Hitchens – God Is Not Great VII
In my extended review of Christopher Hitchens, “God Is Not Great,” we have finally reached chapter two. This is one of the problems with the Neo-atheists, as there are so many blatant errors and problems in their writings and with their arguments that even just picking out just some of the most obvious ones takes many posts. There were for example many more problems in Chapter one that I easily could have addressed, but I have decided to move one and will attempt to pick up the pace a bit with the hopes of one day finishing.
Hitchens begins this chapter asking why the belief in “infinitely benign and all-powerful creator” (pg 15) who watches over and cares for us, and who has prepared eternity for those who obey him, does not make believers happy? He goes on to state that, “religion does not, and in the long run cannot, be content with its own marvelous claims and sublime assurances. It must seek to interfere with the lives of nonbelievers, or heretics, or adherents of other faiths.” (pg 17) His prime example for this was Mother Teresa actions against a change in Irish Law to allow divorce.
To Hitchens and the other neo-atheists, no doubt this is a powerful and devastating indictment of religion. My reaction, on the other hand, is more along the lines of shaking my head and saying, so many errors, so little time.
Let’s start with Hitchens’ question about happiness. The simple fact is that believers are, as a general rule happier, as many polls have demonstrated. For example, an extensive survey of teenagers and young adults last year found that those who said that religion or spirituality was the most important thing in their lives were a third more likely to be happy than those for whom it was not important. So the premise of Hitchens argument is just false and the question we should be asking is why are so many of those who reject God unhappy? But I suspect the answer to this question would not support Hitchens as well.
Hitchens’ broader claim about interfering with the lives of nonbelievers is not so clear cut, though his prime example reveals some significant problems with his reasoning. Now it is certainly true, that Christians have at times interfered with the lives of non-believers. But this is not the black and white question implied by Hitchens.
While Hitchens points to negative examples of such interference to bolster his case, what about the positive examples? What about those Christians who felt compelled to interfere in the slave trade because they believed it to be immoral? What about those Christians today who feel compelled to interfere for the poor, the sick, and the persecuted around the world? Would the world really be a better place if Christians just closed their eyes to such suffering, as not any of their business? Would the world really be a better place if, instead of vigorously fighting to end the slave trade, William Wilberforce had adopted the secular motto of “who am I to judge”?
Just as Christians tend to be happier than atheists, numerous polls also show that Christians are more charitable as well. For example, the United States is not only more religious than Europe; it is the most charitable country in the world; and not only in total dollars, but in percentage of Gross National Product as well. In fact, the US gave more than twice as much as percentage of GNP than its closest competitor, England, and more than ten times than the far more secular France.
Even if you factor in Government “contributions,” in addition charitable giving by individuals, the US still gives nearly 50 percent more than England, and over twice as much as France. This difference between secular vs. religious giving continues within the United States as well, as states where religion is strong and important tend to out give the more secular states.
So while Hitchens bemoans interference, it is often good and to be commended rather than attacked. Even his example of Mother Teresa opposing a change in divorce law is problematic, though not surprising. I have frequently been told by secular opponents that my position on this or that political issue is invalid because it is “religious.” Carried to its logical conclusion such reasoning would make Christians and other people of faith second class citizens, whose very participation in the democratic process was suspect.
It would seem that for many secularists in democracy people are free to enact the social policies they want, just as long as those social policies cannot in any way be considered religious. Hitchens suggest that the Catholics could continue to follow their church’s teaching on divorce without “imposing them on all other citizens.” In other words, do what you want, but keep your religious noses out of social policy, that is for us secularist to determine based on what we think our reason tells us at any given moment.
Of course if the secularist were correct, one could just as easily ask why even have a Government policy on divorce or marriage at all. Just let everyone do whatever they want, for as soon as you have any policy at all, someone will not like it. While secularist I have talked to object to such counterarguments, when you look at the social trends and recent court rulings, that seems to be exactly where we are headed.
