Nine Reasons to Get a Christian Apologetics and Ethics Degree at Denver Seminary

"Douglas Groothuis has established the reputation of being one of the best apologists and Christian philosophers in the Evangelical community. Now he has developed a new and exciting program in Christian apologetics and ethics. This program is very important in light of contemporary culture, and any student who studies with Groothuis and his colleagues will get first-rate training. I highly recommend this program."  JP Moreland

In August, 2012, Denver Seminary launched a new Master of Arts degree in Christian Apologetics and Ethics. The purpose and mission of this degree is to train students to ably defend the faith and wisely engage culture, thus advancing the mission of God through Christian apologetics and ethics. There are many good reasons to study this subject in Denver as opposed to elsewhere similar degrees are offered. Here are nine of those reasons.

(1) The Christian Apologetics and Ethics degree is broad in scope yet focused in mission. Students will be able to immerse themselves deeply in the field of apologetics and ethics, while being taught by a faculty acutely aware of our purpose to go and make disciples of all nations (Matt. 28:19). Moreover, students will have the opportunity to grow in their understanding of philosophy, theology, and cultural criticism in order to deepen apologetics skills and become knowledgeable, discerning ministers of the Gospel.

(2) Students will be able to sit in classes sized appropriately for the development of relationships with each other and with their professors. Douglas Groothuis, a top-notch Christian philosopher, experienced apologist, and the author of a leading apologetics textbook on the market (in addition to ten other books), is the primary professor. Dr. Groothuis is not only a gifted thinker, but he is an outstanding teacher committed to personally attending to his students’ intellectual and spiritual growth.

(3) Students will have the opportunity to take core classes from Craig Blomberg, a world-renowned New Testament scholar and apologist. Dr. Blomberg is a prolific author, who has written, among other books, The Historical Reliability of the Gospels, Jesus and the Gospels, and The Historical Reliability of John’s Gospel. Blomberg is also a leading and respected authority in the field of New Testament studies and historical Jesus studies. Furthermore, Dr. Blomberg is extremely accessible and loves to meet with and get to know his students.

(4) One of the leading Old Testament and ancient Near East scholars in the world, Richard Hess, is a full-time faculty member, and teaches part of the core curriculum in the Old Testament department. In his classes, he ably addresses important apologetic issues such as violence in the Bible, and the reliability of the Old Testament documents.

(5) Along with Craig Blomberg and Richard Hess, Denver Seminary’s biblical studies and Christian thought faculty will help the Apologetics and Ethics student gain a robust biblical studies and theological education, which will serve to bolster their apologetics skills.

(6) Students in this program will become well-versed in ethics, apologetic methodology, natural theology, arguments for the reliability of the Bible, comparative religion, thus being carefully groomed and equipped for wise cultural engagement and leadership.

(7) While being academically rigorous, this program serves to prepare students for a life of ministry. Having a background in Christian apologetics and ethics is beneficial to campus ministry, youth ministry, or work in para-church organizations. The ethics, philosophy, and critical thinking elements of this degree will help equip those who want to go on to law school, or become involved in politics. The degree will also help pastors to better answer difficult questions of their congregants, as well as to train those in their care to do the same. Furthermore, writing skills are an important component of this degree, and those who go through the program will be well-equipped to write for newspapers and magazines, and to publish articles or even books.

(8) Denver Seminary has cultivated an atmosphere of study and fellowship. The campus boasts an expansive library, with many conference rooms and study areas. Additionally, the seminary recently completed a new student center, complete with comfortable seating, a stone fireplace, and a full-service coffee and snack bar.

(9) Denver Seminary is a short drive from the Rocky Mountains, and students can enjoy the beautiful mountain view and sunny weather most days of the year.

The Christian Apologetics and Ethics program is intellectually deep, personally intimate, and set within a respected educational institution. For those individuals interested in learning how to defend historic Christianity, think more carefully, write more persuasively, speak more clearly, and be mentored by some of the sharpest minds in the field, this new program is worth your attention, and perhaps a visit.

