Relativism is the biggest sensation to hit the campus since instant coffee machines and overhead projectors. After the dismal failure of the Secular Humanist movement in the world, people where in search for a different way, a different set of glasses to view the world. Gone are the days of objective truth, everything is now relative, “What is true for you is not necessarily true for me”, “Your values are right for you, but not for me.” These are the new mantras of this new generation; Post Modernism, naturalism, secular humanism and other similar worldviews are the order of the day. On the campus you hear “So many people disagree- Relativism must be true”1, “I don’t have to believe in Jesus and be a Christian because all religions lead to God”. These relativist statements are most certainly stumbling blocks to people coming to know Christ on my Campus, now that is not because they can not be refuted but because the people who throw them out there have not actually considered the implications of what they are saying. Firstly I will talk about what ‘objective truth is’, I believe this is of paramount importance because this is what is being attacked by relativism. I will also discuss the many faces of relativism from which these statements are fostered and show the folly in them.
“From a practical point of view, the question of whether we can know objective truth is one of the most important questions in apologetics, because today most arguments between Christians and non-Christians eventually come down to this point.”-Kreeft and Tacelli; Handbook on Christian Apologetics. I find this to be true in my experience, after having won the argument on the relevant issues, e.g. whether the bible is reliable, or was Christ God and if God exists then why is there so much evil and suffering in the world, defeated their response is always “Well that’s true for you but not for me”. They say this with so much confidence as if it’s irrefutable and nothing I could say could change that. However comfort in subjectivism and relativism is untenable, simply because it is impossible to live with such a view consistently. Just because truth is hard to find it doesn’t give us an excuse not to look.
At this point let me give the definitions for relativist and subjectivist;
Relativist: an adherent or advocate of relativism or of the principle of relativity. Subjectivist: 1The quality of being subjective. 2The doctrine that all knowledge is restricted to the conscious self and its sensory states. A theory or doctrine that emphasizes the subjective elements in experience. 3 Any of various theories holding that the only valid standard of judgment is that of the individual. -Dictionary.com
As you can see from the definitions they are almost interchangeable, therefore I will use them as so.
Defining Objective
In order to diffuse the relativist’s statements I think the first step would be to define what ‘Objective Truth’ is. Objective means; not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice; based on facts; unbiased, according to Dictionary.com. In the Handbook of Christian Apologetics Kreeft and Tacelli say ‘Objective truth’ is ‘independent of the knower and his consciousness’. For example, “I like ice cream” is a subjective truth; “There is a pen on the table” is an objective truth; “I don’t want to steal” is a subjective truth and “I shouldn’t steal whether I want to or not” is an objective truth.
