“A Place for Truth” in Print: Leading Thinkers Explore Life’s Hardest Questions
We are thrilled with our newest Veritas publication, “A Place for Truth: Leading Thinkers Explore Life’s Hardest Questions”, which was released this month. This exciting volume contains some of The Veritas Forum’s most outstanding presentations. Editor, Dallas Willard, thoughtfully contextualizes each chapter.
Below is an excerpt from the introduction, written by Dallas Willard. For a preview of the table of contents, please click here.
Dallas Willard is professor of philosophy at the University of Southern California. He is the author of “The Divine Conspiracy”, “Renovation of the Heart”, and “Hearing God”.
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Contributors include: Richard John Neuhaus, Os Guinness, Tim Keller, Alister McGrath, David Helfland, Hugh Ross, Paul Vitz, Dallas Willard, Peter Singer, John Hare, Rodney Brooks, Rosalind Picard, Jeremy Begbie, N.T. Wright, John Warwick Montgomery, Mary Poplin, and Ronald Sider
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Columbia University Explores Haiti and the Problem of Suffering with Cornel West and Gabrielle Apollon
The most recent Veritas Forum at Columbia explored how we might continue to engage in Haiti, even after the effects of the earthquake are forgotten. We recently had the opportunity to hear from Gabrielle Apollon, the graduate student selected to interview Cornel West at the forum.
Gabrielle Apollon was one of the most influential student leaders in the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship chapter at Columbia, and recently graduated with her Masters from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs. She is now working as an intern in the office of the Special Envoy to Haiti with the U.N. Gabrielle’s family is Haitian, and she was present there during the recent earthquake. Here’s what she had to say:
Please describe your experience with the situation in Haiti. How did that prepare you to interview Cornel West at the recent Forum?
My family is Haitian, and I’ve been traveling to Haiti to visit since I was six years old. I was most recently in Haiti in January of 2010 on a trip with several students and a professor from the Columbia School of International and Public Affairs. We had been there for five days when the earthquake hit. The day after the earthquake we drove through Port Au Prince to the U.N. Logistics Base, which was near the airport. It was there that we spent the next two days volunteering at the infirmary. There were only six doctors available at the infirmary to service over a hundred patients. We witnessed so much pain, and so much devastation, it seemed there was so little that we could do. When reflecting on my time in Haiti, the impact of the cross hit me harder than ever before. Because Jesus suffered and died a horrible death on the cross I know that God has entered into our suffering. This allows me to make sense of everything I saw and experienced in Haiti. God suffered the same way we do, and that makes the idea of a loving God something I can believe in.
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Happiness and the Netherlands: Veritas at Tilburg
Since the Fall of 2008, ten Veritas Forums have taken place at five Dutch universities. Last November over 350 Dutch students explored the question “What are the ingredients for a happy life?” during a Veritas Forum in Tilburg, which is one of 13 research universities in the Netherlands.
At the recent forum in Tilburg, roughly 60% of the people who attended weren’t Christian. It was exciting to witness how the Holy Spirit paved the way for an atmosphere of openness and respect.
The panel consisted of the political leader of a progressive left-wing party, Femke Halsema, Christian economist Lans Bovenberg, psychologist Ad Vingerhoets, and Christian CEO Henk Hak. Lans Bovenberg was the recipient of the Spinoza Prize in 2003, which is the highest scientific prize awarded in the Netharlands. One planner remarked “it’s bewildering for people when a prominent scholar like Bovenberg turns out to be an enthusiastic Christian. It’s my desire and prayer that this positive bewilderment will cause people to start inquiring about the Christian faith and that The Veritas Forum will cause a positive change in the spiritual atmosphere in Dutch academia”.
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Media Spotlight
Last year we were encouraged by a number of engaging Veritas presentations and dialogues. We’d like to spotlight the following:
The Veritas Forum at Stanford University January 26, 2010 “Can Science Explain Everything?” with Ard Louis
The Veritas Forum at Iowa State February 19, 2010 “The Problem of Evil and Suffering” with Peter Kreeft
The Veritas Forum at Columbia November 17, 2009 “Faiths in Conflict: Searching for a Common Space” with Vinoth Ramachandra, Akeel Bilgrami, and David Eisenbach
Veritas Riff Orchestrates Its First Conference!
The word “veritas” may evoke thoughts of campus forums around the world, and “riff” may call up pictures of jazzmen, but do not be misled—the first “Veritas Riff” Conference was neither a lecture for musicians nor a jam session for academics! With a mission to “equip Christian thought leaders with the communication skills and peer support needed to become recognized and compelling cultural commentators,” Veritas Riff brought together thirteen young and mid-career Christian scholars engaged in producing brilliant, world-class content in specialties as diverse as astrophysics, bankruptcy law, and sociology of gender.
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