Tag Archives: apologetics

Religion as Sacred and Science as Profane

[The following is adapted from a paper I wrote for an undergraduate class I took several years ago. – Funky]

Religion as Sacred and Science as Profane:
Bryan Appleyard’s Views on Science and Religion in Relation to Mircea Eliade’s Theory of the Sacred and the Profane As It Applies to the Search for God

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An Exchange on Cloning

[For the uninitiated: Theomorph is an atheist lexivore and Jerry Nora is a Catholic MD/PhD student with penchant for bioethics. – Funky]

A week ago, Theomorph posted some thoughts about cloning on his blog. Below I have the questions that he poses in bold and his own answers in italic, and my own counterpoints are in plain text.

Tuck in, and happy debating!

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Apologetics and Conversion

"The Trilemma: Useless" was written as an entry in Vox Apologia XVIII. Since there were only four entries, RazorsKiss could easily comment on all of them. His commentary on mine causes some head scratches for me.

I’m interested as to why he chooses conversion as the end of apologetics (although, to some extent, it is true), and why he uses the worst-case scenarios to negate all cases where it might work. Go check it out, and see what you think of it.

How is conversion not an end of apologetics?

  • apologetics
    • The branch of theology that is concerned with defending or proving the truth of Christian doctrines.
    • Formal argumentation in defense of something, such as a position or system.
    • Middle English, formal defense, from Latin apologticus, from Greek apologtikos, suitable for defense, from apologeisthai, to defend oneself verbally, from apologos, apology, story. See apologue.]
  • conversion
    • A change in which one adopts a new religion, faith, or belief.
    • Middle English conversioun, religious conversion, from Old French conversion, from Latin conversi, conversin-, a turning around, from conversus, past participle of convertere, to turn around. See convert.

Apologetics is concerned with the rational defense of (in this case) Christianity. Ultimately, we would like our listeners to see things our way, i.e. turn (vertere) to face the direction we face with us (con). IOW, if Christianity can be rationally defended and we intend to perform such defense, do we not desire that our listeners be converted to our position? I understand that not all conversion need be achieved through apologetics. However, the ultimate goal of apologetics should be to convert. Any result short of that is just a comprimise and hopefully temporary.

The Trilemma: Useless

The so-called trilemma is a popular evangelism and apologetics crutch. As Josh McDowell puts, Jesus was either a liar, a lunatic, or Lord. The originator of the idea, C.S. Lewis, put it this way in Mere Christianity:

"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of thing Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg – or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."

I’m a big fan of Lewis and his writings were instrumental to my return to faith, but I cannot accept this argument. It is fallacious and essentially useless for converting a non-believer.

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The Dangers of Apologetics

"[I]f a Catechumen ask thee what the teachers have said, tell nothing to him that is without. For we deliver to thee a mystery, and a hope of the life to come. Guard the mystery for Him who gives the reward. Let none ever say to thee, What harm to thee, if I also know it? So too the sick ask for wine; but if it be given at a wrong time it causes delirium, and two evils arise; the sick man dies, and the physician is blamed. Thus is it also with the Catechumen, if he hear anything from the believer: both the Catechumen becomes delirious (for he understands not what he has heard, and finds fault with the thing, and scoffs at what is said), and the believer is condemned as a traitor. But thou art now standing on the border: take heed, pray, to tell nothing out; not that the things spoken are not worthy to be told, but because his ear is unworthy to receive. Thou wast once thyself a Catechumen, and I described not what lay before thee. When by experience thou hast learned how high are the matters of our teaching, then thou wilt know that the Catechumens are not worthy to hear them. "

– St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, Prologue 12)

"Do not give dogs what is holy; and do not throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under foot and turn to attack you." – Matthew 7:6