During July and August of 2003, a group of high school students and some of their parents met in the Rose home to read and talk about worldviews. Here is the original announcement:
The purpose of this meeting is to read some prominent authors who comment on the Christian and other worldviews. We will read an opponent of Christianity and two intellectuals with Christian convictions. All of them are influential today. Students are likely to encounter all of them during their college careers.
Before each date noted, please read the assigned pages and be prepared to talk about them in the meeting. Meetings are at 9:00 PM at the Rose’s.
Here is a table of the readings.
| Meeting | Moreland | Sire | Russell | page count |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7/15 | pp. 11-82 | pp. 9-19 | (none) | 83 |
| 7/22 | pp. 83-136 | pp. 20-39 | pp. 3-23 | 95 |
| 7/29 | pp. 137-154 | pp. 40-73 | pp. 24-47 | 76 |
| 8/5 | (none) | pp. 74-117 | pp. 48-87 | 84 |
| 8/12 | (none) | pp. 118-171 | pp. 88-103 | 70 |
| 8/19 | pp. 155-172 | pp. 172-200 | pp. 104-156 | 100 |
| 8/26 | pp. 173-200 | (none) | pp. 157-206 | 78 |
The Sire book presents a helpful framework for evaluating “ultimate questions” and their various answers. There are seven key questions, and eight worldviews, each proposing answers (or non-answers) to every question. The questions are:
In the last meeting, we marked off a whiteboard into seven rows and eight columns, and threw a bunch of strips of paper into a hat, each with a telling statement or cultural reference, and we played a game of ‘worldview fortune cookies’. The class decided on a fitting placement for each strip of paper. Some fit in more than one place. Some strips were blank, so that we could pose key phrases in the heat of discussion. The result was a very messy but interesting whiteboard.
The moderator later transcribed the result to a slightly less messy spreadsheet. It was a pleasant and useful way to pass some summer evenings, and we will do it again some day.
