Randal Rauser

Home of progressively evangelical, generously orthodox, rigorously analytic, revolutionary Christian thinking (that's what I'm aiming for anyway)

afterlife

10. The 59-Second Apologist: Will we have free will in heaven?

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Mark Twain once quipped: “Let us swear while we may, for in heaven it will not be allowed.” That piece of advice, however questionable it may be, does raise an interesting philosophical question: when a person becomes unable to sin, must they give up their free will? Some theologians have supposed so. To note one […]

Love has no shelf life: The goodness of life forever

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I’d like to live forever, and under the right conditions I hope I can. I discuss that wish (and rebut those who look askance at the prospect) here. So I always remain puzzled by atheists/skeptics/naturalists etc. who insist that they really don’t want to live forever, even under the most ideal of conditions. Soren Kierkegaard […]

How should we think about atheists who have no problem with atheism?

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Yesterday my article “Do you have enough faith to be a theist? Or an atheist?” drew an interesting comment from a reader named Bilbo who reflected: “At a very dark perod [sic] in my life, when I was angry at God for everything, I tried living as an atheist for a few years. The bleakness […]

Do spirits have a ghost of a chance to persuade a skeptic?

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Over the years I have blogged on the topic of ghosts on several occasions, including the articles “Should Christians believe in ghosts?”, “Jesus believed in ghosts (so maybe you should too),” and “J.B. Phillips and the Ghost of C.S. Lewis.” Three years ago I even did some research and writing for a planned book on […]

“Heaven is for Real” A Review

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Last night I saw “Heaven is for Real” available to rent at Redbox. Having read the book, and presented seminars critiquing it, and having written a sixty page book proposal titled What on Earth Happened to Colton Burpo? which was rejected by the publishers because they were worried that I (and they) would appear to […]

J.B. Phillips and the Ghost of C.S. Lewis

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J..B Phillips was a well known Bible translator of the highly regarded Phillips Translation as well as the author of the popular 1962 book Your God is too Small. In his 1967 book Ring of Truth: A Translator’s Testimony (London: Hodder and Stoughton) Phillips recounts a stunning experience he had with a ghost … and not just any […]

NDEs and those determined not to believe in them

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In “Sprites and near death experiences” I argued that current study of NDEs is in the early stages of first-person reports analogous to the study of “sprites” (a rare meteorological phenomenon) which was initiated forty years ago with a growing collection of first-person reports. Mike D replied: I thought Sam Harris did a bang up […]

An Unbelievable debate on heaven with the Friendly Atheist

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Today (February 1st, 2014) Unbelievable with Justin Brierley broadcast a discussion / debate I had with the Friendly Atheist (Hemant Mehta). I have included the 1 1/2 hour episode below. After listening to the broadcast feel free to join the discussion. (Of course you can also join the discussion before listening to the broadcast, just […]

Cooling Twilight reviews “What on Earth Do We Know About Heaven?”

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The blog Cooling Twilight (great name, by the way) has reviewed What on Earth Do We Know About Heaven? You can read the review here. The closing of the review summarizes matters nicely: “In this slim vol­ume Rauser tack­les impor­tant and intrigu­ing issues in a robust and engag­ing way, pro­vid­ing a rea­soned alter­na­tive to so much of […]