Posted on 12/10/2011 8:17:18 PM PST by SeekAndFind
It’s a possibility that doesn’t seem laughable anymore. Hitchens, the celebrated British journalist, angry atheist and roué, has a very powerful piece in the January issue of Vanity Fair. Hitchens has been in Houston undergoing treatment for esophageal cancer, which he was diagnosed with in 2010.
In his essay, Hitchens rejects a popular aphorism attributed to Nietzsche: “Whatever doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.” Hitchens had thought of the phrase at different points in his life where he narrowly escaped death — experiences told well in his memoir “Hitch-22.” After enduring chemotherapy and radiation treatments that made swallowing unbearable and left his entire body a rash, Hitchens rejects Nietzsche’s slogan. “In the brute physical world,” Hitchens writes, “and the one encompassed by medicine, there are all too many things that could kill you, don’t kill you, and then leave you considerably weaker.” Hitchens speculates that some maladies are so devastating that it may be better to have not lived, while acknowledging that sometimes we push through the pain and reach the other side glad that we hadn’t given up.
Rejecting one of the more sophomoric of Nietzsche’s aphorisms may seem small, but out of such moments are great conversions made. I am currently working on a documentary about Whittaker Chambers, the great writer who left communism in the late 1930s and wrote a masterpiece, “Witness,” about the ordeal. Chambers’s faith in communism began to unravel when he watched his baby daughter Ellen eating at the breakfast table. Chambers began to focus on the young girl’s ear:
The thought passed through my mind: “No, those ears were not created by any chance coming together of atoms in nature (the Communist view). They could have been created only by immense design.” The thought was involuntary and unwanted. I crowded it out of my mind. But I never wholly forgot it or the occasion. I had to crowd it out of my mind. If I had completed it, I should have had to say: Design presupposes God. I did not then know that, at that moment, the finger of God was first laid upon my forehead.
Perhaps Hitchens’s admission that Nietzsche might have been wrong, even about something small, will lead him to a healthy curiosity about Christianity. Up until now, Hitchens has had nothing but bile for Christianity and all religion — including the religion of Marxism, which Hitchens, a former leftist, eventually admitted could not survive “the onslaught of reality.” But Hitchens’s attacks on religion were always propelled by the kind of fury that one usually finds in zealots and former believers; it’s always the ex-Catholics (Maureen Dowd, etc.) who are the hardest on the Church. I found “God is Not Great,” Hitchens’s anti-religion rant, unreadable not because it argues against religion, but because it does so in such an angry, scattershot and childish way. As David Bentley Hart once wrote, “God is Not Great” is “a book that raises the non sequitur almost to the level of a dialectical method.” Oh, for the book where Hitchens takes on Aquinas, Augustine, Dietrich Von Hildebrand, Robert P. George, George Weigel and Hans Urs von Balthasar. I guess it’s much easier to pick on Mother Teresa, which Hitchens has done with particular gusto.
Hitchens certainly has the intellectual ability to take on some great Christian thinkers and perhaps reassess his prior positions. I knew that he was a brave soul as far back as 1989, when I was an intern at The Nation magazine. Hitchens had been a writer for the magazine (he had just moved on to Harper’s when I arrived), and I remember finding a bunch of hate mail addressed to Hitchens in a file. It was from feminists who were angry that Hitchens had come out as pro-life (video evidence can be found here). I knew at that moment that he was a brave and honest thinker. A couple weeks later, I met the man himself at a party. I engaged him in conversation and tried to sell him on the greatness of the band the Clash. He didn’t buy it, calling the group “nihilistic.” A colleague from The Nation pulled me aside and said that Hitch would probably be better if I asked him about 19th-century British poets.
I remained a fan of Hitchens over the years, but didn’t see him up close again until January 2010, at a party for the launch of The Daily Caller. As soon as I saw him, I knew something was wrong. I had been diagnosed with cancer (non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma) in 2008, and when I saw Hitchens, I felt like I was seeing myself from two years prior. He had the same ashen look. I reintroduced myself and reminded him about our conversation about the Clash. He examined my face and then said, “Yes, I think I do remember that.”
