Essays in Unitarian Theology by Kenneth Twinn Lindsey - General ...

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ESSAYS IN UNITARIAN THEOLOGY
I would not agree that the proposition " God is Love "
is equivalent to some such proposition as " dustbins are
future-~erfect ". But what of the criterion of verifia-
bility? L Perhaps the linguistic philosophers are on
surer ground here. How can the claim that God is
love bk verified? What is the evidence?/ How would
the world differ from the world as we know it if the
opposite were true? Admittedly, this is a harder nut
to crack, but before we tackle it, it is perhaps instruc-
tive to examine what would presumably be the answer
of those who accept the critique of linguistic analysis,
but who nevertheless still cling to the validity-in some
non-metaphysical sense-of the proposition c c God is
love ".
'0 , They would insist, I suppose, that they believe that
God is love because they have felt his love in their
hearts. and are aware of it in their lives, as something
/
quite apart from, and not in the least evidenced by,
external circumstance. They would point to the
experience of Jesus, who " for the joy that was set
99 .
before him, endured the cross, despising the shame ,
the experience of Paul, who, in spite of " tribulation,
nakedness, peril and the sword ", was persuaded that
nothing: could ever separate him from the love of God
in ~hYist Jesus. he^ would further adduce the
ex~erience of the saints, who felt the love of God as a
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present reality, even in the midst of persecution and
torment. An interesting example of Christian awareness
of the love of God, even when all the circumstances
seem to contradict it, is furnished by an incident from
the life of the Quaker saint John Wilhelm Rowntree.
When threatened with serious eye-trouble, he consulted
a specialist, who informed him that there was no hope.
BELIEF IN GOD 35
He went out from the consultation [says his biographer]
under the doom of coming and irreparable blindness. He
stood by some railings for a few moments to collect himself,
and suddenly felt the love of God wrap him about as
though a visible presence enfolded him, and a joy filled
him such as he had never known before."
Now it is obvious that such pragmatic verification of
the reality of the love of God cannot be ignored.
The scientist certainly does not disregard such methods
when testing the validity of his hypotheses. Indeed,
the extent to which modern medical science, for
example, is pragmatic and empirical is often frankly
astonishing. Many modern treatments including the
administration of such drugs as cortisone, and even
such drastic processes as shock-therapy and brain sur-
gery, appear to be based on no surer foundation than
that, in many cases, for some unknown reason they
appear to work. Pragmatism, then, has a valid place
-especially when it forms but one link in a chain of
evidence. But to make experience of the love of God
the proof of that love, or even the chief ground for
believing in it, is very dangerous. 1.t clearly plays
straight into the hands of those sceptics who insist that
the proposition cc God is love " merely means cc I feel a
warm inner security ". It is, of course, quite con-
ceivable that when a person says he feels a warm, inner
security, especially in the face of adversity, he does so
because he is actually aware of the love of God as an
external reality. But it is also conceivable (as some
psychologists argue) that he merely feels a warm inner
security because he was subjected to the right methods
of cleanliness-training m his infancy.
* Quoted Inner Light, a devotional anthology (First Series), p. I I 6.