Tolle Lege

Welcome to Tolle Lege. In this inaugural post, I want to frame the vision for this blog by discussing two principles that I hope will guide the dialogue between faith and reason, and between one another, both on this site and on our campus. In this year’s Logos Lecture, Dean Whaley compared the relationship of faith and reason to a marriage on the rocks. If we are to reconcile these alleged differences, we must consider the interests of these two parties. What must we do to be reasonable? What must we do to be faithful? While the compatibility of faith and reason has been evidenced in my experience, I want to consider to what propositions we must be dedicated if we are to realize an integrated intellectual life. To this end, I propose the following:

Follow Reason

In The Republic, the manifesto penned for him by Plato, Socrates is asked whether he will consider a certain idea.  He replies, “Perhaps I will sail further into these matters. I do not know. I will let the wind set my course. I will follow reason wherever it leads” (394d, translation mine). This attitude of intellectual tenacity, this willingness to “follow reason,” shapes his whole life. Socrates has an uncanny ability to navigate the philosophical problems posed to him by his questioners and to demonstrate the foolishness of his opponents. He does this by asking some good questions, by refuting some bad answers, and by freely admitting what he does not know. Nothing is spared his scrutiny: from the foundational dogmas of contemporary politics to the accepted wisdom of the Sophists, to the aesthetic aspirations of the poets. His is the quintessential life of reasoned reflection.

Follow Jesus

In the Gospels, Jesus calls his disciples out of their ordinary lives. His command is simple: “The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, ‘Follow me’” (John 1:43, ESV). This call to follow Christ is the call to faith, dedication to his purpose, submission to his authority, trust in his kindness and love. For Philip, faith was not wishful thinking nor was it a desperate clinging to an unintelligibly abstract idea of God. It was trust in something undeniably real and unavoidably important, a human being who claimed to be God in the flesh, who described himself as “the Way, the Truth, and the Life” (John 14:6), and who simultaneously displayed unmatched humility and gentleness. Teaching wisdom, he offers answers to many of life’s questions, yet his own paradoxical, ostensibly miraculous person poses the greatest question of all: “Will you follow me?”

As we enter this conversation, let us emulate Socrates. Let us question. Let us challenge our assumptions and those with which we are presented. Let us follow reason wherever it leads, in confidence that it leads us to the truth. At the same time, let us consider Christ’s example of one “Who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant” (Philippians 2:6-7). Let us approach our discussion humbly with an attitude of service.

For those of us already following Jesus, let us love God with our minds (Matthew 22:37) so that we may better understand the Gospel and “be prepared to give a reason for the hope we have within us.” (1 Peter 3:15) For those of you seeking the truth by following reason wherever it leads, I urge you to carefully consider both the questions posed by life as we live it and the person of Jesus Christ and the answers that Christianity offers to both. Thus we enter an intersection of discourses, a place of dialogue between faith and reason.