Originally Posted by kerry

Lance and I hooked up at Hedge's presentation tonight. I thought Hedges was very good. He adds a dimension to the debate about religion that is missing. He is quite strongly opposed to the Hitchens/Dawkins/Harris contingent, mainly focusing on their misplaced worship of science and inability to see the problems inherent within their own culture particularly in the use of US power abroad. In my view, Hedges did a better job of defending religion than Alister McGrath did in his debate with Hitchens that was linked here a few months ago.
My wife bought his book so once I read it, I might be able to articulate some disagreements I have with Hedges. He was raised in a liberal Christian home and attended Harvard Divinity School himself. He knows US christian fundamentalism inside and out. But he sees the masses of fundamentalists as victims of a few hypocritical manipulative demagogues like Roberstson and Dobson who control the hopeless. I think he doesn't appreciate the extent to which fundamentalist religion can gain a foothold in the human brain getting power as an independent cultural variable that can't be accounted for strictly in terms of social alienation. On this point, I think Hitchens is more insightful.

He's debated Hitchens. I'm going to start googling and see if I can find a link.

Here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=re3d0hiM4EQ

Looks like the whole debate is no longer available on YouTube because of some copyright issues with the radio station that sponsored it.

I think I found a link to an audio version of the complete debate. I'm downloading it at the moment so I'm not certain it will work, but I think so.

http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:TpdESFwYi3oJ:richarddawkins.net/forum/viewtopic.php%3Ff%3D1%26t%3D34298+hedges+hitchens+debate&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=17&gl=us&client=firefox-a

Originally Posted by MS Fowler

"Liberal Chrisitan" ia an oxymoron, much in the same way as " Self Righteous Christian" might be an oxy moron.
While understanding the role of the Holy Spirit to teach, I would not depreciate education. Having said that, Harvard Divinity school would not be my choice for a sound theological education. ( Says the not-so-humbe graduate of Covenant Theol. Seminary in St. Louis, MO).

Originally Posted by MS Fowler

"Liberal Chrisitan" ia an oxymoron, much in the same way as " Self Righteous Christian" might be an oxy moron.
While understanding the role of the Holy Spirit to teach, I would not depreciate education. Having said that, Harvard Divinity school would not be my choice for a sound theological education. ( Says the not-so-humbe graduate of Covenant Theol. Seminary in St. Louis, MO).