A common argument by atheists is that most people are in some way atheist because they don’t believe in the many thousands of gods that have been part of human religion through time. Most believe only in one god and are therefore “atheist” with respect to all the other gods. Therefore, they argue, how do people know that the pointers towards the divine are pointers to the particular god they follow?

Of course, the argument can be reversed: most people throughout history and also today believe that there is a transcendental aspect to this world, that there is something spiritual beyond the material. Even most people who are not part of organised religion know that. Atheism, the sense that there is no spiritual dimension to the world, is clearly an oddity and outlier. The real question is what this spiritual dimension is and who God is. Clearly there are competing accounts of the spiritual realm. Why then would we trust and follow the God revealed in Jesus Christ? Arguments only take us so far, but clearly the account of the spiritual world given by Christianity in some way has to align to some extent with our own experience and knowledge, though possibly not fully. The witness of so many generations who have lived and died for this faith is part of the witness for its truth and value. Beyond that, faith requires a personal experience of the truth of God, a calling of the Holy Spirit. That may be a “strange warming of the heart” or a steady assurance to trust Jesus.

Pointers towards God exist all around us. Today, as we think particularly of animals, we may want to focus on the role of animals and the natural world. After all, in those animals we experience something more than an accident of nature. They live and breathe character and goodness beyond purely instinctual behaviour. There is wonder and beauty in the natural world that points us towards the transcendental. Appreciative observation of the natural world points to the fact that the universe is more like a great thought than a big machine.

And yet, the world is a flawed mirror of the Creator. Along with the beauty and harmony of nature, there is also violence, disease and death. Just as among humans there is love and goodness, there is also evil, conflict and disregard. Any account of the spiritual world also has to make sense of this troubling contrast. In the Bible we read that all nature groans for its redemption, that it longs for God to make all things new (Romans 8:19–23). As those who believe in Jesus Christ, we are called to not add to the suffering of creation, but rather show God’s goodness to the people, animals, ecosystems and landscapes around us.