This is a tricky book to review. It isn't really a work of apologetics-- thus the "Believer" part of the title. But it isn't really a work of devotion either, because devotion assumes the truths of faith, and there's that "Skeptical" in the title. It isn't making a well-defined argument, per se, because one central thesis of The Skeptical Believer-- so far as it can even be said to have one-- seems to be that arguments are less relevant to day-to-day belief than stories are. But it doesn't seem

This is a tricky book to review. It isn't really a work of apologetics-- thus the "Believer" part of the title. But it isn't really a work of devotion either, because devotion assumes the truths of faith, and there's that "Skeptical" in the title. It isn't making a well-defined argument, per se, because one central thesis of The Skeptical Believer-- so far as it can even be said to have one-- seems to be that arguments are less relevant to day-to-day belief than stories are. But it doesn't seem to be a unified story either-- it's broken up into a series of short and more or less independent reflections. Reflections on what? Taylor never says exactly, but I would roughly state the topic as "the life of faith as story rather than argument".



This can all be a bit frustrating at times, especially for the book's intended audience-- Christian believers (including Taylor and myself) who like to be rational / skeptical / argumentative and are bothered by having an "Inner Atheist" who likes to attack faith from that perspective. Taylor's answer-- though it's a little misleading to even call it an answer-- asks us to give up this focus on rationality. Not in the sense of ceasing to be skeptical, or in the sense of ceasing to believe that Christianity is logically true, but simply in the sense of not making it the basis for one's spiritual life. In the place of argument, Taylor proposes story as a foundation. This is annoyingly (perhaps intentionally) vague, but it seems to entail a shift from "conclusion" to "choice" as the mover of faith, and from understanding to imagination or empathy as its dominant mode of thought.



This is asking a lot of a Skeptical Believer, and what really makes the book work is how Taylor shows-- not describes-- how it works from his own perspective. This book really clicked when I stopped trying to read it as a series of claims and started thinking of it more like a face-to-face conversation with the author. He's an older guy who has seen a lot of life and faith, and his writing style is wonderfully conversational (if a tiny bit stilted and awkward in spots). One striking feature of the book is the peppering of parenthetical interjections from Taylor's "Inner Atheist", which Taylor-- in a good demonstration of his approach-- usually opts to move past rather than refute.



I read this book in small doses over a long period of time, which seems like how it's meant to be read. Those looking for striking insights or bold claims should look elsewhere; it's more like the book is teaching a particular way of thinking about (and, eventually, living) one's faith. I also wouldn't recommend it to anyone besides the intended audience: Christians, including "former"/"maybe"/"sort-of" Christians, who feel left out by all this talk of faith and who see skepticism as an obstacle to their spiritual life. But for those who fit that description, this book is capable of seriously changing the way you think about belief.