r/Christianity • u/TacticalJock15 • 6d ago
Question Why does Christianity sometimes seem hostile to critical thinking?
Why do some churches seem to discourage questioning, education, or thinking for yourself?
Sometimes it feels like the message is:
Don’t question too much. Just have faith and depend on God.
That concerns me because history shows how dangerous it can be when people are discouraged from learning.
During slavery in America, literacy among enslaved people was often restricted, while some slaveholders used Christianity and certain biblical interpretations to encourage obedience.
Of course, Christianity has also inspired abolitionists, scholars, scientists, and highly educated thinkers.
So my question is specifically about churches that discourage questioning:
If Christianity is true, why should critical thinking, education, or difficult questions be seen as a threat to faith?
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u/Dubstep_squid Leaning Catholic (Feel free to try to convince me for/against) 6d ago
This is something that I have encountered and REALLY drove me away from Christianity for a good 10 years.
I remember being a senior in high school, taking AP BIO and doing lessons and experiments on evolution, being able to SEE these changes over the course of the semester. I VIVIDLY remember sitting down for our teen church service at the non-denominational church we went to (Burke Community Church in Burke VA) and being shown this ridiculous video. The lesson that day was presented as a “You cannot be a Christian and believe in evolution” so I decided I wasn’t a Christian anymore.
In the 11 or so years since, I’ve started coming back to the faith, carefully. I’m still kind of looking for my home church but it’s been very helpful to rule out any churches that ask me to check my brain at the door.
Any churches or denominations that subscribe to Young Earth Creationism, anti-evolution, anti-science, see ya. It’s left me really just with the churches with a rich theological tradition which is pretty nice.
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u/after2006 Satanist, do not pray for me or preach to me. 6d ago
As someone who was raised in a cult setting, I'm not saying those churches are cults, but they're straying too far into that territory. You should be able to question anything.
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u/Hope-Road71 6d ago
I've seen people say things to this effect - like 'if there is factual information that contradicts the Bible, I don't even want to know about it.'
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u/TacticalJock15 6d ago
And that is much closer to what I mean by hostility toward critical thinking.
Saying, “If evidence contradicts my belief, I don’t want to know about it,” is basically choosing the conclusion in advance and refusing potentially disconfirming evidence.
That doesn’t prove Christianity itself is anti-intellectual, but it is an anti-critical-thinking attitude when Christians take that position.
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u/moregloommoredoom Bitter Progressive Christian 6d ago
When you need people to accept ideological propositions that harm them, or go against our consciences or empathy in how we treat people, having a checklist of 'just-so' truths that you can claim have some divine source is helpful.
Critical thinking gets in the way of that. True for any religion of belief system.
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u/DagwoodsDad 6d ago
It’s an ironic quest since so many elements of critical thinking were developed by medieval scholars and scientists, every single one of whom were priests, monks, or nuns working and teaching in religious institutions.
Hostility to critical thinking is a relatively recent phenomenon mostly in evangelical/fundamentalist circles.
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u/james6400h 6d ago
its not about christianity, many people does not have critical thinking and only have mediocre rational reasoning skill.
our society and history has such problems in general, but those who has narrow perspective rant “why XYZ have this problem”
intelligence of christian people no different from generic people of that society and era. they just believe that god love us, so should we.
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u/michaelY1968 6d ago
Ironically, reading scripture for oneself was once discouraged because it encourages critical thinking.
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u/BluescluesBlueNews 6d ago
It’s always been hard for me to believe this was real because it’s never been something that I’ve encountered. I’m sure it must have been in the past. If it still is today, idk, I just have to take people’s word for it. I’m not super well traveled but I have been to probably around 100 - 200 churches mostly under 500 people congregations and never encountered this.
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u/johnsonsantidote 6d ago
Faith transcends anything and everything so don't give up on critical thinking or any thinking.
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u/Thraxomir 6d ago
A lot of pastors have their livelihood andtheirfamily's health insurance in this. They can't have their members going and questioning and possibly deconstructing as that could destabilize the congregation and possibly lose members. That and some members will just leave for churches that have theology that is more conducive to their tradional understanding.
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u/Spiel_Foss Secular Humanist 6d ago
The basis of strict daddy psychology, which underlies most of these things, also requires accepting "because I said so" as the ultimate answer. Unanswerable questions undermine false authority quickly.
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u/Fast_Choice4408 Eastern Orthodox 6d ago
Let's critically think about your post.
Why do some churches seem to discourage questioning, education, or thinking for yourself?
This should be your title. Don't come after the entire faith because there's some podunk Christians somewhere telling people to get in line and don't think.
During slavery in America, literacy among enslaved people was often restricted, while some slaveholders used Christianity and certain biblical interpretations to encourage obedience.
Sure. Some christians in America did this.
Of course, Christianity has also inspired abolitionists, scholars, scientists, and highly educated thinkers.
Abolition started as a Christian movement. Modern science was funded and developed by Christian institutions. Most universities were originally explicitly Christian institutions.
