Baldilocks gets a bit of dander up over Christopher Hitchens' predictable tirade against the life of Jerry Falwell.
What Hitchens forgets about the only faith-based religion he could be talking about--assuming he ever knew it--is that if faith were not the sole criterion to get into Heaven, then no one could go since no one is capable of not doing wrong whether accidentally or willfully.
Perhaps Hitchens does take this into account but, as many do, finds it easier to believe that there's nothing else but the physical world. Understandable. However, judging from his many tirades against religious persons, especially faith-based Christians, I suspect that Hitchens does believe in the existence of God. And hates His guts.
I've been watching Hitchens closely enough to know that he doesn't hate God, in fact I don't think Hitchens cares whether or not there is a God. And unlike more foolish folks like, Hitchens doesn't bother to try and disprove God's existence. Rather Hitchens is an historian, and a damned good one who has a remarkable memory and candor about man's inhumanity to man. Where Hitch goes off the deep end in when, based on such evidence of evil, religious leaders or followers claim divine inspiration.
Hitchens, I believe, like the most thoughtful philosophical readers of humanity is perplexed by the awesome silence of God. And like most atheists he is absolutely intolerant of the supernatural. This combination makes him fundamentally question the validity of revelation. He is very precise and logical about that condition. I remember enough of my symbolic logic to recall that accepting the truth of a false premise justifies everything. It is a sufficient condition to doubt the truth of claimed revelations which justify any sin or barbarity. One needn't go all the way to God. Logically, one could argue that 99.9% of humans throughout history have been false prophets without denying the existence of God. This would put you exactly in Hitchens shoes as an extreme skeptic.
What Hitchens does not do is go out of his way to denounce spirituality or to hubristically spit in the face of blameless holy men. I doubt you'll find him saying much against the works and deeds of MLK. And it is in that regard that Hitchens is useful completely outside of any religious influence. For if there was ever any unanimity of religious opinion we would be doing our duty to challenge their conclusions a great disservice without a neutral or dissenting party.
From my perspective, I find it a revelation accepted on faith and reason that God created in man a fully developed sense of morality. The tree of knowledge let us know our nakedness and the meaning of our sins. It's not remote controlled. It's a feature of our design. It is a feature of Hitchens' design as well, one he has nourished as we all should. I cannot imagine that Falwell has lived a blameless life, and I don't think that just because he, or anyone, is dead, that they should escape criticism. He was 73 and his death was not some great tragedy, probably less so than MLK's eldest daughter who also died this week at the age of 51. We are right to respectfully debate the political contributions of such people, and I'm not sure that the basis upon which Hitchens would judge Falwell merit the outrage I'm hearing.
Apparently Dobson on Hugh Hweitt's show today was very upset that Hitchens called Falwell a 'toad'. Oh horrors.
Tangentially, yesterday Dennis Prager, who is stumping for Giuliani against the putative conservative majority on the issue of abortion sat for an hour trying to reason with the leader of the Southern Baptist Convention. It may well have been Rush Limbaugh who also weighed in on the matter. But this leader suggested very forthrightly that Giuliani would not have his vote if it came down to a choice between him and Hilary Clinton because of Giuliani's position on abortion. My sympathies are with Dennis Prager who is trying to talk sense into Republicans who are having such a difficulty.
But this only illustrates a sentiment that I think has gained legitimacy through the success of the electoral machinations of Karl Rove. I continue to believe that the very notion that the soul of the Republican party is what Hitchens appropriately calls 'Christianist' evangelicals is a myth. That 2% (or whatever) of the American electorate has been motivated to swing the Right way and that may be the critical difference in many states, but don't mistake a swing minority for a core majority.
I do not know how much credit to give Falwell for politicizing evangelical Christianity. Nor do I know exactly how much credit to give political evangelical Christianity for energizing conservatism. But it's clear that conservatism has made Republicans the majority party. Surely Richard Vigeury and Ralph Reed had something to do with it. Surely Newt Gingrich and Lee Atwater had something to do with it. Surely Thomas Sowell and Alan Keyes had something to do with it. Surely Colin Powell and Condi Rice had something to do with it. Surely Richard Sciafe and Rush Limbaugh had something to do with it. Surely Tom DeLay and Trent Lott had something to do with it. Surely Ronald Reagan and Ross Perot had something to do with it. I could go on. My point is all of these folks are not of a piece and they don't all pray the way Falwell did or Hitchens might believe them to.
Despite all of the noise, the principles of Conservatism do not originate whole cloth out of Christianity, evangelical Christianity or Falwell's brand of evangelical Christianity. The more political defense I hear of Falwell, the more annoyed I become.
Oh. And a 'Christianist' is one who thinks politically the way his church tells him God would have him think politically. That is one who is more likely to ask what would my Bishop say, rather than what does the Constitution say. I've mentioned my beef before.
At any rate, there is no question in my mind that Hitchens' irreverence is a net benefit to Western Civ, because despite his pet peeves, even Sharpton could see that Hichens is not on about God so much as he is about false prophets and evil deeds done on the basis of dicey revelation.
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