During my University years a flurry of atheist books came out. Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and of course Christopher Hitchens came out with polemics against religion. I picked up a copy of God is Not Great and read it through. Hitchens could write really well and he sure could argue. He was not afraid to take any position, no matter how unpopular, even amongst his fellow atheists.
A few months ago I heard about a book that had just been released. It was called The Faith of Christopher Hitchens. It was written by Larry Taunton, an Evangelical who had befriended Hitchens, organized some of his debates and even debated him himself. A friend told me that it was very good and that I should pick it up. Busy with other things, I forgot about it and moved on.
A few days ago, I ran across a YouTube video of an interview. Eric Metaxas was interviewing Larry Taunton about the The Faith of Christopher Hitchens. About a quarter of the way through the interview I turned it off. I didn’t want to hear any more. I was hooked and off to the bookstore.
Taunton gives some of the background of Christopher’s life then goes on telling about his friendship with this famous atheist. Early in the book, on page 29, Taunton wrote: “The public and private Christophers did not match.” In public he was the worlds most famous atheist and anti-theist but in private he was a completely different man. He certainly didn’t agree with his fellow atheists on a lot of things whether it be the ethics of Peter Singer, gay marriage, abortion, the war in Iraq or many other issues. Hitchens on occasion referred to himself as a “Protestant Atheist”. I simply thought this was a former protestant who became atheist and retained some vague cultural protestant ethics. That’s not at all what it means. There is a whole deeper meaning to that phrase.
Taunton unpacks his friendship with Hitchens. He tells about the deep conversations they had, the road trips they took together and yes, the Bible study they did together.
One thing that Taunton brings up in the book is Hitchens disdain for liberal religion. He respected Taunton because he believed his faith fully. Hitchens had no respect for liberal, watered down, ecumenical based religion. To be honest, I think that most thinking people don’t. I certainly don’t and would be happy to agree with Hitchens on that point.
I’ve tried to be as spoiler free as possible for this review. At several points during this book my jaw dropped with what I read. Yours will as well.
Christopher Hitchens is gone. He left behind a great corpus of writing and a personality that one can hardly forget. What Taunton gave us was a side to Christopher that few saw. He was able to dig through much of the public image and media hype and see the man behind God is Not Great. This book is a must for anyone who has ever read any of his writings or watched his debates. There is certainly more to Hitchens than most people think.
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