My causes

I just watched an interesting programme in which Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sachs decided to put his faith to the test and invite four leading atheists to challenge him.

One of the four was a scientist who felt that because science could explain, or has the potential to explain, everything that he is, then there is no room and no need for God. The way he framed his position brought home to me some key issues in sharp clarity:

- The atheist has to have faith that God cannot be one of those causal forces and...
- The atheist has to believe that God cannot work through the medium of any of the other causal forces... to get to the point where they don't believe that there is a God
- Many believers fail to grasp the reality of some of the myriad causal forces that contribute to the making of each one of us

These forces are indeed wide ranging. They involve nature and nurture, culture and genetics, history and biology - a spicy cocktail if ever there was one, but included in that list, and indeed running through it, I include God.