Isn’t that what makes the religious suspect to the non-religious?
Erin Straza writing for Patheos’ Evangenlical Channel, Christ and Culture section:
Our search for evidence of the transcendent is well documented throughout history. From the Shroud of Turin to the image of Mary on toast, the human heart longs for connection to the divine. This desire was the basis for Tide’s Super Bowl commercial “Miracle Stain,” in which a football fanatic slops salsa on his jersey and sees the image of Joe Montana. The jersey is enshrined, drawing the masses to pay homage to the miracle at the newly developed Montanaland… until the jersey gets laundered with Tide, thereby removing every trace of the stain—and the divine.
Isn’t that what makes the religious suspect to the non-religious? Some may see a parallel between the football fanatic and Christians. Perhaps some people think that Christian faith is no more substantial than a salsa stain. But are other pursuits, such as football or power or good deeds, any different? This humorous, clever TV spot speaks to our heart’s tendency to turn our passions into near-religious devotion. But not all faith objects are made equal. Some are easily washed away; others stand the test of time, and eternity.
You did notice, as Russ Breault did yesterday, the final message in the ad? Is the message about soap or what?
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Is the Shroud real? Probably.
The Shroud of Turin may be the real burial cloth of Jesus. The carbon dating, once seemingly proving it was a medieval fake, is now widely thought of as suspect and meaningless. Even the famous Atheist Richard Dawkins admits it is controversial. Christopher Ramsey, the director of the Oxford Radiocarbon Laboratory, thinks more testing is needed. So do many other scientists and archeologists. This is because there are significant scientific and non-religious reasons to doubt the validity of the tests. Chemical analysis, all nicely peer-reviewed in scientific journals and subsequently confirmed by numerous chemists, shows that samples tested are chemically unlike the whole cloth. It was probably a mixture of older threads and newer threads woven into the cloth as part of a medieval repair. Recent robust statistical studies add weight to this theory. Philip Ball, the former physical science editor for Nature when the carbon dating results were published, recently wrote: “It’s fair to say that, despite the seemingly definitive tests in 1988, the status of the Shroud of Turin is murkier than ever.” If we wish to be scientific we must admit we do not know how old the cloth is. But if the newer thread is about half of what was tested – and some evidence suggests that – it is possible that the cloth is from the time of Christ.
No one has a good idea how front and back images of a crucified man came to be on the cloth. Yes, it is possible to create images that look similar. But no one has created images that match the chemistry, peculiar superficiality and profoundly mysterious three-dimensional information content of the images on the Shroud. Again, this is all published in peer-reviewed scientific journals.
We simply do not have enough reliable information to arrive at a scientifically rigorous conclusion. Years ago, as a skeptic of the Shroud, I came to realize that while I might believe it was a fake, I could not know so from the facts. Now, as someone who believes it is the real burial shroud of Jesus of Nazareth, I similarly realize that a leap of faith over unanswered questions is essential.
My name is Dan Porter. Please email me at DanielRobertPorter@gmail.com
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