The popular atheist writer/blogger Greta Christina calls one of Hitchens’ ideas about religion a “terrible argument.”

You know that Christopher Hitchens is not a fan of religion. If you had any doubt you can read his best-selling book God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, watch him debate leading Christian and religious theologians (on one occasion four of them at a time) or read any of the numerous articles he’s written on the subject. Yet, despite his public outcry and comparison of religion to child abuse and labeling it a “menace to society” readers may be surprised to discover that he is actually indifferent to religion as long as it produces good behavior. Shocking I know. Furthermore he’s admitted that he’s not arguing “religion should or ever would die out in the world.”

In God is Not Great Hitchens describes a story of how a Muslim cab driver went to great lengths to return a large sum of money that his wife had left in his cab. When the the cab driver told him that it was his religious duty to return the money and refused a generous reward that Hitchens had offered it seems to have sparked a unique moment of shared humanity for Hitchens with a religious person. In response to the Muslim cab driver’s act of selfless service Hitchens makes a shocking admission, “And if all Muslims conducted themselves like the man who gave up more than a week’s salary in order to do the right thing, I could be quite indifferent to the weird exhortations of the Koran” (p. 188). Hitchens is essentially saying that as long as religion produces good behavior the strange and peculiar commandments, beliefs and ideas are not a problem. He could have said as he has said elsewhere that religion is not needed to do good or to know right from wrong. Or he could have acted on his statement, “I think religion should be treated with ridicule, hatred and contempt, and I claim that right.” But he didn’t. There was no ridicule for the cab driver. Instead, like many of us progressive religious people Hitchens demonstrated tolerance and a level of respect to this religious person and his beliefs.

In a curiously un-self-aware move a few weeks ago, Christopher Hitchens slammed President Obama’s handling of the unrest in North Africa as “pathetic” and “cynical” in a piece for Slate Magazine. Employing a facile (and – given how devoid of neutrality US Mideast policy often has been – a tad euphemistic) analogy to a fickle Swiss banker, he declares:

The Obama administration also behaves as if the weight of the United States in world affairs is approximately the same as that of Switzerland. We await developments. We urge caution, even restraint. We hope for the formation of an international consensus. And, just as there is something despicable about the way in which Swiss bankers change horses, so there is something contemptible about the way in which Washington has been affecting – and perhaps helping to bring about – American impotence. Except that, whereas at least the Swiss have the excuse of cynicism, American policy manages to be both cynical and naive.

He’s right, but I’m not sure he has the credibility to point this out. Much more importantly, nor do many in Washington these days, at least those inside the halls of power. It’s a charge only someone with a track record of at least mild dissent from the dreary, self-defeating status quo in US Mideast policy should dare to make.

This is a satirical response to “How to Write about the Gnu Atheists, a Guide” which is itself a satirical rebuttal to the way the new atheists have been characterized by critics. For the most part I agree with the points raised in the piece and hope religious critics of the new atheists will reflect on it. I am writing this piece to simply point out that the new atheists have over generalized and distorted religion in many of the same ways that critics of the new atheists have critiqued them. Thus, this is my satirical “guide” for new atheists who are critiquing religion and seeking the best methods for their approach.

How to Write about the Religulous

The first and most important thing to do when writing about the religulous is to conflate all religion with the belief in a supernatural god. By identifying all religion with an abusive and cruel “celestial dictator” it will ensure the maximum ability to attack and ridicule your target. It also provides the advantage of avoiding the complexity of various religious people who use the words God, sacred or divine but do not mean an omnipotent personal being or anything outside or above the laws of the universe. To help make your case you can borrow this line from popular anti-religious atheist blogger Greta Christina, “The thing that uniquely defines religion is belief in supernatural entities. Without that belief, it’s not religion.” Or this one from Christopher Hitchens (author of God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything), “To be religious is to be a theist.” Following this definition it’s crucial that you primarily focus on the Abrahamic faiths and ignore things like the Buddhist Churches of America (the oldest Buddhist group in the U.S.) Sure they meet on Sunday mornings, sing hymns, sit in pews, use sacred texts, send their children to Sunday school and listen to a reverend or minister. But they don’t believe in a supernatural god so they don’t really count and you can safely ignore them. It’s better to take the Buddhists off the “religion can be harmful radar” because a lot of liberal Westerners see Buddhists as pure, esoteric, spiritual and enlightened, so it’s best not to confuse these good people by including Buddhists among the religulous.

