In his book. The Rage Against God, Peter Hitchens make three points which make the book, not new, worth reading.
The first is that those atheists who "hate God" and all religion, including, sadly, his late brother Christopher, do not believe that Christianity makes a difference in the world, or even that altruism is possible.
Peter makes a good case, despite failures, for the goodness which comes out of people who sacrifice their comforts for others, such as the husband or wife, taking care of a very ill or even mentally disturbed mate.
That this altruism is denied reveals a darkness in the heart of the atheist, who does not want to believe that men and women can achieve a holiness or extremely honourable lifestyle.
Connected to this idea, in the book, is the rather simple idea, which I see in Gramsci, who is never mentioned in the book, but responsible for many of the ideas seen in Lenin and Stalin or Lukacs (who I studied in college), and others, that violence and the complete lack of ethics are needed for so-called atheistic regimes to succeed.
Of course, we know that tyranny must be sustained by violence over the desire for freedom, but Hitchens insight that these people choose to be violent, believe totally in violence and do not care if they must perpetrate it should help all those who deny the violence of certain groups today understand that there are really evil people who want to build their lives on violence.
A nice, but simple idea which needs to be applied today....
The third idea which caught my attention and which is stated with clarity in Gramsci, is the "Systematic Malice" of atheistic regimes.
We are facing that malice now in many Western countries.
For those not inclined to read the more meaty and basic sources of these excellent ideas summarized and defined by Hitchens, such as reading Gramsci, this book of his is a good start.
Christians who are naive cannot be the Church Militant.
It is part of our present generations love of so-called progressivism which makes many people not want to admit that there are evil people and they really do hate God and His People.
The sadness of Christopher's passing in 2010 is that he could not come to believe in the reality of goodness.
