Your Truth, My Truth

We have all heard some variation of the phrase, "That may be true for you but not for me." We may hear it coming from multiculturalists, pro-choice advocates and members of other ideologically driven movements. Its use, however, is not limited to such circles. It has been adopted by the public at large and become perhaps the central moral principle of our age. The underlying philosophy beneath such ethical rhetoric is known as postmodernism.

Early modern philosophers differed from previous Christian thinkers in that they did not believe in revelation or an afterlife. These moderns shared a confidence in modern science to discover the truth, or at least verifiable certainty, about the natural and political world. Postmodern thinkers, on the other hand, replaced the professed objectivity of the moderns with radical subjectivity: truth is not discovered, but created. In short, postmodernism does not offer a new method of finding universal truths, but rather dismisses them altogether. How should we respond to the claims of postmodernism?

—Leadership University Editor/Webmaster, Byron Barlowe

Feature Articles:

There is Truth, After All
Reality Breaks In on the Postmodernists
Gene Edward Veith
Did President Clinton's defense of his testimony in the Lewinsky matter employ postmodern modes of interpretation?

The Breakdown of Religious Knowledge
Todd Kappelman
The author describes the characteristics of premodern, modern and postmodern thought.

Escape from Nihilism
J. Budziszewski
Nihilism is a close relative, if not identical twin, of postmodernism. A professor describes his release from this destructive intellectual trap.

Postmodern Philosophy/Culture:

How Do You Spell Truth?
Don Closson
This article describes both modern and postmodern views on truth. He then presents what Christian teaching means by Truth.

After Modernity, What?
Wilfred M. McClay
This is a book review of "Postmodern Times: A Christian Guide to Contemporary Thought and Culture" by Gene Edward Veith, Jr.

Christians and Postmoderns
J. Bottum
The origin and development of postmodern thought is traced through the ideas of different philosophers over the centuries.

Defeating Postmodernism:

Preaching As Though We Had Enemies
Stanley Hauerwas
Should Christians employ modern assumptions in order to attack postmodernism?

Reaching Youth Today
Josh McDowell
How does one minister to the postmodern generation?

Reclaiming Natural Law
Dean C. Curry
A review of two recent books on the natural law tradition, a philosophical alternative to both modernism and postmodernism.

Richard Rorty and the Postmodern Rejection of Absolute Truth
Dean Geuras
What should the Christian response to postmodernism be? Will postmodern theory simply fall apart on its own?

Real Issue cover
Real Issue, March 1998
Includes the following:
The Postmodern Puzzle
Dennis McCallum
When Worldviews Collide
Armand Nicholi
Discerning and Defining the Essentials of Postmodernism
Stan Wallace
Why Care About Ideas?
Jim Cook

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Updated: 14 August 2006