(Part 9) Reddit mentions: The best christian theology books

Stephen C. Meyer, It's called Darwin's Doubt: The Explosive Origin of Animal Life and the Case for Intelligent Design.

http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Doubt-Explosive-Origin-Intelligent/dp/0062071475

From the reviews:

>“It’s hard for us paleontologists to admit that neo-Darwinian explanations for the Cambrian explosion have failed miserably....Meyer describes the dimensions of the problem with clarity and precision. His book is a game changer.” (Dr. Mark McMenamin, paleontologist at Mt. Holyoke College and coauthor of The Emergence of Animals)

>“Darwin’s Doubt represents an opportunity for bridge-building rather than dismissive polarization—bridges across cultural divides in great need of professional, respectful dialogue—and bridges to span evolutionary gaps.” (Dr. George Church, professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School and author of Regenesis)

>“Meyer writes beautifully. He marshals complex information as well as any writer I’ve read....a wonderful, most compelling read.” (Dean Koontz, New York Times bestselling author)

>“Darwin’s Doubt is by far the most up-to-date, accurate, and comprehensive review of the evidence from all relevant scientific fields that I have encountered in more than forty years of studying the Cambrian explosion.” (Dr. Wolf-Ekkehard Lonnig, senior scientist emeritus (biologist) at the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research)

>“Meyer demonstrates, based on cutting-edge molecular biology, why explaining the origin of animals is now not just a problem of missing fossils, but an even greater engineering problem at the molecular level....An excellent book and a must read.” (Dr. Russell Carlson, professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at the University of Georgia and technical director of the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center)

>“Darwin’s Doubt is an intriguing exploration of one of the most remarkable periods in the evolutionary history of life.... No matter what convictions one holds about evolution, Darwinism, or intelligent design, Darwin’s Doubt is a book that should be read, engaged and discussed.” (Dr. Scott Turner, professor of biology at the State University of New York and author of The Tinkerer's Accomplice)

>“It is a tour de force…This book is well informed, carefully researched, up–to–date and powerfully argued. It confronts Darwin’s doubt and deals with the assumptions of Neo–Darwinism. This book is much needed and I recommend it to students of all levels, to professionals and to laypeople.” (Dr. Norman C. Nevin OBE, BSc, MD, FRCPath, FFPH, FRCPE, FRCP; Professor Emeritus in Medical Genetics, Queen's University, Belfast)

>“Darwin’s Doubt is another excellent book by Stephen Meyer. Stephen Meyer has clearly listened to the arguments of those who are sceptical about intelligent design and has addressed them thoroughly. It is really important that Darwinists read this book carefully and give a response.” (Dr. Stuart Burgess, Professor of Design and Nature, Head of Mechanical Engineering at Bristol University)

>“I spend my life reading science books. I’ve ready many hundreds of them over the years, and in my judgment Darwin’s Doubt is the best science book ever written. It is a magnificent work, a true masterpiece that will be read for hundreds of years.” (George GilderTechnologist, economist, and New York Times bestselling authorGeorge GilderTechnologist, economist, and New York Times bestselling authorGeorge GilderTechnologist, economist, and New York Times bestselling authorGeorge GilderTec)

>“The issue on the table is the mechanism of evolution—is it blind and undirected or is it under the control of an intelligence with a goal in mind? In Darwin’s Doubt, Stephen Meyer has masterfully laid out one of the most compelling lines of evidence for the latter.” (Dr. William S. Harris, Professor, Sanford School of Medicine, University of South Dakota)

>“Dr. Meyer has written a comprehensive and up–to–date analysis on the massive scientific evidence revealing the total failure of the neo–Darwinian explanation for life’s history. Darwin’s Doubt is important, clearly written with sound arguments, excellent illustrations and examples that make the topic easily understandable even for non–specialists” (Dr. Matti Leisola, Professor, Bioprocess Engineering, Aalto University, Finland (emeritus); Editor-in-chief, Bio-Complexity)

>“Meyer makes a case for intelligent design as the only viable scientific theory for the origin of biological novelty. Meyer’s challenge to naturalism will no doubt be strongly resisted by those committed to a materialist worldview, but provide food for refection for those who are searching for truth.” (Dr. Donald L. Ewert, Molecular Biologist, Associate Member (retired), Wistar Institute)

>“Stephen C. Meyer’s Darwin’s Doubt is a truly remarkable book. Within its 413 pages of text are four tightly woven interrelated arguments. Using 753 references, he presents evidence associated with the serious weaknesses of materialistic theories of biological evolution, and positive evidence for the theory of intelligent design.” (Dr. Mark C. Biedebach, Professor Emeritus, Department of Biological Sciences, California State University, Long Beach)

>“A great book on the origin of animal life and crises of Darwin evolution; very clear, factual, comprehensive, logical, and informative. An enjoyable reading for both non–expert and expert.” (Dr. Change Tan, Molecular biologist/developmental biologist, Associate Professor, University of Missouri-Columbia)

>Steven Meyer gives an insightful and thoughtful treatment to the history of life. Justice Louis Brandies taught us that, ‘Sunlight is the best disinfectant,’ and Dr. Meyer lets the sun shine in. (Dr. Stephen A. BatzerP.E., forensic engineerDr. Stephen A. Batzer, P.E., forensic engineer)

>“Steve Meyer’s book is a much–anticipated bombshell that details the swarm of problems of Darwinian evolution and also presents the case for intelligent design. Ask yourself: how often does a book of this kind receive a warm welcome from leading geneticists and paleontologists? Never, until now! ” (Dr. Tom Woodward, Research Professor, Trinity College, Tampa Bay, Author of Darwin Strikes Back: Defending the Science of Intelligent Design)

>“Stephen Meyer’s new book, Darwin’s Doubt, is a fascinating and rigorous study demonstrating not only that biologists and paleontologists do not have an adequate explanation for the Cambrian Explosion, but that there is an alternative view that makes more sense.” (Dr. Richard Weikart, Professor of History at California State University, Stanislaus; Author of From Darwin to Hitler)

>“Meyer is a talented writer with an easygoing voice who has blended interesting history with clear explanations in what may come to be seen as a classic presentation of this most fundamental of all debates.” (Terry Scambray, New Oxford Review)

http://www.amazon.com/Signature-Cell-Evidence-Intelligent-Design/dp/0061472794/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1415097955&sr=1-1&keywords=Signature+in+the+Cell%3A+DNA+and+the+Evidence+for+Intelligent+Design

From the reviews:

>“Signature in the Cell is a defining work in the discussion of life’s origins and the question of whether life is a product of unthinking matter or of an intelligent mind. For those who disagree with ID, the powerful case Meyer presents cannot be ignored in any honest debate. For those who may be sympathetic to ID, on the fence, or merely curious, this book is an engaging, eye-opening, and often eye-popping read” — American Spectator

>Named one of the top books of 2009 by the Times Literary Supplement (London), this controversial and compelling book from Dr. Stephen C. Meyer presents a convincing new case for intelligent design (ID), based on revolutionary discoveries in science and DNA. Along the way, Meyer argues that Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution as expounded in The Origin of Species did not, in fact, refute ID. If you enjoyed Francis Collins’s The Language of God, you’ll find much to ponder—about evolution, DNA, and intelligent design—in Signature in the Cell.