For more information:

            Official website: http://www.denverseminary.edu/apologetics/

            “Like” us on Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/DenverSeminaryApologetics
            Follow us on Twitter: @DSApologetics

Written by Sarah C. Geis, graduate of Denver Seminary. 

How to Miss the Point: A Guide to Dimwitted Discourse

People have valued reasoned, fair disagreements and good listening skills for far too long. It is high time we dispense with those boring and outdated formalities! After all, why respect the laws of logic when you can enjoy the adventure of following your own passions? When you get the point, you can only either agree or disagree. How boring! On the other hand, when you miss the point, you open up a fallacy-filled wonderland where conversation and emotions are set free to frolic! If you wish to dispense with the authoritarian laws of logic (which care nothing about you!) and transcend the boundaries of social courtesy, then here are some suggestions for you to try on your entirely subjective journey. These primarily apply to written arguments, but can also apply to listening to a spoken argument.

1. Foster the conviction that all with whom you disagree are personally attacking you.
Even if the individual doesn't know you, your ideas are your identity. Never mind the fact that this introduces all sorts of strange problems for understanding personal identity. That stuff is not important. What is important is that your very person, and all you hold dear, are being assaulted.

2. Don't accept the author or speaker's own definitions of his terms.
For instance, if someone is using the term "idealist" to mean a person who has lofty goals, you could show off your philosophical prowess and point out that he has gotten philosophical idealism (something else entirely) all wrong. It would also be fun to attack a Lutheran who believes in Christian orthodoxy  (small "o") for being a closet Orthodox Christian!

3. Embrace category confusion.
Here is a time-tested example: If the argument is about economics, you may wish to respond by claiming that the author is just racist. You get bonus points here, as this tactic also functions as an ad hominem and as a red herring fallacy (look them up if you are curious).

4. Ignore all qualifiers. 
This most often takes the form of responding with a counterexample to an admitted generalization. Example: Your interlocutor is evaluating the drawbacks to social media, and then says "interactions on social media tend to encourage more rudeness than would be likely in person." You can fire back a response like this: "I'm always nice on Facebook! See? You're wrong." Or, "Uncle Joe uses Facebook to befriend invalids connecting to the world via laptop," etc. You don't want your counterexample to actually work. So, avoid using the skill in situations where the author has clearly made a universal statement such as, "There are no black swans." Then, those who are still slaves to logic could refute the universal statement by saying-- truthfully-- that "Uncle Joe has a black swan."

5. Skip to the end. 
By doing this, you don't get the argument at all, and you will miss the author's definition of terms as well as all qualifications.

6. Read halfway through and stop reading. 
Sometimes, an author begins by surveying a given topic, or by introducing an argument with which she will then disagree. If you stop reading halfway through, you can respond as if the survey or the dissenting argument were actually the view of the author!

7. Just read the title and no further. 
This one is catching on all over the world. Make sure to leave a comment if it is a blog or a Facebook post. All of this can be accomplished in under a minute.

8. Partially attend to something else while reading or listening. 
This is a sure way to miss important things to the author or speaker and only catch words and phrases that are important to you.

9. Convince yourself that evaluation of or criticism of something is reducible to hatred.
Assume that if the arguer has negative things to say about a person or thing, then the arguer is actually displaying a deep-seated, concentrated hatred of that person or thing. For instance, all who criticize technology clearly hate technology and are hypocrites for using it at all.

10. Confuse descriptive with prescriptive statements. 
If I read an article reporting that "People who smoke marijuana enjoy the experience," this is describing a state of affairs in the world (a descriptive statement). If I want to miss the point, I can respond as though it was a prescriptive statement. In other words, I can act shocked that the author would dare suggest that we should smoke marijuana (which would have been a prescriptive statement, had the author actually said that).

11. Ignore quotation marks, italics, or indented quotations, and attribute them to the quoting author.
By doing this, one can make the author appear to say all sorts of crazy things. 