A few months later, Hitchens was diagnosed. Since then he has done something that is not easy — write with great insight and originality about cancer, a disease that lends itself to cheesy empowerment sloganeering and weepy martyr kitsch. His latest piece in Vanity Fair is the best yet. He avoids the cheap sentiment that’s part of so much writing about the illness. He celebrates life while saying that it’s also okay to die if it comes to that. The only one who did it better was Richard John Neuhaus in his book “As I Lay Dying.”
In his piece, Hitchens admits that the brutality of his treatment has made him reassess the bravado he showed about death in “Hitch-22,” where he claimed he wanted to be fully awake and conscious at the moment death came, in order to enjoy the ride fully. Now that death has, if not arrived, at least driven by the house, Hitch is not so sure.
I wouldn’t tell Christopher Hitchens that now is the time to get right with the Lord, or to pray or read the Bible. I wouldn’t try and convince him of the resurrection. I would only ask him to entertain the notion that love — the love he has for his life, his wife and his children, the love his readers have for him and the love that the doctors and nurses are showing him — is a real thing whose origins are worth exploring without glibness (sorry, saying “love for your fellow mammals” doesn’t require religion, as Hitchens did once, doesn’t cut it). It also can be done without Christophobia. I know that my discovery that I had cancer focused my mind on discovering the true nature of things, and I’m not talking about wishful thinking.
Ironically, there is a kind of symmetry between Hitchens and his declared enemy, Mother Teresa, whom Hitchens wrote a nasty book about and called a fanatic and a fraud (yawn). In her 2009 book “Come Be My Light,” published posthumously (Mother Teresa died in 1997), Mother Teresa writes of long periods, indeed years, of “darkness” and suffering, during which she felt that God wasn’t there. After the book was published, Hitchens went on TV to gloat. Even Mother Teresa didn’t believe it! In fact, Mother Teresa was going through what many saints do, a dark night of the soul. Such things can make us doubt God, and that is anything but an unholy thing. As Chesterton noted, Christianity is the only religion that allows God to be an atheist (“Why have you forsaken me?”). Perhaps Hitchens is going through something similar. And as Mother Teresa’s pain made her doubt her God, in second-guessing Nietzsche, Hitchens may be doubting his.
Mark Judge is the author of A Tremor of Bliss: Sex, Catholicism, and Rock ‘n’ Roll.
I’m a Christian....and call me crazy...but I’ve always had an affinity for ol’ Hitch. Maybe it’s because I’ve lived in Britain (or married to a Brit)....but I’ve always chuckled at his candor. He’s been VERY outspoken about Islam (which is BANG ON)....but I’ve never found a cold-hardheartedness like I have with so many other atheists....and, sometimes, I’m wondering if he’s just ‘being bombastic for ratings and writings’.
I pray for him. There is always hope....and something tells me.......he knows that.
Is there any real difference?
Christopher Hitchens’ brother is a very strong Catholic. Maybe he’s having an influence on him, in the late stages of his disease.
The house is on fire. I don’t want people to die. I have found the path out of the fire and want others to find the path as well.
I remember listening to a man from India who anguished over what he might be reincarnated into after his death. He was truly troubled by the thought that he might have to go through another painful illness. Over and over.
The pain of despair has got to be worse. Resting in the arms of someone who loves you is a much more comforting end.
People of faith sin every day. So religion doesn’t save anyone.
People of faith sin every day. So religion doesn’t save anyone.
People of faith sin every day. So religion doesn’t save anyone.
You might consider reading the sight rules.
Of course, the Deist’s recognize Objective Truth and Natural Law Theory which presupposes a Designer. Atheists are Relativists.
What that means is there can be no “homosexual” marriage—because there is a standard for Right and Wrong which comes from Natural Law (imbedded into our Constitution because our Natural Rights come from God.)
“Homosexual” marriage defies “Right Reason according to Nature” (Just Law) which is the fundamental principle of our Legal System.