> That's really implausible. What makes you think any of it is true?

That's a great question! I believe in Christianity for reasons including personal experience, the lack of cogent arguments against it (an area I've studied for some time, and that's not meant as a challenge against you or anything, though I'm happy to answer your questions and objections), the historicity of the Biblical documents (archeologically, especially those of the New Testament and the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Nazareth), the remarkable ability of theism to best explain a wide range of the data in human experience (such as the possibility of our having reliable cognitive faculties and their deliverances, the beginning of the universe, the existence of objective moral values and duties, the "fine tuning" of the initial conditions of the universe for the development of intelligent life and our exorbitant means of observing the world around us, the fact of widespread religious experience, the implausibility of the development of conscious agents from inorganic matter, the irreducibly of certain instantiations of biological complexity to any naturalistic incremental evolutionary mechanism, the existence of regularity and a bias in nature towards simplicity and aesthetic features (which I am happy to elaborate on), the possibility of change (the actualization of potentials and the nature of hierarchical causal series), and a great deal more that space does not permit me to detail).

> It's also a very anthropocentric way of looking at the universe, which has been around billions of years longer than we have.

I don't think so; rather, I think it is a very God-centric way of looking at the universe. I don't believe we were the entire reason God created the universe, and I do believe that it exists for His glory.

> You're suggesting that God created the universe so that we would come into existence on one planet in it,

No, the creation of the cosmos was not entirely done just so that human beings would wind up in it--that would make it a rather inefficient means of creating us. Rather, God has no shortage of paint, and He exercised His creative power here for a lot more than just humans. Luckily for us, we get to be a part of it and observe the living painting He made and praise Him for it.

> for a tiny fraction of the time, so he could save us from punishments he devised?

This is a caricature of Christian theology. God didn't create everything just so He could "save us from punishments he devised". I commend you to read the Gospels and C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity for a better understanding of the Christian system of thought, because the understanding you've presented is in fact confused in many ways.

God created mankind not so that we could be punished, but rather so that we could participate in the wonderful thing that is life and bring glory to Him by living for Him and enjoying Him and His creation. However, we rebelled and continue to rebel against Him and this purpose and bring evil into the world each and every day--perversions to His creation. It is this evil that warrants punishment, punishment which God has done everything in His power to try and save us from by living a human life in the person of Christ and brutally and tortuously dying after resisting all temptation so that we could be vicariously redeemed through Him. By living a perfect life, He did what no man has ever done and so further warrants the right to say what should happen to those of us (all of us) who fail to do the same (which He, by virtue of living perfectly, demonstrated is possible)--and yet His choice, when given even more right to condemn us, is to show us mercy and save us by allowing us redemption before Himself! Hence, His sacrifice and offer of salvation is the greatest example of mercy and love mankind has ever known.

And so He allows us to choose Him, and loves us enough to respect our choice to reject Him and live apart from Him if we so choose (which is what hell is--separation from Him that is chosen by the individual).

> I don't. Thomas Aquinas died 800 years ago and knew nothing about modern neuroscience or psychology. We have a natural tendency to believe whatever we're taught growing up.

I think it's more than just a "tendency to believe whatever we're taught growing up", because virtually all human beings throughout history and in the modern day have believed God exists. And, when you ask them, they will explicitly adduce to you reasons for their believing in His existence--so attributions of human belief in God to uncritical acts of will or psychoanalytic theses seem to me implausible and uncritically formulated or accepted themselves, for they are conceived of without making any account of the individual's reasoning with respect to the question they purport to answer. And Aquinas's sentiment has been repeated throughout the history of philosophy by the most eminent atheists and theist thinkers alike up until the modern day--not that I think that we should reject the ideas of people in the past out of what philosophers call "chronological snobbery", an uncritical bias in favor of contemporary thought by virtue of its being contemporary.

Thanks for the exchange so far, I hope I've helped you understand what I believe and why a bit more. Please note that I do not intend in writing this to sound condescending, so if it comes off that way my apologies.

I went through almost the exact same thing. After leaving our main church, my wife and I stopped going all together. Several years later, after we moved because of jobs, we started going again. Needless to say, that didn't last long.

My wife and I both come from very strong Christian backgrounds; my wife's father was a Southern-Baptist minister for decades, and my dad went to Dallas Theological Seminary and taught church classes most of his life. So let's just say that leaving wasn't an easy thing.

However, my own search led me to realize the truth. Since my wife and I are very close, I talked with her about these things but was very careful about what I said. I'm still careful. I approach the discussions from the standpoint of "searching for answers" rather than declaring that I've already decided.

My mantra over the last few years has been "If it were possible to know the truth, and one of the possibilities was that God didn't exist, would you really want to know?" Well, my answer is yes. I don't want to be a blind-follower Christian. If God is real, then I want to know for sure!

I recommend approaching it like that. It let's your spouse see that you are truly searching for answers. The truth is all we really want, and we can't use a 3000 year-old book to do it. We need real answers, not mythology.

Be sure to talk about it a lot, and be open minded to your spouse's point of view. Let them know you still care for them deeply.

This sub-reddit has been so helpful and caring, so good job starting here. Also grab some books or find some web-sites that discus these things. Here are a few I recommend:

Sites

• http://new.exchristian.net/
  
  
• http://www.patheos.com/ (you'll find many opinions here. great site)
  
  
• https://richarddawkins.net/
  
  Books
  
  
• https://www.amazon.com/God-Not-Great-Religion-Everything/dp/0446697966/
  
  
• https://www.amazon.com/God-Delusion-Richard-Dawkins/dp/0618918248
  
  
• https://www.amazon.com/Undeniable-Evolution-Creation-Bill-Nye/dp/1250074223
  
  Cheers
  ~Nate

I'm struggling with how to respond to your post. I'm not sure there's much to be said here, because we're kind of talking past each other. You don't really seem to have grasped what I'm explaining, and I suspect that's because you're assuming a number of things about my beliefs and perspectives. I'm happy to continue this conversation if we can get passed that, but I'm not sure I can continue with such a broad scope.

However, I feel like we should deal with this little bit:

>I think the best suggestion I can make to you is to step back, look at the shape of your beliefs - what you seek to include, what you seek to exclude - and see if a spot of introspection can illuminate the what/why of your belief structure and worldview. You are already remaking a religion in your own image, it pays to understand the basis of that image.

A few things I think we should clarify:

First, you should know that I'm a pastor. I've got an M.Div, with three years of graduate study of the Bible, Church History and Theology. I've studied scripture in the original languages. I preach every Sunday. I've sat in hospital rooms and listened and cried and prayed with people struggling with the hardest questions of their lives: questions about who they are, what their purpose is, how they make sense of their lives, many of them as they lay dying. All that to say, I've done--- and continue to do--- plenty of "stepping back to look at the shape of my beliefs." Far more than you can imagine. But thanks for the concern. You are right to say it's important to ask those questions of ourselves. ;)

Second, you should understand that what I'm expressing to you isn't something I simply came up with. What I'm sharing with you is very basic Christian theology you'd be taught in many a mainline seminary or divinity school. This isn't me "remaking religion in my own image." I wish it were that easy.

