Thinking Faith blogs

Gratitude: Reflections at an Academic Waypoint

Posted by Georgina Bartlett in Faith-in-Scholarship blog on Monday 16th September 2019

In the next few weeks, I am hoping to submit my thesis. I'm not at the summit of my academic career (at least, I hope I'm not!) but I am approaching a significant waypoint that I've been working towards for three years. I don't really know what I expected to feel as I approached the final incline: victory, perhaps? I certainly don't feel that. I do feel wondrous awe and gratitude, though: at this natural pausing place in my academic (and life) journey, God has pulled me aside, turned me around, and shown me where I am and where I've come. It's a beautiful view.

Pedagogues or parents?

Posted by Mark Hutchinson in Faith-in-Scholarship blog on Tuesday 10th September 2019
Image of large lecture hall.

Looking outside as I write this, I see that the nights are drawing in and there’s the beginnings of a chill in the air, which can mean only one thing: autumn term is nearly upon us. Inevitably, then, the minds of many academics will fast be turning away from ongoing research projects or thoughts of a holiday (or a kind of tug-of-war between both these things, as Georgina described so well in July), and towards the returning students and the task of teaching.

Tags: 
learning and teaching

Redrafts, patience, and God in the details

Posted by Alicia Smith in Faith-in-Scholarship blog on Monday 2nd September 2019

I'm drawing closer to the end of my doctoral work, and that means a lot of my work at the moment is revising drafts. In the last couple of weeks I have been redrafting the introduction to my thesis. This is slow, bitty work: fixing various details, doing small pieces of further reading and research, tightening up or clarifying expression on sentence level.

Tags: 
ideas for academics

From food to Jesus

Posted by Mark Roques in RealityBites blog on Friday 30th August 2019

I am writing a short booklet which aims to help people to talk creatively about Jesus. This is my first chapter. Love feedback if you have a moment.                  

Chapter 1 From Food to Jesus

A lot of people enjoy talking about food, recipes and celebrity chefs like Gordon Ramsey and Nigella Lawson. Imagine you are cutting up some garlic with a non-Christian friend, Derek, in your kitchen. Try out this possible spiel:

A Holiday for the Restless

Posted by Georgina Bartlett in Faith-in-Scholarship blog on Monday 12th August 2019

It's vacation season once more and everyone seems to be posting pictures of themselves lounging by the river, sipping G&Ts. No better time, then, to consider the role of rest in our work. Academia seems to offer lots of ‘time off’: Easter breaks, Christmas breaks, and summer breaks can dwarf the terms they punctuate. But we all know that breaks are not really breaks for researchers. When undergrads are away, academics rejoice: now we can really start getting some work done!

Tags: 
academic life for Christ
advice for students

A Christian view of scientific progress

Posted by Richard Gunton in Faith-in-Scholarship blog on Wednesday 31st July 2019

Christian thinkers have proposed a range of ideas about what science is, ranging from reading the book of God's works and "thinking God's thoughts after Him" to studying how the Universe runs itself if God doesn't intervene.  Views like these were expressed by early modern scientists (Galileo, Bacon, Newton and others) who were Christians of one sort or another, but they needn't be the last word for a theistic perspective on science.

Tags: 
Christian philosophy in diagrams
natural sciences

Somerset Maugham and the Fear of Final Judgment

Posted by Mark Roques in RealityBites blog on Wednesday 10th July 2019

In the final year of his life, the atheist novelist Somerset Maugham (1874 – 1965) became terrified of dying and the possibility of judgment by a just and holy God loomed alarmingly. He had led a sordid, decadent and intensely selfish life and he craved secular comfort and consolation. In this state of fevered anguish he summoned the famous atheist philosopher Alfred Ayer to his deathbed in the south of France and pleaded: "Freddie I have led a debauched and depraved life.

Tags: 
atheism
worldviews

Critical thinking and grace

Posted by Mark Hutchinson in Faith-in-Scholarship blog on Tuesday 9th July 2019
Essay covered in red pen

In this post I’d like to reflect on a tension that I consider to be quite widespread within academia. ‘Critical thinking’ is often extolled as one of the core virtues necessary for the intellectual life: much university-level teaching is geared towards developing this skill, and it is viewed as foundational for effective research.

Tags: 
challenges
ideas for academics

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