You remember, I hope, that for Nancy Pearcey, every worldview needs a starting point. This point is a reference or an unquestioned foundation on which to build an entire worldview. But we shouldn’t stop there. The consequences of idols are significant. So, I suggest trying to understand a little bit about what these consequences are.

The Insufficiency of Idols

Schaeffer makes a statement that greatly saddens him: « the gods [of the Romans] were an amplified humanity, not divinity. Like the Greeks, the Romans did not have an infinite god. Therefore, they did not have a sufficient intellectual reference point, meaning they did not have anything grand or permanent enough to refer to for thinking or living. As a result, their value system was not strong enough to withstand the tensions of life, whether individual or political. All their gods combined could not provide them with a sufficient foundation for life, morality, values, and final decisions. » When humans do not start their reasoning with something grand enough, they are lost and « carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning » (Ephesians 4:14).

An image returns several times2 in Schaeffer’s writings: « in the Swiss Alps, it often happens that a valley bathed by a lake is adjacent to another that is dry. But water can filter under the mountain, and the second valley starts to fill up. If the water level remains lower or equal to that of the first, it can be naturally concluded that the second lake derives its source from the first. But if it exceeds it by several meters, our easy explanation no longer holds, and the problem remains. Similarly, if we acknowledge that there was something personal at the beginning of all things, we can understand why man aspires to personality. But if, in his search, he does not find a model that precedes and founds it, the problem remains unanswered. If at the beginning, there was less than personality, we are ultimately forced to reduce the personal to the impersonal. Bringing the superior down to the inferior, modern science does it through a kind of reductionism where the concept of personality represents no more than the impersonal to which complexity has been added. »3 If the world was truly created by God and we were created for Him, everything must reflect His person. Unfortunately, sin has separated us from God, and we have transformed « the glory of the incorruptible God into images representing corruptible man » (Romans 1:23). These idols turn us away from God, from truth, and from the reality of the world. « Since Christianity truthfully accounts for reality, to reject it based on another system is to deviate from the real world. »4 The non-Christian, as well as his thought systems, cannot therefore account for reality.

Idols only explain part of reality

Following her mentor, Nancy Pearcey develops the same idea in her works. Still based on this concept of idols and presuppositions, she writes: « But of course, whatever part of reality is absolutized, it is always just a part. Therefore, the worldview based on this foundation will always be partial, incomplete, one-sided, and unbalanced. There will always be things that do not fit into its categories of explanation, that fall outside of its framework, that go beyond its boundaries. What then? Anything that goes beyond the boundaries is simply rejected or denied. For example, materialism insists that anything beyond matter is not real. Empiricism claims that anything beyond the senses is not real. Naturalism asserts that anything beyond the natural is not real. Pantheism affirms that anything that is not the One, that encompasses everything, is not real. These are all forms of reductionism, as they reduce the complex reality with multiple levels that God has created to a single level… Because Christianity starts with a transcendent Creator, it idolizes no part of creation. And therefore, it neither denies nor denigrates any other part. » [5]

Toute vision du monde non-chrétienne est ainsi réductrice pour Pearcey, tout comme Schaeffer. Une de nos tâches en tant que chrétiens est de montrer aux autres que les idoles réduisent la réalité des choses. Les prochains articles montreront en partie comment utiliser cette faiblesse des visions non-chrétiennes.

1 SCHAEFFER Francis, How Should We Then Live ? The Rise and Decline of Western Thought and Culture, Fleming H. Revell Company, Old Tappan, New Jersey, 1976, p. 21 (translated via internet).

2 We find this image in He is There and He is not Silent but also in SCHAEFFER Francis, Dieu, illusion ou réalité ?, Éditions Kerygma Aix-en-Provence, FRANCE, 1989, p. 76 (translated via internet).

3 SCHAEFFER Francis, Dieu ni silencieux ni lointain, une philosophie chrétienne, Éditions Cruciforme, Montréal, 2014, p. 27-28 (translated via internet).

4 SCHAEFFER Francis, Dieu, illusion ou réalité ?, Éditions Kerygma Aix-en-Provence, FRANCE, 1989, p. 105-106 (translated via internet).

5 PEARCEY Nancy, Saving Leonardo, A Call to Resist the Secular Assault on Mind, Morals, & Meaning, B&H Publishing Group, Nashville, Tennessee, 2010, p. 244-245 (translated via internet).