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I: THE MESSAGE

The central topic is the age-old and never-finished discussion of the relation between
faith and reason.1 In any event, it is an ancient topic that goes all the way back to the very
beginnings of the Christian religion. But while it is an ancient topic, it is also a crucial
current topic; there is no topic, it seems to me, more important for the present-day
Christian community than this, and none that warrants more of our best thought and
attention.
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II: A REFORMED COMMENT OR TWO

This is a long letter, and of course there is a lot more to it than the bare bones summary I
have given. The bare bones summary will have to suffice, however; and in what follows I
would like to make a couple of comments on the pope's suggestions.
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2. This is ontological naturalism; another variant is epistemic naturalism, where the
idea is that science really tells us all there is to know (and one thing science
definitely does not tell us is that there is such a person as God).
3. See his Darwin's Dangerous Idea, and see my "Dennett's Dangerous Idea:
Darwin, Mind and Meaning," BOOKS & CULTURE May/June 1996.
4. My thanks to the members of the Notre Dame Center for Philosophy of Religion
colloquium.
Copyright 1999 by the author or Christianity Today International/Books &
Culture Magazine. Click here for reprint information on Books & Culture.
July/August 1999, Vol. 5, No. 4, Page 32