C S Lewis on Belief and Authority

I believe it on His authority...Believing things on authority [by faith] only means believing them because you have been told them by someone you think trustworthy. Ninety‑nine percent of the things you believe are believed on authority. I believe there is such a place as New York. I have not seen it myself. I could not prove by abstract reasoning that there must be such a place. I believe it because reliable people have told me so.

--Mere Christianity, book 2, chapter 5

It is a simple but powerful observation to recognize that we take most things on faith-- or through varying degrees of faith. The extent of the faith is a function of the knowledge available to us and our expertise in interpreting knowledge and opinion from that realm.

This is certainly true with anything historical-- whether the existence of Abraham Lincoln, the divinity of Jesus Christ, or specifics about the reconstruction of our earth's history.

Brit Hume gets the Gospel

"Tiger Woods will recover as a golfer. Whether he can recover as a person I think is a very open question, and it's a tragic situation for him. I think he's lost his family, it's not clear to me if he'll be able to have a relationship with his children, but the Tiger Woods that emerges once the news value dies out of this scandal -- the extent to which he can recover -- seems to me to depend on his faith. He's said to be a Buddhist; I don't think that faith offers the kind of forgiveness and redemption that is offered by the Christian faith. So my message to Tiger would be, 'Tiger, turn to the Christian faith and you can make a total recovery and be a great example to the world.'"
Brit Hume, on "Fox News Sunday"

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