Tag Archives: Christian

Videos

William Lane Craig asks: can we be good without God?

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A video lecture in 3 parts, and a peer-reviewed paper to go with the clips.

Part 1 of 3:

Part 2 of 3:

Part 3 of 3:

And here is the article that discusses the same topic, in more detail, and with footnotes.

Excerpt:

Can we be good without God? At first the answer to this question may seem so obvious that even to pose it arouses indignation. For while those of us who are Christian theists undoubtedly find in God a source of moral strength and resolve which enables us to live lives that are better than those we should live without Him, nevertheless it would seem arrogant and ignorant to claim that those who do not share a belief in God do not often live good moral lives–indeed, embarrassingly, lives that sometimes put our own to shame.

But wait. It would, indeed, be arrogant and ignorant to claim that people cannot be good without belief in God. But that was not the question. The question was: can we be good without God? When we ask that question, we are posing in a provocative way the meta-ethical question of the objectivity of moral values. Are the values we hold dear and guide our lives by mere social conventions akin to driving on the left versus right side of the road or mere expressions of personal preference akin to having a taste for certain foods or not? Or are they valid independently of our apprehension of them, and if so, what is their foundation? Moreover, if morality is just a human convention, then why should we act morally, especially when it conflicts with self-interest? Or are we in some way held accountable for our moral decisions and actions?

Today I want to argue that if God exists, then the objectivity of moral values, moral duties, and moral accountability is secured, but that in the absence of God, that is, if God does not exist, then morality is just a human convention, that is to say, morality is wholly subjective and non-binding. We might act in precisely the same ways that we do in fact act, but in the absence of God, such actions would no longer count as good (or evil), since if God does not exist, objective moral values do not exist. Thus, we cannot truly be good without God. On the other hand, if we do believe that moral values and duties are objective, that provides moral grounds for believing in God.

This is the easiest argument for God’s existence to discuss with non-Christians. If you would like to hear a good debate on this topic, I recommend the debate between Arif Ahmed and Glenn Peoples.

Mentoring

The Elusive Wapiti updates his “Marry a Zealot” post

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The Elusive Wapiti updates his marital advice for young Christian men.

He begins like tis:

Ten months ago, I published the second installment in the ‘Advice to My Sons’ series, titled “Marry a Zealot“, in which I exhort them and others to become fervent Believers–and seek out other Believers as mates–to best insure them against the ravages of divorce should they marry.

The point of that post was to highlight the additional protection that serious religious conviction, as indicated by active religious attendance, provides them against divorce, an important consideration for men in the post-Christian West nowadays. By way of contrast, a secondary point of that post was to show that mere self-identification or occasional participation in religious services exposed a fellow of the marrying kind to greater risk of marital disruption than if he and/or his wife had no religious affiliation at all.

Since the link to the pdf that supported that post has since disappeared, I did some spadework to recover the data that supports this advice.  I was able to locate it here, on page 9 of the scholarly article Bad News about the Good News–The Construction of the Christian-Failure Narrative, Journal of Religion & Society, volume 14.  The article drew the data shown in the following tables from the General Social Survey, 1980-2009.

His main concern is how religious belief correlates with divorce.

Here shows the evidence then says this:

When one takes one’s faith seriously enough to put it into action, as measured in this case by attending church at least once per week, this behavior appears to yield anti-divorce benefits.  Yet I am thoroughly unimpressed with a 38% divorce rate for Evangelicals, a group whose noisy claims to family values are belied by their itchy dissolutive trigger fingers. Moreover, the picture for active black Protestants remains dark and grim; their marriages garner no protection whatsoever from church attendance.  The data for Roman Catholics is much more encouraging, and it seems that the RCC has been more effective than Protestant denominations at countering the scourge of divorce. Perhaps the theological rigidity and hierarchical structure associated with Marianism makes it less vulnerable to socio-political contagions like feminism and divorce, while the, ahem, diversity, of Protestantism makes it more prone to worldly influences.

I think that it is a good idea in general for young men to not leave marriage at the level of feelings. I have posted before a list of questions to find out if a woman is a zealot. I think that young Christian men should read Wapiti’s post and then my post and then act accordingly.

Videos

William Lane Craig vs. John Shelby Spong on the resurrection of Jesus

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William Lane Craig is the greatest Christian debater in the history of the church, and Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong is a very liberal non-Christian.

Part 1 of 2: (61 minutes)

Part 2 of 2: (42 minutes)

The moderator is none other than the famous journalist David Aikman! The opening speeches are only 15 minutes, and the rebuttals are 10 minutes. This debate is accessible because Craig’s opponent is not really attacking him on a scholarly basis, but more as the pretty typical liberal atheist that you meet at work.

Craig spends all of his opening speech explaining historical methods, sources, dating and how he infers the resurrection as the best explanation of the minimal facts. The resurrection of Jesus is quite awesome to debate when people are given time to explain the historical methods and how the scholars use these methods to evaluate which facts are likely to be historical and which are not.