John Hare to deliver ‘Can we be good without God?’ lecture

	John Hare

John E. Hare, a professor at the Yale Divinity School, will present a lecture entitled “Can we be good without God?” as part of the Richard O. and Cindy F. Connell Lecture Series. The lecture, which is free and open to the public, will take place on Tuesday, March 24 at 8 p.m. in Sinclair Auditorium.
Hare, the Noah Porter Professor of Philosophical Theology at the Yale Divinity School, is the author of The Moral Gap for which he received the Institute of Advanced Christian Studies Book Prize. The book develops an account of the need for God’s assistance in meeting the moral demand of which God is the source.
“Professor Hare's work explores the relationship between morality and God,” says Ben Wright, professor and chair of religion studies. “Many people take it as a given that human beings ought to act morally, but Professor Hare asks why we should be good or act morally. Moreover if we determine that we should act morally, can we?”
Hare’s other works include God's Call which discusses the divine command theory of morality, analyzing texts in Duns Scotus, Kant and contemporary moral theory, as well as Why Bother Being Good?, in which Hare gives a non-technical treatment of the questions, 'Can we be morally good?' and 'Why should we be morally good?'
The visit will be a homecoming of sorts for Hare, a member of Lehigh's philosophy department from 1974 until 1987.
The lecture was endowed by Richard '62 and Cindy Connell in 2005 to support an annual lecture that would focus on Evangelicalism and Contemporary Affairs. Past lecturers have been Alvin Plantinga from the University of Notre Dame in 2006, and Randall Balmer of Columbia University in 2007.
--Tricia Long