What is Faith?

[hiding in plain sight]

According to Alma 32:21, faith is described as this:

faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true.

So when someone asks me to "just" have a little bit of faith and doubt my doubts, I think about this verse.

Faith is not a perfect knowledge, but it is faith in something that is ultimately true.

I have a lot of faith in things I don't know for certain. But in these things, my faith is continually justified.

For example, I have faith that all of you will drive safely on the road in the morning while I drive to work. Do I know this for a fact? No.

But almost every morning my faith is justified because I arrive safely at work without incident.

But if you were to ask me to touch a hot stove and tell me that if I had enough faith I wouldn't get burned, what would happen? The first time I would get burned. I would think, maybe the problem is me. The second time I would get burned. I would think, maybe I didn't understand what I was told. The third time I get burned, I now "know" that this is not true. That no matter how much "faith" I have I am going to continually get burned. I am now 3 for 3 that this admonition to have faith and I won't get burned is NOT true.

And that is how I feel about the church. I am more than happy to have faith, as long as my faith is justified.

But every time I touch church history I get burned.

Every time I touch prophetic teachings, I get burned.

Every time I try to convince myself the book of mormon is true (i.e., literal) I get burned.

For any mormons visiting this site, please think about this.

Faith is only faith if it is based upon something that is true. Doubting your doubts about not getting burned when touching the stove will only get you burned. Stop touching the stove!

[GoodBoy]

And that is how I feel about the church. I am more than happy to have faith, as long as my faith is justified.

Exactly! Every time I time I hear preaching about the virtues and necessity of faith I feel like shouting:
"It matters WHAT you have faith IN!".

* Should Muslims doubt their doubts and just have faith in Islam and the prophet Muhammad? What about suicide bombers who doubt their doubts about whether they will go to heaven for their actions?
* What about those who wondered whether the teachings of David Koresh (Branch Davidians) were right, but just chose faith. Was that the right thing to do?
* There are so many problems with the teachings and lifestyle of the FLDS, do the followers choose faith instead of doubt?
* Many wonder whether L. Ron Hubbard, the leader of Scientology, is right about everything. Do they do the right thing and keep the faith?
* The Jehovah's Witnesses are a tight group. Should they choose faith?
... The responses are endless.

Is faith, for faith's sake, really a virtue?

[Shawn]

Faith is a great trick to get people to follow a religion. It follows the Law of Attraction.

[Hagoth]

Faith is reading the Book of Mormon, praying to know if it is true, not getting a satisfying answer, reading it gain, praying to know if it is true, not getting a satisfying answer, reading it again... for the rest of your life.

Faith does not require you, apparently, to apply the same procedure to the scriptures or truth claims of any other faith tradition. Faith already tells you they're all wrong.

[wtfluff]

For example, I have faith that all of you will drive safely on the road in the morning while I drive to work. Do I know this for a fact? No.

But almost every morning my faith is justified because I arrive safely at work without incident.

This ^ type of "faith" is different than "religious faith" because it is based on experience / evidence that you arrive safely at work most always, if not every day that you've gone to work.

Something else that "faithful believers" like to point to is: "I don't KNOW the sun will come up tomorrow." to which I reply: "But based on a lifetime of experience / evidence, you're pretty damn sure that it will, no?"


Since my signature will change at some point, I'll poke my "faith" quote here for posterity:

Faith is the excuse people give when they believe in something and don't have a good reason. - Matt Dillahunty

Another quote from Matt that I like is:

Faith can be used to justify anything. When something can be used as a justification for everything, it shouldn't be used as a justification for anything.

[LSOF]

Faith, particularly religious faith, is simply believing what you're told simply because you're told to believe it. Gullibility, in other words.

[Corsair]

* Should Muslims doubt their doubts and just have faith in Islam and the prophet Muhammad? What about suicide bombers who doubt their doubts about whether they will go to heaven for their actions?
* What about those who wondered whether the teachings of David Koresh (Branch Davidians) were right, but just chose faith. Was that the right thing to do?
* There are so many problems with the teachings and lifestyle of the FLDS, do the followers choose faith instead of doubt?
* Many wonder whether L. Ron Hubbard, the leader of Scientology, is right about everything. Do they do the right thing and keep the faith?
* The Jehovah's Witnesses are a tight group. Should they choose faith?

As a thought experiment I was trying to figure out faithful, TBM answers to these questions. I kept retreating to a couple of meandering phrases like "it's complicated" and "God will lead them to the truth eventually if they are faithful" and "They will be judged according to the light of Christ in them". But these answers seem like empty platitudes. How would or should a faithful LDS believer answer these questions?

[Not Buying It]

The Brethren want me to believe that faith is being taught that 2 + 2 = 5, just accepting it my whole life, and never checking to see what 2 + 2 really is. Not checking is taken as a sign of faith. They want me to be afraid to check if it's true or not. In other words, what they call faith is really fear.

Faith is really following the truth wherever it may lead you. Anything else isn't really faith.

[hiding in plain sight]

Exactly! Every time I time I hear preaching about the virtues and necessity of faith I feel like shouting:
"It matters WHAT you have faith IN!".

* Should Muslims doubt their doubts and just have faith in Islam and the prophet Muhammad? What about suicide bombers who doubt their doubts about whether they will go to heaven for their actions?
* What about those who wondered whether the teachings of David Koresh (Branch Davidians) were right, but just chose faith. Was that the right thing to do?
* There are so many problems with the teachings and lifestyle of the FLDS, do the followers choose faith instead of doubt?
* Many wonder whether L. Ron Hubbard, the leader of Scientology, is right about everything. Do they do the right thing and keep the faith?
* The Jehovah's Witnesses are a tight group. Should they choose faith?
... The responses are endless.

