Christopher Hitchens, R.I.P. — and an atheist Christmas remembrance
In the midst of all the GOP presidential campaign hustle and bustle comes the sad news tonight that iconoclastic journalist Christopher Hitchens has succumbed to cancer.
Vanity Fair announces:
Christopher Hitchens—the incomparable critic, masterful rhetorician, fiery wit, and fearless bon vivant—died today at the age of 62. Hitchens was diagnosed with esophageal cancer in the spring of 2010, just after the publication of his memoir, Hitch-22, and began chemotherapy soon after. His matchless prose has appeared in Vanity Fair since 1992, when he was named contributing editor.
“Cancer victimhood contains a permanent temptation to be self-centered and even solipsistic,” Hitchens wrote nearly a year ago in Vanity Fair, but his own final labors were anything but: in the last 12 months, he produced for this magazine a piece on U.S.-Pakistani relations in the wake of Osama bin Laden’s death, a portrait of Joan Didion, an essay on the Private Eye retrospective at the Victoria and Albert Museum, a prediction about the future of democracy in Egypt, a meditation on the legacy of progressivism in Wisconsin, and a series of frank, graceful, and exquisitely written essays in which he chronicled the physical and spiritual effects of his disease. At the end, Hitchens was more engaged, relentless, hilarious, observant, and intelligent than just about everyone else—just as he had been for the last four decades.
Agree or disagree with him (and we certainly did, jovially so, on some of his extreme atheist stunts), Hitchens was a trenchant analyst and a naturalized American original. His writings on Muslim jihadists, Islamic rage boy syndrome, and sharia law were especially compelling — and his fearless work on those topics was cited here numerous times over the years.
Here he was after the 7/7 bombings taking on feckless leftists blaming Bush and Iraq:
My son flew in from London at the weekend, and we were discussing, as we have several times before, why it hadn’t happened yet. “It” was the jihadist attack on the city, for which the British security forces have been braced ever since the bombings in Madrid. When the telephone rang in the small hours of this morning, I was pretty sure it was the call I had been waiting for. And as I snapped on the TV I could see, from the drawn expression and halting speech of Tony Blair, that he was reacting not so much with shock as from a sense of inevitability.
Perhaps this partly explains the stoicism and insouciance of those Brits interviewed on the streets, all of whom seemed to know that a certain sang-froid was expected of them. The concrete barriers around the Houses of Parliament have been up for some time. There are estimated to be over 4 million surveillance cameras in the United Kingdom today, but of course it had to be the Underground—”the tube”—and the good old symbolic red London bus. Timed for the rush hour, and at transit stations that serve outlying and East London neighborhoods, the bombs are nearly certain to have killed a number of British Muslims. None of this, of course, has stopped George Galloway and his ilk from rushing to the microphone and demanding that the British people be removed “from harm’s way” by an immediate withdrawal from Iraq. (Since the Islamists also demand a withdrawal from Afghanistan, it surprises me that he doesn’t oblige them in this way as well, but perhaps that will come in time.)
…It is ludicrous to try and reduce this to Iraq. Europe is steadily becoming a part of the civil war that is roiling the Islamic world, and it will require all our cultural ingenuity to ensure that the criminals who shattered London’s peace at rush hour this morning are not the ones who dictate the pace and rhythm of events from now on.
And on his refusal to capitulate to Islamic Rage Boy:
The lives of Shiite Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Christians—to say nothing of atheists or secularists—are considered by Sunni militants to be of little or no account. And yet they accuse those who criticize them of bigotry! And many people are so anxious to pre-empt this accusation that they ventriloquize the reactions of Sunni mobs as if they were the vox populi, all the while muttering that we must take care not to offend such supersensitive people.
