Confidence in Life

Matthew Lee Anderson is Assistant Professor in the Honors College at Baylor University, USA.

• IntroductionChapter One: (Procreative) Neutrality is Not EnoughChapter Two: Parenthood and Procreative Bonds Chapter Three: The “Gift of Life”: Luck, the Involuntary, and Procreative AgencyChapter Four: Neither Optimism nor Pessimism: Karl Barth Among the Moral PhilosophersChapter Five: Birth Between the Times: Procreation in the Doctrine of CreationChapter Six: Respect for Life as a Reason to CreateChapter Seven: Mary and the Eschatological Confirmation of Procreative BondsChapter Eight: Honour, Agency, and Reasons to ProcreateConclusion:The Meaning of Procreative FideismBibliographyIndex

In the face of the threats of climate change, population growth, and mass migration, the issue of whether to have children, and why, is rising in salience not only in academic philosophy, but also in wider popular discourse. In his book Matthew Anderson brings a searching intelligence, analytical tenacity, lucid thinking, and a lively pen to the task of working out a thoroughly theological response to the question, and one that counters ‘procreative pessimism’ with Christian hope. This is a work of unusually high intellectual caliber.