On something rather tackily called Premier Christian Radio, Peter Hitchens discusses the subject of his new book, The Rage Against God, with one Adam Rutherford (a Guardian contributor, amongst other not-insignificant things). That subject being: the growing trend of what P'itchens' brother (i.e. Ch'itchens) calls "antitheism".
As with every other discussion of the subject, it begins in the confusion/conflation of American evangelicalism with the whole of present and historical Christianity (which P'itchens is quick to clarify), before the sciences of homosexuality and abortion are introduced to drive it (the discussion) into a very shallow but, apparently, very muddy ditch.
Rutherford was a poor choice of disputant for Hitchens, not for the reason that he is unintelligent or unreasonable (he's neither), but because he isn't himself an antitheist and doesn't really have much sympathy for the antitheist view. The debate, however, is worth listening to (even at 90 minutes) for its illustration of the manner in which essentially boutique enthusiasms have obtusely been turned into a revolutionary credo.
Note Hitchens' distinction between the USA and Britain, that one was designed, the other grew; his assessment of multiculturalism, that it can only lead to "the creation of hostile solitudes"; and his treatment of the 'secular' view that Christians imagine themselves to be "good" when that is precisely the opposite of the case. (Re. this last point: I think I explained it rather succinctly here.)
As with every other discussion of the subject, it begins in the confusion/conflation of American evangelicalism with the whole of present and historical Christianity (which P'itchens is quick to clarify), before the sciences of homosexuality and abortion are introduced to drive it (the discussion) into a very shallow but, apparently, very muddy ditch.
Rutherford was a poor choice of disputant for Hitchens, not for the reason that he is unintelligent or unreasonable (he's neither), but because he isn't himself an antitheist and doesn't really have much sympathy for the antitheist view. The debate, however, is worth listening to (even at 90 minutes) for its illustration of the manner in which essentially boutique enthusiasms have obtusely been turned into a revolutionary credo.
Note Hitchens' distinction between the USA and Britain, that one was designed, the other grew; his assessment of multiculturalism, that it can only lead to "the creation of hostile solitudes"; and his treatment of the 'secular' view that Christians imagine themselves to be "good" when that is precisely the opposite of the case. (Re. this last point: I think I explained it rather succinctly here.)
