god is not Great

The Vatican has its latest scandal to answer for, again involving homosexuality that will be categorically denied as usual. My latest read has been Christopher Hitchen's god is not Great, which ties in nicely with this story as it often reflects on the historical debauchery of the Catholic headquarters, whilst it simultaneously criticises its continued refusal to refute the lecherous acts of others. The Danish cartoon crisis last year, for example, is an instance where the Vatican perpetuated inter-religious conflict by calling for greater understanding of one another's sensitivities, rather than condemning the threats made by the Islamic everyman who called for the heads of those cartoonists, and carried out threats of arson and vandalism to Christian places of worship. A similar situation arose with the knighthood of Salman Rushdie as you well recall. These instances are discussed at length by Hitchens in a book full of opinion and subjective analysis. Hitchens is a journalist, so, naturally, his way with words proves highly persuasive, and the book is written with a more 'matter-of-fact' stance than The God Delusion perhaps, which grapples with the contradicting philosophies and logic of biology versus scripture. Hitchens is highly trained with the teachings of all modern religious texts and has experienced first hand the cultures of each. His constant attacks on immoral traditions, such as the "circumcision" of females at a very early age, or the paternal rights of a father to pull his son's mutilated foreskin away with his mouth, are designed to make the reader feel uncomfortable, yet his statement is clear: "religion poisons everything" - his brilliantly potent subtitle which is sadly lost in translation for the British publication. It is another persuasive book about the case against religion, taking lead from Dawkins' success. Whereas Dawkins ascribes merely one chapter to the damage religion has done to our international wellbeing, Hitchens dedicates an entire book.