This is Elgin Hushbeck, asking you to Consider Christianity: a Faith Based on Fact.
Hitchens – God Is Not Great VI
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This week I return to my extended review of Christopher Hitchens, “God Is Not Great,” Hitchens concludes his first chapter, describing his father’s funeral where he spoke on Philippians 4:8
Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report: if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.
For Hitchens, this is a “Secular injunction” that shines “out from the wasteland of rant and complaint and nonsense and bullying which surrounds it.” (p 12)
The last part of Hitchens’ comment can only be seen as at best hyperbole. In fact, what immediately precede this passage are injunctions to: rejoice, be gracious, don’t worry, pray, and be thankful, though I guess that these were corrupted by the “rant” about prayer.
On the other side, what follows this supposedly “secular injunction” is an encouragement to not only think about these things, but to put them into practice.
Ultimately Hitchens comments make no sense. The immediate context does not support his description of a “wasteland of rant and complaint and nonsense and bullying,” nor does the broader context of the letter, the New Testament, or even the Bible as a whole. Such distorted hyperbole may be as red meat to his fellow atheists, to be uncritically swallowed, but it hardly supports his claim that he is representing the rational position.
His description of this as a secular injunction is likewise problematic. Why is this injunction secular? Is it because the word God does not appear in the passage? The context is certainly not secular. This injunction comes as at the conclusion of the letter, in the passage Paul is summing up what it means to live as true Christians.
As a side note, I can’t help but wonder if Christians down through the ages had really taken these words to heart, how different the writings of the neo-atheists would have been, as a great deal of their critiques involve Christians who did not live up to the teachings of Bible.
Still, there are two main problems with Hitchens claim that this is a secular injunction. The first is that some of these words lose their meaning apart from a context that involves God. Granted terms like true and honest have secular meanings, thought it is worth noting that as society has become increasingly secular both of these terms have suffered. For example, it now common among those strongly influenced by secularism to believe that truth is relative, and thus is different from person to person. There is no such thing as absolute truth.
Terms such as lovely and good report are even more problematic. It would be very difficult to claim that as society has become more secular it has become lovelier, or that it has even exulted the lovely. A survey of modern art would quickly show the opposite. In fact noted the historian Jacques Barzum summed up the last 500 years of the cultural life in Western Civilization in the title of his book as From Dawn To Decadence.
Finally, terms such as pure and virtue are inherently moral and thus require a moral context before they have any meaning at all. For example, pure in the context Paul meant is something vastly different that pure in a racial context. In fact I would argue, based on the teachings of the Bible that pure in a racial context is irrelevant and to advocate it is evil.
In short the injunction itself is meaningless unless given a context or framework in which these terms can be understood. Christians have a clear framework in which to understand this injunction. Secularism has no such clear framework. Secularists are free to fill in the blanks however they see fit. Most do this from the culture in which they live, which in Western cultures means one strongly influenced by Judeo-Christian values.
As such it is very possible that Hitchens and I would have a great deal of agreement as to what this injunction is saying, but where we agreed, it is not because I am adopting a secular framework, but rather because Hitchens views overlap those derived from the Bible.
But even if we assume that these terms had some universal meaning apart from Christianity, that would still not make this a secular injunction, for there is the problem why should it be enjoined. What is the secular imperative to embody these attributes? There isn’t any.
Sure a secular rational in favor could be constructed. But a secular rational against could likewise be constructed. This is because secularism itself is neutral. In fact in the context of evolution, the key imperative would be to survive, and so whenever lying or injustice served the aim of survival, then it should be done.
In the Christian context, truth and justice are attributes of God. Since we are created in his image, we should likewise embody these attributes. Not just when it serves our personal interest, but at all times. For as Paul said in the next verse,
Likewise, keep practicing these things: what you have learned, received, heard, and seen in me. Then the God of peace will be with you.
