{"id":3570,"date":"2017-08-14T10:00:10","date_gmt":"2017-08-14T08:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/augustinianheartblog.wordpress.com\/?p=1331"},"modified":"2017-08-14T10:00:10","modified_gmt":"2017-08-14T08:00:10","slug":"day-21-faith-and-reason","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/augustinian-heart-blog\/34-days\/day-21-faith-and-reason\/","title":{"rendered":"Day 21 – Faith and Reason"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"021Day 21<\/strong> – Faith and Reason<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cBelieve that you may understand,\u201d says Augustine; but he also says, \u201cunderstand that you may believe.\u201d Belief is \u201cto think with assent.\u201d This is a conviction that comes from a basic classroom experience: one cannot progress much in one\u2019s studies unless one learns first to trust in the teacher\u2019s word. Understanding – the exercise of the faculty of reason – works on data that are often received on trust. Thus, reason is complemented by faith. It is also a given experience that what one has learned on the word of another, is deepened and perfected in research and inquiry. In this second case, reason builds on what has been heard, noted and memorized. This whole learning process applies even to the big questions of life: \u201cWho am I?\u201d \u201cWhat am I here for?\u201d \u201cWhat is happiness?\u201d \u201cHow can I be happy?\u201d \u201cWhy is there so much evil?\u201d etc. To these questions, the Church – Mother and Teacher – hands on what she herself has received from the deposit of faith entrusted to her. What the Church gives is not a product of human research done according to accepted scientific principles; rather, what she gives comes from quite another source, God – the Creator of all.<\/p>\n

The reasoning of a Christian works within the ambit provided by God\u2019s revelation regarding Himself, the world and man, as interpreted by the Church. This way, the Christian is assured of a way of looking at things that is not arbitrary but guaranteed by the authority of the Revealer Himself. \u201cFaith\u201d and \u201cScience\u201d cannot be in conflict so long as we remember that \u201cFaith\u201d answers the question \u201cWhy?\u201d while \u201cScience\u201d answers the question \u201cHow?\u201d This means that one can be a good scientist without ceasing to be a Christian. And, in fact, it is the Church\u2019s conviction that real Christians make excellent scientists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Day 21 – Faith and Reason \u201cBelieve that you may understand,\u201d says Augustine; but he also says, \u201cunderstand that you may believe.\u201d Belief is \u201cto think with assent.\u201d This is a conviction that comes from a basic classroom experience: one cannot progress much in one\u2019s studies unless one learns first to trust in the teacher\u2019s word. Understanding – the exercise of the faculty of reason – works on data that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[143],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-34-days"],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false,"gform-image-choice-sm":false,"gform-image-choice-md":false,"gform-image-choice-lg":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Provin\u010bja Agostinjana","author_link":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/author\/agostinjani\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Day 21 – Faith and Reason \u201cBelieve that you may understand,\u201d says Augustine; but he also says, \u201cunderstand that you may believe.\u201d Belief is \u201cto think with assent.\u201d This is a conviction that comes from a basic classroom experience: one cannot progress much in one\u2019s studies unless one learns first to trust in the teacher\u2019s…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3570"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3570\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agostinjani.org\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}