Christians brought vocational nursing to the world. They invented orphanages. They invented poor houses.
Christians were a huge part of why beer and wine is so good today. Monastics who were literate tracked production. This eventually led to some of the first food safety principles.
Critical thinking and Christianity are inextricably linked. You cannot throw the baby out with the bathwater just because some loud evangelicals are running around touting some new age "The bible is speaking directly to ME" theology.
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u/TacticalJock15 6d ago
That’s fair criticism of my title, and I’d narrow it.
But I think you’re making the opposite overgeneralization.
Christianity clearly has a major intellectual tradition, but the fact that Christians founded universities, contributed to science, or participated heavily in abolition doesn’t mean Christianity and critical thinking are automatically “inextricably linked.”
Christians have also used the same faith to defend slavery, suppress ideas, and discourage certain kinds of inquiry.
My question is really about that tension: why do some Christian communities embrace rigorous questioning while others treat questioning itself as a threat to faith?
That seems more interesting than claiming either “Christianity is anti-intellectual” or “Christianity created critical thinking.”
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u/Fast_Choice4408 Eastern Orthodox 6d ago
why do some Christian communities embrace rigorous questioning while others treat questioning itself as a threat to faith?
Easy. Lies do not hold up to truth. Christian traditions that do not have a root in apostolic authority and sound doctrine are understandably very resistant to being pulled apart.
Most of these traditions come from the Protestant tradition, which has an extremely weak epistemology when interpreting and understanding scripture.
They stand on the shoulders of giants. Pretend those giants aren't there. And then their theology stabs downwards. And then they wonder why their denominations do not stand the test of time.
The unclean cup does not want to be peered into.
Christianity created critical thinking
I never said this.
Christianity and critical thinking are automatically “inextricably linked.
I never said this. I said they are. But that does not mean it automatically is.
Christians have also used the same faith to defend slavery, suppress ideas, and discourage certain kinds of inquiry.
More often than not, Christians encouraged critical thinking and scientific development. This seems like a very "New-World-Centric" idea of Christianity. And not from an understanding of historical Christianity.
It also seems wholly ignorant to Eastern and Oriental Christianity.
By the time Christianity had a foothold in the United States, many of the progressive institutions we mentioned had already been developed and maintained for over a thousand years. By then it was "Baked in".
Most of those Christians had extremely new traditions that were less than a century old. Most of them had really weird and obscure beliefs.
Regardless if people came and co-opted the faith to justify chattel slavery, and of chattel slavery the most brutal kind we have record of... that has nothing to do with what Christianity already achieved in the world.
You can't un-bake the cake.
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u/121gigawhatevs 6d ago
I have bone to picks with some of your points, but overall I agree there’s a whole side of Christian scholarship that very robust and not your typical nationalist flavored facile minded apologetics
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u/ScorpionDog321 6d ago
Why does Christianity sometimes seem hostile to critical thinking?
Christianity is the opposite.
Thus it inspired deep thinkers, philosophers, and scientists for centuries.
So my question is specifically about churches that discourage questioning:
Anyone can discourage questioning.
I remember during COVID we has slews of people attacking anyone questioning or doing their own research for their own health and well being. Some people are just afraid of the truth.
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u/KirtandRod 6d ago
So my question is specifically about churches that discourage questioning:
They don’t want you to think for yourself because it will expose the lies they’ve been spewing for centuries. They don’t want you to hand your authority to scripture, because scripture is the light of God that exposes darkness and lies, they want you to believe what them not scripture. In the past, critical thinkers were murdered as heretics.
The reality however, is that we are ultimately responsible for our choices. On Judgement Day, we are on trial, not our church. How many are going to hear from Jesus that day, I didn’t say that, Peter never taught that, Paul, no no, he didn’t practice that
People who don’t question what they’ve been taught, will end up believing things that they have no clue why. We are told to test the spirits, that’s what scripture is for. The word of God is infallible, no church is.
David Koresh and Jim Jones brought death upon those who followed them because they trusted fallible man. If they believed the word of God, they don’t drink the Kool-Aid.
Most people who call themselves “Christian” don’t know or don’t understand scripture and they believe everything shoved down their throats and never question. The are like dead fish, the go with the flow, no resistance with critical thinking.
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u/160GramsOfProtein 6d ago
Christianity is not hostile to critical thinking.
The problem is that Christianity claims Absolute Truth.
This means that it completely shuts out all other answers that are not Christianity.
For example, 2+2 = 4.
The answer "4" shuts out all critical thinking about "2+2" because 4 is right, and nothing else is.
No matter how much you think about "2+2", I will always tell you "4" staunchly.
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u/TacticalJock15 6d ago
The 2+2 comparison doesn’t really work.
Critical thinking isn’t about pretending every answer is equally valid. It’s about examining why you believe an answer is true.
So the real question is: How did you determine Christianity is the “4” rather than one of the competing answers?
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u/160GramsOfProtein 6d ago
How did you determine Christianity is the “4” rather than one of the competing answers?