This is Elgin Hushbeck, asking you to Consider Christianity: a Faith Based on Fact
Rational Evil V
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This week I conclude my discussion of the development of secular thought following the holocaust by looking at one final disturbing trend. So far I have looked at how in the attempt to maintain a belief in Human Rights apart from a belief in God, equal in the eyes of God became merely equal; where the differences among people were equated or just ignored.
But Human rights was founded on another concept in addition to the belief that we are all equal in the eyes of God. It was also based on the belief that we are special creations of God, created in his image. To remove God from the definition of Human rights mean also tossing out the idea that people are special creations of God.
This was the most dangerous development for as we saw, the competing view is that rather than special creations of God, we are just animals that happen to have resulted from the undirected process of evolution. But if this is the case, why should humans have any rights at all?
This of course would bring us right back to the thinking of Social Darwinism and Eugenics, the very thinking that led to the holocaust in the first place. No, a concept of Rights had to be maintained. But if we are nothing more than animals that resulted from the process of evolution, how could a concept of rights be restricted just to us? Wouldn’t other animals have rights as well?
Thus was born the belief in animal rights. While most people are still shocked by PETA’s campaign likening eating meat to a “holocaust on your plate” it is merely the logical outgrowth of the attempt to maintain a concept of rights apart from God.
While, extending the concept of rights to animals may be a logical step, it does not really solve the problem, but rather creates many more. If animals do have rights, how do these rights come into play when the lion kills a gazelle? The normal answer is that the lion does not know any better, we do. But this has the effect of putting us below the animals, not equal to them. Animals are free to do whatever they do, but our actions must be constrained by a notion of rights.
In short animals and in a more general sense nature, over time came to be more valued than people. Worst still, since virtually anything we do has some effect we become a problem. In its most extreme form people rather than being a part of the environment came to be seen as a disease that must be controlled, or in some cases removed, as in the case of the Texas scientist who calls for the creation of a genetically engineered version of the ebola virus, that would kill 90% of the people on the earth, so as to lessen our damaging effect.
But these threats are not just theoretical. One of the key aspects of the Judeo-Christian worldview is that people, as special creations of God, are more valuable than animals. But in the new secular view people are less valuable, and for some even a problem. While rarely directly stated, it nevertheless works itself out in a myriad of ways.
For example, the major reason energy prices such as the cost of gas, heating oil, and electricity, are so high is because concerns for the environment restrict our ability develop energy. Most of these environment concerns make no sense apart from an absolutist view that people represent a danger to the planet and that anything we do would damage to environment, often despite clear evidence to the contrary.
Most of the real damage of this inversion of rights, are indirect and often do not appear until years later. Thus the limitation on oil drilling for the last several decades is only now beginning to have a real effect on the price of gas as the excess capacity that had existed in the system is now gone, and demand is beginning to exceed supply.
One of the clearest examples of the valuation of nature over people is also one of the earliest; the concern over insecticide DDT during the 1960s. During the 1960s it was alleged that DDT caused the shells of some birds to weaken making it difficult for them to reproduce. In order to protect these birds, DDT was ban. At the time of the ban it was pointed out that DDT was very important to controlling the spread of mosquitoes, which spread deadly diseases such as malaria. But these arguments had little effect; the birds were more important than the people, and had to be protected. After all, at the same time over population was also seen as a major problem.
It is now known that DDT was not the cause of the problems with birds, and in fact is really very safe. The effects of the ban are also clear. Diseases that had been virtually eliminated in places have now returned. Malaria alone kills between one and two million people a year. Yet despite the evidence to the contrary, for many a theoretical threat to the environment, is more important that the actual deaths of tens of millions and the ban remains in effect.
The first attempt to reconstruct society based on science rather than God, ended in the holocaust. The subsequent attempt of reconstruct a concept of rights apart from God has resulted in not only more pain and suffering, but millions of deaths. Just perhaps the real problem is the attempt to remove God.
This is Elgin Hushbeck, asking you to Consider Christianity: a Faith Based on Fact.
