Talk - Lewes Think Tank Forum

Professor Norman Vance is giving a talk for the Lewes Think Tank Forum at Christs Church in Nevill, entitled ‘Our basis - who would throw stones at the impregnable rock of holy scripture?’ “I’ve been doing a good deal of academic research into 19th century ways of constructing biblical authority,” he says, from his office in Sussex University, “and what the rebels of the time - including writers like George Eliot - were rejecting when they were responding to this authority in an increasingly secular Victorian society.”

Vance, Professor of English at the university and Convenor of an MA in Literature, Religion and Philosophy, believes that then, as now, criticism of the Bible came from an over-literal interpretation of the scriptures. “Varieties of atheism feed on simplified notions of what they reject,” he says. "This set of beliefs has become intellectually bankrupt because it has nothing new to say.” I wonder what sort of crowd he is expecting at the church. He knows that there will be representatives of various different branches of the church, from Quakers to Roman Catholics. He’s not sure if any non-believers will attend. “Part of the intellectually bankrupt nature of atheism,” he concludes, “is the fact that it doesn’t engage with what it professes not to believe in.” An interesting challenge, that. Is there any point in grappling with theology if you don’t believe in the validity of religion? DL