INTERNET SOURCE: http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2010/July/Atheism-Aside-Peter-Hitchens-Journey-to-Faith/
Atheism Aside: Peter Hitchens' Journey to Faith
LONDON
- One of Britain's most famous journalists and outspoken atheists Peter
Hitchens has become a Christian.
His
new-found faith has led to a very public literary debate with his older brother
Christopher, who does not share his brother's belief in God.
Christopher,
a very outspoken atheist and an American citizen, has written the book God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons
Everything.
In
response, Peter, columnist for the London
Mail on Sunday and a former atheist and Marxist revolutionary, has
just written a book titled The Rage
Against God: How Atheism Led Me to Faith.
The Battling Hitchens Brothers
The
siblings, who've been dubbed "The Battling Hitchens brothers," came
from a family with a Christian heritage. Their grandfather was a devout
Baptist.
"He
was a very strict Baptist," Peter told CBN News. "His wife, my
paternal grandmother who I never knew, was an Anglican of a Protestant type. It
was an extremely religiously conscious household."
Peter
said relations between the two brothers are cool. This interview
took place before it was announced that Christopher has developed
cancer.
"I
think it's typical of quite a lot of younger older brother relations. We don't
get on particularly well," Peter said, adding that he and Christopher
fought often as children.
Peter
has suggested that Christopher spends so much time debating and attacking
religion that he is actually a "repressed seeker." Christopher,
however, has denied the claim.
For
all their public dueling, Peter said the two haven't recently spoken privately
about faith.
"I
don't think I could be bothered to discuss it with him in private, to be
honest," Peter said. "I don't think I'd get anything different in
private than I get in public."
"I
express the hope in the book that he'll stop assuming that religion poisons
everything and that everyone who believes in God is stupid," Peter said.
"I don't ask for any more."
"There's
a difficulty: if you take a public position, a very public position, then you
brick yourself up in a tower and it's got arrow slits instead of windows. You
can chuck missiles out of it, but you can't get out yourself," Peter
observed.
Life as an Atheist
Peter
told CBN News that during his time as an atheist, he rarely had doubts about
his unbelief.
"Not
for a long time. No. We were armored against. We were full of our own
righteousness," he explained. "We knew what was right. We knew we
were right. We knew we were good. We defined our own goodness."
The
former Marxist revolutionary wrote in his book that as an atheist, he didn't
have any Christian friends - and didn't want any.
"I
wouldn't have wanted any," he said. "I found the whole thing
repellent."
"There
is a lot of scorn in revolutionary socialism," he explained. "There's
a lot of scorn for the people who aren't up for it. There is a lot of scorn for
the people who are opposed to it. There's a feeling that you are the vanguard
and you know best, and everyone else is ignorant and stupid."
"You
see that scorn in the new atheists, in the way they treat their opponents - not
with any kind of respect at all," he continued. "They still act as if
Christianity is a kind of stupid aberration that only an idiot could
follow."
Too Late for Britain?
Although
Peter has returned to Christ, Great Britain largely has not. Church attendance
is low and atheists have conducted public campaigns against faith. Peter said
it may be too late for a revival of Christianity in Britain.
"I'm
not allowed to despair, but if I were allowed to, I would," he said.
"It's gone a long way. Christianity has been very badly damaged
here."
"Huge
numbers of people don't know anything about it at all, who don't know the Bible
stories, who've never opened a Bible, who don't know the Bible, have never been
inside a church, have no conception of what Christianity is or means," he
said.
So
how does this man of faith feel about having led others to become
atheists?
"Obviously
you look back on this and you think, 'Well, I've changed my mind, but the other
people whom I have influenced have lives of their own and their thoughts have
taken on a life of their own," he said. "But ultimately because I
persuaded them, it's my fault. It's one of those things for which there is no
real path back."
Peter's Journey Back to Faith
In
his book, Peter said his return to Christianity was a process over many years.
He writes about a moment in his journey back to faith when, as an atheist, he
genuinely feared God.
It was when he gazed on Rogier van der Weyden's painting "The Last Judgment," which shows the terror on the faces of those condemned to Hell.
It was when he gazed on Rogier van der Weyden's painting "The Last Judgment," which shows the terror on the faces of those condemned to Hell.
"They've
obviously just heard the last trump," Peter said. "And one of them
was actually vomiting with fright."
"And
it just came through that I might be judged. And I was scared. I still
am," he revealed. "One of my reasons for my change is that I am
scared. But then again, "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of
wisdom."
Originally broadcast July 23, 2010.
VIDEO INTERNET SOURCE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8LqfgKuXFs
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