In Depth:  John Blanchard

John Blanchard has recently brought out a new evangelistic booklet. He talked to EN about the cross in the run-up to Easter.

EN: You have a new booklet out entitled Why the Cross? What would you say is the great attraction of the cross for needy sinners?

Almost as universal as the fact of death is the fear of death. The American film producer Woody Allen famously said, ‘I’m not afraid of dying. I just don’t want to be there when it happens’, but this was just his quirky way of twisting the truth.

The official death toll resulting from the devastating earthquakes and tsunamis in the Indian Ocean a few months ago may never be known and their impact on the thinking of millions of people is beyond calculation.

For many without a biblical perspective, the almost instinctive reaction is to ask 'Where is God when things go wrong?'

Evangelical Press has just published what it is calling its 'Book of the year', a major treatment of atheism and agnosticism by Christian Ministries evangelist, John Blanchard. Entitled Does God believe in atheists? It traces the development of atheistic thinking from the 'Golden Age' of Greek philosophy to the present day. Here is an edited extract from the book's chapter on secular humanism.

The first article in Humanist Manifesto II includes the words: 'We find insufficient evidence for the existence of a supernatural'. This blunt dismissal of deity is underlined by a promotional leaflet issued by the International Humanist and Ethical Union and which 'presents the case for understanding the world without reference to a god', while in his recent book All in the mind Sir Ludovic Kennedy claims 'definitely to disprove the existence of God'.