Words can be awfully clumsy.
Think of it. All we have are words to use when talking about words! It can be difficult to describe things clearly, due to the different ways different people understand the same words. Sometimes, we can be totally convinced another is dead wrong, when really, we've been in agreement and have been talking about the same thing, only using different words. It can be frustrating when trying to explain things of great importance.
Not being able to describe something in words does not mean it is not real. Since we have more senses than one, common experiences can easily defy explanation.
Can you tell me how salt tastes?
What is the actual difference between left and right?
How does good music sound?
Can you draw a picture of the smell of a flower?
Insisting on personally acceptable verbal explanation is not a good determinant of truth and error. Insisting on one's sense of vision as the only way to verify truth is absurd. Some unwittingly imply that they are omniscient, by believing that if they haven't seen something, it cannot be. Ironically, this assumption of omniscience is made without a single shred of evidence in its favor.
I consider it among the most egregious hubris to hold such an attitude.
"If someone can't give me an explanation I am willing to accept, then that other person must be wrong."
"If I haven't seen it, it does not exist."
This attitude is no way to seek growth in light and truth.
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My studies at a Jesuit institution have refreshingly put me in contact with lots of good people who practice good conversation through respectful dialogue. From them I've been given succinct words to crystallize my own beliefs regarding the search for knowledge from others by thoughtful discussion. The following are principles of an Ignatian conversation, recorded by Ignatius of Loyola, a Spanish priest who established the Catholic order known as the Society of Jesus, whose members are known as Jesuits. These principles help guide seekers of truth through the Jesuit way of reflective learning:
Be slow to speak.
Listen attentively.
Seek the truth in what others are saying.
Disagree humbly, respectfully and thoughtfully.
Allow the conversation the time it needs.
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As a kid, I liked the 1997 Warner Brothers' film, Contact, based on Carl Sagan's novel of the same name. To me, it was an exciting story about receiving a radio message from aliens far from Earth. These aliens share information on how to build a machine to take a person out into space, allowing them to see marvelous things before safely returning them to Earth.
Beginning college in Oklahoma after missionary service in California, I was in a video store looking for something good to watch. I saw Contact on the shelf and remembered it from my childhood. I looked at the back and saw its PG rating, which was a very welcome sight in my search for a wholesome movie among so much filth. I rented it.
Coming from many of the same people who brought Forrest Gump to life, it is a well-made movie. Yet, at the time I rediscovered it, it was so much more than I remembered! Not only a fascinating science fiction story about intelligent aliens and space travel, more importantly, it bore an enormously satisfying moral lesson regarding the search for truth, about which I had spent all my strength working to teach others in California over the preceding two years.
If you, like me, enjoy finding precious nuggets of spiritual knowledge and wisdom in every location they can be found, please watch this movie! The very theme of the movie is finding important lessons in messages from higher intelligences, with an interesting contrast between those who insist on their own understanding of empirical evidence, logic and science, and those who value spiritual communications from divine sources, in addition to good logic. The movie is about many people's uneasiness with the relationship between "science" and "religion."
In the story a young scientist, Ellie, becomes fascinated by the pursuit of contact with aliens, based on her belief that there are millions of other intelligent civilizations in our galaxy. Her use of a radio leads her to intensify her search for answers to the great questions of her soul following the death of her father. Her spiritual yearnings are unmet in many of the conventional methods used to placate the typical mourner.
Ellie's heart is hardened as she rejects any help from religious teachers to explain her loss or her place in the universe. She dedicates her life in seeking to use the best scientific instruments available to bring in all the eternal knowledge she craves.
In her relentless pursuit of truth, she insists on things being given to her according to her mathematical scientific reasoning.
The universe delivers in a big way. She gets the very experience she wants, but in a way that greatly humbles her. Her descriptions of the experience defy the expectations of earthbound skeptics, who doubt the reality of the journey despite the adamant testimony of the lone traveler. As the sole witness to the excursion, Ellie returns without any convincing evidence the journey even took place, beyond her word only. Much of the humility gained is because of her inability to adequately share the experience with anyone else beyond a retelling of the events.
The story starkly illustrates the fact that what we call "science" and what is known as "religion" are not separated by any unconquerable gulf, nor are they entangled in insurmountable conflict, but instead can provide opposing complimentary witnesses to truth. Faith is a principle of action and of power. It applies to science as well as spirituality. Ellie is willing to die for her convictions that guide her pursuit.
Her belief that there are many civilizations out there waiting to make contact is based only on her application of mathematics and probability, based on the faith gained by the plainly evident reality of life on earth as she sees it before her. Her drive towards discovery is as much a leap of faith as any of the more spiritual voices around her, some clamoring in a violent frenzy for vindication.
I encourage you to watch this movie with the following ideas in mind.
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Truth reflects upon our senses, and when it does, knowledge is the result. The way truth is made manifest can vary from person to person, according to the diligence and heed they give to the truth they are willing to receive. We have more than the five commonly cited bodily senses. In addition to sight, smell, taste, touch and sound, which are the hallmarks for scientific observation, we have spiritual senses. These are less easily defined but are just as real and just as reliable, if properly developed through practice. It's unfortunate that many in the world take little thought or have had little encouragement or guidance in developing these spiritual senses. Truth reflecting upon these spiritual senses gives knowledge as surely as that given by physical observation. In fact, it's actually more sure than knowledge imparted by way of bodily senses.