To show you what I mean, I'm going to suggest some reading for you, so that you might better understand what I'm talking about here.

I'd start with Biblical Theology: A proposal by the late Brevard Childs (not that it matters, but he taught at Yale). It's a tiny book, but it'll give you a very accurate overview of how the Christian canon came to be, and why it came to be, and why that question matters to Biblical exegesis and authority.

Also, if you're really interested in understanding the foundations of Christianity (and have some time on your hands), check out The Crucified God by Jurgen Moltmann. This book touches on a lot of issues, but one of them is how the crucifixion and resurrection are so foundational to the Christian faith.

I'm happy to give it one more shot, and try to explain with more clarity a canonical-critical approach to scripture to you if you're sincerely interested.

God bless you! :) I love how you have shared your testimony.

I'm a young Christian guy and, unfortunately, struggle with porn and masturbation as well. So I do relate to your troubles there.

As someone who is new to the Christian faith, you might find this book REALLY helpful:

https://www.amazon.com/Mere-Christianity-C-S-Lewis/dp/0060652926/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473987989&sr=8-1&keywords=mere+christianity

It is called "Mere Christianity" by C.S Lewis, who, fun fact, is also the auther of the "Chronicals of Narnia" fiction series.

C.S Lewis was a devout Christian and has wrote many great books on the Christian faith. I would also reccomend his book "the Screwtape Letters" which is a book about demons. And it might help you with temptation, as you shall realise the spiritual reality of what happens whan you go through that tempation.

You also mentioned that your parents are Catholic, so they might appreciate that you learn Theology from the renowned Theologian,

Thomas Aquinas: https://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Aquinas-Selected-Writings-Classics/dp/0140436324/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1473988742&sr=1-1&keywords=thomas+aquinas

https://www.amazon.com/Aquinass-Shorter-Summa-Thomass-Theologica/dp/1928832431/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1473989822&sr=1-7&keywords=thomas+aquinas

https://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Aquinas-50-Pages-Laymans/dp/0988442515/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1473989867&sr=1-3&keywords=thomism

https://www.amazon.com/Aquinas-Beginners-Guide-Edward-Feser/dp/1851686908/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1473989924&sr=1-6&keywords=thomism

Thomos Aquinas is not only one of the greatest philosophers of Christianity, but one of the greatest philosophers PERIOD.

Just by reading, you can really learn a lot about the nature of God, what it means to

pray, how to properly interpret Scripture, understanding your

sexuality, the proper use of meditation etc.

Just reading one book can inform you a LOT.

I say this because, a lot of times, new Christians ask how or where

they can learn more about Christianity. Which is funny because the

answer is right in front of them. :) You learn more about religion

just as you learn more about everything else iln life. Through books.

)

Anyways. God bless you in your newfound relationship with Him.
May you grow in faith and find righteous abstinence from sin.
Pray for me as I shall pray for you.

Deo Gratias! +++

Ok folks, with heavy heart I really do need to get across New York to catch a 9pm flight out of JFK. I could quite happily have continued for several hours more (the Taylor Swift playlist is still going strong too), and I want to thank you all for creating such a welcoming and stimulating space (and I'm not just referring to this thread). Sorry to all those I either didn't get chance to answer, or (and this probably applies to everyone) answer as fully as the questions deserved. (I do think I gave the Dawkins/duck question a pretty comprehensive answer, mind.)

As you'll have realized by now, I'm not averse to self-promotion (hey, those two daughters need to eat...): and I really do think that some of you will find Faith and Unbelief and The Trinity: How Not to Be a Heretic at least interesting. (Which isn't necessarily to say you'll agree with them, of course.)

And by all means come find me on Twitter: @ssbullivant

Thanks again, and God bless,

Stephen

If I can let you know, you're not alone. I'm 32 and hopefully next year my gf of 4 years and I are planning on getting married. It isn't easy, but waiting is possible. Being with likeminded friends helps. And perspective takes time. In the bubble of school a lot of things look fun. But in the real world, with real consequences, not so much. These things do have emotional and psychological consequences that you will take with you into your future relationships. Waiting is a means of protecting those future relationships.

Now for those questions, yes they can get annoying. But you don't have to reinvent the wheel. There have been many smart Christian writers, theologians, artists, philosophers, apologists, etc... who have given these issues a lot of thought and you would do well to get acquainted with them. I'd recommend something like Grudem's Systematic Theology for basic doctrine. For specific questions, Tim Keller's The Reason For God is pretty popular, and I'm liking philosopher Douglas Groothuis's Christian Apologetics.

> We know very little about Jesus’ early life and upbringing. When
he went back to Nazareth with the disciples, the people were amazed to see
their carpenter as teacher and prophet (Mark 6:1–16), from which we can be
fairly certain that they thought he lacked the education needed for such
work, and thus had little in the way of learning. This comment also tells us he
had never taught there before.

> Of late much work has been done on the intertextuality of both the First
and Second Testaments. We have learned about the numerous allusions to
Scripture in, for example, Deutero-Isaiah, Matthew, and Paul. What needs to
be remembered is that such intertextuality was at home in oral performances:
Deutero-Isaiah, Matthew, and the Epistles of Paul were, like all other
writings in antiquity, intended to be read aloud. This means that their scriptural
allusions were designed to be perceived by ears, not eyes. This matters
so much because Jesus’ teaching was, from every indication, oral. We have no
evidence that he ever wrote anything. Indeed, we do not know what sort of education he might have had, nor even know for sure whether he could read,
although this may be the best guess. But our ignorance in these particulars
is no argument against Jesus’ ability to allude. Even if he did not write
anything, and even if he could not read at all, the evidence is that he and his
hearers, whether formally educated or not, had heard Scripture recited often
enough that large portions of it were quite familiar to them, sufficiently so
that oblique and sometimes even subtle references to it could be appreciated.

> We may surmise that he experienced the socialization of a typical boy in
that culture. Growing up in a Jewish home, most likely he attended school
from roughly age six to at least twelve or thirteen, as a system of “elementary
education” was widespread in Palestinian Judaism. His “primer” would have
been the book of Leviticus. Whether he had formal training as a teacher of
the Torah beyond the schooling given to every boy, we do not know.

> As a boy and young man, Jesus almost certainly attended the synagogue
(a place of Scripture reading and prayer in local communities) every Sabbath,
and perhaps on Mondays and Thursdays as well. As a faithful Jew, he would
have recited the Shema upon rising and retiring each day, the heart of which
affirmed: “Hear O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord; and you shall love
the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all
your might.” Presumably, he participated in the Jewish festivals and went on
pilgrimages to Jerusalem. From the gospels, it is clear that he was very familiar
with his Scriptures, the Hebrew Bible. He may have known it from memory,
a feat not uncommon among the learned. The Psalms were probably his
“prayer book.”

