Van Til: Meanwhile let us finish our story.

Thorn: Okay, Dr. Van Til. Please continue.

Van Til: At ten I came to this country and after some years decided to study for the ministry.

Thorn: So, by that point, your indoctrination was sealed, wouldn't you say?

Van Til: This involved preliminary training at a Christian preparatory school and college. All my teachers were pledged to teach their subjects from the Christian point of view.

Thorn: All the better to make your indoctrination all the more complete, right Dr. Van Til?

Van Til: Imagine teaching not only religion but algebra from the Christian point of view!

Thorn: It's not something I'd like to imagine for long. Imagine that every time I found a 3 in a formula or equation, I wouldn't know whether to process the operation as if it were really a 3, or a 1. For instance, I could see the equation 3 x 35 = 105, and, on Christian theism, I could say "false!" for it could really be only 35!

Van Til: But it was done. We were told that all facts in all their relations, numerical as well as others, are what they are because of God's all comprehensive plan with respect to them.

Thorn: So, was the "fact" that God was capable of putting together such a plan also part of his plan? That is, after all, a "fact" to be reckoned with, if one takes Christianity at its word.

Van Til: Thus the very definitions of things would not merely be incomplete but basically wrong if God were left out of the picture.

Thorn: So, Dr. Van Til, what did you do in the case of words which were key to your lessons but were not defined in the Bible? Did you just make up definitions in order to fit this aim?

Van Til: Were we not informed about the views of others? Did we not hear about evolution and about Immanuel Kant, the great modern philosopher who had conclusively shown that all the arguments for the existence of God were invalid? Oh, yes, we heard about all these things, but there were refutations given and these refutations seemed adequate to meet the case.

Thorn: I wonder how accurate the representations of those views were once the refutations were brought to bear. Were primary sources ever used in presenting opposing arguments, Dr. Van Til? Nevertheless, far be it from me to appear to sanction anything Kant said.

Van Til: In the Seminaries I attended, namely Calvin, and Princeton before its reorganization along semi-modernist lines in 1929, the situation was much the same. So for instance Dr. Robert Dick Wilson used to tell us, and, as far as we could understand the languages, show us from the documents, that the "higher critics" had done nothing that should rightfully damage our child-like faith in the Old Testament as the Word of God.

Thorn: I'm sure that's most important. You wouldn't want anything to destabilize your faith. But wouldn't you want to know whether what you believe is true or not? Seems this is what should be of highest concern, especially because Christians are often noted for talking a lot about "the truth!"

Van Til: Similarly Dr. J. Gresham Machen and others made good their claim that New Testament Christianity is intellectually defensible and that the Bible is right in its claims. You may judge of their arguments by reading them for yourself.

Thorn: I've read a lot of them. They only tell me that those who advance such arguments are desperate to believe these things, but sense that they are not rationally warranted in saying these things are true.

Van Til: In short, I heard the story of historic Christianity and the doctrine of God on which it is built over and over from every angle by those who believed it and were best able to interpret its meaning.

Thorn: How do you determine who is "best able to interpret" the meaning of Christian doctrine?

Van Til: The telling of this story has helped, I trust, to make the basic question simple and plain. You know pretty clearly now what sort of God it is of which I am speaking to you.

Thorn: Yes, it's clear to me. Essentially, no different from any other god.

Van Til: If my God exists it was He who was back of my parents and teachers. It was He who conditioned all that conditioned me in my early life. But then it was He also who conditioned everything that conditioned you in your early life. God, the God of Christianity, is the All-Conditioner!

Thorn: I'm sure you've been trying to convince yourself of this for a long, long time, Dr. Van Til.

Van Til: As the All-Conditioner, God is the All-Conscious One. A God Who is to control all things must control them "by the counsel of His will."

Thorn: Yes. There it is: the primacy of consciousness. This is metaphysical subjectivism at the root of your entire worldview. Well, at least you're explicit about it.

Van Til: If He did not do this, He would himself be conditioned.

Thorn: And you don't want that.

Van Til: So then I hold that my belief in Him and your disbelief in Him are alike meaningless except for Him.