12. Remember that no one has the right to criticize things you like. 
Decide right now that all criticisms of anything you like are immediately invalid. After all, we know that things and people that we like are perfect.

13. Misunderstand or fail to detect sarcasm. 
To spin it positively, be rigidly serious all the time, insist on taking yourself very seriously, and you will discover all sorts of wild statements that are ready for your attack.

14. Insist on seeing your pet issue as a fundamental component of every argument you read.
If you are into women's issues, for example, cry foul at anything in the argument that can conceivably (or even inconceivably) be construed as an attack on women's rights (assuming, of course, that the argument itself is not about women's rights-- then you must pick another point-missing tactic). 

15. Don't look up words you don't understand. 
Just react to them upon your first, confused reading.

16. Present your response when maximally angry.
You will be amazed at your own propensity for the creative use of fallacies, misspellings, and overall murky thinking when overcome by emotion. Things can get wild if you take this advice. You may even regret it later, making the fun last as long as possible. 

17. Avoid paragraphed and correctly punctuated responses.
If you are going to respond online, it is fun to see how crazy you can make your chosen target by posting responses that are (to use a term I heard recently) longer than a Dispensationalist chart. The more run-on sentences the better, when you omit careful punctuation and paragraphs, it tends to stun the opponent. If you are lucky, the bewildered adversary may actually try to respond to your mass of verbal chaos. Watch him squirm, and enjoy.

Video of a Lecture Series On the Reliability of Scripture

This in-progress adult education series is put on by my church, Cherry Creek Presbyterian Church, which is why I am one of the speakers. The series also includes Doug Groothuis, Craig Blomberg, and Rick Hess. http://commongroundsseries.wordpress.com/

Against the Reign of Online Education: Responding to the Rise of the Faceless Classroom (Part 3)

* Disclaimer: Due to likely misunderstanding (which routinely occurs), please note that, as my title carefully dictates, my opponent is "the reign of online education" rather than online education itself. This series combats the idea that online learning "rules" and is nearly as good as or even superior to embodied learning. I use the internet, am thankful for many benefits the internet offers, and I understand that there are times when online education is helpful.

Before reading any further, please read Part I here, and Part II here. 

The Academic Ethos Under Fire

"...education is not merely schooling. It is a lifelong discipline of the individual by himself, encouraged by a reasonable opportunity to lead a good life. Education here is synonymous with civilization. A civilized community is better than the jungle, but civilization is a long slow process which cannot be "given" in a short course." - Jacques Barzun, Teacher in America, p. 9.

Ethos; noun: the distinguishing character, sentiment, moral nature, or guiding beliefs of a person, group, or institution -- from Merriam-Webster

What makes a strong, respected academic institution? Perhaps examples come to mind of actual institutions which garner respect, such as Oxford, Cambridge, American Ivy League schools, and so on, but what is it about these places that placed them above the rest in so many minds? Institutions such as these are known for rigor, for a certain climate of academic seriousness, for turning out respected members of society, and for having reliable, longstanding traditions of such. If we walk the grounds of these schools, we find that the campuses contain very old, usually beautiful buildings, which put us immediately in touch with the particular school's past. This physical contact with academic history affects the sensitive person's psyche, often compelling one to read a book, or sit quietly under a tree. Furthermore, professionalism is contagious. If a campus has well-dressed, well-mannered, extremely studious occupants, then any new individual will feel out of place and (positively) pressured to rise to their level. Whether or not the person has the capacity to actually attain this goal is beside the point. In short, a quiet, studious campus, especially one with a beautiful, professional, academic ethos, has a certain amount of power in itself to shape the lives and habits of individuals.

