We’re all presups, in the sense that you use it. All of us have axioms, things we take as foundational truths to our worldview. Some of us have just adopted those from others, or inherited them from our religion, without considering them and testing them against other presuppositions.

It is your view that no consistent atheistic worldview exists. If you grant the premise that God does not exist, you would find, though, that it is quite possible to build logical arguments for morality, cosmology, etc., and there is something quite liberating about realizing, “we don’t have to know it all, we’re just funny, nearly-hairless mammals on a not-so-special rock around a not-so-special star in a particular galaxy out of hundreds of billions, why should we know it all?”

I would be the first to say that if you need medication, you should get it. I know the difference it makes in my life. Not only that, I know the difference it makes in my thinking.

I look at it the same way I do glasses. I don’t see clearly without glasses. I put glasses on, and then I do see clearly. I don’t think clearly without medication; I take it and I do think clearly. (I know that there will be some who dispute this, of course :-D )

You are correct in some respects that I can’t know for certain what my life would have been like without having gone through what I have gone through, but I do think it is possible for us to make some inferences. I most certainly do know what it is like to have gone through what I have gone through, and had I not gone through it I would not have an understanding of it. Thus, I know that what I understand now is something different from what I would have understood without these experiences.

Perhaps surprisingly, my depression is what showed me the truth of the presuppositionalist claims precisely because I think so radically different when I am depressed than from when I am feeling up. When I am depressed, little tasks look like huge mountains. I feel like I can’t do anything. I’ve intentionally made stupid decisions while depressed. For instance, one time I just didn’t pay my rent. I had the money, but it was too much work just to mail the envelope. So I never sent the rent in, and of course got a lovely notice attached to my door.

This is something that I would never do if I didn’t feel depressed. I talked with a therapist about it, and she mentioned that I should try certain techniques when I feel depressed to try to get me out of the funk. For instance, since I rationally know that it is not difficult for me to mail an envelope, when I feel depressed I should mail in my rent even when I don’t feel like it.

The problem with that is that it is only rational when I am not depressed. As soon as I become depressed, it becomes rational for me to not mail in the rent. After all, what would be the problem if I got evicted and had to live on the street? Would my life really be worse off? Etc. Thus, the very definition of what is rational changes depending on my perspectives.

This is why I am a presuppositionalist. Our presuppositions determine how we view reality, and when our presuppositions change our behavior changes too. Our thinking changes. Our very idea of “rational” changes. I have empirically experienced this. I know it for a fact. And I know that when I am not depressed, I look at the things I did when I was depressed and I say, “How stupid! I can’t believe you actually thought that was rational then!” And yet I know that I did think it was rational.

This is something that I would not be able to empirically remember had I not gone through it with depression. This has enabled me to understand that my senses do not determine reality. It has also enabled me to understand that my presuppositions could be wrong. That is why I have to look and see if they are consistent or not.

What I do know (and what I will post on later) is that my Christian presuppositions are consistent with my beliefs. I also know that when I look at the atheist position, it is inconsistent with its own beliefs. This rationality, of course, is something I see because of the perspective I have; I fully understand why atheists such as yourself do not see it the same way and, in fact, view it the exact opposite. One of us is looking at the world through the lens of “depression” and the other isn’t–or perhaps both are looking through different kinds of “depression” and something else is true (I’m using “depression” metaphorically, of course).

Anyway, I would say that all of our debating aside, if you need medication get it. It’s nothing to be embarassed about or to feel ashamed of–it’s really no different than wearing glasses. Of course, it took me some time of healing before I got to the point where I could look at my depression in that manner. But God never said life would be “easy.”

I rationally understand that God has His purpose for it. I know my atheist friends would mock me for that: How can you believe in a God who allowed you to go through so much pain? But I do. What I went through has so radically altered my life that I know I am nowhere near what I would have been had I not gone through that. And I trust that I’m better off for it than I would have been without going through it. I do that because I believe God has a purpose for everything that happens, and because I can hold to the fact that all things work together for good.

We can never know that we are better off for our pain and suffering than without it. It is an unfalsifiable faith position. We can never know “what might have been”. We can never know whether or not God has purposes for those things, we can only believe…

Yes, sometimes I hate God for it, it’s true. But I can’t help but wonder what God has saved me from by having me go through this dark valley and learn complete dependence upon Him.

I admire you. I simply didn’t have the faith to go through my dark valley. Things that I used to be able to believe in spite of, I no longer could. It was basically that simple. My friend committed suicide, and in none of my prayers did God find it necessary to inform me of this impending tragedy, nor anyone else, to call and encourage her. All she needed was love and comfort, and I know she would’ve been fine. But she died alone, and God didn’t even give me a hint of it coming, and so I could no longer believe in the God I’d been brought up to believe, nor any other gods.

The problem of evil destroyed God, so that even if this also meant destroying “absolute, universal evil”, it was a more believable universe [that no absolute morals exist] than that they do, but that everything that happens has a purpose for good. My faith was destroyed. I don’t see it coming back, and I have now amassed a decent understanding of the OT which I had purposely glossed over in the past. I still read the Bible quite regularly, and find my eyes opening wide as I find passages that I had never taken the time to really think about.

I don’t think I could ever believe in this God again, short of a miracle. There is a part of me that still wishes I could. Life was more comfortable in some ways — dreams of an eternal bliss with no pain, with all my loved ones. It hurts now to realize it was a shattered illusion, a hope, with no reason to be believed.