The greatest sin is certainty

If I believed that the universe communicates with us, I'd view what happened during some television watching a little while ago as being a message to me from the universe. But since I don't have such a belief, I'll go with coincidence.

My last blog post was called "A clear mind sees a foggy world. A foggy mind sees a clear world." I found this wonderful notion in Tim Urban's book, What's Our Problem? A Self-Help Book for Societies. Urban does a masterful job arguing against zealotry, where a person is so sure that a belief they hold is correct, they're unwilling to entertain the possibility that the belief could be wrong.

I mentioned the clear mind/foggy mind adage to a friend today in the course of our usual Sunday get-together at a coffeehouse where we talk politics, sports, television, life in general, and any other subject that comes to mind. I told Jim that after watching a gripping, though rather unrealistic disaster movie (La Palma) on Netflix, now I was going to turn to a higher quality movie, Conclave.

Conclave is about the election of a new pope after the previous pope died unexpectedly. I've just started watching it, so don't spoil my enjoyment of it by mentioning an important plot point in a comment. As I was eating dinner, grilled tofu and mushrooms in a whole wheat tortilla, I watched the beginning of Conclave. 

The actor Ralph Thiennes plays Thomas Cardinal Lawrence, the Dean of the College of Cardinals whose job is to select the next pope. He gives a homily, or short sermon, to the assembled cardinals prior to them beginning the process of choosing a new pope. Lawrence starts with some boring and predictable remarks, then changes gears. 

Here's a two-minute You Tube video of his from-the-heart portion of the sermon, which I like a lot. I've also shared a transcript that I made from the Netflix subtitles. 

Let me speak from the heart for a moment. Saint Paul said, "Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ." To work together, to, uh, to grow together, we must be tolerant. No one person or - or faction seeking to dominate another.

And speaking to the Ephesians, who were of course a mixture of Jews and gentiles, Paul reminds us that God's gift to the Church is its variety. It is this variety, this diversity of people and views, which gives our Church its strength. 

And over the course of many years in the service of our mother the Church, let me tell you, there is one sin which I have come to fear above all others.

Certainty.

Certainty is the great enemy of unity. Certainty is the deadly enemy of tolerance. Even Christ was not certain at the end. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? He cried out in agony at the ninth hour on the cross.

Our faith is a living thing precisely because it walks hand in hand with doubt. If there was only certainty and no doubt, there would be no mystery. And therefore no need for faith.

Let is pray that God will grant us a pope who doubts. And let him grant us a pope who sins and asks for forgiveness and who carries on.

Certainty is indeed undesirable, whether we see it as a sin or some secular term.

Certainty eliminates any possibility of taking a scientific view of reality, for science knows that nothing is 100% certain, that even the most well understood laws of nature could prove to be incomplete or even wrong as more evidence about them is gathered.

Certainty precludes our being able to engage in productive discussions with others. Take this blog, for example. I've become a proud atheist after being a religious believer for about 35 years. But I'm not completely certain that God doesn't exist. If someone who believes in God isn't completely certain that God does exist, we can have a reasonable conversation about God, for each of us is at least somewhat open to the other person being correct about God. 

Zealotry requires certainty. A zealot has no doubt that what they believe is absolutely true. Not only does this make them annoying, it also makes them unable to have a reasonable discussion with anyone who doesn't share their certainty. 

Uncertainty is a mark of humility, as is doubt. Uncertainty and doubt point toward mystery, as Cardinal Lawrence says in Conclave. Mystery makes life much more interesting. It opens the door to increased knowledge, while certainty closes the door.

Comments

[sant64]

Others might read Paul as ever certain that only his version of Christianity was correct. Paul's claims of certainty extended even to Peter and other apostles who, unlike Paul, actually lived with Jesus.

Bart Ehrman explains all this here: https://ehrmanblog.org/35878-2/

My view of Paul is that he's the very model of the upstart Guru. One can read Paul's letters and be impressed by his outreach to Gentiles. But it can't be denied that Paul appointed himself an equal with Jesus's actual apostles (ie, directly appointed successors), never appeared to take direction from any of them, and often criticized them for not having the correct version of true Christianity, i.e., that of Paul's. Paul was a lot like Kirpal Singh, a guru who claimed to be the true successor.

The Cousin Vinnie argument ("How can you be so sure"?) has its merits and usefulness, but it is also frequently used to undermine others' beliefs. You might as well title this essay "The Sin of Having Beliefs."

Or the sin of having beliefs that don't align with your own, as I see from your other blog that you're still enraged that Trump won the election. Where's the uncertainty? At this point, you should at least be certain that Trump won the election, including the popular vote, and that America's cultural tide -- men, women, minorities, even young people -- has swung to Donald Trump as leader, and the majority have rejected all the things you were certain were good for them.

[Jimmy]

I set the intention to visit the Astral before going to sleep. I woke in a dream walking down a city street of rainbow light shafts all around the city. Tall buildings lined the street as in New York. Up in the sky were twin suns setting. The street was crowded with beings facing the twin suns. One sun set and the other remained.