So, there is a MAJOR difference between Deists and Atheists—and it is Rational Thought-—The Age of Reason was when “Deists” appeared.
Irrational Atheism led to Hitler, Stalin, Lenin, Mao, Pol Pot BECAUSE there is no Objective Truth—so any kind of law is “Right” —like homosexual marriage. There is no basis for Right and Wrong for atheists—just whatever urge feels right.
Life is a gift. Creation is also a gift.
I do not judge you or harbor any ill will against you in any way.
But with your permission I think I will head off to bed.
Ah Hitchens has spent his life spewing his form of 'hate' against the very Creator of his soul. I do not speculate over which side of the 'gulf' any soul goes when they return to met the Maker.
There is a requirement you left out in this forgiveness business, and, that is repentance, meaning, a change of heart. Hitchens is responsible for his own beliefs or lack thereof. Now I do not take any joy for his bad health. I will say one day, as with the rest of us, Hitchens will get to have his own, face to face, one on one, meet and greet with the Creator of his soul.
Funny little thing about your post is that when it serves your purpose you preach Christ, and then as if that is the only requirement for a 'believer' jump off the deep in and 'JUDGE' believers. So which is it, you know, old Alinsky had a particular 'rule' for radicals to follow in regards to ridiculing the Christians.
What that means is there can be no “homosexual” marriage—because there is a standard for Right and Wrong which comes from Natural Law (imbedded into our Constitution because our Natural Rights come from God.)
I thought Deists believed a creator made the universe and then abandoned it. So where is the Deists Bible that states all these things you claim?
Designed the World. There is a difference. In other words, an acorn will always grow into an acorn tree unless perverted from its original design.
Natural Law Theory is similar...just states there was a Designer of Nature (which is obvious to everyone with a brain).
Fundamental idea of our Constitution and where Natural Rights come from the Creator—all this philosophy came from Natural Law Theory-—Laws of Nature and Nature’s God.
Even Aristotle—a pagan came up with the observation of design in all nature and the teleological design in man—where his ideas of Ethics derived.
It was Marx that threw out Natural Law Theory—he hated the family unit—took loyalty from the state. He also couldn’t remold man into the image he wanted to design—that like Winston Smith. Very ugly.....
It is why the Marxists are trying to destroy the meaning of biology and make men and women interchangeable. It will destroy the emotional and physical development of children. They need both a male and female role model—preferably who love them—to grow into emotionally healthy and strong adults who can interact maturely with both sexes. It is God’s design for man.
I’m still waiting for the Deists’s bible that states their beliefs. You view seems more Judeo-christian.
I’m still waiting for the Deists’s bible that states their beliefs. You view seems more Judeo-christian.
“For goodness’ sake”. That’s interesting. And suppose someone who is also an atheist has a different idea of what is “good”? Something you think is “very bad”?
That’s the big problem with doing what one thinks is “very good”. Hitler thought he was doing good for Germany. Helping the German people, making Germany a better place.
I’m sure Pol Pot thought he was doing good. So do many objectively “bad” people. They don’t think they’re doing “bad”, they think the people opposing or criticizing them are the “bad” ones.
You’re riding on the coattails of religious moral principles. At least some honest atheists recognize that they are better off living in a country that has at least a few vestiges of moral principles based on religion.
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I don’t think anyone is expressing hatred. If anything, I think this thread reflects the spirit of charity and hope us believers have for Mr. Hitchens. One should never discount another who has a concern for one’s immortal soul.
It’s interesting, my father and I were just today discussing the parable of the Good Samaritan and how the man left beaten on the side of the road was passed by a priest and a Levite and the outcast Samaritan was the one who stopped and offered aid. In that sense, I accept your characterization that “non-believers” do good in the world. As I’m sure does every believer.
Having said that, however, I think its unreasonable for those who subscribe to Hitchens’ notion of a “celestial dictatorship” to assume that they, through the power of their own intellect are equipped to determine moral truth. For if there is no God, no Natural Law, then all we have is utilitarian philosophical musings.
Best Regards
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