This mental and moral capitulation has a bearing on the argument about Iraq, as well. We are incessantly told that the removal of the Saddam Hussein despotism has inflamed the world’s Muslims against us and made Iraq hospitable to terrorism, for all the world as if Baathism had not been pumping out jihadist rhetoric for the past decade (as it still does from Damascus, allied to Tehran). But how are we to know what will incite such rage? A caricature published in Copenhagen appears to do it. A crass remark from Josef Ratzinger (leader of an anti-war church) seems to have the same effect. A rumor from Guantanamo will convulse Peshawar, the Muslim press preaches that the Jews brought down the Twin Towers, and a single citation in a British honors list will cause the Iranian state-run press to repeat its claim that the British government—along with the Israelis, of course—paid Salman Rushdie to write The Satanic Verses to begin with. Exactly how is such a mentality to be placated?
We may have to put up with the Rage Boys of the world, but we ought not to do their work for them, and we must not cry before we have been hurt. In front of me is a copy of this week’s Economist, which states that Rushdie’s 1989 death warrant was “punishment for the book’s unflattering depiction of the Prophet Muhammad.” There is no direct depiction of the prophet in this work of fiction, and the reverie about his many wives occurs in the dream of a madman. Nobody in Ayatollah Khomeini’s circle could possibly have read the book for him before he issued a fatwah, which made it dangerous to possess. Yet on that occasion, the bookstore chains of America pulled The Satanic Verses from their shelves, just as Borders shamefully pulled Free Inquiry (a magazine for which I write) after it reproduced the Danish cartoons. Rage Boy keenly looks forward to anger, while we worriedly anticipate trouble, and fret about etiquette, and prepare the next retreat. If taken to its logical conclusion, this would mean living at the pleasure of Rage Boy, and that I am not prepared to do.
His second-ever Tweet in 2009 glibly (he was a perfect match for the medium) took on the Muslim murderous sanctions for apostasy:
“The Hadith says…if someone becomes an apostate…they must be killed. The sentence is death: don’t anyone be telling me that’s a metaphor.”
Of course, Hitchens’ hard-drinking, chain-smoking ways and days are legendary (and remember the waterboarding thing?). But what I’ll remember is how unimaginably gracious he was when a complete stranger asked him a Christmas favor three years ago this month.
From my e-mail archives:
Michelle Malkin writemalkin@gmail.com
to chitch8003@aol.com
date Sat, Dec 20, 2008 at 9:44 PM
subject a strange request
mailed-by gmail.com
Mr. Hitchens -
It’s odd and last-minute, but what the hell: I have a fabulous atheist blogger at HotAir.com who goes by the nom de plume “Allahpundit.” Last Christmas, Ayaan Hirsi Ali was kind enough to send an autographed copy of Infidel for me to pass along as a secular, end-of-the-year token of appreciation:
http://hotair.com/archives/2007/12/24/santa-comes-early/
Might it be possible for me to FedEx you a copy of “God Is Not Great” for a signature in time for the holidays? It’s the only way I can top last year.
Thanks for your consideration.
Best,
Michelle Malkin
Hitchens wrote back in a few hours:
writemalkin@gmail.com
date Sat, Dec 20, 2008 at 11:52 PM
subject Re: a strange request
mailed-by aol.com
Surely you may. I shall be in California over the “holidays”, so ship it to me at [address and phone number redacted].
Meanwhile, “compliments of the season”, as Mr Jefferson used to say.
Thanks for asking.
CH
As busy as he must have been during the holiday season with family and work, he still took the time to check by both e-mail and phone to ensure that I received the signed book, which Allahpundit in turn received in time… “with compliments of the season:”
It was an unexpected and extraordinary holiday gesture from an extraordinary literary and journalistic giant.
Allahpundit writes tonight: “Hitchens being Hitchens, I wonder which he anticipated more eagerly — the end of the pain or finally knowing if he was right about you know what. I suspect he was right. I hope we’re both wrong.”
I pray so, too.
R.I.P., Christopher Hitchens. Gone too soon.
