Is there truly a higher power?

MICHELLE MARR

Comedian Steve Martin once answered the question “Does God Exist?” in

an essay by the same name. First published in “The New Yorker

Magazine,” in 1998, it is written from the perspective of a talking

horse named Toby.

“Being a talking horse leaves me with plenty of time to ponder

these big issues,” Toby said.

Like so much Martin produces, the essay is very funny -- and

equally irreverent.

A few moments into pondering the essay’s title question, Toby the

talking horse suggests, “Ask yourself this: Do I really need to know

the answer to this question?” He is confident, he tells the reader,

“if you are honest with yourself, you will realize that a

yea-or-neigh answer wouldn’t really change your life much. Although a

neigh might free up a lot of time now spent worshipping.”

A new Public Broadcasting Services website and a recently

broadcast four-hour program, both called “The Question of God,”

would, respectfully, disagree.

Based on a book written by Armand M. Nicholi, Jr., a psychiatrist

and associate clinical professor of psychiatry at Harvard University

Medical School and the Massachusetts General Hospital, the website

and the broadcast contends with many of the questions my psychology

101 class tangled with 30-some years ago and similar classes still

grapple with today: Who am I? How did I get here? What is the purpose

for my life?

It also debates some questions psychology classes typically demur

on: Why is there so much pain and suffering in the world? Why is

death inevitable? Is there such a thing as evil? Does God really

exist?

With “The Question of God,” the answers begin with a supposition,

prominently posted on the home page of the website: “How each of us

understands the meaning of life comes down to how we answer one

ultimate question: Does God really exist?”

Both the website and the television program, which is available on

video and DVD, is based on Nicholi’s book, “The Question of God: C.S.

Lewis and Sigmund Freud Debate God, Love, Sex, and the Meaning of

Life,” which grew out of a seminar he began to teach at Harvard

University in 1967. Nicholi has taught the course each semester

since.

It began as a course strictly on Freud but Nicholi’s students soon

complained that it was unbalanced since it represented only Freud’s

strictly materialist-humanist point of view.

It occurred to Nicholi, who had read Lewis’ book “The Problem of

Pain” while he was a surgical intern, that there might not be any

better counterbalance to Freud than Lewis.

In an interview for https://www. beliefnet.com, Nicholi said, “I

noticed this astounding parallelism. Freud raises an argument, Lewis

attempts to answer it, as if they’re standing at a podium arguing

back and forth.”

Sigmund Freud was a life-long, militant atheist, who not only did

not believe in God but also assailed religious beliefs as childish at

best or “mass delusions” at worst. He insisted such beliefs could

hold no credence for an intelligent, rational adult’s mind.

C.S. Lewis, an Oxford-trained literary scholar, critic and don,

was himself a long-time atheist. He likely shared the views of Freud,

who, with his theories on human behavior, had greatly influenced

literary criticism in the early 1900s.

But Lewis, unlike Toby the talking horse, could not glibly shrug

off the question of God’s existence. Instead, he diligently studied

it through the disciplines of philosophy, literary criticism, history

and anthropology and, around the age of 30, he made what he called a

transition, from the worldview of an atheist to that of a Christian.

“The Question of God” allows the two men, long after their deaths,

to debate their opposing points of view in their own words, deftly

drawn from their writings by Nicholi.

The broadcast combines dramatizations of Freud’s and Lewis’ lives

with interviews with historians and biographers as well as

fascinating round-table discussions moderated by Nicholi.

These discourses include a range of contemporary thought from

seven participants, some of whom believe in God and others who don’t,

including Michael Shermer, who is the editor-in-chief of Skeptic

Magazine and director of the Skeptics Society; author Winifred

Gallagher; Douglas Holladay, a general partner at Park Avenue Equity

Partners, LP.; Louis Massiah, an independent documentary filmmaker

and journalist; and three others, a practicing physician, Jungian

analyst and attorney;

Several months ago, Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ” was

being hailed as the best evangelistic tool to come down the pike in a

very long time. And while I have followed up on that conviction only

very casually, evangelistically, the film seems not to have been all

it was expected be.

While it may not convert a soul any more than Gibson’s film, for

anyone who wishes to better understand his or her own Christian

faith, for anyone who wishes to unfold that faith for others who are

unfamiliar with it, “The Question of God” might provide a better

means.

It could also make it easier for anyone who has always believed in

God to better comprehend the rational of those who don’t.

The website contains the transcripts of the four-hour program, and

some video, along with a comprehensive discussion guide, downloadable

as a PDF file, and vastly more, including the full version of

Martin’s essay, “Does God Exist?”

Whether you answer the question proposed by Toby the talking horse

with a yea or a “neigh” or an “I just don’t know,” “The Question of

God” -- the book, the program and the website -- is a remarkable

resource for anyone who cares to consider the question.

* MICHELE MARR is a freelance writer from Huntington Beach. She

can be reached at [email protected].