Questions And Observations On The Conflict Between Faith-Based and Secular Rationalities

The book is a broad overview of some of the basic questions and topics in the ongoing debates between secular and faith-based (specifically Christian) approaches to understanding reality. The first part consists of 73 short questions and/or propositions that range over some of the main points of contention in discussions of these topics. Some of the subjects considered are: the benefits and harms of science . . .the limitations of science . . . religious and secular violence . . . and the rationality of faith: that is, the validity of faith-based reasoning, if God does exist. This is followed by a selection of short essays on various aspects of the theist / atheist debate, written from a traditionally Christian vantage point. The failure of the 'Enlightenment', "The beneficial results of the Protestant Reformation," "There has never been a Christian country," John Calvin's alleged authoritarianism, German liberal Protestantism in the 19th century, and the profound secularism of modern German society in the 19th and early 20th centuries are also discussed.Following are two previously published magazine articles by the author, used with permission. One seeks to demonstrate the secular origins of the Holocaust in humanistic philosophies; the other analyzes Nietzsche's bitter and irrational hostility towards Christianity as expressed in his book The Antichrist. The main purpose is not to refute Nietzsche, but to bring his extreme and now outdated views into the open.