You're invited to a Thinking Matters Auckland, God, Morality and Society, event:

What: Dr Matthew Flannagan speaking on "In Defence of Divine Commands"
When: Tuesday 4th August – 7:00pm
Where: Lecture Room 2, Laidlaw College, 80 Central Park Drive, Henderson, West Auckland
Format: Talk followed by questions, answers and discussion.
Cost: Free but donations are appreciated

Are God's commands irrelevant when we discuss moral and ethical questions? Many claim that this is the case and offer the following as an argument against Divine Commands: either an action is right because God commands it or God commands it because it is right; the latter renders God's commands superfluous, if they are right independently of God then God is unnecessary; however, the former renders God's commands arbitrary, if God commanding an action makes that action right then any action could conceivably be right. Given this, they conclude that God and the commands he issues, should be kept out of consideration of our ethical and moral questions.

In this talk Matt will challenge this line of thought and will demonstrate that this attempt to dismiss God's commands from our consideration of ethical and moral issues is flawed and will explain, in layman's terms, why a Christian should not be intimidated by this argument.

Matt holds a PhD in Theology, a Masters degree in Philosophy. His area of expertise is Philosophy of Religion, Theology and Applied Ethics. He is an adjunct lecturer in Philosophy for Laidlaw College and Bethlehem Tertiary Institute and is currently re-training to be a high school Religious Studies/Philosophy teacher. He has formally debated the Abortion Law Reform Association of New Zealand’s Dr Zoe During and the New Zealand Association of Rationalist Humanist’s Dr Bill Cooke and his publications appear in international journals of philosophy and ethics. He writes for MandM and has nearly 15 years experience teaching, engaging and challenging secular culture both in New Zealand and internationally.