• The Historical Jesus in Recent Research

My suggestions don't really explain the Bible, but they are thought-provoking and fascinating if you like science.

Creation and Time

Beyond the Cosmos (I found this book really interesting.)

The Creator and the Cosmos

The Fingerprint of God

These are all by the same guy, and I really enjoyed them a great deal, so I fully recommend them to you.

I also enjoy Christian fantasy books, for example:

The Dragon King Trilogy: In the Hall of the Dragon King

The Warlords of Nin

The Sword and the Flame

The Pendragon Cycle: Taliesin

Merlin

Arthur

Pendragon

Grail

To be honest, I haven't read the last two, they weren't out yet when I read these books.

I also recommend some classics like Lilith by George MacDonald.

The Case for Christ

Anyway, that's all I can think of at this time. If I think of anything else, I'll update this list.

Juan Cole is a good place to start.

An old one, but VERY useful is Sir John Bagot Glubb's A Short History of the Arab Peoples. He lived among the bedouin of the Arabian Peninsula and became fluent in Arabic. Plus he is a good writer. https://www.amazon.com/Short-History-Arab-Peoples/dp/0880292261/ref=sr_1_4?crid=14EK2682K6QSK&keywords=john+glubb&qid=1558423559&s=books&sprefix=john+glubb%2Caps%2C309&sr=1-4

​

I would also recommend Karen Armstrong - anything by her. But The Battle for God: A History of Fundamentalism is fascinating. https://www.amazon.com/Battle-God-History-Fundamentalism-Ballantine-ebook/dp/B005DB6NCA/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=battle+for+god&qid=1558423715&s=books&sr=1-1

​

Best of luck! Hope this helps.

It's probably rude to answer a question with a book recommendation, but here goes: Epistemology: Becoming Intellectually Virtuous would both answer your question and start a whole more complex level of inquiry.

Everybody's got assumptions, everybody accepts certain propositions on trust; how do we draw lines around what we accept as "true" - and do it in a way that's not arbitrary, a way that's more defensible than "Well, duh, it's science"? Both in and outside of religious circles, people have been working on that question for a few hundred years, and Epistemology: Becoming Intellectually Virtuous does a really good job of surveying and giving practical application to some answers. I recommend it to fundamentalists, materialists, and anyone else who's puzzled by other people's ways of thinking about truth.

A lot of the current atheist/Christian discourse I see around here suffers from a lack of epistemological depth, on both sides. I'd be delighted if a bunch of /r/Christianity and /r/Atheism readers picked up this book and read it. It's only five bucks used at Amazon :-)

He's so readable that I can definitely recommend skipping the books about St. Augustine and just going directly to the source. As others have mentioned, Confessions. Others you may be interested in are City of God and On Grace And Free Will.

Also, as /u/Philip_Schwartzerdt mentioned, John Calvin isn't typically considered one of the Church Fathers given that his time on earth came in the 16th century. In fact, as a Catholic, we would consider him a heretic, but that's neither here nor there. :)

For other early Church Fathers books, you may want to check out this collection of writings from the early church, Against Heresies by St. Iranaeus, countering heresy in the early Church, and The First And Second Apologies by St. Justin Martyr, a convert to the faith at about 130 A.D. and who was martyred (surprise) around 165 A.D.

As you may have guessed, with me being a Catholic in the Roman Rite, that's the perspective to which my study of the early Church Fathers led me, but if you wish to get a primer on St. Irenaeus before the books come, this is a worthwhile read.

I highly encourage the study of the fathers. The whole Christian world disagrees on many parts of of Sacred Scripture, and the testimony of the fathers, especially those who were direct disciples of the Apostles, should be one of our primary sources of discerning Christian truth amid the chaos. Plainly put, there are many interpretations of Scripture which "make sense" or are feasible outside of the tradition of the Apostles, but if said interpretation is true, it should be reflected in the doctrines, beliefs, and practices of those whom the Apostles taught.

I'll pray for you as you jump into this study. Please reach out if I can be of any help!

Peace,

DK

Mr. Syme has offered a good list to begin. I would like to follow that list up with a number of other good works:

• The Everlasting Man by G.K. Chesterton
  
  
• Theology and Sanity by F.J. Sheed
  
  
• Born Fundamentalist, Born Again Catholic by David Currie
  
  The NAB you have is an approved translation, but I highly recommend using the RSVCE.
  
  It is certainly a good idea to buy Sacred Scriptures and the Catechism right now. These two pieces of literature are essential to any Catholic's library. The Missal is very good for your devotional life, especially if you are converting and have no prior experience with our Church.
  
  Be sure to balance your reading of non-fiction works with some good, rousing fiction as well. The brain needs to find itself in fantasy every now and then. Chesterton, Tolkien, Lewis, and Waugh are all good authors.

Sure.

If evolution is of interest to you (and if you have interest in the intersection between theology and science), Finding Darwin's God by Kenneth Miller explores both sides of the debate and debunks many common misconceptions about evolution. I first read it in a college biology topics course.

If you like the topic of 'creationist attempts to dispute or disrupt the teaching of evolution in the classroom', Summer of the Gods, about the Scopes Monkey Trial, is a great book (although not explicitly about science).

You may find The Selfish Gene by Dawkins worth a read.

Books by Mary Roach can be fun; I've read Stiff and enjoyed it, and Packing for Mars was pretty good as well.

I have heard good things about The Emperor of All Maladies, though I haven't read it myself.

Our Stolen Future, about contamination of the environment by artificially produced estrogen and estrogen analogs, is dated but interesting.

The Discovery of Insulin by Bliss is a great story about how science happens and how scientific discovery occurs, and it lays out what may be the most important discovery in medical science during the 20th century.

Were those types of books what you were looking for?

The easiest way to get Christianity is to read the Bible. But to supplement that, I would encourage you to read books by these two German authors: Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Jurgen Moltmann

Bonhoeffer was a prominent leader of the confessing church (the church that resisted Hitler) and was a prominent member of the German resistance and a part of the Valkyrie plot. If you want to know more about him and his life, Eric Metaxas wrote an excellent Biography about him. Bonhoeffer's most famous works are "Life Together" about living a life in Christian community, and "The Cost of Discipleship" which is about Grace and how we must not live in a place of cheap Grace. Bonhoeffer was executed a t Flossenburg concentration camp a few months before VE day, and there are some nice memorials to him there (about 1.5 hours east of Nurnberg).

Jurgen Moltmann was drafted into Hitler's army in like 1944 and was taken prisoner. He found God in a Scottish POW camp. Moltmann writes a lot about Hope and spends a lot of time exploring what Christ's sacrifices mean to believers. Some of his most famous works are "The Crucified God", "Theology of Hope", "Trinity and the Kingdom" and "The Way of Jesus Christ." Moltmann also comments on more social issues which arose in the post-war era and has a more social theology, which adds a unique depth to his writing.

