Jan. 18, 2007
By Marilyn Stewart
NEW ORLEANS -- Is atheism facing its demise? Oxford theologian Alister McGrath thinks so.
The 2007 Greer-Heard Point-Counterpoint Forum of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary (NOBTS) to be held February 23-24 on the seminary campus, will address the question of “The Future of Atheism.”
At the forum, McGrath, Oxford University professor of historical theology, prolific evangelical Christian apologist and author of The Twilight of Atheism, will present his case in dialogue with Daniel C. Dennett, university professor and Austin B. Fletcher professor of philosophy of Tufts University, who will defend an atheistic position.
The Greer-Heard Forum provides a venue in which an academically recognized evangelical scholar can engage a non-evangelical scholar on current issues in faith and culture.
McGrath holds Oxford University doctorates in both molecular biophysics and Christian theology and has published numerous works on Christian theology and its relationship to the natural sciences. His three-volume work, A Scientific Theology, explores the contributions of science and theology to each other.
As a former atheist, McGrath has a passion for addressing atheism that is grounded in the natural sciences. Of particular interest to McGrath are the writings of Richard Dawkins, Oxford evolutionary biologist and author of The Blind Watchmaker and The God Delusion. McGrath’s forthcoming response, The Dawkins Delusion: Atheist Fundamentalism and the Denial of the Divine, is to be published in 2007.
Dennett, who holds degrees in philosophy from Harvard and Oxford, directs the Center for Cognitive Studies at Tufts and is best known for his books Darwin’s Dangerous Idea and Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon.The third annual Greer-Heard Forum will highlight other recognized Christian philosophers and apologists including William Lane Craig, author or editor of more than 30 books, including Theism, Atheism and Big Bang Cosmology and Creation Out of Nothing. In addition, a special event of the Evangelical Philosophical Society will be held in conjunction with the Greer-Heard Forum.
The public is invited to attend the two-day event. To register for the forum visit www.greer-heard.com or call 504-816-8060. The cost is $20 per person and $10 for Southern Baptist ministers.
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