Mr. Hitchens asks the question about Rick Warren: "do we want these weirdos and creeps officiating in any capacity at the inauguration of the next president of the United States?" This is a curious question. Leaders like Rick Warren have been officiating at inaugurations since Washington's NY inaugural, and for nearly two centuries before Washington and the Republic at other similar public ceremonies. At their founding, many States in the Union drafted official covenants between the said State and the God who Rick Warren proclaims. It was a group of "weirdos and creeps" who set sail to Plymouth Rock from Holland to escape the religious persecution in their home of England. Their DNA is the seed of our nation's conception.

As for the question of equality of persons in Rick Warren's theology, Mr. Hitchen's misunderstands it. Rick Warren's contention from the Bible is that all people are of equal value and the "imago dei" (the image of God) is imprinted on their very being (no Jew or Gentile, male of female, slave or free, has an advantage). Because God loves all equally and each is so valuable, the belief goes, He came to humankind in His Son, to redeem all because people are plagued by a fatal disease of the soul called sin. But, these equally-valuable-people have been given an exquisite treasure: freedom -- the freedom to accept God's Son or reject Him. Either way, they then must accept the consequences of their decision when they finally stand before God. This theology is odious to millions of people, especially to those who believe in no god at all -- it has always has been odious to some (Jesus was killed because it). But not liking these propositions is not the same as contending that certain people are better than others. Rick Warren's theology states that salvation is a gift of grace and cannot be earned by either pedigree, intelligence or good works.

One of the questions that should be asked of everyone is, however: "What have your belief's wrought?" What fruit have your convictions born? Rick Warren's ilk has been among the most magnanimous in history. The story of Lord Anthony Ashley Cooper, the Seventh Earl of Shaftsbury (for whom Shaftsbury Street in London was named and the monument eros erected in Trafalgar Square), or, perhaps William Wilberforce come to mind. These men devoted their lives to people no one else wanted or cared about. Both men are from Mr. Hitchen's country of origin, and both espoused the same theology that Mr Hitchens finds so odious in Rick Warren. What Warren has been doing among the African poor, especially, and other Americans, domestically, is in the same vein.

Mr. Hitchen's is free to believe anything he wishes about certain theists, but "weirdos and creeps" is hyperbole.

Like "manifest destiny" isn't creepy.

It was a group of "weirdos and creeps" who set sail to Plymouth Rock from Holland to escape the religious persecution in their home of England

YES BUT !…………And this is something that I myself have only recently begun to understand the totality of . As a result of researching my Puritan ancestors who arrived in 1630 with the Winthrop fleet .

Talk about turning my #uckin world upside down……

The Pilgrims for the most part got along with the Indians of Massachusett.

The Pilgrims purchased land and lived with the permission of the Indians all around and seemingly between the two for a while, all was well. They were not enemies.

The following Wikipedia information , interestingly enough, I just assembled last night to prepare and print for a relative.

Long story short- my relatives could have been delighted to have been described as ‘weirdoes and creeps’ knowing goddamn well that the description was entirely all too charitable.

The man who I am related to who arrived from England all those years ago, Bible in hand, interestingly enough , was named Christopher and Avery.

Now for this………………..

Squanto (or Tisquantum)

Main article: Squanto

One of the earlier contacts between the Wampanoag and Europeans dates from the 16th century, when merchant vessels and fishing boats traveled along the coast of present-day New England. Captains of merchant vessels captured Native Americans and sold them as slaves in order to increase their earnings. For example, Captain Thomas Hunt captured several Wampanoag after enticing them aboard his vessel in 1614. He later sold them in Spain as slaves. One of his victims, a Patuxet named Squanto (or Tisquantum), was bought by Spanish monks, who attempted to convert him. Eventually he was set free, and despite his prior experiences he boarded an English ship again in order to accompany an expedition to Newfoundland as a translator. From Newfoundland he made his way back to his homeland in 1619, only to discover that the entire Patuxet tribe, and with them, his family, had fallen victim to an epidemic.[13]

In 1620, religious separatists and others from England who are known today as "Pilgrims" arrived in present-day Plymouth, where Squanto, along with other Wampanoags, taught the starving Pilgrims how to cultivate corn, farm squash and beans, catch fish, and collect seafood.[14]

In March 1621 Massasoit visited Plymouth, accompanied by Squanto. He signed an alliance which gave the English permission to take about 12,000 acres (49 km²) of land for Plymouth Plantation. However, it is very doubtful that Massasoit understood the differences between land ownership in the European sense, compared with the native people's manner of using the land.[citation needed] At the moment, this was not particularly significant, because so many of Massasoit's people had died that their traditional lands were significantly depopulated. Furthermore, it was impossible for the Wampanoag to suspect that the few English, who had barely lived through the winter, could ever be a danger to them.[citation needed]

