Next Meeting of CUFREE (Champaign Urbana Freethinkers) is Jan 24th at the Urbana Free Library. 

Next Next Meeting… we will go the “The Great God Debate!”  See the details below.

The Great God Debate Comes to U of I:
Authors Dinesh D’Souza and John W. Loftus to Tackle Questions of Faith and Reason

CHAMPAIGN,IL—On February 9, 2010 at 7:00pm on the University of Illinois campus, authors Dinesh D’Souza and John W. Loftus will debate the question “Does the Christian God exist?”  The event will be held in Foellinger Auditorium on the south end of the main Quad and is open to the public.  After the formal portion of the debate, D’Souza and Loftus will field questions from the audience.

Mr. D’Souza will be responding in the affirmative. He is the author of What’s So Great About Christianity? and has appeared on a number of popular news programs. He has previously debated Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, Peter Singer, and a number of others.

Mr. Loftus will be responding in the negative. He is a former Christian minister and the author of the recently published Why I Became an Atheist, which has been acclaimed as one of the most effective defenses of atheism in recent times.  Mr. Loftus is also a contributing author of the forthcoming The Christian Delusion: Why Faith Fails.

Moderating the debate will be Kenneth J. Howell, the director of the Institute of Catholic Thought at St. John’s Catholic Newman Center on the Illinois campus.  “This debate should be a great opportunity for different worldviews to have a healthy exchange of ideas, which is the essence of what a university is about,” said Prof. Howell. “D’Souza and Loftus are both articulate spokespersons for their worldviews and their presence promises an enlightening evening.”

The event is being co-sponsored by the Champaign-Urbana Freethinkers, the Atheists, Agnostics, and Freethinkers student organization, the Fellowship of Catholic University Students, and the St. John Institute of Catholic Thought. 

I hope to see you there!

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