Reimagining Apologetics

Within the broader world of Western Christianity, the discipline of apologetics has fallen out of favor. Courses on apologetics—stillrequired in many conservative schools—are no longer a part of the curriculum of mainline Protestant undergraduate and seminary programs.

Within broader evangelicalism, apologetics appears to be at a bit of a crossroads. A few years ago, I had the opportunity to teach a course in apologetics at Fuller Seminary, where the course (as of this writing in 2020) remains an elective. Many of my students expressed deep suspicion about the subject matter, uninterested in any sort of training in triumphalism. As one student put it: “If apologetics is about making arguments and hitting unbelievers over the head with the ‘truth’ I really want nothing to do with it.” The students let me know that although they found the questions intriguing, they were put off by the aggressive posture manifested by apologetic practitioners. The students’ suspicions manifest the complaint that traditional apologetic presentations are not effective in addressing contemporary crises of faith. They often serve only to confirm participants in what they already believe. Indeed, at the end of my apologetics course, several of the students suggested that it be renamed (“Christian Witness”) or at least given a modifier (“Pastoral Apologetics”) so that other seminarians would not be scared away.

I feel the force of these concerns. It sometimes seems as if the apologetic project has simply run its course and that the word is too freighted with negative connotations to salvage. And yet the questions that apologetics has sought to address remain. Can we defend the faith without being defensive or contend for the faith without being contentious?

On what grounds may we appeal to those outside the walls of the church? Is there still hope for apologetics, especially in an age where people are more likely to construe faith in terms of internal resonance (authenticity) rather than external proof (authority)?

I believe the answer to this last question—whether there is hope for apologetics—is yes. I argue that apologetics remains an essential dimension of Christian witness in a secular age but that the discipline is in need of a fresh infusion of imagination. This is necessary because the dance of faith and doubt is experienced imaginatively and not just intellectually. Doubters require more than good arguments. They require an aesthetic sense, an imaginative vision, and a poetic embodiment of Christianity. If Christian faith can only be adequately grasped from the inside (from a position of commitment), how can we help those on the outside to experience its reorienting force? What is needed is a provocation of possibilities, a vicarious vision of what it feels like to live with Christian faith, a sense of the beauty of faith that is felt before fully embraced. For this, the imagination is essential.

By reimagining apologetics, I mean simply an approach that takes the imaginative context of belief seriously. Such an approach prepares the way for Christian faith by provoking desire, exploring possibility, and casting an inhabitable Christian vision. When successful, it enables outsiders to inhabit the Christian faith as if from the inside, feeling their way in before attempting to criticize it by foreign standards. Whether a person ultimately embraces the vision that is being portrayed, imaginative engagement cultivates empathy. It enables a glimpse, even if just for a moment, of the possibilities that Christian faith facilitates for our life in the world.

By Christian faith I mean a holistic pattern of life. This includes the embodied practices that make belief intelligible (prayer, worship, hospitality, peacemaking, creation care, etc.), as well as the felt sense of what belief means for everyday life. In other words, to be a Christian is not simply to believe a list of propositions but also to experience the world through the lens of a meaningful imaginative vision. Indeed, it is impossible to separate my faith (what I believe and in whom I trust) from my desire (what I love and what I wish to be the case) and my imagination (what I feel is possible), as well as from my concrete, lived reality (the way that my faith is tested and maintained in the course of everyday life). (Anthony C. Thiselton, The Hermeneutics of Doctrine, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007)

Rather than conforming blindly to the expectations of society, I “follow my heart” and “choose my own adventure.” If this framing of things raises a red flag, consider that there are both thick and thin versions of this. Thin versions might lead to narcissism and sociopathy. But thicker versions could result in a more examined, creative, and self-responsible life.

As an example, perhaps no company pushes authenticity as pervasively as the Walt Disney Corporation. In its many movies we find ballads of self-discovery and self-expression, counseling each viewer to “follow your heart.” But within these cinematic universes, authenticity is not self-justifying. Villains like Ursula (the sea witch) and heroes like Moana (the seafarer) both follow their hearts. But only the latter’s pursuit is meant to be exemplary. This is because authenticity requires a moral horizon, one that takes seriously the nature of the world and our place in it. Thin versions of authenticity become self-defeating, because they fail to find resonance outside our narrow pursuits. This means that the question is not whetherauthenticity is a worthy pursuit, but what kind of authenticity will lead us to the good ending we so desire.

Addressing authenticity means accounting for a person’s embodied, aesthetic experience of the world, their felt sense of their place in the world, and the possibilities that are available. This quest for authenticity is fundamentally an imaginative quest, and for many people it takes place without explicit reference to God. But I argue that God may be more present in the quest for authenticity than we think.

The conviction of God’s active presence calls for an apologetic that meets people where they are, with confidence that God’s Spirit is already at work as well. It means that winsome believers are called to join our neighbors in the quest for authenticity, offering a larger horizon in which God’s active presence can be named as it is felt. For faith begins, as Marilynne Robinson reminds us, as an intuitive response to “the feeling of an overplus of meaning in reality, a sense that the world cannot at all be accounted for on its own terms” (Marilynne Robinson, What Are We Doing Here? Essays, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018). It is in moments of imaginative excess, when Reality breaks through—perhaps summoning unlooked-for tears to our eyes—that we are especially open to the provocations of belief.

Lisa FieldsJuly 18, 2025Comment