Importance of History and the Impossibility to Live Without Faith - Wei Jun

Inspired by Ps. Tan's diagram on how God equates to truth and we are all under the coverings of Truth. The limit of God, as reflected in this diagram, is infinity.

The second part of the week started off interestingly with a presentation about the history of our churches. History classes had always been boring to me since secondary school days-I simply hated it. Today, in line with my academic pursuit and in this process of being forced to read up on historical accounts, I truly embrace the magic of history, providing a basis and foundation to the things currently around me.

The different presentations the rich history that many Presbyterian churches today encompass left me awed. Even the youngest church is somewhat linked to the oldest. Also, it was impressive to find out also that many youths within the Presbyterian churches, though not very fluent with Mandarin, still attempts to learn and not give up on learning Word in Chinese. Being an independent church, it is perhaps even easier for traditions to die. 

Currently, my church webpage has no proper and perhaps a lost historical account. On the task of presenting my church history to my fellow course mate, I realized how important historical roots could simply affect my sense of belonging to the church. I feel that it is important not to let the roots of our church die, and am looking forward to share what I have learnt to my fellow church mates in hopes that they would feel the same, further connection with our church.

A session with regards to Christianity and Science follows. The speaker uncovered how Science as a subject is on a different ground of comparison with our Faith. Simply, the conclusion derivate for both takes on a different approach: one deductive and one inductive in nature. Importantly, understanding that philosophy provides a framework for science to flourish would change one’s understanding of both entities. 

Limitations of Science are highlighted and the speaker reflected on how science cannot answer simple questions of our lives such as the purpose of our existence. (Simply, Science takes on conclusion based on experiments and observations, and this has limitations to how far it can explain certain phenomenon). Reflectively, it had always seemed to me that Science and Christianity are on opposite end of the spectrum and can never co-exist. 

However, this session taught me that the basis of comparing both in the first place lies on a different plane altogether and perhaps more, that “God is a foundation in which Science flourish” (as stated by the speaker). The session helped to open my perspective, better reflecting upon the positions that both Science and Christianity undertake. In the world of materialism and objectivity, it is also important to remember that everything we do entails the notion of faith; hence it is impossible to live a life without faith.

Wei Jun