***
Richard Fernandez (Wretchard the Cat), himself a master of prose, raises his glass:
All there is to say about his life, Hitchens has already said himself. His facility at expression was such that it is presumptuous to try and add to his account. Nevertheless he would probably appreciate being remembered by those who knew him; and I did slightly. Even the most modest of people like to think the world has shifted, even ever so slightly, because they lived, spoke and wrote.
And Hitchens lived, and spoke and wrote.
We might quarrel about the extent to which he or anyone has made a difference. But in one matter we are agreed; and he will surely pass over any differences if I raise a glass in his memory. As he explained to an Arab waiter once in Beirut about the virtues of whiskey, “all you have to do is pour it. My problem is to drink it.” Perhaps he was talking about life as much as Johnny Walker. So for those who are so inclined, please raise a glass of whatever you please, and down one for Christopher Hitchens.
Well alright, Christopher. One is not enough. Maybe two is better.
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Beautifully said Michelle, all of it.
Mr. Hitchens, “May you be in heaven before the devil knows you’re dead.”
***
Heavy smoking and heavy drinking have their price. I think that they cut 20 years off a person’s life span.
***
And when an atheist dies–what future hope can he / she look forward to? I think that it takes more “faith” to believe that all the wondrous things we see around us are just some random accident of probability rather than believing in God the Creator. Who may be asking Mr. Hitchens to expound a little bit on his theory that He doesn’t exist!
***
I guess that most atheists look down on us believers as clueless misguided fools. Who couldn’t possibly be as smart as they are. Kindov of like most liberals think of conservatives.
***
John Bibb
***
Through everything he accomplished he stayed true to himself and did it his way. I can think of no higher compliment.
I agree with Rush Limbaugh.
I didn’t always agree with him, but I always read what he wrote.
Godspeed!
I’m sure he thinks God is Great now.
I hope God forgives you, Christopher.
Eternal rest grant unto him O Lord,
And let Perpetual Light shine upon him.
May his Soul
And the Souls of all the faithful departed
Through the Mercy of God
Rest in Peace.
Amen.
Man, I got bullied till I was in tears once at work by an atheist who had just read God Is Not Great. He was talking about how good it was, and I mentioned that I had read a review saying Hitchens didn’t really take moderate Christians like me into account in the book. I don’t usually go around talking about my beliefs, and some liberals will just assume you’re an atheist. Anyway, it was awful.
Not Hitchens’s fault his reader behaved that way, though. I’m very sorry to hear of his death. I read that he was pretty gracious about people saying prayers for him, and I’ll say a prayer for his family and friends today.
This news is deeply, deeply saddening. He was a model argumentarian and had a mind like no other. This is a horrible loss.
Christopher, may God shower you with his grace and mercy, in spite of your denials of his existance.
Christopher:
By now you have the answers to all your questions. I hope and pray you’re with God to ponder how wrong you were.
Beautifully put, and a beautiful example of Christianity.
The Christian posters here exemplify the grace of Christianity.
It is very sad when an atheist dies.
How ironic that a man so prolific in his denials of God, had Christ in his name. I wonder at what age his parents realized to their anguish, the name they chose for him, was for naught.
May Mr. Hitchens have found peace with God.
Quite a few nights while unable to sleep, I prayed that Christopher would take Jesus into his heart. Maybe he did.
I always enjoyed reading Mr. Hitchens work. It did not always cheer on my belief system and sometime try to throw it out the window after stomping on it.
But Christopher’s body of work is incredible. Always thought-provoking…always well presented. Most often, I would prepare for his work, as I did for William F. Buckley’s…mind engaged and dictionary by my side.
Fare thee well, Mr. Hitchens. I do hope you find peace in the hereafter.
Watching my own father die of cancer, when he was brought home for the last days, I knew he was finally replaying regrets in his head. Although he was unconscious, I was assured he was listening and contemplating what happens next.
‘In the twinkling of an eye’, Mr Hitchens will find out too.
(I Cor. 15:52)
On December 16th, 2011 at 6:24 am, tre said:
I’m sure he thinks God is Great now.
