Unbelievable? | Refuting Atheist Coronavirus Memes

Justin Brierly interviews Dr. Craig about popular atheist memes concerning the Coronavirus.

JUSTIN BRIERLY:  Well, I´m joined now by William Lane Craig of Reasonable Faith. It´s an International Organization, which is really about helping to defend the Christian worldview and he’s published many books, spoken, debated, and has a popular podcast as well and many, many videos online too. Bill, thank you very much for joining me on the program today.

DR. CRAIG: Certainly, good to be with you Justin.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: Just tell me first of all Bill, what´s life in lockdown looking like for you and Jan at the moment? Have things changed much for you since the restrictions came into play?

CRAIG: Well, I have to say I almost feel guilty that it’s had so little impact upon my life. I typically spend every day in my study, from morning until evening, writing and reading and that´s what I´ve continued to do. I have had to cancel three speaking engagements, that would’ve required travel; but apart from that, this has been a very productive time for me, in writing my book on the historical Adam. So, I suspect that people like artists, writers, composers, artisans, who normally are sequestered in their study, or studio or workshop don’t experience a great deal of disruption and that´s certainly been the case for me.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: Are you missing though being able to meet with church people on a Sunday? And obviously you run your Defenders classes as well on a Sunday.

DR. CRAIG:  That is one major difference, yes. We are no longer meeting for Defenders. But, in this digital age I am still teaching Defenders every Sunday. We are podcasting it. So, I record the lesson and we livestream it at the normal time, and then post the video as well and lately we’ve even added a hymn, which we normally sing in class but now we have the music and the words on the screen, and so even Defenders class is going forward. We are very fortunate with Reasonable Faith being a web-based, virtual ministry all of its activities are going forward pretty much.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: That´s great to hear. In a way, what would you say of the opportunities that this particular period enforces on people? This lockdown, for lot of people that simply means that are home a lot more than they used to be, probably online a lot more than they might normally be. What opportunities does that present to evangelists and apologists who want to see this time used for good?

DR. CRAIG: Well of course, we hope that it will make people more reflective. It´s very sobering to think that you might die. As an older American myself, I´m supposedly at higher risk, though I have no underlying conditions, and I´m very healthy. But, it is a sobering thought to think: “Gee, this could be the way I come and end, through something like this.” And so, I hope that makes people more reflective, about the ultimate meaning and purpose of their existence and to think about the big questions. I also think this is a wonderful opportunity for Christians and others to do more reading. This a great time to get those books that you’ve always wanted to read and to spend a few hours a day in study. So, I would encourage folks to really use this time to better themselves intellectually through reading some good books.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: Let’s talk a little bit about some of the specific apologetic issues that this sort of issue raises. Inevitably, a lot of people are going to be asking the question at this point: why does God allow something like coronavirus to suddenly change everything? why has God allowed a world, in which a virus can run rampant in this kind of way? It’s the classic problem of suffering, but in this case, it’s a specific type of suffering, it´s one to some extent could be argued, is not necessarily because of human freedom that we see the coronavirus having its impact. It’s part of nature if you like. So where would you begin with that kind of a question, Bill?

CRAIG: Well, I’ve tried hard to find some philosophical insight from this pandemic, but quite honestly Justin, it really doesn’t add anything new. We already have abundant examples of horrible evils in the world to choose from to illustrate this problem, and so, there’s not a whole lot really new here that adds to what has already been said. I think in this case, we probably have suffering that it is the fusion of both natural evil and moral evil. Because although the pandemic is caused by a virus. It seems that human factors were involved in its initial careless handling in that laboratory in Wuhan, China, that may have resulted in its being unintentionally released into the world. So, there’s both the human factor and the natural factor involved.

As I reflect on it, it seems to me that one of the things that we might take away from this, is that it illustrates so well the point that I´ve often made in response to the problem of evil: that do to our cognitive limitations, we are simple not in a position to judge with any sort of confidence the probability of God’s having morally sufficient reasons for permitting the suffering to occur.

