Hong Kong Liberal Religious Forum

"This is the truth. There is a mighty blue tea cup circulating on the orbit of a distant star. It is so small and so far away that nobody can ever see it and science can never find it. But the faithful can feel it with their hearts. It created you and loves you. If you believe in it and confess your sins to it, it will forgive you so you can be "born again". Believers will go to heaven after death. Pray to it and it will give you strength to lead a good life."

This psychological reassurance, with the very supportive blue tea cup-believing community of brothers and sisters, certainly helps. But is it intellectually honest to believe in the distant orbiting blue tea cup?

For a claim such as God that can never be seen (proven or disproven), the honest and hence correct position to take is the agnostic position (which simply means saying "I don't know"). Having faith in that claim is intellectually dishonest (because you really don't know) and hence wrong (unethical) because being dishonest is unethical. For something you don't know (such as existence of God), the honest and correct thing to do is to say you don't know. This is a simple but strong argument for agnosticism.