The ‘first pass’ refers to the first reading of the story, where we first of all make sure we understand the story as the author intended it to be understood and identify possible areas of further analysis.  The ‘second pass’ refers to a second reading, where we consider to what degree the story may speak to matters of substance and consider the story’s relevance to readers today- especially those readers interested in defending the faith through the arts.

———————

First Pass:

What is the story about?

What is the story’s primary themes?

Does the story have secondary themes that are worthy of note?

Does the story convey truth?

Does the story lie or mislead the reader about some aspect of reality?

Who is the author and is there anything in his historical context that might impact how we interpret the story or give weight to various themes, incidents, and characters?

Second Pass:

What truths/falsehoods does the story convey propositionally?

What truths/falsehoods does the story convey through intangibles, such as aethestics?

Is the author overtly, covertly, or unconsciously conveying these truths/falsehoods?

Can the narrator of the story be trusted?

What issues concerning human nature, God, Christianity, sin, etc, are raised by the story?

In what ways could the story be used to initiate conversations about these issues?

What would one have to learn more about in order to most effectively apply the story to contemporary issues in theology, philosophy, and apologetics?

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Speakers’ books and resources

(Mainly additional resources and books relevant to the presentation. Links to respective organizations are on the speaker bio page)

Keynote Speaker: Dr. Gene Edward Veith Jr.

• God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life
• Spirituality of the Cross
• Loving God with All Your Mind: Thinking as a Christian in the Postmodern World
• Modern Fascism: The Threat to the Judeo-Christian Worldview
• The Soul of Prince Caspian

• Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton
• The Violent Bear it Away by Flannery O’Conner
• Prince Caspian by C. S. Lewis

• The Theme Is Freedom, M. Stanton Evans
• Total Truth, Nancy Pearcey
• How Christianity Changed the World, Alvin Schmidt

The rest in alphabetical order…

Brian Auten

• http://apologetics315.blogspot.com/

Brian Godawa

• Hollywood Worldviews
• Word Pictures
• To End All Wars
• Faith of Our Fathers (Wall of Separation)
• Lines That Divide
• Change Your Life!
• The Visitation
• Engaging Unbelief

Jamie Greening

• The Haunting of Pastor Butch Gregory: A Collection of Short Stories

Anthony Horvath

• Birth Pangs: Fidelis
• Birth Pangs: Spero
• We Chose Life: Why You Should Too
• Polite Company and Other Short Stories
• Richard Dawkins, Antony Flew, and Mother Teresa Go to Heaven

• Culture of Death Presentation
• Margaret Sanger’s Pivot of Civilization
• Inherit the Wind (DVD)
• Civic Biology (textbook used in Scope’s Monkey Trial)

• Summer of the Gods by Edward J Larson
• A Religious Orgy in Tennessee: A Reporter’s Account of the Scopes Monkey Trial by H. L. Menken
• The Scopes Trial: A Brief History with Documents
• Downloads of Scopes Trial transcript and other original source material
  

Dallas Jenkins

Glenn Jones

• Link to further readings
• Interview with Michael Ward
• Planet Narnia
• the Narnia Code

Jason Jones

• Snowman Trailer
• Cristadia Trailer
• Open Letter from Paul Weyrich
• Link to link to Broken Hearts Sing video.
• Bella Hero Video

Dr. Ryan MacPherson

Dr. Angus Menuge

• Agents Under Fire, Materialism and the Rationality of Science
• Lightbearer in the Shadowlands: The Evangelistic Vision of C.S. Lewis

Dr. Holly Ordway

• Not God’s Type: A Rational Academic Finds a Radical Faith
• www.hieropraxis.com – author homepage

Dick Rolfe

• Resources downloadable during the conference
  

Mikel Del Rosario

• Apologetics Curriculum
• www.apologeticsguy.com
• Citizen Link / Focus on the Family article.

Israel Wayne

• www.IsraelWayne.com
• www.ChristianWorldview.net
• www.ChristianWorldview.net/blog
• www.WisdomsGate.org

Keynote Speaker: Dr. Gene Edward Veith Jr.

• God at Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life
• Spirituality of the Cross
• Loving God with All Your Mind: Thinking as a Christian in the Postmodern World
• Modern Fascism: The Threat to the Judeo-Christian Worldview
• The Soul of Prince Caspian

• Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton
• The Violent Bear it Away by Flannery O’Conner
• Prince Caspian by C. S. Lewis

• The Theme Is Freedom,  M. Stanton Evans
• Total Truth,   Nancy Pearcey
• How Christianity Changed the World,  Alvin Schmidt

The rest in alphabetical order…

Brian Auten

• http://apologetics315.blogspot.com/

Brian Godawa

• Hollywood Worldviews
• Word Pictures
• To End All Wars
• Faith of Our Fathers (Wall of Separation)
• Lines That Divide
• Change Your Life!
• The Visitation
• Engaging Unbelief

Jamie Greening

• The Haunting of Pastor Butch Gregory: A Collection of Short Stories

Anthony Horvath

• Birth Pangs: Fidelis
• Birth Pangs: Spero
• We Chose Life:  Why You Should Too
• Polite Company and Other Short Stories
• Richard Dawkins, Antony Flew, and Mother Teresa Go to Heaven

• Culture of Death Presentation
• Margaret Sanger’s Pivot of Civilization
• Inherit the Wind (DVD)
• Civic Biology (textbook used in Scope’s Monkey Trial)