There is no campus in the online classroom besides the computer room. There is no need for professional appearance, for the student only sees his or her computer. There are no other students seen studying, and no one is nearby talking about an interesting lecture or an upcoming academic conference. When only taking classes online, one cannot run into professors in the student center or parking lot, and have an impromptu discussion. Furthermore, online classes do not facilitate training, either implicitly or explicitly, of the students to speak clearly and well. This is because no one ever hears the students speak! When taking an online class, one can take one's time (to a certain extent) in coming up with responses, because type is all that is measured. Yes, one is required to read and write for the faceless, online professor, but reading and writing are hardly the only components of well-rounded education. The fact that one completes reading and writing assignments says little of his or her overall habits as a fully-orbed scholar. To use track as an example, record times are rarely set alone or in practice. This is because, when running a race, competitive instincts are triggered by the intensity of other runners who have been dedicated to training and winning. The point is not necessarily to win the race (although this was precisely the point for me when I ran track), but instead, to run one's personal best. We frequently find that our personal best is accomplished alongside other souls who are working hard and dedicated to their task. A person risks missing out on taking his or her scholarship to even higher levels when he or she is immersed primarily (or only) in the isolated online classroom.

Moreover, the embodied exchange of and critique of ideas aids in teaching us how to respectfully disagree and defend our own views. When confronted with people who think differently than we do, we are presented with the opportunity to practice professional respect of and appreciation for those with ideas and worldviews other than our own. In the real world, the disagreeing party cannot be made to disappear by opening another tab or closing the laptop. Online, one can easily avoid paying adequate attention to unfavorable ideas in favor of others. It also provides a safe environment for the marginalization and outright rejection of ideas that perhaps should be taken more seriously. A computer cannot respond to or even detect the sigh, skeptically raised eyebrow, or eye-roll of a student as can a professor or another student. These subtle, but important, reactions are part of how we judge the success of a given argument. By contrast, having a disagreement with another embodied human, from whom one cannot easily escape, has the power to prompt changed or deepened ideas.

When the online “classroom” is one’s intellectual training ground, the person is placed into an artificial, unrealistic, socially sterile environment where attention and respect can be selectively given with little to know social or professional consequences. In embodied discussion, a student cannot so easily get away with dismissive reasoning, special pleading, or disrespect for good ideas with which he or she may disagree. The embodied classroom environment provides a community of intellectual checks, balances, and, from there, further refinement. In the online classroom, one only has to turn down the volume of the lecture, skip ahead in the power points, tune out and click onto Facebook, answer the cell phone, check e-mail, break up a dog fight (it has happened to me), and so on. The possibilities for unbridled intellectual minimalism while taking an online class are seemingly endless. One can engage in these inattentive behaviors in a traditional classroom, true, but there exists varying types and degrees of helpful social pressure against such things.

Online learning creates a private, subjective idea environment that offers only grades and perhaps brief comments for feedback. This does nothing to help the development of the whole person who should be testing out ideas in community, thus learning evaluation skills, debate techniques, and other points of view from peers and the professor. Learning is far better when done within a system of other minds. Moreover, online learning does nothing to alleviate the problem of self-centeredness. Instead, when one primarily learns alone, one may become increasingly convinced that he or she has very good points, and thinks and speaks rather well. Only when learning alongside other people consistently can one begin to retrain one's sensibilities away from the self and toward the outside world and other souls. Then, objective evaluation of one's own ideas can lead to growth.

The online marketplace of ideas is now chaotic, without hierarchy, without context, and faceless. Postman calls this "information-glut." In the midst of the information-glut epidemic, we are actively neglecting the remedy-- participating in a world of ideas with other human beings who can weigh, invent, deconstruct, and reconstruct ideas together. A stable academic institution therefore finds its stability and respectability in its people and in their ability to train students to wisely navigate the realm of ideas and our contemporary digital onslaught of information. On the other hand, institutional respectability is not found in its technological achievements, access to and dissemination of mere information. Being encouraged (or forced) to participate in the embodied classroom exposes the student to a complex, interactive thought-world which cannot be sufficiently reproduced by an online version of the same class. Of course, a physical classroom does not guarantee an interactive environment, but at least the format encourages such an environment. None of this is to say learning, even good learning does not happen in the online classroom. It can, and it frequently does. However, there are costs and benefits to all that we do, and we must be honest about what we gain and what are giving up in favor of convenience. I maintain that while there may be a place for online education, it remains inferior to the real thing.

