Posted on 11/18/2009 3:36:45 PM PST by wombtotomb
Some of the work by F.F. Bruce might suit your needs.
Try ‘A Mind’s Matter: An Intellectual Autobiography’ by Fr. Stanley Jaki. Fr. Jaki was a prolific writer, and many of his books would be good choices.
Poster was not asking for cynicism.
If he starts to think the world is 6,000 years old, smack him.
That type of idiocy can do him no good.
Seconded.
I read ‘Orthodoxy’ at just about this young mans age, and it changed my life.
You might recommend www.reasons.org website to your nephew. Be Thinking. org is another interesting site which tries to balance sceince and faith issues.
They are available for only about $9 plus shipping on Amazon.com.
This is the information age. How in the world did chance add information and order to DNA and the structure of "evolving" life? And here we are trying to instill artificial intelligence into computers/robots.
The first law of thermodynamics (energy/matter cannot be created) has application in the field of Information Theory.
Easy to read and understand. Presented at a good pace. Compelling and persuasive.
Try “Fundamentals of the Faith” by Peter Kreeft. This is a good beginner’s introduction to Aquinas, with many apologetics as well.
Mere Christianity is good.
There are two books, and I’m trying to remember which that I found very helpful on my journey.
One on how science dovetails with the teachings of scripture.
Two, on the historicity of scripture. Chances are the reasons he believes that the bible is inaccurate is through faulty understanding of the history of the times.
[[ We of Western heritage have trouble with paradoxical perspectives. On the one hand, life we live with the human senses and our abilities to manipulate our environment and make servant machines to do for us, we think that this is the pinnacle of what it means to be alive, to be freed from effort. Paradoxically, we are living in a well of spacetime, which is a 'limits factory' rather than a freeing experience. Limits make for variation in theme and expression.
The laws of Physics define our reality but they also function as limits to how much we can know of ’it all’. By ’all’ we refer to the total package, body, soul, and spirit, and our interaction with the universe of realms in which these aspects of our being have reality. But without those limits imposed from the start, a range of expression that yields a Stephen Hawking and a Mozart but also an average guy ‘me’ or you would not be possible.
In a very practical sense, the big bang of creation has had several stages of emergent phenomena, reaching a point of Stephen Hawking emerging from the background states. The complexity of Hawking’s mind in contemplating the universe is far more than the sum of the chemical reactions occurring in the organ filling his skull. Hawking’s mind is a soulish quality far beyond the physical organ of his brain, yet utilizing his physical brain.
Spirit LIFE is less restricted than our spacetime senses, yet we have so little tangible evidence of this level of reality. By our modern standards reality is of course derived from our manipulations of spacetime.
We have the biblical stories of One who came to this limits well and lived and died and rose again from the dead, to occupy a physical body capable of 'beyondness' to these limits. He appeared inside a locked room thus it would appear by some means passing invisibly through solid walls then to suddenly appear. In the Old Testament we have the scene of a hand appearing, to write upon a wall, while the remainder of the being to which the hand was attached remained in a state of reality outside the sensing of the people in the room. It is Catholic belief that Jesus was conceived and born by some means which allowed Mary to remain a virgin. The resurrection story indicates that when the seal on the tomb was broken and the stone rolled back, the tomb was empty except for grave clothes still in the fashion as if wrapped around a body, but collapsed ... Christ left the grave clothes without unwrapping them and left the chamber through solid rock; the stone was subsequently rolled away to show the women seeking his body --to anoint it with oils and spices-- that the tomb was empty!
It is a seeming mystery that God is greater than the creation yet can inhabit the creation and move freely in and out of the limits well. And even more paradoxical, this Creator actually tells us He desires to commune with us, with we created beings! I have wondered how many scientists actually consider that God ‘thought’ of occupying a human body even prior to space and time and matter being expressed, then the whole of the creation went through a billions-of-years evolutionary process drawn toward the goal God had in bringing it all into being? Not many I would suspect. Christians ought not shy away from considering such a thing.
When we think of power, we conceive of the authority to order others about, or we think of the ability to plug into sources to do work our animal self cannot achieve as quickly without mechanical assistance. But there is a power which seems to wisp about as if mere breeze, a thing that seems as tenuous as a thought. Yet this power is greater than all the forces of the limits well we inhabit. This book will explore some of the weird scenes in the Bible ... weird from a science-only mindset. We will seek to stretch our minds to encompass occurrences having no easy scientific explanation but which may be about to have such a means to explain them, as the cutting edges of Physics and cosmology extend our comprehension of the universe. In the end we will connect a story in Daniel to the empty tomb in Jerusalem on resurrection morning.
One quick note on the Bible of Judeo-Christian heritage which we will be holding up as our standard for veracity, our source of material related from witnesses:
The Hebrew Bible, in particular the Torah (The Five Books of Moses), has done more to civilize the world than any other book or idea in history. It is the Hebrew Bible that gave humanity such ideas as a universal, moral, loving God; ethical obligations to this God; the need for history to move forward to moral and spiritual redemption; the belief that history has meaning; and the notion that human freedom and social justice are the divinely desired states for all people. It gave the world the Ten Commandments, ethical monotheism, and the concept of holiness (the goal of raising human beings from the animal-like to the God-like). Therefore, when this Bible makes strong moral proclamations, I listen with great respect. … The Bible speaks in such clear and direct language that one does not have to be a religious fundamentalist in order to be influenced by its views. All that is necessary is to consider oneself a serious Jew or Christian. [Dennis Praeger]
"Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it."
God has His ways of turning a man around.
I’d recommend three books, two of which have already been recommended by previous posters:
1. Mere Christianity, by C.S. Lewis. Start here. This book is so engaging and sensible, it is irresistible to all but the most cynical minds. It’s bound to make him hungry to learn more. Lewis wasn’t a Catholic, but Catholics (even young ones) can read it without danger to their Faith.
2. The Handbook of Catholic Apologetics, by Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli (both Catholics). This book is an exhaustive set of arguments for logical and reasonable arguments for the existence of God and for the Catholic Christian Faith.
3. How The Catholic Church Built Western Civilization, by Thomas E. Wood (mentioned above). This is a very readable and comprehensive book that, if he loves history, he’s bound to enjoy.
Hope that helps.
My mind has just been completely blown by the concept of agnostic apologetics. Agnosticism means without knowledge, and apologia is an argument in favor of something. So here I am trying to figure out how you argue for that of which you have no knowledge.
Lee Strobel is great..... Might check youtube and his website for a sample. I’ve seen him speak several times.
In my experience, professors in Divinity Courses in universities leave a lot of damage in their wake when it comes to enhancing the horizons of students who pursue such courses only to find many of them loaded with the higher criticisms and cynical pronouncements.
Sure, Archaeologists can tell us all about the H’apiru and other ancestors of the Israelites and those they dwellled with?. But, is that what people really go into such programs to learn? I doubt it. It was not so in my case.
I thought that the Poster was seeking information concerning historical apologists for Christianity. Perhaps I read too fast and misunderstood.
Thank you all for taking a few minutes to share the works and authors that have challenged and shaped you. I appreciate each and every one of your input.
I am going to print off this list and bring it to my sister. We will sift through it together and see what we can get him.
As to the agnostic apologetics comment, I have never had to debate an agnostic or atheist on the existence of God. I leave that to bigger minds than mine, therefore I was looking for information about it. My specialities are theology of the body and contraception/abortion. The people I have had occasion to speak to have already been believers, though some not such good ones.
I do thank you all again. I will post as we go through this trial. Please keep him in your prayers! Thanks again!!!!!
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