Social justice book reviews
For the first twenty years of my life, creationism was a fact. At least, I was taught that it was. God created the earth in six days, and anyone who tells you otherwise was maliciously and purposely lying to you. Evolution was vilified; it was not only factually incorrect, but it was morally reprehensible, as if facts could sin.
Read more
Have you ever overheard a conversation on something that you’re passionate about, but for one reason or another, it would be out of place for you to interject? This happens to me all the time, and it’s immeasurably frustrating. In most groups I’m in, I’m considered “the atheist” of the group, but since I started my office job in March, this has not necessarily been the case.
Read more
I’ve come out as atheist to college friends, two siblings, and my parents. All of them were, and are, Christian, but even so, every conversation went differently. In the big picture, they went alright. They certainly could have gone much worse, but at the same time, I would not want to ever relive that time in my life. I had a list in my head of who knew and who didn’t know, and once I told someone and had that weight lifted, it was only so long until I would have to tell the next person.
If someone you know has just told you that they’re an atheist, just know that it was probably at least just as hard for them as it is for you. But there are a few things you can do that will make this time easier for everyone.
Read more
A few weeks ago, I wrote a response to a presentation by young-earth creationist Jerry Bergman in which he utilized appeals to authority as his primary forms of argument that “there are a lot of scientists who are being persecuted because they don’t believe in evolution.” Among the men that he used to make his case were C.S. Lewis. On Lewis’ evolutionary stance, Bergman stated, Read more
A couple days ago I was flipping through a creationist book from my shelf, and I couldn’t help but notice that the author rarely ever used the word “evolution” when describing the theory of evolution by natural selection. Instead, he almost always called it Darwinism. Of course, we know what someone means when they say Darwinism, and even evolutionists often call it Darwinian evolution or Darwin’s theory of evolution. But I think that creationists have a very specific reason in using the term “Darwinism” instead of the word “evolution”. That is: they want to equate believing that evolution is true with belonging to a religion that worships Charles Darwin.
Read more
Last night, I successfully completed Presbyterian pastor Timothy Keller’s apologetics book The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism. I find it fascinating to read through various apologetics books (like The Case for a Creator, Emails to a Young Seeker, and this), and see how they differ and how they don’t. There were a lot of topics in The Reason for God that were familiar, but as with most apologetics books, the author tweaked a thing or two to try to refresh the tired arguments and make them his own.
Read more
Let me tell you a story.
I was twenty years old, and a junior in college. I was in one of Grove City’s required classes called Civilization and the Speculative Mind, a class about worldviews, philosophy, and Christian theology. I wrote my term paper for this class on why naturalism does not inevitably lead to nihilism. It was a response to the claims made by James W. Sire in the class textbook The Universe Next Door. He had made three “bridges” between naturalism and nihilism which I had set out to debunk. They were:
Read more
Believe it or not, everyone has their faults—even atheists! I know, I’m shocked too. This week we are going to turn our attention away from creationists and humble ourselves with a little bit of atheist introspection. No one is perfect, and when it comes down to it, most of these points should just serve as a reminder to be a decent person, no matter what your beliefs. Regardless, here are nine things that some (not all) atheists do that they probably shouldn’t.
Read more
Recently, I came across a post on my old church’s website that a few months back, they hosted a presentation by a creationist on “The Best Evidence Against Evolution.” You may know that a while ago, I wrote a series for this blog trying to discover the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod’s official stance on evolution. In the end, it seemed that they decisively hold to young earth creationism, although the church still has no definitive stance on whether evolution is actually true.
Read more