Expansion of the Colonists

Seal of Plymouth Colony

After 1630, the members of Plymouth Colony found themselves becoming a minority, due to the growing number of Puritans arriving and settling near present-day Boston. Barely tolerant of other Christians denominations, the Puritans largely viewed the native peoples as savages and heathens. They were also soldiers and traders, who had little interest in friendship or cooperation with the Indians. Under this new leadership, the English expanded westwards into the Connecticut River Valley, and in 1637 they destroyed the powerful Pequot Confederation

Between 1640 and 1675 new waves of settlers arrived, and they continued to force the native peoples westward. While the Pilgrims had normally paid for the land, or had at least asked for permission, most Puritans simply took the land for themselves. In 1665 the Indians of southern New England were simply in the way of the English. They did not desire the ability to survive in the wilderness. Catching fish and the trading of commodities had replaced the colonists’ trading of furs and wampum from previous years. The population of the native peoples continued to decline, due to recurring epidemics in 1633, 1635, 1654, 1661 and 1667.[13]

King Philip's War

Main article: King Philip's War

On July 20, 1675 some young Wampanoags trekked to Swansea, killed some cattle, and scared the white settlers. The next day King Philip's War broke out, and the Indians attacked a number of white settlements and burned them to the ground. The unexpected attacks caused great panic among the English. The united tribes in southern New England were successful as well: of 90 English settlements, 52 were attacked and partially burned down.[22]

At the outbreak of the war, many pro-English Native Americans had offered to fight against King Philip and his allies, serving as warriors, scouts, advisers and spies. However, mistrust and hostility caused the English to eventually discontinue Native American services, even though they were invaluable in the war.

Philip only barely escaped capture, but among the prisoners taken were his wife and their nine-year-old son. They were taken onto a ship in Plymouth and sold as slaves in the West Indies. On August 12, 1676, English troops surrounded Philip's camp, and shortly thereafter he was shot and killed. His head was cut off and for 20 years it was displayed on a pike in Plymouth.[22]

Rick Warren is a weirdo and a creep, to say the #ucking least.

Be he a Pilgrim or be he a Puritan, I don’t give a shit.

He’s a #ucking hater.

1. You can't even prove Jesus existed, let alone give empirical proof of your god. So your theological arguments are exercises in imagination solely.

2. The Pilgrims were religious fundamentalists and lunatics, or in the terms of this article, weirdos and creeps. Their policies are only tangentially related to the Constitution, and quite probably, the Pilgrims would have found the Constitution to be blasphemy.

3. So your belief is that your god gives us Hobson's Choice-- no choice at all. "Love me, or I'll hurt you?" You, and your beliefs, are weird and creepy.

4. Warren is offensive because he produces his own facts and vomits them to his sheep, such as his assertion that homosexuality is comparable to pedophilia. His lies promote bigotry and he is, to quote Hitchens, a weirdo and a creep.

5. Doing good things does not balance out doing bad things, I hate to tell you. Your moral subjectivity disgusts me, and should disgust any thinking person.

Calm down. Some persons have found empirical evidence of the evidence of God. You're right about Rick Warren and his ilk, however. These are snake oil salesmen of the lowest kind.

Really. And what is this empirical evidence? Because I'm sure that scientists would be glad to hear about it.

Two things:

Rick Warren's theology states that salvation is a gift of grace and cannot be earned by either pedigree, intelligence or good works.

One of the questions that should be asked of everyone is, however: "What have your belief's wrought?" What fruit have your convictions born?

hmmm, isn't this the fundamental contradiction of protestantism? That is, if "salvation" is not a consequence of "good works", then why would any rational believer perform such acts? I have no idea what motivated Shaftsbury or Wilberforce, but one suspects that Warren's motivations are directly related to his remuneration, since he is already "saved". But how does one come to know that one is "saved"?

As James Joyce said apropos of converting from Catholicism to Protestantism: "why forsake an absurdity which is logical and coherent for one which is illogical and incoherent".

Three things:

1. Yes we can prove that Jesus existed (there is a large body of work, both religious and non-religious, dedicated to this), even if his divinity is in dispute.

2. The fact that God can't be proven empirically only proves that God can't be proven empirically, not that he doesn't exist. There are plenty of things that can't be proven empirically but we don't discard them on that fact alone - we recognize the limits of empiricism (and our own theories, scientific or not) and keep striving to find ways to understand them.

3. I also dislike religious fundamentalists (and the Religious Right in particular), but I would venture to argue that some of Zeugitai's statements could constitude atheist fundamentalism (which, contrary as it sounds, is real).

1. You can say anything you want, but there is no contemporary records of a rabble-rouser named Jesus of Nazareth. Neither the Jews, nor the Romans, nor anybody else, recorded his existence. The only records of him come from a group that claimed he was god. You can see the inherent problem of believing them as a facual source, yes?

2. Oho? What things in our universe can't be observed or experimented upon? The only things I can think of are imaginary characters, like gods.

3. Yes, Jessica. Because refusing to tolerate morons who attempt insert their fairy-tale beliefs onto objective reality is fundamentalism.

