Athens or Jerusalem?
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LIVE Event for students of Philosophy of Religion for AS/A Level Religious Studies
With Dr Peter Vardy
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Dates for 2025-26
● Worcester, 12th November 2025
● London, 21st November 2025
● Manchester, 3rd March 2026
● Coventry, 9th March 2026
● London, 12th March 2026
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Building on the success of “Evil and the God of Love” and “The Word” in 2024-25, Candle Conferences presents an all-new LIVE event for students of the Philosophy of Religion for AS / A Level Religious Studies. “Athens or Jerusalem?” will explore content specified by ALL ENGLISH EXAMINATION BOARDS, focusing on the compulsory Philosophy of Religion paper. The event aims to get students really excited about the subject, enriching and extending their knowledge and understanding as well as supporting them in analysing, evaluating and making informed, well-reasoned academic judgements.
Sessions include…
- Faith & Reason
Through this introductory session Dr Peter Vardy will explore the relationship between faith and reason. Around the year 200 AD Tertullian asked “What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” (Prescription Against Heretics, Chapter 7), identifying the existence of two competing strands within Christianity that had developed by that time and which persist to this day, explaining many of the challenges philosophers encounter when they study Christianity. This session will conclude with a small-group activity. - Arguing for God
Through the second session Dr Vardy will outline and evaluate the attempts that have been made to argue for God’s existence. Is it possible to prove God’s existence a priori, from reason alone? Can God’s existence be demonstrated a posteriori from observations? Can God’s existence even be inferred as the best explanation for reality as we find it? This session places many of the A Level topics in context and will conclude with an exercise, designed to support students in making and defending academic judgements. - Religious Experience
The next session will consider whether direct religious experiences – solitary or corporate – provide good evidence for the existence of God. Are they, as Hume and much later Dawkins suggested, just natural phenomena? Do they justify belief only for those who have them, as James argued, or do they provide good evidence for God’s existence for all of us, as Swinburne and Alston have maintained? As always, Dr Vardy will draw on rich and varied examples to make this topic come alive and the session will conclude with a discussion. - The nature of God
The last session will draw the strands together, considering what the various arguments and religious experience suggest about the nature of God and then evaluating the extent to which these insights are coherent and compatible with Christian beliefs. In particular, Dr Vardy will explore the extent to which the evidence points to God being omnipotent and what that might mean, as well as the implications of omnipotence for the problem of evil and suffering. This session will conclude with a debate on the motion: “This house believes that faith has little to do with reason.” Students will prepare and contribute their academic arguments before a final vote is taken.
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About our speaker…
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Dr. Peter Vardy was Vice Principal of Heythrop College, University of London (1999-2011); he is internationally well-known as a leader in the fields of Religious Studies, Philosophy and Ethics and Values Education. Peter’s many books – including the best-selling “Puzzle of” series for HarperCollins – demonstrate his ability to communicate complex ideas with clarity, accuracy and humour. For more than three decades schools and colleges have looked to Peter to provide outstanding conferences, resources and CPD / INSET, both to support their work in RS and Philosophy and more broadly.
Peter was awarded an honorary doctorate for his work in promoting Religious Studies in schools by the University of Chichester in 2021.
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