I have had to revise my earlier statements about not going to the November 2012 academic conferences in Milwaukee on the grounds that when you are personally invited to participate in a panel discussion by Doug Geivett and Mike Austin at the Evangelical Philosophical Society (“EPS”) you do not say no 🙂

(If I said “no” I think Andrew would throw things at me and André Z would egg him on)

Matt has been invited to speak on the same panel too.

Here is what we know so far:

Mike and Doug co-edited a book entitled Being Good: Christian Virtues for Everyday Life.  At the EPS meeting in Milwaukee in November 2012 there will be a panel discussion in one of the sessions offering critical discussion of the book and it’s themes. Matt and I are now scheduled to be participants in that panel.

The panel will discuss different aspects of the book, such as, an analysis of a virtue in the book that a participant disagrees with by giving an extension of the book’s discussion of character in some way.

Matt was already going anyway as his paper on Singer and Infanticide got through the blind review process and was accepted.

I had thought I might not go as we in the process of radically changing how I earn money. I am about to swap my regular weekly income for a contract for services that will see me retain most of the money I make my firm but pay my own expenses (and still be supervised and under the umbrella of a firm as all baby-lawyers should be under the law). So this is both exciting as I will have more control over what I earn but it is also scary as there are no guarantees that I will earn consistently; imminent changes to how legal aid is to be paid make that even scarier. The theory is that in the long run I will make more than I was on my very low baby-lawyer income but it is yet to be tested. As I am the primary earner in our house there is a lot riding on this, including the extension to our mortgage to purchase this opportunity. Going to America is not a cheap exercise from New Zealand but we have providentially managed to find a way the last two years with a lot of help from our friends so I am going to stop worrying and focus on trusting in God to whom I am  grateful for this opportunity.

Tags:   Being Good: Christian Virtues for Everyday Life · Doug Geivett · Evangelical Philosophical Society · Mike Austin · Milwaukee5 Comments