withallyourmind.net

Well… I had anticipated blogging a little more frequently since my last post, but life has kept me from it. Today, I arrived in San Diego for the Evangelical Theological Society/Evangelical Philosophical Society Annual Meeting. The Apologetics Conference I spoke of in my last post takes place each evening, starting tomorrow, while the day is spent listening to papers from evangelical scholars in philosophy and theology.

I arrived in San Diego after noon and made it to three excellent sessions today. Here’s a brief summary:

First, J. P. Moreland delivered a paper entitled, “How Evangelicals Became Over-Committed to the Bible and What can be Done about It.” One might misunderstand Moreland’s topic without having attended the session. In one sense, Evangelicals are under-committed to the Bible, yet, Moreland argues, they have over-committed to the Bible in making it the sole authority, or source of knowledge. This stands in contrast to the historical view which holds that the Bible is the ultimate authority or source of knowledge. This over-committment stems from a withdrawal from the broader world of ideas, surrendering the source of “real knowledge” to the hard sciences. Moreland’s call was for evangelicals to recover the use of right reason, natural law, experience, Creeds , and tradition as subordinate sources of knowledge.

I then heard an excellent paper by Dr. Angus J. L. Menuge of Concordia University Wisconsin called, “Socrates in Service to Christ: The Formation of an Apologist.” One never knows what to expect and is often misled by the Title of a Paper. I was pleasantly surprised that Menuge’s paper presented a study of Oxford University’s Socratic Club under the presidency of C. S. Lewis, 1942-1954. He asserts that the Socratic Club provides an ideal model for training Christians in apologetics. His paper was quite insightful.

Lastly, I attended a session in which Steven L. Porter of Talbot School of Theology presented a paper called, “What does a foundationalist theological methodology look like?” Porter first recounts how philosophical nonfoundationalism has led to a nonfoundational movement in theology. He then asks why a recent resurgence in philosophical foundationalism has not led to a corresponding surge in theological foundationalism. Finally, Porter provided a sketch of how three foundationalist theories (externalism, doxastic internalism, and nondoxastic internalism) affect theological methodology.

Tomorrow’s another day. I’ll see if I can provide another update then.

Hi all. I am finally back after a little over 2 weeks. I and my wife were on a Mediterranean cruise in which we visitied Barcelona, Florence, Rome, Naples, Ephesus, Istanbul, Athens, and Venice. We had a wonderful time (althought delayed a couple of days on our return and still missing some baggage). Among the highlights for me was the privilege of standing in the Stanza della Segnatura in the Vatican and gazing on the amazing fresco, The School of Athens, by Raphael. This is the painting which graces the upper right hand corner of our website. I could not have imagined how much more impressive this fresco is in person.

It was also awesome to walk through the ancient ruins of the city of Ephesus and walk the streets walked by the Apostle Paul two millenia ago. We also were thrilled to stand on Mars Hill in Athens - the exact spot where Paul engaged the Greek philosophers, presenting a rational case for the truth of the Christian message.

Being gone for over 2 weeks has resulted in my being very busy catching up with all my responsibilites, but I hope to resume blogging on a regular basis.

I recently became a contributor to the Florida Student Philosophy Blog, where I will cross-post some of my specifically philosophical thoughts, and my first post contained some of my thoughts on the graduate school application process, a very stressful thing for aspiring philosophers. You can check it out here.

I will be away for a couple of weeks and will most likely not be able to blog during that time. Jeremy will, however, take up the slack. I’ll be back soon!

It’s been a loooong time since I’ve posted anything here, and it has been at least partly due to the fact that I have spent a lot of time over the last couple months preparing for and then moving myself and my wife and all of our stuff 2,600+ miles across the country. At any rate, I have arrived safely in the bay area and settled into our new place in Berkeley well enough to get back to blogging. Although this blog has obviously become primarily the domain of my father, I do want to continue posting some of my thoughts on it and my goal at this point is to be disciplined about posting twice a week (I’m thinking of every Monday and Friday now, but this may change once my schedule changes when classes begin).

I also want to introduce my new personal website at http://jeremy.withallyourmind.net. Not much is there yet, but it is a work in progress.

Blogging will be a bit slow for the next couple of weeks as I’ll be spending two weeks at Biola University in California doing some class work. I’m also working at the hospital a great deal more than usual to make up for the time I’ll be away. I’ll still try to post an occasional blog.

Jeremy is also in the midst of his move to Berkeley, California, where he’ll be beginning his studies for his Ph.D. in philosophy. This will limit his ability to pick up the slack.

God is good to us. Thanks to all those who are interested in what we have to say here.

I have always attempted to blog daily and have been mostly successful in this effort. However, over the last couple of weeks, the blogging has been sparse. There are numerous reasons for this, but nonetheless, I hope to return to at least near-daily blogging.

As a return to my duties, I’ll offer something light. My wife and I have been American Idol fans from the first season. I was happy to see 17 year old Jordin Sparks win this past season’s contest. Her Christian faith has been a part of her public life for some time. John Dawson, of WORLD Magazine, profiles her Christianity and involvement in various Christian causes here (HT: Between Two Worlds).

Johnny-Dee of Fides Quaerens Intellectum recently complemented this blog by naming us one of the ” 5 blogs that make you think”. He described withallyourmind as…

A father-son team of bloggers. Almost everything they blog gives you a solid argument with which to wrestle. Anyone who is looking for intelligent evangelical Christians should check them out.

We appreciate the kind words!

It’s been an extremely long time since I’ve posted anything to this blog, and I’m not sure how many regular viewers we have, so it may be that no one remembers me. At any rate, if there are any such people, perhaps they will remember that I have been in the process of applying to PhD programs in philosophy. Well, out of the 12 departments to which I applied, I was admitted at four, and I have officially decided to pursue graduate study at the University of California at Berkeley starting next fall. They have a great program and one which will definitely increase my chances of being able to secure an academic job upon graduation. It’s obviously a great opportunity for me, and one about which I am both excited and nervous. The school is statistically more secular than most others, which may make things difficult from time to time, but which also opens up good opportunities for a person who wants to defend Christianity in the public realm of ideas. The move and getting used to the new environment will also be difficult, and so, naturally, any prayers offered on my behalf would be appreciated. All things going according to plan, in five years there will be a second Dr. Carey in the family!

My classes at Biola have just begun again. Between that and other commitments, I’ve missed a couple of days blogging. Hopefully, I’ll be up to speed again soon.