Perhaps like Sam Harris you do believe that Buddhism is a religion. If you agree you have two options. One is to ignore all the good things Buddhists have done and focus on the bad things: list all the wars Buddhists have fought or discuss abusive eastern gurus, for example. We explain how to do this below, but the key point is that the bad things are the result of the religion, the good things are not. This tactic works well with Christianity. If you can’t make it work with Buddhism your second option is to argue for the elimination of Buddhism as a religion as Harris does in the essay “Killing the Buddha.” But to do that you must make sure not to discuss the contents of any World Religion text as it might be confusing to introduce more atheist religions such as Taoism, Confucianism, Jainism and other strands of Buddhism. And at all costs avoid mention of Unitarian Universalism, a religion with 19% atheists and 30% agnostics.

Whatever you do, don’t admit that you can be an atheist without being anti-religious.

Christopher Hitchens’s book God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything is a lengthy and detailed description of what happens when religious people behave badly. And this apparent correlation between religion and bad behavior is perhaps one of the most common reasons cited by the new atheists as to why all religion should be abandoned. But does Hitchens really believe religion causes people to do bad things? As I illustrate his position is unclear.

An interview with Jian Ghomeshi on QTV reveals the double standard that Hitchens has about the cause/effect relationship of religion and human behavior.

Jian Ghomeshi: I think you would be hard pressed to find a religious person to claim that there’s never been any negative implications or violence or wicked deeds that have been done in the name of religion.

Hitchens: They say in the name of. It’s not in the name of. That’s their get out clause. You echo it yourself. It’s explicit; it’s part of the religion. The most celebrated action of the Abrahamic is the willingness of someone to gut and murder his own son because he thinks it will please God…It’s not in the name of. It’s in the word of God himself. The commandments and instructions. These are warrants for genocide, rape, slavery, infant mutilation and worse.

Hitchens has also stated, “Religion kills,” “is violent” and “has caused innumerable people not just to conduct themselves no better than others, but to award themselves permission to behave in ways that would make a brothel-keeper or an ethnic cleanser raise an eyebrow.” He has also said, “The evil things missionaries do are definitely done because of religion.” Hitchens tries to draw a direct correlation between the violent behavior of people and their religion. His book God is Not Great is mostly a chronicle of all of the horrendous things done by people who are religious. And he disagrees with Ghomeshi who says wicked deeds have been done in the name of religion. But if something is not done in the name of religion how else does it occur? According to Hitchens religion has the magical power to make people do things. But for Hitchens religion only has the power to make people do wicked things. Anything good done in the name of religion is strictly due to human nature and nothing else, “Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it.” After discussing some awful acts carried out by people who are religious Hitchens states, “At minimum this makes it impossible to argue that religion causes people to behave in a more kindly or civilized matter.” But in the same interview on QTv he states [emphasis added],

Jian Ghomeshi: Would you agree that there is anything in the world that that has been done in the name of religion that is positive?

Hitchens: Things done by Jimmy Carter are done by Jimmy Carter. If you’re telling me people wouldn’t help build affordable housing if they weren’t Baptist fundamentalists…

Cross-posted from Common Sense Religion

As one of the most prominent public voices resisting the culture of Christian and religious dominance Christopher Hitchens earns himself a comparison to the freedom fighter who nearly fifty years ago urged the civil rights movement to “stop singing and start swinging.” Responding to a culture of white supremacy, the vicious legacy of colonialism and the hypocrisy of American democracy Malcolm X became one of the strongest voices for black resistance and identity. For much of his life, before his break with the Nation of Islam and his shift toward racial inclusiveness he framed the race problem in an absolutist manner claiming that all white people are devils. He believed that white people could never do any good. Malcolm X publicly made his case by deconstructing the white mindset, analyzing the white power structure and describing the vicious history that has accompanied the Euro-American legacy. It was this fierce resistance against assimilation into white culture that set him apart from the strategy of integration pursued by Dr. King and many others. Despite their shift towards each other’s positions near the end of their lives it is still accurate to describe them as James Cone did: Malcolm X saw America as a nightmare while Dr. King saw it as a dream.

