“Down with the Christian church! A plague on its legalism and its bullying throughout history. And ‘hurrah’ for Voltaire, that Enlightenment literary wit who tweaked the tail of the Roman Catholic Church, and insisted that science and philosophy be free of ecclesial bullying, superstition and all things metaphysical.” Rationalism and the ‘separation of church and state’, he said, should be the basis of civilised society.

The crowd is cheering for Voltaire… but what’s this? One of those cheering in the crowd looks a lot like Jesus! Why is this?

Three reasons:

First: Just as Voltaire’s greatest critics were the clerics of his time, Jesus’ main enemies were also the religious leaders of his time.

Second: Jesus would agree that non-biblical superstitious accretions adopted by some churches deserve to be ridiculed.

Third: Rational truth makes perfect sense to Jesus, who was the one who created a rational universe that could be understood.

But in a time of quiet, I think Jesus might have had a few things to say to Voltaire – things to do with truth and integrity. 

Despite being a rationalist who claimed to champion truth, Voltaire didn’t let truth get in the way of propaganda. He was responsible for the myth that the early Christian church had fifty different gospels of Jesus’ life, before they settled on just four. Voltaire also claimed that the early church fathers were responsible for the phrase, “I believe because it is absurd” – presumably because it suited his anti-Christian rhetoric.

Jesus might reasonably say that being a rationalist did not give him the mandate to tell outright lies. By lying, he was displaying a classic symptom of what happens when people dismiss God – the one who fundamentally guarantees what truth is.

Voltaire’s scurrilous accusations against French royalty earned him an eleven-month stint in the Bastille, and his intemperate language also resulted in him spending some time in exile in England.

Voltaire’s morality was certainly rubbery. He became distressingly anti-Semitic in his latter years… and he conducted a 16-year-long affair with Émilie du Châtelet, a highly intelligent, unabashed free spirit who – remarkably for her time – was a distinguished scientist. (Émilie was responsible for translating Newton’s Principia into French.)

There have been occasions when the institutional church has engaged in unconscionable behaviour in direct contradiction to the life and teaching of Jesus. It has to be said that whenever the Christian church has been institutionalised and wedded to the monarchy, it has become corrupted by power and greed. However, when it has behaved in an authentically Christian way, it has been beautiful. It has provided legal civility, hospital care, education and social welfare to millions.

If you only commit to human-centred rationalism, it will be impossible for you to believe in anything bigger than yourself. This will inevitably lead to rubbery ethics, a sense of meaninglessness and the deification of self.

But I am not advocating an anti-rational faith. A rational God has created a rational universe designed to point people to him. Christianity is not ‘anti-rational’; it is ‘rationality AND’… Therefore, think big and seek God. Embrace more in your mind than yourself.