Faith is (not) a Virtue

Scriptures and righteous leaders frequently emphasize the importance of virtuous faith. The first principle of the Mormon Gospel is faith. Without faith we cannot be saved in the kingdom of heaven. Considering this great importance, let’s strive to better understand faith by looking at the dictionary definition. Faith, /fāTH/ noun - “a widely held but unjustified belief in supernatural causation leading to certain consequences of an action or event, or a practice based on such a belief.” Now, did you catch my switch? I changed something about the definition. Take another look and see if you can pick out the edit.

The above is actually a word-for-word copy-paste definition of superstition. Faith is defined as a “Belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof.” In other words, thinking the supernatural is true based on anecdotal feelings. No verifiable empirical evidence to support any truth claims, but rather the fuzzy feel goods that contradict every other religions’ feel good faiths. And yet one of these omniscient deities teaches through claimed prophets that faith is good, virtuous, and required for heaven. 1 Corinthians says “That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.” Even though modern medicine and science (wisdom of men) has helped billions of lives while miracles of faith have yet to be verified.

Faith and Superstition happen to be very similar. The faithful mutter a prayer to an invisible person for safety and blessings while the superstitious mutter an incantation to an invisible force for protection and good luck. Mormons receive a patriarchal blessing to learn about their plan of life God has prepared for them, but laugh at palm-readers and tarot card fortune tellers. It’s common for those with faith in Hinduism to touch a set of prayer beads for comfort, but if someone holds their lucky rabbit foot then it’s an embarrassing superstition. The faithful are careful to not walk under a ladder because it’s bad luck, while the superstitious dare not drink coffee because it’s an evil sin of the devil. Oops, I seemed to have mixed up the terms faith and superstition in that last example.

According to the wise and intelligent, superstitions are a laughable embarrassment because there is no evidence to support the claim that breaking a mirror is seven years of bad luck. Just the opposite seems to be true for faith according to the religious. Faith is a respectable virtue because it’s challenging to remain faithful when all supporting evidence falls short. You must believe in an invisible god or you’re considered weird, apostate, and evil.

The only difference between faith and superstition is tax exemption. The government recognizes and protects the superstitious religious beliefs so it seems like something to respect. Superstition is not a virtue and neither is faith. I think scientific skepticism is an honorable virtue. Don’t just take someone's truth claim for what they say it is, find out for yourself by practicing good science and scrutinizing verifiable evidence. Thanks for reading and please, watch this awesome 5 min video.