Recently I attended a lecture on science and religion at the University of Auckland. As is normal after such talks students stayed and discussed issues raised by the presentation. One student brought up a fairly common chestnut, he objected to the claim made by some Christians that their religion was true and that other religions […]
Entries Tagged as 'Series'
Contra Mundum: Pluralism and Being Right
November 5th, 2010 8 Comments
Tags: Contra Mundum · Investigate Magazine · Pluralism
Contra Mundum: Abraham and Isaac and the Killing of Innocents
October 3rd, 2010 124 Comments
Since 9/11 a choir of commentators have claimed that the willingness to murder innocent people in the name of God stems from the progenator of the Abrahamic faiths. Abraham, the father of Christianity, Judaism and Islam is commended for attempting to kill his own son. The account of this episode is arguable the most infamous […]
Tags: Abraham · Contra Mundum · Investigate Magazine · Isaac · John Hare · Killing Innocents
Contra Mundum: Selling Atheism
September 2nd, 2010 133 Comments
New Zealand motorists will have noticed a new genre of advertising billboards, those attempting to sell the concept that there is probably no God. These billboards are the collective efforts of the New Zealand Atheist Campaign, The Humanist Society and the New Zealand Association of Rationalist Humanists. Like all advertising campaigns, these billboards offer clever-sounding […]
Tags: Atheism · Contra Mundum · Investigate Magazine · NZ Atheist Campaign · NZARH · The Humanist Society
Contra Mundum: Did God Command Genocide in the Old Testament?
August 1st, 2010 147 Comments
Perhaps the most perplexing issue facing Christan believers is a series of jarring texts in the Old Testament. After liberating Israel from slavery in Egypt, the Israelites arrived on the edge of the promised land. The book of Deuteronomy records that God then commanded Israel to “destroy totally” the people occupying these regions (the Canaanites); […]
Tags: Alvin Plantinga · Canaanites · Contra Mundum · Investigate Magazine · James K. Hoffmeier · K Lawson Younger · Kenneth Kitchen · Old Testament Ethics
Contra Mundum: Secularism and Public Life
June 1st, 2010 63 Comments
Legal scholar Stephen Carter stated, One good way to end a conversation – or start an argument – is to tell a group of well educated professionals that you hold a political position (preferably a controversial one such as being against abortion or pornography) because it is required by your understanding of God’s will. In […]
Tags: Christopher Eberle · Contra Mundum · Doctrine of Religious Restraint · Investigate Magazine · Michael Tooley · Nicholas Wolterstorff · Philip Quinn · Religion in Public Life · Richard Rorty · Robert Audi · Stephen Carter · Terence Cuneo
Contra Mundum: Richard Dawkins and Open Mindedness
May 6th, 2010 146 Comments
The bold statement “Richard Dawkins opens minds” leaped out at me from the newsletter sitting on the University of Auckland’s Law Library counter. The article went on to sing the praises of Richard Dawkins and mentioned his book The God Delusion. On reading the piece one could be forgiven for concluding that Dawkins’ works are […]
Tags: Alvin Plantinga · Atheism · Contra Mundum · Faith and Reason · Investigate Magazine · Nicholas Wolterstorff · Peter Van Inwagen · Richard Dawkins · Richard Swinburne · Science and Religion · The God Delusion · William Alston · William Lane Craig
A common objection to belief in the God of the Bible is that a good, kind, and loving deity would never command the wholesale slaughter of nations. In the tradition of his popular Is God a Moral Monster?, Paul Copan teams up with Matthew Flannagan to tackle some of the most confusing and uncomfortable passages of Scripture. Together they help the Christian and nonbeliever alike understand the biblical, theological, philosophical, and ethical implications of Old Testament warfare passages.
