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DR. MICHAEL WARD, University of OXFORD 

English Literary Critic & Theologian

C. S. Lewis on Appearance and Reality in the Christian Life.

Thursday, January 26, 2023 @ 12:00 PM Pacific Time

View Talk on our YouTube Channel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrJCGCZYIQc

Abstract

C. S. Lewis knew well that Christians walk “by faith, not sight”, as the apostle Paul puts it (2 Corinthians 5:7).  But what is the difference between faith and sight?  How does faith differ from delusion?  Michael Ward will explore these themes as they are presented in Lewis’s writings, especially his fiction, and in particular his best-known works, the seven Chronicles of Narnia.

Biography

Michael Ward is the author of the award-winning Planet Narnia: The Seven Heavens in the Imagination of C.S. Lewis (Oxford University Press), co-editor of The Cambridge Companion to C. S. Lewis (Cambridge University Press) and presenter of the BBC television documentary, The Narnia Code. A member of the Faculty of Theology and Religion at the University of Oxford in his native England, Dr. Ward is also Professor of Apologetics at Houston Christian University.  He studied English at Oxford, Theology at Cambridge, and has a PhD in Divinity from St. Andrews University, Scotland. He played the role of Vicar in the film ‘The Most Reluctant Convert: The Untold Story of C.S. Lewis’ and handed a pair of X-ray spectacles to Agent 007 in the James Bond movie ‘The World Is Not Enough.’ In real life he is a Catholic priest, assisting at Holy Rood Church, Oxford alongside his work as an academic. His latest book is After Humanity: A Guide to C.S. Lewis’s The Abolition of Man (Word On Fire Academic). 

Next in GFCF Series: Save the Date March 14 @ 4 PM: Regent College OT Professor Matthew Lynch on The Land Keeps the Score: Violence in Creation According to the Old Testament Details at https://ubcgfcf.com

Bibliography on C.S. Lewis Oeuvre

1. C.S. Lewis: A Biography, Roger Lancelyn Green and Walter Hooper (HarperCollins, revised and expanded edition 2002)

2. C.S. Lewis, A Companion and Guide, Walter Hooper (HarperCollins, 1996)

3. The Cambridge Companion to C.S. Lewis, ed. Robert MacSwain and Michael Ward (Cambridge University Press, 2010)

4. Planet Narnia: The Seven Heavens in the Imagination of C.S. Lewis, Michael Ward (Oxford University Press, 2008)

5. The Lion’s World: A Journey into the Heart of Narnia, Rowan Williams (SPCK, 2012)

6. After Humanity: A Guide to C.S. Lewis’s The Abolition of Man, Michael Ward (Word on Fire Academic, 2021)

Register for the Science & Faith Conference at Trinity Western University on January 28, 2023:  www.csca.ca/van-23 

If you liked Michael Ward, you will like this dialogue: Does God Exist? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2u54a1FL28

Sir Roger Scruton: Anybody who goes through life with an open mind and heart will encounter moments that are saturated with meaning, but whose meaning cannot be put into words. Those moments are precious to us. When they occur, it is as though, on the winding, ill-lit stairway of our life, we suddenly come across a window… through which we catch sight of another, brighter world–a world to which we belong but which we cannot enter. There are many who dismiss this world as an unscientific fiction. I am not alone in thinking it real and important.