I hope God forgives you, Christopher.
no offense, but … Tre… maybe you are the one who needs forgiving.
In the book “Keys Of the Kingdom” by A.J. Cronin, the main character’s friend, a doctor and lifelong atheist, dies treating the sick in a plague and the Catholic priest main character is moved to ask “So why shouldn’t He welcome a sincere atheist with a smile on His face and a twinkle in His eye? ‘I’m here, you see, in spite of all they taught you. Enter into the Kingdom which you honestly denied.”
Hitchens died in Houston, but oddly enough there was no mention on local news channels (at least before 7:15, when I left for work). The local rag (Houston Chronicle) has a little link at the bottom of the web site.
I enjoyed Hitchens’ writing, although I didn’t agree with much of what he wrote.
God will STILL forgive him his sins and accept him into Heaven.
Very sad indeed. I believe the Bible says that if you deny God, He will deny you. Hopefully, something was lost in translation or something. Because I fear for Mr. Hitchens’ soul. May God have mercy on a good and faithful servant who enriched the world, but may have lost his own soul. It is not up to me to judge him, so I just pray God will be merciful. RIP Mr. Hitchens.
My thoughts as well. The thought of someone dying without acknowledging Christ as his/her Savior is heartbreaking. Plus I cannot imagine going through life without the hope, joy, and peace that the good Lord gives. I pray that Hitchens received Jesus in his heart before his last breath.
I was very torn on commenting on this thread. I’ll keep my comments about Mr Hitchens to a minimum, as it isn’t my place to judge him in death (although the actions and beliefs of his life are available).
I know this is a political site, and that Hitchens was known for his incisive political analysis, but as the comments have wandered into matters of spirituality and eternal reward, I feel compelled to say that I am dismayed by the attempts here to convert him after his death.
Hitchens was an unapologetic atheist, as was his choice. He wrote articles and books which strongly discouraged the belief in God; this was his right. However nice/personable he might have been, he was an unrepentant adversary (enemy) of God.
If Christians cannot bring themselves to believe that an atheist would fail to receive an eternal home with God based upon simple biblical principles (John 14:6, John 3:16, Acts 2:38, and many other verses, what possible incentive can they have to be teachers and good examples to bring people to Christ?
I’m sorry if I stepped on any toes, but this is just not right.
and you are correct.
Jesus died for all of mankind’s redemption. All.
A believer in Marx. A fervid anti-religious mouthpiece. Called Mother Teressa a b****.
The world is a better place today.
I can’t think of anything worse than to have the realization of God and His love and mercy for all and not be able to partake of it because you chose not to know Him. That is hell but it never has been, nor never will be His desire for us.
Yes, we have only to ASK for forgiveness and BELIEVE in Him. “Knock and it shall be opened to you, Seek and you shall find, Ask and it shall be given to you”…not sure where that is exactly and I have paraphrased, but you know that is what the Bible says. You don’t just automatically get redemption because you lead a good life. Good works do not get you into heaven. Only true salvation will do that. Many people do pussyfoot around that TRUTH because they want to be politically correct. We WANT to believe a “good” person is with God. While we can’t judge anyone’s heart, God can. I can only repeat what others have said…I hope he found redemption before he passed. It is possible that he did.
max said:
WE are ALL in need of God’s forgiveness and may we approach Him in all humility that we may know His forgiveness. May we keep our own death in the front part of our minds always to remind us of our human state and need for God’s mercy.
You have posted a lot of wisdom this a.m. AMEN.
A man who drove me crazy at times, but I never stopped liking or admiring him.
I pray that God showed him mercy and God’s love for him was revealed through the Holy Spirit to him before he died.
Michelle,
Why would you give such a blasphemous book as gift?
Do you also give your kids toxic toys for Christmas?