Christopher Hitchens is perhaps the most well known voice amongst the new atheists; Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Daniel Dennet. With books like The God Delusion, The End of Faith, and God is Not Great and with bold personalities they have a reputation for being fierce critics of all things religious. For them religion is most certainly a nightmare. But even amongst a group of vigilant, passionate and hardcore atheists, Hitchens stands out. Perhaps this is because of his prolific career as a journalist, author and popular media commentator on a variety of subjects. But he is also known for being a contrarian; taking unpopular positions and defending them against anyone who will put up a fight. And he claims he has never refused to debate anyone. His God is Not Great book tour presented the opportunity for numerous media appearances, lectures and debates with religious defenders. He even ventured into the Christian Book Expo and debated four well-known evangelical and conservative Christian apologists at the same time. Like X, Hitchens systematically deconstructs the logic of that which he is resisting by pointing out the inconsistencies and hypocrisies within many religious institutions and their texts. He also does a brilliant job of describing the inevitable and disturbing conclusions that must be reached if many of the religious doctrines are taken to be as literally true.

I want your opinion about something. I’m a liberal religious person who doesn’t believe in doctrines, dogma or a supernatural God. 19% of members in my tradition identify as atheist, 30% as agnostic and the rest Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Pagan or otherwise. Many of us have been wounded by the bigotry, homophobia and dogma in the religions we grew up in and find refuge, support and community in my tradition. We come together on Sunday mornings to enjoy music and hear sermons about social justice, the power of community and how to live inspiring and meaningful lives. Some ministers may use the word God in an all-inclusive way but most choose to avoid the term because of its troubled history. Here’s my question for you: Should I abandon my tradition because liberal and moderate religion serves to justify the extremes? Is my participation in this religious institution providing legitimacy and credibility for fundamentalism, violence, oppression and bigotry done in the name of religion? I’m studying to be a minister in this tradition. It’s called Unitarian Universalism. Am I guilty by association? Should I jump ship? What do you think?

I know what Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins would tell me. They are two of the new atheists most responsible for spreading this idea about liberal and moderate religion justifying the extremes. Liberals are “aiding and abetting” the most dangerous religions because they give them credibility by participating in the institution of religion itself. Sam Harris states that moderates are “in large part responsible for the religious conflict in our world” and “Religious tolerance-born of the notion that every human being should be free to believe whatever he wants about God-is one of the principal forces driving us toward the abyss.” And Richard Dawkins states, “The teachings of “moderate” religion, though not extremist in themselves, are an open invitation to extremism.” And when asked about why he lumps liberal religions like Unitarianism in with fundamentalism Hitchens responded a reference to Camus stating that he believes all religion is comparable to rats and vermin.

Christopher Hitchens critiques the Ten Commandments and updates them for the 21st century. What do you think? What would your Ten Commandments look like?

The idea “to be religious is to be a theist” as Christopher Hitchens stated in his debate with Lorenzo Albacete is a quite ethnocentric claim. It is true that in the West we have often associated a theistic God with religion, but this neglects Taoism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Jainism and numerous religious traditions which have adopted a deistic, pantheistic, panentheistic or other understanding of God. And as I pointed out in my critique of Hitchens last week, Unitarian Universalism contains 19% of people who identify as atheist/agnostic.

In the over 140 comments I received from my post “Christopher Hitchens: The Orthodox Protestant Atheist” both on the Tikkun site and in the version crossposted on Alternet.org there was both surprise and disbelief that atheists could be religious leaders. I described how I am in seminary at Starr King School for the Minstry studying alongside atheists and agnostics who are in training to become religious leaders and ministers. This seemed to be an oxymoron as for some of the respondents all religion is evil and always associated with God. So I thought it would be helpful to include a few statements from atheist students in seminary studying to be religious leaders.

