Justin Thacker (Head of Theology at the EA) wrote an interesting article in The Guardian this week. He responds to Colin Blakemore's speculation, that maybe we humans carry within us a false model of ourselves, as beings who have free will.
Blakemore's position appears to be that free will is an illusion, and that we are actually biologically programmed to behave in certain ways, and that freedom of thought and independent choice are simply illusory. He also postulates that eventually science will reveal the part of the brain that creates religious ideas.
Thacker's responding article points out that Blakemore's argument suffers from a number of flaws, not the least of which is the fact that Colin Blakemore writes and argues as if he and others do have free will.
Personally I find it strange that Colin Blakemore takes an apparently scientific viewpoint, yet he states that the big 'why' (e.g. "Why are we here?") questions are dubious, and should be rephrased as 'how' questions. What kind of science is it, that is not happy to try and address both 'how' and 'why'?
Blakemore's penultimate paragraph makes plain his bias, he'd rather have us only ask "the how questions that science answers so well". OK, lets only ask the questions we can currently answer shall we?...Er...but won't that restrict the development of scientific thinking? Might it slightly stifle the search for truth? Or is that another figment of our imagination?
Sorry Colin, you can restrict your questions to how, but me, I'm going to keep asking why as well!
Let's pray for more people of the ilk of Justin Thacker, and pray that Justin will continue to enjoy the freedom to put forward a sound evangelical response to such important issues. Let's also pray that Colin Blakemore and others like him find the Truth for themselves.
Saturday, 7 March 2009
Hot Line to God
A Dutch artist, Johan van der Dong, has set up a dedicated mobile phone number, to act as a kind of hot line to God. People can leave messages to God on the voicemail system. The aim of his work is to focus attention on changes to the ways Dutch people perceive religion. The work which is part of an instalation in the university city of Groningen, officialy begins on Sunday, but already over a thousand messages have been left.
This started me thinking; might God respond to the messages? If He does how will the artist react? More importantly what message would you leave?
As a Christian I beleive that I don't need to leave a mesage for God on an answer phone, as I can get straight through to Him, He's never engaged! That said I think this phone line is a great idea, as I'm of the mind that anything that makes people think about our relationship with God and encourages people to speak to him is generaly a good idea. I just hope that people take His answers seriously and don't write them off as figments of artistic imagination.
Lets pray that many use this opportunity phone God and are delighted to find him at home and patiently waiting to hear from them!
This started me thinking; might God respond to the messages? If He does how will the artist react? More importantly what message would you leave?
As a Christian I beleive that I don't need to leave a mesage for God on an answer phone, as I can get straight through to Him, He's never engaged! That said I think this phone line is a great idea, as I'm of the mind that anything that makes people think about our relationship with God and encourages people to speak to him is generaly a good idea. I just hope that people take His answers seriously and don't write them off as figments of artistic imagination.
Lets pray that many use this opportunity phone God and are delighted to find him at home and patiently waiting to hear from them!
Monday, 2 March 2009
CAP Christians Against Poverty
Just heard that C.A.P have won the Sunday Times award for the best small comany to work for. Great to see a Christian company getting some well earned recognition, and amidst some pretty tough competition, what is evern more impressive is the fact that they have won it for an unprecidented second time! Well done C.A.P!
The debt counselling work of C.A.P is becoming increasingly well known as the credit crunch continues to bite, and as increasing numbers of people need their expertise.
Their web site says: "CAP aims to show God’s love in action by providing sustainable poverty relief through debt counselling, advice and practical help. CAP’s unique ‘hands on’ approach empowers people to help themselves out of poverty and be released from the fear, oppression and worry generated by overwhelming debts."
It's a sign of the times that more and more people in the UK and right across the so called afluent North, are finding themselves having to call upon the Church and such important Christian charities.
The challenge before us is to support such organisations in prayer and practical ways so that they can continue to set an example of excellence whilst doing such important work.
Keep up the great work guys!
You can find out more about C.A.P at their web site here
The debt counselling work of C.A.P is becoming increasingly well known as the credit crunch continues to bite, and as increasing numbers of people need their expertise.
Their web site says: "CAP aims to show God’s love in action by providing sustainable poverty relief through debt counselling, advice and practical help. CAP’s unique ‘hands on’ approach empowers people to help themselves out of poverty and be released from the fear, oppression and worry generated by overwhelming debts."
It's a sign of the times that more and more people in the UK and right across the so called afluent North, are finding themselves having to call upon the Church and such important Christian charities.
The challenge before us is to support such organisations in prayer and practical ways so that they can continue to set an example of excellence whilst doing such important work.
Keep up the great work guys!
You can find out more about C.A.P at their web site here
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