Article: Reaching Those Who Are Disinterested by J. Warner Wallace

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Sometimes it is difficult to persuade fellow Christians of the importance of apologetics.  I myself have had to make an "apologetic" for the discipline of apologetics to believers.  In the past, I have even given a talk entitled, "The Case for Apologetics."

In this featured article, author and speaker J. Warner Wallace gives some tips on how to get those who are disinterested in Christian case-making interested.

You can check it out here.

Courage and Godspeed,
Chad

Comments

John B. Moore said…
I guess you mean "uninterested." Almost nobody is disinterested in the field of religion.
December 1, 2013 at 7:56 PM
Chad said…
Hello John,

I hope all is well with you and yours. Would you care to elaborate on your above comment?

Respectfully
December 2, 2013 at 9:21 PM
John B. Moore said…
I think the J Warner Wallace piece was about how some people are uninterested in religion. In other words, they're not excited about it.

Disinterested means having no opinion. I think most people have an opinion about religion. Even if they're uninterested, they still have a pretty firm opinion that they can explain if someone insists.
December 3, 2013 at 12:02 AM
Chad said…
Thank you John. Actually, if you look up the word "disinterested" it means "having no desire to know about a particular thing : not interested." This makes complete sense when one considers what Jim was dealing with in the article. He was addressing the problem of Christians who seem "not interested" in making a case for what they believe and/or learning apologetics. I have run into this myself.

They are certainly not disinterested in their religion, but are surely disinterested in taking the time to learn about the arguments and evidence used to defend it.

Respectfully
December 3, 2013 at 6:20 PM
John B. Moore said…
So you're saying disinterested means the same as uninterested?

I'm suddenly quite interested in this little vocabulary dispute we're having. Maybe I'm misreading the various explanations I saw online.

December 3, 2013 at 9:05 PM
Chad said…
Hello again John,

Thank you for the comment and the link.

I was using the word “disinterested” in the same sense that Jim used it in his article. When one looks at the way the Online Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary defines the words “disinterested” and “uninterested” it is as follows:

1. uninterested- not wanting to learn more about something or become involved in something: not interested

2. disinterested- having no desire to know about a particular thing: not interested

I believe this is how Jim was using the words.

However, as your link demonstrates and the Merriam Webster’s Dictionary explains here, these two words have a “tangled history” [see the section title "usage discussion of DISINTERESTED"] and the above definitions do not seem to be precise enough to honor their original definitions. This is worth noting and I appreciate you pointing it out; however, I don’t think it calls into question any of the points made by Jim in the article.

Thanks for the opportunity to learn John and I hope all is well in Tokyo!

Respectfully
December 3, 2013 at 10:54 PM
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