“But he said to them, ‘Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.’” – John 20:25b

Skepticism is a key driver of the human tendency towards curiosity, innovation, and progress. No institution that values real, effective, positive change mandates blind faith. 

Blind faith is a slippery slope – while it relieves the believer of the burden of decision-making, it can so easily be weaponized into an agent of mass destruction.  

When I was neck-deep in evangelicalism, I remember being told that Christianity was not a religion, but a “faith.” In hindsight, this was simply another method of distinguishing Christianity from the rest of the religions and cultivating the us-versus-them dynamic that any institution of fear thrives on. But at the time, it was a badge of honor. 

The idea that faith – believing without seeing – is a superior trait goes back to the Gospel of John. Thomas, one of the disciples of Jesus, refused to believe that Jesus had risen from the dead until he saw and touched his wounds for himself. In this narrative, Jesus appears and allows Thomas to do just that. After this, Jesus blesses those who believe without seeing. 

On the surface, this is a fairly wholesome tale. A dear teacher and leader has been miraculously resurrected, but one of his followers, perhaps stricken still by grief and reluctant to be disappointed again, doubts the good news. For this, Thomas was branded as “doubting.”

What this story actually reinforces, however, is the very blind faith that often precludes curiosity and investigation. Of course, there were many in the history of scientific discovery who were devout Christians or Muslims, and many were driven by their faith. But they all fell short in that they presupposed their faith to shape science, and not the other way around. 

As proud as I was to be a blind-faith follower of Jesus back then, I could never quite silence the voice that encouraged me to investigate. Often I found websites and misinformation that confirmed my biases, but eventually this tide began to turn. I simply could no longer ignore the fact that there was no evidence for much of what was in the Bible – and not just that, but heaps of evidence against much of what was in the Bible. 

Accepting reality quieted a long and painful tumult within me. And though it hurt to leave the church, it was the right call. 

A skeptic mind is seen as dangerous to these institutions that want nothing but control, so skeptic minds are villainized and cast out as “faithless,” “godless,” and “demonic.” Another common refrain is that people who leave the church “just want to sin.”

Nothing could be further from the truth. Curiosity and investigation are part of what makes us human, and to lose that is to lose our humanity. We will revisit the pain of leaving the church in a future piece, but it felt applicable to this topic as well. 

I do not think religion is “bad” for science or society. Religion, just like scientific investigation, is simply one method of embracing the human experience, a method that happens to be tied to the subjective rather than the objective. I think it can and very much has been a force for good. 

But I do know that blind faith and loyalty with no skepticism is a dangerous idea, and one that can – and very much has – led humanity into its darkest depths.