The Society of Biblical Literature (the main learned society for the field) launched an educational site this year called Bible Odyssey, featuring the complete contents of the HarperCollins Bible Dictionary and a lot of original content. Have a look through the "Bible Basics" section. Before the site was launched, it was announced that it would include the great, scholarly articles from the Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary, and let us all hope that this will eventually be accomplished.

In buying a Bible, remember that it is a collection of literature written thousands of years ago in exotic foreign cultures; such a journey is not to be undertaken without a guide. You need an annotated edition. The HarperCollins Study Bible and the New Oxford Annotated Bible are both excellent references. Those Bibles have maps in the back, but the Oxford Bible Atlas may be a useful supplement. If you're not looking to spend a lot, the New American Bible is a great translation with lighter, but still very illuminating notes.

For background on the societies in which the Bible and Christianity were formed, The Ancient Mediterranean World: From the Stone Age to A.D. 600. For studies on what can be known about Jesus from historical evidence, The Historical Figure of Jesus by E. P. Sanders and Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium by Bart Ehrman. (Ehrman has a blog which is worth the subscription; you can also learn a lot from his lectures and interviews on YouTube.)

For the perspective of modern Christians and not just information about the religion's history, Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton and Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis are two books that are considered classics by many Christians today, across denominational lines. There's a sort of intellectual line running through the two, since Lewis was converted from atheism by reading Orthodoxy (although he did not become a Catholic like Chesterton, as his friend J. R. R. Tolkien had hoped).

Have fun!

The problem with pain and evil is that we don't really know.

I firmly believe that the Creator didn't intend for any of this, yet that unhinges a whole bunch of presuppositions about what the Creator is like; such as immutability, impassibility, even omniscience.

For me the root question was "If GOD knew the outcome of creation before creation, doesn't that make GOD ultimately responsible?"

There are no definitive answers for theodicy. There are guesses and suggestions, frameworks and world views.

Our conception of GOD; that primary view of GOD's attributes will influence so much of how we understand suffering and pain.

The best framework for me is Open Theism.

Here are some awesome resources for what has proved so vital for my faith regarding pain and suffering:

1)The Crucified GOD - Jurgen Moltmann - an awesome book (if not a little on the academic end) thinking through Jesus and suffering.

2) Is GOD to Blame? - Greg Boyd - a much easier to read book exploring these very questions.

3)The Openness of GOD - Pinnock et. al. - for me this is the gold standard. It isn't too dry and heady but isn't weak on research either.

Awesome question and I love that quote from your brother.

Read a book like this one: http://www.amazon.com/Undeniable-Evolution-Creation-Bill-Nye/dp/1250074223

Try to find a copy of this incredible 3 episode PBS series: http://www.pbs.org/show/your-inner-fish/

Visit a good natural history museum

Watch this 4 minute video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFxu7NEoKC8

Go to a zoo.

Read Darwin's On The Origin Of Species...This abridged audio production is fairly easy to follow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpU8HfUwdmY

It's easy to say 'I can't see evolution happen', but I could just as easily say 'I can't see a tree grow'. I really can't, but walking through a forest and seeing different sized trees should be enough for me to reasonably assume that they do.

You don't need to be a biochemist to see similar proof for evolution. It can be very clearly inferred from all sorts of things around you right now.

EDIT: Thanks for the gold /u/rjkardo!!

I'll give you my answers, since they're definitely going to be considerably different, at the very least, from the ones you'll get from anyone else around here.

>Mainly, I'm interested in hearing the Protestant criticisms of Catholicism, and Catholic criticism of Protestantism.

I can't really speak to this one, as I'm not really either of those. There are Catholics that I would deem to be "true Christians" (e.g. Gustavo Gutiérrez, Óscar Romero, John Dominic Crossan) and there are Protestants that I'd refer to as the same (e.g. Jürgen Moltmann, Reinhold Neibhur, Martin Luther King, Jr.). Heck, I'd even call people who don't profess to follow Jesus yet act in a Christlike manner to be "true Christians" (e.g. Mohandas Gandhi, Ernst Bloch, Slavoj Žižek). I'm much less concerned about one's theology than I am about one's praxis.

>How do you view the "lukewarm" Christians mentioned in the Bible?

You're talking about the ekklesia in Laodicea in Revelation 3:15-16, right?:

>I know your works; you are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were either cold or hot. So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I am about to spit you out of my mouth.

These are Christians that refuse to take a side. James Cone has a good quote that I tend to go back to for those "Christians" that refuse to take a side:
>"Either God is identified with the oppressed to the point that their experience becomes God's experience, or God is a God of racism."

One could substitute any form of hierarchy for Cone's "racism" in that quote; race for him is an ontological symbol of oppression. For God to be a god of liberation (as Jesus' God was/ is) He/She must have an alignment with the oppressed. He cannot be neutral, for neutrality to injustices privileges the status quo. And just as God must take a side, so must Her/His followers. That's what the lukewarm Christians in Laodicea were doing - refusing to take a side. They were unwilling, perhaps afraid to be "hot," and thus were no better than the "cold" rest of the world. Revelation's God is saddened by Her/His followers refusing to take a stand - lukewarm is equivalent to cold, neutrality is equivalent to oppression, but it is much easier to judge active agents of oppression than its passive agents.

> How do you feel about the divide on social and scientific issues - where it seems Catholics are generally more progressive, and Protestants are generally more conservative?

I don't really have a great answer for the science one. If you believe in a Creator (I don't ), and you believe that that Creator is "good," then you should believe that everything that that Creator endowed you with, including the ability to reason, is likewise "good." Thus, denying scientific discoveries and theories because they go against a literal reading of a 2500+ year-old book is spitting on your Creator's gifts to you.

As far as "social issues" go, it should be noted that the metanarrative of the Bible is inherently a political story, one of liberation. Whether God is guaranteeing a "promised land" to slaves in Egypt or guaranteeing that He/She will bring Her/His people home from exile, the authors are making statements against empires. When Mark opens his Gospel with "The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God," he's making a direct statement against Caesar Augustus, who was said to be the bringer of evangelion ("good news") and whose full imperial name included the phrase Divi Filius ("Son of the Divine/ Son of God.") The anointed (Christos) son of god that brings the good news was not the Emperor of the known world, but a Jewish peasant bastard from rebellious Galilee. He went on a mission preaching a "Kingdom of God" (as opposed to an "Empire of Rome?") where "the last will be first and the first will be last." He attacked the center of social/political/religious/economic power of Judea, the Temple of Jerusalem, and was promptly executed by Rome with a method saved for political radicals. But then, the scandal! He was resurrected, denying the ultimacy of Rome's power and Rome's ideology, ensuring via promise that the "Kingdom of God" was something that can be achieved.

