Direct from the San Francisco Book Review

April 2, 2014April 5, 2014 / Minimalist Christian / Leave a comment

The Big Picture – An Honest Examination of God, Science and Purpose
By P D Hemsley
eLectio Publishing, $4.99, 266 pages, Format: eBook

A former atheist/agnostic who gave God a chance offers open-minded readers this work which is both ambitious in scope and credible in approach: //The Big Picture: An Honest Examination of God, Science, and Purpose//. Polarizing subject matter such as God and science, evolution, and intelligent design are revisited with the goal of gently challenging entrenched thinking on both sides.

Hemsley, a Chartered Engineer, “has lived on both sides of the faith fence.” His book is comparable to a technical presentation designed for a general audience. It is highly organized with stated goals, evidence, and the author’s conclusions. Fluid, straightforward writing helps the reader progress through several chapters or conclusions dealing with faith, science, purpose and design, quantum physics, free will, reason, Jesus, and more. Even so, those with less of a scientific bent will need to exercise their concentration skills in the scientific sections.

The strength of this book lies in complexity and compatibility. The chapters “Science Describes an Incredible Universe” and “The Universe Exhibits Design and Purpose” make for fascinating reading, especially the subsection where “challenged by the complexity of the biological machinery” Hemsley explores how a modern-day designer would engineer a human being and how long it would take. Additionally, the author’s version of the Genesis creation account featuring the compatibility of scientific discoveries and God’s design is an interesting interpretation to consider.

No emotional appeals are made to the atheist, agnostic, hardcore creationist, or plain honest seeker for a change in his or her worldview. In the words of the author, a self-described Minimalist Christian: “Whether you agree with my conclusion or not, I hope that many of the myths that currently inhibit so many of us will have been weakened or dispelled. I hope that a step can be taken towards finding purpose and experiencing life in abundance.”

http://citybookreview.com/the-big-picture-an-honest-examination-of-god-science-and-purpose/

Click HERE to buy a copy.

“The Big Picture” – an honest examination of God, science and purpose – OUT NOW

October 16, 2013December 20, 2013 / Minimalist Christian / 3 Comments

“I recommend this book to all thinking people – we might just change the world.”

“This book will definitely make you think and then think again. Hemsley did his research for this book, and I received many answers to questions I’ve pondered over the years.”

“it is a welcome relief to come across a book that presents such a broad and balanced overview”

“This book covers an considerable amount of territory in its 253 pages.”

The Big Picture is a much-needed book that allows the reader to consider the big questions of life without feeling bludgeoned to adopt the author’s opinion. The book explains basics of science, philosophy and religion in a straightforward manner.

It will encourage all those who want to live a good and purposeful life and would like a sound basis for doing so. Such readers may find a resonance with the teaching of Jesus and this book will explore whether we can trust what has been recorded in the gospel accounts, and whether the findings of science and a reasoned understanding of the Bible are consistent or contradictory.

Many books in the arena of science and faith are hostile and adversarial. The authors set up straw men of their opponent’s arguments, dismantle them and then preach their own arguments to their disciples. The author of The Big Picture recognises that there are intelligent atheists and intelligent believers, and that a case can always be made for whatever someone wants to believe. The reader is therefore treated with respect

ebook

paperback

Amazon UK

Goodness – me!

May 3, 2013May 25, 2013 / Minimalist Christian / 13 Comments

Do you ever stop to think what you would like on your gravestone when you are dead? It’s a good way of finding out what we really want to be like. I don’t think any of us would like to see phrases like:

“Always selfish and greedy”

“Never had time for anyone else”

“Vindictive and hateful”

When we see a new baby, at a christening who would want to think that the baby would grow up to be a thief, or to have a string of husbands who she cheated on and deserted, or to be a child molester.

We know deep down that we want to be good.

In the 11^th century, Anselm of Canterbury described how being good is possible through ‘goodness’, and how supreme goodness is God. So that desire to be good is actually us wanting to be like God (supreme goodness), to act like God, to be in his image.

St John’s describes in his gospel that God is love. So when we love one another, our love is possible through love, which is through God. We are choosing to act like God, to be part of God.

Each of us has the essence of goodness in us, and the essence of love in us. God is goodness and God is love, so we all have God within us. Sometimes we choose to ignore goodness and love, and instead choose to be selfish, vindictive or hateful. But that is not what we want to be – as we found at the start of this post.

The true Christian religion is about helping us to be what we want to be – good and loving. It is about connecting with that goodness and love within us; God within us. It is about learning from Christ what goodness and love looks like, and trying to imitate him.

And if you want to be good and loving, then that means that you want to be like God. Jesus said that ‘if you have seen me then you have seen God’; Jesus represented supreme goodness and love in human form. So if you want to be good and loving, since Jesus was supremely good and loving, then you want to be like Jesus, and if you want to be like Jesus you can call yourself a Christian.

Christians pray to help make that connection with goodness and love. Here’s an example of a Celtic prayer from Lindisfarne:

Help me dear Lord to care too much

To love too freely

To pray unceasingly

To forgive endlessly

To laugh fearlessly

To question

To live

To be who I am

To be where I am

To be what I am

To hope

To believe

To reach out my hand

That’s a good prayer, isn’t it? It’s about connecting with God within us. It’s asking God to help us be who we want to be.

Do you want to be the sort of person that the prayer describes? You can take a step closer by praying that prayer.

https://philhemsley.wordpress.com/2012/06/21/an-argument-for-and-definition-of-god/

https://philhemsley.wordpress.com/2012/12/29/the-god-of-science/

An argument for, and definition of God.

June 21, 2012January 26, 2015 / Minimalist Christian / 12 Comments

I have started reading Anselm; interesting stuff. Not sure I’ve really got my head round it yet, but nevertheless let me try to paraphrase my understanding of his argument so far in a modern context:

We are all aware that there are ‘non-material’ things: love, justice, purpose, hope, belief, to name a few. An act of love is carried-out through ‘love’, and an act of justice is carried-out through ‘justice’. If love did not exist then one could not carry-out an act of love. And it is through ‘goodness’ that we are able to carry-out an act of love; without goodness we could not carry-out an act of love, or of justice, or… Apart from goodness, all other non-material things are carried-out through goodness, and therefore goodness is the ultimate non-material thing, or ‘essence’ and it exists through itself.

We can also perceive that some acts are express more love than others; there can be great love, or great justice, or great goodness. And we can imagine that for any great goodness there could be a goodness that is just a little greater … until we reach infinite goodness. And so everything that is good in any way is within that infinite, or supreme goodness.

Everything exists through something, and we have seen that of things immaterial everything exists through supreme goodness. But everything must exist through one thing. If we imagine that there were more than one thing, then either there would be one thing through which the more than one thing were able to exist – which would then be the one thing, or they might exist through a ‘power to exist through oneself’ – which would then be the one thing, or they would exist mutually through each other – which defies reason.

The universe exists, and so it exists through something. Non-material things exist, and they exist through supreme goodness. Therefore either the universe exists through supreme goodness, or supreme goodness exists through the universe. But can supreme goodness exist through the universe? We can conceive that there are other universes, but it is inconceivable that those other universes exist without supreme goodness; being non-material supreme goodness cannot be constrained within a material context. Therefore it is impossible that supreme goodness exists through the universe, but the universe must exist through supreme goodness, and there can only be one supreme goodness – which we define as God.

https://philhemsley.wordpress.com/2013/04/14/proof-of-god/

https://philhemsley.wordpress.com/2012/12/29/the-god-of-science/