Examine the faith that shaped the world

If you've ever found yourself wanting to take Christianity seriously — really seriously — but unsure how to begin, I want you to know that impulse is exactly right. Not the half-engaged Google search, not the culture-war argument at a dinner table, but a sustained, honest, intellectually rigorous engagement with what Christianity actually claims and why so many thoughtful people across two millennia have found those claims not just comforting, but true. That's the course I've tried to build here, and I'm genuinely glad you're considering it.

I'll be honest about what this course is not. It's not a devotional. It's not designed to produce a predetermined conclusion in you. And it's not going to pretend that the hard questions — the problem of suffering, the exclusivity of Christ, the church's complicated historical record, the tension between miracles and modern science — are easy or unimportant. I've spent years sitting with those questions myself, and I've come to believe that Christianity is far more intellectually defensible than its cultured despisers claim, and far more demanding than its casual defenders suggest. Both observations matter, and this course takes both seriously.

What you'll find here is a structured journey through the deepest questions: Does God exist, and what do the philosophical arguments actually establish? What do we know about Jesus of Nazareth — as a matter of history — and what did he claim about himself? How did the New Testament come to us, and is it reliable? What does the resurrection mean as a historical event, and what are the best counter-explanations? How does Christianity compare — fairly, generously, precisely — with Judaism, Islam, secular humanism, and the other great systems of meaning competing for your allegiance? These aren't rhetorical questions. We work through them, carefully, together.

I've also tried to model something I believe is in short supply in conversations about faith: intellectual charity. That means applying the same critical standards to Christian claims that we apply to everything else — no more, but also no less. It means presenting objections in their strongest form before attempting any response. It means distinguishing what we know with confidence from what remains genuinely uncertain. And it means trusting you, as a serious adult learner, to follow the argument and form your own judgment.

By the end of this course, you won't just know what Christians believe. You'll understand why those beliefs took the shape they did, how they've been tested, how they compare to the alternatives, and what it would mean to hold them — or reject them — on good grounds. Whatever you conclude, you'll conclude it with greater clarity, greater rigor, and greater intellectual integrity than when you started. I can't think of a more worthwhile outcome. I hope you'll join me.