When I was 15, I knew I was right. The world was 6,000 years old, I had a personal relationship with God Almighty, and I knew his opinions on such diverse matters as sexuality, economics and literature. When anyone presented me with a counter-argument or disconfirming evidence, I mostly ignored them. It did not matter whether I could defeat their argument or explain their evidence. I knew the Word of God, so they must be wrong.
The teachers from my Christian school would have considered my rigid attitude a success. To the fundamentalist, faith is certain. This is not to say I and my fundamentalist friends did not experience doubts – we did. For us, though, doubt was something to be overcome, a temptation sent by Satan to separate us from the Lord. The best response was to pray.
