Putting Philosophy back in the marketplace!
The Stoa is a pub philosophy group. We meet at the The Bohemian on the Sea Front in Deal, Kent, UK every 1st Wednesday of the month from 7.30pm to 9pm.
You don't have to have studied philosophy or do any preparatory reading—you just need an open and enquiring mind.
All welcome. Just bring your brains and some beer money!
You can contact us at: east.kent.stoa@gmail.com
or on Facebook
The Stoa is essentially a conversation and discussion group and NOT a lecture series, course or reading group. We put up some reading each month on the website but this is just for interest. Feel free to browse but don’t feel an obligation to read any of the stuff. Just come along to the topics that interest you. You don’t have to be prepared on any of the topics or to have studied philosophy before.
What's on at the Stoa...
Is this all there is?
Belief, Faith, Religion, and Spirituality
Wednesday 6 May 2026
7:30pm — 9:00pm at The Bohemian
I thought that in May we should tackle something a bit more contentious at the Stoa—Religion and Spirituality.
Some questions follow to provoke some thought. Hopefully, we will get a range of views, pro and con, to get us arguing!
We won’t cover all these questions so pick out the ones you feel are most pertinent. Or perhaps you can come up with some better ones.
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And here is a collection of aphorisms on Religion to provoke thought and discussion.
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Religions postulate another world beyond this one, which gives our everyday, mundane world meaning and purpose. Sometimes, supernatural beings such as gods and angels give us information about this normally, hidden, spiritual domain. Is this worldview still credible or just beyond belief? If we can’t any longer believe in the old ‘Three-tier’ universe (Heaven, Earth, Hell) does that leave us without meaning or purpose in a cold, impersonal universe? Alternatively, are there aspects of the old supernatural cosmology that we can still hang onto and use?
Can you be religious without religious experience, ie, experience of this other world?
Can you be ‘Spiritual But Not Religious’?
All religions record miracles of various kinds which are difficult for modern people to believe in. Are miracles and the supernatural integral parts of religion? Can you have a religion without supernaturalism?
Do you pray? Does prayer work?
What’s the difference between prayer and meditation?
We want to live beyond our death for three reasons:
We understandably fear the thought of our own non-existence.
We want justice to be done: we want compensation for our undeserved sufferings and losses in life and we want the guilty punished.
We want meet our loved ones again and continue our relationships with them.
But is any kind of life after death plausible?
Would you really want to live for ever and ever without end?
Will all non-believers be punished after death for their lack of belief—even if they couldn’t help their non-belief?
Can you have values and morality without religious faith?
Does religion make you happier?
Does religion make us better people—more compassionate and concerned for the welfare of our neighbours or as Christopher Hitchens says, does “religion poison everything”? Does it make us more tribal and aggressive?
Can you have a cohesive society without a religion that everyone can adhere to? Are there secular alternatives like Nationalism and Political ideologies that can play the same role as religion used to.
Is there a difference between faith and belief? Can you have one without the other? Faith as trust and commitment based on belief but not as a species of belief.
Or is faith just belief in things for which you have inadequate evidence or reasons?
If the universe was created by an Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omni-benevolent Father God, why do good people suffer?
Do you believe we live in a just universe? Do people who suffer tragically and unjustly somehow get compensation through a cosmic law which balances everything out in the end?
Are the stories we read in the various religions ‘true’ in a factual sense or can they be said to be ‘truthful’ in the literary sense? True our human condition and ‘true’ ethically? Can religion be accessible to us is we read it as symbolic and metaphorical? Or do we lose something if we take that approach?
How much of your religion is fictional?
Is science incompatible with religious faith?
Does science undermine our dignity as human beings, or undermine our values by turning us into mere objects in a meaningless universe? Does religion by contrast gives us meaning, purpose and dignity?
Do religion and science just cover different domains of human existence like Science and Art do? In fact should we interpret religion as belonging to the domain of art? (See NOMA—Non-Overlapping Magisteria)
Perennialism — Are all religions basically the same—various path all going up the same mountain?
Most religions offer us salvation or liberation from something. What do you think we need saving from? And what is the means of salvation: a divine saviour, enlightenment, personal improvement?
These are topics we've covered so far... Drop us a line to tell us what you'd like to talk about in future.