A scientist may perform an experiment and document the results. The published findings can be scrutinized by others, who choose to accept the findings as good science based on their analysis. Some few may choose to do so, but not every scientist personally performs every experiment. The truths found through this scientific inquiry are established, nevertheless. So it is in spiritual matters as well, though so easily dismissed by their not appearing strictly "scientific" from the outside looking in.
One example is the assertion that the existence of God has been proven scientifically. People have observed God with their own eyes in real experience. They have written their accounts. We can study their words. Is this not science? Is this not how journals and other publications disseminate scientific knowledge to those who don't actually have to repeat the same experiences to share in and benefit from the knowledge gained?
Non-religious faith is used all the time in the world. You might ask a nonbelieving friend why they follow their GPS to places they've never been. Why do they have such confidence they will get where they need to go? Have they seen the satellites transmitting the data to their smartphone? Have they seen the radio signals carrying that data? If they just roll their eyes, press them to explain why they so openly trust in that technology. Help them to see how faith in spiritual matters operates in the same way.
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Sadly, our weakness in expressing ideas is usually what causes misunderstandings that lead to conflict. In a war of words, or tumult of opinions, we do well when we slow down, remembering that another's experience—expressed in words we assume to know as well as they do—is valid. This doesn't mean everything others say is true or complete, but it does mean we ought to listen when someone is telling us something they hold in importance. What they hold to be true is valid to that person because it accords with the logic and truth afforded to that individual believer, regardless of whether it is actually true according to another's knowledge.
Now, an important caution. This openness to listening may easily be twisted into the pernicious fallacy described by labeling things as one's own truth, independent of absolute truth.
"My truth, your truth..."
Have you heard these descriptions? They are inaccurate. What is often called "my truth" is better labeled as "my belief," or occasionally may properly be "my knowledge."
Truth is truth. No matter who believes it, truth is truth. No matter how it is discovered, truth is truth. No matter how it is labeled, truth is truth. Truth does not change. Truth does not need to be believed. In fact, truth doesn't care if anyone believes it. Even if no one believes it, truth is still truth.
Of course, the ultimate source of truth is God. All truth is independent. Things that are true are true because they are true, and not because of anything outside the truth itself. Regardless of anything one chooses to see as evidence for or against it, truth is truth. (Doc. & Cov. 93: 24-40)
Insisting on personally acceptable verbal explanation is not a good determinant of truth and error.
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See these videos, first from a scientist who applies different methods to discovering and applying truth, and the other from an Apostle of Jesus Christ:
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Experiment Upon the Word
The most scientific I can be in spiritual matters is to recommend a simple experiment. This experiment is testable, repeatable and observable, but it's only shareable by encouraging each inquirer to repeat the experiment for themself. It is impossible to adequately share the experience with another. As with any experiment, the conditions must be met. Flippantly saying one has performed the experiment without seeing the results others have received indicates the conditions were not actually satisfied, and the test ought to be repeated with those conditions carefully in mind.
What is the experiment?
It is to receive the Book of Mormon: to read it, study it, and live by its teachings. Then to pray to God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, and ask if the Book of Mormon is the word of God. The conditions to be met are that the inquirer must have faith in Christ, and real intent. They must really intend to act in accordance with the knowledge they are poised to gain. Those who pursue this course and ask in faith will gain a testimony of the truth of the Book by the power of the Holy Ghost. They will learn that they can apply this same experiment to anything claiming to be true, to seek God's pure intelligence regarding its truthfulness. (Moroni 10: 3-8)
I am grateful for the teachings of Joseph Smith regarding the influence of the Holy Ghost. One thing he taught, paraphrased, is that the Holy Ghost can give sudden strokes of ideas, and the effect is to be enlightened by pure intelligence. (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, compiled by Joseph Fielding Smith, p. 151)
This pure intelligence flowing into us defies human language. Complete understanding can be achieved in a moment, which would take hours to clumsily define or explain using words. The pure intelligence offered by the inspiration of God the Holy Ghost is really the only knowledge one can claim as their own, since everything else, we claim merely by our bodily senses or on the word of another. Rather, speaking with God through spiritual communication conveys real truth, sinking deeply into our immortal spirits. It is not a sermon or lecture. It dives underneath all the sophistications or eloquence of language and delivers real truth right where it counts. Unfiltered through human senses, truth can flow directly from Spirit to spirit in purity. (See Deuteronomy 32: 7)
The Lord once whispered these words clearly to me:
"In matters of doctrine, seek ye pure fountains of living water."
Drink deeply.
See also:
The Candle of the Lord, by Boyd K. Packer
What Is True? by Russell M. Nelson
Pure Truth, Pure Doctrine, and Pure Revelation, by Russell M. Nelson
Receiving a Testimony of Light and Truth, by Dieter F. Uchtdorf
To Acquire Spiritual Guidance, by Richard G. Scott
Our Creator's Cosmos, by Neal A. Maxwell