Category Image Reactions to a book I'm reading


This isn't an entry about the book. I haven't finished reading it yet. It's just a comment about the title of the book and how people react when they ask me what I'm reading.



"God is Not Great" - How Religion Poisons Everything
by Christopher Hitchens.y

I always get the same reaction. The person drops their jaw when they read the title.

Makes me wish for a book cover. :)

Here's the text from the back cover.

From the author hailed as "one of the most brilliant journalists of our time" (London Observer) comes a book that redefines the debate about religion in public life. With his unique brand of erudition and wit, Christopher Hitchens addresses the most urgent issue of our time: the malignant force of religion in the world.

In this eloquent argument with the faithful, Hitchens makes the ultimate case against religion (and for a more secular approach to life) through a close and learned reading of the major religious texts, citing numerous historical instances in which sexual repression and outrageous acts of violence have been committed in the name of God.

Hitchens tells the personal story of his own dangerous encounters with religion and describes his intellectual journey toward a secular view of life based on science and reason, in which the heavens are replaced by the Hubble telescope's awesome view of the universe, and Moses and the burning bush give way to the beauty and symmetry of the double helix. "God did not make us," he wrtites. "We made God." Religion, he explains, is a distortion of our origins, our nature, and the cosmos. We damage our children -- and endanger our world -- by indoctrinating them.

Whether lifelong believer, devout atheist, or someone who remains uncertain about the role of religion in our lives, you will want to consider and engage in the arguments within this book, and you will not soon forget Hitchen's foreboding refrain: Religion Poisons Everything.

Posted: Wednesday - September 26, 2007 at 06:39 PM           |

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