Belief

Does God exist? If there is a God, or any gods, what are they like? Did they create the world or

humanity? Are they a source for morality? It is possible to categorize views about deities in a variety

of ways. One common procedure is to classify views about the existence of deities. This classification

system categorizes view about deities as:

Theism — The belief that gods or deities exist and interact with the universe. Atheism — An absence

of belief in a single god, all gods, or a belief that gods do not exist at all.

Deism — The belief that a god or gods exists, but does not interact with the universe.

Agnosticism — The belief that there is no way to know about gods or deities.

Design and belief in God

What is design?

Any complex mechanism is designed for a

purpose. Design involves things working

together according to a plan to produce

something that was intended.

If you look at a car you can see that the

fuel powers an engine which turns a shaft

which turns the wheels and so makes a

self-propelled vehicle to allow people further and more easily. A look at any part of a car makes you

think that the car has been designed.

Laws of science

The universe works according to laws. The laws of gravity, electricity, magnetism, motion, bonding,

gases, etc. all involve complex things working together. Since the effect of all those laws working

together is so complex, some belief that proves that has been designed.

DNA

DNA is made up of two strands that form a ladder-like structure called a double helix. The DNA

molecule replicates by unzipping and using each strand as a template for successive strands. These

new DNA strands are then passed on to daughter cells during cell division. Again, a complex subject

matter and therefore a possible argument. The structure of DNA and its formation of templates seem

to indicate a design or blueprint for the structure of organisms.

Evolution

Some also see evidence of design in the process of evolution where complex life forms develop from

simple ones.

Beauty of nature

Some see evidence of design in the beauties of nature. Sunsets, mountains, and oceans appear to

have beauty that an artist would have to spend a long time designing.

Why this may support belief in God

Using the appearance of design to lead to belief in God is often called the Argument of design. It

goes like this:

Anything that has been designed needs a designer.

There is plenty of evidence that the world has been designed.

If the world has been designed, the world must have a designer.

The only possible designer of something as beautiful and complex as the world would be God.

Therefore the appearance of design in the world proves that God exists.

This argument shows how the appearance of design in the world can lead people who are not sure

about God to believe that he exists; and how it will yield extra reasons for believing in God to those

who already believe.

Causation and belief in God

causation

This is the process by which one thing

causes another. It is often known as cause

and effect.

Cause and effect seem to be a basic

feature in the world. Whatever we do has

an effect. If I do my homework, I will have

the effect of pleasing my parents and

teachers. If I don’t do my homework, I will

annoy my parents and teachers.

Modern science has developed through

looking at causes and effects and in particular looking for single causes of an effect. Just as my

parents’ happiness may be caused by other things than me doing my homework, so the increase of

someone’s heart rate may be caused by other things than exercise. So when a scientist tries to

discover the cause of increase in heart rate, she tries to reduce all the variables (for example, arrival

of girl/boyfriend) so that a single cause can be identified. Science seems to show us that, when

investigated sufficiently, any effect has a cause and any cause has an effect.

Today, the big-bang theory of the universe points to an event that started the universe. It says that

originally all the matter of the universe was compressed together, and an explosion of energy caused

it to spread out and form the universe as we know it today.

So, if the universe began, it must have had a cause. The argument then is that this cause must be an

uncaused, changeless, timeless, and immaterial being.

“It must be uncaused because we know that there cannot be an infinite regress of causes. It must be

timeless, or eternal, and changeless, because it was the creator of time (at least causally before it

created time). In addition, because it also created space, it must transcend space and therefore be

immaterial rather than physical in nature. This further implies that this being is separate from its

creation, not a part of it.”

Summary

The appearance of causation in

the world is often called the First

Cause Argument and goes like

this:

If we look at things in the world

we see that they have a cause, for

example, ice is caused by the

temperature falling and water

becoming solid.

Anything caused to exist must be

caused to exist by something else

because to cause your own

existence, you would have to exist

before you exist, which is nonsense.

You cannot keep going back with causes because in causal chain you have to have a beginning, for

example, you have to have water to produce ice. So if the universe has no First Cause, then there

would be no universe, but as there is a universe, there must be a First Cause.

The only possible First Cause of the universe is God, so God must exist.

This argument makes people think that the universe, the world and humans must have come from

somewhere, they must have had a cause. As God is (to them) the only logical cause of the universe, it

makes them think that God must exist, or it supports their belief in God if they already belief.

The search for meaning and purpose

Most people, at some point in their lives, ask the questions:

Why are we here?

Where are we going?

What’s the purpose of our life on earth?

These questions are the start of a search for the meaning and

purpose of life. Very often this search leads people to think that

this life cannot be all there is. They begin to think that the

purpose of this life involves the existence of life after death.