I often pointed out, that seemly trivial events in history can be amplified to have worldwide repercussions. So, that we have no idea whatsoever why a certain event might have been permitted by God to occur. And, if indeed it’s correct that this virus was unleashed on the world through the careless handling of a lab technician in Wuhan, this illustrates so well the fact that a seemly solitary, trivially event can have truly worldwide repercussions as it is amplified. And we don’t even know the reason for the missteps that led to this lab technician’s mistake. Was he distracted that day? Was there something on his mind that caused him to be careless? We don’t know, but I think we can see from this illustration that seemly trivial, tiny events can really have worldwide repercussions and, that ought to make us very cautious about saying of any particular evil or suffering that God cannot have, or that it’s improbable that he has morally sufficient reasons for allowing it to occur.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: I must confess Bill, I´m not as familiar as you appear to be with this suggestion that it may have been a laboratory that was responsible for the outbreak, in the first instance. So just for my benefit, as much as anything, what’s the information that you’ve been hearing about this?

CRAIG: Well, this is what we are hearing in the news here in the States these days, that it seems, and of course this is uncertain, it seems probable that the virus was the result of mishandling of experimental viruses or diseases by a laboratory worker in Wuhan, who became infected unknown to himself, took it home to his girlfriend, infected her and thence it has spread. And now it has affected the entire world. It is really stunning if this is in fact...

JUSTIN BRIERLY: As opposed to the prevailing theory that I’d understood which is that it was transferred from bats to humans through potentially on unhygienic conditions in a Wuhan market. But I suppose, we will wait to see exactly what the source was.

CRAIG: Yes. This all needs to be settled out, doesn't it?

The stories that I’ve heard most recently was that it was political to try to blame it on the Wuhan market, rather than on this laboratory that was handling various diseases, but we will see.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: We will see. And there will be a lot of investigation, I imagine, into where exactly the blame lies, if anywhere. I suppose ultimately what we are seeing though is that, very often, the natural evils that do exist in the world are often exacerbated by our human freedoms, the way we choose to respond.

So, I can think for instance, you know, earthquakes typically are a natural evil. But they affect those in developing countries far worse than in the West, because of the disparity of resources and infrastructure and so on. So, there is a degree to which human freedom isn’t out of the picture when it comes to these issues.

CRAIG: No, I think that natural and moral evil are just inextricably intertwined in our experience. And if I might say one other thing that occurred to me as I thought about this. I´ve noticed a lot of snarky comments on the web and social media from unbelievers criticizing believers for taking precautions to protect themselves with regard to the virus. They say: don’t they trust in God? I thought they believed that God was in control; This shows they don’t really believe; they’re just like us, unbelievers, in taking these precautions.

And I think, that is just opening yourself up to a sucker punch from the problem of evil. Because the lesson of the problem of evil is that God doesn’t exempt Christians from suffering in this world. We of all people ought to know that because we follow a crucified savior, who was innocently tortured and executed. So, this idea that Christians ought not to take precautions but trust in God, it’s just extremely naïve. Every time we wear seatbelts or are careful getting out of the shower on to the wet floor, we take precautions because we know God has established a world that operates according to natural laws, and that he’s not going to preferentially exempt us from the consequences of those laws.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: And you know that those skeptics, would equally be quick to blame the Christians if they didn't take precautions. So, you can´t win either way, can you?

CRAIG: No, you can’t. That’s really true. (Dr. Craig laughs)

JUSTIN BRIERLY: I mean, going back… you've responded to many an atheist internet meme in your time Bill, but another one that I’ve seen during the rounds whenever I’ve posted content of my channels from atheists is: a picture of Jesus pouring a vile of, you know, some sort of virus unto the world and saying: “Now I´m just going to add a little bit of coronavirus into the mix.” And there is this sense that many people have this idea of a God who essentially some sort of sadist. Willing these acts to happen and for pain and misery to occur. How do you best answer that? What is the best picture of how we see God despite these kinds of the events and circumstances?

CRAIG: I think we emphasize, that according to the Bible, God´s overall purpose for the human race is to lovingly and freely bring them into an eternal saving relationship with himself.

