Tim Challies reviews the The Dawkins Delusion? by Alister McGrath and Joanna Collicutt McGrath. Dawkins, of course is the author of The God Delusion - perhaps the best of the current atheist tracts. An excerpt from the review:
Rather than writing what would be a dry, exhaustive and exhausting point-by-point rebuttal, McGrath replies simply by challenging him "at representative points" and then allowing readers to draw their own conclusions about the overall reliability of Dawkins's evidence and judgment. After all, "Religion to Dawkins is like a red flag to a bull - evoking not merely an aggressive response but one that throws normal scholarly conventions about scrupulous accuracy and fairness to the winds." If Dawkins really does engage in such poor argumentation, McGrath should have an easy task. He says also, "Dawkins simply offers the atheist equivalent of slick hellfire preaching, substituting turbocharged rhetoric and highly selective manipulation of facts for careful, evidence-based thinking. Curiously, there is surprisingly little scientific analysis in The God Delusion. There's a lot of pseudoscientific speculation, linked with wider cultural criticisms of religion, mostly borrowed from older atheist writings. Dawkins preaches to his god-hating choirs, who are clearly expected to relish his rhetorical salvoes and raise their hands high in adulation." And so McGrath sets out to do just one thing: to assess the reliability of Dawkins's critique of faith in God.Book Review - The Dawkins Delusion? :: Challies Dot Com
He launches a four-pronged attack and the chapter titles tell the story: Deluded About God?; Has Science Disproved God?; What are the Origins of Religion?; Is Religion Evil?. Those who have read The God Delusion will recognize in these headings core components of Dawkins’s argument against religion and against God. ....
Jim,
ReplyDeleteThe God Delusion is the book I was trying to remember during the Friday afternoon conversation. I heard a sermon recently in which the speaker countered the book. You can listen to it online at http://www.woodmenvalley.org/index.cfm/PageID/218/cfid/2136735/cftoken/48036396/index.html and click on The True Story of Jesus.
Linda
Linda,
ReplyDeleteI've been listening. It's pretty good. Our faith means nothing if it is not based on reality and on things that really happened. The sermon is found here: http://www.woodmenvalley.org/images/images_WVC/LovingLife_GospelofJohn_Pt13_MHeard_22Jul07.m3u
Jim,
ReplyDeleteI realized after I had posted that the web address gets cut off because it's so long. So I'm glad you were able to find the sermon.
Linda