Responding Inappropriately to Tragedy

Yesterday, I was talking with some friends briefly about the horrors of the Aurora shooting. A waitress was nearby, and reacted by saying something along the lines of "That's the hype of the day. There's always something crazy going on in Colorado." This deeply bothered me. A massacre in a movie theater cannot, and should not, be reduced to "the hype of the day." When we find ourselves responding to large-scale catastrophes with insufficient solemnity, then perhaps we have negligently allowed our sensibilities and emotions to become warped--and flattened-- by a culture infatuated with entertaining itself into oblivion. If we, rather, immerse ourselves in the good, the true, and the beautiful, then tragedies like the one in Aurora will affect us as they should: as shocking, devastating evidence of a fallen world. Then, and only then, can we respond appropriately, weeping with those who weep, and caring for the affected souls.

Against the Reign of Online Education: Responding to the Rise of the Faceless Classroom (Part 2)

* Disclaimer: Due to likely misunderstanding, please note that in the title, my opponent is "the reign of online education" rather than online education itself. That is, I take issue here with the idea that online learning is nearly as good as or even superior to embodied learning. 


Part I is here, and Part III is here.
 
The Social Effects of Online Learning

Everywhere the 21st century American looks, personal technological devices are on display. A family out to dinner typically contains at least one, if not all, members distracted by a handheld device with an internet connection. Teenagers “hanging out” in groups are often seen sending text messages to recipients elsewhere instead of conversing with those souls actually in front of them. College students commonly navigate between classes with iPod earbuds in place, oblivious to the existence of other students. Commuters are frequently absorbed in their laptops or personal devices, rarely making eye contact with anyone else. It seems clear, therefore, that while we are not deficient in our access to information through technology, we are increasingly alienated from other people and from the world around us.

One might ask what this milieu has to do with the analysis of online education. The connection can be summed up thus: In a world where extended, high-quality interaction with fellow human beings is infrequent, substantive ideas are rarely exchanged and critiqued, and therefore embodied academia provides a last frontier of sorts where this vital activity is not only possible but required. For those who are connected to the internet for multiple hours in a day (which includes most of us, if we are honest), any ideas that arise tend to do so in without ever coming into contact with the outside world. Until people voice and discuss their ideas, counterexamples may go unpresented, extemporaneous tangents—often most fruitful in yielding unexpected insights— will go unexplored, and so on. To expand on the saying “two minds are better than one,” multiple academic minds are better than one.

In an online course, one’s writing and ideas can be corrected and graded, but no one is present with the online learner who can gradually, subtly shape how the learner thinks as the learner thinks it. This cognitive luxury of the student-teacher or peer relationship is encouraged in person, but is far more difficult to reproduce online. Furthermore, the student is less likely to approach the teacher for any sort of significant mentoring relationship, given the fact that a teacher is hard-pressed to show care or concern over the internet. It is visible displays of professorial sensitivity and personal interest (conveyed in posture, tone, facial expression, and so on) that tend to give students the confidence to seek out a deeper relationship with the teacher.

In the online classroom, the student and her thoughts, expressions, reactions, tone (but tone is scarce, given verbal silence on the part of the student) and logical processes occur in social isolation, without the possibility of rich, timely, socially sensitive, cognitively formative feedback. Without others physically present with the student, no one is present to refute bad mental processes or ideas, to question vague ideas, to demand examples, to provide counterexamples, to gently persuade the student that an apparently interesting insight is actually not so interesting after all (and is thus a waste of time to pursue), or to press for more elaboration where such is needed. Moreover, unpalatable ideas easily dismissed in the online environment may receive helpful pushback from students more sympathetic to the idea. Consider this example: A theology student rolls his eyes when the professor mentions a well-known dispensationalist seminary. A peer sympathetic to some threads of dispensationalist theology notices the disapproving facial expression, and asks for the reason behind the eye roll. It comes to the surface that the eye-rolling student has always assumed that all dispensationalist theologies resemble the popular (and theologically problematic) Left Behind novel series in some way. A discussion ensues which helps to clarify the different scholarly perspectives within dispensationalism, leads to increased respect for the aforementioned seminary, and allows all parties involved to forge ahead in their views with an appropriate level of scholarly nuance and accuracy.

