I wanted to wait a while before writing about the genuine sadness I felt when I heard about the death of Christopher Hitchens. He was a great writer, a man who understood how to paint a picture with words, and as an Englishman who cared deeply for the United States-probably saw the politics in that country with more clarity than many "native Americans" did. Not that he was 100% right all the time-his endorsement of the Iraq war and Bush's misguided "freedom agenda" are calls he got very wrong. But even when wrong-he was eloquent. And more importantly he could carry an argument on the strength of his words-even when the strength of his ideas-were prone to disagreement.
Now those who hated Hitchens-really hated him. I think primarily, because his ability to be contrary , just really annoyed them-and so rather than take on the arguments he made on merit, they chose to attack him personally. Especially after 2007 when he published his book, "God is not Great" wherein he laid to waste a lot of deeply held beliefs of others. The assholes among us-would say he got his just desserts. What they fail to realize is that we are all poorer for not having his insight and erudition. What people never realized, as one writer expressed in a eulogy, was that :
It would be easy to simply say that nobody is perfect and dismiss Hitchens’ support for some nasty right-wing causes as blemishes in an otherwise admirable career, but that would not do the man sufficient justice. While many of his political positions were mistakes, the important thing to take away from his stalwart defense of them is that Hitchens never pandered to an audience. Having arrived at his positions through careful moral deliberation, Hitchens would aggressively advocate for them until either his goals were achieved, or further deliberation caused him to change his mind. Hitchens would not hesitate to alienate his existing fans if he thought it would be necessary to do so in order to confront injustice. Today, when most newspaper columnists appear to simply express positions calculated to best corner the market potential of a particular slice of the political spectrum, Hitchens’ approach is more needed than ever, even if it makes us angry from time to time.
Furthermore, Hitchens relished the role and meanings of words and speech-in a way that most of us can only wish we could attain. He found-in his arguments ways to praise those he disagreed with-even when most of us could not. Otherwise, how could he have written some of his praise of the King James Bible, while being totally skeptical of the contents therein?
In a way that seems odd to me-but totally on context with American thinking-people remain fixated with Hitchen's atheism. I actually find it totally understandable-even if I don't come to the same conclusions that he did. As my Canadian counterpart wrote:
Under no circumstances would I associate myself with anyone running around Africa and telling the locals that AIDS was bad, but condoms were worse, so I quit. But I would never presume to say that Church's position wasn't biblically sanctioned because it is. I just happen to believe that the sanction is moronic and demonstrably lethal to the most vulnerable people on earth. If you believe that "God hates fags", you sure as shit better not have a tattoo while doing so because that just happens to be the next verse in Leviticus.
Essentially, that's what God is Not Great is about. If you wrap yourself in some supernatural, superstitious ceremony, you should also be called to account for the true – and sometimes breathtakingly so – evil that's done in it's name. If the world was populated with rational adults, rather than overly tall children, that book would not have been as controversial as it was.
The facts are the facts. And the facts are that the Catholic Church didn't renounce the biblical interpretation that the Jews were responsible for the murder of Christ – the basis of 1,000 years of Christian-propagated pogroms – until Vatican II, seventeen years after the Holocaust ended. And, to my way of thinking, that's more than enough reason to renounce Christianity.
I personally believe that Hitchens' non-belief was prompted by his anger at God's non-interventionism, which in the face of the tremendous amount of suffering in the world-is a rather reasonable and moral position. Hitchens expressed his sheer surprise at this irrationality by denying the existence of God. There he and I part ways. I firmly believe in God-but I also acknowledge that-when it came to Deities-mankind lost the toss, and got one that was more than happy to be vindictive and unfair. As has been acknowledged in other texts-the Bible does a very poor job explaining suffering. But the fact that it does-does not lessen the possibility that God exists, rather that-like Lucy-He's still got a lot of explaining to do. In that regard the Gospels are a little light. Hitchens took the path of refusal. I prefer that of resigned acceptance-with just a tinge of resentment that he does not intervene to fix our problems. I think that elsewhere on the other inhabited planets-there are deities using their godlike powers to help the mortal members of that planet's population. It just is not happening here. And that's kind of the point, He can do that whether we like it or not-only God is God.
But it still does not lessen my admiration of a man who could express his contempt so eloquently-and with a biting wit and cutting language. In the face of his demise-he wrote words that were simply brilliant. Borrowing from the Canadian Counterpart again:
One can't truly appreciate Christopher Hitchens without exploring the way he conducted the last 18 months of his life. Instead of engaging on a maudlin celebration of his own mortality, Hitchens instead used his esophageal cancer as a point of intellectual exploration, especially in his Vanity Fair column. If you read anything today, it should be "Topic of Cancer" and his most recent essay "Trial of the Will."
It was on the topic of his own mortal illness that he truly broke through a journalist, and produced some of his most beautiful writing. There was no sentimentality or self-pity in those columns, particularly "Trial of the Will", published just a week before his death. It was an intellectual and philosophical exploration on what it is to die, written by someone who was in the process of doing just that. "Tuesdays With Morrie" it wasn't.
We are all much poorer for his loss. And for the nitwits who criticize him even in death-well, that just confirms they are nitwits. Your time is coming."It didn't matter if you agreed with him or not because he was smarter than you are and would argue circles around you. Even when he was wrong, he could make a persuasive case that he was right. That isn't normally the job of a journalist, but it is the raison d'etre of a writer. "
And above all else. more than I can ever hope to be-Hitchens was a writer.
God rest you and give you peace.
And yes-its perfectly fine for a believer to wish that -as we should for all men. For those who don't believe that-I have nothing but contempt. I just wish I could express that contempt as well as he did.