Religion Class
Paul Pog
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Idea 1 Session 9 - Valuing Your Liberal Arts Education
I attached two ideas, just pick one
Your paper should be three paragraphs in length and address these questions (one paragraph per question):
Which writing assignment was most beneficial? Why?
Which book was most beneficial? Why?
What is one idea from the course that you hope to live out moving forward?
This is a religion class
Here are the books: chose from the books below and say where you think make sense.
You could read a summary and get an idea of the book. Pick any book you want
The Transforming Vision
· Author: Walsh, Brian and Middleton, Richard.
· Publisher: IVP
· Edition: 1984
· ISBN: 0877849730
Your Mind Matters
· Author: Stott, John R.
· Publisher: IVP
· Edition: 2006
· ISBN: 0830834087
The Idea of a Christian College
· Author: Holmes, Arthur
· Publisher: Eerdmans
· Edition: 1987
· ISBN: 0802802583
The Call: Finding and Fulfilling the Central Purpose of Your Life
· Author: Guinness, Os
· Publisher: Thomas Nelson
· Edition: 2003
· ISBN: 0849944376
William Wilberforce: A Man Who Changed His Times
Session 9 - Valuing Your Liberal Arts Education
This is the topic I enjoyed the most Idea and I hope to live out moving forward
The Liberal Arts Defined
Throughout the last several weeks, we have looked at the key to embodying our faith as Christians: holding a biblical worldview and allowing it to inform our action. Walsh and Middleton assigned an appropriate title to their book, The Transforming Vision. This is in essence what our embodied faith is all about: acting as transforming agents in our world and, thus, fulfilling the cultural mandate.
Now, we must look at the liberal arts as an important element to our becoming transforming agents in our world. Foundational to the liberal arts are the ideas of creation, man being made in the image of God, and man being commissioned with a cultural mandate—ideas we have looked at in depth in Transforming Vision. Arthur Holmes, author of The Idea of a Christian College, adds a fourth: truth. He writes:
If we confess that God is the all-wise Creator of all, then he has perfect knowledge of everything we ever sought to know or do. The truth about the physical order is known perfectly to him, the truth about humankind and society, and the truth about everything we ever wondered about in our most perplexed moments. The early church fathers summed this up in what has become a guidepost for Christian scholars ever since—all truth is God’s truth, wherever it be found.[1]
In other words, God as Creator and God as authority imbibes our world with truths (remember how Walsh and Middleton spoke of the world being created by God by word and by wisdom). As creatures, we are compelled to study these truths and order our own lives by them. We must learn who we are created to be and our place in this world if we ever hope to act as transforming agents. Holmes continues on to say that "once we grasp this principle (that all truth is God’s truth), then the worlds of literature, philosophy, history, science, and art become the Christian’s rightful domain." [2] We engage in the world as Christians because it is here that we learn about ourselves and our place in culture as co-laborers with Christ in the cultural mandate. Walsh and Middleton emphasized that we are called to partake in and affect the culture around us. Now, we look at the importance of devoting ourselves to the liberal arts that we might equip ourselves to do just that.
In his chapter, "The Liberal Arts: What and Why?," Holmes argues that when looking at what entails the liberal arts, we should properly ask, " What will this do to me?" We do NOT want to ask, "What will this do for me?" That is the WRONG question. As I said before, the liberal arts is closely tied with the idea of self-actualization. It has everything to do with the person you are becoming. And Holmes gives two major reasons why you should be asking the "to me" question. One, the world is in constant flux. If you merely train yourself for a certain career, what is to say that career will even exist in 10, 20 years? Two, you are in a constant state of flux also. If you merely train yourself to be a certain individual, what’ s to say you won’t change to some degree over the next 10, 20 years? In other words, merely training yourself to be a certain type of person doing a certain type of job does not achieve the deeper goal of becoming a transforming agent in your world.
Many students think of their time in college in these terms: money and time in college leads to a diploma, which in turn leads to more money on the other end. This approach to life is economism at its ugliest. This approach to life is also reductionistic. You are reduced to a mere dehumanized, manufactured worker.[3] This cannot fulfill the cultural mandate!