Rational Evil IV
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Over the last several weeks I have been looking at the development of secular thought following the holocaust, and how the attempt maintain human right apart from God has resulted in a number of competing and conflicting strategies.
These strategies produced a number of absurdities that if given any serious thought would quickly undermined the entire system and many did think seriously about this, and worse they pointed out these problems. These critics needed to be addressed.
The problem was that they could not be answered in the normal way. How can one rationally defend the belief that men and women are the same when they are so clearly different. How can one morally defend the belief that we really should not condemn the honor killing, i.e. the murder by her relatives of a woman because she was the victim of rape.
The simple answer is that you can’t. So rather than answer the arguments, those making them needed to be silenced. Anyone questioning the belief that men and women are different were called sexists. Anyone pointing out a negative aspect of other cultures were called bigoted.
While freedom of speech is still proclaimed a basic human right, and even defended in areas of vulgarity and sexuality, restrictions on speech have greatly increased in other areas. At first, labels such as sexist, racist, bigot, homophobe, etc, were enough to silence, or at least discredit those pointing out the problems with the new secular reasoning. But over time, the power of rational argument began to push past this first line of defense.
Simple labeling was not enough and stronger deterrents were needed. Starting with universities, supposedly bastions of free speech and intellectual inquiry, more formal limitations started appearing on what could be said and what could be researched.
These speech codes were challenged in the courts and many were struck down. But the need that spawned them remained, and so despite rulings such as Dambrot v. Central Michigan University and Corry v. Stanford speech codes did not go away, they were simply repackaged as anti-harassment policies.
In fact, according to Jon Gould, a law professor at George Mason University, “hate speech policies not only persist, but they have actually increased in number following a series of court decisions that ostensibly found many to be unconstitutional.”
Political Correctness was thus born in a series of formal and informal speech codes and training classes on anti-harassment and diversity; not only in specific classes but it also incorporated throughout the curriculum.
But such indoctrination in school from Kindergarten through College was still not enough. So the training was expanded into the business world. For example, in 2004 California passed a law that required employers to provide mandatory sexual harassment training. And of course to transgress these policies in the work place threatens one’s job and thus their livelihood.
By labeling these policies anti-harassment and diversity automatically gives them an air of respectability and masked the more questionable aspects. After all who supports harassment and who doesn’t support diversity? But the real question is what constitutes harassment and what is diversity? Everyone would agree that a boss demanding sex from an employee in order to keep their job is morally reprehensible and should be illegal. But what about acknowledging that men and women are different?
In a well publicized example in 2005 Larry Summers the president of Harvard University was addressing the question as to why more men seem to go into science and math than women. He suggested that one possible line of research could look at possible differences between men and women.
A fire storm of criticism erupted at this mere suggestion that men and women might be different, and this eventually led him to issue an apology. Even so, the faculty of arts and sciences issue a vote no-confidence, and his suggestion was a factor in his resignation the following year.
But even sanctions that can could threaten one’s job have not been enough to silence the rational arguments, so not too surprisingly the sanctions are being stepped up and the arguments them are being criminalized, as the Brigitte Bardot recent discovered when she was fined €15,000 by a French court because her comments on the ritual slaughter of animals in Islamic culture, “constituted a legal offense.”
In 2006 Mark Steyn published the bestselling book, America Alone in which he argues that in the cultural conflict between Western and Islamic civilization that Western Civilization is losing. When Steyn’s book was excerpted in MacLean’s Magazine the Canadian Islamic Congress claimed that article “subjected Canadian Muslims to hated and contempt” and as a result as I write this Steyn is awaiting a decision from the Vancouver Human Right Council. This is just one of many examples of such attempts to silence those who differ with the current views of diversity.
Thus, in the effort to preserve a view of Human Rights apart from God, the traditional view of Human Right has been turned on its head. Speech is suppressed. Freedom of Religion has been turn into separation of Church and State and the suppression of religion. Intellectual freedom has been restricted to lines of inquiry that are consider acceptable, and exclude things like Intelligent Design. Those who do not fall into line are not only shunned, but can lose their jobs, livelihoods, or be convicted and fined by the government. All in the name of Human Rights.