They may come to believe this because one of the purposes of

life for many people is justice – the idea that the good are

rewarded and the evil punished. Obviously this does not happen in this life where the good often

seem to be punished by illness and disaster, whereas the evil sometimes seem to get all the good

things of life. This leads people to think (or hope) that there must be a life after death where the

good are rewarded and the evil punished.

Only God could provide an afterlife and decide who should be rewarded and who should be

punished. Therefore, the search for meaning and purpose has led them to believe that God must

exist.

The search may also lead people to believe that this life is a preparation for a future life with God.

They may then think that the purpose of life is to follow a particular religion, which will lead them to

believe that God exists.

Occurrence of religion and belief in God

When someone sees so many people believing in (some sort of) religion, they begin to think religion

must be true. After all, if billions of people pray to a God, go into special buildings to worship this or

these God(s), follow strict, complicated and hard rules as part of their religion, there must be

something making them do it. There is the feeling that so many people cannot be wrong. If so many

hold a certain opinion, it must be right.

If the person then studies religion, they are likely to be impressed by the fact that, although there are

differences between religions, there are many similarities. Most religions believe in one God, life

after death, the need to follow certain moral rules, the need to pray and worship God.

The similarities may lead the person to think that there must be one force behind all the religions,

with some different interpretations. This force could only be God, and so, if religion comes from God

and leads to God, God must exist.

"The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is

also" Mark Twain

Non-religious explanation of the world

Science explains how the world came into being this way:

Matter is eternal, it can neither be created nor destroyed it only can be changed (scientists call this

the law of thermo-dynamics).

About 15 billion years ago, the matter of the universe became so compressed that it produced a huge

explosion (the Big Bang).

As the matter of the universe flew away from the explosion, the forces of gravity and other laws of

science joined some of the matter into stars, and, about five billion years ago, the solar system was

formed.

The combination of gases on the earth’s surface produced primitive life forms, like amoeba.

The genetic structure of these life forms produces changes (mutations),

Any change that is better suited to living in the

environment will survive and reproduce.

Over millions of years life forms were produced

leading to vegetation, then invertebrate animals,

then vertebrates and finally, about 2,5 million years

ago, humans evolved.

The evidence for the theory of evolution is the fossil

record (the evidence from fossils of life developing

from simple to complex), and the similarities

between life forms being discovered through genetic

research. (about 50 % of human DNA is the same as

that of a cabbage).

Science can explain where the world came from and

where humans came from without any reference to

God. If God exists, he must have made the world and

he must be the only explanation of the world. The

scientific explanation of the world and humans

without any reference to God is could be proof that

God does not exist.

Assignment Column

If so many people believe in God, he must exist. But then again, most people once believed the earth

was flat…

What do your parents believe? What do you believe? Are there any special rules you follow? If you

don’t believe in God, what do you believe? Do you believe anything?

Write a column for a magazine, about your own culture and beliefs. (about 500 words)

The argument of design, the evidence of causation, the meaning and purpose of life must be

featured in your column.

Spirituality in art

How does contemporary art address the idea of spirituality? How do artists working today reveal and

question commonly held assumptions about faith, belief, meditation, and religious symbols?

Beryl Korot

While quilting, actress and host S. Epatha Merkerson

evokes the theme as a “thread which connects us all.”

Using found material culled from the broadcast, Korot

manipulated the footage on her computer, slowing down,

colorizing, and looping isolated gestures and sounds.

Ann Hamilton

Whether working with sculpture, textiles, film, and

sound, or even her unique mouth-operated pinhole

cameras, Ann Hamilton finds all her art to be about a

“very fundamental act of making.” “When I’m making

work,” she says, “there’s a point where I can’t see it. And

then there’s that moment where you can see it—it’s like

it bites you—and you think it might be beautiful.” The documentary follows the construction of one

of the artist’s installations entitled ghost… a border act (2000), which exemplifies the relationship

between the line of thread and the line of the written word. For this site-specific installation inside an

old textile mill in Charlotte, North Carolina, Hamilton projects a video image onto translucent silk

walls of a room. The video shows a close-up view of a pencil drawing a line that is then ran in reverse.

The segment then travels to the Venice Biennale for the artist’s installation, myein (1999), which

incorporates an audio recording of whispered words and a poem written in

Braille on the walls. It is made slowly visible by intermittent drops of

magenta powder from the ceiling. The documentary also features Hamilton

experimenting with the beginnings of other art projects, and interacting with

her son and friends at her home in Columbus, Ohio.

