Truth

So what is truth? How can we as human beings grasp it? CAN we as human beings grasp it? Does it really exist or has the postmodern world destroyed it? Has our newfound concept of multiple truths killed any prospect of absolute truth, and in so doing destroyed any hope we have of stability in a society of spiritual chaos?

I don't know the answers to these questions, but I started thinking aout these questions during my Christian Formation class the other day. We were talking about philosophy's effect on the Christian faith and how we've come to the postmodernity we live in now. By postmodernity I mean an age in which we question everything because we are skeptical of everything. Tradition, history, all stability we might have is thrown out the window as we question everything people used to hold as absolutely true. And so a question that was asked in class was how we viewed truth, and how we believed it could be obtained and defined and verified. The issue we were dealing with is the multiple truth philosophy held by our society; how what is true for you is not necessarily true for me. And the problem that poses to Christianity is this: How can we claim to have the truth when everyone else has their own truth? Who are we to challenge the truths held by other religions, or even just the truth held by the people around us?

How do we define truth? From a Christian standpoint truth is defined as the Words of God. He is our precedent of truth. But is that adequate today? I don't think many postmodernistic people would say so. Truth has to be something that everyone not only CAN agree on, but HAS to agree on. An absolute truth is something that cannot be denied, it cannot be contested, because it is absolutely true. This is a poor example, but you cannot adequately argue that 2 + 2 does not equal 4. It is a known truth, it is something we can all agree on. But that is math, not theology. How do we defend our faith as true from a postmodern world? If nothing is absolutely true anymore, what can anyone believe in beyond themselves? Nothing. There is no stability in a world without universal truth. And despite the chaos that is rampant in society, I would say we live in a very stable world, which means that something or someone is keeping it that way. In my mind, God is a necessary truth. He has to exist, or none of this makes any sense. Without Him, there is no purpose to the world, no order to the world, and no purpose in our lives.

Unfortunately I can't think straight right now, so I'll end this post here. Hopefully I'll have more structured things to say on this later.