Remember that our goal is to become transforming agents in our world, and the liberal arts are meant to aid us in realizing that goal. How so? Holmes argues that "education has to do with the making of persons, Christian education with the making of Christian persons." [4] The liberal arts is not a list of disciplines, as students often assume. The liberal arts are not language, rhetoric, sciences, law, religion, etc. Holmes writes that a mere list of disciplines cannot "motivate students . . . because it’s hopelessly fragmented."[5] Rather, consider the following definitions[6]:
Cicero: education of free men for the exercise of their freedom
Aristotle: education is for the wise use of one’s leisure
American college: preparation for leadership
Modern college: education for citizenry in a democracy
Holmes writes that the key idea is that the liberal arts are "appropriate to persons as persons."[7] In a nutshell—what are the liberal arts? Answer—the education of a whole person.
Now, to follow the philosophical trail we must ask—what is a person? And Holmes gives us a three-part answer. First, a person is a reflective, thinking being. Holmes says we are inquisitive, analytic, and that we see things in relationship. All three of these qualities lend themselves to the idea that human persons are reflective beings. For example, watch a baby crawling around, picking up everything, putting everything in his mouth, exploring everything and trying to discern—what is this world all around me? Think of yourself in junior high and high school trying to figure out who you were, what you liked, how you fit in or didn’t fit in, and what to do about it. By nature, we experience life and reflect on it. We see things with our eyes, organize it in our brain, reflect on it, and store it away for later use. We are reflective beings.
Second, we are valuing beings. Holmes explains that valuing stems from reflecting. As we observe and order our world, certain things take precedence as most important. Out of reflection comes deep belief of what is essential, good, of prime importance. And we come to value these things.
Finally, we are responsible agents. This is the key to Holmes’ entire concept of person. He writes that "the purpose in our reflective and valuing capacities" is that we become responsible agents.[8] The diagram you find on page 34 pulls together the three components of person. A responsible agent is informed by her reflective and valuing capacities and then translates what she experiences, knows, values, etc., into responsible relationships and responsible action. Do you see a recurring word here? It is responsible. This takes us back to the idea that the liberal arts educate a person in order that this person might function in her world responsibly. Holmes summarizes thusly, "Liberal education is an open invitation to join the human race and become more fully human." [9]
The goal of the liberal arts is that you discover yourself. When you are asked to read literature, you are being asked to reflect on story and understand yourself and your world in light of that story. When you are asked to study the periodic table, you are being asked to reflect on order, science, the elemental things of creation and understand yourself and your world in light of that information. All that you do as a student, enrolled in a liberal arts university, is meant to train you as a reflective, valuing, responsible agent who can function responsibly in this world. Furthermore, as a student enrolled in a Christian liberal arts university, all that you do here ought to train you as a follower of Christ who is being transformed in order that you might function as a transforming agent to the world around you. That is the glorious liberal arts.
The Liberal Arts Embodied
The liberal arts educate persons to be responsible agents who fulfill the cultural mandate. But do the liberal arts (what Holmes also calls a liberal education) educate persons and what should those persons look like after college? Where would you find a liberally educated person?
To address how the liberal arts educate persons, let’s look closely at Dorothy Sayer’s article, The Lost Tools of Learning. www.gbt.org/text/sayers Let me warn you. Some of you are scholars. You love this type of stuff. Some of you are not scholars, and you will read this article and think—hey now, what on earth is she talking about and why are we reading this?! Let me encourage both camps. To the scholars—thinking philosophically is a joy to you. So you must hone your skills in a special way and prepare to serve culturally along these lines. To the non-scholars—thinking philosophically may be a foreign language or a burden. A liberal education holds a special value to you because it has the capacity to train you in thinking and seeing your world. Such skills will help you rise above in your future careers. No matter what your vocation in life, you must know how to think logically, reason accurately, and argue persuasively.
Now, take some time to read Sayers, The Lost Tools of Learning. For a little background, Dorothy Sayers lived in England at the same time as C.S. Lewis (mid-20th century). She was a medieval scholar and culturally engaged woman.