John Feodorov

Calling on his Native American heritage and sense of humour, John Feodorov sets tradition against

modern-day kitsch to create a “hybrid mythology” in provocative multimedia installations. His work

whimsically examines his own and New Age assumptions about Christianity and Native American

spirituality. “I have this background,” he says, “of a traditional Navajo and this outsider Christian

background of Jehovah Witnesses, which are completely opposed to each other. And I’m in the

middle trying to make sense out of it.” Filmed in Seattle, Washington, where the artist works and

lives, the segment features his Totem Teddies (1989–98) series, which critiques the co modification

of spirituality. Feodorov combines the Navajo’s majestic bear symbols, with notions of consumer

society, infusing the totem with a promise of salvation for sale. “Advertising wants people to believe

that buying something will change their lives,” he explains. “Well, this is something that is just

outright telling you that.” We also witness Feodorov’s Office Shaman (2000)

performance/installation, in which he joins contemporary office culture with ritual healing and

sacrifice. He openly admits that his work debunks spirituality, but only in order to investigate

supposedly “fixed” ideologies.

Shahzia Sikander

Trained in the labour-intensive discipline of Indian and

Persian miniature painting, Shahzia Sikander has adapted

an enduring artistic tradition to the task of questioning and

exploring her Eastern heritage, its boundaries, and its

liberating possibilities. “My whole purpose of taking on

miniature painting was to break the tradition, to

experiment with it, to find new ways of making meaning, to question the relevance of it,” she says.

The segment follows Sikander through the ritualistic and methodical process of miniature paintings.

“It takes many, many layers, at least ten to twenty layers of different colours to build it up,” she

explains. “It’s in the application. The build-up has to be very thin, because it builds luminosity. The

whole key to that sort of jewel-like sensibility is to build it up very slowly.” Raised as a Muslim in

Pakistan, next door to India, her work combines figurative and abstract elements from both Muslim

and Hindu cultures. The borrowing and crossover between cultures is evident in Sikander’s work as

she plays with ideas of veiling and revealing. The segment traces her many balancing acts: between

studio and museum, small works and large-scale installations, Islamic faith and American attitudes

towards Islam, and her life in the United States as it compares with her family’s in Pakistan.

James Turrell

The final segment in Spirituality profiles James

Turrell, an artist known for his use of light as the

primary material in his work. Turrell has devoted his

life to capturing the ethereal properties of light and

its powers to evoke transcendence and the sublime.

Recalling his Quaker upbringing, Turrell recounts his

initial interest in light, which was inspired by his first

experience at a meeting house. “My grandmother was trying to tell me what you did [there],” he

says, “and her explanation was you went inside to greet the light.” In Turrell’s commissioned Live Oak

Friends Meeting House (2000) in Houston, the building’s installed sky space aligns the sky with the

ceiling’s edge, enabling those who enter the space to have a unique and intimate experience with

light, an experience characteristic of Quaker tradition. Art:21 then travels to the Painted Desert in

Flagstaff, Arizona, where we discover Turrell’s life’s work, Roden Crater. “I had this thought to bring

the cosmos closer,” he explains. This observatory includes a series of tunnels and chambers opening

to the sky, encouraging visitors to connect with the stars and experience the mystifying yet

grounding realization that we, too, are a part of this universe.

New Rituals

What rituals prepare artists to make the work they do? Explore the performative and

process-oriented aspects of making art and examines ritual as an act that is given

special and sometimes mythological significance. After looking at how ritual affects

artistic practice, reflect on rituals in daily life, such as cleansing, eating, dressing as well

as life rituals births, weddings, or graduations. Explore how they affect the

consciousness and culture of individuals and communities and create a new ritual based on what

they perceive to be missing among the aspects of life that have been ritualized, commemorated, or

mythologized in our culture.

Many artists discuss their working process and the routines and rituals they make part of their art.

Janine Antoni makes repetition and ritual one of the central themes of her work in the interest of

“bringing you back to the making, the meaning of the making.” Gabriel Orozco takes walks as part of

his practice of making art outside of a formal or fixed studio. Bruce Nauman diligently records daily

activities on his ranch in New Mexico and reflects on them as a form of meditation and an art

practice.

How is ritual reflected in contemporary art?

What is the difference between a ritual and a habit or a routine?

When or how does a habit or routine become a ritual?

How is a habit or a routine like a motif in art?

What is the purpose of a ritual and why do communities engage in particular rituals?

How is a ritual related to the idea of commemoration?

What is a rite of passage?

What value systems are revealed by the choice to mark or ritualize specific aspects of life?

“I imitate fine art rituals such as chiselling (with my teeth), painting (with my hair and eyelashes), moulding

(with my body).... The reason I’m so interested in taking my body to those extreme places is that that’s a place

where I learn, where I feel most in my body... I’m really interested in the repetition, the discipline, and what

happens to me psychologically when I put my body to that extreme place.”

Janine Antoni