Thinking and being

Do you not know? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God... Isaiah 40.28

René Descartes' (in)famous dictum "I think therefore I am" expresses that autonomous assumption that the world revolves around human beings. Putting self at the centre inevitably means pushing others to the margins or ignoring them altogether, even God. And so society becomes atheistic and deprives itself of the ultimate source of truth and hope.

Switching Descartes' saying around - "I am therefore I think" - may sound just as presumptuous but, rather resting our existence on our ability, it accepts that existence as a gift from which our ability springs. And, because every creature has a Creator, the ground is prepared to give God his proper place. The consequence of this way of thinking is that we take our place among our fellow creatures while recognising that we have particular gifts, for which we are accountable to the Creator from whom all purposes and existences derive.