Miracle Realism
I’ve talked with God before about the problem some fundamentalists have with magic, how they think that it’s the devil’s work but that miracles are different. We talked some more about it this week and I think I’ve hit upon the difference, the thing that qualitatively separates miracles and magic.
The big picture distinction is, well, miracles come from God and magic comes from anything else that’s sentient. Magic comes from humans and elves and fairies and leprechauns and so on. You might notice there that pretty much everything in that sentence is except humans is made up. There really aren’t elves and fairies and such, and there really isn’t magic. But if we ignore that magic is made up or just plain faked, we get down to the distinction being that magic comes from humans and miracles come from God.
Ah, but haven’t the saints all performed miracles? And so then, don’t miracles come from humans? Well, if you’re going to take that position then there’s no distinction I can find, a miracle is just magic and then the whole Christian mythos ceases to have anything to say on the matter.
So what is it that makes humans something other than just another animal, from a Christian point of view. It’s free will. God gave us souls so that we could exercise free will and be something more than just parts of her. So there’s the distinction, magic is an exercise of free will and miracles are an exercise of God’s will.
So are the Christians secretly opposed to free will? Looking at the politics that the Christian leaders support, there’s certainly evidence to support the notion but I hate to saddle all Christians with the baggage of their leaders. So, I’d just like to say, I’d like to see more people thinking for themselves, more people not blindly following what they’re told should be their faith. I think we’ve had enough miracles to get us by, but the world could use a little more magic.
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