Andy Bannister and Randal talking atheism over a Bold Cup of Coffee

On Friday night I had the privilege of serving as the moderator in the second installment in the Taylor Seminary/Wahl Centre “Crucial Conversations” series. (The first installment was my dialogue with atheist Justin Schieber which you can watch here.)

This time the dialogue featured Christian apologist Andy Bannister and local Muslim Imam Sherif Ayoup discussing the similarities and differences between Christianity and Islam. The venue was packed with about 400 people as Andy and Imam Sherif shared their perspectives with eloquence and generosity. Over a couple hours the conversation covered everything from God to ISIS to salvation and heaven. Fortunately the evening was filmed and I’ll be making it available in the future.

The following morning Andy and I traveled up to Gateway Alliance Church in north Edmonton to visit my friend Drake De Long-Farmer of the website Bold Cup of Coffee. On their website Bold Cup promotes “Healthy and helpful dialogue in a world full of conflict and disagreement.” That mission captures my heartbeat in the subtitle of one of my books: “Dialogue in a world of loud voices and hardened opinions.” I have previously been on Bold Cup talking about apologetics and heaven. This time we recorded two episodes which will be featured both on Bold Cup and on my podcast. In the first I interviewed Andy on his 2015 book The Atheist Who Didn’t Exist. And in the second Drake joined us for a discussion of Islam.

Before letting Andy go, I forced him to record two more podcasts. On the first we focused in on the question of whether Muslims and Christians worship the same God. And on the second we addressed the topic of atheism, morality and meaning. That interview will be featured this week in The Tentative Apologist Podcast.

My thanks to Andy Bannister, Imam Sherif, Drake De-Long Farmer, and everybody else who made this busy but deeply enriching weekend possible.