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Hitchens, Peter. The Rage Against God: How Atheism Led Me to Faith. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2010. Pp. 224. The genre of this text is far from what I expected, and I believe that this is not going to be very exciting reading for many people who have an analytical, apologetic bent. The Rage Against God: How Atheism Led Me to Faith is more about Peter Hitchens' personal memoirs within the larger context of his youthful, atheistic worldview and how, finally, he slowly discovered that his worldview was no longer tenable. The book does not become apologetic until the middle of the book, and even then it is not the kind of hard-hitting, facts-based apologetics that one is accustomed to in other books on this topic. Furthermore, the text seems to exit the apologetic tone soon after its arrival. Hitchens writes at length about his time as a journalist in the Former Soviet Union, and he mentions some of his other travels (e.g., Mogadishu). His purpose for these accounts will be revealed later. The Rage Against God is written more like a novel sometimes and a history at other times than a non-fiction account revealing a spectacular conversion to Christianity (as the title leads the reader to expect). Peter Hitchens was born in October of 1951 in the United Kingdom. He is a British columnist and author. He has published five books. He is also a former resident correspondent in Moscow and Washington. However, possibly more important to the topic at hand is that fact that Peter is the younger brother of the well-known New Atheist Christopher Hitchens, author of God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, (Twelve, 2009). During his teenage years, Peter lost his childhood faith in Christ and rebelled against everything he had been brought up to believe. In his book, he provides an account of his spiritual journey back to God and the Christianity of his youth. Couched in narrative, this is a mildly interesting story of a man who expresses his lament of the death of the modernity that he was reared under as a child in Briton. But this is not simply a maudlin cry for a time past. Hitchens notes that within his glorious upraising were the hidden realities of war and death (and more). His childhood past, while wonderful and glorious to his youthful self, is now seen in the more severe light of mature understanding. His childhood patriotism, while still alive in the man, is revisited with a more mature eye and Hitchens notes that too often patriotism itself becomes a false religion, with the worship of certain war heroes and political heroes. Some of his country's patriotic songs compare the sacrifices of honorable soldiers with the sacrifice of Christ, and the author, rightfully, finds this disturbing. After his historical journey, he zeros in on three main arguments by what he calls Anti-theists (note the “against” as opposed to the simple "a"-theist): “that conflicts fought in the name of religion are always about religion; that it is ultimately possible to know with confidence what is right and what is wrong without acknowledging the existence of God; and that atheists states are not actually atheist” (p. 11). However, the book suffers from a loose-knit selection of personal journeys and situations. These selections did not seem to organically flow from one to the next. Thus, a serious problem with this book is the fact of the lack of organizational structure throughout most of its pages. It simply seems to jumps from place to place. A major concern that Hitchens has is with the third of his three rebuttals, “that atheists states [countries] are not actually atheist.” This is the claim that atheists make that the author is attempting to disprove. However--and this is part of the lack of organization in the book--he speaks of the Former Soviet Union throughout the book as an example of an atheist state that was, in fact, atheistic. More time is given to the Former Soviet Union than any other topic. For hose who have either studied the history of or are interested in Stalin, Lenin, Trotsky, et al. and the Former Soviet Union, this book is an interesting review of this atheist state. Hitchens argues that it was indeed an atheistic worldview that inextricably ran through the politics of these men and their Soviet Empire. I myself have studied such history, and I did indeed enjoy the review via Hitchens on this fascinating discussion. However, I can easily imagine that those without that background might not enjoy or properly understand the Former Soviet Union theme and its atheistic underpinnings that run throughout of the entirety of the book. Besides the Former Soviet Union theme, another issue that may be a problem for this text in the U.S. is that it has as its intended audience a United Kingdom readership. Britons will fair far better than American readers due to the many U.K. references to places and events (though I found that information quite interesting). Another factor that might limit the usefulness of this text is the fact that Hitchens speaks much of his childhood within a specific time context. Much of the first half of his book recalls events and societal issues that took place--and just how life felt--in the 50's and 60's, with impact still reverberating from Word War II. This may hamper younger readers from becoming fully engaged in the book simply because they will likely not be able to personally identify. Another man's history and how he felt growing up may be a hard sell to those who did not experience those same 50's and 60's. So, there are three looming issues that may hamper full reading engagement: (1) his nearly constant references to the Former Soviet Union, (2) written more for a UK audience, (3) and readers might need to be 50+ years old to "feel" his discussion of his childhood upbringing. Next, this book is difficult to classify since it does not seem to fit any single genre. One might expect (understandably from the title) a strong argument grounded in philosophical apologetics. What best describes it--as stated above--is that this book is Hitchens “personal memoirs within the larger context of his atheistic worldview and how, finally, his worldview was no longer tenable.” I was expecting more of a philosophical argumentation showing how atheism had lead him to faith in Christ. For those expecting to read a solid philosophical rebuttal of the atheism that Hitchens once embraced, they will be disappointed. I had hoped to hear a solid spoiling of the atheistic beliefs on issues involving such arguments as cosmology, teleology, or morality. Hitchens does deal with the moral argument, but again, not as an apologist. He deals with it in the fact that he lived in an atheistic state, the Former Soviet Union, and saw first hand the destruction and moral and ethical decay of a nation and of a people due to the lack of having a belief in a transcendent moral lawgiver. In the final analysis, this book seemed to be something of a soft apologetic. The apologetics are there, but you have to find them, uncover them, and think about them. Hitchens says early on in the book, “I want to explain how I became convinced, by reason and experience, of the necessity and rightness of a form of Christianity that is modest, accommodating, and thoughtful--but ultimately uncompromising about its vital truth” (p. 11). Note well that he is explaining how he came to be convinced, not how you can convince others. And, note also that he came to this through “reason and experience.” I think that it would have been far better if he had said that he had come to this through “the reason of experience” because that is truly what this book discloses. Ultimately Hitchens does share with his reader that the book will not be like other apologetic or philosophical books on the issue of God's existence. Curiously, however, he does not give this information until the very last page. He says,
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