Why should we not want for Christopher Hitchens to receive from God, that which we want for ourselves? Because he denied or said some bad things about something that he didn’t believe in and that hurt our feelings? We do not know if Christopher will receive a place in God’s kingdom, we as Christians are hopeful that he does, because therein lies hope for all of us flawed creatures.
Have you really explored and strengthened your faith, if you haven’t explored all arguments against it?
Does the Vatican keep only one book on hand?
Because God is not served in the process.
I don’t disagree that holding out hope for someone who not only did nothing, but was actively opposed to a belief in God, makes us all feel better about ourselves and our situations, but it is not remotely the situation that is described in the scriptures.
What is the point of anything we are told in the Bible, if someone who adamantly refused to even believe (as we are told even the demons do in James 2:16) has the same shot as anyone else to receive a home in Heaven? Is it better than God should be a liar about the requirements for salvation than that our precious sensibilities be bruised?
A parachute is no salvation to one who will not so much as pull the cord.
Do we know that Christopher did not pull the cord at the last instant and repent? Many a sinner has gone to his grave with repentance on their lips.
No. And I am not strictly speaking about Mr Hitchens, as I do not know the events of his last days/hours. I am merely saying that if Christians cannot agree that Christ is a necessity of salvation we need to look into a name change.
Yes, many of us have said that we hope he repented. I think the problem we are discussing is whether or not God will take into His Kingdom someone who was a Good person, but an atheist. The Bible says “NO” and I believe in the Word of God. But, we do HOPE he repented before he died…none of us can judge his heart.
He will either go to God or disappear into a big black nothingness forever. Separation from God is the worst kind of hell. And I believe he will KNOW which one he has achieved.
Praying for someone’s soul and wishing them mercy regardless of their faith or lack thereof, does not serve God? You suggest our prayers are wasted on this man, the old Altar boy in me thinks otherwise.
You sound put off about the possibility of sharing a space in God’s kingdom with someone you’ve deemed lesser than yourself. Something to reflect upon perhaps.
We do not know the lines of demarcation God will use when we stand in judgement. What sacrifices and penances we have acquired over the years that will offset our transgressions. That is the great mystery that awaits us all, including the departed Mr. Hitchens.
Classy post, MM. That’s very nice of you to share, and a nice tribute to a brilliant man.
I’m agnostic and feel that the views of some athiests are as dogmatic and as extreme as some christians/muslims, but Hitchens was a flat out brilliant writer and debater. He was also a fascinating “character” of our times.
I suspect, Hitchens was right about, “you know what”. But as I’ve told friends and posted online, if the talent-deficient Tim “Freaking” Tebow leads and wills the sorry Broncos to a Super Bowl, I just may convert to Christianity next year.
Not when it is done instead of preaching to them while they are still alive to do something about their lives, which is why I mentioned incentive.
Not at all. There is value in every soul, and because of that value, I hate to see Christians putting stock in last-second (or even after the last second) miraculous saves as opposed to a lifetime of service to God, which is the model we see in the Bible.
Not entirely, but we do know in part:
Matthew 21-23
I refer readers to Hitchen’s article about Lt. Mark Daily, an honors graduate of UCLA and ROTC who passed on an opportunity to teach at West Point in favor of becoming an infantry officer in Iraq in 2006.
I know the Daily family and Mark’s story. Hitchen’s article was a wonderfully written piece of insightful journalism. New York University’s esteemed journalism school nominated it as one of the decade’s top 80 works of journalism. Read it for yourself at http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/11/hitchens200711
We have lost the one and only. In the season of joy, this is a sad day. Beautiful column, Michelle
Well based on that, I believe God will judge me harshly, because I’ve been too busy screwing up my own life instead of preaching to others how to live theirs.
I have enjoyed this exchange though.
To all the Christians here who claim to know exactly what God’s word in the Bible means in regards to salvation and who gets to live in paradise should grab a slice of humility imho…
One gone, three to go..
