the existence of one God. What follows is a short essay in which I pitch monotheism against atheism as a way of presenting my thoughts on the rational basis for the belief in the existence of one God.

To begin with, I am not interested in trying to convince atheists that there is a God because I am quite confident that it would be a fruitless endeavour. Nor am I especially interested in debating them on this point. The way I see it is that their atheism is their problem and only they can do something to solve it. I am only interested in giving to those who do believe in the existence of God a greater confidence in that belief and to do this by giving them the most simple and, I believe, most convincing rational basis for it. I would characterise that rational basis as evidence of the existence of God, not proof. There can be no proof of the existence of God because if there were, then coming to faith would be no more than an intellectual exercise and having faith would be no more than an intellectual understanding and anybody who has faith will tell you that is not the case. Indeed, it is the very essence of belief in the existence of God that it cannot be proven, because that lack of proof requires the involvement of another, non-rational faculty that is best identified as our spiritual faculty. This spiritual faculty overcomes our natural, rational resistance to believing in something that cannot be proven and so it allows us to believe in the existence of God.

My evidence for the existence of one God is twofold. Both evidences relate to the concept of truth. The first of them is that if we posit the existence of one God, that then enables us to make perfect sense of everything else in existence in relation to that one God, from the inner world of the person to the outer world of the cosmos. I am aware of no exceptions to this including the existence of evil and suffering, both of which can be convincingly reconciled with the existence of one perfect God. The reasoning then runs very simply as follows: That which makes perfect sense is true; the existence of one God makes perfect sense; therefore, the existence of one God is true. The atheist will no doubt challenge the validity of the first premise of this syllogism because if they do not then they are lost. All that I can say in relation to this is that I regard the first premise as self-evidently true and can think of no valid argument against it.

The atheist will in turn no doubt challenge the believer to identify anything in existence that contradicts their exclusively scientific comprehension of it. If they should do so, then only keep in mind these few facts about the cosmos. It has long been known that the cosmos is expanding. According to everything that is known about the big bang and gravity this expansion should be slowing down, but it is not. Scientists have recently discovered that the expansion of the cosmos is accelerating. So simply ask the atheist, why is the expansion of the cosmos accelerating and what is it accelerating towards and into? Science has no credible answers to these questions and so nor will they, but they will probably say as scientists do that the accelerated expansion of the cosmos is explained by the existence of dark matter or dark energy, which scientists claim is a form of matter or energy that is everywhere in the cosmos and that accounts for those features of the cosmos that science cannot explain, but that we mysteriously can neither see nor measure in any way. It is completely invisible to us. You will find that the atheist is very happy to believe in the existence of dark matter, for which there is no proof, while at the same time strenuously opposing belief in the existence of God because there is no proof. The suggestion that there is such a thing as dark matter is science fiction. I do not believe there is any such thing and would recommend to you that you reject the suggestion that there is because I believe that the implications of its non-existence are very important to the person of faith.

They are very important because if you believe in the existence of one God Who created the cosmos, and Who is infinite in His essence and so must exist beyond the outer limits of cosmos, then it is entirely reasonable to believe that it is the existence of God that is responsible for the accelerating expansion of the cosmos and that it is God that the cosmos is accelerating towards and perhaps even into. This certainly makes a lot more sense than to believe that an invisible and immeasurable dark matter is responsible for it, unless of course the dark matter is in fact the divine essence, which is food for thought. That science cannot make perfect sense of everything in existence and that the existence of one God can should be reason enough for anyone to drop their resistance to belief in the existence of one God and to let their spiritual faculty to take them the rest of the way to faith. That aside, it should certainly be enough to bolster the believer in their faith, which is the main purpose of this essay.

My second evidence for the existence of one God is this. I propose that the comprehension of existence that is at once the most simple, the most beautiful, the most rationally compelling and the most spiritually satisfying is the truth.  That there is one God who is the creator of all that is not Him is to me the most simple, the most beautiful, the most rationally compelling and the most spiritually satisfying way to comprehend existence. After all, what could be more simple than one God Who is The Perfect One in every conceivable sense? What could be more beautiful than the thought of one God and His creation side by side and occupying the totality of existence? What could be more rationally compelling than one God Whose existence enables us to make perfect sense of everything in existence that has come to human awareness? And what could be more spiritually satisfying than to contemplate the one God Who is the source of all spirit? Therefore, I say that the existence of one God is true.

That concludes this essay on the existence of one God. To recap, the existence of one God is the only proposition that enables us to make perfect sense of everything in existence that has come to human awareness and is therefore true, and the existence of one God is the proposition that is at once the most simple, the most beautiful, the most rationally compelling and the most spiritually satisfying way to comprehend existence and is therefore true. That satisfies me and I believe that it should satisfy anyone who is both willing and able to believe in the existence of one God.

31/08/2023

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