My favorite author, Philip Yancey, wrote a book that some of you may be interested in if you want to read up about this. It's "Reaching For The Invisible God". More info at www.philipyancey.com (Only one L in Philip). It's very good.

"Rumors Of Another World" (www.rumorsofanotherworld.com) is his latest book and is very good as well, but I liked "Reaching…" more.

His best book I think is "What's So Amazing About Grace?" (Not the gold colored pamphlet you see on the site, the book) It's not on this subject, but very close.

On his web site, some books have a "Product Excerpt" or a "Take A Closer Look" link if you'd like to read some of them. All of those are good excerpts.

>On Religion
>
>1. God
>
>It is quite well understood that there is a difference between the laws of
>physics as we know them, and the laws of physics as they truly are.
>
>For example, we once thought that there was something called "the force of
>gravity", but a man named Einstein convinced us that gravity isn't actually
>a force. Instead, the space and time that objects move around in is warped,
>and the curved paths that objects travel along is really what we once
>considered to be the force of gravity. Whether this will be our final notion
>of gravity or not remains to be seen, though if history is any indication it
>is quite unlikely.
>
>What is important about this realization is that there is nothing about our
>understanding of the laws of physics that should be taken as being equal to
>the true construction of our nature. It should not be unexpected that
>concepts that we take for granted, such as energy, or time, may one day be
>thrown away and completely replaced in our attempts to decipher the world
>about us.
>
>It seems reasonable then that we should make a clear distinction between the
>unknowable construction of nature and the conjectured laws that exist as
>scientific knowledge. We can do this in the most simplest of ways: give them
>different names.
>
>The man-made laws, theories, hypotheses, and assumptions may as well retain
>their current names. We understand a theory to be a hypothesis, the product
>of imagination, that has been accepted as quite good by a community of
>knowledge seekers; there is no reason to redesign the scientific method and
>its system of terms.
>
>That leaves the true design and makeup of Nature that is inaccessible to us.
>What name shall we give such an elusive entity? I suggest God.
>
>We accept God as the governor of all natural things, and we accept that God
>is unknowable to us.
>
>As we can say nothing further about God, by definition of this term, we
>shall say nothing further about God and move on.
>
>2. Afterlife
>
>I have recently been told the story of a successful lawyer, a man with many
>great conquests to speak of. This man also claims to have no beliefs in the
>supernatural.
>
>In his retirement speech, after decades of achieving much for himself, he
>has revealed his final desire to be remembered for morality and compassion.
>
>To some it seemed odd, that a man who once denied the thought of passing
>into an afterlife where he would be judged by a creator, has now professed
>regret that he be remembered for a life devoted to his own worldly triumphs.
>
>But, how peculiar is that really? Does not the memory of our lives live on
>in the hearts and minds of those we've left behind after our deaths? Does
>not our life take on a new form, as its judgment by others, once our
>conscious being has ceased to exist?
>
>Just as a theist lives an entire life following a moral code in order to
>gain the acceptance of a gate keeper to a divine plane of existence, is it
>not reasonable to suggest that all men and women face the acceptance of
>their fellow human beings based on the virtues of the life that has come to
>an end?
>
>In this way we all face an afterlife that is determined by the decisions we
>make during the trials and tribulations of our natural lives.
>
>3. The Soul
>
>I have come to believe that what many religious beliefs designate as the
>soul is rather more accurately understood as consciousness. In order to
>wholly understand my belief you must completely understand my ideas about
>consciousness. Those ideas are rather lengthy and difficult to understand
>and will not be mentioned here, instead you will have to read and understand
>the Multiple Natures Conjecture. However, I will simply say here that the
>soul as consciousness in my view retains the theistic property of serving as
>the link between a natural existence and a deeper, supreme existence.
>
>4. Conclusion
>
>Some would argue that this discourse On Religion is incomplete; I have not
>mentioned morality or the purpose and meaning of our lives. However I do not
>agree that these important discussions fall exclusively in the domain of
>religion and thus are covered elsewhere.
>
>I think the topics I have discussed are primarily of interest to religion
>and that my arguments give an adequate defense of my chosen world-view of
>deism.