Fr. Barron on Hitchens

Fr. Barron's commentary on Christopher Hitchens and who God is:



My two cents on two things:

1. God is not a what, God is a who. God isn't a category, but a person, in the deepest sense of the word.

2. What came to my mind while reading one of Fr. Barron's commenters, who objected Father's characterization of CH's notion of God  as"sky fairy." The commenter emphasizes CH's seriousness in his conclusion that religion lead people to do stupid, dishonest, cruel things. I have no doubt religion was often the motivation for these things, but do people really think religion is the ultimate cause for these actions? Do they honestly, intelligently, believe that minus religion, human beings can be innocent of cruelty, jealousy, violence, and such? What inevitably follows that type of thinking is, and has been, massive social programs and revolutions intended for reconstructing human behavior. Without exception each of these experiments has led to coercion, mind control, oppression, betrayal, injustice, finally inhumanity and cruelty. To its credit, religion has employed similar measures, when the desire to reconstruct becomes fanatical, coercive measures are only natural.