A journey from atheism

Article: 30.06.19

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Philip Vander Elst describes how CS Lewis enabled him to grasp some liberating truths

In my early twenties, before my conversion to Christianity in 1976, I did not believe that our world offered entirely convincing and reliable evidence for the existence and goodness of God. (1)

Notes:

Philip Vander Elst read philosophy and politics at Oxford, is a freelance writer and lecturer, and his publications include C.S. Lewis: a short introduction and Libertarianism: a Christian critique.

1 See my personal testimony, From Atheism to Christianity: a personal journey, available at https://www.bethinking.org/author/philipvander-elst/page/all

2 I failed to understand the cosmological argument for God, whose truthfulness I now recognize and is explored in my paper Does science contradict religion?, available, again, at https://www.bethinking.org/author/philip-vander-elst/page/all

3 For a detailed forensic philosophical restatement and defence of C.S. Lewis’s argument, see, for instance, Victor Reppert, C. S. Lewis’s Dangerous Idea: In Defence of the Argument from Reason, (InterVarsity Press, USA, 2003).

4 J.B.S. Haldane (1892-1964), Professor of Biometry at University College, London, in Possible Worlds (1928), p.220.

5 C.S. Lewis, ‘De Futilitate’ [On Futility], an address given at Magdalen College, Oxford during the Second World War, Essay Collection & Other Short Pieces, (London: HarperCollins, 2000), p.680.

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Faith Magazine

July/ August 2019

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The Faith Vision

Editorial: 10.11.22

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The Church refused to engage with modern science. The Second Vatican Council explained the urgent need to do so.

The Faith Movement: a time of renewal

Article: 01.09.22

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The Faith Movement has a joyful understanding of God and the mission of the Church, seeing Christ as the Lord of History and recognising that He has a special call to men and women of each era, including our own.