Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Atheist vs. Unitarian minister on what is a true Christian

Stand to Reason notes this interesting interaction in an interview in the Portland Monthly, where fire-breathing jihadist* atheist, Christopher Hitchens, responds to a question by a unitarian minister who considers herself a 'liberal Christian', and schools her: 
Maryiln 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 and [sic] distinction between fundamentalist faith and liberal religion?

Christopher 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.
Game. Set. Match.  Though I must admit, its tough to know who to root for in this situation.

Btw, did he just unwittingly evangelize her???

[*the term 'jihadist atheist' is the term David Berlinski uses in his book, The Devil's Delusion:  Atheism & It's Scientific Pretensions, to describe the new atheists--zealots who are hell-bent (excuse the pun) on converting everyone to their very narrow & dogmatic beliefs.  I'm only about half-way through this book by a self-described 'secular Jew,' but so far I like it and would recommend it.]

6 comments:

Joshua Butcher said...

What's up with the enemy throwing the smack-down on themselves lately?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/01/AR2010020102067.html

John said...

Great article, Joshua. Thanks for passing it along. Very interesting stuff.

celiselott said...

Wow, that's a little scary. Scary when non-Christians are speaking truth... kind of reminds me of the story of Balaam.

John said...

@ Courtney, yeah, & with Hitchens, it is a definite reminder of Balaam's ass!

Joshua Butcher said...

lol @ John!

celiselott said...

Delayed reaction: hahaha! Love it!