Referring to a 2007 debate, apparently, Richard Dawkins refers to Christopher Hitchens as one of the “Four Horsemen”, in reference to the Book of Revelation’s four horsemen of the Apocalypse. The other “horsemen” would be Sam Harris, and Daniel C. Dennet, the “elite” of the “New Atheism”. By the way, as an irony, the name “DANIEL” means God judges me or God is my Judge.
For those that “wish” and “hope” that Hitchens would “change” his views on God (God with a capital “G”) before he died, here’s a quote from Wikipedia:
In April 2011, Hitchens was forced to cancel a scheduled appearance at the American Atheist Convention, and instead sent a letter that stated, “Nothing would have kept me from joining you except the loss of my voice (at least my speaking voice) which in turn is due to a long argument I am currently having with the specter of death.” He closed with “And don’t keep the faith.” The letter also dismissed the notion of a possible deathbed conversion, in which he claimed that “redemption and supernatural deliverance appears even more hollow and artificial to me than it did before.”
From Dust he was made and to dust he has returned. Since his body has assumed room temperature, it is safe to assume, empirically, that Hitchens chose his own ETERNAL destiny. He wanted no part of God and, according with his letter, something tells me he got his wish granted. God resists the proud and lifts up the humble. All the oratory skills that Hitchens might have developed and possessed won’t buy him a stairway to heaven. A fitting quote to his cenotaph would read “Si Monumentum Requiris Circumspice”
A sad tragedy, indeed.
God is not mocked.
Rio
Semper Fi!
And I appreciate you being willing to argue the point.
I certainly see the place for mercy. We all need it.
Thank you for the link. Wow.
RogueCheddar wrote:
Giving a blasphemous gift has nothing to do with strengthening or, in this case, imparting faith to an atheist co-worker.
If she wanted to go that route, there are plenty of books that explore AND address errors, rather than just pushing error.
The Summa Theologica is one example, but the Handbook of Christian Apologetics by Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli would probably be a better in this case.
Interesting reflection by Allahpundit at the end. Reassessing things maybe?
All human beings are unique, special, precious yet created fully in the image of God. As with all of us, there was only one Christopher Hitchens and there will never ever be another.
Evidence That Demands A Verdict – Christianity Beyond a Reasonable Doubt
By Josh McDowell
Awesome post! +200
I don’t pretend to know all the ins and outs of the Bible with its many translations. But it is stated in there that you must believe that Jesus is your savior and accept His Grace to be saved. That is pretty clear. That’s all I know for sure and it’s enough for me. There are MANY who won’t be saved. It says that in the Bible too. I know that doesn’t seem fair and just, but one day we will know the answers. I just believe that God is in charge. (and I have to remind myself of that daily!)
Re. American hero 2Lt. Mark Daily —
First reported here in January 2007:
http://michellemalkin.com/2007/01/19/the-immortal-words-of-2lt-mark-daily/
Picked up by Sen John Cornyn from my blog:
http://michellemalkin.com/2007/01/31/2lt-mark-dailys-message-reaches-the-senate-floor/
Then Los Angeles Times:
http://michellemalkin.com/2007/02/18/i-genuinely-believe-the-united-states-army-is-a-force-of-good-in-this-world/
Then immortalized by Hitchens:
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/11/hitchens200711
Read the whole thing. An amazing story, an amazing American hero.
I won’t try to improve on this:
http://www.catholic.com/tracts/salvation-outside-the-church
Thank you Michelle for expanding on my reference. Mark Daily lived and died as a exemplary American and human being, taking action on his beliefs that America is a force for good in this world and that we have an individual responsibility to act accordingly.
I have been blessed to know Mark’s family. They are the salt of the earth and our nation’s future is bright as long as we have people like them among us.
Please say a prayer this Christmas season for Mark and his loved ones.
Thanks for the links, Michelle! Christopher Hitchens was indeed a gifted and inspiring writer! He had a lot of insight into the human condition and a ton of compassion!! He may have professed to be an atheist, but I don’t really believe that…not for one minute.
