In this paper, I reformulate Sterba's argument from evil and consider the various ways theists might respond to it. There are two basic families of responses. On the one hand, theists can deny that God, as a perfect being, needs to act in accordance with Sterba's moral evil prevention requirements (MEPRs). We can call these responses exceptionalist responses. On the other hand, the theist can deny that God's acting in accordance with the MEPRs would imply an absence of significant and especially horrendous evil consequences of immoral actions in the world. We can call these responses compatibilist responses. I argue that the availability of both sorts of responses shows that Sterba's argument should not be taken as a logical argument from evil. A good God is logically possible. However, this does not show that Sterba's argument fails as an evidential argument from evil. In the second section, I argue that if we work within the framework of what Jonathan Kvanvig calls Creator Theology (CT), the force of Sterba's argument as an evidential argument is greatly weakened.

In this article, I respond to Stephen Law's evil god challenge (EGC) to traditional theism. I argue that while there are credible a priori grounds for believing that the first cause is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-good, there are no credible a priori grounds for believing that the first cause is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-evil. Because of this, theists have a reason for explaining away the a posteriori evidence against theism. The hypothetical evilist, on the other hand, does not. Thus, while the problem of the good makes it absurd to believe in evilism, the problem of evil does not make it absurd to believe in theism.

John Henry Newman starts the second half of the Grammar of Assent by laying out a "paradox," and he announces that the purpose of the following chapters of the book is to resolve it. Surprisingly, recent scholarship has tended not to question the nature of this paradox. In this paper, I argue that we should understand Newman's paradox to be a kind of skeptical paradox that arises when we accept "Lockean rationalism." I then show how Newman deals with the paradox. One of the upshots of this reading is that "naturalism" plays a smaller role in Newman's anti-skepticism than previous commentators have suggested. Another is that we should understand Newman to be a kind of infallibilist.

I argue that we can understand John Henry Newman as defending the Principle of Faith throughout the University Sermons. According to the Principle of Faith, belief in the Christian message is in itself a good act of the mind, and it has moral significance. I argue that Newman's developed account of faith and its relation to reason in Sermons 10 through 12 are designed to defend the Principle of Faith. Finally, I argue that we can understand Newman's defense of the Principle of Faith as a reaction against criticisms dating back to the English Deists.