• Summer of the Gods by Edward J Larson
• A Religious Orgy in Tennessee:  A Reporter’s Account of the Scopes Monkey Trial by H. L. Menken
• The Scopes Trial:  A Brief History with Documents
• Downloads of Scopes Trial transcript and other original source material
  

Dallas Jenkins

Glenn Jones

• Link to further readings
• Interview with Michael Ward
• Planet Narnia
• the Narnia Code

Jason Jones

• Snowman Trailer
• Cristadia Trailer
• Open Letter from Paul Weyrich
• Link to link to Broken Hearts Sing video.
• Bella Hero Video

Dr. Ryan MacPherson

Dr. Angus Menuge

• Agents Under Fire, Materialism and the Rationality of Science
• Lightbearer in the Shadowlands: The Evangelistic Vision of C.S. Lewis

Dr. Holly Ordway

• Not God’s Type: A Rational Academic Finds a Radical Faith
• www.hieropraxis.com – author homepage

Dick Rolfe

• Resources downloadable during the conference
  

Mikel Del Rosario

• Apologetics Curriculum
• www.apologeticsguy.com
• Citizen Link / Focus on the Family article.

Israel Wayne

• www.IsraelWayne.com
• www.ChristianWorldview.net
• www.ChristianWorldview.net/blog
• www.WisdomsGate.org

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A word from Anthony Horvath, Executive Director of Athanatos Christian Ministries, the host of this conference.

I have been involved in Christian apologetics for more than fifteen years and was a religion teacher for five and a director of a congregation’s educational programs for a little under three.  I have seen with my own eyes the trends that have been documented by the Christian statistician George Barna.   I think the Church has been slow to react and slow to notice, but this is changing.  On the face of it, Christian apologetics is needed more today than ever before.  As someone who benefited greatly from apologetics and has been active in it, I wouldn’t argue with that claim.  However, it seems to me that the problem runs far deeper.  The problem certainly goes beyond this generation- each generation represents the fruit of efforts planted by the next.  The problem, put simply, is that the transmission of the faith is in dire straits.

The primary means by which the faith is transmitted from one generation to the next is the family.

As a teacher and church worker I only had a student for an hour.  An hour a day five days a week as a teacher and maybe an hour or two a week as a church worker.  As an apologist my time was almost always far less than that.   Say, 1 hour for the presentation and five minutes in one on one time after it, answering questions.   As a teacher, a student spent more time learning from each other than they ever did me.  Time spent with family outweighs everything, though.    You just can’t beat the family’s importance in passing on the faith- or any worldview, for that matter.

It follows then that if the family is broken into pieces the impact on the spirituality of the children will be affected.  If this happens at a societal level… well, I think we are seeing what can happen.

The Church knows this.  Certainly, advocates for traditional marriage have known it for decades.   I don’t think it has always recognized the diverse nature of the attacks on the family.   They have come from all directions.   They have come after men in one way and women in another and children in others.  It has come legislatively, it has come culturally.  I would submit that the chief reason that the attacks are succeeding is not because of  the superior ability of the Enemy but because of simple disobedience to the Scriptures by Christians themselves.

The Scriptures are fairly clear about the importance of the family and there doesn’t seem to be any reason to think that God’s plan for it has changed since they were written.  But will we obey the Scriptures?

But this conference recognizes something important:  many Christians are as ignorant about God’s plan for marriage as they are about reasons to believe God exists at all.   These Christians often know that they are ignorant.  They know what the Church’s position is but they don’t know the reasons and rationale for God’s plan for marriage and the family.  This breeds timidity.   A person in this state is unlikely to take firm positions in society- or their own family.  The Church has done a reasonably decent job making its positions known… but not a very good job showing out those positions make sense- from Scripture, from natural law, etc.  That is, they are not arbitrary doctrines plucked by some men to exert power over other men.  There are good reasons for them.  At any rate, as even Christian families are fracturing at an astonishing pace, the next generation is being turned out into society with a very weak foundation- if they have one at all.

This conference recognizes something else that is important:  once such a person becomes immersed in society, they are more likely to absorb the ideas and morals of that society just by swimming the culture.  They adopt the way the world thinks unthinkingly, which is the worst possible way.  “You cannot reason a person out of a position they weren’t reasoned into.”

Two things are happening at once, today:  The Family was already under attack in numerous ways but it is profoundly so by the music, movies, etc, of our modern day.  There has been no other time in history when there is such media saturation.   And yet, the Church has been slow, slow indeed, to meet this challenge.   Some Christians even go so far as to call for a withdrawal, but I contend what we need is to engage.

The Church needs to actively and deliberately enter the market place of ideas.  It needs to embrace the arts, which belonged to Her anyway for centuries, and communicate in a way that people can hear and understand… and absorb.  It may be a rear guard action;  ultimately, God will judge those outside the Church.

Nonetheless, the stakes are high.  High divorce rates, pornography, homosexuality, etc, etc, issue their own sorts of consequences but one of the attacks on the family is resulting in actual lives being shed, scores at a time.  I refer to abortion on demand in the United States and elsewhere.    It turns out that many of the issues of contention in our society end up hinging on whether or not God’s plan for marriage is being carried out…

I hope you will join us in this conference as we tackle these thorny issues.   We can’t afford not to make the attempt.  We can chalk it up to sin or the great apostasy but this will not absolve us from our duties and responsibilities.  Join us as we press ahead on the front lines, even as they are collapsing around us.

The cost is $21.00 but you can pay more if you like to support ACM and its ministries.

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