People need a great deal of practice articulating their ideas to each other, not only for the purposes of shaping intellectual processes and crystallizing knowledge, but also because it is precisely in such multi-minded environments that the best thoughts and ideas are born. Iron sharpens iron, as the Proverb goes, and the friction necessary to create sufficient sharpness for battle is best found in person. Discomfort and disagreement profoundly shape and train a thinker, and due to the human propensity to flee such formative situations, the online environment provides an ideal setting in which to ignore the uncomfortable. This is often the case even in threaded discussions, which tend to be an exercise in minimalistic hoop-jumping rather than an arena for robust academic conversation.

A society driven by technological advances favors processing speed, efficiency, and personal convenience over meticulous, socially sensitive, organic (read: flexible and varied), high-quality interaction with people and ideas. The pursuit of information has become more important than embodied relationships. Part of the value of being physically present in one's classes is the possibility of building relationships-- professional and otherwise. As discussed previously, these relationships are the seedbed of new ideas, discarded bad ideas, helpful examples, discussion of previously unknown conferences or professional organizations, and ultimately, mutual inspiration and encouragement to press on in this challenging, disorienting, and often discouraging world of academia.

To be continued. Stay tuned for "Assault on the Academic Ethos," "Information-Age Epistemology," and more...

Against the Reign of Online Education: Responding to the Rise of the Faceless Classroom (Part 1 )

This essay will be posted in a currently unknown number of installments. 

In the age of the internet, instant information is at the fingertips of anyone with access to an internet connection. Because computer-accessed information is so convenient-- and convenience is one of the chief information-age virtues-- educational institutions have understandably become attracted to online forms of education. An online course can exist even when physical space is limited, or when there are scheduling conflicts due to busy students. Moreover, the student of an online course need not spend a dime on gasoline, find childcare, or even change out of his or her pajamas to "attend school." It should come as no surprise, then, that online education is being warmly embraced and enthusiastically adopted by educational institutions.

Because contemporary academic organizations have become transfixed by online education's promise of a global reach and thus a geographically unrestricted student body (and further, a geographically boundless source of income), those concerned with pedagogy (and sadly, not all educators are) must ask whether this trendy educational exodus out of the embodied learning environment is ultimately of help or harm to the cause of true education. The fact that we can do something in no way means that we should. I love Blue Bell ice cream—more than any other dessert, in fact—but I do not eat it for my meals (not regularly, anyway) because that would be a most unhealthy lifestyle choice.

To continue the metaphor, if technology is like food, we must determine whether it is “junk food” or “health food.” As Neil Postman taught, no technology is neutral. What Postman meant was that in some way, every technology—for better or for worse— shapes the people that use it and, therefore, their culture. He stated that shaping power well: "New technologies alter the structure of our interests: the things we think about. They alter the character of our symbols: the things we think with. And they alter the nature of community: the arena in which thoughts develop" (Technopoly, p. 20).

Because technology changes “the nature of community” and culture itself, no technology should ever go uncritiqued. The stakes are too high to neglect adequate evaluation of our culture shapers. Therefore, let us take a good look at that which is too often viewed with indiscriminate favor: online education. For the duration of this series, my intention is to provide a counterbalance to the prevailing sentiment regarding this topic. It should not surprise the reader, then, that this counterbalance will be predominantly negative. If this series succeeds in slowing gushing technophiles down so that they carefully reconsider their philosophy of online education, then I will consider such a litany of negativity a success.

To be continued...