Worldview Fragment: faith as its own justification

Worldview fragment: one or more related ideas/viewpoints that can (and often do) serve as a component or flavor in a complete worldview held by some specific individual. The "fragment" term is not intended to be a subtle insult, but to accurately reflect the reality that the fragment is 1) not necessarily an actual, comprehensive worldview, and 2) could likely coexist with a variety of other fragments within some individual's worldview. A puzzle piece isn't worthless because it's a puzzle piece.

Before proceeding, the definition of "faith" in this worldview fragment must be clarified, because "faith" has many rich meanings, some of which have occupied Christian thinkers for years. In this fragment, however, the meaning of "faith" is uncomplicated. A quote from Miracle on 34th Street, a movie which is teeming over with this worldview fragment, expresses it well:

Faith is believing when common sense tells you not to. Don't you see? It's not just Kris that's on trial, it's everything he stands for. It's kindness and joy and love and all the other intangibles.

Then faith, according to this fragment, is the opposite of reason. It's the opposite of sensory experience. It's the opposite of systematic inquiry. It's belief grounded in nothing. It's commitment to a disembodied idea. It's a mental leap into a void. It's warping something tangible to better fit something intangible.

In short, faith is the broad category of thought that disregards the accepted standards of evidential truth, epitomized by scientific methods and procedures. An editorial like "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus" advances its suppositions about Santa Claus, fairies, the unknown, the unseen, the sublime, and a raft of Platonic Ideals explicitly NOT on the basis of actual verification but on the observation that the effect of those beliefs is good--in fact, the effect of life being worthwhile! A top theme of Miracle on 34th Street is the same mismatch or dichotomy, personified by the conflicts between Fred Gailey and Doris Walker, and it comes to a similar conclusion:

Look Doris, someday you're going to find that your way of facing this realistic world just doesn't work. And when you do, don't overlook those lovely intangibles. You'll discover those are the only things that are worthwhile.

In other words, everything real (i.e., tangible) is determined by observation and experimentation, but everything that matters most is believable solely by furiously shutting one's eyes against the exact same standards and pretending. Faith is pretending pretty things, not seeing. Is it any wonder that "people of faith" (a fascinating label in itself) don't feel flattered when "people of science" (another fascinating label) interview them, debate them, or portray them like this? Some people will say they "wish they could believe like you do". If anyone wants a prime example of damning with faint praise, that would be it. "I wish I held to your beliefs just as I wish I held to other fictional beliefs, like Santa Claus and fairies and objective, transcendent morality."

Obviously, the problem here is not the mere defense of the existence of and need for love, joy, hope, compassion, imagination, etc. Christianity asserts and defends the same! The problem lies in acknowledging the existence of the dilemma and therefore mounting a defense at all. For Christians (and others), "leap of 'faith' " is not an apt description of the way they think. God exists and is good. Humanity has value not because we say it does nor because we have highly-advanced herd-animal empathy for one another's genes, but because God created humanity to exhibit a divine spiritual spark. Faith no longer has to be its own justification, as a wish-fulfillment escape hatch from soul-crushing reality. Rather, faith is a Christian virtue, the strength-giving virtue of confidently trusting God in all of life's details.

Some would have us think that, in a universe whose mysteries are not mysterious and whose purpose is nonexistent, the only path to meaning is elaborate fantasies that must be taken on "faith". (Creatively clever writers have noticed that even stories containing blatantly unrealistic, perhaps nonsensical, elements can avoid the obvious question "Doesn't this mean that the story presumes the existence of the supernatural, and therefore a supernatural Source, God?" simply by explicitly or implicitly framing those elements in the "have faith, not questions or truth" mode of illusionists.) That faith is not Christianity. It's not why Christ died. The intangibles are actually tangibles. Good is backed by Someone, while Evil is rebellion against Him.