I write in response to Leah Hitchens' September 18 column, titledThrow away your television-influenced religious views. Ever since I was attentive enough to join in intelligent conversations that buzz around me about religion, God or the nature of the universe, I have observed two pretty cohesive camps that do not represent the intellectual breadth of religion, but who tend to be loudest and most visible: those who take religious dialogue seriously, and those who deride religious dialogue as a waste of time. The waste of time mentality occurs on both sides of the debate
as those who are religiously orthodox don't like much asking of questions and those who are fervently irreligious find the whole concept of religion somewhat of a ridiculous concept to consider. I, like any other decent 20-year-old, am enough of a libertine to enjoy going without pants as much as possible, and yes, I do not attend church services. But I am also in the process of engaging with difficult questions in this university setting and have a number of conclusions concerning this false dichotomy.
Leah Hitchens' column tries to be in the camp that likes religious dialogue. It tries very hard, in fact. I too think that religion should be taken a little more seriously both by the faithful and the unfaithful, avoiding unnecessary descents into yes/no theology that makes half of the population evil for not worshipping God or the whole dumb/smart trope, which militant atheists frequently use to make themselves appear the pinnacle of the evolutionary ladder. Intelligence, someone once remarked, is the ability to see two differing or even opposing concepts and not to become angry. Furthermore, a favorite professor and former dean of mine once told all her students that we are to respect the conundrum and not to avoid the larger questions, the begging questions, those considerations that rob us of sleep. And it is with this mentality, devoid of judgement, superiority complexes, righteousness, or a sense of monopoly over the truth that any respectable religious dialogue must occur. I am not the only resident of the city who believes this.
Unfortunately, Ms. Hitchens' column fails to avoid picking one of the nastier camps. It is clear to me, and to other readers as well, that the true intent of the column was not at all to defend the dignity of religion, as it claims to do. Instead, Ms. Hitchens promotes her own religious views as though they were the strictest fact, throwing in her lot with the don't ask questions camp. I apologize for the implication that this makes Ms. Hitchens incurious or close-minded; I simply follow the wording of the column. Labelling the distinct historical possibility that Christ was married (confusing the Gospels with history is a grievous error) as a work of fiction does nothing to promote the cause of religion as a dignified undertaking, while simply putting Ms. Hitchens' beliefs at the theological crux of the letter. Might I also remind Ms. Hitchens that it's religion that is increasingly turning to media, leading to The 700 Club and televangelist radio and television to promote the Word to a wider audience. On a technical note, Marxism did not exist at the time of the French Revolution, and unless the question is a retrospective, it's a misleading one. It is the dogmatic inflexibility of those poor few who often usurp the microphone that gives faith a bad name, not its visibility in the public sphere. In the future, I hope that Ms. Hitchens' well-intended columns may do more to bring about a wider, non-Christian interfaith dialogue and do more to avoid simply preaching a strictly Christian message from a paper pulpit.
Jesse Pyle is a junior studying English.
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Opinion
Letter to the Editor