Liberation is the heart of Jesus' evangelion. Thus, as far as social (and economic. Especially economic!) issues are concerned, the God that Jesus professed will always be on the side of the oppressed, not that of the oppressors, for that would be the demesne of the God that named Caesar "Augustus." I hesitate to even affirm "progressivism" as the Christian God's ideology de jure; it's more radical than that. Jesus completely subverts what the Romans considered to be "reality" by presenting a Kingdom of God free of death (oppression). He revealed society's constructed nature, denied the invalid claims to ultimacy (because nothing man-made can truly be "ultimate"), and presented an alternative. Whereas Empire causes oh so many to fall into non-being, Jesus instilled his followers with the courage to be.
>And lastly, why do you think you've found the most correct version of Christianity?

Most correct? I hesitate to ever claim superlatives, but I am confident that my understanding of Christianity is much closer to Jesus' religious beliefs than the abomination of "mainstream" Christianity is. Why, though? Because I make every effort to read the Gospel with the eyes of a first-century Jewish peasant - Jesus' original followers and original audience. Or, failing that, I read it through the eyes of oppressed classes, after all, they certainly have a hermeneutical privilege. I read the Bible unpolluted by Plato's doctrine of the eternal soul or by the obscenity that is Constantine's in hoc signo vinces. I divorce myself from the assumptions of "nature" that our society makes, just as Jesus himself did. I reject the inherently flawed assumptions about a "just world" and those that affirm the powers-that-be as infallible.

What does that leave me with? Hope. Energization against an unjust world because Christ's gospel screams that there shall be a real, just world that we can bring about. Not just can, but must, for
>"Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it. Peace with God means conflict with the world, for the goad of the promised future stabs inexorably into the flesh of every unfulfilled present.".

So, am I confident that I've "found the most correct version of Christianity?" No, and I don't think that that's possible. But I have been to the mountaintop, I have seen the Promised Land, and I know the Kingdom of God. Exegesis, coupled with the hermeneutic of the oppressed, offers no reasonable alternative "Christianity" to the gospel of liberation. Sadly, instead of this "bottom-up" model, Christianity has long been co-opted by "top-downers" more interested in either explicitly imposing their will further upon the downtrodden or simply pushing their legitimate grievances aside in favor of otherworldliness. But again, God cannot be neutral, and what use is a God on the side of the powerful? Why let them continue to stack the deck, to stack their team? The only God worth believing in is the God who evens the score, who stands on the side of true (distributive, not retributive) justice, the God who killed all oppression and bought us liberation at Calvary.

"The Orthodox Church" By Kallistos Ware. A very readable and comprehensive book by a well respected convert now bishop.

Byzantine Theology by John Meyendorff. He is one of the greatest contemporary Orthodox theologians.

The Way of the Pilgrim Author unknown. This is a classic of Eastern Christian spirituality that brings many people into the Orthodox way.

Hope these help!

This one won a Pulitzer Prize, but I'm afraid it is non-fiction

If you need it to be fiction, here's one of the best plays ever written about a trial on the same subject

I also agree with KosherDev - go see a real one.

Edit - to add another link....

John Hick: He's basically reusing the argument made by Irenaeus in the 2nd century but doing so in contrast to Augustine's Free Will/The Fall Theodicy. A very simple summary is; instead of reading the Fall as necessarily literal, where humanity was perfect in its distant past, Hick looks to the eschatological perfection (the end times/ultimate) of humanity once we are reunited with God. We are not deviants trying to reattain our perfection, but children maturing into it, of which suffering is a necessary part. See the IEP for a larger summary or read his book, Evil and the God of Love

David Griffin: I'm not familiar with his specific arguments but the Process Theodicy works in this way: Individual moral agents' free will is the utmost power thus while God is a t all times trying to influence the individual to making the right actions, He cannot ever overrule someone's free will. As such, the suffering that occurs in the world is the result of absolute free will and God's omnipotence is compromised to account for what might be excessive suffering. Read here for more on Process theology and look at God, Power, and Evil: A Process Theodicy for DRG's argument specifically.

A good recent anthology of primary texts from Yale University Press is Eastern Orthodoxy: The Essential Texts.

A meaty series from St. Vladimir's Press is The Church in History.

The Cambridge History of Christianity is a wonderful and rich resource. It's written by multiple scholars. Volume 5 covers the Eastern Orthodox.

A classic secondary source on Orthodox thought is John Meyendorff's Byzantine Theology: Historical Trends and Doctrinal Themes.

Happy reading!

I'll put forward three more that I have read several times.

1. "Redemption, Accomplished and Applied" -- Great treatment of the Ordo.
   
2. "The Reason for God" -- Great manual on how to effectively speak with skeptics about Christianity. I have personally seen the HS use this book to bring two of the closest people in my life to Christ.
   
3. "The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification" -- Puritan work, brought into modern English. Imagine, 300 years ago the Justification/Sanctification debate was ended by a Puritan.

I would say it's supernatural. Don't stop praying the rosary. One time, While I was praying to work, it felt like while praying the rosary, I felt a spiritual breaking of chains. Just attribute it as awesome and keep on praying. Consider it a blessing:)

Read the Secret of the Rosary and after the Rosary get this book http://www.amazon.com/Devotion-Precious-Blood-Jesus-Christ/dp/1579182720/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1450317863&sr=8-1&keywords=precious+blood+of+jesus

and this one http://www.catholictradition.org/Mary/rosa-mystica4.htm

and get green scapulars. and get brown scapulars. get the 5 fold scapular. get the bible, read it. You can get a plenary indulgence for reading the bible 30 minutes, going to mass, confession, praying 1 our father 1 creed and 1 ave maria and gloria and detachment from all sin, then saying your intention for a plenary indulgence...(removal of punishment due to sin=no purgatory and no punishments of sin here on earth) get it every day... if you can...and make sure to above all else...go to adoration... and mass daily...and do not hesitate to get st. benedict medals and holy water all over your house. ask your priest to bless oil and exorcise salt put over your house and get this book https://www.ewtn.com/library/NEWAGE/EVIDSATN.HTM

reading this book
http://www.amazon.com/City-Penguin-Classics-Augustine-Hippo/dp/0140448942/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1450318220&sr=8-1&keywords=city+of+god

keep going to adoration and search-- get that peace!

Yes!
To add to the list of (modern) books that you could look into (because these eloquent writers tell it better than I could ever paraphrase), I'd recommend "The Great Partnership: Science, Religion, and the Search for Meaning" by Jonathan Sacks -- Amazon link here: https://www.amazon.com/Great-Partnership-Science-Religion-Meaning/dp/0805243011

I think Hugh Ross has some great ideas in Beyond the Cosmos: What Recent Discoveries in Astrophysics Reveal About the Glory and Love of God

The two best books on this subject, IMO, are:

The Great Partnership: http://www.amazon.com/The-Great-Partnership-Science-Religion/dp/0805243011/ref=pd_sim_b_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=0F6V6MAAKJEZ2BNHBKFA. This speaks on a more philosophical level how science and Torah complement each other.

The Challenge of Creation: http://www.amazon.com/Challenge-Creation-Encounter-Cosmology-Evolution/dp/9652295949/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395243512&sr=1-1. This goes through a myriad of traditional Torah sources to show that Torah-observant Jews have nothing to fear from science.

