Can we know God is real?

Abstract

This article focuses on whether Christian faith has the status of knowledge or is something less than that. I argue that it is, indeed, knowledge whenever some significant cluster of Christian beliefs is experienced as self-evident and that cluster includes or presupposes God’s reality. Whenever that happens those beliefs are justified and so count as knowledge, not blind trust. This conclusion is not, however, presented as a proof of God’s existence. In fact, I argue that God’s existence cannot be proven – though it can be known. Nor am I assuming that knowledge must be defined as justified true belief. I take knowledge to be justified belief, and argue here that the experience of a belief’s self-evidence counts as justification.