What Hitchens Has Learned about Religion... or Religious People

Melinda Penner:

Christopher Hitchens reveals what he's learned from his engagements with religious believers over the last couple of years since the release of his book god Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything.

I haven't yet run into an argument that has made me want to change my mind. After all, a believing religious person, however brilliant or however good in debate, is compelled to stick fairly closely to a "script" that is known in advance, and known to me, too. However, I have discovered that the so-called Christian right is much less monolithic, and very much more polite and hospitable, than I would once have thought, or than most liberals believe. I haven't been asked to Bob Jones University yet, but I have been invited to Jerry Falwell's old Liberty University campus in Virginia, even though we haven't yet agreed on the terms.

Wilson isn't one of those evasive Christians who mumble apologetically about how some of the Bible stories are really just "metaphors." He is willing to maintain very staunchly that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ and that his sacrifice redeems our state of sin, which in turn is the outcome of our rebellion against God. He doesn't waffle when asked why God allows so much evil and suffering—of course he "allows" it since it is the inescapable state of rebellious sinners. I much prefer this sincerity to the vague and Python-esque witterings of the interfaith and ecumenical groups who barely respect their own traditions and who look upon faith as just another word for community organizing....

It sounds like he really has learned some things about Christians that gives him new respect (grudgingly?) that he didn't know in advance and has a more favorable view toward the people, if not their convictions.

The comment about the predictability of the "script" surprises me a bit. That may be so, but after reading and hearing Hitchens on numerous occasions, he's very predictable, too. His book really didn't have anything new or fresh other than attitude, sticking to the familiar atheist "script." In the debate this past spring at Biola University with William Lane Craig, Hitchens was completely predictable and even conceded some of his time back because he said he would only repeat himself. He seems to imply that predictability is a weakness, no fresh intellectual or rational meat, but I think it's at least as true for his own arguments.

I'm a bit confused by his comments about Calvinists being reluctant to tell him he's going to Hell. First, that's not only a Calvinist doctrine. Second, he leaps to the conclusion that the reluctance is a lack of conviction with the doctrines. That is a possibility. Christians are too unfamiliar with their own theology and reasons for it these days. But that doesn't mean they don't believe it. It could be they're uncomfortable being that direct face to face as to tell him he's damned. Some Christians might be unable to explain the doctrines they believe or are too unfamiliar with them to debate them. And he could be right in some cases. But Hitchens is too quick to presume Christians really don't believe what they say.

In any case, this is a good reminder that Christians need to be taught Christianity. It is a religion, not only a relationship. And the way we learn Who we're in a relationship with is through theology - the knowledge of God.

Finally, Hitchens celebrates the acquired confidence secularists/atheists are gaining. They may be gaining a new attitude, but polls don't show they are gaining in numbers. (Skip the headline of this poll and read the details: "The percentage of atheist Nones — who say there's no such thing as God — hasn't budged in years.")

Hitchens seems to think that the new atheist challenges have generated a new "need to give an account of themselves." That has always been the case for Christians for 2000 years. It may be a new thing for other religions, I don't know. I think it is new for atheists to give an account for their beliefs. Plenty of Christians have been interested in engagement, but found no one to engage them. Hitchens is right - the new dialog taking place is a good thing.

And so is our pluralistic society that values and tolerates differences of opinion.

This is a wholly good development, and it is part of the pluralism and polycentrism that distinguish the sort of society that we have to defend against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

I'm a little confused, though, because Hitchens' case in his book is for "how religion poisons everything" and is literally bad for society. He seems to make a case in his book for ridding religion from society so that human beings can be truly enlightened. That would create a monolith rather than pluralism. Perhaps he values the current pluralism that allows for the debate that will eventually rid the human race of religion and naturally lead to the univocal view of atheism.

At any rate, it sounds like Hitchens is enjoying the engagement and learning something new about religious people, particularly Christians. Perhaps he'll learn much more before he's done.