I would check out The Historical Jesus in Recent Research by James Dunn. It's a collection of essays. I haven't read this particular collection of essays but it is part of a series called "Sources For Biblical and Theological Study" which is very good and tries to get the most important essays on a particular subject. This volume would have various essays from the most influential scholars.

I'm actually more interested in reading the Christian books, since I've read pretty much all of the popular atheist literature:

Orthodoxy

Mere Christianity

But of course there's good atheist literature too:

HPMOR and others that I'll think of and post later I suppose.

I've found W. Jay Wood's introductory work on epistemology that focuses largely on virtue epistemology to be extraordinarily helpful in how to become, as the title of his work states, intellectually virtuous.

Theology and Sanity by Frank Sheed is a fantastic read that I would strongly urge every Catholic to read. It really helps tie together a lot of church teachings into a coherent whole which really helped shape my worldview. Some say it's a hard read so Sheed also wrote Theology for Beginners which I hear is an easier read. Also, if you look closely at his videos, you can see the book on Fr. Barron's book case.

Luther was not a fundamentalist; he was the founder of Protestantism. Fundamentalism arose later from Protestantism and Catholicism, in the 1900s. There's an excellent history of the movement if you'd like to take the time to read it: https://www.amazon.com/Battle-God-History-Fundamentalism-Ballantine-ebook/dp/B005DB6NCA The first Fundamentalist was Sister Aimee Semple who had a storefront church in LA in the early twentieth century.

Fundamentalists look down on both mainstream Protestants and Catholics alike, as well as Jews, Muslims, Bahais, etc.., etc.. They believe that they communicate directly with God and that God acts in their lives and they have "the gifts of the Spirit" and can create miracles in their every day life. God talks to them directly (and I mean this quite literally for many of them; some of them, including my father, will tell you that God speaks out loud to them).

IBLP is a special, weird little sect/cult based on one man, Bill Gothard, but a lot of their beliefs (woman submits to man, women must dress ultra modestly, remove yourself from the world and only concern yourself with Godly things, etc.) are common in fundamentalism.

Several years ago I read God's Greatest Gifts and really enjoyed it. It is very short and simple. Then when I was pregnant I realized that my youngest daughter was due (and eventually born!) on his feast day. That prompted me to read Selected Writings throughout my pregnancy. I'll be honest that I struggled through most of it. I don't know if I'm not smart enough, or if it was the translation, but I just found it difficult. I think I'm just much more of a St Athanasius / St. Basil the Great / St. Chrysostom reader. Their works just seemed to really resonate with me.

Well one of my favorites is Bill Nye and this book is a very easy read and makes a strong argument... But he is not an expert in climate science, only a scientist who has looked at the argument. How about anyone on this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_climate_scientists

or NASA: http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/

“Whoever [in speaking to another person] is not committed to the truth—such a person, from that moment on, no longer considers the other as a partner, as equal. In fact, he no longer respects the other as a human person. . . . [The other person] becomes an object to be manipulated, possibly dominated.” -Josef Pieper

The point here being that it is easy for theists and atheists to pick out weak arguments and pretend that is the best the other side has to offer but that is intellectually dishonest. If you wish to be an atheist, that is your decision, but you should at least try to read and understand the best arguments from the other side before doing so.

https://www.amazon.com/Christian-Apologetics-Comprehensive-Biblical-Faith/dp/0830839356/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1501512539&sr=8-1&keywords=groothuis+christian+apologetics is a good book on the topic.

http://www.str.org/ is good if the previous read is too difficult for you.

It's pretty much all around you. Whether or not you choose to except that or don't is up to you. If you like science and are not really biased to the point of willful ignorance, read some of these:

• http://www.evolutionnews.org/
  
  
• The Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism Michael J. Behe
  
  
• I Don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist (Unabridged) Norman Geisler
  
  
• Design Revolution: Answering the Toughest Questions About Intelligent Design (Unabridged) William Dembski
  
  
  
• Icons of Evolution: Science or Myth? Why Much of What We Teach About Evolution Is Wrong (Unabridged) Jonathan Wells
  
  
• The Privileged Planet: How Our Place in the Cosmos is Designed for Discovery (Unabridged) Guillermo Gonzalez, Jay Richards
  
  
• The Myth of Junk DNA
  
  
• http://www.arn.org/mm/mm.htm
  
  
• http://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Doubt-Explosive-Origin-Intelligent/dp/0062071475/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1372549628&sr=1-1&keywords=stephen+c+meyer
  
  
• http://www.amazon.com/Signature-Cell-Evidence-Intelligent-Design/dp/0061472794/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1372549648&sr=1-3&keywords=stephen+c+meyer
  
  
• http://www.arn.org/
  
  
• http://www.amazon.com/Slaughter-Dissidents-Jerry-Bergman/dp/0981873405/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1372549727&sr=8-1&keywords=slaughter+of+the+dissidents (Read this one more then once)
  
  
• http://www.dissentfromdarwin.org/links.php
  
  
• http://discovery.org/
  
  
  Etc...
  
  
  
  

> The purpose of any suffering is ultimately to bring us closer into union with him

I actually somewhat like your idea here but you still might want to consider what the purpose of animal suffering is as well as the purpose of suffering newborns.


This paper might interest you.: http://mind.ucsd.edu/syllabi/02-03/01w/readings/hick.pdf

I think it is along a slightly different track than your thoughts but still similar.

Edit:if you are super interested here is his book on it. http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/0230252796 Again not saying it has all the answers.

Evil and the God of Love

http://www.amazon.com/Evil-God-Love-John-Hick/dp/0230252796

I don't buy what he's selling, in many ways, but it's a good place to start.

For your reading pleasure: (pdf's I and II of) Stcherbatsky's translation of Vasubandhu's appendix to his Abhidharma-kosa {2} , {oh, Louis} : The @Soul Theory of the Buddhists@ hosted by some Russians.

How about the Bible?

Signature in the Cell: DNA and the evidence for intelligent design

What would make you believe in God?

God or Atheism - Which is more rational?

If Good and Evil Exist, God Exists

This has nothing to do with the show, but he has done some very well written books recently.

Bill Nye has a good book. He read the audio book too.

Undeniable

Gurdjieff was a Sufi mystic who has a book written by one of his students, Ouspensky, called In Search of the Miraculous. You may find some profound and useful material of Gurdjieff in this book.

​

https://www.amazon.com/Search-Miraculous-Harvest-Book/dp/0156007460

It sounds like a summary for this book.

