Barry's Blog

Last week I had the opportunity to attend a debate in Birmingham, Alabama, with my good friend Mark Elliott, at Samford University, on the question of God. The debate featured two of the more celebrated representatives of each theological position, Christopher Hitchens and John Lennox. Hitchens, one of the leading apostles of atheism, read philosophy at Oxford University, and is a British journalist and professional provocateur. He can be seen on many programs as a political commentator, yet, in recent days he has found a new career in debating Christians on the existence of God. You may be familiar with his best-selling book, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. Hitchens displayed a certain panache, as expected, and occasionally drew applause from the crowd that was decidedly Christian in its makeup.

John Lennox, the Christian apologist, is Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford and a Fellow in Mathematics and Philosophy of Science, and is the author of God's Undertaker: Has Science Buried God? While Lennox is a man who displays humility and respect to his opponents in debate, this should not be construed as weakness of mind or argument, something that these "new atheists" have rather quickly come to realize. Despite the impossibility of setting forth all of the arguments set forth by both sides, here are three takeaways from the evening:

The Place of Reason: While the Christian position is oftentimes chided by atheists and agnostics as being a position of "faith" and not reason, Lennox did an admirable job of marshaling data that suggests great purpose and design in our universe, pointing to a Grand Designer. While Hitchens rarely gave a rebuttal to any of Lennox's statements, his points seemed to focus, as his book does, on the supposed "failure" of all religions. While science by definition deals with empirical data, that which is repeatable and observable, Lennox argued, much as Malcolm Muggeridge did in his remarkable book, The End of Christendom, that human reason itself is a "cul-de-sac," as it is outside the proper domain of science to answer questions such as: where did I come from? Where am I going? Is there a purpose or reason for my existence?

The Possibility of Revelation: There is an underlying tone among atheists and agnostics as they decry the Christian faith against the notion that Biblical revelation is possible. I heard Anthony Flew, the world-renowned atheist whose conversion to theism (not a Christian at this point it seems) make the statement several years ago in Oxford, that one of the primary reasons he rejects Christianity is because he rejects the very notion of biblical revelation. Hitchens, in a similar vein, made a snide remark toward Lennox when the latter told the story of Jesus' healing the ear of a man who lost his ear at the hands of one of the disciples on the night Jesus was betrayed. Hitchens was heard clearly to say, a bit under his breath, "or so they say that He did this..." To Hitchens and this cadre of non-believers, any form of supernaturalism, even the possibility of revelation, is synonymous with superstition.

The Reality of Religion: What is remarkable about this new strain of atheism is that they claim that only science and empirical data can give us clues about meaning and life as we know it. Yet Hitchens himself rarely set forth any positive arguments to account for his atheistic worldview. His theology (for even atheists have a theology, that there is not God) is at the very root a theology of protest. And as Lennox suggested, even the atheist (not just the Christian), must have an explanation to account for evil and suffering in this world. For if there is no Heaven, there will be no final redemption of this blighted planet, and therefore there are millions who have lived in this world who will never receive justice. In reality, the hope of Heaven is the Christian response to the suffering in this world. To the ardent atheist, since there is no transcendent meaning and purpose to this, then life is no more than the way Shakespeare described it in the words of Macbeth:

"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing."

In reality, the atheist demonstrates a greater "leap of faith" than those embracing Christian theism, his own "religious" view, for he seeks to find meaning and purpose in a world that he has told us has no meaning and purpose. Following up a debate last October at Oxford University between John Lennox and Richard Dawkins, the Oxford professor best known for his book, The God Delusion, Melanie Phillips of the British weekly magazine, The Spectator, interviewed Dawkins. Phillips reported that Dawkins, at the beginning of the debate, made a most startling admission, that "a serious case could be made for a deistic God..."And speaking of placing "faith" in the improbable, Phillips reported that:

"Even more jaw-droppingly, Dawkins told me that, rather than believing in God, he was more receptive to the theory that life on earth had indeed been created by a governing intelligence - but one which had resided on another planet. Leave aside the question of where that extra-terrestrial intelligence had itself come from, is it not remarkable that the arch-apostle of reason finds the concept of God more unlikely as an explanation of the universe than the existence and plenipotentiary power of extra-terrestrial little green men?"

Robert Jastrow, a Jewish scientist, expressed it so eloquently a number of years ago in his book, God and the Astronomers, when he suggested that for all the advancements of science, its attempt to answer the ultimate question of origins lies not in the realm of science, but beyond the realm of science:

"For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting their for centuries."