released 10/9/2026
In this previously unreleased conversation from 2014, theologian David Bentley Hart discusses what Western people — both Christians and atheists — understand by the terms God, transcendence, being, and reality in modernity. In explaining key themes in his book The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss (Yale University Press, 2014), Hart explores the impact of nominalism in theology and reductionism in scientific materialism in making belief in God appear less plausible. He also tackles: what it means that “God is Being”; the weaknesses of Anglo-American philosophy; the failure of imagination that makes many misunderstand transcendence; and the popularity of the New Atheists in spite of the movement’s “feeble discourse.” The last part of this conversation involves the “problem” (for naturalists) of consciousness. Hart argues that there is no way within purely materialistic paradigm to account for the subjective experience of consciousness. There is a “fittedness” between mind and being that indicates intelligence and intelligibility.
48 minutes
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