This is Elgin Hushbeck, asking you to Consider Christianity: a Faith Based on Fact.
Rational Evil III
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This week I continue my discussion of the development of secular thought following the holocaust. Last week I looked at how the foundation for Human Rights went from equal in the eyes of God to equal without any real definition as to how we are equal; and how for some equal then became the same, where any difference was to be denied; the example being the belief that men and women are the same. But there was a different and somewhat conflicting approach taken simultaneously: rather than deny any differences, differences were to be celebrated.
At first celebrating diversity might seem to be a somewhat problematic answer to the question of how we are equal. But at the core of the celebration of differences is the ideal that differences do not really matter, for all differences are fundamentally the same.
This idea of diversity has been so ingrained, that many might even be wondering how I could see this as a problem. The reasons are twofold. First, the idea that all differences are fundamentally equal is as untrue as the idea that differences do not exist, and both have led to a great deal of suffering and harm. Despite what the supporters of diversity preach, not all differences are equal. While some differences are irrelevant, many differences are significant.
When it comes to food, I think the celebration of differences is a good thing, though even here there would be some significant differences in food, at least in regards to health. But some difference, be they individual or cultural are not only significant, but some are clearly better than others, particularly when it comes to differences that touch on morality. While this may be heresy to those who support diversity, it remains nevertheless true and it is under the guise of cultural diversity that a lot of suffering and injustice is allowed continue.
For example, as I discussed last week, the belief that men and women are equal in the eyes of God is a Biblical truth taught in both the Old and New Testaments. As a result, I believe that cultures that follow this truth are better, at least in regards to their treatment of women, than societies that do not.
While this may seem a straight forward conclusion, for many strongly influenced by modern secular thought, it is one they find difficult to make. In order to maintain the notion of equality among differences, no judgment about those differences can be permitted. They may fight strongly for equality in their own country, but things that would otherwise be condemn such as the subjugation of women, dictatorship, and other forms of oppression in other countries often get little more that a response of “who are we to judge?”
Things that cannot be accepted, even under the guise of respecting cultural diversity, are frequently just ignored. Yet as cultures intermix, this becomes increasingly difficult. Honor killing is the ability or even duty of a father or brother to kill a woman who is believed to have brought dishonor to the family. The dishonor, need not even be through some act committed directly by the woman, as victims of rape are seen has have brought dishonor upon the family.
While common in ancient cultures, honor killings were forbidden by the Old Testament in the Laws given by Moses. As Judeo-Christian values came to dominate, honor killings disappeared from Western Civilization. Yet they remain a part Arab culture even today.
While largely ignored when it occurred elsewhere, with immigration, it is now becoming a growing problem in the Western Cultures such as the United States, Canada, and Europe, though here there is an attempt to downplay these honor killings as merely “domestic violence” lest it appear that Western Civilization is somehow better.
This attitude of ‘who are we to judge’ has been taught to our children, and unfortunately, it is a lesson that some have learned far too well. For example, in late 2007 when a teenager learned that his friend had just murdered several people at a mall in Omaha, he had no judgment about the lives taken. No judgment about the family and friends whose lives would never be the same because of the loss of a loved one. No judgment about the wounded or their pain and suffering. Instead he said, “I don’t think anything less of him… he wanted to go out in style.”
So in order to maintain equality among differences, one approach has been to celebrate differences without any judgment about them, which is fine when dealing with non-moral choices such as food. But when dealing with differences that have a moral component, it inevitable means ignoring pain and suffering, and in some cases even evil.
As Western Civilization has been casting off it Judeo-Christian roots, it would seem that it has also cast off the Bibles injunction; “Do not stand by while your brother’s blood is shed” (Leviticus 19:6), for we do now stand by, often in the name of cultural diversity.
This is Elgin Hushbeck, asking you to Consider Christianity: a Faith Based on Fact.
