Worldview Thinking
Fifty years ago, a California gangster named Mickey Cohen shocked people on both sides of the law when he went forward in a Billy Gra- ham crusade and made a profession of faith. After several months, how- ever, people began to notice that Cohen’s life showed no sign of the changes that should have been apparent in the life of a genuine convert. During an interview, Cohen made it clear that he had no interest in aban- doning his career as a gangster. He explained his position in a novel way. Since we have Christian movie stars and Christian politicians, Cohen noted, he wanted to be known as the first Christian gangster.
Until recently, most Americans, regardless of their competence in reli- gious matters, would have expressed their dismay at Cohen’s behavior. Religious converts, people used to say, are supposed to live better lives than they did before their conversion. I suspect that many Americans today would find nothing unusual in Cohen’s attempt at self-justification.
One purpose of this chapter is to explain these odd happenings. Cohen displayed a defective understanding of the cognitive and moral demands of what this chapter will call the Christian worldview. If some- one considers himself a Christian, he is supposed to think and act like a Christian. The fact that so many Americans no longer think that way is indication of a major shift in their worldview.
O ne thing students can learn from philosophy is the nature, impor-tance, and influence of worldviews. If one is serious about getting somewhere in the study of philosophy, it is helpful to examine the big- ger picture, namely, the worldviews of the thinkers whose theories have become a large part of what philosophers study.
A worldview contains a person’s answers to the major questions in life, almost all of which contain significant philosophical content. It is a con- ceptual framework, pattern, or arrangement of a person’s beliefs. The best worldviews are comprehensive, systematic, and supposedly true views of life and of the world. The philosophical systems of great thinkers such as Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, Augustine, and Thomas Aquinas delineate their worldviews . Of course, many worldviews suffer from incompleteness.
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