Gunning for God (2 page)

But the atheists’ poster campaign did not end here. In 2009 Richard Dawkins and the British Humanist Association commissioned posters depicting two very happy looking children with the legend: “Please don’t label me. Let me grow up and choose for myself.” However, in an exquisitely ironical contradiction of their first poster campaign’s claim, that atheism was the prerequisite for joy, it turned out that the grinning children, selected by the atheists to embody their vision of childlike happiness, were children from a devout Christian family. As the father of the children commented, it was quite a compliment that the atheists judged these particular children to be happy and free, without knowing about their family background.
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I shall comment later on why I am in fact sympathetic to the atheists’ desire not to have children labelled and to allow them to choose for themselves. The question of parents teaching children what they believe is, of course, a very different matter.

At the moment, Richard Dawkins would appear to be the principal driver of the atheist bus. Like him, I am a scientist (a mathematician in fact); like him, I believe in truth; and also like him, I am a professor at Oxford University. But, unlike him, I am a theist — a Christian, to be precise. I do not associate the existence of God as such with worry, but rather with joy. Indeed, if I were impelled to come up with a bus slogan, it might go something like this: “There is good evidence for the existence of God. Therefore trust him and experience real joy.” Of course, I am aware that God might be a potential source of worry for atheists. After all, as Lucretius noted centuries ago, if God exists, atheists will meet him one day. More of that in due course.

Richard Dawkins and I have engaged in two major public debates, the first in Birmingham, Alabama in 2007, where we discussed some of the major theses of his best-selling book
The God Delusion.
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The second debate was on the question “Has Science Buried God?”, which is the subtitle of my own book,
God’s Undertaker.
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This latter debate
¹⁷
was held in 2008 in the Oxford Natural History Museum, the place where in 1860 Thomas Henry Huxley had his famous interchange with Bishop Samuel Wilberforce over Darwin’s
The Origin of Species
. The setting was both unusual and dramatic. Dawkins and I were perched on stools, with the vast head and jaws of the museum’s showpiece, the Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton, towering threateningly above us. T-Rex is certainly extinct. On that Dawkins and I agree. Dawkins also thinks God is extinct, or, more exactly, that he never existed. I disagree.

I also have had two public debates with Christopher Hitchens, who describes himself as a contrarian. Our first encounter was before a large audience in the Usher Hall at the Edinburgh Festival in 2008, where the motion under consideration was “The New Europe should prefer the New Atheism.”
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At the end of the debate a number of members of the audience, who had initially indicated their indecision on the issue, surprised many by moving to reject the motion. Consequently it was pronounced lost by the moderator, James Naughtie of the BBC, when Hitchens graciously conceded. One member of the audience who did not contribute to that shift of opinion was Richard Dawkins. He did not seem to be at all pleased with the outcome.

I met Hitchens again in March 2009 for an equally lively re-match. This was an even larger event, organized by the Socratic Club at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama. The issue before the house was “Is God Great?” — the topic of Hitchens’ best-seller.
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Not surprisingly, perhaps, no vote was taken on that occasion.

I have also debated the physicist Victor Stenger (among others) in Australia at an 1Q
²
Debate
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organized by
The Sydney Morning Herald
in August 2008, on the topic “The world would be better off without religion.” As part of Sydney Science Week 2008 I encountered Michael Shermer, the editor of
Sceptic Magazine
, to debate the question “Does God exist?” In July 2009 I had a lengthy moderated discussion for Australian Television with Peter Atkins, Emeritus Professor of Chemistry at Oxford.
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In addition, in April 2011 I engaged in a very warm-hearted public discussion with Daniel Lowenstein, Professor of Law at UCLA on the topic “Is Christianity true?”
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That brings me to my motivation for this book. In each of my debates and discussions I have tried to present in the public space a credible, rational alternative to the fare which the New Atheists offer, rather than simply attempting to use rhetoric or emotional appeal to “win” the argument on the day. Whether I have succeeded or not is up to the respective audiences to judge. However, these public events do not, of course, permit full development of arguments. I thought it worthwhile, therefore, to draw from such experience and give in book form a more thorough presentation of the central issues.

I have already written at length on the science aspect in my book
God’s Undertaker
; and have addressed the more recent entry into the debate by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow in a further book
God and Stephen Hawking: Whose Design is it Anyway?
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Because of their topicality I shall include some of the flavour of these arguments here. The main debate, however, is not limited to science. Indeed, the arguments that often grip the attention of the general public have to do with morality and the alleged dangers of religion. These issues will be our main concern here.

Other authors have paved the way. Alister and Joanna McGrath have impressively deconstructed many of the major arguments in
The Dawkins Delusion?
;
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as has Keith Ward in
Why There Almost Certainly Is a God.
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At a more accessible level, David Robertson’s
The Dawkins Letters
is an excellent guide.
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More recently David Bentley Hart, in
Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and Its Fashionable Enemies
,
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very effectively exposes the superficiality of the New Atheist approach to history. One might ask, so why add yet another book?

The New Atheists want to “raise the consciousness” of atheists and encourage them to stand up and be counted for their faith. Hence they are constantly adding to the ranks of their spokespeople. They are out to get converts.
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The importance of the issues and the extent of public interest warrant analysis of the New Atheism arguments from as many different angles as possible, so that everybody’s “consciousness is raised” — including that of Christians.