Maybe you should read his book Undeniable.

https://www.amazon.com/Undeniable-Evolution-Creation-Bill-Nye/dp/1250074223

The theory of evolution isn't the only "scientific" theory to explain the formation of human beings. The theory of evolution has "flaws" and does not explain everything satisfactorily. Some of these questions have remained unanswered by the theory of evolution since it was initially proposed by Darwin. The scientific community is just as dogmatic as the religious one with regards to the theory of evolution among other things. I would suggest checking the following material and similar material also from the scientific community.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0089LOM5G/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_taft_p1_i0

https://www.amazon.com/Heretic-Scientists-Journey-Darwin-Design/dp/1936599503/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=heretic&qid=1574584576&s=books&sr=1-1

https://www.amazon.com/Darwins-Black-Box-Biochemical-Challenge/dp/0743290313/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3CKSTFGSKWOXW&keywords=darwins+black+box&qid=1574584922&sprefix=Darwins+black+bo%2Caps%2C291&sr=8-1

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0061472794/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=uslimkeptic-20&camp=1789&creative=9325&linkCode=as2&creativeASIN=0061472794&linkId=166be51886e107227843bc81a6f6cf02

In The Battle for God the author points out that the virgin birth was one of the five fundamental beliefs described by the Evangelical preachers to say what a person must believe in order to be a Christian.

We know exactly how it did. We do it all the time with artificial selection.

If you want proof, look no further than your dog or an ear of corn.

Here are a couple of compelling examples:

http://www.nature.com/hdy/journal/v82/n1/full/6884120a.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1194281/Darwins-evolution-moth-changes-black-white-thanks-soot-free-skies.html

Really, I feel silly even arguing this.

I highly recommend Bill Nye's Undeniable:

http://www.amazon.com/Undeniable-Evolution-Creation-Bill-Nye/dp/1250074223/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1451618364&sr=8-3&keywords=bill+nye

I assume the evangelist in question interviewed leading evo-biologists for their views on the subject?

I gather that philosopher Stephen Meyer's Signature in the Cell is the most advanced case to come from the "intelligent design" crowd (it certainly has caught Thomas Nagel's attention), and I also gather that the evo-bio crowd thinks he just gets a lot of the science mistaken, perhaps subtly, perhaps glaringly. What I think is needed for this debate are proponents/opponents who specialize in both philosophy and biology, so as to sift the noise from the signals. Unfortunately, tons and tons of noise is being fed into the mainstream public debate. It's like people debating political philosophy with no one reading Rawls and Nozick; i.e., the pitiful state of political "dialogue" in mainstream America today. :-(

I went to Alpha when I was still a Christian, but when doubts were starting to form. They invite you in by sharing a meal together, watching Gumbel's presentation, and having discussion. The video segments are made up of the same old arguments stating that people are basically bad and need to be made right by the blood of Jesus. It's an effective tool on those who aren't able to or aren't trained in logical/cognitive fallacies.

> I've tried to respectfully challenge her on a couple of things, but she feels that I'm attacking her new found faith.

IMO this is a red flag. Being defensive usually doesn't allow for an open mind. Be wary.

> Are there any good books which help explain non-literalist Christian beliefs to someone who came from a literalist background?

I wouldn't keep pointing in the direction of belief, but rather point in the direction of truth (Plus, we were taught to hate Rob Bell in church):

• Why Evolution is True By Jerry Coyne
  
• Undeniable: Evolution and the Science of Creation by Bill Nye
  
• Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality by Eliezer Yudkowsky
  
• The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
  
• The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark by Carl Sagan
  
  Pointing in the direction of religion, yields more bad philosophy.

He also wrote this book where he all but decries hereditary genetics, blaming disproportionate IQs on biased testing and cultural/environmental issues, all of which has been disproved many times before. Unfortunately, he's more of a pop star than a scientist. I've said it before but I'll take an E. O. Wilson over a Bill Nye any day.

EDIT: Downvoted by people who couldn't tell you who E. O. Wilson is.

In the first place, I don't need to demonstrate design of the hands of a deity, all I need to do is demonstrate that there is a rebuttable presumption of design, and at that point, there would be hard evidence for the notion that the existence of a designer is possible, which may or may not be a deity. Goodbye atheism, hello agnosticism. If the design hypothesis is not refuted, that is the only explanation we are left with, through a process of elimination. Once the design hypothesis is shown to be plausible, we can then go into scientific evidence extant for further confirmation that would exclude any other hypothesis (some of which is in the PDF; see Challenge 16), and once that is done, the identity of that designer. But first things first!!

Yes, it is easy to conclude the appearance of design, Richard Dawkins himself has done that, which is the entire point of my video. The whole idea of the "blind watchmaker" thesis is that biology is constantly providing the appearance of design, which of course leads to a design inference. This is a rebuttable presumption of course, and that is the point of Dawkins' book, that he is able to rebut the presumption. Unfortunately, he confines himself to one level of the argument, evolution, and even though he fails there, he barely attempts to address the origin of life problem, which is in fact the sole locus of the problem, if you accept the notion of the universal common ancestor.

There are even more peer-reviewed articles, and if you want them put together, check out the Meyers book:

http://www.amazon.com/Signature-Cell-Evidence-Intelligent-Design/dp/0061472794/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1421927648&sr=8-1&keywords=signature+cell

Here is the bibliography from the book, you'll find lots of peer-reviewed articles there!!

https://www.scribd.com/doc/253395869/Signature-Bibliography

The problem with atheists is that they spend so much time reading the works of other atheists and only conversing with other atheists, that they don't spend the time they need to get the facts of the matter that have been developed in the last decade.

You're pretty much stating the premise behind "The Problem of Evil:"

> If God is perfectly good, then He must want to prevent evil.

> If God is all-powerful, then He can prevent evil.

> Evil exists.

> Therefore, God is either not perfectly good or God is not all-powerful, or both.


There are plenty of philosophical arguments out there if you really want to look into it. There are immensely more intelligent individuals who have argued against The Problem of Evil. My argument against it would pail in comparison to theirs.

One counter argument is this:

> Evil exists because of humans free will

> If God was to stop evil from occurring this would reveal God

>* If God is revealed this would remove elements of humans free will and the need for faith. Both of which are elements needed for Humans to reach heaven/enlightenment.

All evil is the reaction based on the actions of humans with free will. To prevent evil from occurring god would have to remove humans free will. By doing so we would become mere puppets/slaves. Destroying the point of human existence.

I studied this a long time ago, so this is a very poor example. You should look into "Irenaean Theodicy" and "Evil and the God of Love"

I'm Catholic, but I think you're coming from absolutely the right direction. It's inexcusable to dismiss all the innocent, horrific suffering in the world as being part of some abstract "higher purpose" or vague justification. Anyone who does is full of shit and needs to take a serious look at what they're purporting to believe in. I think these are difficult questions that need to be asked if you want to say that you really believe in God. A lot of Christians kind of brush over them, bristle when you state the facts, when you so much hint at the slightest challenge to their faith. But if they do, then their faith is shaky to begin with.

Jurgen Moltmann is a theologian who discusses theodicy (the problem of evil) in a way that is very fascinating. I recently read The Crucified God which addresses it pretty well.

I find it incredibly difficult to come to terms with the amount of suffering in this world. I struggle with it. I'm gonna fight it, I'm gonna keep fighting it, and I think that's what we're meant to do. That's the point of Christ. Christ is taking up the cross, he's taking up the suffering of the world, he's protesting God, he's protesting himself, he's encouraging, demanding this continual protest of evil and suffering in the world rather than justifying it.

It's fascinating fucking stuff.