Atheist-Christian Debates

24: Library

Recommended

• Keller, Werner, The Bible As History: Top notch book for finding scientific and historical facts about the bible.
• Rhodes, Ron, The Challenge of the Cults and New Religions: This book is practically indispensable in handling just about any cult, from Jehovah's Witnesses to Mormonism and everything in between. Not only that, but it's good for showing you what makes your religion non-divisive.
• Michael L. Brown, Answering Jewish Objections To Jesus, Vol. 1, 2, 3, 4: Book 1 is good for a response to the problem of evil. The others are good for answering alleged `contradictions' and the like.
• Saal, Witnessing to Muslims about Christ: The title sounds self-contradictory, but it's actually good for learning the basics about how to witness to Moslems and people of other religions. Not as in-depth as Michael L. Brown's books on Judaism, but it gives you the advice that his books are lacking. I.e. how to avoid conflicts and heated arguments like I've got on this site.
• J.B. Phillips, Your God is Too Small: An in-depth perspective on why it's unimaginative to be an atheist. Shows examples of various ways we limit what God can and cannot be, making him seem tiny and weak.
• Bob Sorge, The Fire of Delayed Answers: All around good book on prayer. Words to live by.
• Rick Warren, Purpose Driven Life: Perhaps the hype is a bit excessive, and they don't use the traditional translation of the bible, but its advice can help you when you've given up hope.
• Griffin, C.S. Lewis: A Dramatic Life: Nuggets of wisdom are admittedly sparse in this one, but if you read carefully enough, you can find a few interesting responses to atheism in it.
• Dr. Paul L. Maier and Hank Hanegraaff, The DaVinci Code: Fact or Fiction? Recommended in the May 2004 issue of the Lutheran Witness, it debunks a lot of bizarre conspiracies atheists like to toss at Christians.
• Schaeffer, The God Who is There: Has some good responses to atheism in it, but it's weighed down with an unneccessary, overly alarmist bashing of Dadaism.
• Poundstone, Carl Sagan: A Life in the Cosmos: Not very useful in terms of apologetics, but a smooth read nonetheless. Sagan's life is as sordid as it is fascinating, and Poundstone makes Sagan's dry rambles clear and understandable to the layman. The only ammunition I got from this one was the fact that Sagan was a pothead, but it's a good, easy read, nonetheless.
• Carnegie, How To Win Friends And Influence People. Don't quote it at the atheist. Read it and practice what it says on the atheist.
• Unlocking The Mystery Of Life [DVD]: Good, inspiring material for a Christian. The arguments about the so-called `scientific naturalism' and the ostracization of God believing scientists is right on the money. The agnostic said "Darwin's theory needs work," but that's the worst he could say about it. His other objections were addressed, he just hadn't gotten that far on the DVD at the time. Beautiful footage of the Galapagos islands, and a nice text section so that you don't have to wade through too many movies.
• C. S. Lewis, Miracles: Recommended by a fellow Christian, this book sounds like what I should have been reading before this site was put together. The only problem with it is that some people have used it to argue for the existence of magic and such things.
• C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity: Contains a critique on dualism. Another must have.
• Sagan, Contact: More enjoyable than Sagan's essays. I liked the idea of the man who got wealthy by not selling a device that blocks out TV commercials...and the scene with the giant pendulum.
• Bell Publishing Company, The Lost Books Of The Bible: I wanted to send this to my atheist correspondent, but it's my grandma's book. I don't take this one very seriously, but it answers the atheist's question, "what do the books so thoughtfully omitted from the bible say?"
• C. S. Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia: Show this to anyone who says Christianity and the furry fandom cannot coexist.

Mixed Feelings

• Josh McDowell, More Than A Carpenter: Some parts are good, like the "would you die for a lie?" section. Other parts are a bit weak. "Quit Joshing me, Josh!" was the agnostic's reply. The `Good Moral Teacher' arguments definitely need work.
• Brian H. Childs, David W. Waanders, The Treasure of Earthen Vessels: Explorations in Theological Anthropology: Can be helpful if you can translate it. I guess it's a Christian book, but the verbage makes it impossible to comprehend. The title is catchy, seeming to indicate some sort of synthesis between evolutionary theory and spirituality. No dice. In actuality, this book is filled with essays of the most vague and bewildering sort. It discusses theories of some obscure guy named Lapsley, and I have no idea what it all means. What does it mean to `participate in the life of God?' Is that the same thing as salvation? Why is there a Buddhist section in the book? Is it really Buddhist, or is it just an Asian perspective on salvation? I certainly have no clue! I get more bewildered by its wordiness every time I read it.
• Mandino, Og, The Greatest Miracle In The World: It's amusing, and provides inspiration to the faithful, but is rather like religious fluff. I'd be hard pressed to find any useful substantial argument for God's existence in this one. The atheist's arguments will punch so many holes in this book that it will make it into Swiss cheese.
• Mackay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds: One of Carl Sagan's favorite books, this five pound paperweight is rather long and tedius, with very few nods towards religion in it. In fact, most of the book is spent dismissing various spiritual phenomenon under the ill fitting blanket of `self delusion.' However, I found the information on the deceptive tricks of alchemy quite interesting, and the section on the crusades, to Mackay's credit, did not depict the Turks as any better than the crusaders.

Not Recommended

• Aulenbach, How to Go to Heaven Without Going to Church: Too generic to be useful to atheism or Christianity.
• Peale, Norman Vincent, The Power of Positive Thinking: Most likely, this is the source of all the arguments that `Christianity is magical thinking.' Peale argues that we can somehow repeat bible verses and everything will be hunky dory. Too much like Christian Science. Not a good tool for witnessing to agnostics.
• Sagan, Broca's Brain: I probably wouldn't have gotten into so many ridiculous arguments with the agnostic if I hadn't tried reading this book. The only parts of this book I liked were the sections on Einstein and science fiction stories. Mostly the book just made me angry or sleepy (in the case of the Velikovsky arguments). I tore out two or three chapters from the book and fed the rest to my guinea pig.
• 23 Minutes In Hell[CD]: A recording of a man's unemotional recollection of a vision of hell. Not enough scriptural support for what he's saying - in fact, he argues a lot of stuff that atheists will latch on to like ticks on a dead dog - erroneous interpretations of hell..."Why does God torture people for all eternity? It's horribly cruel," et al.