Response to:
"Ultimate Questions are a matter of personal opinion."
Response: This view advocates pluralism and the issue is whether or not pluralism is appropriate to apply to ultimate questions of life.
Truth is what corresponds to reality, whether concrete or abstract in any aspect of life. Most people don't have any problem believing there really are truths that correspond to reality. "Two plus two equal four," "my favorite sports team is 0 for 7" and "the law of gravity" are statements that are true because they correspond to reality. They are true whether or not anyone believes they are true. They can be verified by counting your fingers, looking at the sports page and then jumping off a cliff.
Step into a philosophy or religion class, a psychology or sociology class, humanities or art class and you've stepped into the battle over Absolute Truth. Nearly every professor and student will tell you that there are no absolute truths about the ultimate questions of life like: Does God exist? Is there a life after this one? Where does evil come from? Is there a meaning and purpose to life? These issues are on the same level as food or musical tastes. You can like whatever food or religious belief you want to but don't say it is inherently better or truer than someone else's? tastes and beliefs.
Usually, if you claim to know the true answers to those questions you will feel like one of those little gofers in the amusement park game that pop up and get bopped on the head for points. You will be scolded that you are being intolerant of other viewpoints and that intolerance will not be tolerated! You will be told to delete everything you believe to be absolutely true and reformat your thinking to join the community of intellectually sophisticated people that learned long ago that there is no absolute truth when it comes to philosophy and religion.
Here is the problem. It is a logical fallacy to mix the categories of taste and truth. They are not even in the same ballpark.
Let's listen in on a hypothetical conversation see if our challenger really believes what he says he believes.
Challenger: "All religions are right. They all teach essentially the same things and lead to the same ultimate reality, so you can believe whatever you want to believe because it won?t make any difference in the end. It's only a matter of personal opinion or taste."
Responder: "Well that sounds nice but I disagree. I think religious ideas, for example, what God is like, are a matter of truth and other religions are simply wrong." (This is designed to get a response!)
Challenger: (Delivers an angry tirade about intolerance, etc.)
Responder: "You said that religious ideas are only a matter of taste. But if religious ideas are only a matter of taste and therefore neither right nor wrong then why are you so upset with my view? Would you be upset if I like Mexican food but you don't" You probably wouldn't because food is a matter of taste, not truth. But you believe my Christian view is absolutely wrong and false. It is obvious that you too, in fact, believe that religious answers to the ultimate questions of life are either true or false."
Generally, when people, even scholarly professors, buy into pluralism they are not aware of the double standard they are using. They want everyone else to practice pluralism even though they believe their views are right and everyone who disagrees with them is wrong. Pluralism is fine when it comes to expressions like food, music and art but it just doesn't work when applied to Ultimate Questions. The reason is two-fold: there are true answers to the Ultimate Questions and everyone knows it.
One of the aspects of pluralism that is especially annoying is that you can repeat the mantra, "All religions teach the same thing," mindlessly and without knowing anything about the various religions and get away with it. You don't have to know anything about the Bible before you discount it. Everyone assumes that sometime in the distant past it was proven to be full of myths, legends and contradictions. One doesn't have to know anything about Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Taoism, etc to accept them as all being equal. Suppose you asked me, "What are the differences between the writings of Shakespeare, Adolph Hitler, Mao Tse-tung, J.R.R. Tolkien and Confucius and I answered, "I haven't read them but I believe they all say the same thing." You wouldn't be very impressed would you?
It has become crystal clear in recent years that what the pluralist is really saying is, "All religions that don't claim to have the absolute truth are equally valid." Out of ignorance people think that Christianity is the only religion that claims to have the only absolute truth and all others are wrong. If they would do their homework they would realize just how different are the truth claims of the different religions and how mutually exclusive their worldviews are. So it turns out that no religion meets the pluralist?s qualification.
This brings us to an interesting dilemma, if all religions claim to have the truth then can we know if one of them is right and if so how? This whole web site is designed to help answer those questions. After all of our research we have concluded that Biblical Christianity alone has the true answers to the Ultimate Questions. I am not talking about a specific church or denomination under the umbrella of Christianity. I am not talking about cultural expressions of Christianity like music, language, dress, family roles, etc. I am talking about the core orthodox doctrines taught in the Bible.
Conclusion
When people are honest they know there must be a personal transcendent God who is perfect in everyway and as such is the author of absolute truth. In addition, everyone eventually appeals to an absolute moral standard that is above and beyond all people and cultures. What makes Christianity unique is that Jesus claimed to be that God coming to earth in human flesh to show us the way back to Him and make it possible through His sacrificial death on the cross. He actually claimed to be God Himself which is a claim none of the other founders of religions made. He said, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father (God) except through me. So how do we know if He was telling the truth? He said He would prove He was God by rising from the dead. Only God can do that. The historical evidence shows that He did, in fact, rise from the dead. All the other founders of religions like Mohammed and Buddha claimed only to be prophets and are still dead in the graves. Jesus is alive. Jesus is alive and lives in and through me as a Christian. And I know I have found the true way to heaven. When we become a Christian Jesus fulfills His promise. He is the Way we should follow, the Way to Heaven. He shows us the Truth and He gives us eternal Life."
Copyright 2005. Gary C. Burger and New Media Ministries. Each article may be reproduced and distributed freely as long as it is done so in its entirety. If quoted it must be properly cited as a reference.
