Introduction Apologetics is a branch of Christian theology that helps provide reasons for belief in the explanatory power of Christian theism. It is true that other faiths attempt to provide reasons for justification for their own truth claims. I have talked to my share of people from a variety of religious backgrounds such as Islam, Mormonism, The Bahá’í faith, The … [Read more...]
Becoming an Ambassador, part 3
Third post in a series. Part one and part two. In this post I want to deal with the third leg of my metaphor for evangelism, knowledge. Again from Stand To Reason’s article on the ambassador model, at a minimum an ambassador “…must know the character, mind, and purposes of his king.” The scope and depth of subjects one could study is, candidly, staggering. Thus in this post I … [Read more...]
Consistency Among Disciplines
Every day thousands of scientists around the globe perform experiments and observations of the natural realm. They note a certain condition, make (or allow) a change, then note the new condition. Many times, the same experiment or observation is conducted repeatedly to be certain the results of the first (second or third) were not just "flukes." Scientists combine many of these … [Read more...]
Literary Apologetics: Planet Narnia and The Narnia Code by Michael Ward
It might seem odd to put Planet Narnia (Oxford University Press, 2008) on my list of recommended “literary apologetics” books, since it’s a study of CS Lewis’s use of medieval planetary imagery in the Chronicles of Narnia — not a specifically apologetic work. However, anyone who’s serious about understanding how a story can show forth the truth of the Christian faith would do … [Read more...]
"A New Kind of Christian" Critique – Part 2
Part 1 McLaren continues with his criticism. The modern view of Christianity is not the absolute, ultimate truth; it is rather a “view from a point”. As modern Christians, what we thought of as objective certainty is really reliant on our subjective preference for our personal viewpoint.[i] Instead of our faith being compared to a building (an allusion to foundationalist … [Read more...]
Argue Without Being Argumentative
Who likes to argue? Depends what you mean. Unfortunately, apologists use words which could give people the wrong impression: “Apologetics” sounds like apologizing. “Defense” sounds like training for hand-to-hand combat. And “argue” sounds like the thing you hate doing with your family on the way to church! … [Read more...]
An Easter Meditation inspired by Counting Crows
Ravi Zacharias told this story in a radio podcast to illustrate where western culture is with regard to belief and worldview: Two Australian sailors were on leave in England and decided to go out to the pubs. After a long night of drinking, they were both very drunk and had to get back to their ship. By this time it was early morning and a heavy fog had settled in. They got … [Read more...]
Convince Me There’s A God – Thermodynamics
After leaving atheism for theism more than 40 years ago, I’m answering some of the most-asked questions from atheists: What happened to me? Did I lose my mind? Was I on drugs? How can an atheist possibly become a theist? Was I just a bad atheist? Is that what happened? … [Read more...]
"Moral Bioenhancement" and Academic Blindness
David DeGrazia, professor at George Washington University, has written a peer-reviewed paper for the Journal of Medical Ethics on "Moral Bioenhancement" (MB). The suggestion is to "encourage or require" advanced technologies, including genetic and embryonic "selection" to enhance the moral status of the human race. I learned about this through William Briggs's excellent … [Read more...]
Replicating DNA with Extraordinary Fidelity: Meet DNA Polymerase
In a previous article, I gave a brief overview of the complex molecular mechanisms governing DNA replication. Now, I will focus specifically on the replication enzyme DNA polymerase. DNA polymerase is the enzyme responsible for synthesizing new strands of DNA, complementary to the sequence of the template strand. The unidirectional DNA polymerase progresses along the template … [Read more...]