Spielberg’s Latest “Challenge to Faith” Mostly Affirms the Faith of Those Who Already Lack It

Both Van Til and Clark Camps Agree: Starting with the Wrong Presuppositions Still Gets You Exactly Where You Planned to Go

Steven Spielberg’s latest film is being marketed as a bold intellectual reckoning for Christianity. In practice, it functions more like a polished reassurance that disbelief remains as plausible as ever—provided one begins by assuming it.

The film’s argument, such as it is, does not so much arrive at its conclusion as it installs it at the foundation. Divine revelation is quietly set aside, human reason is granted autonomy, and from there the narrative unfolds with a kind of cinematic inevitability. Unsurprisingly, a worldview that begins by excluding God manages, after two hours and a swelling score, to conclude that God is unnecessary.

From a Van Til perspective, the film is almost commendably transparent. There is no pretense of neutrality here—only a set of presuppositions doing exactly what presuppositions do. From a Clarkian standpoint, it is equally instructive, though for less flattering reasons: the axioms are false, the coherence is mostly aesthetic, and the conclusions, while confidently delivered, never quite achieve logical lift.

The film leans heavily on the sense that its ideas “fit together,” a kind of narrative coherentism where emotional resonance substitutes for propositional truth. But coherence among claims is only meaningful if those claims are true to begin with. Otherwise, one has not constructed a worldview, but a well-lit echo chamber.

None of this will likely trouble its intended audience. The film does not aim to persuade across presuppositional lines; it aims to stabilize those already standing on one side of them. In that respect, it will probably succeed.

But calling that a challenge to Christianity is like calling a mirror an argument. It reflects what is already there—with impressive clarity, to be sure—but it does not move anyone an inch beyond it.