I've been reading this exchange between Doug Wilson and Christopher Hitchens over at Christianity Today's Magazine.
These men have been involved in a debate entitled "Is Christianity Good for the World?". This is the final installment.
What I find fascinating is that while Wilson is engaging Hitchens in the subject and is actually asking some valid questions, Hitches seems to dismiss them without ever answering them. How is that a debate?
Hitchens' mind is so closed. He seems to have no intention of considering what Wilson is saying could be true. It seems to me that he has been making an effort to build his soapbox bigger than Wilson's so he can keep talking over his head without ever answering the questions at hand.
His effort can best be summed up in one word: monologue. It is like he is having an argument with himself.
Read Wilson's last word:
You say that you cannot believe that Christ's death on the Cross was salvation for the world because the idea is absurd. I have shown in various ways that absurdity has not been a disqualifier for any number of your current beliefs. You praise reason to the heights, yet will not give reasons for your strident and inflexible moral judgments, or why you have arbitrarily dubbed certain chemical processes "rational argument." That's absurd right now, and yet there you are, holding it.With Hitchens having his book on the NY Times bestseller list, which means that many of our neighbors would be reading it, we should be prepared with a response to his argument. Personally, I think that Hitchens is closer to God now than he thinks he is. Who knows what God has in store for him?
So for you to refuse to accept Christ because it is absurd is like a man at one end of the pool refusing to move to the other end because he might get wet. Given your premises, you will have to come up with a different reason for rejecting Christ as you do.
But for you to make this move would reveal the two fundamental tenets of true atheism. One: There is no God. Two: I hate Him.
