Order this book from Amazon.com Mere Christianity C.S. Lewis New York, New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc., 1943 Recommended by: Francis S. Collins, M.D. Perhaps the books that have changed my life most profoundly are a couple of books written by the Oxford scholar, C.S. Lewis. Not about science actually, but about faith. When I was 27 I was a medical intern; I was a pretty obnoxious atheist at that point. I began to realize that while in other parts of my life I didn't make decisions without accumulating data and then looking at it, I hadn't really done that when it came to this very important decision: "Do you believe in God, or not?" Because I had no real grounding for that, I discovered in college that I couldn't debate those who said faith was just a superstitious carry-over from the past and we've gone beyond that. I assumed that must be right, and I promoted that same view. At 27, particularly as a medical intern, watching so many tumultuous things happening around me -- young people dying for terrible reasons that shouldn't have come to pass -- you can't avoid noticing that there are some pretty scary questions that don't seem to have answers. I decided I'd better resolve this. Somebody pointed me towards C.S. Lewis's little book called Mere Christianity, which took all of my arguments that I thought were so air-tight -- about faith being just irrational -- and proved them totally full of holes. About the Book The British scholar's celebrated and plain-spoken defense of the essential principles of the Christian religion. In this book I am not trying to convert anyone to my own position. Ever since I became a Christian I have thought that the best, perhaps the only service I could do for my unbelieving neighbors was to explain and defend the belief that has been common to nearly all Christians at all times.