Is faith, for faith's sake, really a virtue?

You are so right GoodBoy.

It fully matters what you are being asked to have faith in. When the TBM's around me try to give me pithy advice like "doubt your doubts" to get me to stop thinking, I ask what you have said so eloquently right here. "If I was a muslim, would your advice help me find mormonism? If not, is it really good advice at all?"

They never like that question. I wonder why?

[hiding in plain sight]

The Brethren want me to believe that faith is being taught that 2 + 2 = 5, just accepting it my whole life, and never checking to see what 2 + 2 really is. Not checking is taken as a sign of faith. They want me to be afraid to check if it's true or not. In other words, what they call faith is really fear.

Faith is really following the truth wherever it may lead you. Anything else isn't really faith.

You have hit on a key concern I have with how mormon's ask you to have faith. You are so right. It usually comes down to fear tactics.

"The devil is really powerful and able to deceive the very elect, be careful what you read."

Fear tactic.

"Don't leave the good ship zion, where will you go?"

Fear tactic.

"Even the very elect will be deceived"

Fear tactic.

I believe true faith inspires hope.

I believe superstition inspires fear.

I see more fear than hope in most TBM arguments to get you to have faith. Hmmmmmmm.

Great point.

[hiding in plain sight]

I asked my wife one time, to imagine if she were a Jehovah's witness.

I was going to use the analogy doubt your doubts with her and ask her if she felt that advice would help her find mormonism or if it would just be a tactic to keep her as a JW.

She just looked at me and said, "I am not going to play that game".

And the conversation ended.

Maybe next time.

[Hagoth]

I asked my wife one time, to imagine if she were a Jehovah's witness.

I was going to use the analogy doubt your doubts with her and ask her if she felt that advice would help her find mormonism or if it would just be a tactic to keep her as a JW.

She just looked at me and said, "I am not going to play that game".

And the conversation ended.

Maybe next time.

That's a great story. I once asked Mrs. Hagoth to take a survey that evaluates the likeliness that your religion or organization deserves the cult label. When I took the test I got something like an 88% chance that I was involved in a cult, but I could see that she was giving the church worse ratings than I did. About 1/3 of the way into the survey she said something to the effect of, "I can see where this is leading. It's going to tell me that I'm in a cult. I don't need that," and she closed the window. I totally understood her reasoning. She doesn't feel like she's in a cult, she doesn't need anybody telling her she's in a cult and all it would do is make her feel bad when she has already made a choice to remain faithful.

[deacon blues]

Wonderful topic. My current working model of faith in this crazy world is to decide what seems the most reasonable, add in a little bias towards Jesus, and go with it. I fell in love with the Sermon on the Mount 50 years ago, and I still love about 90% of it.

[Deepthinker]

I like the scripture quoted, because I use that most often when trying to explain myself to DW, and what faith means to me. We’ve also talked about the opening line of a primary song that goes “faith is knowing the sun will rise”. To me, that’s a contradiction.

I think faith and doubt should coexist, they work together not against each other.

Being certain about the LDS version of God, that we “know” that version of God exists seems to be viewed by other members as having great faith. That level of certainty and saying they “know” something gives a sense of security to the person saying it, to the point I think many begin to want to believe it. Like, gaining a testimony is found in bearing it example.

I now see it much differently. I think those who say they are certain about their views on God are, without even recognizing it, really saying they no longer have faith. They have perfect knowledge. I don’t think they really mean this, it is just a repetition of what they’ve been told about what makes up a "strong" LDS testimony.

[DPRoberts]

I think faith and doubt should coexist, they work together not against each other.

That is the way I see it. I see little point to faith if there is no doubt about a particular thing. But LDS Church leaders when they talk about faith are not really talking about "faith". They are talking about a belief system. That suits their purpose in perpetuating the church, but also sets disaffected members up to totally walk away from any kind of faith or spirituality once they no longer follow the church's belief system.

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

Lately I have become rather fond of Paul's definition, and particulary the KJV translation. As I reach for a more universal type of faith, his definition resonates with me. I still hope that the spiritual feelings we experience might point to some greater purpose that lies outside of our limited perceptual abilities. That hope is not a tangible thing, yet its substance permeates many of our fellow being who follow its light to lead purposeful lives.

Another observation about faith is that I think whatever I had as a TBM I still have. It is not the least bit impacted by my lack of belief in Mormon authority figures and their teachings.

[Ghost]

Alma's definition of faith always bothered me for the same reason that the standard philosophical definition of knowledge bothered me. That is, someone can claim knowledge if

• The person believes a statement to be true
• The statement is in fact true
• The person is justified in believing the statement to be true

In both cases you believe something, and that thing happens to be "true" (conforming to reality). Sure, we can to come to a point where we are confident that something is likely or unlikely based on experience. But isn't that simply belief, not faith or knowledge, if we accept these definitions? If the thing happens to be true, then it really was faith or knowledge after all. That's nice, but too bad we'll never find out.

I guess my working definition of faith is behaving as if something is true or will probably have a certain result. Maybe the thing is not true, and maybe it won't have that result, but what else can we do?

For example, someone who finds himself or herself on this site might believe none of the supernatural claims made by the LDS church or any other religious group, but may have faith that living according to some of the teachings will have a positive effect in his or her life, even if it's just maintaining family harmony. And that could be "true" faith in the end just as much as anything else.