Barry's Blog

"I admire the serene assurance of those who have religious faith. It is wonderful to observe the calm confidence of a Christian with four aces."  -Mark Twain

Not withstanding Twain's observation, recent reports have Antony Flew, one of the world's most revered atheists, as now having become a believer in God, despite his professional reputation over the decades as a writer "preaching to the choir" of those strident philosophers who denounced the existence of God. Arguably Flew's greatest contribution remains his first, when as a precocious 27-year-old he delivered a brief paper in 1950 called "Theology and Falsification," at a meeting of the Socratic Club, an Oxford University group presided over by Christian apologist C.S. Lewis. "Theology and Falsification" has since become over the years somewhat of a "spiritual law" tract for committed atheists.

Flew, whose name has largely flown under the radar screen for most, is about to take on much greater visibility, beyond the recognition of only atheists and philosophers. HarperOne, an imprint of HarperCollins, has just this month released his book recounting his spiritual journey from unbelief to belief, "There Is a God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind," co-authored by Flew and Christian apologist Roy Abraham Varghese.

Not everyone is amused. Mark Oppenheimer, editor of The New Haven Review, wrote a derisive article in the November 4th issue of The New York Times, essentially bringing into question the veracity of Flew's conversion. Oppenheimer writes: "But is Flew's conversion what it seems to be? Depending on whom you ask, Antony Flew is either a true convert whose lifelong intellectual searchings finally brought him to God or a senescent scholar possibly being exploited by his associates. The version you prefer will depend on how you interpret a story that began 20 years ago, when some evangelical Christians found an atheist who, they thought, might be persuaded to join their side."

Flew's conversion was first reported in late 2004, and has cast him into a culture war that for most of his life he was happily content  to avoid. I heard Flew interviewed at a conference at Oxford University in the summer of 2005 about his rethinking of life and faith, and it was clear that he had been reflecting on theological matters for a number of years. He was also not embarassed to admit that he had been duly influenced in his thinking by a number of brilliant scientists and philosophers, who were Christians. Then, as well as now, Flew rejects Christianity, but confesses that he now believes in "an intelligence that explains both its own existence and that of the world." Atheists no doubt thought that the "signs of the Apocalypse" are upon us when, in late 2006, Flew was among the signers of a letter to Tony Blair asking that intelligent design be included in the British science curriculum!

Several points are worth making from Flew's metanoia about our world as it relates to the existence of God. First, it is amazing what can happen when a man objectively and humbly considers the evidence for God's existence in our complex and awe-inspiring cosmos. Second, while the "new atheists" a.k.a. Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, etc., receive immense pleasure when religious folk jettison their faith (having "come to their senses" from the fairy tales of religious dogma), they are not so happy when one of their own becomes a turncoat.

For FinishingWell,

Barry Morrow 

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