Chesterton & Three Anti-Christian Arguments

For when I look at the various anti-Christian truths, I simply discover that none of them are true,” G.K. Chesterton wrote in his common-grace, common-sense classic Orthodoxy. Chesterton goes on to describe three arguments often held by agnostics regarding the Christian faith. Here’s an excerpt:

“I discover that the true tide and force of all the facts flow the other way. Let us take cases. Many a sensible modern man must have abandoned Christianity under the pressure of three such converging convictions as these: first, that men, with their shape, structure, and sexuality, are, after all, very much like beasts, a mere variety of the animal kingdom; second, that primeval religion arose in ignorance and fear; third, that priests have blighted societies with bitterness and gloom. Those three anti-Christian arguments are very different; but they are all quite logical and legitimate; and they all converge. The only objection to them (I discover) is that they are all untrue.”

It is as though Chesterton were writing in response to contemporary secularists. To paraphrase G.K.C., the three arguments against Christianity are (1) man is merely an evolved beast (2) religion is the product of prehistoric man’s superstition (3) religion poisons society. This seems to be a necessary way of seeing religion if you are committed to a secular worldview. As Chesterton observed, the one characteristic they all share in common is that they are false.

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