Churches For Apologetics: A Petition.
Written by David Smart, Posted in Apologetics, Christian activism, Education, Witnessing
The leadership and overall community of the Christian Apologetics Alliance [1] are highly motivated to encourage and equip the church in defending the faith using the tools available through Christian apologetics. It is their desire to see local churches everywhere creating and fostering a safe environment of questioning and learning in which members of Christ’s body are enabled and empowered to confront the hard questions that target the faith and consequently grow in strength, knowledge, and confidence. Apologetics in the church is no less important and relevant today than it was over 150 years ago when Wilberforce noted the following: [2]
In an age in which infidelity abounds, do we observe them [parents] carefully instructing their children in the principles of faith which they profess? Or do they furnish their children with arguments for the defense of that faith? They would blush on their child’s birth to think him inadequate in any branch of knowledge or any skill pertaining to his station in life. He cultivates these skills with becoming diligence. But he is left to collect his religion as he may. The study of Christianity has formed no part of his education. His attachment to it—where any attachment to it exists at all—is too often not the preference of sober reason and conviction. Instead his attachment to Christianity is merely the result of early and groundless possession. He was born in a Christian country, so of course he is a Christian. His father was a member of the Church of England, so that is why he is, too. When religion is handed down among us by heredity succession, it is not surprising to find youth of sense and spirit beginning to question the truth of the system in which they were brought up. And it is not surprising to see them abandon a position which they are unable to defend.
According to Drew Dyck, the vast majority of those who leave the church recount how they “were regularly shut down when they expressed doubts. Some were ridiculed in front of peers for asking ‘insolent questions.’ Others reported receiving trite answers to vexing questions and being scolded for not accepting them.” He mentioned studies which found that deconverts reported “sharing their burgeoning doubts with a Christian friend or family member only to receive trite, unhelpful answers.” [3]
It is the earnest prayer of Christian Apologetics Alliance that every church commits to adopting an apologetics program designed to adequately and honestly address such difficult questions when they arise, and to equip a generation of leaders and teachers in the church who not only have a real passion for apologetics but who will also recognize the skepticism and doubt in others as an authentic spiritual plea.
Please add your voice to their petition and proclaim that you are committed to equipping and supporting your church with an apologetics program:
[1] Christian Apologetics Alliance [web site] [Facebook page].
[2] William Wilberforce, Real Christianity (1829; Multnomah, 1982), 1-2; quoted in J. P. Moreland, Love Your God With All Your Mind: The Role of Reason in the Life of the Soul (NavPress, 1997), 134-135. (All emphases mine.)
[3] Drew Dyck, “The Leavers: Young doubters exit the church,” Christianity Today (November 19, 2010), http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2010/november/27.40.html (Accessed January 20, 2013). “More than in previous generations, 20- and 30- somethings are abandoning the faith. Why?”
