Summer seminar for recent PhD graduates

If you're a recent (2006 or later) PhD graduate, you might like to apply for the Templeton-funded Purdue Summer Seminar on Perceptual, Moral, and Religious Skepticism, which will take place from 8 to 24 June 2011. The general focus is on religious belief, scepticism, and disagreement. Fifteen interdisciplinary participants will be selected (from the fields of theology, philosophy, psychology, or cognitive science); each will receive a stipend of $5,000 to cover travel and other costs. The deadline for applications is 1 December: more details available on their website.

If you'd like to mention any other upcoming events or conferences, feel free to leave a comment with the details.

Karl Barth blog conference

This year's Karl Barth blog conference is now underway, and it's bigger and better than ever. There'll be three weeks of posts around the theme of "Barth in conversation". Each post comprises a short essay plus a critical response. To keep up with the discussion each day, just follow the link at the top of my sidebar. Here are the posts so far:

• General introduction
• Week 1 introduction
• Barth and Schleiermacher
• Barth and Herman Bavinck
• Barth and Bonhoeffer
• Later this week, there'll be posts on Barth and Tillich, and Barth and Robert Jenson. (My own post, coming up later, is on Barth and the Jewish anarchist philosopher Jacob Taubes.)

The posts and comments so far are really top-notch – so head on over and check it out!

Poetic Graffiti: clerihews on ten modern Christian poets

by Kim Fabricius

Well folks, it's been too long since our last series of clerihews. So for those of you who have trouble reading poetry (or would like to be able to talk about poets without reading them), Kim has now produced a convenient abridged version. Here are ten clerihews on modern Christian poets (five of them dead, five living):

W. H. Auden
Sure liked his Gordon’s;
Of course the intoxicated sod
Was also drunk on God.

Wendell Berry
Is very, very
Farmy.
And some would say barmy.

T. S. Eliot,
Just for the hell of it,
Paraded his Latin and Greek
(The pompous High Anglican geek).

Kevin Hart
Is exceedingly smart;
Writes on God, deconstruction, and sex –
With his ex.

Geoffrey Hill,
Dense and difficult; still,
His poems on our malady
Are such fun to parody.

Elizabeth Jennings
Prayerfully wrote about sinning
And shadows and terror –
Unlike the pope, without error.

D. Gwenallt Jones
Is likely unknown
To those who know little of Wales.
That’s a lot of Theology Fails.

R. S. Thomas
Was furiously famous
As a Welsh priest and poet.
But “God is love”? You wouldn’t know it.

Archbishop Rowan,
With R. S. and Euros Bowen,
Another Welsh poet and priest,
Alas now sings with Dylan “I Shall Be Released.”

Franz Wright
Sees the light
In the dark in his verse:
The headlights of a hearse.

John Henry Newman

Loads of good stuff lately at ABC Religion and Ethics, including a whole suite of posts to mark Cardinal Newman's beatification:

• Tracey Rowland on the influence of John Henry Newman on Benedict XVI
• Benedict XVI's homily for Newman's beatification
• Ian Ker on Newman's biglietto speech: the church succeeds by failure
• Austin Cooper on Newman's defence of the church
• Scott Stephens in defence of Benedict XVI 
• Tracey Rowland on Benedict and the banality of sacro-pop
• Paul Griffiths on Catholic sins and presentism
• Alister McGrath on Stephen Hawking, and again on the limits of science 
• Tamas Pataki on religion and violence
• Jonathan Malesic on why politicians should keep their faith hidden

And speaking of Newman, Kim has written a wondrous clerihew for the occasion:

Cardinal Newman
Wasn’t at his own exhuming,
Nor does his miracle,
For all the panegyricals,
Pass muster as empirical,
So a saint
He ain’t.

Tomáš Halík: atheism and patience

The T&T Clark blog mentions that Czech theologian Tomáš Halík has been awarded the prestigious Romano Guardini Prize. Halík is a Catholic thinker steeped in Nietzsche; he sees modernity's criticism of Christianity as an indispensable resource, and as the context within which contemporary faith has to be articulated.

As you will have noticed, there is currently a whole industry of books responding to Dawkins and the new atheists – including some real gems (e.g. Terry Eagleton, David Bentley Hart), but also much that is merely boring and reactionary. I was stunned to discover that even Marilynne Robinson's book, in spite of all the rave reviews (and in spite of my huge admiration for everything else she has written), was dull and uninspired. (Actually, it raises another question: why did Robinson feel the need to write this book, when her novel Gilead had already proved the existence of God?)

In contrast, I think Tomáš Halík has produced one of the best and most beautiful responses to the new atheism, in his recent book Patience with God (Doubleday 2009). His argument is that the real difference between faith and atheism is patience. Atheists are not wrong, only impatient. They want to resolve doubt instead of enduring it. Their insistence that the natural world doesn't point to God (or to any necessary meaning) is correct. Their experience of God's absence is a truthful experience, shared also by believers. Faith is not a denial of all this: it is a patient endurance of the ambiguity of the world and the experience of God's absence. Faith is patience with God. Or as Adel Bestavros puts it (in the book's epigraph): patience with others is love, patience with self is hope, patience with God is faith.

In contrast to the overblown rhetoric of so many Christian apologists – with their drastic naivety about the ambivalence of the natural world and the intractable difficulties of believing – Halík's account strikes me as a sensitive and realistic articulation of the difference faith makes. The best thing about his book – again, in contrast to the usual apologetics – is that it's actually a Christian response to atheism. Surely anything a Christian says to an atheist ought to arise not from an invincible commitment to being right, but from an understanding of the kindness of God, an awareness that there is room in God's family even for those who doubt – those for whom the word "God" cannot easily be deciphered from the dark hieroglyphics of the world.

Two theology events

A couple of good theology events this week:

On 16 September there'll be an eConference on christology with Gerald O'Collins. The event will be streaming live all around the world. Congregational groups are encouraged to participate together, or you can join with another group (hundreds of congregations are participating), or just view it at home. It's all free, and the registration process is optional.

And if you're in Sydney, Jeremy Begbie's New College Lectures begin tonight. He'll be speaking over the next three nights on Music, Modernity and God. Unfortunately I'll miss the first two lectures, but I'll be there on Thursday night for the finale.