Peter Bolland

Another of the British Empiricists, Scottish philosopher David Hume (1711–1776) took Locke’s work to its logical conclusion and shocked the philosophical world in the process. Known as skepticism, Hume’s philosophy openly questioned the existence of God, a radical stance in the early 18th century. Under Hume’s scalpel, no sacred cow was safe—not science, not reason, not theology, not even the existence of the soul. Join us for an inquiry into the brilliant, beloved, and unorthodox mind of David Hume.

Preeminent among the British Empiricists, John Locke (1632-1704) offered a bracing alternative to the earlier rationalist philosophy of Descartes, Leibniz, and Spinoza. Unlike rationalism which argued that knowledge was best built on a foundation of innate or priori ideas, Locke argued that empirical or sense experience was our sole means of apprehending the world—all of the ideas in our head were a posteriori, or built on perception of the external world. Furthermore, and probably more germane to our everyday lives, Locke famously championed the idea of natural rights, including the right to private property—a notion that would transform the world. Join us for this inquiry into the influential philosophy of John Locke.

I'll be guest-preaching at both the 8:00 A.M. and 10:30 A.M. services. Attend live or watch live, or after the fact, on the cathedral's YouTube channel. Click here for more information: https://stpaulcathedral.org/