Sayers writes in this essay, "I am concerned only with the proper training of the mind to encounter and deal with the formidable mass of undigested problems presented to it by the modern world."[1] In other words, she thinks it very bad that young men and women do not get trained in how to think because their world (and culture) throws a million things their way that they cannot properly discern. So, she writes this essay about her dream way of educating young people so that they are prepared to think and be equipped for a lifetime of self-propelled learning. Put in her own words, "to have learnt and remembered the art of learning makes the approach to every subject an open door."[2] If people are taught how to learn, they can do it for the rest of their lives. If they are not taught properly how to learn, they are stunted for life.
Remember, we said previously that the liberal arts should educate you to be a responsible agent. Sayers says that to educate a person means you give him the tools of learning. Subjects do not matter nearly as much as methods and process.
Her proposed method is a return to medieval learning, comprised of a Trivium and Quadrivium. The Trivium was basically the process by which children were given the tools of learning. The Quadrivium came later, during our modern-day university, and was the application of those learning tools on specialized subjects. The Trivium is what concerns us because we want to understand what the tools of learning are.
Sayers goes through three stages: grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric. Basically, she is outlining stages for different types of learning. The end result is a student who can independently acquire knowledge, reason her way through that knowledge, and persuasively express that knowledge. He can read, write, discern arguments and defend his thinking. He can approach a new subject with a pre-learned pattern for gaining proficiency in that subject.
Let’s think of it in this way—musicians practice scales. Why? So they can delight audiences everywhere with scales? No, they practice scales so they can play their instrument better. Athletes train using drills, sprints, and maneuvers that they do not use on the playing field. Why? So they can become better athletes. You don’t see a football player doing plyometrics on the field. But you do see the results of plyometric training when he can outrun the defense and use fancy footwork to make it to the end zone. In like manner, Sayers argues that people must be trained in the skills of learning so they can take those skills and apply them in a myriad of ways.
This is of particular interest to us because we want to understand how the liberal arts turn us into transforming agents in our world. Sayers would argue that the liberal arts trains a student how to think and then that thinking can be applied in her world over the course of her entire life.
Sayers writes, "When the use of the tools has been well and truly learned, it is available for any study whatever."[3] If you read further down in that same paragraph, Sayers speaks about letting some subjects fall to the wayside. What? Why would you spend time studying something only to let it go? Why do we learn foreign languages that we never speak again after college? Why do we slave away at higher level math when we have no intention of pursuing an engineering degree? Why learn biology if my career goal is business? Sayers argues that subjects are means by which we acquire learning tools. Or as Holmes would say, the liberal arts should not be approached with the question—what will this do for me, but rather, what will this do to me? We learn foreign languages, memorize the periodic table, and take integrals in math because the discipline of these subjects teaches us something general about learning. And we take that principle with us wherever we go.
In closing, I want to encourage you that no learning is wasted if you approach it with the mindset that your ultimate goal is learning how to learn and how to apply that learning to your life as a responsible agent engaging your culture.
IDEA 2 Session 3 - The Biblical Worldview: Based on Creation
In the Beginning
It is very hard to have a complete look at the Christian life without looking at where it begins. We call that concept the creation narrative. "Narrative" is defined as a "message that tells the particulars of an act or occurrence or course of events." The Bible starts with the narrative of how the world came to be. This is also known as cosmology, which is the study of the universe and how it began. In this session, we are going to put on our cosmologist hat and investigate the beginning of human existence.
In order to have a complete Christian worldview, it is important to begin where the Bible begins, which is a view of the creation narrative. This starts in the beginning of the Bible in the book of Genesis, chapters 1 and 2. Genesis 1 gives us a chronological account of creation. In days 1-3, God is at work forming an unformed earth, which includes creating the sky, sea, and land. Days 4-6 tell of the creation of the sun, moon, stars, fish, and birds. In verses 26-28, God said,
"Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground." So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."
Soon after this, God says that what he has made is very good. This decree is the basis for human civilization and culture. In Creation Regained, author Albert Wolters states,
The cultural mandate in Genesis 1:26-28 provides a sort of climax to the six days of creation. The stage with all its rich variety of props has been set by the stage director, the actors are introduced, and as the curtain rises, they are given their opening cue. The drama of human history is about to begin, and the first foundational Word of God to his children is the command to fill and subdue.