From a fellow atheist seminarian at Starr King:

First, I think there is a difference between being an atheist and being anti-religious. They are orthogonal. There is also a difference between being anti-religious and being opposed to the effects of particular religious traditions. These terms should not be conflated. Since when did not believing in God mean that you are opposed to other people believing in God and or practicing religion regardless of whether they believe? I am an atheist. Just to be clear, by that I mean I don’t believe that there is a god, a higher consciousness, or a spirit. I am also opposed to the effects of certain religious traditions. But I am not by any means anti-religious. I don’t deny the value that religion or religious practice, (whether actual belief in god and the afterlife, or simply liking the pretty candles at mass and multiple opportunities for community) brings to people including myself. Religion has a lot to offer and to deny that is to deny the complexity of the human condition.

Despite having engaged in numerous debates with Christians, Muslims and Jews across the liberal/conservative spectrum Christopher Hitchens still holds to an amazingly ignorant understanding of the liberal religious heritage. His understanding of who is and who isn’t a Christian is perhaps the most disappointing and surprising piece of evidence for his myopic interpretation of religion. While rejecting conservative Christians’ theological claims about God, the Bible and Jesus, he accepts their understanding of who is and is not able to be considered a Christian. In a recent interview with Marilyn Sewell, a Unitarian Universalist minister and self-professed liberal Christian, Christopher Hitchens paraphrased C.S. Lewis to explain the boundaries of who constitutes a Christian. It’s not surprising then that a recent blog post by Dr. Ray Pritchard of “Keep Believing Ministries” for a conservative Christian site called Crosswalk was entitled, “Christopher Hitchens Gets it Exactly Right.”

During a recent trip to Portland, Oregon, noted atheist Christopher Hitchens laid down some seriously good theology… In one of the delicious ironies of our time, an outspoken atheist grasps the central tenet of Christianity better than many Christians do. What you believe about Jesus Christ really does make a difference.

What did Hitchens say?

Sewell: The religion you cite in your book is generally the fundamentalist faith of various kinds. I’m a liberal Christian, and I don’t take the stories from the scripture literally. I don’t believe in the doctrine of atonement (that Jesus died for our sins, for example). Do you make any distinction between fundamentalist faith and liberal religion?

Hitchens: I would say that if you don’t believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ and Messiah, and that he rose again from the dead and by his sacrifice our sins are forgiven, you’re really not in any meaningful sense a Christian.

Why is Hitchens so quick to accept such an orthodox interpretation of the boundaries of Christianity? His brain seems to short-circuit when he has to think about religion in complex ways. He wants to hold firmly to an either/or dichotomy–the very same one which he is critiquing fundamentalism for. In debates he has stated that he is “Protestant atheist” meaning that he recognizes the validity of the various reformation movements which liberalized, expanded and diversified Christianity. But which denomination of protestant atheist is he? This isn’t clear but it is apparently not one which falls outside of his or C.S. Lewis’s orthodox boundaries of inclusion/exclusion. Isn’t is shocking that of all people, Christopher Hitchens is in agreement with the many forces in history which have led to the extermination, torture and destruction of “heretics” for simply believing the “wrong” form of Christianity? Since when is Hitchens so concerned about who is and isn’t a Christian?

In the typical fashion that have made Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins into heroes among those who hate the religions of the world (sometimes for good reasons, sometimes not–there are some destructive elements in many religions, but that’s not the whole story), we get in the article on Chanukah (which you can find below) Hitchens’ distortions endorsed by Dawkins.

The approach is typical: a religious view or practice is misdescribed and distorted, then ridiculed. The critique is made to seem plausible by quoting out of context and taking the least sophisticated possible interpretations of whatever religious tradition is being critiqued.

Unlike Hitchens and fellow traveler Dawkins, I first link to the entirety of Hitchens attack, so you can read it in context, then present the original text he is critiquing which I wrote in 2007 and which he misrepresents. All this is followed by my comments.

After you’ve read it all, you could try to figure out why anyone with a serious intellectual curiosity would give a moment’s attention to Hitchens’ intellectual clownishness.