My aim is to provide one of these angles, in the hope that it will be of help. This book is not simply a product of passive analysis, important though that is. It is a product of public engagement with the New Atheists and their ideas. I have stepped into the public arena in order to add my voice to those who are convinced that the New Atheism is not the automatic default position for all thinking people who hold science in high regard. Like me, there are many scientists and others who think that the New Atheism is a belief system which, ironically, provides a classic example of the blind faith it so vocally despises in others. I should like to make my own small contribution towards raising public awareness of this fact.

I have, however, a further reason for writing. The debate has necessarily given prominence to atheist arguments and reactions to them, which means that the positive presentation of the alternative tends to come short. Perhaps it is for this reason that the New Atheists incessantly chant Bertrand Russell’s famous mantra about there not being enough evidence. In light of this, I propose in this book not only to deal reactively with atheist objections to Christianity, but also positively to present detailed evidence for the truth of Christianity.

I would like to express my thanks to the many people who over the years have stimulated my thinking on these issues, including those representatives of the atheist worldview that I have encountered in both public debate and private conversation. I am also grateful to my research assistant Simon Wenham and to Barbara Hamilton for her invaluable help with the production of the typescript.

THE CHARGE OF THE BRIGHT BRIGADE

The New Atheists regard themselves as distinguished and worthy offspring of the Enlightenment, and, in an attempt to jettison the negative image they feel atheism has had hitherto, they have accordingly styled themselves as “the Brights”. Christopher Hitchens deserves credit for objecting to such a “conceited cringe-making proposal”.
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Just imagine what the reaction would have been had the Christians equally foolishly and condescendingly called themselves “the Clevers”.

No doubt those of us who disagree with the Brights will by default be dubbed “the Dims” or “Dulls”, or perhaps even “Darks”. Dennett, however, says that this is not necessarily the case, and that those who believe in the supernatural should call themselves the “Supers”.
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“Super-Bright”, therefore, would be an oxymoron.

Hitchens’ objection to this rather tasteless bit of hubris has been ignored; and the Brights have now staked their claim to a piece of cyberspace by setting up a dedicated multilingual website under that name. We find there the following explanation of the term: “A bright is a person who has a naturalistic worldview. A bright’s worldview is free of supernatural and mystical elements. The ethics and actions of a bright are based on a naturalistic worldview.”

As children of the Enlightenment, the Brights see themselves as luminaries of a new era of rational understanding, dispelling the darkness of religious superstition and error. Michel Onfray displays a rather limited memory in explaining their objectives thus: “We need a return to the spirit of Light, of Enlightenment, that gave its name to the eighteenth century”; as if there was no high calibre intellectual discussion before the eighteenth century, and, as Alasdair Maclntyre points out,
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as if the Enlightenment project was not a failure in its ability to supply a foundation for morality. As if the Enlightenment took us on an upward path from barbarism to peace, instead of ushering in one violent revolution after another until we reached the depths of human wickedness in the bloodiest century to date — the twentieth.
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In its headlong charge, the Bright Brigade does not appear to wish to pause and consider such things. We must, however — and we shall.

WHAT IS NEW ABOUT THE NEW ATHEISTS?

The New Atheists have been around for some time now; so, in that trivial sense, they are no longer new. What is more, at the intellectual level, their arguments never were really new. However, the new thing about them is their tone and their emphasis. The New Atheists are much louder and shriller than their predecessors. They are also more aggressive. This change in tone centres on the fact that they are no longer content simply to deny God’s existence. For instance, Christopher Hitchens says: “I’m not even an atheist so much as I am an antitheist; I not only maintain that all religions are versions of the same untruth, but I hold that the influence of churches, and the effect of religious belief is positively harmful.”
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The agenda of the New Atheists has widened, therefore, to include attack on the existence of belief itself. This particular feature is described by them as their way of expressing their “loss of respect” for religion. As Richard Dawkins puts it, “I am utterly fed up with the respect we have been brainwashed into bestowing upon religion.” Christopher Hitchens sums up the position in his all-encompassing, and characteristically wild, statement: “Religion poisons everything.”
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Bradley Hagerty on National Public Radio reports Hitchens as saying (to roars of approval from a capacity audience at the University of Toronto): “I think religion should be treated with ridicule, hatred, and contempt, and I claim that right.”
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Sam Harris’s intention is “to destroy the intellectual and moral pretensions of Christianity in its most committed forms”.
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WHY THE AGGRESSION?

Something appears to have snapped. And it has: the Twin Towers on 9/11. According to the leading German weekly news magazine
Der Spiegel
, it was that horrific event in 2001 that gave birth to the New Atheism. A cover article entitled “God is to blame for everything”
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says: “Without the attacks on New York and Washington, there would be no New Atheism.” In a later interview with the same magazine, Dawkins says that 9/11 “radicalised” him,
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thus confirming his earlier statement:

My last vestige of “hands-off religion” respect disappeared in the smoke and choking dust of September 11, 2001, followed by the “National Day of Prayer”, when prelates and pastors did their tremulous Martin Luther King impersonation and urged people of mutually incompatible faiths to hold hands, united in homage to the very force that caused the problem in the first place.
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