22 Quotes by Nancy R. Pearcey

Just as scientists test a theory by taking it into the lab and mixing chemicals in a test tube to see if the results confirm the theory, so we test a worldview by taking it into the laboratory of ordinary life.

Christianity is total truth – consistent, coherent, and comprehensive. It can be lived out in the real worldview without contradicting our most basic human experience.

We live in a moral wasteland where human beings are desperately seeking answers to hard questions about life and sexuality. But there is hope. In the wasteland we can cultivate a garden. We can discover a reality-based morality that expresses a positive, life-affirming view of the human person – one that is more inspiring, more appealing, and more liberating than the secular worldview.

To protect women’s rights, we must be able to say what a woman is. If postmodernism is correct – that the body itself is a social construct – then it becomes impossible to argue for rights based on the sheer fact of being female. We cannot legally protect a category of people if we cannot identify that category.

The problem is that many people treat morality as a list of rules. But in reality, every moral system rests on a worldview. In every decision we make, we are not just deciding what we want to do. We are expressing our view of the purpose of human life. In the words of theologian Stanley Hauerwas, a moral act “cannot be seen as just an isolated act, but involves fundamental options about the nature and significance of life itself.

Why I Raise My Children without God.” Instantly it went viral. The author, a young mother named Deborah Mitchell, listed several reasons why she shielded her children from learning about God – most of them variations on the problem of evil. Mitchell argued that a loving God would not allow “murders, child abuse, wars, brutal beatings, torture and millions of heinous acts to be committed throughout the history of mankind.” 1.

So here is Paul’s diagnosis of the human condition so far: God is constantly reaching out to people with evidence of his existence through general revelation. But humans are constantly suppressing those truths by creating idols.

Only people who understand that Christianity is true to the real world are capable of the relaxed confidence that allows them to be open, patient, and loving toward those who differ from them.

Idol-centered worldviews not only fail to match the external world, they also collapse internally. They are self-refuting. The technical term is that they are self-referentially absurd, which means they propose a standard for truth that they themselves fail to meet.