Doesn’t anybody notice this? I feel like I’m taking crazy pills!
That’s how Mugatu, played by Will Ferrell, felt about Derek Zoolander’s looks in the the 2001 movie Zoolander. When I read some of the things that atheists write I feel the same way. The truth looks so obvious, but it is somehow missed in almost every case.
Take, for instance, atheist Christopher Hitchens’ appearance on Hannity and Colmes to discuss Dr. Jerry Falwell’s death:
I saw this on TV live when it aired and, although Hannity did not do the best job himself, it was clear that Hitchens had absolutely no idea what he was talking about regarding the beliefs of Christians and resorted to simply flinging unfounded insults and unschooled misunderstandings. Yet, if you browse around atheist blogs the opinion is that Hitchens won. If people really believe this, either they are taking crazy pills or I am. I must give Hitchens the benefit of the doubt, though, and assume that if he actually tried to understand the views of Christianity, then he would come to an intelligent opinion.
Now, on washingtonpost.com, Hitchens has once again displayed his ignorance by writing the following:
Here is my challenge. Let Gerson name one ethical statement made, or one ethical action performed, by a believer that could not have been uttered or done by a nonbeliever. And here is my second challenge. Can any reader of this column think of a wicked statement made, or an evil action performed, precisely because of religious faith? The second question is easy to answer, is it not? The first — I have been asking it for some time — awaits a convincing reply.
I’m not sure what Hitchens means by a “convincing reply,” but I don’t think his questions accomplish what he wants them to. The main Christian argument regarding the nature of morality is not that non-Christians have no ability to be moral, but they have no logical reason to be moral.
To answer the second, yes, some Christians have done terrible things just as some non-Christians have. This proves nothing. But how do we know that these actions are either moral or immoral? We know this because there has to be a source of morality outside of us. Evolution can’t explain it. If the main morality was a “survival of the fittest” attitude, then it should be right for me to rob my neighbors. Yet we all know this is wrong. My question for Hitchens is why? My answer is that morality was given to us by God. What is Hitchens’ reason for the existence of morality? He has obviously judged the late Dr. Falwell by some measuring stick.
My name is Richard Smolenski and I am a theologian in training. I have an M.A. in Christian Apologetics from
Why must morality be dictated to you? And why does morality have to be “outside us”? In other words, morality is undiscoverable and must be dictated. Religion is an absurd act of willful servility and it degrades the human condition to begging for special favors from an entity that there is no evidence. I know, because I was a christian for 28 years.
Eric
I’m so sorry that you lived 28 years of your life as a Christian and found no evidence that God existed. Something was definitely missing. From your own statement about religion, I would not hestitate to say that religion was all you had. Perhaps someone forgot to tell you that religion is NOT the same as Christianity. Try a relationship with Jesus Christ. Leave the religious people and their religious “stuff” out of the picture. Then, you will get the evidence you so unfortunately missed out on the first time around. I know this, because I lived this! Relationship with God = Revelation from God. Religion = nothing.
You might try reading the book of Galatians.
Carpenterites,
You seem to think that the forces of evil need to be rational. We do not. We simply need to be present in whatever form is currently marketable, and we will skim off some of the crud from the bottom of the bowl. For as my old friend Screwtape always notes, Humans are so easily distracted and will believe anything.
Always nice to meet an opponent. Do stay in touch.
Bweaselgub