When I first encountered C. S. Lewis, I dismissed him as a mere apologist and banished most of his books from my reading lists. But after an unexpected introduction to another side of his writings, I found that I could be friends with Clive. Here's where an atheist can agree with the 20th century's most influential Christian apologist.Read This
The Divine Metaphor
Eight weeks ago, I fell for a woman in my hometown with whom I have religious differences. She’s a Christian with an evangelical background. I’m an agnostic atheist [1] with a history of aggressive anti-theism. We’ve spent weeks going back and forth about the wisdom of interfaith relationships, now trying to parse this verse or […]Read This
The Faith of an Infidel [5]: The Council of Salzburg
Part of an ongoing series on religion and philosophy. Read Part 4 or view all the posts. Sometimes life seems like the set-up to a bad joke. Last week in Salzburg, at the end of Ramadan, I ate an enormous meal prepared by a professional Syrian chef now living in a refugee camp on the […]Read This
The Faith of an Infidel [4]: It is not good that the man should be alone
Part of an ongoing series on religion and philosophy. Read Part 3 or view all the posts. When I made it to Mariazell I felt … pretty much the same. On the sixth and final day of “Walker goes to Mariazell,” I walked from St. Aegyd am Neuwalde back up into the mountains, past Hubertussee […]Read This
The Faith of an Infidel [3]: On the Way
Part of an ongoing series about religion and philosophy. Read Part 2 or view all the posts. As I write I can look out my hotel window on the mountains to the south of Rohr im Gebirge, a tiny hamlet of 500 people, one hotel, and seemingly no restaurants, nestled in the alpine foothills of […]Read This
The Faith of an Infidel [2]: God has a sense of humor and other hypotheses
Part of an ongoing series about religion and philosophy. Read Part 1 or view all the posts. My first appointment on my arrival in Vienna was breakfast with a Catholic mother (whom I will call “Jess”) and her two-and-a-half-year-old son. Jess was born in Croatia when it was a part of the Socialist Federal Republic […]Read This
The Faith of an Infidel [1]: A new personal device
“God is a character in this play,” I told my father as we ate breakfast in Albuquerque a few weeks ago. With great effort, I’d brought myself to tell him about the latest development in my romantic life: I had fallen for someone who felt, on religious grounds, that she could not reciprocate. It wasn’t […]Read This