Sometimes you hear people ask the question, “Can’t you be a good person without believing in Christianity?” But the reason for believing in Christianity is not that it is a means to making someone “a good person”. The reason for believing in Christianity is because it is true. Yes, you can be a good person, humanly speaking, without believing in Christianity. Many non-Christians are very good people. But God wants us to be something more than just “good people”. He wants us to share his own life and joy. Being just “a good person”, compared to being what God has designed us to be, is like being a flea compared to a horse. Sometimes I wonder whether a person who asks this sort of question suspects that Christianity is true but doesn’t want to believe it. That’s not quite honest. If it is true--if God does exist, and did create us, and loves us, and sent his Son Jesus to save us from sin, and wants to take us to heaven to live with him in unimaginable happiness forever--if all this is true, then it is the most colossal truth we have ever heard. We can’t use this as a mere means to the end of “being a good person”. That would be like using the world’s greatest work of art as a paperweight. If Christianity is true, we must believe it because it is true. If it is not true, we must not believe it, even if it does make us better people. Believing in Santa Claus might make us better people, too but I don’t know any adult who believes in Santa Claus. We can’t manipulate truth for the sake of anything else. Truth is absolute.
(This reflection is based on thoughts by Peter Kreeft in his book, YOUR QUESTIONS, GOD’S ANSWERS.)
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