This life is not all there is, and therefore the purpose of life is not happiness in this life. Rather God’s goal for human history is too freely bring men and women into an eternal love relationship with himself, and that is an incommensurable good.  Not simply because it’s eternal and everlasting, but because God is himself infinite goodness and love, and so to be a personal relationship with the infinite good is incomparable. When God permits horrible suffering in this life, it is only with a view toward accomplishing his ultimate purposes, which is to bring people freely into relationship with an incommensurable good, that far outweighs the shortcomings of this finite existence.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: What comfort can we give nevertheless for those who are feeling the sting of the pain and the suffering? For those who either themselves or have close ones who are suffering from this virus, or the knock-on effects economically and so on… of what it may mean for jobs and so on? What would be your advice, at a pastoral level I suppose, for people?

CRAIG: I think here, the resurrection of Jesus which we just celebrated at Easter time is the basis for our future hope. The apostle Paul says that even though our outer nature is wasting away, nevertheless we have this hope of glory beyond all comparison to what we suffer here, and that is not pie in the sky. It is grounded in the historical Resurrection of Jesus from the dead who was the forerunner on our behalf. That even I think, as I’ve argued, is historically credible and well attested and provides a solid basis for hope for the future even in the face of the terrible limitations and suffering of our finite existence on this planet.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: I’ve often felt that pain and suffering, as much as for some people it tends to make them, drive them away from God or to blame God, for others it actually causes them to draw close to God. And as C. S. Lewis famously said: Pain is God’s megaphone to rouse a deaf world. How do you hope that God may yet use this situation to draw people to himself? Do you see that happening even now?

CRAIG: Oh, I think what you just said is very true Justin, and can actually be, I think, empirically demonstrated. When you read a mission’s handbook about the growth rates of Christianity round the world, what do you find over and over again, is that in countries that have suffered terrible natural and moral evils, countries like Ethiopia, El Salvador, Indonesia, China and so forth, the growth rates of evangelical Christianity are multiple times the population growth rate. Whereas in the comfortable, indulgent, materialistic nations of Western Europe and North America, there the growth rates are basically flat. So that, as one person pointed out to me, it’s almost as though God has disfavored these comfortable Western nations by not allowing them to suffer in the way that much of the world suffers.

So, I think you’re quite right. When there is terrible suffering in our lives it does prompt us to turn to God for a source of comfort and hope. But when things are easy going for us, then we tend to be forgetful of God. So, as you say it’s a kind of “Heads I win, tails you lose” situation. If things are going well, people don’t think they need God. If things are going bad, then they blame God. What’s God supposed to do?

JUSTIN BRIERLY: I suppose my hope in this, and I don’t know what yours might be Bill, is that the church would be ready, and Christians would be ready to meet people where they are, as they experience these questions. Because for many people, I’ve noticed just it in my own social media timeline and as we broadcast services online and so on, lots of people that I wasn’t expecting to be watching and to be looking for some kind of hope appear to be suddenly searching. How can churches and Christians be ready, I suppose, in these uncertain times to make sure that we don’t miss what God may be asking us to do right now?

CRAIG: Well, I think we need to be equipped with good answers. 1st Peter tells us that we should always be ready with an answer for those who ask us a reason for the hope that is in us. So, we need to talk about the problem of evil and try to understand how one might rationally respond to it. But then what you just said Justin, also brings another very important thing to the fore and that is, that Christians themselves are deeply involved in the social response to those suffering from this virus.

Organizations like Samaritan’s Purse are building clinics, staffing the hospitals, going to nursing homes and helping those who are shut in there. All I think around the country and probably around the world, Christians are engaged in meeting the medical and economic needs of people. And that hands-on kind of Christianity, that tangible demonstration of the love of God for people, I think is a powerful witness to the truth of the Gospel.

JUSTIN BRIERLY: Well we can pray obviously, that it will be an opportunity for many people to be introduced, perhaps for the first time to a God who is there, even in difficult circumstances. Sometimes it is those circumstances that force us to seek that God out. But for now, thank you very much Bill.

Bless you and Jan as you continue in your ministry.

We look forward to hopefully seeing you in person at some point once restrictions are lifted again.

Craig: I would love that. I would very much like to be back in the UK again. So, all the best Justin. Stay safe and keep up the good work.