God didn't need to create the universe. He alone is complete. He didn't accidentally create the universe either. In his book. Engaging God's World: Visions of Faith, Learning and Living, Cornelius Plantinga Jr. says, "Creation is an act of imaginative love." He also quotes G.K. Chesterton stating, "The whole difference between construction and creation is that a thing constructed can only be loved after it is constructed; but a thing created is loved before it exists." And even though we don't see His name mentioned in the first two chapters of Genesis, Jesus is a central part of the creation narrative.
We tend to think that Jesus doesn't come onto the scene until later, but really, He was there in the beginning. The writers of the New Testament often refer to Jesus' role in creation. They say that creation happened through Jesus, in Jesus, and for Jesus. This is true because Jesus has always existed as part of God. The Trinity is made of up of God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit. So at Christmas we are not celebrating the creation of Jesus but his incarnation, the fact that he came to the earth in human flesh and spirit. Jesus is central to the creation narrative, as He will be the only One to rescue us from the fall, which we will learn more about in the next online session.
As you are well aware, others try to explain the origins of the universe and man. Let's investigate this further.
What about Science?
Perhaps you are wondering why other people don't see the creation of the world in the same way that Christians do. Why do some people think a "big bang" created the world? This is known as spontaneous existence. Journalist Lee Strobel explains this as Quantum Theory in his book, The Case for a Creator. He states, "Quantum theory...holds that a vacuum is subject to quantum uncertainties...things can materialize out of the vacuum, although they tend to vanish back into it quickly."
Atheist Quentin Smith insists that "the most reasonable belief is that we came from nothing, by nothing, and for nothing" (Strobel 13). If this is true then anything can pop into existence...a cat, a car, a planet, etc. Unfortunately, for supporters of this theory, neither science nor experience has demonstrated any substantial evidence for an occurrence of this nature. Discover Magazine stated that "the spontaneous, persistent creation of something even as large as a molecule is profoundly unlikely." Additionally, the universe cannot have an infinite number of events in the past; it must have had a beginning.
Strobel's Conclusions
Strobel does a great job breaking down cosmology, physics, biochemistry, and biological information to make the case for an actual Creator. He believes that more and more scientists are supporting the notion of "intelligent design," which is the concept that the cosmos has a Creator. Strobel quotes Rice University Professor James Tour when he writes, "Only a rookie who knows nothing about science would say science takes away from faith, if you really study science, it will bring you closer to God." What a powerful declaration!
Cosmology tells us that the universe has a cause. The laws of physics prove that mere chance cannot reasonably account for an accidental, habitable earth. The incredible biological systems that exist in this world point to a designer. Computers don't know how to code themselves; someone is always coding the information. The same is true for our DNA. No theory has come close to defending how the information that makes up our DNA came to by natural means. If you are interested in more in-depth study of these issues you can read Strobel's book in its entirety as I have only given you a brief look at his posits.
Undoubtedly, we know that science can be helpful, but eventually, scientific theories demand a response. Only when we accept the intelligent design position can we truly see God for who He is the Creator of our universe. Once we accept that, we must learn what our role is in creation.
What Do We Do with God's Creation?
We as humans are not made to simply rule over the earth but to care for it. We need not have a "conquest" mentality about the earth but more of a stewardship mentality. Cornelius Plantinga Jr. puts it well when he states, "In the kingdom of God that Jesus proclaimed, dominion is never lording over; it's more like lording under by way of support. In the kingdom of God, to have dominion is to care for the well-being of others."
To take care of God's creation, we need knowledge and wisdom. Walsh and Middleton believe scripture gives two important elements of God's creation: the physical creation itself and the creation of wisdom. Before creation, God had wisdom, and yet, he also "appointed and gave birth to wisdom" (TV p. 46). Wisdom would become "the model for the world he created. Wisdom was there before the world was made, and yet she was also there at creation ..." (TV p. 46). We, as humans, must employ wisdom and work together in developing and cultivating the creation. This means living together in community with one another. We should seek to take good care of the cosmos God has given us along with deeply caring for others in order to enjoy God's creation in its entirety.