Yes we can prove that Jesus existed (there is a large body of work, both religious and non-religious, dedicated to this), even if his divinity is in dispute.

Apart from the dubious and contradictory accounts in the 4 gospels of the New Testatment, what is this "large body of work" (particularly the "non-religious" component)? Before framing your answer, I'd suggest strongly that you check Bart Ehrman's "Misquoting Jesus", a fascinating exegesis of biblical textuality.

obak - 'As for the question of equality of persons in Rick Warren's theology, Mr. Hitchen's misunderstands it.'

I beleive you are addressing this part of Hitchen's article;

'However, the man he has chosen to deliver his inaugural invocation is a relentless clerical businessman who raises money on the proposition that certain Americans—non-Christians, the wrong kind of Christians, homosexuals, nonbelievers—are of less worth and littler virtue than his own lovely flock of redeemed and salvaged and paid-up donors.'

I think Hitchen's point was that, based on Warren's theology, these people have less worth to God, or at least their souls do after they die.

'the freedom to accept God's Son or reject Him.'

I'm not sure that the people who follow Warren's theology understand the oddity of this equation to those who don't.

Here's an analogy for you.

I tell you my favorite movie is '2001: A Space Odyssey'. You then tell me that my favorite movie needs to be 'The Godfather' (with book in hand saying such, if it helps) or my soul will not go to heaven.

This is not a matter of acceptance or rejection. I've viewed both movies multiple times. I've had discussions about both movies with multiple people. You could have me watch each a hendred more times and my affection for '2001' would only increase.

So, if I believe you, and wish for my soul to continue on 'The Godfater' has to become my favorite movie.

I see only one way to do this. Lie to myself.

1. The methods of determing the existence of Jesus of Nazareth are the same as they are for any historical figure - the historical method is hardly some plot cooked up by the religious right to prove a point. It's untrue to claim that Jesus never existed. Or at the very least, it requires overlooking decades/centuries of religious and non-religious study of texts, carvings and art, the nature of religious devotion, etc. Again, while his divinity is in dispute (among academics and laypersons), his existence is not.

2. Not to get sappy on you but - love? And contrary to what you claim, the universe in its entirety has hardly been 'proven empirically' (as any physicist will tell you) and so to say that everything in the universe can be 'experiemented' and 'tested upon' strikes me as exagerration, to say the least.

3. I would call it just as much a 'fairy-tale' belief to think that we know everything about the universe, it's origins, our reason for being here, science, nature, humanity, etc. Science takes faith too, strange as it sounds.

There are many people - all smarter than me - who have dedicated their academic career to the philosophy of religion. All I'm saying is that black and white statements found on either side of the religious debates are inaccurate and unhelpful. I don't believe the things I've said are extreme or inflexible - I'm simply saying that the nature of religion, God and faith, is a much more open, dynamic concept than many people (who may only have a cursory knowledge of the subject) assert. There is room for discussion and debate on either side, something that has been happening for centuries. This is not simple topic and it can't just be written off as childish fairy-tale.

The fact that God can't be proven empirically only proves that God can't be proven empirically, not that he doesn't exist. There are plenty of things that can't be proven empirically but we don't discard them on that fact alone - we recognize the limits of empiricism (and our own theories, scientific or not) and keep striving to find ways to understand them.

Most people don't understand just how much they're giving up when they say "God can't be proven". Science is a tool built for evaluating evidence. If you define something, anything, that God or Prayer does, then it's probably possible to bring science to bear and see if that's true or not.

So... let's say I have a heart attack. Question: "Should I pray?" (i.e. would it help me in *any* way to pray to God?)

If the answer is "Yes", then you've just proven the existence of God... so the expected answer is "no", there should be no statistical difference or advantaged gained.

The same holds true for pretty much anything where we can gather any statistics. If praying for God's protection did anything for us then it would show up in the statistics, but it doesn't.

So when you say "God can't be proven" you're also saying "God doesn't do anything that has any statistical effect on humanity".

The methods of determing the existence of Jesus of Nazareth are the same as they are for any historical figure - the historical method is hardly some plot cooked up by the religious right to prove a point. It's untrue to claim that Jesus never existed. Or at the very least, it requires overlooking decades/centuries of religious and non-religious study of texts, carvings and art, the nature of religious devotion, etc. Again, while his divinity is in dispute (among academics and laypersons), his existence is not.

I'll reframe my previous question: where is the textual evidence (apart from Matthew, Mark et al.) for the existence of Jesus Christ? What is the basis of the historicity of this individual? The fact that there may be centuries of "religious and non-religious study of texts" isn't sufficient evidence; after all, the ancient Greeks spent the better part of a thousand years studying the goings-on of Zeus and the gang on Mount Olympus, and I remain unconvinced as to the existence of those "immortals". Why is the account of the life of Jesus Christ in the gospel of John deserving of more credibility than the account of the life of Apollo in Homer's Iliad?