Paul Badham – författare

Many think that belief in life after death flies in the face of what science has discovered.Paul Badham explores the grounds on which the hope of immortality, central for Christian doctrine, can be revitalized today.He suggests that the possibility of a relationship between God and human beings is confirmed by our religious experience, and that resurrection and immortality need each other.Includes chapters on the evidential value of near-death experiences, concepts of heaven, and arguments against belief in hell.

The discussion of death is at last being brought out into the open, while the care of the dying is seen to involve more than the traditional services of doctor and priest. Facing death brings together contributors from the law, philosophy, medicine, social work, theology and religious studies to discuss issues such as hospice care, the arguments for and against euthanasia, and religious hope for eternal life. There are also accounts of recent research into 'near-death' experiences and into measuring the quality of human life. This broad, interdisciplinary approach to death in contemporary society will have a special interest for a whole range of caring professions, but, beyond that, its interest is, of course, universal.

The Modernists claim that core beliefs like faith in God, hope for life after death and respect for the teaching of the historical Jesus, could be freed from outmoded supernatural ideas like six-day creation, virgin birth, substitution atonement and Hell. They argue that for Christianity to survive it must be brought into line with the best of modern thought. Paul Badham supports this viewpoint. He argues that modern physics and philosophy can be used to support belief in God and that near-death experiences have revived belief in the immortality of the soul. He believes that contemporary New Testament scholarship helps us know more about the historical Jesus, but requires a fresh look at what Christians mean when they call him divine. Modernism makes a very useful contribution to the dialogue between Christianity and other faiths by giving priority to religious experiencing and thereby encouraging a pluralist understanding of divine reality.

The Modernists claim that core beliefs like faith in God, hope for life after death and respect for the teaching of the historical Jesus, could be freed from outmoded supernatural ideas like six-day creation, virgin birth, substitution atonement and Hell. They argue that for Christianity to survive it must be brought into line with the best of modern thought. Paul Badham supports this viewpoint. He argues that modern physics and philosophy can be used to support belief in God and that near-death experiences have revived belief in the immortality of the soul. He believes that contemporary New Testament scholarship helps us know more about the historical Jesus, but requires a fresh look at what Christians mean when they call him divine. Modernism makes a very useful contribution to the dialogue between Christianity and other faiths by giving priority to religious experiencing and thereby encouraging a pluralist understanding of divine reality.

This book is unique in that it provides data resulting from a four year study of religious experiencing in China today which could radically transform the understanding of the role of religion in contemporary China. The suppression of religion by communist authorities in the latter part of the 20th century is well known but, far less well-known, is the underlying resurgence of religious life within the most populous nation on earth. The research is focused on the Han Chinese who form over 90 percent of the population of mainland China and is undertaken on ten sites across the country resulting in data from 3,000 detailed questionnaires. The importance of this project is that it is ground-breaking research in an almost wholly new context. No previous research on this scale has taken place before and indeed until recently no such research would have been permitted in a state which since the Communist Revolution of 1949 has been deeply suspicious of any manifestation of religious feeling, and in which a wholly atheistic educational system has prevailed.