“Unimaginably gracious” indeed. That’s a great story.
The Bible is pretty clear on what his fate will be. He was obviously very intelligent and talented, and its a shame that he spent so much of his time opposing Christianity. What’s even more of a shame though is that this man was given such a stage to press his case for the disbelief in God, even by Christians. There should be no tolerance or acceptance for an unrepentant enemy of God.
R.I.P. Mr Hitchens.
After reading some of bile spewed over at HA its refreshing to come over to MMs site and read the nearly all caring posts.
I had the privilege to listen to him give a speech at my College around the 08 election. During the Q&A session he destroyed all of the liberal student and faculty anti-Bush questions, er, talking-points related to terrorism and Iraq.
Strange. People who want to force others to pay for genital mutilation (sex change operations), kill babies, fire missiles at American citizens with no due process, defecate and fornicate and do drugs in the street, and grow the state into an all-controlling monster are good.
People who hope others find the promise of eternal peace with no personal gain are bad.
I think this is just part of the expanded definition of insanity…
Mr. Hitchens was a strong ally in the war against the Islamites, but he was a sadly mixed blessing. Politically, his heroes were Trotsky and FDR (with a few others) and it was somewhere in the space between those two that his ideology could be found. He was a marxist (Trotskyite actually), but of one of the more modern, hip types. He realized Stalin did not work out but could never quite grasp why the monster had won so handily after such a good beginning with Lenin. Worse, while anyone who loathes Michael Moore and defended the Iraq War, far better than G.W.Bush ever did, couldn’t be all bad, my sense was that he was never comfortable with the Right and always wanted to keep his distance. Moreover, I think he was hurt that many of his former colleagues simply found him irrelevant after 9/11. His efforts to demonstrate he was still a good leftist went wanting. He hated Ayn Rand (of course, doesn’t everyone?) and couldn’t stand Sarah Palin (again, just like everybody else) but nobody left or right cared. He also had little good to say about Israel. Thanks for sharing, Hitch.
Yes, he truly, really, was an atheist, you can count on it, but he never understood the extent to which Marxism and it’s variants had become religions as well. That failure, that religion can come in more forms than the standard theological model, greatly weakened his book God is Not Great. Finally, his knowledge of economics was nil and I honestly don’t believe he understood how politics works. Alas, few do.
Anyway, I agree he will be missed. I’ve defended him in the past and may even have occasion to do so again. Good-bye Mr. Hitchins and thanks for all the help.
I don’t really care what anyone here thinks of me, but as a hospice nurse having helped people take their last breaths before leaving earth, even as recently as last Wednesday night, and possibly, quite probably tonight with another patient, I make a point to tell them as they lay dying, “Jesus loves you more then any of us could ever imagine, and he doesn’t care what you did in your past. All he cares about is that you ask him to come into your heart before you walk with him. You will walk with him, but you need to ask him into your heart before you do….” I give all glory and thanks to Him alone who tells me to tell my patients this, and I truly wish I’d gotten the chance to tell Mr. Hitchens…..if anyone is offended by my thinking that God loves them, then I continue to pray that God has mercy on your soul.
regarding last-minute conversions, I would refer people to Matthew 20: 1-16 (The Parable of the Laborers) – ending with the enigmatic “Thus the last shall be first, and the first shall be last.”
I always liked Hitchens, especially when he was defending Bush’s War on Terrorism. I knew he was an atheist, but I always hoped he would find God. There is some quote from somewhere which says, “Once he you have begun to seek for God, you’ve already found Him.” In his arguments against Faith, perhaps Hitchens was seeking God.
I try to leave the judging to God regarding salvation. I hope to meet Mr. Hitchens in Heaven, if it be God’s will.
He disappeared in the dead of winter:
The brooks were frozen, the airports almost deserted,
The snow disfigured the public statues;
The mercury sank in the mouth of the dying day.
What instruments we have agree
The day of his death was a dark cold day.
