Eric Metaxas - Socrates in the City - Conversations on Life, God and Other Small Topics

SOCRATES IN THE CITY

CONVERSATIONS ON “LIFE, GOD, AND OTHER SMALL TOPICS”

Eric Metaxas

Editor

Contents

Cover

Title Page SOCRATES IN THE CITY CONVERSATIONS ON “LIFE, GOD, AND OTHER SMALL TOPICS” Eric Metaxas Editor

Socrates in the City - Eric Metaxas

Belief in God in an Age of Science - Sir John Polkinghorne, Frs, Kbe

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

Making Sense out of Suffering - Peter Kreeft

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

The Importance of Fatherhood - Paul Vitz

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

Can an Atheist Be a Good Citizen? - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

Who Are We? C. S. Lewis and the Question of Man - Jean Bethke Elshtain

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

The Good Life: Seeking Purpose, Meaning, and Truth in Your Life - Charles W. Colson

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense - N. T. Wright

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

The Twilight of Atheism: The Rise and Fall of Disbelief in the Modern World - Alister Mcgrath

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

The Case for Civility—and Why Our Future Depends on It - Os Guinness

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

The Language of God: A Believer Looks at the Human Genome - Francis S. Collins, Md, Phd

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

How Good Confronts Evil: Lessons from the Life and Death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer - Eric Metaxas

Introduction

Talk

Q & A

Eric’s Acknowledgments

Speaker Biographies

Selected Published Works

About the General Editor

Copyright

About the Publisher

Socrates in the City An Introduction Contents Cover Title Page SOCRATES IN THE CITY CONVERSATIONS ON “LIFE, GOD, AND OTHER SMALL TOPICS” Eric Metaxas Editor Socrates in the City - Eric Metaxas Belief in God in an Age of Science - Sir John Polkinghorne, Frs, Kbe Introduction Talk Q & A Making Sense out of Suffering - Peter Kreeft Introduction Talk Q & A The Importance of Fatherhood - Paul Vitz Introduction Talk Q & A Can an Atheist Be a Good Citizen? - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus Introduction Talk Q & A Who Are We? C. S. Lewis and the Question of Man - Jean Bethke Elshtain Introduction Talk Q & A The Good Life: Seeking Purpose, Meaning, and Truth in Your Life - Charles W. Colson Introduction Talk Q & A Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense - N. T. Wright Introduction Talk Q & A The Twilight of Atheism: The Rise and Fall of Disbelief in the Modern World - Alister Mcgrath Introduction Talk Q & A The Case for Civility—and Why Our Future Depends on It - Os Guinness Introduction Talk Q & A The Language of God: A Believer Looks at the Human Genome - Francis S. Collins, Md, Phd Introduction Talk Q & A How Good Confronts Evil: Lessons from the Life and Death of Dietrich Bonhoeffer - Eric Metaxas Introduction Talk Q & A Eric’s Acknowledgments Speaker Biographies Selected Published Works About the General Editor Copyright About the Publisher

Can you imagine how happy I am that this book has come out? If not, let me tell you how happy—very, very. It’s a tremendous joy for me to look at the evidence of something we’ve been doing for ten years now and to realize that these talks are just as fresh on the page as they were the actual evenings of the events. That is saying a lot, because most of these events were magical. Just ask the people who have attended over the years.

In reading the talks in this book, I’ve come to the conclusion that they are treasures, nothing less, and to think that they are available to the readers of this book—that they are not lost to the ether but are right here for you to enjoy, just as we enjoyed them on the evenings of our events—absolutely thrills me.

But before I say more, perhaps you don’t really know what Socrates in the City is. Let me explain: We are a UFO cult. There, I’ve said it. Of course, that’s not for public consumption. To the public we present ourselves as an elegant and upscale Manhattan speakers’ series. So, I’ll have to stick with that description going forward in this essay, but you and I will know that I am really talking about a UFO cult and that underneath our terribly sophisticated street clothes, we wear cult-issue silver unitards with a nifty lightning-bolt-and-leaping-leprechaun logo. It’s quite a logo. But we won’t mention this again.

But seriously, it’s hard to believe it’s been more than ten years since I started Socrates in the City with the simple idea that the philosopher Socrates was quite right when he famously said that the “unexamined life is not worth living.” It struck me that in New York City, where I live, people weren’t being much encouraged to think deeply about the big questions—or should I say, the Big Questions. It seemed that there was something about our culture which worked against examining the Big Questions. I wanted to remedy that a bit.

Also, I realized that I have had the privilege of being acquainted with a number of brilliant writers and speakers who had thought rather a lot about the Big Questions and who had some pretty terrific answers to those questions. Why not bring them to New York? And why not invite my friends to hear them? And why not serve wine and hors d’oeuvres? And so, Socrates in the City was born.

As it happened, eight of our first ten speakers were named Os Guinness. That’s not a weird coincidence, but it is evidence of the generosity of a dear friend, to whom we here gratefully doff our caps.

I remember that our second event—Os was not the speaker—took place the day after the hotly contested 2000 election between Al Gore and George W. Bush. Everyone had stayed up till three or four a.m. the night before, hoping to find out who had won. Little did they know the issue would drag on for many weeks.

So, the next night a handful of our audience members had some difficulty keeping their eyes open during David Aikman’s terrific talk on Solzhenitsyn, Nelson Mandela, and Elie Wiesel. Quel dommage! In all these years that has never happened again, but should it ever happen to you at a Socrates event, you should probably consider getting a good night’s sleep the night before and cutting back on the pre-talk libations. The act of open-mouthed snoring while Bishop N. T. Wright or Sir John Polkinghorne—or any other ecclesiastical worthy—is holding forth is still considered déclassé in most respectable New York social circles.

Almost all of our events have been held in the ornately gorgeous rooms of the most exclusive private clubs of Manhattan. The Union League Club, the University Club, the Union Club, and the Metropolitan Club have been a few of our favorites. The art in some of them is reason enough to attend Socrates in the City events. Besides, listening to a talk on how a good God can allow suffering is always somehow improved if your gaze can wander to a 1903 bas-relief of Hercules slaying the Erymanthian boar. We don’t know how this works, but it does.

We always begin our events with a reception where wine and hors d’oeuvres are served. Because of a lawsuit, we’ve had to cut back on the unlimited sangria and shrimp, but please keep praying; perhaps the judge will see things our way. After the reception, we begin our program with my introduction of the speaker.

My introductions have always been calculatedly dopey—or dippy— because we firmly believe that’s the surest way of letting the audience and the speaker know up front that we expect to have fun and that this will not be a ponderous intellectual exercise. We will not abide pretentiousness, but we will sometimes countenance a freewheeling Marx Brothers approach to the search for truth. To this point, my opening comments and introductions have often taken their cues from the speeches of Foster Brooks and Charlie Callas at Dean Martin’s celebrity roasts. This is intentional.