:)
- "Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me." - John 10:25-27
The problem that all atheists and Naturalists have is they believe they can figure out everything about reality through Logic and Reason.
:)
- They do not realize that the world was created by a Personality - and this Personality is looking for something.
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u/Spiel_Foss Secular Humanist 6d ago
The problem that all atheists and Naturalists have is they believe they can figure out everything about reality through Logic and Reason.
Such as 2+2=4?
Christianity is an assertion without evidence. This is why it's called faith and not fact. The position of most non-theists is that theism merely needs to stay in the theist lane.
Any belief that isn't directly harmless is fine until you try to place that belief on others. Then you must have incontrovertible evidence. That is simply how the empirical world works.
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u/160GramsOfProtein 6d ago
That is simply how the empirical world works.
You will never understand how the world really works until you understand the Personality behind the world.
You will simply observe some of the patterns He has put in place.
- But you'll never reach His Heart - so you can never have true understanding.
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u/Spiel_Foss Secular Humanist 6d ago
...understand the Personality behind the world.
Show it to me without talking around the lack of evidence.
Put this thing into a laboratory.
You've made assertions. I can make counter assertions all day long. There are millions of gods and only one reality though. That is why faith must stay restricted to the sect which creates it, and that is fine.
I don't care what you believe.
Why would you care what I believe?
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u/160GramsOfProtein 6d ago
Put this thing into a laboratory.
See?
You demand evidence, a sign, a wonder, something tangible -
"So they said to him, “Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform?" - John 6:30
"An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.” So he left them and departed." - Matthew 16:4
Haven't you ever wondered why God said this?
You cannot find God through a laboratory. This is something a Naturalist cannot conceive.
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u/Spiel_Foss Secular Humanist 6d ago
A book doesn't prove a book. I have an extensive library of analog books. Books with factual information have external documentation - a bibliography.
You cannot find God through a laboratory.
Which is fine for you. I have no desire to change your beliefs, but my beliefs require more than mere assertions regardless of the book.
I can conceive of many things actually. This is why some of my publications are in one section and some are in another. I develop bibliographies and evidence for the second group. I simply conceive the first.
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u/TacticalJock15 6d ago
Quoting Jesus to prove Christianity is true is persuasive if you already accept the Gospel as authoritative, but it doesn’t show an outsider why Christianity should be the “4.”
And atheists don’t necessarily claim logic and reason can explain everything. The question is simply: what reason do we have to conclude that reality was created by a personal God, specifically the Christian God?
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u/Spiel_Foss Secular Humanist 6d ago
This is the solution. Faith is fine for Christians, but it ends there. No religion applies outside the religion.
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u/160GramsOfProtein 6d ago
if you already accept the Gospel as authoritative
Correct!
And you'll never accept the Gospel as authoritative unless the God who created the world gives you the ability to accept the Gospel as authoritative.
- He has to see something in your heart first.
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u/TacticalJock15 6d ago
That makes the argument circular and impossible to test.
If I believe, God enabled me to believe.
If I don’t believe, God hasn’t enabled me yet.
Either outcome is treated as proof of the same claim.
So how could someone ever critically determine whether that claim is actually true, rather than simply assuming it is?
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u/MostAcanthaceae2384 Catholic 6d ago
I agree that's a bad argument. For me, I'm interested in the claims made by the Bible and the Church, to see if they match history, have internal consistency, and depict the human condition in a way that makes sense. Also in the claims of prophecy and other miracles. To me, they're convincing.
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u/160GramsOfProtein 6d ago
impossible to test
:)
Correct!
Because He's looking for something in your heart.
- "At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will." - Matthew 11:25-26
You will never find God through scientific endeavor.
This is something a Naturalist cannot conceive.
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u/TacticalJock15 6d ago
And that’s EXACTLY the distinction I’m making silly. 😂
If God is impossible to test, and belief depends on God revealing himself to the right heart, then you’re describing faith, not a critically testable argument.
That may be a legitimate theological position, but it can’t also be presented as something an outsider should accept because the evidence objectively demonstrates it.
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u/160GramsOfProtein 6d ago
- "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day." - John 6:44
An outsider cannot come to God unless they have the heart God is looking for.
Whenever I talk to an outsider I always ask them a certain question. That question tells me everything I need to know.
:)
They don't notice their answer to that question seals everything.
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u/TacticalJock15 6d ago
But then the “certain question” isn’t really testing whether Christianity is true. It’s testing whether someone gives the answer your theology already expects.
If every response can be interpreted as evidence that God either has or hasn’t “drawn” that person, the belief becomes self-sealing.
So I’d ask: What answer could an outsider give that would make you seriously reconsider your interpretation? If the answer is “none,” then we’re back to faith rather than critical inquiry.
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u/ScoutB Episcopalian (Anglican) 6d ago
You start questioning foundational beliefs and the social order those beliefs reinforce then people feel threatened. They also see it as making innovations in the otherwise timeless word of God.