Far from his illness
The wolves ran on through the evergreen forests,
The peasant river was untempted by the fashionable quays;
By mourning tongues
The death of the poet was kept from his poems.
But for him it was his last afternoon as himself,
An afternoon of nurses and rumours;
The provinces of his body revolted,
The squares of his mind were empty,
Silence invaded the suburbs,
The current of his feeling failed; he became his admirers.
Now he is scattered among a hundred cities
And wholly given over to unfamiliar affections,
To find his happiness in another kind of wood
And be punished under a foreign code of conscience.
The words of a dead man
Are modified in the guts of the living.
But in the importance and noise of to-morrow
When the brokers are roaring like beasts on the floor of the Bourse,
And the poor have the sufferings to which they are fairly accustomed,
And each in the cell of himself is almost convinced of his freedom,
A few thousand will think of this day
As one thinks of a day when one did something slightly unusual.
What instruments we have agree
The day of his death was a dark cold day.
–W. H. Auden
The man was a vile leftist that happened to agree with conservatives on ONE thing – the need to fight radical islam – and people here are fawning all over him.
GOOD RIDDANCE!!!!!
At the battleground where unmasked Good and Evil meet face to face, he chose the side of Good. He did it in defiance of most those who were ‘on his side.’
His thinking was screwed up with regard to socialism, but he would not bow to Great Evil when he could see it, even though it cost him to stand against it.
In the Great Balance Of All Things, that matters a great deal.
Sheesh, and I thought I was critical of the man. So I thought I might add this in the interest of balance. It comes from the NR site (Jonah Goldberg if you must know) and while it was only one paragraph of his remembrance of Mr. Hitchens, I confess I rather liked it.
With all due respect he saw islam for what it is and the threat it posed to his liberal worldview. Please, the man was Bill Maher with a British accent.
The death of any admitted unbeliever is sad to believing Christians, but also a powerful example of God’s sovereign justice.
A good friend of mine once said “hell is truth learned too late.” I believe Mr. Hitchens has experienced this already.
Matthew 7:1 Do not judge, or you too will be judged.
OTOH
Mathew 7:23 I will tell them plainly, “I never knew you.”
If you are a Christian then you must believe that Mr. Hitchens was a fool, playing a foolish game, and propagating a message of doom. Inasmuch as he might have swung some people to his way of thinking, what is there to rejoice in his life?
To see anyone play a foolish game with their soul is heartbreaking; to see them advocate doom to others is infuriating.
I am an American, and I defend his right to be a fool.
But I don’t advocate it, even after he is called to reckoning for his actions.
May God have mercy on his soul, and I mean that sincerely.
Sadly, I’ve seen too many intelligent people considier themselves so self-reliant they have no need of a Savior. It’s their choice of course. But there is a special shame for those who try to convert others into the atheist death-wish. A very recent interview of Hitchens by Richard Dawkins proves my point, but I will not link it because it is in an atheist publication.
I have always been told and I do believe that we will be surprised of who is in heaven when we die and who isn’t.
Because I liked Hitchens (though I’m a rather Christian Conservative), and I always want to say this to Atheists (and Communists), if there is no God, then what does anything matter? Why bother arguing against Christianity? We’re all going to die and that’s the end, if there is no God. As Dostoyevsky wrote, “If there is no God, then all things are permissable.” If one believes there is no God, how can one argue that there is a right or wrong? Or even a reason for arguing…
As for judging, we are not to judge anyone’s soul. That is for God to decide, he knows the heart. We most certainly may judge actions. Such as: the advocation of atheism is, at best, a risky venture.
As far as judging is concerned, the Savior AND JUDGE of mankind has already revealed judgement as He emphatically states on the Gospel of John: “He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the [fn]only begotten Son of God.” (3:18).
Here’s a note from Mr Berlinsky, titled: A Flower of Chivalry: Berlinski on Hitchens, 1949-2011
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/12/a_flower_of_chi054271.html